Canon List Disclosure Register

PROBLEM: The list of books in the Bible was fixed by different authorities at different times — Athanasius's Festal Letter 39 (AD 367) is the earliest surviving list naming exactly the 27 New Testament books; the regional councils of Hippo (393) and Carthage (397, 419) listed 73 books; the Council of Trent (April 8, 1546) defined the Catholic canon at 73 with an anathema on denial; the Protestant canon of 66 was fixed by confession (Thirty-Nine Articles, 1563/1571; Westminster Confession, 1647). No single council closed the canon for all Christians, and the lists are still cited without their dates, authorities, or scope — so claims about "the" canon are routinely made with no record of which list, decided by whom, and for whom.

SOLUTION: An IBM Cloud Ideas compliance improvement that maintains a canon-list disclosure register: every historical canon list logged with its date, authoring authority, scope (regional, confessional, or ecumenical), the books it includes and excludes, and the source text, so any claim about the canon can be checked against the list it actually rests on.

EVIDENCE BASIS: DOCUMENTED — Athanasius, Festal Letter 39 (AD 367), first surviving list of exactly the 27 NT books (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd series, vol. 4); Hippo 393 / Carthage 397, 419 (73 books, regional councils); Trent, Session IV, April 8, 1546, Decree Concerning the Canonical Scriptures (73 books, anathema on denial); Thirty-Nine Articles Art. VI (1563/1571); Westminster Confession ch. 1 (1647).