The Highway Forums General Discussion Open Forum What books are canon & when was canon complete?

Here, if anywhere, those arguing against Luther's biblical orthodoxy have a point. Though it is unfair to call him a subjectivist on the canonical question, there is no doubt that he developed a personal criterion of canonicity that took its place alongside of apostolicity and perhaps even swallowed it up. He unabashedly states this new criterion in his Preface to James: "All the genuine sacred books agree in this, that all of them preach and inculcate Christ. And that is the true test by which to judge all books, when we see whether or not they inculcate Christ.56 For all the Scriptures show us Christ (Rom. 3:21), and St. Paul will know nothing but Christ (I Cor. 2:2). Whatever does not teach Christ is not apostolic, even though St. Peter or St. Paul does the teaching. Again, whatever preaches Christ would be apostolic, even if Judas, Annas, Pilate, and Herod were doing it."

The dangers in such an approach to canonicity are legion, and they were fully recognized by Luther's own contemporaries - not only by his theological opponents but also by his colleagues and supporters. Thus, as early as 1520, Luther's Wittenberg University co-reformer Bodenstein von Carlstadt - hardly a traditionalist (his radically negative attitude to ecclesiastical adiaphora eventually caused his rupture with Luther) condemned Luther's rejection of James and argued that one must appeal either to known apostolic authorship or to universal historical acceptance (omnium consensus) as the test of a book's canonicity, not to internal doctrinal considerations.57 " In spite of certain deficiencies in Carlstadt's treatment, a 19th century student of the subject was certainly right in noting that unlike Luther on the Canon, "Dr. Bodenstein's reforming approach was based on history and not on feelings, on critical evaluation and not on piety." 58 As is well known, the church that carries Luther's name has never adopted his canonical judgments.

Though it is understandable that, passionate reforming spirit that he was, Luther would reintroduce the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith everywhere, it is unfortunate that he misused it as a canonical criterion. One must first establish the Canon and then set forth all that the canonical books teach: canonicity before doctrine. If one reverses the procedure, personal doctrinal emphasis, however commendatory, may turn into weapons by which genuine Scripture is rejected or down-played unnecessarily. Had Luther begun with a purely historical view of the Canon, he would have been forced to discover the entire compatibility between James and Paul; his misleading criterion of canonicity opened the floodgates to subjectivity - in spite of his best intentions - and short-circuited the kind of exegesis of James that would have revealed its harmony with Pauline teaching and its vital complementary place in the corpus of New Testament doctrine.