HistoricalChristian.Faith

Clement of Alexandria on the Old Testament Canon

Dates: c. 200 AD (Titus Flavius Clemens, c. 150–215; head of the catechetical school of Alexandria, teacher of Origen; his Paedagogus and Stromateis are dated c. 198–203) · Wikipedia
Summary: Clement quotes four of the disputed deuterocanonical books — Sirach, Tobit, Wisdom, and Baruch — with the same explicit citation formula he uses for the protocanonical books: “the Scripture which says,” “Scripture,” “the Divine Scripture.” A fifth disputed book, Judith, he strings into a chain of scriptural maxims without the formula. Where Clement of Rome, the Didache, and Polycarp wove the disputed books in as authoritative counsel, and Irenaeus ascribed them to named prophets, Clement goes a step further in form — the bare word “Scripture” — making him the firmest second-century witness to the disputed books cited as Scripture before any Christian Old-Testament list.

Claims & evidence

He cites Sirach as “the Scripture which says” (Sirach 21:6)

At this stage some rise up, saying that the Lord, by reason of the rod, and threatening, and fear, is not good; misapprehending, as appears, the Scripture which says, “And he that feareth the Lord will turn to his heart;” and most of all, oblivious of His love, in that for us He became man.

— The Instructor (Paedagogus) I.8.¹ The quoted line is Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 21:6, one of the deuterocanonical books carried in the Greek Septuagint but not the Hebrew canon. Clement introduces it with the same formula — “the Scripture which says” — that he uses for the protocanonical books, treating Sirach as Scripture without qualification.

He cites Tobit as “the Scripture which says” (Tobit 12:8)

…having heard the Scripture which says, “Fasting with prayer is a good thing.”

— Stromata VI.12.² The saying is Tobit 12:8 (the angel Raphael's counsel to Tobit), again adduced under the express formula “the Scripture which says” — the same deuterocanonical book whose maxim “alms delivers from death” Polycarp had woven in a century earlier, here named outright as Scripture.

He cites Wisdom as “Scripture” (Wisdom 2:12)

The Elegies of Solon, too, intensely deify the seventh day. And how? Is it not similar to Scripture when it says, “Let us remove the righteous man from us, because he is troublesome to us?” when Plato, all but predicting the economy of salvation, says in the second book of the Republic as follows…

— Stromata V.14.³ The words are Wisdom of Solomon 2:12 — the prophecy of the plot against the righteous man that the Fathers read as foretelling the Passion. Clement sets it expressly against the pagans (Solon, Plato) as “Scripture,” the deuterocanonical Wisdom serving as the inspired text over against the philosophers.

He cites Baruch as “the Divine Scripture” (Baruch 3:16–19)

Excellently, therefore, the Divine Scripture, addressing boasters and lovers of their own selves, says, “Where are the rulers of the nations, and the lords of the wild beasts of the earth, who sport among the birds of heaven, who treasured up silver and gold, in whom men trusted, and there was no end of their substance, who fashioned silver and gold, and were full of care? There is no finding of their works. They have vanished, and gone down to Hades.” Such is the reward of display.

— The Instructor II.3.⁴ The passage is the deuterocanonical Baruch 3:16–19, here given the strongest label of all — “the Divine Scripture” — the same book Athenagoras and Irenaeus cited as prophecy, Baruch being reckoned in the Greek and Latin tradition an appendix to Jeremiah.

He adduces Judith alongside Galatians, Isaiah, and Proverbs (Judith 8:27)

And how can the law be not good, which trains, which is given as the instructor (παιδαγωγος) to Christ, that being corrected by fear, in the way of discipline, in order to the attainment of the perfection which is by Christ?… And he that is near the Lord is full of stripes. Plainly, he, that draws near to knowledge, has the benefit of perils, fears, troubles, afflictions, by reason of his desire for the truth… Whence “the fear of God” is divinely said to be the beginning of wisdom.

— Stromata II.7.⁵ The clause “he that is near the Lord is full of stripes” is Judith 8:27, woven into a chain with Galatians 3:24, Isaiah 5:21, and Proverbs 1:7. Here Clement does not use the “Scripture” formula — the Judith line is braided in as an authoritative maxim, a use closer to Clement of Rome's than to the four explicit citations above, and so counts as the weaker of his five.

Notes

• The “Scripture” formula is the point. Four of the five citations — Sirach, Tobit, Wisdom, Baruch — are introduced with “the Scripture which says,” “Scripture,” or “the Divine Scripture,” the very wording Clement reserves for the protocanonical books. That formal parity is what makes them firmer than the woven maxims of Clement of Rome, the Didache, and Polycarp, and a step beyond even Irenaeus's “Daniel the prophet” / “Jeremiah the prophet” attributions: Clement does not merely treat the matter as prophecy, he labels the books themselves “Scripture.”
• Use, not a list. Like the witnesses before him, Clement renders no Old-Testament catalogue; he simply cites these books as Scripture in the course of argument. So this is a witness to use at the highest formal register, not a canon-verdict — the kind of practical reception that his pupil Origen would later set against an explicit Hebrew-sized enumeration.
• Bearing on the argument. Clement stands squarely on the “using” side of the divide weighed in the argument “Did the early church reject the deuterocanon…?” (assessed contested): the head of the Alexandrian school, citing four disputed books with the explicit “Scripture” formula — weighty evidence against the flat claim that the primitive church did not reckon these books Scripture, a full century and a half before the earliest Western conciliar lists.
• Place on the timeline. At c. 200 AD Clement stands a generation after Irenaeus (c. 180) and a generation before his own successor Origen (c. 240), who would return the timeline to a Hebrew-sized canon — the same Alexandrian school producing a teacher who cites the disputed books as “Scripture” and a pupil who counts them outside the Hebrew twenty-two while keeping the Greek in church use.

Sources