Season 2: Episode 42
Who Chose the Books of the New Testament?
Date Aired: 11/20/2023
Starting in the first century CE, there was an explosion of Christian literature—dozens of gospels, letters, apocalypses and more—but only a fraction of those texts made it into the New Testament canon. Who decided which books were in and which books were out? For this episode, Helen and Dave welcome New Testament scholar Francis Watson, who introduces us to important figures like Athanasius of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea, some of the earliest influential Christian writers to weigh in on which texts were authoritative and which were “spurious.”
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