The Closed Canon of the Old Testament

1 New Testament Canon The authority of the Holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed, and obeyed, depends not upon the testimony of any man, or Church; but wholly upon God (who is truth itself) the author thereof: and therefore it is to be received, because it is the Word of God. (Westminster Confession of Faith, 1.5) The phrase authority of scripture, can make Christian sense only if it is a shorthand for the authority of the triune God, exercised somehow through scripture Authority, particularly when we locate it within the notion of God s Kingdom is the sovereign rule of God sweeping through creation to judge and to heal. It is the powerful love of God in Jesus Christ, putting sin to death and launching new creation. It is the fresh, bracing and energizing wind of the Spirit. (N.T. Wright, The Last Word, 2005) But why are baffling passages left in at all? Oh, because God speaks not only for us little ones but for the great sages and mystics who experience what we can only read about, and to whom all the words have therefore different (richer) contents. Would not a revelation which contained nothing that you and I did not understand, be for that very reason rather suspect? To a child it would seem a contradiction to say both that his parents made him and God made him, yet we see how both can be true. (C. S. Lewis, Letters) Introduction The first Christians possessed no fixed or closed New Testament canon; they relied on the Hebrew Scriptures and on the gospel that was being preached by the apostles. Canon means measuring reed, rule, standard, norm. In ecclesiastical usages in the first three centuries, it referred to the normative doctrinal and ethical content of Christian faith (i.e. the canon of truth or rule of faith ). By the fourth century, it came to refer to the list of books that constitute the OT and NT. What was the process of NT canon formation? Why a new covenant with new revelations? When did those revelations cease? When did those revelations become codified into a canon, not least a closed canon? If you don't have a canon, is it possible to develop a theology? The Closed Canon of the Old Testament The critical consensus of the last two hundred years argued that the OT came to be canonically recognized in three separate steps, corresponding to the three divisions of the Hebrew canon: the Law (Torah or Pentateuch) achieved canonical status toward the end of the fifth century B.C.; the Prophets achieved canonical status around 200 B.C.; and the Writings achieved canonical status sometime before or during the first century A.D., certainly by the time of the Council of Jamnia (A.D. 90). The OT has Jesus stamp of approval in that he quotes every book but Esther. Also, there is ample evidence that the NT writers cited as Scripture most of the books that constitute the OT. First, the quotation patterns of the NT largely line up with predominant Jewish evidence for the shape of the canon. NT writers quote every book in the Law, and from many of the other canonical books, from both the Prophets (Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Minor Prophets) and the Writings (Psalms, Job, Proverbs, Daniel, Chronicles). Even some OT books not certainly quoted in the NT may be alluded to. 1

2 Second, when literature outside the corpus of what is now recognized to be the OT canon is cited, it is not referred to as Scripture (graphe) or assigned to the Holy Spirit or to God as the ultimate author. Third, there is no hint that the NT writers want to jettison any of the canonical OT as being incompatible with their developing Christian faith. Paul goes so far as to insist that the reason why OT was written was for the instruction and encouragement of Christians (Romans 15:3-6; 1 Corinthians 10:11; 2 Timothy 3:14-17; 1 Peter 1:10-12; Hebrews 11:39-40). Fourth, many NT passages, although cast as refutation or correction of traditional Jewish theology, nevertheless appeal to what both sides have in common, namely, agreed upon Scriptures. Fifth, it is probably, though not certain, that Jesus reference to all the blood from that of Abel to that of Zechariah son of Berekiah (Matthew 23:35) runs from the first man to be killed to the last one in the Hebrew canon to be killed. There is adequate evidence to support the view that there was a closed canon of OT Scripture to serve as a model in the formation of the NT canon. In A.D. 90, the Council of Jamnia neither assigned canonical status to any book not previously recognized, nor rejected any book previously accepted. The Authority and Use of the New Testament Writings Discussions of canon raise the classic chicken and egg problem. Which comes first, a book s canonical status or its functional authority? It is best to argue for the latter over the former. There was an authoritative message from the beginning. Jesus styled himself after prophets like Moses and Isaiah, thus in his preaching he set himself up as an authority on par with, and in some sense fulfilling, OT Scriptures (c.f. Matthew 5:17-48). The good news of Jesus was passed on by the