BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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You're just repeating your assertion. The evidence points to there only being one recognized Jewish canon. Cite your evidence to the contrary. As I already explained, even if the Sadducees did not recognize anything outside of the 5 books of Moses (Torah) as canon as some church fathers argued, their view of canon was proven wrong by Jesus himself, especially in verses like Luke 24:44 and others.

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This is incorrect. Jesus only quoted the Torah to the Sadducees because that's all they accepted. He was proving them incorrect using only the scripture they accepted.

Jesus was speaking to the Apostles in Luke 24:44. He was not proving the Sadducees wrong.

According to Marc Zvi Brettler, is an American biblical scholar, and the Bernice and Professor in Judaic Studies at Duke University, the Jewish scriptures outside the Torah and the Prophets were fluid, with different groups seeing authority in different books.

Here is a modern Jewish scholar that argues that mulitple canons existed

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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And again, the Septuagint was a collection of both Jewish canon AND non-canon. Therefore, Jesus and his apostles quoting the canonical parts of the Septuagint can not be taken as an endorsement by them of the Septuagint as a whole as being canonical. This is a faulty "canon by association" argument.

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No, YOU are claiming that they were non-canonical. The Septuagint was whole.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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A word about it changing in the 1600's only because of Martin Luther - you do realize the countless Roman Catholics throughout history, even popes, that strongly opposed the apocrypha as canon?

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Please cite Catholic sources that show that "popes, that strongly opposed the apocrypha as canon?"

The Council of Rome in A.D. 382, under Pope Damasus I, affirmed the inclusion of the deuterocanonical books.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Right, so the bible came from God, not the Church. The Church only recognized and preserved what was given by God.

Ask yourself this question: when did a book of the New Testament become the divinely inspired word of God? Was it right when it was being written? Or only after the Church decided it was?

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The NT was recognized as inspired over time through the discernment of the early Church, guided by the Holy Spirit.

The same Church that denounced the Arian Heresy (Nicaea - 325), Nestorianism and Pelagianism (Ephesus - 431), Monophysitism - (Chalcedon - 451), Monothelitism - Constantinople - 681), and others is the same Church that has affirmed the same ORIGINAL 73 book canon in multiple councils.

Are you finally agreeing that Protestants removed 7 books from the bible?

If so, by what authority should they do so considering the fact that they have always been included?

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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- Your point about Josephus is inconsequential; the fact remains that he reported what was considered canon by the Jews, and it did not include the deuterocanonicals. Please note that the original Septuagint did NOT contain the deuterocanon, and that the Septuagint gradually include books that were considered "useful" and didn't pay attention to what was necessarily "canonical" by the Jews. Thus, being in the Septuagint didn't necessarily make it part of canon.

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Please site a Jewish source that stated that the deuterocanon was NOT part of the original deuterocanon. I would like to learn when that was. IF, (big IF here, they were added, when? Would that have been during the time of Jesus or 100+ years before his birth.

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Is Josephus not Jewish enough for you?

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Philo, who wrote in the first century, never made mention of the three-part division and also quotes from Sirach and Wisdom.

As mentioned earlier, Josephus was part of the same Pharisee group that rejected Jesus.

Do you want to hang your hat with that group?

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Philo did in fact allude to the three-fold division of the Hebrew bible in his work De Vita Contemplativa. Again, him quoting from apocryphal books does not necessarily mean they were considered canon. The evidence points to the apocryphal books being considered by the Jews as edifying (and thus, quotable) but they were never considered canonical.

Your argument against Josephus is ad hominem. His rejection of Jesus does not in any way mean that his reporting of what the Jews held as canon is false. This is a logical fallacy. You asked for a Jewish source, and you got one, a notable Jewish historian. Whatever his beliefs about Jesus were have nothing to do with the veracity of the historical facts he reported.

Don't forget that Jesus himself was Jewish, and positively affirmed the 3-fold division of the Tanakh as God's word in whole. He never did the same for the Apocrypha, nor did he ever reference any of its books in the New Testament. This is the inescapable fact that is inconvenient for Roman Catholicism - the evidence bears that the Protestant Old Testament is positively affirmed by Jesus directly, whereas the Catholic one is not.

Also, consider that in Jubilees, which originated with the Jewish Essenes, the number of canonical books is cited at 22, the same number given by Josephus.

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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You're just repeating your assertion. The evidence points to there only being one recognized Jewish canon. Cite your evidence to the contrary. As I already explained, even if the Sadducees did not recognize anything outside of the 5 books of Moses (Torah) as canon as some church fathers argued, their view of canon was proven wrong by Jesus himself, especially in verses like Luke 24:44 and others.

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This is incorrect. Jesus only quoted the Torah to the Sadducees because that's all they accepted. He was proving them incorrect using only the scripture they accepted.

