'The Nativity Story' Movie Problematic for Catholics, "Unsuitable" for Young Children

My post was about past teaching, and I included quotes from Aquinas and Augustine as evidence. Today, I would say elements within the church are all over the map. The official teaching is probably different from Aquinas and Augustine.

Luther didn't throw any canonical books out. The Roman Catholic church added them to the Canon at Trent. "As the Church reads the books of Judith and Tobit and Maccabees but does not receive them among the canonical Scriptures, so also it reads Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus for the edification of the people, not for the authoritative confirmation of doctrine."
Jerome
Jerome's preface to the books of Solomon

I'm sorry, I try hard to let each person state their own positions and not distort them. My apologies.

We still have a difference on what is "secondary." I disagree with that what God "does" is not essential. I think your support of much of Calvin is an essential difference with, say, Orthodox Lutherans.

I think the view of God you describe is closer to pre-Moses than it is to post-Christ, and that is a very essential difference with Christian Orthodoxy.

As for the other questions, they were answered sufficiently. I would that I could ask if you agreed with Luther on the Peasants War or on burning down Jew's houses, etc..

Apologies again for any offense not in the spirit of courteous, yet passionate, discussion and debate.

thanks for your reply...

"She called Jesus her savior. If she were without sin, then she would be without a need for a savior."

The reason Mary is without sin is because of Christ. She did not make herself sinless. You know that. Catholics know that. When you do not sin (or any other human for that matter), is it you who causes that purity? Mary was and is without sin because God graced her with that condition and reality. God is her savior. Christ is God. Mary did not save herself or remain sinless by her own power.

Had Mary accomplished even half the things you falsely assume Catholic's believe and teach, we would have to worship Mary. We don't. But I do see clearly that you were taught that we worship Mary. And by your words I see clearly that you believe we worship Mary, even when we tell you we don't. Thank God our faith is not based on what you believe about us. If that were the case, we'd be lost.

And at this point I have come to understand that you need to find and attack untrue Catholic "windmills" that do not exist. I respect your right to do so, as I respect my son's right to play PlayStation games.

Could you have chosen otherwise?

This is always a weird question in my mind. How can you possibly choose God without faith? And if God gives you faith to choose God, then won't you choose Him because you have faith?

Essentially what you (and others) deny is that God gives you faith to choose Him.

What I meant about what God "does" specifically regarding Arminian "light" which is what most Arminians are as opposed to Pelagian, was whether one believes that God chose one as opposed to one choosing God doesn't NECESSARILY affect one's salvation. I have many non-Calvinist friends. It's really okay that they don't view Scripture the way I do. They have come to Christ and trust in Him alone for their salvation. The latter is essential. The former is not.

As to agreeing with Luther on the peasant war etc., I agree with him no more on that than you do the Popes. Luther wasn't acting out of sola scriptura there. He was being a product of the Middle Ages which he was on the heels of. Nothing in Scripture says burn the houses of those who disagree with the gospel.

I do appreciate our dialog. You are not discourteous. We are having a discussion. We disagree, but can certainly be civil about it. I do not demand you come to see things my way. I wouldn't. I point you towards Scripture, for that is what I believe. But, if you decide to go with tradition we can still dialog with a spirit of civility. That is impossible for some posters I have run into.

"elements within the church are all over the map. The official teaching is probably different from Aquinas and Augustine."

The official Church teaching is not exactly Aquinas or Augustine, yet the history includes their thoughts and teachings. See Humanae Vitae, Love and Responsibility and Theology of the Body and B16's latest Deus Caritas Est. The Church doesn't shy away from sex and it doesn't vilify sex either. You may be surprised if you look at the links I provided. I know I have been, especially since the media paints such a bleak over bearing picture.

As far as elements being all over the map: you are correct here. But, that doesn't make the teachings wrong or unworthy to follow. It points out the humanness of the Church. After all the Church itself cannot take one to heaven. It only guides one to the true Christ who provides the grace needed.

Yes, I understand. I generally think that sort of bringing the Protestants to task by appeals to the authority of Luther or others, are waste of time, since rejection of human authority is a hallmark of the Reformation; and on the other hand it is legitimate to ask a Catholic to reconcile his views with the doctrines of Rome, -- when such doctrines exist. My only point is that often less that doctrinal statements are assumed to be doctrine when they are not.

The Roman Catholic church added [the deuterocanonical books] to the Canon at Trent

This is not correct. The canon with the deuterocanonical books in it was affirmed at the Ecumenical (in the Catholic sense) Council of Trent because at that point it was challenged by the Reformers. Prior to that, and since at least the local councils at Hippo and Carthage in late 4th-early 5th century, the canon contained the deuterocanonical books. No bible was copied or printed without them prior to the Protestant truncated bibles; the deuterocanonical books remain on the canon in the Orthodox Churches even though they were not subject to Trent.

So you dispute Jerome?

