If it was the Scriptures that Jesus and the apostles used it would seem good enough for me.
It is interesting to me, the fact that the Jews themselves did not ultimately (emphasis mine) see fit to include those extra books in their Tanakh, yet the RCC did.
The question to respond to the question in resonse to the question is: "Why should the Jews determine Christian Scripture?" They made this decision after the time of Christ and possibly in reaction to their use by Christians.
If the Jews decide today to remove the book of Isaih shall we remove it?
"...that is the best I could do."
And so ends 2 Maccabees. Well, there is one more verse after that, but my point is that the author hardly seems divinely inspired to me.... I find it surprising that such description found its way into inspired text.
Ever read the verse where Paul specifically says he is NOT speaking for God? ("I, not the Lord say"). Yet that IS still Scripture.
The real question should be: If they were in there in the beginning and even in the original KJV/Authorized Version fifteen hundred years later... why take them out? Because the Jews had stopped using them more than a thousand years before? Or because some implied doctrinal texts don't match what you believe?
What do you think of changing Scripture to match what you believe... instead of the other way around?
Romans 3:1-2
"What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?
Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God."
The real question should be: If they were in there in the beginning and even in the original KJV/Authorized Version fifteen hundred years later... why take them out?
Because they weren't there in the beginning. You can't take out what wasn't there in the beginning.
Why was Jerome forced, kicking and screaming, forced to include them in the Latin Vulgate?
Where were they, and how were they labelled in the original KJV?
What meaning does the following have to you?
St. Jerome distinguished between canonical books and ecclesiastical books. The latter he judged were circulated by the Church as good spiritual reading but were not recognized as authoritative Scripture. The situation remained unclear in the ensuing centuries...For example, John of Damascus, Gregory the Great, Walafrid, Nicolas of Lyra and Tostado continued to doubt the canonicity of the deuterocanonical books. According to Catholic doctrine, the proximate criterion of the biblical canon is the infallible decision of the Church. This decision was not given until rather late in the history of the Church at the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent definitively settled the matter of the Old Testament Canon. That this had not been done previously is apparent from the uncertainty that persisted up to the time of Trent (The New Catholic Encyclopedia, The Canon).
But the New Testament doesn't quote the Apocrypha at all, to the best of my knowledge, so apparently it WASN'T good enough for them.
The question to respond to the question in resonse to the question is: "Why should the Jews determine Christian Scripture?" They made this decision after the time of Christ and possibly in reaction to their use by Christians.
First of all, because the first Christians were ALL JEWS. We got our Old Testament straight from them! And even though the Jews didn't officially close their canon until about the end of the first century AD, they never considered the Apocrypha inspired. The 39 books of the Jewish Tanakh were considered inspired, and the Apocrypha were considered important reading for history etc.
If the Jews decide today to remove the book of Isaih shall we remove it?
Of course not, and it is a moot question. They never would. We never would. There are many reasons why this is true, for example, there is too much New Testament derived from Isaiah - Jesus Himself quoted from Isaiah numerous times, and it is one of the most prophetic books in the entire OT.
Ever read the verse where Paul specifically says he is NOT speaking for God? ("I, not the Lord say"). Yet that IS still Scripture.
That's not the same thing. Because Paul clearly DOES speak for God elsewhere within the same epistle. The verse to which you refer is in 1 Corinthians 7, and the first chapter of that verse finds Paul saying things "in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ" and describing what God sent him to do. Chapter 2 begins with him "declaring the testimony of God."
Look at it this way - why do you think Paul felt it necessary to clarify at all, making sure they understood where that particular statement was coming from, unless he expected his audience to treat his words as teachings from the Lord?
The real question should be: If they were in there in the beginning and even in the original KJV/Authorized Version fifteen hundred years later... why take them out? Because the Jews had stopped using them more than a thousand years before? Or because some implied doctrinal texts don't match what you believe?
As previously stated, they weren't "in there" in the beginning. Therefore the Jews never "stopped using them" - the fact is, they never considered them as inspired from day one. It's not that they changed their minds. And I have no idea to what implied doctrinal texts you refer.