John Chrysostom on Canon of the Old Testament
Predates or straddles the settled dispute
stretching forth his hands to God, the prophet said, "Let the lifting up of my hands be an evening sacrifice, set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth, keep the door of my lips;" and he who before admonished, himself too says again "Who shall set a watch before my mouth, and a seal of wisdom upon my lips?"
THE POSITION
No canon list survives from him. What survives is his practice: he quotes Sirach in the same breath as the Psalms as authoritative admonition, cites it elsewhere with the plain scriptural formula "it says," and uses Bel and the Dragon as illustration without marking it as different in kind. The dispute this locus asks about — whether the deuterocanonical books belong in Scripture — is a sixteenth-century one, and he is eleven centuries early for it.
2 May my prayer be set before You like incense, my uplifted hands like the evening offering. 3 Set a guard, O LORD, over my mouth; keep watch at the door of my lips.
1 OTHER HOLD THIS
ABOUT THIS FIGURE
Archbishop of Constantinople and the most prolific preacher of the patristic era — the largest surviving body of Greek expository preaching is his. This entry rests on the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers translations of his homilies on Romans, 1 Corinthians, John, Hebrews and 2 Thessalonians, together with the Instructions to Catechumens.
Cite this page
"John Chrysostom on Canon of the Old Testament", Examined Doctrine, July 2026 edition, https://examineddoctrine.com/position/chrysostom/ot-canon (archived at https://examineddoctrine.com/editions/2026-07/position/chrysostom/ot-canon).