ing as a completed New Testament. It is evident that Serapion
already holds the Catholic principle that all words of Apostles possess
the same value to the Church as words of the Lord; but a completed
collection of apostolic writings was not yet at his disposal.[109] Hence
it is very improbable that Theophilus, bishop of Antioch, who died as
early as the reign of Commodus, presupposed such a collection. Nor, in
point of fact, do the statements in the treatise "ad Autolycum" point to
a completed New Testament.[110] Theophilus makes diligent use of the
Epistles of Paul and mentions the evangelist John (C. I. 1.) as one of
the bearers of the Spirit. But with him the one canonical court of
appeal is the Scriptures of the Old Testament, that is, the writings of
the Prophets (bearers of the Spirit). These Old Testament Prophets,
however, are continued in a further group of "bearers of the Spirit,"
which we cannot definitely determine, but which at any rate included the
authors of the four Gospels and the writer of the Apocalypse. It is
remarkable that Theophilus has never mentioned the Apostles. Though he
perhaps regards them all, including Paul, as "bearers of the Spirit,"
yet we have no indication that he looked on their _Epistles_ as
canonical. The different way he uses the Old Testament and the Gospels
on the one hand and the Pauline Epistles on the other is rather evidence
of the contrary. Theophilus was acquainted with the four Gospels (but we
have no reference to Mark), the thirteen Epistles of Paul (though he
does not mention Thessalonians), most probably also with the Epistle to
the Hebrews, as well as 1st Peter and the Revelation of John. It is
significant that no single passage of his betrays an acquaintance with
the Acts of the Apostles.[111]

It might certainly seem venturesome, on the basis of the material found
in Theophilus and the original document of the first six books of the
Apostolic Constitutions, to conclude that the formation of a New
Testament canon was not everywhere determined by the same interest and
therefore did not everywhere take a similar course. It might seem
hazardous to assume that the Churches of Asia Minor and Rome began by
creating a fixed canon of _apostolic_ writings, which was thus
necessarily declared to be inspired, whereas other communities applied
or did not deny the notion of inspiration to a great number of venerable
and ancient writings not rigidly defined, and did not make a se