[Invincibly Ignorant]

"The Church" collected and preserved the Christian Scriptures. No matter how one defines" The Church,"the Canon was only gradually finalized. Not until the 13th Century was the entire Bible published and widely distributed in the format we know. As you correctly point out, the first churches were synagogues and the "Old Testament"books were therefore the first Scriptuire available to all. It was probably decades before Christians everywhere got to look at what we call the New Testament. It took even longer to decide which of the many Christian writings were authentic.

Ok. Are we like in the middle of some discussion I'm unaware of?

[RobbyS]

You argue that the notion of hierarchy in the Church is wrong. I am simply saying that this is immaterial. Whether early church government was congregational or hierarchial, we--humanly speaking-- owe to those Christians the Holy Scriptures.