Catholic and Protestant Bibles: What is the Difference?

Catholic Exchange.com ^ | 02-06-07 | Mary Harwell Sayler

[Salvation]

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Catholic and Protestant Bibles: What is the Difference?

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March 6, 2007

Question: What's the difference between a Catholic Bible and a Protestant one? Is our Old Testament the same as a Jewish Bible? If not, why?

Answer: The most noticeable differences occur in the number of books included and the order in which they have been arranged. Both the Jewish Bible and the Hebrew canon in a Protestant Bible (aka Old Testament) contain 39 books, whereas a Catholic Bible contains 46 books in the Old Testament. In addition, the Greek Orthodox, or Eastern Orthodox, Church accepts a few more books as canonized scripture.

To give you a quick overview of a complicated subject, here's what happened: Several hundred years before the birth of Christ, Babylonian conquerors forced the Jews to leave Jerusalem. Away from their Temple and, often, from their priests, the exiled people forgot how to read, write, and speak Hebrew. After a while, Jewish scholars wanted to make the Bible accessible again, so they translated Hebrew scriptures into the Greek language commonly spoken. Books of wisdom and histories about the period were added, too, eventually becoming so well known that Jesus and the earliest Christian writers were familiar with them. Like the original Hebrew scriptures, the Greek texts, which were known as the Septuagint, were not in a codex or book form as we're accustomed to now but were handwritten on leather or parchment scrolls and rolled up for ease in storage.

Eventually, the Jewish exiles were allowed to return to Jerusalem where they renovated the Temple. Then, in A.D. 70, warring peoples almost completely destroyed the sacred structure, which has never been rebuilt. Without this central place of worship, the Jews began looking to the Bible as their focal point of faith, but to assure the purity of that faith, only Hebrew scriptures were allowed into the Jewish canon. By then, however, the earliest Christians spoke and read Greek, so they continued to use the Septuagint or Greek version of the Bible for many centuries. After the Reformation though, some Christians decided to accept translations into Latin then English only from the Hebrew texts that the Jewish Bible contained, so the seven additional books in the Greek translation became known as the Apocrypha, meaning "hidden." Since the books themselves were no secret, the word seemed ironic or, perhaps, prophetic because, in 1947, an Arab boy searching for a lost goat found, instead, the Dead Sea scrolls, hidden in a hillside cave.

Interestingly, the leather scrolls had been carefully wrapped in linen cloth, coated in pitch, and placed in airtight pottery jars about ten inches across and two feet high where, well-preserved, they remained for many centuries. Later, other caves in the same area yielded similar finds with hundreds of manuscripts no longer hidden. Indeed, the oldest copies of the Bible now known to exist are the Dead Sea scrolls of the Septuagint.

Because of this authentic find from antiquity, many publishers in the twentieth century added back the books of Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, First and Second Maccabees, as well as additions to Esther and Daniel. So now, when an edition of the Bible says "with Apocrypha" on the cover, the extra books from the Septuagint will usually be placed between the Old and New Testaments or at the end of the Bible. Catholic Bibles already contained those books, however, so you'll find them interwoven with other Old Testament books of history and wisdom writings. 

For the New Testament, it's a different story — and short. All of the books were written in Greek or Aramaic from the start. Although some debate occurred about which Gospels or Epistles should be included, all Christians eventually accepted all of the same 27 books in the same order. So, as long as you choose an edition that does not add explanatory notes opposed to a Catholic perspective, any reputable translation of the New Testament is fine.

 

© Copyright 2007 Catholic Exchange

[Kitty Mittens]

Christ decreed Textus Receptus? When did He do that?

Lol, from All Eternity, Before Anything Existed He Knew and Ordained Everything He would Do, Including Using the Textus Receptus to Bless Millions in His Family.

Known from Eternity to God are all His Works. (Acts.15:18, Textus Receptus)

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so much for all those beautiful Scriptures!

[Alamo-Girl]

Indeed, it could be piercing on both accounts. We'll see.

[Alamo-Girl]

LOLOL! Perhaps I try too hard to be succinct.

[Alamo-Girl]

Indeed, and the merging of spirits (if any) could be a temporary thing in lieu of language. I don't know. We'll see.

[Alamo-Girl]

Amen.

[Alamo-Girl]

LOLOL! I'm sure the timing will be perfect.

[Alex Murphy]

You left out

ROTFLSHIMMCOMN [Rolling On The Floor Laughing So Hard It Made Milk Come Out My Nose]

[Alamo-Girl]

Er, when Paul is speaking of the "mind of Christ" in I Cor 2 - he is speaking, not of our mortal minds, but the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Thus, the Scriptures in the Tanakh which presage what happened at Pentecost use the Hebrew phrase ruach Elohim - particularly those passages which speak of the Spirit of God coming upon one of His servants.

[Forest Keeper]

But economia can only be applied with regard to discipline, never on matters of dogma. A bishop could not exercise economia to allow someone to deny the Real Presence, or the Trinity or to say that Mary is not the Theotokos. The same would go for certain disciplines. For example, a bishop could not tell someone its OK to never go to confession or communion or that its OK to sleep with your girlfriend before you are married. I'll bet that's clear as mud, right?