Jesus was speaking to the Apostles in Luke 24:44. He was not proving the Sadducees wrong.

According to Marc Zvi Brettler, is an American biblical scholar, and the Bernice and Professor in Judaic Studies at Duke University, the Jewish scriptures outside the Torah and the Prophets were fluid, with different groups seeing authority in different books.

Here is a modern Jewish scholar that argues that mulitple canons existed

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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And again, the Septuagint was a collection of both Jewish canon AND non-canon. Therefore, Jesus and his apostles quoting the canonical parts of the Septuagint can not be taken as an endorsement by them of the Septuagint as a whole as being canonical. This is a faulty "canon by association" argument.

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No, YOU are claiming that they were non-canonical. The Septuagint was whole.

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Jesus positively affirms that the Law, Prophets, and the Psalms (Hagiographa, aka Writings) are God's Word. If it were true that the Sadducees held only to the Torah as canon, as some Church fathers argued (incorrectly) then Jesus' affirmation of the other divisions of the Tanakh in the Gospels proves that the Sadducees' view of canon is wrong. This isn't incorrect, this is basic logic. You don't seem to understand the point being made here.

What is Brettler's evidence for his claim that the Hebrew canon was "fluid"? It is already known that within Judaism during the Second Temple period (about 500 BC - 70 AD) there was debate about the inspiration of certain books, such as Ezekiel, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs and Esther. The evidence shows that the Jews had a definitive, agreed upon canon; there was debate whether certain books in that canon should be removed due to them not being truly inspired, but there was no debate about whether books should be added. This isn't evidence of an "open" or "fluid" canon during this time, but rather that there was debate whether the canon should be even more exclusive, i.e. more "closed". Also keep in mind that "debate" about the canon did not necessarily mean there wasn't agreement about what the canon contained or that there were "different canons". The Council of Jamnia (around 75-117 AD) is alleged to have addressed such issues, and the resulting decision was pretty much to leave the canon the same as it was. And keep in mind through all this, that none of the debate ever involved the addition of the Apocrypha - the Jews simply never considered it canon, it just wasn't an issue.

Even the apocryphal books themselves support the the idea that a completed canon existed: Ecclesiasticus alludes to a 3-fold division Jewish canon that was complete and closed, and I Maccabees cites that there was "no prophet in Israel" after Micah, the last prophet in the Jewish canon.

The Septuagint was a project over a century in the making, with translations done by different groups of people, at various times, and at various locations. So the Septuagint likely didn't exist as a "whole" single bound source in Palestine during the time of Jesus. We don't really know what form it took place in this time and place. In fact, whatever parts of the Septuagint the Jews had during this time was probably on scrolls. And again - the Septuagint was not the Jewish canon. It included both Jewish canon as well as non-canon that the Jews still considered very important for edification and teaching.

The earliest existing manuscripts of "whole" Septuagints containing apocryphal books are from the 5th and 6th centuries AD, which are of Christian origin, not Jewish. It's interesting to note that these manuscripts all differed with respect to which apocryphal books were included. That brings up a lot of interesting questions itself.

I'm not the one claiming the apocrypha to be non-canonical. History shows that this was the unified view of the Jews themselves. And a very inconvenient fact for the Roman Catholic Church is that many of their own early church fathers, even a bishop of Rome (Gregory the Great), agreed!

Coke Bear said:

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Please make me understand how the Church for 16 centuries got the bible "wrong". The books were always in the bible.

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Shouldn't this be a question for the Catholic Church itself? Doesn't the list of canonized books from the Council of Trent differ from that of the Council of Laodicea? Many church fathers rejected the apocrypha as canon. So did pope Gregory the Great. The Glossa Ordinaria, the standard, authoritative reference of biblical commentaries used during the middles ages to train all theologians of the time taught that the apocrypha was not canon. The New Catholic Encyclopedia says of the Glossa Ordinaria: "So great was the influence of the Glossa ordinaria on Biblical and philosophical studies in the Middle Ages that it was called 'the tongue of Scripture' and 'the bible of scholasticism'.119" In this article, William Webster states "The importance of the Glossa ordinaria relative to the issue of the Apocrypha is seen from the statements in the Preface to the overall work. It repeats the judgment of Jerome that the Church permits the reading of the Apocryphal books only for devotion and instruction in manners, but that they have no authority for concluding controversies in matters of faith." Webster is talking about the preface to each of the books of the Apocrypha, which stated, "Here begins the book of Tobit which is not in the canon; here begins the book of Judith which is not in the canon'" and so forth.

