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The exact criteria for inclusion of books into the canon of Scripture is not known. Possibly 5 principles were used:

1) Authoritative: the book is from God
2) Prophetic: written by a man of God
3) Authentic: authentic document
4) Dynamic: must have life-transforming power of God
5) Accepted: people of God accepted it as the Word of God

While Old Testament canon was a matter beyond dispute, it was necessary to define what the New Testament comprised of for several reasons:

1) Marcion (A.D. 140) developed a heretical canon he began to propogate
2) Eastern churches were utilizing many false books during church services
3) Edict of Diocletian

On the day of the Roman Terminalia, Feb 23, 303, Diocletian sacrificed to the pagan gods:

" . . . In the first, while Diocletian was sacrificing in public, the chief interpreter of the victims' organs reported that he could not read the future in them because of the hostile influence of Christians standing around. Diocletian burst into a rage, insisting that all in his court should offer sacrifice, and sent out orders to his army to follow suit." (Ramsey MacMullen, Constantine, p.24). "

Diocletian then consulted the most powerful shrine of augury and divination in the world, the Oracle of Apollo in Delphi, Greece. But his priests brought him bad news: the Oracle had quit working too... (a lamentable state of affairs since Christ's Resurrection). This caused him to fly into an uncontrollable rage and he ordered the holocaust to commence immediately. Fire, racks, swords, wild beasts, crosses, poison and famine were made use of to kill the Christians. Invention was exhausted to devise tortures against those who would not deny Christ and acknowledge Caesar as "lord" and burn incense to his image. At that time Christianity had been growing by leaps and bounds throughout the Empire. Despite Christians being outstanding citizens, but the Roman Emperors seen them as a threat to the empire because they refused to acknowledge the divinity of the Emperors or call Caesar "lord."

The main target were books of the New Testament . . . and the histories of Christ. All of the great books portraying the Mount of Olives as the site of the Resurrection were systematically destroyed. Even books written by pagan authors were destroyed they revealed doctrines and practices of the Apostolic church.

Eusebius tells us that there were innumerable histories of the Life of Christ and the early church. Only one account survived this persecution:

"Hence by recent authors also, there are, as I have said, demonstrations without number, which we may carefully read, very able and clear, written in argumentative form in defense of our doctrine, and not a few commentaries carefully made upon the sacred and inspired Scriptures, showing by mathematical demonstrations the unerring truthfulness of those who from the beginning preached to us the word of godliness" (Preparation for the Gospel, Bk. I, ch. III, p.7.)

This persecution lasted 10 years and was ended by Constantine's (A.D. 280 - 337) defeat of Maxentius at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge (A.D. 312). Subsequently he, and his co-emperor, Licinius, jointly issued the Edict of Milan (A.D. 313), which mandated toleration of Christians in the Roman Empire. As guardian of Constantine's favored religion, the church was then given legal rights and large financial donations.

In 325, he called the Council of Nicaea to convene for the explicite purpose of addressing the Arian heresy. Constantine did not preside over the Council of Nicaea because of his age, (and because he had no theological knowledge), but was represented by two presbyters. One outcome of this council was changing the time of the Lord's Resurrection to the Sunday following the Passover. This was to coincide with the old Roman festival of Easter which usually fell about a week after Passover when the moon rose after midnight.

In A.D. 326, Constantine sent his mother Helena to Jerusalem to discover the spot that he had foreseen as the place of Jesus' Resurrection. This was the site of the temple of Venus on the West side of Jerusalem. He ordered the temple torn down and a church constructed on the site. This is called the church of the Holy Sepulchre to this day. This is the WRONG spot because it was located within the city of Jerusalem and Jesus died outside the city walls.

Pope Constantine was also responsible for changing the date of our Saviour's birth to Dec. 25. Since ALL the books on the correct time of Jesus' birth had been destroyed, this was easy for Constantine to do. Dec. 25 was the date of choice, as it was the Winter Solstice, and to the pagans was known as Dies Natalis Invicti or The Birthday of the Unconquered SUN. There are no solar holidays in the Bible. All Scriptural holidays are lunar, or MOON, based...

