Who Is The Author Of Sacred Scripture?

The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC 105) explains;

God is the author of Sacred Scripture. “The divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of Sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.”

“For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.”

Since the written word of God was entrusted by Christ to the Church He founded, those books are to be venerated as divinely revealed which the Catholic Church recognizes as such. In the canonization of a saint, the Church’s declaration does not make a soul to be holy, it recognizes the holiness already there. Similarly, when we speak of “the canon” of Scripture, we speak of those books acknowledged to be inspired by God and thus the inerrant instruments designated by Providence for the salvation of men. Scripture, always taken together with and not apart from apostolic Tradition, conveys to us the mystery of salvation as God wishes to deliver it to us, although right understanding of such lofty content demands an authorized interpreter and, for those appointed to preach, careful study combined with holiness of life.

The fact that all the books of the Bible are inspired and inerrant does not, of course, make them all of equal importance. There is an order of precedence that both Jews and Christians acknowledge. The Pentateuch is the core, the heart, of the Old Testament; all other books are in some way related to it; much of the content of the prophets, for example, is a reminder to the people of what God has done for Israel and a call to repentance and renewed adherence to the Law. The Prophets come next in importance; finally the other writings, which vary considerably in origin, content, and style. Of the Old Testament books, Deuteronomy arguably holds the highest rank. In the New Testament a similar hierarchy can be perceived: the Gospels hold front rank, and among these, arguably John holds the highest place (the Acts of the Apostles may be linked with Luke’s Gospel as its intended continuation). Then follow the Epistles of St. Paul, and among these, the greater (both in length and in doctrinal content) are, by tradition, placed first. Next come the “catholic” or general epistles, so called because they are addressed not to specific churches but to the entire Church. Last in order, though not least in importance, is the Revelation to St. John, a book whose apocalyptic style is unique in the New Testament. In his inaugural sermon at the University of Paris in the year 1256, Thomas Aquinas presents the Book of Revelation as the point of arrival of the New Testament, for it speaks, in mystical language, of the ultimate end of the New Covenant, eternal life with God—depicted as the wedding of the Lamb and His Bride, the Church, a wedding already anticipated in this life in the one-flesh communion of Christians with the Eucharistic Lamb.