Also, keep in mind the state of Judaism after 100ish A.D. The people left within that religion had crucified the Messiah and seen Him rise from the dead. Despite this, they continued to reject Him. Their temple was destroyed and their nation was destroyed, making it impossible to practice the rites of the Old Testament. They continued to reject Him.

They are not a group of people inclined to preserve things favorable to Him, things the Pharisees would consider...misinformation and disinformation.

Like this:

"Let us lie in ambush for the righteous man, because he is useless to us and opposes our deeds; he denounces us for our sins against the law and accuses us of sins against our upbringing. He claims to have knowledge of God, and he calls himself a child of the Lord. He has become for us as a refutation of our purposes; even seeing him is a burden to us, because his life is unlike that of others; for his paths go in a different direction. We are considered by him as a hybrid, and he avoids our ways as something immoral.

He considers the last things of the righteous as blessed and pretends that God is his Father. Let us see if his words are true, and let us put these last things to the test at the end of his life. For if the righteous man is a son of God, He will help him, and deliver him from the hand of those who oppose him.

Let us test him with insult and torture that we may know his gentleness and test his patient endurance. Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for there shall be a visitation because of his words."

- Wisdom 2:12-20

The prophecy fulfilled in Matthew 27:43.

This is why the scripture preserved by the Church that Christ founded, the Septuagint, is the correct canon. Not the abbreviated scriptures of a religion that rejects Him.

Realitybites said:

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Also, keep in mind the state of Judaism after 100ish A.D. The people left within that religion had crucified the Messiah and seen Him rise from the dead. Despite this, they continued to reject Him. Their temple was destroyed and their nation was destroyed, making it impossible to practice the rites of the Old Testament. They continued to reject Him.

They are not a group of people inclined to preserve things favorable to Him, things the Pharisees would consider...misinformation and disinformation.

Like this:

"Let us lie in ambush for the righteous man, because he is useless to us and opposes our deeds; he denounces us for our sins against the law and accuses us of sins against our upbringing. He claims to have knowledge of God, and he calls himself a child of the Lord. He has become for us as a refutation of our purposes; even seeing him is a burden to us, because his life is unlike that of others; for his paths go in a different direction. We are considered by him as a hybrid, and he avoids our ways as something immoral.

He considers the last things of the righteous as blessed and pretends that God is his Father. Let us see if his words are true, and let us put these last things to the test at the end of his life. For if the righteous man is a son of God, He will help him, and deliver him from the hand of those who oppose him.

Let us test him with insult and torture that we may know his gentleness and test his patient endurance. Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for there shall be a visitation because of his words."

- Wisdom 2:12-20

The prophecy fulfilled in Matthew 27:43.

This is why the scripture preserved by the Church that Christ founded, the Septuagint, is the correct canon. Not the abbreviated scriptures of a religion that rejects Him.

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I don't follow your reasoning here. If the Jews were motivated to not preserve prophecies favorable to Jesus due to his fulfillment of them, then why did they preserve Isaiah, Jeremiah, Psalms, Micah, Zechariah, Malachi, etc. and all the other places in their Scripture that represent a total of nearly 100 instances of fulfillment by Jesus?

In Luke chapter 24 the resurrected Jesus points out his fulfillment of Scripture when walking with two disciples on the road to Emmaus - "and beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." Jesus did not mention anything from the Apocrypha.

Please take the time to read this first post if you haven't yet thank you.

Because Judaism didn't want to remove all prophecies about a future messiah, just discredit Jesus specifically and CYA for their own behavior. Remember, they are still waiting for a messiah...its just that this "messiah" will be the Antichrist.

Here are just a few Jewish teachings about Jesus that prove that the Rabbinic tradition is not an accurate repository of the scriptures for the Christian Church after the end of the Old Covenant.

"Jesus the Nazarene performed sorcery, and he incited the masses, and subverted the masses, and caused the Jewish people to sin."
(Sotah 47a:14)

"Onkelos then went and raised Jesus the Nazarene from the grave through necromancy."
(Gittin 57a:3-4)

Jesus didn't specifically mention a lot of things. Are you a "red letter Christian", who rejects the apostleship of Paul and the inspiration of the epistles?

Because the New Testament quotes and references the Apocrypha many times:

https://dustoffthebible.com/Blog-archive/2019/09/17/does-the-new-testament-or-jesus-quote-from-the-apocryphal-books/

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Right, so the bible came from God, not the Church. The Church only recognized and preserved what was given by God.

Ask yourself this question: when did a book of the New Testament become the divinely inspired word of God? Was it right when it was being written? Or only after the Church decided it was?

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The NT was recognized as inspired over time through the discernment of the early Church, guided by the Holy Spirit.

The same Church that denounced the Arian Heresy (Nicaea - 325), Nestorianism and Pelagianism (Ephesus - 431), Monophysitism - (Chalcedon - 451), Monothelitism - Constantinople - 681), and others is the same Church that has affirmed the same ORIGINAL 73 book canon in multiple councils.

