The Canon of Scripture by Frederick Fyvie Bruce

Author:Frederick Fyvie Bruce [Bruce, Frederick Fyvie]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Non-Fiction, Bible, Reference, Study, General, Religion, Biblical Studies, Ethics, Fiction, History
ISBN: 9780830812585
Google: p144CApRhgcC
Amazon: 083081258X
Goodreads: 842085
Publisher: IVP Academic
Published: 1988-10-30T00:00:00+00:00

HIPPOLYTUS

Hippolytus of Rome (c 170–235), the last significant figure in the Roman church to write in Greek, was the greatest scholar of his age in the west (though neither in scholarly depth nor in intellectual power could he match his younger contemporary Origen in the east).50 He was for a short time bishop of a dissident group in the Roman church (the first antipope, one might say), but died in communion with the bishop of Rome in Sardinia, to which both of them were exiled; he has been venerated as a saint and martyr. His works include a Refutation of all heresies in ten books, a manual of the church order (the Apostolic Tradition), a commentary on Daniel in four books (the earliest orthodox commentary on any biblical book)51 and other exegetical works. An incomplete list of his writings preserved on the back of his statue in Rome (rediscovered in 1551 and now in the Vatican Library) mentions one On the Gospel of John and the Apocalypse, possibly identical with his Chapters against Gaius (referred to by the Syrian writer Ebedjesu, c 1300), of which some Syriac fragments survive; this work evidently defended the apostolic authorship of the Gospel and Apocalypse of John against the anti-Montanist Gaius of Rome and the Alogoi.52 Had the eccentric views of Gaius and the Alogoi been more influential than in fact they were, this work of Hippolytus might have played an important part in the history of the New Testament canon.

As it is, Hippolytus no more than Irenaeus has left us a list of New Testament books. But he evidently placed most of them on the same level of authority as the books of the Old Testament: he refers to ‘all scripture’ as comprising ‘the prophets, the Lord, and the apostles’.53 He knows Hebrews and quotes it, but not as scripture; he also appears to know (if only slightly) James, 2 Peter and Jude. He quotes on occasion some other early Christian works which in the event did not gain canonical status, such as the Shepherd of Hermas, the Didachē and the Letter of Barnabas, but he does not treat them as scripture.

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