How can you possibly choose God without faith

Christ compared faith with a mustard seed. That was in response to a direct request to increase the faith of the apostles:

5 And the apostles said to the Lord: Increase our faith. 6 And the Lord said: If you had faith like to a grain of mustard seed, you might say to this mulberry tree, Be thou rooted up, and be thou transplanted into the sea: and it would obey you.
(Luke 17)

What do we learn form this? Faith is not binary; it can be increased, or grown, and presumably lost (see 1 Timothy 1:19-20 for that). Indeed, many disciples chose to follow Christ but their faith was weak (see Luke 9:61-62, as well as the preceding episode described in Luke 9 and Matthew 8).

Christ continues in Luke 17:

7 But which of you having a servant ploughing, or feeding cattle, will say to him, when he is come from the field: Immediately go, sit down to meat: 8 And will not rather say to him: Make ready my supper, and gird thyself, and serve me, whilst I eat and drink, and afterwards thou shalt eat and drink? 9 Doth he thank that servant, for doing the things which he commanded him? 10 I think not. So you also, when you shall have done all these things that are commanded you, say: We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do.

Faith, we understand now, is not only a source of good works of love but also a product of them. Grow in charity and your faith will grow:

Canon 24. If anyone says that the justice received is not preserved and also not increased before God through good works,[125] but that those works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of its increase, let him be anathema.
(Trent)

you dispute Jerome?

Jerome included the Deuterocanonicals in his translation (early 4c), so I do not dispute him.

If you are referring to hesitation regarding them, as well as regarding some other books later canonized, how is that relevant to the fact of what is or is not canonical?

He said flat out that they were not accepted as canonical. He believed that they were good for edification but not for doctrine. Re-read his statement. It wasn't a hesitation.

How it is relevant is we have 1st century Jewish canon saying what is canonical - a canon that the church accepted. You then have 4th Century Jerome saying that the books were useful for edification but were not accepted by the church as canonical. Then, Luther comes along and says they weren't canonical and the almighty council, as a part of their collective hissy fit, suddenly anathematizes anyone who says they aren't canonical.

Council of Trent:
"If anyone does not accept as sacred and canonical the aforesaid books in their entirety and with all their parts [the 66 books of the Bible plus 12 apocryphal books, being two of Paralipomenon, two of Esdras, Tobias, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, Sophonias, two of Macabees], as they have been accustomed to be read in the Catholic Church and as they are contained in the old Latin Vulgate Edition, and knowingly and deliberately rejects the aforesaid traditions, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA."

"As the Church reads the books of Judith and Tobit and Maccabees but does not receive them among the canonical Scriptures, so also it reads Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus for the edification of the people, not for the authoritative confirmation of doctrine."
Jerome

Excuse me Houston, doesn't anyone see a problem here?

*I know you know this. I just post it for lurkers and bolden the facts because they are so routinely distorted.

1. Why did the Catholic Church add seven books—1 and 2 Maccabees, Sirach, Wisdom, Baruch, Tobit, and Judith—to the Old Testament? John forbids this: “I warn every one who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book” (Rev. 22:18).

It’s always good to start a disagreement with agreement. So before you explain the Catholic canon of the Old Testament to Protestant, agree that no one has the right to add or subtract books from the Bible. That’s about as much common ground as you may have to build on.

Quoting Rev. 22:18 against Catholics is ineffective. For one thing, the next verse could be used by the Catholics against Protestants with the same opposite force: "[A]nd if any one takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book" (Rev. 22:19).

But neither verse applies to this debate. John is speaking only about the book of Revelation, not the entire Bible. None of the apostles knew the Bible. The books that comprise Scripture were not canonized until centuries after Christ. Even when that list was established in A.D. 382, the writings were not collected into a single book until after the printing press came into existence. Even Guttenburg’s Bible was published in more than one volume.

Besides, the Greek word here for "book" is more accurately translated as "scroll." The book of Revelation likely was written on a scroll, but it would have been impossible for the entire Bible to be.

2. Since the Jews were “entrusted with the oracles of God” (Rom. 3:2), shouldn’t we have the same Old Testament canon as they do?

Though this is not a sound objection, it at least requires a detailed answer.

God’s written word was entrusted to the Jews, but he never provided them with an inspired table of contents. For that reason, there has been ample disagreement over the canon—especially among Jews.

The Old Testament took over one thousand years to compile, and the list of inspired books grew continuously as God’s word was revealed. This gradual accretion indicated that the Jewish people felt no need for a static canon but remained open to further revelation. They divided their sacred writings into three parts: the law, the prophets, and the writings (which were canonized in that order). By the time of Christ, the law—and most likely the prophets—was set in number, but the writings were not yet closed.

In Jesus’ time, the Samaritans and Sadducees accepted the law but rejected the prophets and writings. The Pharisees accepted all three. Other Jews used a Greek version (the Septuagint) that included the seven disputed books, known as the deuterocanonicals. Still other Jews used a version of the canon that is reflected in the Septaguint and included versions of the seven books in question in their original Hebrew or Aramaic.

When the Christians claimed that they had written new scriptures, Jews from a rabbinical school in Javneh met around year 80 and, among other things, discussed the canon. They did not include the New Testament nor the seven Old Testament works and portions of Daniel and Esther. This still did not settle the Pharisee canon, since not all Jews agreed with or even knew about the decision at Javneh. Rabbis continued to debate it into the second and third centuries. Even today, the Ethiopian Jews use the same Old Testament as Catholics.

