Course Catalog

REL107E Christian Canon (3 credits) 9492

COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course will bring the student through a study of the production, collection, and transmissions of the Holy Scriptures including attention to the various historic English translations and their backgrounds.

LEARNING RESULTS
The purpose of this course is to enable the student:
• to gain knowledge about how and why the books of the Bible were canonized,
• to employ that understanding toward discerning different canons of different churches,
• to demonstrate how the English translations are based on the notion of a canon,
• and to reflect critically upon the significant contemporary questions about the canon.

REQUIRED TEXTS AND MATERIALS
• F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (Intervarsity, 1988)

• Bruce M. Metzger, The Text of the New Testament (Oxford, 1992)

The student will also need to have access to the New Bible Dictionary for diverse assignments and, in particular, questions pertaining to the English translations.

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INTEGRATION OF FAITH AND LEARNING
Since the Christian canon of the Scripture is viewed as, as least, divinely given, the student will learn how the Church established the collection of books we know as the Bible. Both intrinsic (apostolicity, catholicity, inspiration, orthodoxy, etc.) and extrinsic (early Church, Marcion, the passing away of eyewitnesses, etc.) points will be discussed.

LEARNING DOCUMENTATION
To determine if the course learning results have been attained, students document their learning by submitting the following items:

Assignment #1 What do we mean by “Canon” and why do we have one?
Assignment #2 What is the Greek Old Testament and how did the Church appropriate it?
Assignment #3 Why are there two Christian canons of the Old Testament?
Assignment #4 How did the Reformation affect the Christian notion of the Old Testament canon?
Assignment #5 What is the New Testament and how did Marcion affect the early understanding of it?
Assignment #6 How did the Church respond to the heterodox division of the canon?
Assignment #7 What was the New Testament in the Ante-Nicene Period?
Assignment #8 What was the New Testament in the Nicene Period?
Assignment #9 Why would there be any Questions about the New Testament from Augustine to Luther?
Assignment #10 What should Protestants do with the Apocrypha and the Pseudepigrapha?
Assignment #11 What are the Standards for a Canon? How did the English Translations Develop?

There are 11 lessons and 0 examinations for this course.

LEARNING EVALUATION
Assignments 1 - 10 are worth 100 points each. Assignment 11 is worth 300 points. The total points for the course is 1300.