apostles, and the early church devoted themselves to the apostles teaching (Luke 2:42). Paul writes of Jews reading the Scriptures of the old covenant (2 Corinthians 3:14); thus, by implication the new covenant had dawned, and new covenant Scriptures were not far away. The Epistle to the Hebrews begins by contrasting the former period of revelation with what has taken place in these last days in which God has revealed himself in his Son (Hebrews 1:1-3). The locus and source of all authoritative new covenant revelation rests, finally, in the Son. The apostles were viewed as those who mediated such revelation to the rest of the Church. Precisely because that revelation was tied to the historical Jesus, an implicit closure of revelation was built into that claim. There could not be an unending stream of revelations about Jesus if those revelations were detached from the Jesus of history whom the eyewitnesses knew and confessed. The apostle s witness was conveyed by word of mouth and by writing. Paul s letters to the churches were practical, authoritative interpretations and applications of Christ s teachings. There was no urgent need initially for written stories because of authoritative eyewitness accounts. But as the apostles began to pass from the scene, the need for authoritative writings became acute. The gospels were born of a real practical need for authoritative written accounts of the life of Jesus. The church in Rome asked Mark to write about Jesus based on his travels with Peter. Even before this there were some unofficial collections of the sayings of Jesus that were circulating. Luke recorded Christ s life and the ministry of the apostles based on his travels with Paul. The Jewish Christian communities had the Gospel of Matthew. Toward the end of the first century we get the Gospel of John from Ephesus. The fourfold character of the Gospel accounts had become axiomatic for the church by the end of the first century. There were other gospel accounts circulating, but they were not seen as apostolically authoritative and lacked organic acceptance of content. Once the 2

3 Gospel of John appeared in Ephesus, it moved the Church to begin circulating the gospels as a collection. Tatian was the first to harmonize the four Gospels in Diatessaron (c. A.D. 170, meaning through four ), an attempt to weave the content of the gospels into one continuous narrative. At the end of the first century there was a move to collect the Pauline corpus. Some speculate that the Acts of the Apostles stimulated this move or that Luke collected the writings in defense of Paul at his trial. Regardless, churches were writing one another and requesting copies of Paul s letters. Clement of Rome, in A.D. 95, was in possession of Romans and one of Paul s Corinthian letters. The earliest collection contained ten letters, but the Pastoral epistles (1-2 Timothy, Titus) were later added for a total of thirteen. Now there were two collections: a Gospel canon and a Pauline canon, referred to in categories of Gospel and Apostle. The Acts of the Apostles was not considered part of the Gospels or of Paul, but it served the important function of relating the one (Gospels Jesus) to the other (Apostle Paul), providing the historical context by which Paul s apostolic authority could be understood. It serves as a bridge that unites the two collections. The process of circulating such materials was doubtless aided by the wide use that Christians made of the codex form of books. Until that time, valuable writings were normally published in scrolls; the adoption of the codex (more or less like modern books, with individual leaves sewn or glued together) not only made the books more user-friendly but made it easier to publish several different books together in one volume. The Pauline epistles were in wide circulation by the end of the first century; the four Gospels were being circulated together by beginning or middle of the second century; all of them were recognized as authoritative and edifying in large swaths of the Church. So long as these documents remained scattered in various places, one cannot properly speak of a NT canon. There was extraordinary authority, and implicit closure, from the very beginning. If we pursue the question, When and how were the various NT books read as authoritative witnesses of the gospel of Jesus? instead of the question When and how was the canon closed? we are forced back, not to the closed lists prepared by the Fathers, but to the use of the NT books in the early Fathers. Then we discover that even most of the disputed books are widely cited. Hebrews, for example, is quoted extensively in 1 Clement (c. A.D. 90-110); James is attested in 1 Clement and Hermas (mid-second century). Indeed, even within the NT, an OT passage and a Gospel quotation lie adjacent to each other and are introduced by the Scripture says (1 Timothy 5:18). In 2 Peter 3:16 the epistles of Paul are recognized as Scriptures (c.f. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand!). Though Justin Martyr and others referred to Scriptural authority before him, Irenaeus (115-202) was the first Father to cite and allude to a New Testament in the mid-second century even more than OT texts. However, he does not refer to any canon or list of authoritative texts; he is much more concerned with the canon of truth or rule of faith. Around this time fixed lists of New Testament writings were beginning to appear. The Formation of a Closed Canon of the New Testament Given enough time the churches probably would have drawn up their own list of authoritative, canonical books comprising the NT, but various events and destructive heresies forced the church to move quicker. 1. Marcion s list (c. A.D. 140) 3

