One problem with this approach
was pointed out in the introduction to chapter three (pp. 83-84 above)—it is
simply not known whether the Jewish canon had been limited to twenty-four books
by the time of Jesus and the earliest Christians. Even if it had been so
limited by this time, it is not known whether this canon of normative Pharisaic
Judaism was determinative for the early Church. Another problem is that the
criterion of canonicity possibly used in the formation of the twenty-four book
Jewish canon is of questionable validity. This criterion, discussed in chapter
two (pp. 71-74 above), linked canonicity with prophetic inspiration, which was
believed to have ceased in Israel around 400 B.C. Therefore, only books
believed to have been written before that time were eligible for consideration
for canonicity. The difficulties in this approach were also discussed—namely,
the belief in modern scholarly circles that some books in the Jewish canon were
written wholly or in part after 400 B.C. (Richard Bruce Cox, Jr., “The Nineteenth
Century British Apocrypha Controversy” [Baylor University, May 1981], 465)
