Arilavent
The very first church is more accurately described as the Early Church, but, at the same time there was also the Gnosticist church forming out of the Kabbalists and using what is now considered Apocryphal scripture.
Indeed, there were *MANY* different groups and branches of Christians who existed during the first several hundred years of Christianity. I'm a Valentinian. However, I do want to point out that *ALL* Christians of the time used some works which were not later incorporated into the official canon of scripture. Even the Apostles did because over 30-40 quotations in the New Testament quote or referance or refer to information found in the Deuterocanonical Books, and Jude directly quotes 1 Enoch 1:9 as actually coming from Enoch himself and as a Prophetic Writing, and Jude also referances The Assumption of Moses and The Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs, and James referances 1 Enoch, and over 128 places in the New Testament alone allude to 1 Enoch or refer to information found in it. Jesus Christ and the Apostles used Apocryphal Scriptures and didn't restrict themselves to a man-made canon, so why should we?
Also, Paul refers to a missing epistle of Paul to the Ephesians (Eph. 3:3); a missing Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 5:9); and a missing Epistle to the Colossians, written from Laodicea (Col. 4:16). These writings were important enough to quote or refer to in subsequent writings preserved now as scripture. In addition, Matthew 2:23 cites a now fulfilled prophecy from "the prophets" that Christ would be a Nazarene (someone from Nazareth), but this prophecy is not found anywhere in any existing Old Testament canon. Matthew was citing scripture which is missing now. Another example of missing scripture is the text containing the words of Christ that Paul quotes in Acts 20:35: "remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." This saying of Christ appears in none of the Gospels.
And as for the Old Testament, here are a list of 'lost books' mentioned within it:
The book of the covenant, through which Moses instructed Israel (Exodus 24:7).
The book of the wars of the Lord (Numbers 21:14).
The book of Jasher (Joshua 10:13; 2 Samuel 1:1
cool .
The book of the manner of the kingdom (1 Samuel 10:25).
Possible books containing three thousand proverbs, a thousand and five songs, a treatise on natural history by Solomon (1 Kings 4:32,33).
The acts or annals of Solomon (1 Kings 11:41).
The book of Nathan the prophet (1 Chronicles 29:29; 2 Chronicles 9:29).
The book of Gad the Seer (1 Chronicles 29:29).
The prophecy of Ahijah, the Shilonite (2 Chronicles 9:29).
The visions of Iddo the Seer (2 Chronicles 9:29).
The book of Shemaiah the prophet (2 Chronicles 12:15).
The story of the prophet Iddo (2 Chronicles 13:22).
The book of Jehu (2 Chronicles 20:34).
The Acts of Uzziah, by Isaiah, the son of Amoz (2 Chronicles 26:22)
Sayings of the Seers (2 Chronicles 33:19)
***Early Christian Canons***
The Codex Sinaiticus, which is the oldest New Testament collection available, a fourth century manuscript found in a monastery on Mount Sinai, contains two writings which are excluded in the modern New Testament, the Shepherd of Hermas and Barnabas. And yet even in the other books of that Codex, there appears to be a tendency to omit passages, leading to some shorter versions of Bible verses than we have in the King James text (J. M. Ross, "Some Unnoticed Points in the Text of the New Testament," Novum Testamentum Vol. 25, 1983, pp. 59-60).
In A.D. 200, a Christian in Rome wrote a list of books considered to be canonical. This list is now known as the Muratorian Canon, named after the man who discovered it in Milan. The list does not include Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, or 2 Peter, and includes only two of the letters of John. The canonical works did include the Apocalypse of Peter and the Wisdom of Solomon.
The earliest Christians had no New Testament canon. As the Protestant scholar David F. Payne explains:
"Their Bible, and that of the Jews to this day, consisted of the Old Testament; this was the Canon of Holy Writ accepted by Jesus Himself, and referred to simply as 'the scriptures' throughout the New Testament writings. It was not until A.D. 393 that a church council first listed the 27 New Testament books now universally recognized. There was thus a period of about 350 years during which the New Testament Canon was in process of being formed." (David F. Payne, "The Text and Canon of the New Testament," in The International Bible Commentary, ed. by F.F. Bruce, Zondervan Publ. House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1986, p. 1005.)
Excellent information on the origins of the Bible was summarized by Father A. James Bernstein in "Which Came First: The Church or the New Testament," The Christian Activist, Vol. 9, Fall/Winter 1996, p. 1,4-7. Father Bernstein discusses his discoveries as he explored Biblical origins, many of which surprised him and challenged his old views about scripture. For example, he explains how the canon we accept today differs in some ways from the writings used by early Christians:
"[T]he early Christians used a Greek translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint. This translation . . . contained an expanded canon which included a number of the so-called "deuterocanonical" (or "apocryphal") books. Although there was some initial debate over these books, they were eventually received by Christians into the Old Testament canon.