If anything is certain, it is that there was no common canon among the Jews at the time of Christ.

3.But the seven deuterocanonical books were added at the Council of Trent (1546) in order to justify Catholic doctrinal inventions.

This is a myth that always comes up but is simple to answer. At the Council of Rome in 382, the Church decided upon a canon of 46 Old Testament books and 27 in the New Testament. This decision was ratified by the councils at Hippo (393), Carthage (397, 419), II Nicea (787), Florence (1442), and Trent (1546).

Further, if Catholics added the deuterocanonical books in 1546, then Martin Luther beat us to the punch: He included them in his first German translation, published before the Council of Trent. They can also be found in the first King James Version (1611) and in the first Bible ever printed, the Guttenberg Bible (a century before Trent). In fact, these books were included in almost every Bible until the Edinburgh Committee of the British Foreign Bible Society excised them in 1825. Until then, they had been included at least in an appendix of Protestant Bibles. It is historically demonstrable that Catholics did not add the books, Protestants took them out.

Luther had a tendency to grade the Bible according to his preferences. In his writings on the New Testament, he noted that the books of Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation were inferior to the rest, and they followed "the certain, main books of the New Testament." In 1519, this same attitude fueled his debate against Johannes Eck on the topic of purgatory. Luther undermined Eck’s proof text of 2 Maccabees 12 by devaluing the deuterocanonical books as a whole. He argued that the New Testament authors had never quoted from the seven books, so they were in a different class than the rest of the Bible.

4. Well, if the New Testament never quotes from these seven books, doesn’t that indicate that they were not considered to be inspired?

Following this reasoning, we’d have to throw out the eight other Old Testament books—such as the Song of Songs—that are also not quoted in the New Testament. If we’re not willing to do that, we have to agree that the absence of a quote in the New Testament does not suggest that a book is not inspired.

Though there are no quotes, the New Testament does make numerous allusions to the deuterocanonical books. For one strong example, examine Hebrews 11:35: "Women received their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release that they might rise again to a better life." Nowhere in the Protestant Old Testament can this story be found. One must look to a Catholic Bible to read the story in 2 Maccabees 7.

5. But the book of Judith says that Nebuchadnezzar was king of the Assyrians, when he was really king of the Babylonians. If a book has errors, it can’t be inspired.

In reading Scripture, it is imperative that we understand the genre of the work. Is it a historical passage? An apocalyptic one? A parable? A proverb? Knowing this influences how the book should be read. When Jesus says that the mustard seed is the smallest of seeds (Matt.13:32), he is not providing a treatise on botany. After all, there are seeds smaller than the mustard seed. When Jesus spoke in parables, the people understood that he was telling a story, and they did not expect it to conform to historical or scientific precision.

The same goes with the book of Judith. "Judith" means "lady Jew," and she personifies the nation of Israel, as "Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Assyrians" personifies the enemies of the nation. The Jews of the time were aware that Nebuchadnezzar was not the king of the Assyrians but that the Babylonians and Assyrians were two of the nation’s worst foes joined into one by the author of Judith for the sake of parable.

6. Which translation did the first Christians use?

Early Christians read the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint. It included the seven deuterocanonical books. For this reason, the Protestant historian J.N.D. Kelly writes, "It should be observed that the Old Testament thus admitted as authoritative in the Church was somewhat bulkier and more comprehensive [than the Protestant Bible]. . . . It always included, though with varying degrees of recognition, the so-called apocrypha or deuterocanonical books" (, 53). The authors of the New Testament quoted freely from the Septuagint—over 300 times.

7. Didn’t Jerome and Augustine disagree about the deuterocanonical books?

Yes, as did other early Christians. Numerous Church Fathers quoted the deuterocanonical books as Scripture (see http://www.cin.org/users/james/files/deutero2.htm ), while some did not.

Jerome appears to have rejected most of the deuterocanonical parts of Scripture. But he did accept portions and included all seven books in his Latin translation of Scripture, known as the Vulgate. Ultimately, he recognized that the Church alone had the authority to determine the canon.

Since there was disagreement between some Church Fathers, it became obvious that no individual could provide an infallible list of inspired books. The bottom line: "We have no other assurance that the books of Moses, the four Gospels, and the other books are the true word of God," wrote Augustine, "but by the canon of the Catholic Church."

Since it is unreasonable to expect every person to read all of the books of antiquity and judge for himself if they are inspired, the question boils down to whose authority is to be trusted in this matter. One must either trust a rabbinical school that rejected the New Testament 60 years after Christ established a Church, or one must trust the Church he established.

Which deserves our trust? Martin Luther makes a pertinent observation in the sixteenth chapter of his Commentary on St. John "We are obliged to yield many things to the papists [Catholics]—that they possess the Word of God which we received from them, otherwise we should have known nothing at all about it."

*Isn't it interesting how this old charges are endlessly repeated no matter how many times they are refuted?

The Old Testament Canon

by James Akin

DURING the Reformation, for largely doctrinal reasons Protestants removed seven books from the Old Testament (1 and 2 Maccabees, Sirach, Wisdom, Baruch, Tobit, and Judith) and parts of two others (Daniel and Esther), even though these books had been regarded as canonical since the beginning of Church history.

