Religious Experience And The Creation Of Scripture

Mark Wreford examines the reasons that prompted the New Testament writers to create the texts which would become the formation of the Christian religion. Wreford explores the possibility that certain religious experiences were understood as revelatory, and consequently inspired the writing of texts which were seen as special from their inception. Wreford uses Luke-Acts and Galatians as test-cases within the New Testament, in order to reflect on both the stated importance of religious experiences - whether the author's own or others' - to the development of these texts, and the status of the texts intend to claim for themselves.

Wreford suggests that Luke-Acts offers a helpful paradigmatic example of the relationship between religious experience and the creation of Scripture, as it offers an extensive narrative which reflects on early Christian claims to Spirit-inspired witness, and begins with an explicit authorial statement of purpose. Furthermore, in Galatians Paul's autobiographical account of God's revelation of Christ to him is the foundation of a letter which is intended to play an authoritative role in shaping its addressees' own faith and practice. Wreford first argues that religious experiences are presented as the reason for the existence of the texts and that they appear to have shaped what is written, by examining the defining of religious experience and creation of scripture and caonicity. He then asserts that both Luke and Paul understood themselves to be creating new scriptural writings on the basis of their relationship to new religious experiences, citing the experience and speech at Pentecost, the inclusion of gentiles in the experience, and the journey from revelation to Paul's epistle.