4 The first closed list to come down to us is Marcion s list. Heavily influenced by Syrian dualism, he believed that the God of the OT was a God of judgment and the God of the NT was a God of love. Thus, because Marcion believed the God of the OT loved the Jews exclusively, he rejected the entire OT and also those NT books he thought favored Jewish tradition. He accepted only one Gospel (a highly edited version of Luke), plus his edition of ten letters of Paul (excluding the Pastoral Epistles). Although Marcion s list is the first, the idea of an NT or a Christian Bible is not his brainchild. Rather, Marcion was revising an already existing list of books (implicit and assumed, or explicit and codified?) that were recognized and used as authoritative Scriptures as indeed Paul s letters and the four Gospels were already circulating in collected form. However, this certainly spurred the Church to publish more comprehensive and less idiosyncratic lists. Most importantly, Marcion presented the orthodox churches with a canon which rejected the majority of Scripture the church was already using. Thus, the church was forced to ask, What is the NT? Does the NT make sense without the OT? 2. Muratorian list (c. A.D. 190) By the end of the second century, the Muratorian list reflects the view of the Church in recognizing a NT canon that is 85-90% of what we consider to be canon today. The list is fragmentary, so that Matthew and Mark do not appear, but doubtless they are presupposed, since Luke is referred to as the third Gospel, and John as the fourth. Luke is also recognized to be the author of the acts of all the apostles. Thirteen letters are recognized as authentically Pauline. Two Johannine Epistles and Jude are accepted. The apocalypses ascribed to John and to Peter are both accepted, but the list admits that there was some opposition to the public reading of the latter work. The Shepherd of Hermas is accepted for private but not for public reading, on the grounds of its being such a recent composition. Gnostic, Marcionite, and Montantist writings are all rejected. Books in the our NT that are not mentioned in the Muratorian list: 1 and 2 Peter, James, Hebrews. Books in the Muratorian list but not in our NT: Wisdom of Solomon, Apocalypse of Peter, and two letters forged in the name of Paul to Laodecia and Alexandria against the heresy of Marcion. 3. Irenaeus s list (c. A.D. 200) Similar to Muratorian list: Gospels, Acts, Paul s letters minus Philemon, 1 Peter, 1 John, and Revelation. He also refers to Shepherd of Hermas as Scripture but makes a distinction from other books. 4. Origen s list (c. A.D. 230) Similar to Muratorian list and Irenaeus, but adds: Hebrews, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, James, and Jude. Also adds: Epistle of Barnabas, Didache, Shepherd of Hermas, and Gospel according to Hebrews. There is still a margin of doubt about a few. 5. Eusebius of Caesarea s list (c. 315-325) In the fourth century, increasing numbers of canon lists testify to a conscious desire on the part of the leaders of the early church to form and close a New Testament canon. The most important list for a New Testament canon is Eusebius of Caesarea s list (c. 315-325), whose views were largely indebted to the Alexandrian fathers Clement and Origen. Eusebius distinguished four classes of writings (the first three are sacred): Recognized Books Universally agreed upon by the Church; 22 of 27 books: Gospels, Acts, Paul s epistles, Hebrews, 1 Peter, 1 John, Revelation. 4

5 Disputed Books Mostly agreed upon with some debate: James, Jude, 2-3 John, 2 Peter, Hebrews, Revelation. Some question of doubt about Hebrews because of authorship and Revelation because of millenarianism. Widespread recognition of the former took longer in the West, and widespread recognition of the latter took longer in the East. Spurious Books Some thought they were canonical, but most were doubtful even though they were pious and useful books read in the Church: Epistle of Barnabas, Epistle of Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, Shepherd of Hermas, Didache, Apocalypse of Peter among others. Heretical Books The ideas and implications of their contents are so irreconcilable with true orthodoxy that they stand revealed as the forgeries of heretics They must be thrown out as impious and beyond the pale. Gospel of Thomas, Gospel of Peter, Acts of Andrew, Acts of John, and the like. Eusebius wrote in The History of the Church, In the course of my narrative I shall take