s that would later form the canon forced themselves upon the church because Christ speaks through them. Jesus own words, in Johns Gospel, validated the belief held by His followers that Scripture was divinely inspired by God. In the passage of John 16:12-15, Jesus tells His Apostles that, I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own, he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said that the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you. This verse alludes to a coming time when Christ will send his Holy Spirit to reveal all truth to the Apostles. The apostles were closer to Jesus than anyone so historically, they would have known more about His life, teachings, and ministry. These things put the Apostles writings automatically above all other writings as being inspired by God.The second criteria for canonicity is orthodoxy which means straight thinking.The truth or canon of faith in New Testament literature is what many claim to be the unifying and distinguishing elements. This was one of the issues that was harder to figure out among the early church. Upon examination of the New Testament text, it becomes apparent that there is not one unified view of theology present throughout the entire Bible. Lee McDonald says in his book, titled The Formation of the Biblical Canon, that the very presence of creedal formulations after the formation of a Christian biblical canon has manifestly demonstrated that orthodoxy itself was based upon a canon within the canon. This canon within the canon kept the scriptures orthodox in the sense that the all focus on the same thing, Jesus Christ. The third factor in developing a specific text of ...
