Thread by @drjohnmeade

Canon Order: Thread
1/ There's a spicy debate over the order of books in the Jewish canon & then subsequently the order that the books should have in our Christian Bible today.

Was #Chronicles at the end of Jesus' Bible?

2/ Let's review some evidence.
1 It is said that Jesus' Bible was the long-closed Jewish canon that ended with the books of #Chronicles. Baba Bathra 14b (ca. 200 AD) has this order. But how old and well-known was it?

2 Many argue Matt 23:35//Lk 11:51 support this...

3/ but H.G.L. Peels (ZAW, 2001), shows there maybe other reasons 2 connect Abel & Zechariah son of Jehoida together, not least of which is they r the only two OT figures 2 be killed innocently & the act itself is a cry for vengeance. Is this good evidence 4 Chronicles at the end?

4/ There is no more early external evidence for a Jewish canon that has #Chronicles at the end. Only the Bab. Talmud, and perhaps, though not as clearly as some would make it, Jesus' statements in Matt 23//Lk 11.

What about early, external evidence against this view?

5/ There is much evidence against this view:

1 Later Jewish MSS do not end with #Chronicles. They end with Ezra-Nehemiah (See Leningrad image).

2 The Writings begin with Chronicles (see Aleppo pics of end of Malachai and beginning of Chronicles in that sequence+L image).

6/ 3 What about evidence from early Christians claiming to give the Hebrew book order: Bryennios List, Melito, Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, Athanasius, GregNaz, Epiphanius, Hilary of Poitiers, Jerome, Rufinus...

None of these lists end with #Chronicles.

Not even Jerome?

7/ Not even Jerome. His Prologus Galeatus lists books under the Three sections of the Hebrew canon (Amiatinus, 218v): Torah, Prophets, Hagiographa. He lists #Chronicles in the Third section, but neither at the beginning nor the end (Job at beginning + Esther at end).

8/ How do "#Chronicles as the final book" scholars account for its near complete lack of evidence? In different ways, but it always seems to boil down to this: early Christians say they present the Jewish canon but they must not be (because we know what that canon is).

9/ Early Christians departed from Judaism 1st-2nd century, and therefore, they forgot or were cut off from knowledge of the synagogue and the Jewish canon.

That's possible. But so many Christians claim to know the Jewish Bible, it's difficult to discount all the evidence.

10/ When did #Chronicles wind up at the end of the Hebrew Bible? Not widespread until it was copied at the end of Hebrew MSS from the 12th century AD forward and finally became the conclusion in Printed Hebrew Bibles.

But evidence of this pattern before this time is lacking.

11/ The external evidence for #Chronicles at the end of the Hebrew canon is weak. Some will still argue for it at the end as a fitting conclusion to the Hebrew canon from internal evidence. But not all agree on those finer points.

12/ Final question: What is theologically gained or lost by having #Chronicles at the end or somewhere else in the canon? I'm calling the experts on TW: @DrPJWilliams @milesvvanpelt @PLeithart @lukestamps @M_Y_Emerson @DrJimHamilton. Any one else? Thoughts?

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