THE WORD ‘CANON’
When we speak of the canon of scripture, the word ‘canon’
has a simple meaning. It means the list of books contained in
the scripture, the list of books recognized as worthy to be included
in the sacred writings of a worshipping community. In a
Christian context, we might define the word as ‘the list of the
writings acknowledged by the Church as documents of the
divine revelation’. In this sense the word appears to have
been first used by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, in a letter
circulated in AD 367
The CANON of Scripture
