KindiakMath

Using historical inference and accurate literary analysis, we have demonstrated that there exists a Jesus of Nazareth who died by crucifixion under Pontius Pilate and resurrected from the dead. These facts affirm His claims to divinity, and His identity as the one true God. In particular, his words are true, and therefore, when He claims that the Old Testament is the Word of God, His claim is true.

Theorem 1. The Old Testament is the Word of God.

However, Christians go one step further and assert that the New Testament is the Word of God. That said, let’s first clarify what we mean when we use the phrase “Word of God”.

Definition 1. An individual is an apostle if and only if they (i) were a witness of the risen Jesus, (ii) were personally commissioned by Him, and (iii) were authenticated by God with signs and wonders appropriate to that office.

Example 1. The persons Simon Peter, John the son of Zebedee, and Paul are apostles.

Proof. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus calls Simon Peter among his apostles:

And when day came, he called his disciples and chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and Andrew his brother, and James and John… [Luke 6:13–14]

In the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus calls Saul (with Roman name Paul; see Acts 13:9) to mission:

Now as he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. And falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.” [Acts 9:3–6]

Furthermore, the Apostle Peter endorses Paul as a recipient and teacher of the correct Gospel:

…and when James and Cephas (Peter) and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me, they gave the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and me, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. [Galatians 2:9]

The synoptic gospels and Acts can verify that both individuals were witnesses of the risen Jesus and authenticated by God with signs and wonders appropriate to that office.

Lemma 1. The apostles considered a document to be part of the Word of God if they consider it to be Scripture. In that case, it is authoritative in communicating truth to us.

Proof. We quote the words of Paul from 2 Timothy 3:16–17:

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. [2 Timothy 3:16–17]

So we have reduced the task to determine if the apostles considered the New Testament to be Scripture. Actually, we need one more piece of the puzzle to assure that the New Testament really is Scripture.

Lemma 2. The documents that the apostles considered as the Word of God are the documents that Jesus considered as Word of God.

Proof. Jesus delegates His voice and authority to His commissioned messengers:

“The one who hears you hears me, and the one who rejects you rejects me, and the one who rejects me rejects him who sent me.” [Luke 10:16]

He commands the apostles to carry His message to the nations:

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. [Matthew 28:19–20]

Therefore, when the apostles, under Christ’s commission and the Spirit’s guidance, identify writings as God’s Word, such identification reflects Jesus’ own judgment.

Corollary 1. The documents that the apostles considered as Scripture are part of the Word of God.

Proof. By Lemma 1, any document that the apostles considered as Scripture, they considered as part of the Word of God. By Lemma 2, any document that the apostles considered as part of the Word of God is a document that Jesus considers as part of the Word of God.

Therefore, we have reduced the task to determine which books are considered by the apostles as Scripture.

Lemma 3. The writings of Simon Peter, namely 1 Peter and 2 Peter, and John the son of Zebedee, namely John, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, and Revelation, are part of the Word of God.

Proof. By Example 1, Simon Peter and John the son of Zebedee are apostles who have seen Jesus pre-crucifixion and post-cruxifixion. As per Matthew 28:19–20, they teach the commands of Jesus, and therefore, they teach the words of God. Therefore, these writings are part of the Word of God.

Corollary 2. The apostles convey the words of God.

Proof. The Apostle John records the words of Jesus as follows:

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. [John 12:46]

Since John is the Word of God, the Holy Spirit is the teacher of the words of Jesus to the apostles. Since the apostles remember the words of Jesus through the Holy Spirit, and Jesus is God, they remember the words of God, and thus communicate the words of God.

Lemma 4. The writings of Paul, namely Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon are part of the Word of God.

Proof. By Example 1, Peter is an apostle. According to his letter in 2 Peter, Peter affirms Paul’s words as Scripture:

And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. [2 Peter 3:15–16]

Lemma 5. The synoptic gospels, namely Matthew, Mark, and Luke, as well as the Acts of the Apostles (written by Luke) are part of the Word of God.

Proof. According to Luke’s writings, Matthew is named as an apostle of Jesus pre-resurrection:

And when day came, he called his disciples and chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles: …Matthew… [Luke 6:13; 15]

Post-resurrection as well:

And when they had entered, they went up to the upper room, where they were staying, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot and Judas the son of James. [Acts 1:13]

By Definition 1, Matthew is an apostle, and by the same argument in Lemma 3, his gospel is part of the Word of God.