Are you finally agreeing that Protestants removed 7 books from the bible?

If so, by what authority should they do so considering the fact that they have always been included?

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So you agree that a written word is inspired by God the moment it was written, not when it was recognized by the Church, correct?

That would mean that God gave us the bible, not the Church.

Protestants didn't remove anything. Catholicism ADDED books that the Jews never considered canon, and Jesus never affirmed. The claim that the Roman Catholic Church is always influenced by the Holy Spirit comes into significant question by the accretion over time of unbiblical, even outright idolatrous beliefs and practices into Catholicism as has been pointed out and discussed before.

By what authority do we not include those seven books? By authority of Jesus Christ, who only affirmed the Law, Prophets, and Writings, and from whom the original apostolic tradition came. Jesus rules over his church. His true church follows him, not the traditions of man.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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By what authority do we not include those seven books? By authority of Jesus Christ, who only affirmed the Law, Prophets, and Writings, and from whom the original apostolic tradition came. Jesus rules over his church. His true church follows him, not the traditions of man.

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Unfortunately, you are using the traditions of 19th and 20th century men to exclude the canon of Old Testament used by Jesus and the Apostles and promote the 66 book Bible of the last ~ 100 years.

If the Roman Catholic church had added the Apocryphal books sometime in the last millennium, New Testament writers wouldn't have referenced them.

Realitybites said:

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Because Judaism didn't want to remove all prophecies about a future messiah, just discredit Jesus specifically and CYA for their own behavior. Remember, they are still waiting for a messiah...its just that this "messiah" will be the Antichrist.

Here are just a few Jewish teachings about Jesus that prove that the Rabbinic tradition is not an accurate repository of the scriptures for the Christian Church after the end of the Old Covenant.

"Jesus the Nazarene performed sorcery, and he incited the masses, and subverted the masses, and caused the Jewish people to sin."
(Sotah 47a:14)

"Onkelos then went and raised Jesus the Nazarene from the grave through necromancy."
(Gittin 57a:3-4)

Jesus didn't specifically mention a lot of things. Are you a "red letter Christian", who rejects the apostleship of Paul and the inspiration of the epistles?

Because the New Testament quotes and references the Apocrypha many times:

https://dustoffthebible.com/Blog-archive/2019/09/17/does-the-new-testament-or-jesus-quote-from-the-apocryphal-books/

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If the Jews didn't see Jesus in Isaiah 53, they're weren't going to see him in Wisdom 2. In fact, if you look here: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/wisdom/2 at the bottom, the notes say that Wisdom 2:12 - 5:23 draws heavily from the book of Isaiah.

Yes, I agree that anti-Jesus writings from Rabbinic tradition four to five centuries after Jesus would not be a good basis for Christian belief. But regarding what should be canon for Christians, we should look at what Jesus himself affirmed, which was the canon of the Jews during Jesus' time.

No, I do not reject original apostolic testimony, like from Paul. Paul even said that the Jews were "entrusted with the oracles of God" (Romans 9), further highlighting what Jesus himself had already affirmed.

Those New Testament passages may not necessarily quoting or referencing the Apocrypha, but rather expressing common ideas and expression at the time, or referencing similar passages in the Tanakh. Even so, the mere referencing of isolated portions of a book does not necessarily make that book Scripture. Does Jude referencing Enoch make Enoch scripture?

Realitybites said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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By what authority do we not include those seven books? By authority of Jesus Christ, who only affirmed the Law, Prophets, and Writings, and from whom the original apostolic tradition came. Jesus rules over his church. His true church follows him, not the traditions of man.

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Unfortunately, you are using the traditions of 19th and 20th century men to exclude the canon of Old Testament used by Jesus and the Apostles and promote the 66 book Bible of the last ~ 100 years.

If the Roman Catholic church had added the Apocryphal books sometime in the last millennium, New Testament writers wouldn't have referenced them.

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What part of Jesus personally affirming the Law, Prophets, and Writings, i.e. the Tanakh and NOT affirming anything from the Apocrypha makes you think this is a 19th-20th century idea?

The RCC DID add the Apocryphal books within the last millenium (Trent). Up until then, there was not a consensus within Roman Catholicism as to their canonicity. Are you reading any of my previous comments?

Paul even said that the Jews were "entrusted with the oracles of God" (Romans 9)

Indeed. Were. Past tense.

I've read everything you've written. I think the fundamental flaw in your thinking is that in rejecting the history of your own faith you try and grab onto Judaism without grasping the fundamental difference between the religion of Moses and David and what flies that banner after the crucifixion, resurrection, and destruction of the temple.

