Reasons for Rejecting the Apocrypha or Deutero-Canonical TextsPrior to reading further on in this post it is important that you first read this. Protestants and Catholics disagree on a number of doctrines, most of which are secondary in nature. While these issues are strong enough to cause a number of denominations to develop out of the Reformation, it should only be for the purpose of kindling better relationships with the one true catholic church which is all Christians united under Christ. Doctrines such as the canon of Scripture which I am about to discuss are of major importance, but they should not take priority over our fellowship and unity with brothers and sisters in Christ. “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread,” (1 Corinthians 10:16-17, ESV). We are all united under Christ into the body of believers which make up the one true church.
“We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,With that said, our divide ought to come to an end. We need to cooperate, Protestant and Catholic, in order to share the Gospel which is that Christ was born fully man and fully God, lived a perfect and righteous life taking on flesh to die as the ultimate sacrifice for our sins, and was resurrected on the third day taking the final victory over sin and death so that we might be saved. That is the essential Gospel. Christ is our High Priest, he is our Lord and King, and he is the ultimate Sacrificial Lamb.
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.”
But let’s not pretend disagreements do not exist. The Doctrine of the Canon of Scripture is important. If we are honest with ourselves, then we would agree that God’s Word is of utmost importance because through it we are able to know Christ and the Gospel. But, we must also be forthright with this doctrine because where Protestants and Catholics disagree on the canonicity of Scripture does not affect what we view as the Gospel of Christ.
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| Taken from Norman Geisler's Systematic Theology in One Volume. |
Protestants believe there are 39 books in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament, totaling 66 books in all. The Roman Catholic Church, in 1546, made an official statement at the Council of Trent that they recognize the same 66 books in the Protestant Bible plus an additional 11, 4 of which were added to other books in the Protestant and Jewish Bible and 7 which are separate. For the sake of time I will not give the RCC apologetic for the Apocrypha/Deutero-Canonical texts as Scripture because they will be present in my rejections of their claims.
Reasons for rejecting additional books to the Old Testament:
Reasons for rejecting additional books to the Old Testament:
1. While Jesus and the Apostles referenced Scripture from nearly every book in the Old Testament, they never reference the Apocrypha nor do they claim it was canonical. Even when the Apocrypha may be alluded to by Jesus or his Apostles, they never begin their phrases as they do when quoting Scripture by saying phrases like “thus says the Lord” or “as it is written” or “the Scriptures says.”
2. The Greek Old Testament (Septuagint/LXX) may contain the apocryphal writings, but this does not mean they were inspired as Scripture. Matter of fact, it is not even certain that the LXX of the first century AD even contained these books. Our earliest manuscript evidence of the LXX containing the Apocrypha dates from the fourth century AD.
3. The use of early church fathers in support of canonicity of the Apocrypha is misleading for two reasons: (1) In many cases the early church fathers who used the Apocrypha were not actually claiming divine inspiration or canonicity of them, rather they were just citing a book as we would any other book today; (2) A great number of early church fathers were vehemently opposed to considering Apocrypha as the inspired, divine word of God (Athanasius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Origen, and St. Jerome the early church biblical scholar and translator of the Latin Vulgate).
4. The RCC claims scenes from the catacombs justify use of the apocryphal writings as sacred scripture, yet all these scenes do at best is regard them as relevant literature; in other words, these scenes do not depict the apocryphal writings as divinely inspired.
5. Not all manuscripts of the LXX contain the apocryphal writings and none contain the same list of apocryphal books as approved by the Council of Trent.
6. Early church councils do not support the apocryphal writings as scripture for several because these were local councils without binding authority and there is no infallible way to know which statements by popes are infallible and which are not.
