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A common objection that is posed when addressing the Canon dilemma from Protestants is “we can reject the Fathers that gave us the Canon because we reject the Jews that gave us the Canon”? There is some truth to this argument in terms of us receiving the Texts historically (i.e. passed Down via Moses and their Successors). But it is false to assume that there was some kind of Closed Canon that the Jews agreed upon during the time of Jesus and the Apostles.

Before we show that this assumption is wrong, we should consider admissions from Protestant scholars that there is #1) No formal Canon of OT & NT within the Time of Jesus and the Apostles, this being a gradual process which would conclude by the 3rd century. And that #2) the Jews did not close the Canon before the time of Jesus or at the time of the Apostles, such that Canonicity was debated amongst post-Second Temple Jews.

The church adopted its notion of Scripture as an authoritative collection of sacred writings from the Jews, along with the largely undefined collection of Scriptures current among the Jews when Christianity separated from Judaism, but Christianity’s basic stance toward those Scriptures was shaped by its Christology,

McDonald, Lee Martin. 2006. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority. Baker Academic. (p.22)

There is no evidence from the time of Jesus or before that either the Jews or the followers of Jesus were even remotely interested in the notion of a closed collection of sacred Scriptures, and this is what makes any investigation of such notions in the time of Jesus so challenging.

McDonald, Lee Martin. 2006. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority. Baker Academic. (p.18)

It is true that the Old Testament has commonality in terms of historical foundation/heritage, however it is not honest for one to argue that the canon “just comes from the Jews”. Because, the Jews did not have a formal Canon. There was ideas as to what constitutes as Holy Scripture, but the Canon was not compiled in an official sense.

It is probable, indeed, that by the beginning of the Christian era the Essenes (including the Qumran community) were in substantial agreement with the Pharisees and the Sadducees about the limits of Hebrew scripture. There may have been some differences of opinion and practice with regard to one or two of the Writings’, but the inter-party disagreements remembered in Jewish tradition have very, little to do with the limits of the canon. The idea that the Sadducees (like the Samaritans) acknowledged the Pentateuch only as holy scripture is based on a misunderstanding; when Josephus, for example, says that the Sadducees admit no observance at all apart from the, laws’, ” he means not the Pentateuch to the exclusion of the Prophets and the Writings but the written law (of the Pentateuch) to the exclusion of the oral law (the Pharisaic interpretation and application, of the written law, which, like the written law itself, was held int theory to have been received and handed down by Moses). It would be understandable if the Sadducees did not accept Daniel which contains the most explicit statement of the resurrection hope in the whole of the Old Testament. As for the Samaritans, their Bible was restricted to the Pentateuch. They had their own edition of the book of Joshua and a number of other traditions, but these were not recognized as holy scripture. The Samaritan Bible was basically a popular Palestinian recension of the Hebrew Pentateuch, which was subjected to an editorial process to bring it into line with certain aspects of Samaritan tradition which conflicted with Jewish tradition.* The Samaritan Bible has customarily been treated as evidence for the view that the final Samaritan schism took place at a time when the Pentateuch but not the Prophets or Writings had been ‘canonized’, but this is not necessarily so. When we think of Jesus and his Palestinian apostles, then, we may be confident that they agreed with contemporary leaders in Israel about the contents of the canon. We cannot say confidently that they accepted Esther, Ecclesiastes or the Song of Songs as scripture, because evidence is not available. We can argue only from probability, and arguments from probability are weighted differently by different judges. But when in debate with Jewish theologians Jesus and the apostles appealed to ‘the scriptures’, they appealed to an authority which was equally acknowledged by their opponents. This near-unanimity might suggest that some widely acknowledged authority had promulgated a decision on the matter. It is not easy, however, to identify an authority in the relevant period which would have commanded the assent of such diverse groups. But, as later with the New Testament, so with the Old Testament it is probable that, when the canon was ‘closed’ in due course by competent authority, this simply meant that official recognition was given to the situation already obtained in the practice of the worshipping community.

Bruce, F. F. 2018. The Canon of Scripture. InterVarsity Press. (p.40-42)

The relative silence about a well-defined collection of Scripture among the Pharisees, Essenes, and Sadducees in the first century strongly suggests an absence of concern with the idea of a closed biblical canon before the second century C.E. Some scholars, however, speak of rabbinic Judaism in the second century C.E. and later as if it were the same as the Judaisms of the first century C.E. and earlier. We would be well served again to heed Neusner’s dictum: “What we cannot show, we do not know.”

McDonald, Lee Martin. 2006. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority. Baker Academic. (p. 171)

If the issue of canonicity was settled before the time of Jesus, we must ask why debate about which books could be read in public (i.e., during wor-ship) continued during the formation of the Talmud? Since reading Scripture implies its sacredness and authority for a believing community, restricting the public reading of a document suggests that it is not sacred, The primary exception to this, of course, is the reference in 4 Ezra 14:46-47 to the “seventy” books that were reserved for the wise and not read in public. 

Writings excluded by the rabbis from public reading are the following: 

Ecclesiastes (m. Yadayim 3:5; b. Berakhot 48a; b. Shabbat 100a; Ecclesiastes Rabbah 1:3; 11:9; Leviticus Rabbah 23; Avot of Rabbi Nathan 1; cf. Jerome on Eccl. 12:14)

Esther (m. Megillah 4:1; b. Megillah 7a; b. Sanbedrin 100a; cf. t.