For the record, the Book of Enoch, the Book of Jubilees, the Book of Tobit, the Wisdom of Sirach, Psalms 152155, etc were found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, ultimately rejected by the Jews as scripture. So who took books out and who added them?

Realitybites said:

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Paul even said that the Jews were "entrusted with the oracles of God" (Romans 9)

Indeed. Were. Past tense.

I've read everything you've written. I think the fundamental flaw in your thinking is that in rejecting the history of your own faith you try and grab onto Judaism without grasping the fundamental difference between the religion of Moses and David and what flies that banner after the crucifixion, resurrection, and destruction of the temple.

For the record, the Book of Enoch, the Book of Jubilees, the Book of Tobit, the Wisdom of Sirach, Psalms 152155, etc were found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, ultimately rejected by the Jews as scripture. So who took books out and who added them?

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So the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God... but they didn't know what they were?

Rejecting the history of my own faith? What greater and more authoritative history of my own faith than original apostolic witness which revealed that Jesus himself affirmed the same 3-fold canon of Scripture, and who did not affirm anything from the Apocrypha?

Your view is that whatever was found in the Dead Sea Scrolls is automatically Scripture? Talk about fundamentally flawed thinking....

Quote:

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Jesus himself affirmed the same 3-fold canon of Scripture, and who did not affirm anything from the Apocrypha?

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We've already established that unless you are a liberal red letter Christian who rejects the epistles that this is a false argument. I know you reject the evidence presented to try and buttress the theological integrity of your abbreviated 20th century Bible, but pretty much any reader is going to clearly see the references to what you would consider apocryphal writings in that evidence.

You make the case that the Roman Catholic Church added the Apocrypha to the Bible at the Council of Trent Circa 1500 AD. If this was the case, then the remainder of Christendom which rejects the Council of Trent and is not in communion with the Roman Catholic Church would not consider the Apocrypha to be scripture.

Unfortunately, you're arguing a case that depends on ignoring the history of the faith, and when exposed to that history it does not hold up.

Especially if you're going to be a Sola Scriptura Christian, it behooves you to have the entire Scriptura and not an abbreviated edition created by the British Bible Society around 1900.

Get This KJV. Read the whole thing. Start there.

Realitybites said:

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Quote:

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Jesus himself affirmed the same 3-fold canon of Scripture, and who did not affirm anything from the Apocrypha?

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We've already established that unless you are a liberal red letter Christian who rejects the epistles that this is a false argument. I know you reject the evidence presented to try and buttress the theological integrity of your abbreviated 20th century Bible, but pretty much any reader is going to clearly see the references to what you would consider apocryphal writings in that evidence.

You make the case that the Roman Catholic Church added the Apocrypha to the Bible at the Council of Trent Circa 1500 AD. If this was the case, then the remainder of Christendom which rejects the Council of Trent and is not in communion with the Roman Catholic Church would not consider the Apocrypha to be scripture.

Unfortunately, you're arguing a case that depends on ignoring the history of the faith, and when exposed to that history it does not hold up.

Especially if you're going to be a Sola Scriptura Christian, it behooves you to have the entire Scriptura and not an abbreviated edition created by the British Bible Society around 1900.

Get This KJV. Read the whole thing. Start there.

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It's a false argument that Jesus affirmed the 3-fold canon of Jewish scripture and did not affirm anything from the Apocrypha?

Again, I ask - since Jude referenced Enoch, does that make Enoch Scripture?

You can reject Catholic councils and not be "in communion" with her, yet still hold to the same or similar errors.

The "history of the faith" contains many errors made by man. Should I be praying to Mary?

The fact remains that between us, one is consistent with the history of Jesus and original apostolic authorship, and one is not. If you truly believe the original apostles referenced the apocryphal books, then first answer my question about Enoch, and then offer up one of those passages from the NT that you think makes the strongest case that the NT authors referenced or quotes the apocrypha, and we'll discuss it.

Realitybites said:

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Quote:

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Jesus himself affirmed the same 3-fold canon of Scripture, and who did not affirm anything from the Apocrypha?

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Especially if you're going to be a Sola Scriptura Christian, it behooves you to have the entire Scriptura and not an abbreviated edition created by the British Bible Society around 1900.

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This shows that you don't know the "history of the faith" that you are accusing me of rejecting. Church history is replete with church fathers, theologians, bible translators, a pope, and a major reference work that all reject the Apocrypha as canon.

Can someone give an accurate description of how the Apocryphal writings were added to Scripture or if they were there all along, but were understood nit to be inspired? From what I have heard, even the person who added them admitted that they were not inspired.

xfrodobagginsx said:

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Can someone give an accurate description of how the Apocryphal writings were added to Scripture or if they were there all along, but were understood nit to be inspired? From what I have heard, even the person who added them admitted that they were not inspired.