As Protestant Church historian J.N. D. Kelly writes, "It should be observed that the Old Testament thus admitted as authoritative in the Church was somewhat bulkier and more comprehensive [than the Protestant Bible] . . . It always included, though with varying degrees of recognition, the so-called apocrypha or deuterocanonical books" (Early Christian Doctrines, 53).

Below we give patristic quotations from each of the deuterocanonical books. Notice how the Fathers quoted these books along with the protocanonicals.

Also included are the earliest official canon lists. For the sake of brevity these are not given in full. When the canon lists cited here are given in full, they include all the books and only the books found in the modern Catholic Bible.

(Note: Some books of the Bible have gone under more than one name. Sirach is also known as Ecclesiasticus, 1 and 2 Chronicles as 1 and 2 Paralipomenon, Ezra and Nehemiah as 1 and 2 Esdras, and 1 and 2 Samuel with 1 and 2 Kings as 1, 2, 3, and 4 Kings is, 1 and 2 Samuel are named 1 and 2 Kings, and 1 and 2 Kings are named 3 and 4 Kings. This confusing nomenclature is explained more fully in Catholic Bible commentaries.)

The Didache

"You shall not waver with regard to your decisions [Sir. 1:28]. Do not be someone who stretches out his hands to receive but withdraws them when it comes to giving [Sir. 4:31]" (Didache 4:5 [A.D. 70]).

The Letter of Barnabas

"Since, therefore, [Christ] was about to be manifested and to suffer in the flesh, his suffering was foreshown. For the prophet speaks against evil, `Woe to their soul, because they have counseled an evil counsel against themselves' [Isa. 3:9], saying, `Let us bind the righteous man because he is displeasing to us' [Wis. 2:12.]" (Letter of Barnabas 6:7 [A.D. 74]).

Pope Clement I

"By the word of his might [God] established all things, and by his word he can overthrow them. `Who shall say to him, "What have you done?" or who shall resist the power of his strength?' [Wis. 12:12]" (Letter to the Corinthians 27:5 [ca. A.D. 80]).

Polycarp of Smyrna

"Stand fast, therefore, in these things, and follow the example of the Lord, being firm and unchangeable in the faith, loving the brotherhood [1 Pet. 2:17]. . . . When you can do good, defer it not, because `alms delivers from death' [Tob. 4:10, 12:9]. Be all of you subject to one another [1 Pet. 5:5], having your conduct blameless among the Gentiles [1 Pet. 2:12], and the Lord may not be blasphemed through you. But woe to him by whom the name of the Lord is blasphemed [Isa 52:5]!" (Letter to the Philadelphians 10 [A.D. 135]).

Irenaeus of Lyons

"Those . . . who are believed to be presbyters by many, but serve their own lusts and do not place the fear of God supreme in their hearts, but conduct themselves with contempt toward others and are puffed up with the pride of holding the chief seat [Matt. 23:6] and work evil deeds in secret, saying `No man sees us,' shall be convicted by the Word, who does not judge after outward appearance, nor looks upon the countenance, but the heart; and they shall hear those words to be found in Daniel the prophet: `O you seed of Canaan and not of Judah, beauty has deceived you and lust perverted your heart' [Dan. 13:56]. You that have grown old in wicked days, now your sins which you have committed before have come to light, for you have pronounced false judgments and have been accustomed to condemn the innocent and to let the guilty go free, although the Lord says, `You shall not slay the innocent and the righteous' [Dan. 13:52, citing Ex. 23:7]" (Against Heresies 4:26:3 [A.D. 189]; Dan. 13 is not in the Protestant Bible).

Irenaeus of Lyons

"Jeremiah the prophet has pointed out that as many believers as God has prepared for this purpose, to multiply those left on the earth, should both be under the rule of the saints and to minister to this [new] Jerusalem and that [his] kingdom shall be in it, saying, `Look around Jerusalem toward the east and behold the joy which comes to you from God himself. Behold, your sons whom you have sent forth shall come: They shall come in a band from the east to the west. . . . God shall go before with you in the light of his splendor, with the mercy and righteousness which proceed from him' [Bar. 4:36-5:9]" (ibid. 5:35:1; Baruch was often reckoned as part of Jeremiah, as it is here).

Hippolytus

"What is narrated here [in the story of Susannah] happened at a later time, although it is placed at the front of the book [of Daniel], for it was a custom with the writers to narrate many things in an inverted order in their writings. . . . [W]e ought to give heed, beloved, fearing lest anyone be overtaken in any transgression and risk the loss of his soul, knowing as we do that God is the judge of all and the Word himself is the eye which nothing that is done in the world escapes. Therefore, always watchful in heart and pure in life, let us imitate Susannah" (Commentary on Daniel [A.D. 204]; the story of Susannah [Dan. 13] is not in the Protestant Bible).

Cyprian of Carthage

"In Genesis [it says], `And God tested Abraham and said to him, "Take your only son whom you love, Isaac, and go to the high land and offer him there as a burnt offering . . . "' [Gen 22:1-2] ... Of this same thing in the Wisdom of Solomon [it says], `Although in the sight of men they suffered torments, their hope is full of immortality . . .' [Wis. 3:4]. Of this same thing in the Maccabees [it says], `Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness'" [1 Macc. 2:52; see Jas. 2:21-23] (Treatises 7:3:15 [A.D. 248]).