care to indicate in each period which of the Church writers of the time used the various disputed books; their comments on the canonical and recognized Scriptures; and their remarks about the other sort We must, of course, put first the holy quartet of the gospels, followed by the Acts of the Apostles. The next place in the list goes to Paul s epistles, and after them we must recognize the epistle called 1 John; likewise 1 Peter. To these may be added, if it is thought proper, the Revelation of John These are classed as Recognized Books. Those that are disputed, yet familiar to most, include the epistles known as James, Jude, and 2 Peter, and those called 2 and 3 John, the work either of the evangelist or of someone else with the same name. Among Spurious Books must be placed the Acts of Paul, the Shepherd, and the Revelation of Peter; also the alleged Epistle of Barnabas, and the Teachings of the Apostles [i.e. Didache], together with the Revelation of John, if this seems to be the right place for it: as I said before, some reject it, others include it among the Recognized Books. Moreover, some have found a place in the list for the Gospel of Hebrews, a book which has a special appeal for those Hebrews who have accepted Christ. These would all be classed with the Disputed Books, but I have been obliged to list the latter separately, distinguishing those writings which according to the tradition of the Church are true, genuine, and recognized, from those in a different category, not canonical but disputed, yet familiar to most churchmen; for we must not confuse these with the writings published by heretics under the name of the apostles, as containing either Gospels of Peter, Thomas, Matthias, and several others besides these, or Acts of Andrew, John, and other apostles. To none of these has any churchman of any generation ever seen fit to refer in his writings. Again, nothing could be farther from apostolic usage than the type of phraseology employed, while the ideas and implications of their contents are so irreconcilable with true orthodoxy that they stand revealed as the forgeries of heretics. It follows that so far from being classed even among Spurious Books, they must be thrown out as impious and beyond the pale. Eusebius listing relies heavily on the traditional usage among the churches and is not to be understood as a closed canon. 6. Cheltenham list (c. A.D. 360) Thought to represent North African views, includes all the NT books except Hebrews, James, and Jude. 7. Council of Laodicea s list (c. 363) 5

6 Includes all twenty-seven books except Revelation. 8. Athanasius list (A.D. 367) The first time the term canon is used to refer to a closed collection of writings, and the first time the familiar list of all and only twenty-seven New Testament books is given is in Athanasius list from his Easter Letter of A.D. 367. Athanasius was the bishop of Alexandria, and he wrote 45 festal letters over the course of his tenure, traditionally to inform the church of the date of Easter each year. The most famous of these, Letter 39, explicitly names those books which are included in the canon and those which are not; this list was prescriptive for the Alexandrian Church. Certain books, such as The Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, Judith, and Tobit, and the Didache and Shepherd, are useful for instruction in godliness, but the canonical books alone are fountains of salvation. Athanasius wrote in Easter Letter 39, I fear lest some few of the simple should be beguiled from their simplicity and purity, by the subtlety of certain men, and should henceforth read other books those called apocryphal led astray by the similarity of their names with the true books Forasmuch as some have taken in hand, to reduce into order for themselves the books termed apocryphal, and to mix them up with the divinely inspired Scripture it seems good to me also to set before you the books included in the Canon, and handed down, and accredited as Divine. No ecumenical council officially codified the limits of the canon, though local synods, such as the Council of Hippo (A.D. 393) and Carthage (A.D. 397) in North Africa, confirmed the practice of churches under their jurisdiction who upheld the same canon as that endorsed by Athanasius. Councils and synods tended to confirm and consolidate church practice rather than dictate decisions or exert authority. Thus, they ratified what had already been in practice in the church for several centuries. It was not the case that a group of elderly whitehaired men sat around a table and bargained about which books should be included and which should be excluded. There was no specific church council that said, We need an official list of writings. The Scriptures have an inherent authority and self-authenticating quality which Christians have recognized from the beginning. The books did not acquire their authority because they were included in the canon; the inherent authority of the books was recognized by the church. The bottom line is that God creates the canon, and the Church recognizes and accepts it. N. B. There are