In reaction to the rise of Christianity, the Jews narrowed their canons and eventually excluded the deuterocanonical books - although they still regarded them as sacred. The modern Jewish canon was not rigidly fixed until the third century A.D. Interestingly, it is this later version of the Jewish canon of the Old Testament, rather than the canon of early Christianity, that is followed by most modern Protestants today.
When the Apostles lived and wrote, there was no New Testament and no finalized Old Testament. . . .
[T]he first complete listing of New Testament books as we have them today did not appear until over 300 years after the death and resurrection of Christ. (The first complete listing was given by St. Athanasius in his Paschal Letter in A.D. 367.) . . . Most [early Christian] churches only had parts of what was to become the New Testament. . . .
During the first four centuries A.D. there was substantial disagreement over which books should be included in the canon of Scripture. The first person on record who tried to establish a New Testament canon was the second-century heretic, Marcion. He wanted the Church to reject its Jewish heritage, and therefore he dispensed with the Old Testament entirely. Marcion's canon included only one gospel, which he himself edited, and ten of Paul's epistles. Sad but true, the first attempted New Testament was heretical."
While Marcion was excluding many books he did not like, many early Christians accepted other New Testament books that most modern churches no longer have or no longer accept. For example, there were many competing "gospels" besides Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Before the Gospel of John had been written, Saint Luke wrote that there were *many* others writing related accounts, saying "Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us . . . it seemeth good to me also . . . to write to you an orderly account." (Luke 1:1,3). There would later be controversy over which of the Gospels to use, including controversy concerning the Gospel of John. The Roman Church resisted John, while the church in Asia Minor embraced John. The Syrian Church did not accept all four Gospels of the modern Bible until the fifth century, and "also ignored for a time the Epistles of John, 2 Peter, and the Book of Revelation" [Bernstein, p. 5]. As Stephen Robinson notes (pp. 52-53),
One of the most important of the Greek new Testament manuscripts, known as D or Codex Claramontanus, contains a canon list for both the Old and New Testaments. The manuscript itself is a product of the sixth century, but most scholars believe the canon list originated in the Alexandrian church in the fourth century. This canon omits Philippians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, and Hebrews, but includes the Epistle of Barnabas, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Acts of Paul (not our Acts), and, like the Muratorian Canon, the Apocalypse of Peter. . . . Before the fifth century the Syrian Christian canon included 3 Corinthians and Tatian's Diatessaron. . . .
The Abyssinian Orthodox church has in its canon the twenty-seven books of the modern New Testament, but adds the Synodos of Qalementos (both attributed to Clement of Rome), the Book of the Covenant (which includes a post-resurrection discourse of the Savior), and the Ethiopic Didascalia. To the Old Testament the Abyssinian canon adds the book of Enoch (cited as prophetic by the canonical book of Jude) and the Ascension of Isaiah.
Eusebius, known as the Father of Church History, was a fourth century bishop of Caesarea who disputed the books of James, Jude, 2 Peter, 2 John and 3 John [Bernstein, p. 5]. He absolutely rejected the book of Revelation. Origen in the third century questioned the authenticity of 2 Peter and 2 John.
Interestingly, when Luther and other Protestants rejected the Septuagint text and its Latin translation in the Vulgate, thus rejecting the Apocrypha, and instead used a smaller collection of Old Testament books from the Masoretic Hebrew text, they diverged from centuries of Christian tradition. As a result, the Roman Catholic Bible now has about twelve books more than the Protestant Bible, meaning that about 200 pages of text have been "subtracted" - one could say - from the Protestant Bible relative to the "traditional" Catholic Bible.
***Missing Scriptural Citations***
The scriptures that the Christians had at the beginning of the second century were different from those that they had at the end of the second century. By the end of the second century, the scriptures of the Christians were very close to those we have at present. Tertullian, writing at the end of the second century, cites every book in the New Testament except Philemon. Irenaeus, also writing at the end of the second century, cites every book in the current New Testament except the tiny books of Philemon, 3 John and Jude. Of course, lrenaeus also cites a few apocryphal books as authoritative.
Christian writers at the beginning of the second century have a different set of scriptures than the Christian writers at the end of the second century. Clement of Rome is generally seen as the earliest of the Christian authors after the New Testament. Clement quotes from many books of the Old Testament (Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, 1 Samuel, I Chronicles, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Malachi), and the New Testament books Matthew, Mark, Luke, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Hebrews, and 1 Peter. But Clement also quotes from the apocryphal books of the Wisdom of Solomon and Judith. Furthermore, Clement quotes from other scriptural passages, passages that are not known from any writings. We will list these in roughly the order they might have been found in our current Bibles if they contained them. For example, Clement quotes Moses as saying: "I am smoke from a vessel," a quotation that is not found in any known biblical or apocryphal work. Clement further cites a passage from Psalms 28:5 "Thou shalt raise me up and I shall acknowledge thee." This reading of the Psalm, however, is not attested in any extant manuscript. Clement also quotes from a passage attributed to Ezekiel but not in our text:
Repent, O house of Israel, from your sins from the earth to heaven, and though they be red like scarlet and black as ashes, and you turn to me with your whole soul and say: I Father, hearken to us as to the holy people.
