In this volume, biblical scholar, John Barton, examines the complex relationship between the canonical texts of the Old and the New Testaments. He focuses on the historical questions: how it was that the biblical canon came about; how it was that the church came to accept as authoritative a New Testament containing no more and no less than 27 books and how it was that the church placed alongside these books the Hebrew Scriptures, now renamed the Old Testament. In responding to such questions the author draws a distinction between the notion of scripture and that of canon.