According to Paul’s writings, Paul considers Luke’s writings on par with the Torah as Scripture:

For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain,” and, “The laborer deserves his wages.” [1 Timothy 5:18]

Here, the bolded verse is a quotation from Luke 10:7. By Corollary 1, the gospel written by Luke is the Word of God. Since Luke wrote the Acts of the Apostles, that is part of the Word of God.

Mark writes within Petrine apostolic oversight:

She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son. [1 Peter 5:13]

The church received Mark as the authorized apostolic memoir of Peter. By Corollary 2, the gospel written by Mark is the Word of God.

Lemma 6. The writings of Jesus’ half-brother James are part of the Word of God.

Proof. Paul refers to “James the Lord’s brother” as an apostle:

But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. [Galatians 1:19]

Furthermore, the Jerusalem church recognizes his decisive authority:

On the following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the elders were present. [Acts 21:18]

Thus the Epistle of James conveys delegated, Spirit‑guided apostolic instruction.

Lemma 7. The epistles Hebrews and Jude are part of the Word of God.

Proof. Jude self‑identifies as “a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James” (Jude 1), thereby linking himself to the recognized Jerusalem leader. He writes with binding, church‑regulating authority:

Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. [Jude 3]

Jude directs readers to the standard of “the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Jude 17). Operating within this apostolic framework and exercising normative authority over doctrine and fellowship (Jude 20–23), Jude’s letter functions as apostolic instruction under Christ’s commission and the Spirit’s guidance (Lemma 2). Hence, by Lemma 1, Jude is Scripture and thus part of the Word of God.

Though anonymous, Hebrews explicitly situates itself within the apostolic transmission:

“it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.” [Hebrews 2:3–4]

The author also ascribes speech directly to the Holy Spirit when citing Scripture (e.g. Heb 3:7; cf. 10:15–17), and issues binding exhortations to the churches (Heb 3:12–13; 10:19–25; 13:7,17).

Therefore Hebrews bears the attested apostolic message, sealed by divine confirmation; by Lemmas 1–2, it is Scripture and thus part of the Word of God.

Theorem 2. The New Testament is part of the Word of God.

Proof. Lemmas 3–6 exhaust the books in the New Testament, and since each of these books are part of the Word of God, the New Testament as a whole is part of the Word of God.

Theorem 3. No book written after the resurrection of Jesus apart from the existing New Testament is part of the Word of God. That is, among documents written after the resurrection of Jesus, the 27 books of the New Testament in Theorem 2, and only these books, are part of the Word of God.

Proof. In 367 AD, the 39th Paschal letter of Anathasius contained an exact list of the exact same 27 books that we have today. Since no apostles lived beyond 200 years, there are no other books after 367 AD that can be included as the Word of God. Furthermore, the person of Jesus the God-Man is God’s culminated authoritative revelation of Himself toward us (Heb 1:1–2), codified through the 27 books of the New Testament.

Therefore, whatever we mean by “the Word of God”, we must include the Protestant Old Testament (also known as the Hebrew Tanakh) and the New Testament as parts of the Word of God. Different Christians contest on a subset of Greek books written before the time of Jesus, known as the deuterocanon by Catholic and Orthodox churches, and called the apocrypha by Protestant Christians.

Remark 1. I’m open to hear how you might strengthen the arguments for Lemma 7. Systematic theologian Wayne Grudem summarises a proof by hypothesis testing for Hebrews being the Word of God in the following sense: if Hebrews is not the Word of God, then the probability of a non-apostolic author writing the large Christological content of Hebrews is exceedingly low.

Remark 2. This post’s main weakness is that it attributes the authors of the books in the New Testament according to tradition; there is some debate on the actual authors behind the New Testament, upending some subtle premises made in this post. Check out this post by Chris Nye for a more holistic approach to the ultimately same conclusion. For a more historic orientation, check out this post by Michael J Kruger.

Nevertheless, we can all agree that, minimally, all books present in the Protestant Bible are parts of the Word of God. That is, God speaks to us in the person of Jesus whose words are encoded for us in the Protestant Bible, and His Spirit enables us to understand these words not as literature, but as life in the Word:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. [John 1:1–5]

—Joel Kindiak, 30 Oct 25, 2159H