Subsequently, pope Contantine made Christianity the State religion and united church and state. In so doing, he married the pure bride of Christ with the dirty politics of the Roman Empire.

Prior to this time, a person entered the church through conversion or the new birth. Baptism followed this spiritual regeneration (in context of Jesus' sermon to Nicodemus). Because Constantine believed that baptism washed away sin and made one a Christian, he received Eusebius of Nicodemia, Arius friend, on his death bed (A.D. 337) and was baptized an Arian in 337 A.D. Constantine died at age 57 most probably from the effects of poison.

"Holy Baptism is the basis of the whole Christian life, the gateway to life in the Spirit (vitae spiritualis ianua), and the door which gives access to the other sacraments. Through Baptism we are freed from sin and reborn as sons of God; we become members of Christ, are incorporated into the Church and made sharers in her mission: "Baptism is the sacrament of regeneration through water in the word." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1997, Part Two, Article 1.)

In the 30 years that Constantine reigned, the Roman Catholic system was fully developed. The 2 big festivals: Christmas and Easter with entry through baptism instead of the new birth, union of church and state, and the false time and place of the Lord's birth and Resurrection have continued right down to our time. The first pope's work notwithstanding, it was merely a culmination of a course embarked upon by his predecessor's.

Elagabalus (A.D. 204-222) was high priest of Baal in Syria and later became Roman Emperor at 14 years of age. He established the cult of Sol Invictus Elagabal in Rome. However, since he was a depraved monster even by Roman standards, he was murdered by his troops.

"Emperor Elagabalas, the crowned high priest of Sol Invictus, sacrificed to the sun god every morning. During these daily rites, for which he stood in front of the altar, the amplissimuss sacedos wore typically Syrian robes ornamented with precious stones. It may be that he examined the entrails of young children which had been sacrificed....."(Gaston H. Halsberghe, The Cult of Sol Invictus), p.85)

Emperor Aurelian (A.D. 270-275) considered Sol Invictus Elagabal too foreign or Eastern for Roman tastes, Romanizing it by dropping the Elagabal. He established a college of high priests and made Sol Invictus the state religion of the Roman Empire.

".... Therefore Aurelian established a new college of high priests, under the name Pontifices Dei Solis." (The Cult of Sol Invictus, p. 155).

This institution later evolved into the Roman College of Cardinals that has elected every pope since Constantine. Aurelian was also murdered by his troops.

"...during the rule of Constantine the Great...the cult of Deus Sol Invictus reached extraordinary heights, so that his reign was even spoken of as a Sun Emperorship. Constantine was the personification of Deus Sol Invictus on earth, and could consider the statue of the sun in the Forum bearing his name as a statue of himself" (The Cult of Sol Invictus, p. 167)

Neither the Roman Catholic Church, nor Constantine, were the ultimate authority with respect to establishing canon. The truth is that there was no Roman Catholic Church ruling Christianity before Constantine, because Christianity was an illegal religion and an underground practice. It was not until hundred's of year's later, 5th cent. to the 7th cent., that the first vestiges of this church government rose where there was a Roman bishop as the head of the Church, making it an official Roman Church functioning similar to today's.

The foregoing digression notwithstanding, a test for inclusion in the New Testament, as quoted by McDowell, quoting Geisler and Nix, who agreed with Gaussen, Warfield, Hodge and most Protestants in that it was apostolic approval being the primary requirement and not merely apostolic authorship.

The earliest list of New Testament canon was presented by Athanasius of Alexandria (A.D. 303). That list contains the exact books presently contained in the New Testament. Subsequently, Jerome and Augustine defined the New Testament to be 27 books.

Polycarp (A.D. 115), Clement and others refer to Old and New Testament passages with phrases: "as it is said in these Scriptures." F. F. Bruce says of Irenaeus's writings: "[they] attest the canonical recognition of the 4-fold Gospel, Acts [of the Apostles], Romans, I & II Cor., Gal., Eph., Phil., Col., I & II Thess., I & II Tim., and Titus, of I Pt., I Jn., and the [Book of] Revelation." Moreover, Bruce says, "when at last at the Church Council - The Synod of Hippo (A.D. 393) - listed the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, it did not confer upon them any authority which they did not already possess, but simply recorded their previously established canonicity."