7. The apocryphal writings are not under the authority of the Christian church to decide their canonicity.
8. The early church councils may not have accepted the same books in each case and there is no way to prove they did.
9. Augustine’s authority is ill-founded because his biblical scholar was Jerome, he recognized that the Jews did not accept these books as scripture, he only justified them being in Scripture because of their mention of “extreme an wonderful suffering of certain martyrs;”
10. Augustine later acknowledged Jerome as a superior biblical scholar and preferred Jerome’s Hebrew text over the LXX.
11. The Council of Rome (AD 382) listed different books than the Councils of Hippo and Carthage.
12. The Greek Orthodox Church has not always accepted the apocryphal writings as scripture.
13. The decision to include them came 1500 years after the books were written.
14. The Council of Trent’s decision was made out of a response to the Martin Luther and the Reformation as an attempt to justify certain doctrines lacking biblical basis.
15. Apocryphal books in Protestant bibles prior to the Reformation were placed separately from the Old and New Testaments.
16. Though there were apocryphal manuscripts found in the caves of the Qumran community, only canonical books, not the Apocrypha, were found in the special parchment and script, indicating the Essenes did not view these books as scripture.
Geisler, Norman. Systematic Theology in One Volume. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2011.
2. The Greek Old Testament (Septuagint/LXX) may contain the apocryphal writings, but this does not mean they were inspired as Scripture. Matter of fact, it is not even certain that the LXX of the first century AD even contained these books. Our earliest manuscript evidence of the LXX containing the Apocrypha dates from the fourth century AD.
3. The use of early church fathers in support of canonicity of the Apocrypha is misleading for two reasons: (1) In many cases the early church fathers who used the Apocrypha were not actually claiming divine inspiration or canonicity of them, rather they were just citing a book as we would any other book today; (2) A great number of early church fathers were vehemently opposed to considering Apocrypha as the inspired, divine word of God (Athanasius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Origen, and St. Jerome the early church biblical scholar and translator of the Latin Vulgate).
4. The RCC claims scenes from the catacombs justify use of the apocryphal writings as sacred scripture, yet all these scenes do at best is regard them as relevant literature; in other words, these scenes do not depict the apocryphal writings as divinely inspired.
5. Not all manuscripts of the LXX contain the apocryphal writings and none contain the same list of apocryphal books as approved by the Council of Trent.
6. Early church councils do not support the apocryphal writings as scripture for several because these were local councils without binding authority and there is no infallible way to know which statements by popes are infallible and which are not.
7. The apocryphal writings are not under the authority of the Christian church to decide their canonicity.
8. The early church councils may not have accepted the same books in each case and there is no way to prove they did.
9. Augustine’s authority is ill-founded because his biblical scholar was Jerome, he recognized that the Jews did not accept these books as scripture, he only justified them being in Scripture because of their mention of “extreme an wonderful suffering of certain martyrs;”
10. Augustine later acknowledged Jerome as a superior biblical scholar and preferred Jerome’s Hebrew text over the LXX.
11. The Council of Rome (AD 382) listed different books than the Councils of Hippo and Carthage.
12. The Greek Orthodox Church has not always accepted the apocryphal writings as scripture.
13. The decision to include them came 1500 years after the books were written.
14. The Council of Trent’s decision was made out of a response to the Martin Luther and the Reformation as an attempt to justify certain doctrines lacking biblical basis.
15. Apocryphal books in Protestant bibles prior to the Reformation were placed separately from the Old and New Testaments.
16. Though there were apocryphal manuscripts found in the caves of the Qumran community, only canonical books, not the Apocrypha, were found in the special parchment and script, indicating the Essenes did not view these books as scripture.
Geisler, Norman. Systematic Theology in One Volume. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2011.
Hello Stuart,
ReplyDeleteI assume this is the response you mentioned in the previous combox.
While I appreciate the idea that Catholics and Protestants need to unite, the truth is that there are critical doctrines that both sides consider too important to let slide.
In response to your reasons for rejecting the Deutero Canonical Books, here are my thoughts corresponding to your numbered arguments:
1) Why can Jesus and the Apostles not reference some OT books you accept but if they fail to reference the DC books then this makes only the the DC uninspired? That's not a fair or valid argument.