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The belief that the Apocrypha was part of canon likely began with the Alexandrian Christians who were in North Africa during the time of Augustine (4th century). Augustine believed the Septuagint, which originated in Alexandria and contained the Apocrypha, was canon Scripture. However, Jerome disagreed with him, because he lived in Palestine with the Jews, from where Christianity first originated, and being able to speak and read Hebrew he learned from the Jewish people there that the Apocrypha, while considered important, was never considered canon. Augustine could not read or speak Hebrew, and he based his belief more on tradition than actually investigating the matter for himself, like Jerome did.

So was Augustine's position a result of addition, or was Jerome's position subtraction? Well, we can actually compare them to the earliest historical evidence of what the early Christians considered Old Testament canon - Melito's canon and the Bryennios list, dated 200 years before the time of Jerome and Augustine. Neither list included the Apocrypha. This would make Jerome's position more in line with the earliest known history of the church.

CokeBear, you said history isn't on my side, and Realitybites, you said I'm rejecting the history of my faith. I'm wondering if you still feel this way.

If so, then how do you square that with the fact that the earliest known references to a list of Old Testament canon by the early Christian church, Melito's canon and Bryennios' list, do not include the Apocrypha?

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So you agree that a written word is inspired by God the moment it was written, not when it was recognized by the Church, correct?

That would mean that God gave us the bible, not the Church.

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God gave the Church all 73 books of the bible. Church complied the books the books and gave them to the world.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Protestants didn't remove anything. Catholicism ADDED books that the Jews never considered canon, and Jesus never affirmed. The claim that the Roman Catholic Church is always influenced by the Holy Spirit comes into significant question by the accretion over time of unbiblical, even outright idolatrous beliefs and practices into Catholicism as has been pointed out and discussed before.

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This is FALSE. Many Jews of Jesus time DID consider the deuterocanon as canon.

Idolatrous beliefs - Another ad hominem attack and false understanding.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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By what authority do we not include those seven books? By authority of Jesus Christ, who only affirmed the Law, Prophets, and Writings, and from whom the original apostolic tradition came. Jesus rules over his church. His true church follows him, not the traditions of man.

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The deuterocanon is considered part of the Writings. You don't accept that.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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xfrodobagginsx said:

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Can someone give an accurate description of how the Apocryphal writings were added to Scripture or if they were there all along, but were understood nit to be inspired? From what I have heard, even the person who added them admitted that they were not inspired.

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The belief that the Apocrypha was part of canon likely began with the Alexandrian Christians who were in North Africa during the time of Augustine (4th century). Augustine believed the Septuagint, which originated in Alexandria and contained the Apocrypha, was canon Scripture. However, Jerome disagreed with him, because he lived in Palestine with the Jews, from where Christianity first originated, and being able to speak and read Hebrew he learned from the Jewish people there that the Apocrypha, while considered important, was never considered canon. Augustine could not read or speak Hebrew, and he based his belief more on tradition than actually investigating the matter for himself, like Jerome did.

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This is, once again, a misrepresentation of the truth. St. jerome could not find Hebrew copies of the deuterocanon. Even so, he was obedient to the Church and had them translated and included into the bible.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So was Augustine's position a result of addition, or was Jerome's position subtraction? Well, we can actually compare them to the earliest historical evidence of what the early Christians considered Old Testament canon - Melito's canon and the Bryennios list, dated 200 years before the time of Jerome and Augustine. Neither list included the Apocrypha. This would make Jerome's position more in line with the earliest known history of the church.

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St. Jerome NEVER subtracted them. He included them. The Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, always included them.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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CokeBear, you said history isn't on my side, and Realitybites, you said I'm rejecting the history of my faith. I'm wondering if you still feel this way.

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You can keep misrepresenting history doesn't make your argument factual.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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If so, then how do you square that with the fact that the earliest known references to a list of Old Testament canon by the early Christian church, Melito's canon and Bryennios' list, do not include the Apocrypha?

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You failed to mention that Melito's canon INCLUDED Wisdom and EXCLUDED Ester, Nehemiah, and Lamentations.

Bryennios List also contains the Didache, which describes the proper way to baptize, the Eucharist, and the three-fold hierarchy of the Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.

A discussion about 1 Enoch could spark its own thread. What is clear about that book is this:

(1) Enoch (the seventh from Adam) was not the actual author.
(2) It was written sometime before Jude (which quotes it), and after Deuteronomy (which it quotes).
(3) It was among the manuscripts found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
(4) The early church was familiar with it. Some church fathers thought it was inspired, most did not. Some thought it was inspired and then changed their minds. Most Christian canons reject its inspiration, but the Ethopian canon (and I believe the Copts) still do include it.