Cyprian of Carthage

"So Daniel, too, when he was required to worship the idol Bel, which the people and the king then worshipped, in asserting the honor of his God, broke forth with full faith and freedom, saying, `I worship nothing but the Lord my God, who created the heaven and the earth' [Dan. 14:5]" (Letters 55:5 [A.D. 253]; Dan. 14 is not in the Protestant Bible).

Council of Rome

"Now indeed we must treat of the divine Scriptures, what the universal Catholic Church accepts and what she ought to shun. The order of the Old Testament begins here: Genesis, one book; Exodus, one book; Leviticus, one book; Numbers, one book; Deuteronomy, one book; Joshua [Son of] Nave, one book; Judges, one book; Ruth, one book; Kings, four books [that is, 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings]; Paralipomenon [Chronicles], two books; Psalms, one book; Solomon, three books: Proverbs, one book; Ecclesiastes, one book; Canticle of Canticles, one book; likewise Wisdom, one book; Ecclesiasticus, one book . . . . Likewise the order of the historical [books]: Job, one book; Tobit, one book; Esdras, two books [Ezra and Nehemiah]; Esther, one book; Judith, one book; Maccabees, two books" (Decree of Pope Damasus [A.D. 382]).

Council of Hippo

"[It has been decided] that besides the canonical Scriptures nothing be read in church under the name of divine Scripture. But the canonical Scriptures are as follows: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua the Son of Nun, Judges, Ruth, the Kings, four books, the Chronicles, two books, Job, the Psalter, the five books of Solomon, the twelve books of the Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Tobit, Judith, Esther, Ezra, two books, Maccabees, two books . . ." (canon 36 [A.D. 393]).

Council of Carthage III

"[It has been decided] that nothing except the canonical Scriptures should be read in the Church under the name of the divine Scriptures. But the canonical Scriptures are: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings, Paralipomenon, two books, Job, the Psalter of David, five books of Solomon [Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Wisdom, Sirach], twelve books of the Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Tobit, Judith, Esther, two books of Esdras, two books of the Maccabees . . ." (canon 47 [A.D. 397]).

Augustine

"The whole canon of the Scriptures, however, in which we say that consideration is to be applied, is contained in these books: the five of Moses . . . and one book of Joshua [Son of] Nave, one of Judges; one little book which is called Ruth . . . then the four of Kingdoms, and the two of Paralipomenon . . . . [T]here are also others too, of a different order . . . such as Job and Tobit and Esther and Judith and the two books of Maccabees, and the two of Esdras . . . . Then there are the Prophets, in which there is one book of the Psalms of David, and three of Solomon. . . . But as to those two books, one of which is entitled Wisdom and the other of which is entitled Ecclesiasticus and which are called `of Solomon' because of a certain similarity to his books, it is held most certainly that they were written by Jesus Sirach. They must, however, be accounted among the prophetic books, because of the authority which is deservedly accredited to them" (Christian Instruction 2:8:13 [A.D. 397]).

Augustine

"God converted [King Assuerus] and turned the latter's indignation into gentleness [Es. 15:11]" (The Grace of Christ and Original Sin 1:24:25 [A.D. 418]; this passage is not in the Protestant Bible).

Augustine

"We read in the books of the Maccabees [2 Macc. 12:43] that sacrifice was offered for the dead. But even if it were found nowhere in the Old Testament writings, the authority of the Catholic Church which is clear on this point is of no small weight, where in the prayers of the priest poured forth to the Lord God at his altar the commendation of the dead has its place" (The Care to be Had for the Dead 1:3 [A.D. 421]).

The Apostolic Constitutions

"Now women also prophesied. Of old, Miriam the sister of Moses and Aaron [Ex. 15:20], and after her, Deborah [Judges. 4:4], and after these Huldah [2 Kgs. 22:14] and Judith [Judith 8], the former under Josiah and the latter under Darius" (Apostolic Constitutions 8:2 [A.D. 400]).

Jerome

"What sin have I committed if I follow the judgment of the churches? But he who brings charges against me for relating [in my preface to the book of Daniel] the objections that the Hebrews are wont to raise against the story of Susannah [Dan. 13], the Song of the Three Children [Dan. 3:24-90], and the story of Bel and the Dragon [Dan. 14], which are not found in the Hebrew volume, proves that he is just a foolish sycophant. I was not relating my own personal views, but rather the remarks that they are wont to make against us. If I did not reply to their views in my preface, in the interest of brevity, lest it seem that I was composing not a preface, but a book, I believe I added promptly the remark, for I said, `This is not the time to discuss such matters'" (Against Rufinius 11:33 [A.D. 401]).

Pope Innocent I

"A brief addition shows what books really are received in the canon. These are the things of which you desired to be informed verbally: of Moses, five books, that is, of Genesis, of Exodus, of Leviticus, of Numbers, of Deuteronomy, and Joshua, of Judges, one book, of Kings, four books, and also Ruth, of the Prophets, sixteen books, of Solomon, five books, the Psalms. Likewise of the histories, Job, one book, of Tobit, one book, Esther, one, Judith, one, of the Maccabees, two, of Esdras, two, Paralipomenon, two books . . ." (Letters 7 [A.D. 408]).

