Is Questioning the Canon Heresy?

Questioning the Bible is not merely non-heretical; it is essential, from cover to cover and all the way down to the tiniest detail.

The Bible as we know it today is not the Bible as it was written. That set of books was written in several classical and pre-classical languages, and was translated multiple times to reach its expression in modern English -- and that's probably the least of what's been done to it.

For very long periods -- centuries -- the Bible was effectively the private property of the Catholic Church. That is, persons not in Holy Orders were not permitted access to it. During that period, it is quite possible that large segments of the Bible, particularly the books of the New Testament, were altered to conform to what the Church wanted to teach.

It is in the nature of such a historical question that it can never be settled to anyone's satisfaction. You believe, or you don't, according to the dictates of your own mind and heart -- and the whole weight of the consequences for the decision falls on you.

But that's why God gave us minds and senses, isn't it?

"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it -- no matter if I have said it! -- except it agree with your own reason and your own common sense." -- Gautama Bodhisattva, also known as the Buddha.

I would think no, due to the fact that different denominations of Christanity use different books in the Bible, the main divide in book selection is Catholic-Protestant. That would fall under disagreement of what books should be in it.
But then again all the Protestants could be heritics.

Michael,
It is not heresy to ask legitimate questions and do legitimate research. When one begins to make point blank statements like, "This book does not belong in the canon..." heresy is not far behind. I must wonder which books that you think are not necessary.
The entire issue of trusting the canon is just that, a trust issue. We can drive ourselves crazy with this stuff or...we can trust God that He has divinely inspired, compiled and preserved His Word.
Many Christians refuse to trust God on this issue and therefore set themselves up to be selective in their obedience.
Craig

Of course, the question complicates itself if you consider the canon as accepted by the Roman Catholic church, which includes several books (the Apocrypha) not considered canonical in the Bible used by most Protestant denominations.

It appears to me that the tenets of both branches and various denminations stand pretty well without the Apocrypha although both branches also rely to greater or lesser degrees on traditions and doctrines with questionable support in the Scriptures.

What books are YOU talking about?

I don't think that simply questioning if a certain selection ought to be included is actual heresy. All of us have most likely wondered at some point why some books were included, like those endless lineage passes (Bob begot Sam, etc).

Now, lobbying for the removal or advocating the exclusion of parts of the Bible is heresy, as well as claiming that one knows better than the Bible. But simply analyzing the contents is no high crime.

FWP: You're right, as far as you go, but participating in a church requires a good amount of uniformity of belief. Not that participating in a particular church is more important than a rightunderstanding of God.

CH and mc: I didn't say that I think certain books are unnecessary.

DD: The lineages were included for the Jews, who placed a great deal of importance on such things.

Plus, isn't questioning the inclusion of a book pretty much the same as "advocating the exclusion" of it? It's not claiming that one knows better than the Bible, it's arguing that some book shouldn't be in the Bible at all.

Although I agree with what I consider the original purposes for the Book of Revelation, if I were voting on the Book back then and could see the distorted and twisted ways the Church would end up using it, I'd have voted against making it canon.

JT: Shouldn't the test be simply, "Did God inspire this book?" How it's used is irrelevant to that decision.

Just as whether or not we engage in works tests the sincerity of our claimed faith, it seems proper to consider the future misuse of Scripture as one factor in deciding whether that Scripture is truly inspired.

When we decided whether God's call to ordination is genuine, we assess how that person is likely to function in the ordained office as a partial test of whether the call is genuine.

Thus, the consideration of "this Book is going to cause a lot of division in the church, lead to false hucksters on TV, numerous false allegation of being the anti-Christ" is legitimate in considering whether God really inspired the writer. For me, the Book of Revelation is more akin to the "Lord of the Rings" -- fine religious writing for Christian inspiration and resolve but maybe not inspired by God as an authoritative writing.

JT: I think I see what you're saying. You mean that a if the content of the book is such that it would be likely to cause division (how the heck could that be forseen?) then it probably isn't inspired, because God wouldn't want to cause division. Right?

I don't buy it. Jesus explicitly said that his teachings would cause division. Plus, I don't see how a churhc leader 2k years ago could forsee televangelists.

Short answer is it's never wrong to ask questions.

I ended up writing a long post in response to some of these comments.

Ron: Good post. I do think, however, that some questions are heretical, simply by definition.

Jesus expected that there would be division between believers and non-believers because of his teachings. Within the church, unity was the goal. Revelation has caused serious divisions within the church.

Right now, Christians are so divided up in this country they we are verging on being impotent.

JT: Ah, but is everyone who claims to be a Christian a Christian? I think it's most likely that most of the divisions are between actual Christians and mere posers.

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