Article 3b - The Origin of the Bible – Church Councils and the Process of Canonization by the Catholic Church
By Emmanuel Gomes This article concludes the introduction to the Old Testament, and discusses on how under the infallible authority of the Catholic Church the canon of the Scriptures according to Catholic faith was finalized. There are video lectures at the end of this article. After studying this article, it is recommended to watch the four videos for a comprehensive understanding of the origins of the Bible. From next article onwards, we will begin with the study of the Pentateuch, starting with the book of Genesis. For this Bible Study, we will be following the canonical order. The Development of the Canon in the Early Church – In the previous article , we saw how different sects of Judaism had divergent views on the Jewish Scripture during Jesus’s time. So when did the Jewish community reach a consensus on their canon as described in our first article? Jewish traditions do not have a central authority like the Catholic Church and does not claim to hold infallible cou