The African Code

"[It has been decided] that besides the canonical Scriptures nothing be read in church under the name of divine Scripture. But the canonical Scriptures are as follows: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua the Son of Nun, Judges, Ruth, the Kings, four books, the Chronicles, two books, Job, the Psalter, the five books of Solomon, the twelve books of the Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Tobit, Judith, Esther, Ezra, two books, Maccabees, two books . . . Let this be sent to our brother and fellow bishop, [Pope] Boniface, and to the other bishops of those parts, that they may confirm this canon, of these are the things which we have received from our fathers to be read in church" (canon 24 [A.D. 419]).

Christ compared faith with a mustard seed. That was in response to a direct request to increase the faith of the apostles

That's true about increasing one's faith. It must come from God. What was not addressed was where the "faith seed" comes from in the first place.

The "faith seed" comes from God. We are "unprofitable servants" because what we have is given to us by God-we don't generate faith on our own.

Jerome's opinion is just that, his opinion. The mind of the church as a whole was that they are canonical and this is why they were included in Jerome's Vulgate and canonized at Hippo/Carthage. See detailed Bornacatholic's post above.

It is not true that the Church accepted the Hebrew canon of Jamnia because, again, no Bible appeared without the Deuterocanons, East or West, prior to the Reformation.

The seed of faith does indeed come from God, but the paradox that you see between mature faith and free will disappears if you consider the scripture I showed you, describing the growth of the embryonic faith through the good works of free will.

We are "unprofitable servants" because what we have is given to us by God-we don't generate faith on our own.

Eh, this part is wrong. The gospel does not say so. It says, the servant is unprofitable because he did not go beyond the obligation, --- his work lacked charity.

DEFENDING THE DEUTEROCANONICALS

by Jimmy Akin

When Catholics and Protestants talk about "the Bible," the two groups actually have two different books in mind.

In the sixteenth century, the Protestant Reformers removed a large section of the Old Testament that was not compatible with their theology. They charged that these writings were not inspired Scripture and branded them with the pejorative title "Apocrypha."

Catholics refer to them as the "deuterocanonical" books (since they were disputed by a few early authors and their canonicity was established later than the rest), while the rest are known as the "protocanonical" books (since their canonicity was established first).

Following the Protestant attack on the integrity of the Bible, the Catholic Church infallibly reaffirmed the divine inspiration of the deuterocanonical books at the Council of Trent in 1546. In doing this, it reaffirmed what had been believed since the time of Christ.

Who Compiled the Old Testament?

The Church does not deny that there are ancient writings which are "apocryphal." During the early Christian era, there were scores of manuscripts which purported to be Holy Scripture but were not. Many have survived to the present day, like the Apocalypse of Peter and the Gospel of Thomas, which all Christian churches regard as spurious writings that don't belong in Scripture.

During the first century, the Jews disagreed as to what constituted the canon of Scripture. In fact, there were a large number of different canons in use, including the growing canon used by Christians. In order to combat the spreading Christian cult, rabbis met at the city of Jamnia or Javneh in A.D. 90 to determine which books were truly the Word of God. They pronounced many books, including the Gospels, to be unfit as scriptures. This canon also excluded seven books (Baruch, Sirach, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, and the Wisdom of Solomon, plus portions of Esther and Daniel) that Christians considered part of the Old Testament.

The group of Jews which met at Javneh became the dominant group for later Jewish history, and today most Jews accept the canon of Javneh. However, some Jews, such as those from Ethiopia, follow a different canon which is identical to the Catholic Old Testament and includes the seven deuterocanonical books (cf. Encyclopedia Judaica, vol. 6, p. 1147).

Needless to say, the Church disregarded the results of Javneh. First, a Jewish council after the time of Christ is not binding on the followers of Christ. Second, Javneh rejected precisely those documents which are foundational for the Christian Church -- the Gospels and the other documents of the New Testament. Third, by rejecting the deuterocanonicals, Javneh rejected books which had been used by Jesus and the apostles and which were in the edition of the Bible that the apostles used in everyday life -- the Septuagint.

The Apostles & the Deuteros

The Christian acceptance of the deuterocanonical books was logical because the deuterocanonicals were also included in the Septuagint, the Greek edition of the Old Testament which the apostles used to evangelize the world. Two thirds of the Old Testament quotations in the New are from the Septuagint. Yet the apostles nowhere told their converts to avoid seven books of it. Like the Jews all over the world who used the Septuagint, the early Christians accepted the books they found in it. They knew that the apostles would not mislead them and endanger their souls by putting false scriptures in their hands -- especially without warning them against them.

But the apostles did not merely place the deuterocanonicals in the hands of their converts as part of the Septuagint. They regularly referred to the deuterocanonicals in their writings. For example, Hebrews 11 encourages us to emulate the heroes of the Old Testament and in the Old Testament "Women received their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, that they might rise again to a better life" (Heb. 11:35).