It probably contains some truth mixed with falsehood, and I do not believe that it is an inspired work. More importantly, it was the consensus of most of the church fathers that it was not and that is why it is not scripture, not my personal opinion about it 2000 years later.

Prior to 1629, all English-language Bibles included the Old Testament, the Apocrypha. The abridged 66 Book Bible was not in common use until The British and Foreign Bible Society shortened its bibles published in English in 1804. So we can have a discussion about sola scriptura but anyone taking that viewpoint shouldn't be using a 200 year old bible to make the case.

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So you agree that a written word is inspired by God the moment it was written, not when it was recognized by the Church, correct?

That would mean that God gave us the bible, not the Church.

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God gave the Church all 73 books of the bible. Church complied the books the books and gave them to the world.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Protestants didn't remove anything. Catholicism ADDED books that the Jews never considered canon, and Jesus never affirmed. The claim that the Roman Catholic Church is always influenced by the Holy Spirit comes into significant question by the accretion over time of unbiblical, even outright idolatrous beliefs and practices into Catholicism as has been pointed out and discussed before.

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This is FALSE. Many Jews of Jesus time DID consider the deuterocanon as canon.

Idolatrous beliefs - Another ad hominem attack and false understanding.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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By what authority do we not include those seven books? By authority of Jesus Christ, who only affirmed the Law, Prophets, and Writings, and from whom the original apostolic tradition came. Jesus rules over his church. His true church follows him, not the traditions of man.

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The deuterocanon is considered part of the Writings. You don't accept that.

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Right - GOD gave the world the Bible.

What is your evidence that many Jews of Jesus' time considered the deuterocanon as canon?

What is your evidence that the deuterocanon was considered part of the Writings?

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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xfrodobagginsx said:

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Can someone give an accurate description of how the Apocryphal writings were added to Scripture or if they were there all along, but were understood nit to be inspired? From what I have heard, even the person who added them admitted that they were not inspired.

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The belief that the Apocrypha was part of canon likely began with the Alexandrian Christians who were in North Africa during the time of Augustine (4th century). Augustine believed the Septuagint, which originated in Alexandria and contained the Apocrypha, was canon Scripture. However, Jerome disagreed with him, because he lived in Palestine with the Jews, from where Christianity first originated, and being able to speak and read Hebrew he learned from the Jewish people there that the Apocrypha, while considered important, was never considered canon. Augustine could not read or speak Hebrew, and he based his belief more on tradition than actually investigating the matter for himself, like Jerome did.

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This is, once again, a misrepresentation of the truth. St. jerome could not find Hebrew copies of the deuterocanon. Even so, he was obedient to the Church and had them translated and included into the bible.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So was Augustine's position a result of addition, or was Jerome's position subtraction? Well, we can actually compare them to the earliest historical evidence of what the early Christians considered Old Testament canon - Melito's canon and the Bryennios list, dated 200 years before the time of Jerome and Augustine. Neither list included the Apocrypha. This would make Jerome's position more in line with the earliest known history of the church.

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St. Jerome NEVER subtracted them. He included them. The Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, always included them.

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- Which part is the misrepresentation? Jerome lived in Bethlehem during the time he was translating the Vulgate. He lived in a monastery there. He knew the Hebrew language. His unique position allowed him to ascertain that the Church there did not consider the Apocrypha as canon. If he could not find any Hebrew copies of the Apocrypha, wouldn't that support the point that the Jews did not consider it canon Scripture?

- If the Church always included them, then why did Jerome's influence continue, to where the majority of major theologians during his time and thereafter continue to hold to his position, that the Apocrypha was not canon? Why did the major reference work during the middle ages, the Glossa Ordinaria, teach that it wasn't canon? And the point remains, which you still haven't addressed, that the Council of Laodicea recognized a different canon than was recognized in later councils, one that did NOT include the Apocrypha...."always included them"?

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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CokeBear, you said history isn't on my side, and Realitybites, you said I'm rejecting the history of my faith. I'm wondering if you still feel this way.

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You can keep misrepresenting history doesn't make your argument factual.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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If so, then how do you square that with the fact that the earliest known references to a list of Old Testament canon by the early Christian church, Melito's canon and Bryennios' list, do not include the Apocrypha?

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You failed to mention that Melito's canon INCLUDED Wisdom and EXCLUDED Ester, Nehemiah, and Lamentations.

Bryennios List also contains the Didache, which describes the proper way to baptize, the Eucharist, and the three-fold hierarchy of the Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.

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What historical facts that I've mentioned is a misrepresentation? And how does your argument that they're "misrepresentations" do anything to change the clear historical fact that the Church did not always include the Apocrypha as canon, as I've clearly demonstrated?

