Xt}
THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON IN THE TREATISE DE SECTIS l
Actio II of de seeds, a treatise dating from the sixth or seventh century, sums up the books of the Bible as follows :
t?? µe? ??? ?a?a??? (d?a?????) e?s? ß?ß??a e???s? d??, ?? ta µ?? e?s?? ?st?????, t? d? p??f?t???, t? d? pa?a??et???, t? d? p??? t? f???e?? µ???? ?e??µe?a, e? d? ?a? e?ast?? e? ???st? e???s?eta?, ???' ??? ?p? t?? p?e??????t?? e?ast?? ?????ta?.
Then twelve historical books are enumerated : Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, i.e. the so-called books of Moses or Pentateuch, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings counted as two books, Paralipomena (Chronicles) and Esdras. The contents of these books is mostly summarized in a few lines. Next come the 5 prophetical books : Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and the d?de- ?ap??f?t??, without their contents. The four "hortatory" books are Job, that may be written by Joseph, the Proverbs of Salomo, Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs, epe?d? ? t??t?? ?e???a ?f???t??a est??. The Psalms only are poetical (p??? t? f???e??) 2.
The limitation of the number of the books to 22 is not peculiar to de sectis. This reckoning appears for the first time in Flavius Josephus 3, and also in Melito4, Origen5, Athanasius6, Cyril of Jerusalem7, Gregory Nazianzen 8, Canon 60 of the Council of Laodicea 9,
1 This paper has been presented at the Sixth International Congress on Biblical Studies (Oxford, 3-7 April 1978).
2 PG, 86, col. 1200-1204. There is no fundamental difference between the edition of Leunclavius and ours (in preparation) in this part of the text.
3 Contra Apionem, I, 8 : d ? ? d ? µ ? ?a p ? ? ? t ? ? ? e ? ? ?s ? ß ?ß ? ?a t ? ? pa ?t ? ? ? ? ? ?ta ? ? ? ? ? ? t ? ? ? ?a ? ?af ? ?, t ? d ? ?a ? ? ? pep ?ste ?µ ? ?a.
4 ap. EusEBius, Historia ? eclesiástica, IV, 26.
5 ap. EusEBius, Hist. Eccl., VI, 25.
6 Eastern Letter of 367 (Ep. Fest., 39).
7 Catech., IV, 33.
8 Carm., 33.
9 Th. Zahn, Geschichte des neutestamentlichen Kanons (Leipzig, 1890), II, pp. 193 sqq.