There are a couple of examples of women receiving back their dead by resurrection in the Protestant Old Testament. You can find Elijah raising the son of the widow of Zarepheth in 1 Kings 17, and you can find his successor Elisha raising the son of the Shunammite woman in 2 Kings 4, but one thing you can never find -- anywhere in the Protestant Old Testament, from front to back, from Genesis to Malachi -- is someone being tortured and refusing to accept release for the sake of a better resurrection. If you want to find that, you have to look in the Catholic Old Testament -- in the deuterocanonical books Martin Luther cut out of his Bible.

The story is found in 2 Maccabees 7, where we read that during the Maccabean persecution, "It happened also that seven brothers and their mother were arrested and were being compelled by the king, under torture with whips and cords, to partake of unlawful swine's flesh. . . . [B]ut the brothers and their mother encouraged one another to die nobly, saying, 'The Lord God is watching over us and in truth has compassion on us . . . ' After the first brother had died . . . they brought forward the second for their sport. . . . he in turn underwent tortures as the first brother had done. And when he was at his last breath, he said, 'You accursed wretch, you dismiss us from this present life, but the King of the universe will raise us up to an everlasting renewal of life'" (2 Macc. 7:1, 5-9).

One by one the sons die, proclaiming that they will be vindicated in the resurrection. "The mother was especially admirable and worthy of honorable memory. Though she saw her seven sons perish within a single day, she bore it with good courage because of her hope in the Lord. She encouraged each of them . . . [saying], 'I do not know how you came into being in my womb. It was not I who gave you life and breath, nor I who set in order the elements within each of you. Therefore the Creator of the world, who shaped the beginning of man and devised the origin of all things, will in his mercy give life and breath back to you again, since you now forget yourselves for the sake of his laws,'" telling the last one, "Do not fear this butcher, but prove worthy of your brothers. Accept death, so that in God's mercy I may get you back again with your brothers" (2 Macc. 7:20-23, 29).

This is but one example of the New Testaments' references to the deuterocanonicals. The early Christians were thus fully justified in recognizing these books as Scripture, for the apostles not only set them in their hands as part of the Bible they used to evangelize the world, but also referred to them in the New Testament itself, citing the things they record as examples to be emulated.

The Fathers Speak

The early acceptance of the deuterocanonicals was carried down through Church history. The Protestant patristics scholar J. N. D. Kelly writes: "It should be observed that the Old Testament thus admitted as authoritative in the Church was somewhat bulkier and more comprehensive than the [Protestant Old Testament] . . . It always included, though with varying degrees of recognition, the so-called Apocrypha or deutero-canonical books. The reason for this is that the Old Testament which passed in the first instance into the hands of Christians was . . . the Greek translation known as the Septuagint. . . . most of the Scriptural quotations found in the New Testament are based upon it rather than the Hebrew.. . . In the first two centuries . . . the Church seems to have accept all, or most of, these additional books as inspired and to have treated them without question as Scripture. Quotations from Wisdom, for example, occur in 1 Clement and Barnabas. . . Polycarp cites Tobit, and the Didache [cites] Ecclesiasticus. Irenaeus refers to Wisdom, the History of Susannah, Bel and the Dragon [i.e., the deuterocanonical portions of Daniel], and Baruch. The use made of the Apocrypha by Tertullian, Hippolytus, Cyprian and Clement of Alexandria is too frequent for detailed references to be necessary" (Early Christian Doctrines, 53-54).

The recognition of the deuterocanonicals as part of the Bible that was given by individual Fathers was also given by the Fathers as a whole, when they met in Church councils. The results of councils are especially useful because they do not represent the views of only one person, but what was accepted by the Church leaders of whole regions.

The canon of Scripture, Old and New Testament, was finally settled at the Council of Rome in 382, under the authority of Pope Damasus I. It was soon reaffirmed on numerous occasions. The same canon was affirmed at the Council of Hippo in 393 and at the Council of Carthage in 397. In 405 Pope Innocent I reaffirmed the canon in a letter to Bishop Exuperius of Toulouse. Another council at Carthage, this one in the year 419, reaffirmed the canon of its predecessors and asked Pope Boniface to "confirm this canon, for these are the things which we have received from our fathers to be read in church." All of these canons were identical to the modern Catholic Bible, and all of them included the deuterocanonicals.

This exact same canon was implicitly affirmed at the seventh ecumenical council, II Nicaea (787), which approved the results of the 419 Council of Carthage, and explicitly reaffirmed at the ecumenical councils of Florence (1442), Trent (1546), Vatican I (1870), and Vatican II (1965).

The Reformation Attack on the Bible

The deuterocanonicals teach Catholic doctrine, and for this reason they were taken out of the Old Testament by Martin Luther and placed in an appendix without page numbers. Luther also took out four New Testament books -- Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation -- and put them in an appendix without page numbers as well. These were later put back into the New Testament by other Protestants, but the seven books of the Old Testament were left out. Following Luther they had been left in an appendix to the Old Testament, and eventually the appendix itself was dropped (in 1827 by the British and Foreign Bible Society), which is why these books are not found at all in most contemporary Protestant Bibles, though they were appendicized in classic Protestant translations such as the King James Version.

