The Text and Canon of the New Testament - Tapa blanda

Reseña del editor

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1913 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER VIII THE REFORMATION AND LATER Throughout the Middle Ages the Church held to the Canon as it had become fixed in the early years of the fifth century. It did so because it was the finding of the Church. The history of the Middle Ages is the history of the gradually attained supremacy of the Church of Rome over the whole of the Western Church. As Rome had settled views on the Canon by the beginning of the fifth century, these, as a matter of course, gradually imposed themselves on the entire Church. So great has this influence been, that even the Reformed Churches have simply retained the New Testament Canon of the Roman Catholic Church. The real difference between the Roman and other communions consists in the attitude to the Canon. To the Roman Catholic the Church is the supreme authority, speaking through its Chief Pontiff; Scripture is one fountain of doctrine, side by side with the creeds, the decrees of councils, and the opinions of the Fathers of the Church. Had Scripture played a more important part in the Church of Rome, it is possible that the resulting attitude of the Reformers would have been different. But, as what the Reformers attacked especially was the excessive authority attributed to the Church, they had to find the seat of authority elsewhere, and, as some one has said, 'they substituted for an infallible Church an infallible Book.' There are not wanting signs that in future stress will be laid neither on an infallible Church, nor on an infallible Book, but on an infallible Christ. The changed attitude to Scripture was only part of the great phenomenon known as the Reformation. This is not the place, even if the writer were qualified, to give any account of the Reformation,1 but among the causes which operated...