There is a debate as to whether "Wisdom" in Melito's canon refers to the book of Proverbs - "F.F. Bruce: "According to Eusebius, Hegessipus and Irenaeus and many other writers of their day called the Proverbs of Solomon 'the all-virtuous Wisdom'.

Also, it is possible that Nehemiah was included in Ezra, and Lamentations was part of Jeremiah. There is an argument that Esther was excluded by mistake (read here: https://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2010/05/melito-of-sardis-and-old-testament.html)

So do you concede, then, that the earliest known lists of Old Testament canon in church history did NOT contain the Apocrypha (save Wisdom, which is debatable) thus showing that your claim that the church always included the Apocrypha is wrong?

Realitybites said:

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A discussion about 1 Enoch could spark its own thread. What is clear about that book is this:

(1) Enoch (the seventh from Adam) was not the actual author.
(2) It was written sometime before Jude (which quotes it), and after Deuteronomy (which it quotes).
(3) It was among the manuscripts found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
(4) The early church was familiar with it. Some church fathers thought it was inspired, most did not. Some thought it was inspired and then changed their minds. Most Christian canons reject its inspiration, but the Ethopian canon (and I believe the Copts) still do include it.

It probably contains some truth mixed with falsehood, and I do not believe that it is an inspired work. More importantly, it was the consensus of most of the church fathers that it was not and that is why it is not scripture, not my personal opinion about it 2000 years later.

Prior to 1629, all English-language Bibles included the Old Testament, the Apocrypha. The abridged 66 Book Bible was not in common use until The British and Foreign Bible Society shortened its bibles published in English in 1804. So we can have a discussion about sola scriptura but anyone taking that viewpoint shouldn't be using a 200 year old bible to make the case.

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So you agree, then, that mere reference or allusion to a book by the New Testament is NOT necessarily an indicator or proof of its canonicity?

"...it was the consensus of most of the church fathers that it was not and that is why it is not scripture, not my personal opinion about it 2000 years later." - and so why not do the same for the Apocrypha, given the earliest historical evidence that's been presented?

And so it's now ENGLISH bibles your narrowing your argument to, now that early Church history does not square with your argument? So who's the one "rejecting the history of their faith" now?

Human hierarchies lead to many sins.

False. Human nature and concupiscence lead to sin.

Does your church have one central pastor, and a group underneath him that support his mission?

Order a bunch of you just gather together on Sunday in a strip mall and take turns reading the KJV?

All human organizations have to have structure and hierarchy to survive.

The fact that the Church has survived for 2000 years, despite its failings of many leaders is one of the reasons that shows that it comes from Jesus.

Popes were and are a bad idea.

Power corrupts

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So do you concede, then, that the earliest known lists of Old Testament canon in church history did NOT contain the Apocrypha (save Wisdom, which is debatable) thus showing that your claim that the church always included the Apocrypha is wrong?

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As has been explained to you, that canon had several books that were not accepted by the church fathers as inspired. You're trying to make this argument from the perspective that the 66 book Bible was handed down on stone tablets by Jesus, while in reality it has only existed since 1804.

As far as English Bibles, we're discussing the reduction of the length of the English Bible from the original to its present 66 book form in 1804. Even in English, prior to 1804, even protestant Bibles had accepted Christian canon. As far as Spanish, the 1569 edition of the Biblia del Oso had the deuterocanonical books. The Ethopian Bible has more to this day. Of course the Vulgate, and the Septuagint from which it came have more.

Having some of the Bible is better than having none. A Gideon's New Testament is better than nothing, a 66 book KJV is better than a Gideon's New Testament, and a complete Bible is better than the 66 abbreviated edition.

Realitybites said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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So do you concede, then, that the earliest known lists of Old Testament canon in church history did NOT contain the Apocrypha (save Wisdom, which is debatable) thus showing that your claim that the church always included the Apocrypha is wrong?

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As has been explained to you, that canon had several books that were not accepted by the church fathers as inspired. You're trying to make this argument from the perspective that the 66 book Bible was handed down on stone tablets by Jesus, while in reality it has only existed since 1804.

As far as English Bibles, we're discussing the reduction of the length of the English Bible from the original to its present 66 book form in 1804. Even in English, prior to 1804, even protestant Bibles had accepted Christian canon. As far as Spanish, the 1569 edition of the Biblia del Oso had the deuterocanonical books. The Ethopian Bible has more to this day. Of course the Vulgate, and the Septuagint from which it came have more.

Having some of the Bible is better than having none. A Gideon's New Testament is better than nothing, a 66 book KJV is better than a Gideon's New Testament, and a complete Bible is better than the 66 abbreviated edition.

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Without trying to strawman my argument, can't you just give an answer to the question?