Megillah 2:1a; 2 Macc 15:36; Josephus, Ant. 11.184-296) Ezekiel (Sir 49:8; b. Shabbat 13b; b. Hagigah 13a; b. Menabot 45a; cf.Jerome, Epistle 53.829

Proverbs (b. Shabbat 30b)

Ruth (b. Megillah 7a)

Song of Songs (m. Yadavim 3:5; m. Eduyyot 5:3; t. Sanbedrin 12:10; t. Yadayim 2:14; b. Sanbedrin 101a; b. Megillah 7a)

Silver concludes that “even as late as the early Talmudic period, there were still debates about whether certain scrolls should be included or excluded from a collection that had not yet been named or defined.” The Qumran sect, for example, had no clearly defined Psalter, as seen in its many variations (e.g., the added refrain in Ps 145 and the inclusion of Psalms 151A, 151B, 152, 153, 154, and 155). It is not clear whether the majority of Jews in Palestine accepted the Scriptures (and theology) of the Pharisees. A Judaism “defined by holy texts” was only beginning to emerge during this period, and the precise boundaries of that collection were not yet established. We cannot maintain, therefore, that the sacred writings at Qumran were the same as those of most other Jews in Palestine in the first century C.E. While such questions are of particular interest to scholars today, they were simply not discussed at that time.

McDonald, Lee Martin. 2006. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority. Baker Academic. (p. 176-177)

Notice how Bruce says “limitations of the Hebrew Scriptures”, not an official Canon. Because Bruce recognizes that there was no formal Canon amongst the Jews. Lee McDonald also comments on the issues and specifically states that there was “relative silence about a well-defined collection of Scripture” during the First Century. MacDonald also makes the argument that “if the Old Testament Canon was established before the time of Jesus, why was there debates amongst Rabbis in the early Rabbinic period”. Thus showing that the Old Testament Canon was not established before or during the time of Early Rabbinic Judaism.

What about the Council of Jamnia?

I have heard many times that the Council of Jamia, a Jewish council after the destruction in Jerusalem formalized the Old Testament. However this claim is false, as Bruce shows in this excerpt of his scholastic work. He admits that at the time of Josephus (A.D 37-100), that the Old Testament canon is still “amongst debate” between Rabbis of the day. This council in the least, determined what books “defiled the hands”, which was a ritual that would determine if certain books has prophetic inspiration.

About the same time as Josephus wrote his work Against Apion, the Hebrew scriptures were among various subjects debated by the rabbis who set up their headquarters at Jabneh or Jamnia in western Judaea, under the leadership of Yohanan ben Zakkai, to discuss the reconstruction of Jewish religious life after the collapse of the Jewish commonwealth in AD 70.” Jewish life had to be adapted to a new situation in which the temple and its services were no more. So far as, the scriptures are concerned, the rabbis at Jamnia introduced no, innovations; they reviewed the tradition they had received and left its more or less as it was. It is probably unwise to talk as if there was a Council or Synod of Jamnia which laid down the limits of the Old Testament canon. They discussed which books ‘defiled the hands’—a technical expression denoting those books which were the product of prophetic inspiration. One had to wash one’s hands after handling them, just as one did after ‘defiling’ the hands (whether materially or ritually). One might explain this practice in terms of Mary Douglas’s ‘purity and danger’; but by the time we are dealing with the idea may simply have been that if people had to wash their hands every time they touched a sacred book they would be deterred from handling it casually.

Bruce, F. F. 2018. The Canon of Scripture. InterVarsity Press. (p.34)

Bruce again gives reasons as to why the Question on Canon was difficult and debated even after the time of Jesus.

Neither Esther nor the Song of Songs contains the name of God unless indeed his name be concealed in Cant 8:6, where ‘a most vehement flame’ might be literally ‘a flame of Yah’.? Both works might appear to be non-religious in character, but Esther provided the libretto for the popular festival of Purim, and if the Song could be allegorized so as to become a celebration of Yahweh’s love for Israel, it could continue to be recognized as an inspired scripture. As for Ezekiel, the prescriptions in its closing chapters for the new temple, and its services could with difficulty be made to agree with those in the Pentateuch, and the chariot vision of chapter 1 gave rise to mystical speculations and exercises which some rabbis believed to be spiritually dangerous. The opinion was expressed that Ezekiel ought to be withdrawn’ (withdrawn, probably, from the synagogue calendar of public readings). Other pious souls were content to wait until Elijah came at the end of the age: the problems of Ezekiel would be among those which he was expected to solve., Happily, it was not necessary to wait so long: one Hananiah the son of Hezekiah sat up night after night burning the midnight oil to the tune of 300 measures until he had worked out a reconciliation between Ezekiel and Moses.

Bruce, F. F. 2018. The Canon of Scripture. InterVarsity Press. (p.35)

Conclusion

This article has sufficiently shown that it is not as easy as “appealing to the Jewish people for the OT canon” because there was still disputes between Jewish people as to what the Canon of Scripture was. And even if there was a Canon amongst the Jews, why should we appeal to Jews that reject Christ for the Canon? By what authority are we bound to their Canon?