The reason they were dropped is that they teach Catholic doctrines that the Protestant Reformers chose to reject. Earlier we cited an example where the book of Hebrews holds up to us an Old Testament example from 2 Maccabees 7, an incident not to be found anywhere in the Protestant Bible, but easily discoverable in the Catholic Bible. Why would Martin Luther cut out this book when it is so clearly held up as an example to us by the New Testament? Simple: A few chapters later it endorses the practice of praying for the dead so that they may be freed from the consequences of their sins (2 Macc. 12:41-45); in other words, the Catholic doctrine of purgatory. Since Luther chose to reject the historic Christian teaching of purgatory (which dates from before the time of Christ, as 2 Maccabees shows), he had to remove that book from the Bible and appendicize it. (Notice that he also removed Hebrews, the book which cites 2 Maccabees, to an appendix as well.)

To justify this rejection of books that had been in the Bible since before the days of the apostles (for the Septuagint was written before the apostles), the early Protestants cited as their chief reason the fact that the Jews of their day did not honor these books, going back to the council of Javneh in A.D. 90. But the Reformers were aware of only European Jews; they were unaware of African Jews, such as the Ethiopian Jews who accept the deuterocanonicals as part of their Bible. They glossed over the references to the deuterocanonicals in the New Testament, as well as its use of the Septuagint. They ignored the fact that there were multiple canons of the Jewish Scriptures circulating in first century, appealing to a post-Christian Jewish council which has no authority over Christians as evidence that "The Jews don't except these books." In short, they went to enormous lengths to rationalize their rejection of these books of the Bible.

Rewriting Church History

In later years they even began to propagate the myth that the Catholic Church "added" these seven books to the Bible at the Council of Trent!

Protestants also try to distort the patristic evidence in favor of the deuterocanonicals. Some flatly state that the early Church Fathers did not accept them, while others make the more moderate claim that certain important Fathers, such as Jerome, did not accept them.

It is true that Jerome, and a few other isolated writers, did not accept most of the deuterocanonicals as Scripture. However, Jerome was persuaded, against his original inclination, to include the deuterocanonicals in his Vulgate edition of the Scriptures-testimony to the fact that the books were commonly accepted and were expected to be included in any edition of the Scriptures.

Furthermore, it can be documented that in his later years Jerome did accept certain deuterocanonical parts of the Bible. In his reply to Rufinus, he stoutly defended the deuterocanonical portions of Daniel even though the Jews of his day did not. He wrote, "What sin have I committed if I followed the judgment of the churches? But he who brings charges against me for relating the objections that the Hebrews are wont to raise against the story of Susanna, the Son of the Three Children, and the story of Bel and the Dragon, which are not found in the Hebrew volume, proves that he is just a foolish sycophant. For I was not relating my own personal views, but rather the remarks that they [the Jews] are wont to make against us" (Against Rufinus 11:33 [A.D. 402]). Thus Jerome acknowledged the principle by which the canon was settled -- the judgment of the Church, not of later Jews.

Other writers Protestants cite as objecting to the deuterocanonicals, such as Athanasius and Origen, also accepted some or all of them as canonical. For example, Athanasius, accepted the book of Baruch as part of his Old Testament (Festal Letter 39), and Origen accepted all of the deuterocanonicals, he simply recommended not using them in disputations with Jews.

However, despite the misgivings and hesitancies of a few individual writers such as Jerome, the Church remained firm in its historic affirmation of the deuterocanonicals as Scripture handed down from the apostles. Protestant patristics scholar J. N. D. Kelly remarks that in spite of Jerome's doubt, "For the great majority, however, the deutero-canonical writings ranked as Scripture in the fullest sense. Augustine, for example, whose influence in the West was decisive, made no distinction between them and the rest of the Old Testament . . . The same inclusive attitude to the Apocrypha was authoritatively displayed at the synods of Hippo and Carthage in 393 and 397 respectively, and also in the famous letter which Pope Innocent I dispatched to Exuperius, bishop of Toulouse, in 405" (Early Christian Doctrines, 55-56).

It is thus a complete myth that, as Protestants often charge, the Catholic Church "added" the deuterocanonicals to the Bible at the Council of Trent. These books had been in the Bible from before the time canon was initially settled in the 380s. All the Council of Trent did was reaffirm, in the face of the new Protestant attack on Scripture, what had been the historic Bible of the Church -- the standard edition of which was Jerome's own Vulgate, including the seven deuterocanonicals!

The New Testament Deuteros

It is ironic that Protestants reject the inclusion of the deuterocanonicals at councils such as Hippo (393) and Carthage (397), because these are the very same early Church councils that Protestants appeal to for the canon of the New Testament. Prior to the councils of the late 300s, there was a wide range of disagreement over exactly what books belonged in the New Testament. Certain books, such as the gospels, acts, and most of the epistles of Paul had long been agreed upon. However a number of the books of the New Testament, most notably Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 & 3 John, and Revelation remained hotly disputed until the canon was settled. They are, in effect, "New Testament deuterocanonicals."

hile Protestants are willing to accept the testimony of Hippo and Carthage (the councils they most commonly cite) for the canonicity of the New Testament deuterocanonicals, they are unwilling to accept the testimony of Hippo and Carthage for the canonicity of the Old Testament deuterocanonicals. Ironic indeed!