authoritative apostolic letters we do not possess in our NT (i.e. Corinthian correspondence), but the twenty-seven books are seemingly the ones God intended for the Church. Criteria for the New Testament Canon [T]o speak of the criteria of canonicity is not to speak of an explicit list to which the early church referred, through which each and every document was sifted and subsequently placed in the canon as a result of satisfying each criterion The criteria are a retrospective scheme by which we attempt to understand why certain Christian documents came to be valued above other Christian documents. Scholars have devised this scheme through an examination of the church fathers writings and their use of these numerous documents. (Craig D. Allert, A High View of Scripture?: The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon) Whatever the pressures that encouraged the Church to issue canonical lists including persecution, distance from the climactic events of Jesus death and resurrection, the pressure of Montanism, the rise of Gnosticism, and other movements with scriptures to be rejected the criteria used by the church in discussions as to what books were canonical were primarily three: apostolicity, orthodoxy, and catholicity. 6

7 1. Apostolicity Apostolicity could indicate 1) authorship, Was the book written by an apostle (i.e. eyewitnesses to the resurrection) or those who were in immediate contact with the apostles (i.e. Mark s Gospel was tied to Peter; Luke s Gospel was tied to Paul)? 2) derivation from the general time of the apostles; 3) agreement with apostolic teaching. 2. Orthodoxy Orthodoxy is congruity of the content of the book with the rule of faith or teaching of the church. Was there conformity between the document and Christian truth recognized as normative in the churches? Taking Eusebius distinctions as an example, were the Disputed Books (i.e. Hebrews or Revelation) externally coherent with the teaching of the Church and internally coherent with other Recognized Books (i.e. John and Romans)? It is difficult not to detect the roots of distinctions between true and false, orthodox and heterodox, in NT passages such as Galatians 1:8-9, Colossians 2:8ff, 1 Timothy 6:3ff, and 1-2 John. 3. Catholicity Catholicity is widespread and continuous acceptance and use by the churches. Did the book provide a practical, edifying communal influence on the early church? Canon formation followed the life and liturgy of the catholic church. For a document to be used in a church, it had to be accepted and valued as Scripture by a local church. Through gradual and more widespread recognition, that same document gained an even higher stature in the church catholic. In other words, this criterion capitalized on the standing practices of the churches. (Craig D. Allert, A High View of Scripture?: The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon) Augustine of Hippo (354-430), argued in On Christian Doctrine that the Scriptures accepted by the churches of the major sees (Rome, Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem, Constantinople) carried greater weight. Jerome accepted both Hebrews and Revelation though the Western Latin churches were slow to accept Hebrews and the Eastern Greek churches were slow to accept Revelation. He recognized both in part because a great preponderance of ancient writers of the catholic church had accepted one or the other or both as apostolic and orthodox. N. B. Inspiration, in the sense that we think of it (i.e. God-breathed ) was not at issue for the fathers. The early church did not view canonical NT documents as the only inspired texts; in fact, inspiration functioned in the teachings of bishops, the prayer of monks, the actions of martyrs and of councils. Scripture and Tradition No matter how one looks at the history, it is difficult to maintain that the church had a closed New Testament canon for the first four hundred years of its existence. This means that an appeal to the Bible as the early church s sole rule for faith and life is anachronistic The Bible must be viewed as a product of the community because traditions of the community provide the context in which Scripture was produced. (Craig D. Allert, A High View of Scripture?: The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon) Questions about the NT canon are unavoidably questions about the Church and tradition. The Fathers would not have thought of an appeal to Scripture as settling a question of doctrine because heretics did the same. Thus, a settled canon of Scripture could not on its own establish and preserve right doctrine. The church confessed a rule of faith. 7