2) Any copy of the LXX containing the DC books is evidence favoring their inclusion rather than favoring non-inclusion. At the very least it implies the doctrines taught are not heretical, even if uninspired.
3) The use of the DC by the Church Fathers is a big subject to cover, so to be brief I'll say the following: I know of not a single CF that went by the "Protestant Canon". Some clearly included the DC (e.g. Augustine), and the only Councils I'm aware of that mention the Canon clearly include the DC. Most CFs did not list the canon, so when they do quote the DC, especially among other accepted books, it's safe to claim they saw it as inspired. For example, one of the earliest CF testimonies out there is St Clement of Alexandria's Epistle to Corinth dated from 90 AD. In that Epistle, Clement quotes the holy woman of God, Judith (quoting the DC book of Judith) right along side Esther as two examples Christians should follow.
4) I've not heard of this argument, but I don't see it as proof either way.
5) I'd say this is the same issue addressed in #2.
6) This is an inaccurate statement. The earliest councils addressing the issue of the canon did include the DC books (e.g. Carthage); no council ever used the Protestant canon. The earliest ones were local councils as opposed to ecumenical, but they still testify none the less.
7) This is an odd argument and not one I consider valid. Are you aware there were some of the 27 NT books considered "apocrypha" by some (e.g. Revelation)? If so, then that puts you in a bind based on #7.
8) This is a matter of consulting the available evidence. If Early Council X says Judith and Romans are Scripture and Early Council Y says Judith and Romans are Scripture, it is possible each council had a different "Judith" and "Romans" in mind, but there is no reason to think they did.
(cont)
9) Augustine's explicit criteria for determining the canon was to examine the lists offered by long standing regional churches. In his mind, if old church X had the DC on the list, then that was a good testimony to base the decision on. Augustine never said a book is inspired simply because it contains martyrdom.
ReplyDelete10) This is a historic and factual error.
11) I've seen no proof that this is so; just the opposite.
12) The Eastern Orthodox have had various canons, so this isn't proof either way. For a while the East had doubts about the Book of Revelation.
13) This is an ambiguous claim. The "decision" to include a canon that was always accepted is not a mark of novelty.
14) The Council of Trent was done because Luther started throwing out books from both the Old and New Testament. Luther wanted James, 2Peter, Jude, and Hebrews placed in Apocrypha status. Luther's philosophy was that each Protestant gets to decide what books are Scripture and which are not.
15) True, and Protestant bibles kept the Apocrypha precisely because historically those books were included in Bibles. Only within the last 150 years did Protestant publishers systematically exclude the Apocrypha from modern Bibles. That's revisionist history on the part of Protestants, and most are unaware of it.
16) This is a historical and factual error.
If a Christian is to go by "Scripture Alone," then this includes determining the Canon by Scripture Alone, yet none of the arguments you presented do this. That's the problem with Sola Scriptura - it's a doctrine that makes claims it cannot substantiate.
Simply stating something is false is not proof that you are right or that the statement is false. The same goes for history. For the statements that you were unaware of, I took these from Catholic defenses of the DC and responded to them only.
ReplyDeleteIn order to argue against sola scriptura, you must denigrate Scripture as God breathed and all evidences that the Protestant Bible as God's Word. Since we do not have any books in our Scripture that you all claim is non-canonical, the proof of burden lies on you.
I have a couple of questions. First, how does the RCC establish justification for tradition being equally authoritative with the written tradition? The other questions will be follow up.
Hello Stuart,
ReplyDeleteI did not intent to not substantiate anything I said; if you want proof, please ask. At the same time, I believe you'd do the same for any claims you make.
Also, I have never had the intention of "denigrating" Scripture. Saying Sola Scriptura is unbiblical is not denigrating Scripture. I have not seen any substantial proof for the Protestant canon, particularly any arguments from Scripture.
The justification for tradition being equal with scripture is the fact the "Word of God" was originally only orally preached (1 THESS 2:13). Later, some of the Word of God was written down, some of it remained orally transmitted, which is why Paul says to hold onto both (2 Thess 2:15).