Clement quotes the following passage as scripture, although its source is currently unknown:
Wretched are the double-minded, who doubt in their soul, who say: This we have heard against our fathers and behold, we have grown old and none of them have happened even to us. O fools, compare yourselves to a tree-take the vine-first it sheds the leaf, then the bud comes, then the leaf, then the blossom, and after that the sour grape, then comes forth the ripened grape.
Finally, Clement cites as scripture "Cleave to the saints, for those who cleave to them shall be sanctified," though this is not found in any body of scripture:
The homily known as 2 Clement also contains variations in quotations of the scriptures. Consider the following passage, which comes from a gospel but is not found in any of the gospels known to us:
Ye shall be as sheep in the midst of wolves. And Peter answering, said to him: What if: the wolves should scatter the sheep? Jesus saith to Peter: The sheep shall not fear the wolves after they kill them; ye also shall not fear those who shall kill you and cannot do anything against you, but ye shall fear him who hath power after your death to cast soul and body into the hell of fire.
The sentiments are generally found in gospels but not as they are here. 2 Clement attributes the following saying to Jesus also:
"If ye are gathered to me in my bosom and do not my commandments, I shall cast you out and shall say to you: Depart from me, workers of iniquity; I know not whence ye are."
Of course, this passage resembles the Sermon on the Mount, but if the passage is from Matthew, it is a different form of Matthew than what we now have.
The epistle of Barnabas purports to be written by Barnabas, normally presumed to be Paul's missionary companion, to his sons and daughters in the Gospel. Most scholars date the epistle to the early second century rather than the first century. The epistle of Barnabas: largely a pastiche of scriptural quotations; he simply strings one scripture after another. Among these quotations is the following attributed to the prophets but not found in the scriptures: "and they shall eat from the goat offered by fasting on behalf of the sinners. . . . And the priests only shall eat the innards, unwashed with vinegar" The epistle also includes the following as part of the law of Moses as part of the scapegoat rite: "And all you shall spit and pierce it, and encircle its head with scarlet wool, and let it be driven into the wilderness" Leviticus, however, does not contain this rite. The epistle of Barnabas also includes the following as part of the words of the prophets, but which we do not find in our scriptures: "The parable of the Lord, who shall understand it except the wise and learned who also loves his lord?" The following, the epistle attributes to the prophets but it is absent from our scriptures: "And when shall these things come to pass? Saith the Lord: When the tree shall bend and arise, and when blood shall flow from the wood" The epistle also included the following attributed to the Lord but not found in the scriptures: "Behold, I make the last as the first."
In all of these instances, Christian authors quote from scriptures that are not in the canon, but even quotations that they make from scriptures that we presently have, the quotations do not match the manuscripts. The standard explanation is that these passages found in writers of the beginning of the second century but not elsewhere "are sometimes loosely and inaccurately cited from memory . . . .Indeed they are so unlike anything to be found in the known books of the Bible that despairing critics are reduced to supposing that Clement has taken them from some lost apocryphal source." But this theory assumes that the text of the Bible was essentially the same for the early second century Christians as it is for us today and that no major corruption of the text has occurred. This assumption, however, is not supported by the evidence of the second century Christian writers.
Justin Martyr, a philosopher who lived in the middle of the second century, leveled the following accusation against the Jews: "from the ninety-fifth (ninety-sixth) Psalm they have taken away this short saying of the words of David: 'From the wood.' For when the passage said, 'Tell ye among the nations, the Lord hath reigned from the wood,' they have left, 'Tell ye among the nations, the Lord hath reigned.'", Justin's antagonist, Trypho downplayed the accusation by saying "Whether [or not] the rulers of the people have erased any portion of the Scriptures, as you affirm, God knows; but it seems incredible."
Clement of Alexandria (ca. 150-215) describes the corruption of the gospel of Mark by Carpocrates:
Now then, Mark during Peter's stay in Rome wrote down the acts of the Lord, nevertheless not telling all, nor even hinting at the sacred ones (tas mystikas), but selecting those which he thought most useful for the growth of the investigators' faith. When Peter was martyred, Mark came to Alexandria; polishing both his own and Peter's notes, from which by transferring into his first book those things appropriate for those progressing in the testimony (gn_sis), he compiled a more spiritual gospel for the use of those being perfected (t_n teleioumen_n). In no way, however, did he betray those things not discussed, nor did he write down the initiatory teaching (hierophantik_n didaskalian)of the Lord. But adding to the previously written acts yet others, he still added certain sayings thereto, the explanation of which would be capable of initiating (mystag_g_sein) their hearers into the holy of holies (adytan) of the truth veiled seven times. Wherefore he prepared it thus-neither corruptly nor unprecautiously-so I deem it. And when he died he left his compilation at the church which is in Alexandria, where it is kept very safe and secure to this day, being read only to those who are initiated into the great mysteries (taus myaumenous ta megala myst_ria).