8 For Irenaeus, the canon of truth or rule of faith was not a fixed universal formula or creed, but an elastic summary of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. Though fluid, such a rule generally contained those beliefs deemed necessary for salvation and could be employed in different teaching and polemical contexts. In Against Heresies, Irenaeus wrote, The Church, though dispersed throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: [The Church believes] in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them, and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His [future] manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father to gather all things in one and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race As I have already observed, the Church having received this preaching and this faith, although scattered throughout the whole world, yet, as if occupying one house, carefully preserves it. In deciding disputes, appeal was made not directly to Scripture, but to the most ancient Churches through which doctrine has been safeguarded and handed down. Scripture was never regarded as unimportant, but was seen as sharing a common origin with the rule of faith in the earliest preaching and teaching of the apostles. In general, the fathers emphasize correct interpretation of biblical texts rather than correct selection of texts. Vincent of Lerins (c. 445) wrote, Therefore I have devoted considerable study and much attention to enquiring, from men of outstanding holiness and doctrinal correctness, in what way it might be possible for me to establish a kind of fixed and, as it were, general and guiding principle for distinguishing the truth of the catholic faith from the depraved falsehood of the heretics. And the answer I receive from all can be put like this: if I or anyone else wish to detect the deceits of the heretics or avoid their traps, and to remain healthy and intact in a sound faith, we ought, with the help of the Lord, to strengthen our faith in two ways; first, by the authority of the divine law, and then by the tradition of the catholic church. But here someone will ask, Since the canon of Scripture is complete, and sufficient of itself for everything, and more than sufficient, what need is there to join with it the authority of the Church s interpretation? For this reason because, owing to the depth of Holy Scripture, all do not accept it in one and the same sense, but one understands its words in one way, another in another; so that it seems to be capable of as many interpretations as there are interpreters Therefore, it is necessary, on account of so great intricacies of such various error, that the rule for the right understanding of the prophets and apostles should be framed in accordance with the standard of Ecclesiastical and Catholic interpretation. Now in the catholic church itself the greatest care is taken than we hold that which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all people. This is what is truly and properly catholic. Contemporary Approaches to the New Testament Canon Three contemporary approaches to the significance of the NT canon should be noted. 1. There is no qualitative difference between NT books and other early Christian literature. Whatever sources shed light on the early Christian movement should be treated the same way (i.e. James and 1 Clement). This view is plausible only if one rejects the notion of authoritative Scripture. 2. There is a canon within the canon. Some parts of the NT are more weighty or relevant than other parts. For example, the Pauline epistles are of greater significance than the Gospels. Some think of the canon as a spiral, with the outermost elements (James, 2 Peter) 8

9 gradually giving way to the inner core, the very heart of genuine Christianity (John, Romans). 3. The Church formed or established the canon, conferring authority upon it. What is the relationship between the authority of a text and the authority of the ecclesiastical body that recognizes its canonical status? Protestants tend to locate the deposit of the faith in Scripture; Roman Catholics tend to locate the deposit of the faith in the church, Scriptures being one component of that deposit. Because the canon is made up of books whose authority ultimately springs from God s gracious self-revelation, it is better to speak of recognizing rather than establishing the canon of books that command the church s allegiance and obedience. Bibliography Allert, Craig. A High View of Scripture? The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon, Baker Academic, 2007. Baukham, Richard. Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, Eerdmans, 2008. Bettenson, Henry Documents of the Christian Church (3 rd Ed.), Oxford Press, 1999. Bruce, F. F. The Canon of Scripture, InterVarsity Press, 1988. Bruce, F. F. The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable?, Eerdmans, 2003. Carson, D. A.; Moo, Douglas; Morris, Leon. An Introduction to the New Testament, Zondervan, 1992. Metzger, Bruce. The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance, Oxford University Press, 1997. Metzger, Bruce. The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, Oxford University Press, 2005. Pelikan, Jaraslov. The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition, Chicago University Press, 1975. Witherington, Ben. What Have They Done With Jesus?: Beyond Strange Theories and Bad History Why We Can Trust the Bible, HarperOne, 2007. Wright, N.T. Judas and the Gospel of Jesus: Have We Missed the Truth About Christianity? Baker Books, 2006. 9