What is more important—the Old Testament or the New Testament?

Full Question

Answer

Some will immediately say that the NT is the interpretative key to the OT—all things in the OT point to Christ and what we know of Christ from the NT should guide our understanding of the OT. The OT is therefore subordinate to the NT.

Alternatively, some will argue that we need to know the OT in order to understand the context for the ministry of Christ on earth and through the apostles. The promises and prophecies about the hope of Israel need to be understood before we know what is going on in the NT. The OT therefore controls our understanding of the NT.

It seems like a ‘which came first—the chicken or the egg’ dilemma. However, the concept of a New Testament canon of writings is not exactly apostolic. Our evidence for the use of the expression ‘New Testament’ is from the second century at the earliest. The question is this: did the apostles think they were creating a ‘New Testament’ or adding to the Jewish Scriptures?

The answer to this question cuts through the dilemma. If the apostles and their companions thought that they were adding writings onto the end of Malachi, then there isn’t as such an ‘Old Testament’ and a ‘New Testament’, even though there are (obviously) old and new covenants. The legitimacy of there being a ‘New Testament’ canon as opposed to just a larger canon of Jewish Scriptures is worth questioning especially if we read second century church history in terms of a turning away from the apostolic faith (an apostasy). Is the division between the testaments actually a false teaching of the apostate Christian church?

The question of what comes first—‘the NT or the OT?’ is therefore no more sensible than asking whether the Former Prophets are subordinate to the Latter Prophets (or vice versa). Instead, all the books of the Bible hang together in the one Jewish Scriptures. We can certainly argue that the apostles and their companions knew that they were writing scripture, but the scripture they thought they were writing was Jewish—they were after all (excepting possibly Luke)—Jews. Theologically, there isn’t a ‘problem of the New Testament canon’ except for orthodox Christianity. There is instead a problem of deciding why the four gospels, Acts and the General Epistles, the Letters of Paul and Revelation are Jewish Scripture. The interpretation of this body of writing is a back and forth process that begins with Genesis.