Many times Roman Catholics cite Protestants as not having the whole Old Testament. They are referring to a set of books called the Apocrypha and they were written between the final book of the Old Testament, Malachi, and the 1st Century AD. We are talking about a span of about 400 years. The books are called the apocryphal because no one knows indisputably who wrote them and the Jews themselves do not list them in their official list (canon) of inspired by God scripture. This set of books were apparently first written down in Greek while the other canonical Jewish scriptures are originally written in predominantly Hebrew with a smattering of Aramaic. The Apocrypha does contain similarities to the Old Testament. It contains histories that can be be validated from contemporaneous secular sources, poetry, wisdom literature, and additional chapters of Esther and Daniel. What I read was that when the 70 Jewish Scholars translated the Old Testament Scriptures into Greek bringing the Septuagint (which is the translation that we know Jesus, the Jews, the 1st Century church, and the 1st Century world used along with the Hebrew copies and exists today) into existence there were rules that were followed as to whether or not a book would be included or not. As I remember them they were were as follows:
1. It must have been inspired by God.
2. Prophetic books must have contained prophecy that they knew had come to pass.
3. The books must primarily be in Hebrew which is why the Greek portions of Esther and Daniel were ignored.
4. Not tainted by Hellenism (Greek thought and philosophy).
I may be missing others rules they followed but one criteria that amazed me is that just because a book is true isn't enough to make it scripture. Again, by definition, scripture is true but not all truth is scripture.
For example, in the Apocrypha, there are 2 or 4 books (depending on the edition you are reading) called the Maccabees that tells the story of how the Jews temporarily succeeded in revolting against the Greek conqueror Antiochus IV Epiphanes, king of Syria and overlord of Palestine in the 165 BC. Many aspects of the stories can be directly traced to the Bible and to history. Antiochus did indeed set up a statue of Zeus in the temple re-built by the returned Jewish exiles and tried to force the Jews to worship it. For a time, they fought and was able to rededicate the temple. It's celebrated today as Hannukuk. Antiochus is indeed one of the major Antichrists of history. His action of profaning the temple was prophesied in Daniel "the abomination the causes desolation" in Daniel 9:27;11:31;12:11. Here, as an aside, I must also point out that Daniel may have not only been talking about Anitochus because Jesus quoted Daniel in talking about eschalogical events (Matt 24:15; Mark 13:14) meaning that there is another "abomination that causes desolation" waiting to be revealed. Therefore I'm inclined to think that the Maccabees books are mostly historically accurate. Then why is it left out? Because although it is important and historical, it does not, tried as I might, equip one for service to God. There was nothing that I could see that helped me live a more holy life.
Another example: There are 3 more stories about Daniel in the Apocrypha. I think they were left out because I think they were suspected of not being true. The Daniel in these stories is not meek or humble as he is in the canonical stories. He seems rude and haughty even to king Darius whom is also in the Bible stories. I also saw nothing that fit the criteria for scripture that Paul gave Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:16,17. they also seemed "cleverly invented" to me.
There is also a book wise proverbs in the Apocrypha called Ecclesiasticus. Most of these proverbs are in the canonical Proverbs and Ecclesiastes which is fine. however some of them also contain Greek philosophy. I was alerted to this when i was studying what the Bible teaches on "free will". The Bible always teaches that we do have free will in that we do make choices that matter, however God's purposes win out. I will have to post more detail about this at a different time but my point is that I read Erasmus' essay from 500 years ago called On the Freedom of the Will and a verse from Ecclesiasticus was used to make his point that we do have free will, but because scripture is difficult to understand that is no way to know for sure. He used that verse because it emphatically says that we have free will. I admit that as a Protestant I immediately thought he lost the argument because he could not use any canonical scripture to agree with Ecclesiasticus fully. Martin Luther wrote a response to Erasmus' work soon after and ripped him apart (more on this in a different post). Ecclesiaticus is tainted. There is no verse in the Hebrew Bible that says our human will can over-rule God and what he wants to do.
As a final point on the Apocrypha there is a song that is said to have been sung by Azariah, one of the Daniel's friends who was thrown int the fiery furnace when he refused to worship an idol Nebuchadnezzar set up, praising God for his deliverance. I have no idea why it was left out of our canon. Also a prayer by King Manasseh of Judah that he prayed confessing his sins when he went into captivity and God heard him and delivered him. our cannon has the fact but not the prayer. I have no idea why this passage were left out either. What I know for sure I'm not going to be adding books into the Bible or taking them out.
If you haven't read the Apocrypha, and you are interested in this subject, you should read it. Just to calm you own fears that you may be missing something. You're not. God will give you the peace you need.
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