If I'm following you correctly, and if you are using "doctrine" and "discipline" interchangeably, then that's very helpful, thanks. Let's see. :) Your mention of a bishop was key to me. If a bishop can grant a doctrinal pass, then I infer that without such a pass one is out of luck. That would mean that barring a pass one would "have" to follow all doctrine to be a "good" Orthodox.

Now, I would assume that there are plenty of issues for which there is not even doctrine, or any sort of official Church position. I would think that any Orthodox could hold any view he wanted as long as it didn't contradict anything that WAS on the books, including doctrine. Therefore, I would see the dividing line as being between doctrine and Orthopraxis. In the ballpark?

[Forest Keeper]

The only place where personality plays a role is in self-love, narcissism, arrogance and pride. Those are not God-created attributes.

Say you believe that God has so moved you to give $100 to "charity". What is it that moves you to give to the Heart Foundation, when the next Christian so moved might give to fight lung cancer? Is one a better Christian than the other?

Do we all not identify more so with the personalities of some of the great Biblical figures than others? Peter's "enthusiasm", Paul's steadfastness, John the Baptist's zealotry, or Moses' meekness. These are personality traits that are not sinful by themselves. God uses each to the fullest to accomplish His plan. Each trait made that person perfect for the job God had in mind. I don't understand associating all personality with sin.

[GOPPachyderm]

I have a bible with the apocryphal books as a reference tool, but don't use for studying God's word. Prefer others such as NAS, NKJV, or even NIV as better translations.

[kosta50]

Er, when Paul is speaking of the "mind of Christ" in I Cor 2 - he is speaking, not of our mortal minds, but the indwelling Holy Spirit. Thus, the Scriptures in the Tanakh which presage what happened at Pentecost use the Hebrew phrase ruach Elohim - particularly those passages which speak of the Spirit of God coming upon one of His servants.

But St. Paul chose to quote from the Septuagint OT which uses the Greek word nous (mind, intellect), and not the Hebrew OT, which uses the word ruach (spirit). He could have used the latter if he wanted to leave the Greeks with the impression that he was speaking of the indwelling Spirit. But he didn't.

Mind is tied to Wisdom and wisdom is one of those Gnostic buzzwords (Sophia). When Paul says that God revealed His Son in Paul and not to Paul, he is expressing a profoundly Gnostic concept that Christ was in Paul all along but hidden (and accessible only through special knowledge or gnosis). You will notice that we receive the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit is not revealed within us. Rather He is sent, He comes to us.

I am sure that Paul opted to quote from the Septuagint for a specific reason, as he is known to have used the Hebrew text on other occasions, if he felt it expressed 'his gospel' more accurately. So, I must assume that he felt the word nous was closer to his purpose than ruach.

One thing about Gnsotic texts is that to most people they seem perfectly 'orthodox' and even the trained eyes need can slip past some of the concepts. Which is why it took the Fathers more than three hundred years to sift through 200 extant scrolls before they settled on the Christian canon.

Of course, one would ask then, why did they 'pass' Paul. For one, without Paul there would have been no Church left, as no other Apostle had the energy and personality needed for the hard charging task that was needed.

Second, he was one of the Apostles, and that which was written by the Apostles was 'scripture' almost automatically; also, that which was read in churches (and his epistles were read in churches before the Gospels were written) was considered 'orthodox.'

Otherwise, the Church would have found itself in a situation forced to admit that heterodox scriptures were being read and that the Church was unable to distinguish between holy and profane.

[kosta50]

Do we all not identify more so with the personalities of some of the great Biblical figures than others?

Of course we do. But threse personality differences play a role in this changing world, which is really our opporutnity, a gracious gift, to repent and be saved.

I was speaking of the pre-Fall and post-Judgment mankind. Moseses and Pauls and Peters will not be needed as they were needed on earth. There will be no charity and no blood drives. There will be no conflict, no wars, no competition. No needs, no jobs, no schools.

Our personalities will not be expressed, because there will be no reason to express them. Surely, we won't be arguing on a religion forum. :)

[GiovannaNicoletta]

bookmark

[Quix]

God didn't say He created a 'personality.' He created man. . . . The only place where personality plays a role is in self-love, narcissism, arrogance and pride.

I'm shocked to read this. Sounds as preposterous to me as the sentence: "I [kosta50] just walked back from the moon this afternoon."

I can't conceive of, imagine a way to create man as man is without personality. Personality is inherent in being a human being. Adam and Eve clearly had each their own personalities. We psychologists can talk about the major types of personality. But each individual has a very unique personality.

Have you even TRIED to IMAGINE an individual without a personality? Or do you have a history in Eastern Mysticism in which personality--any NON-ONE-NESS--is 100% illusion???

There are individuals without personality in our world. They are brain dead--literally--key parts of their brain are dead and they are living vegetables. That's to be without personality. It's not usually considered remotely fully human.

Are you contending that our joy-beyond-measure-Heavenly state is to be similarly without personality? GTTM. LOL.

That still strikes me as a serious affront to Father who CREATED A TAILOR MADE PERSONALITY FOR EACH INDIVIDUAL and typically goes to ENORMOUSLY great lengths to protect and shape it.

THOSE ARE FAR from the only place personality plays a role! There could be NO CONSCIOUSNESS without personality. There could be no Martin Buber "I-THOU" relationship with God or anyone else without personality. There could be no choice FOR CHRIST, GOD, SALVATION without personality. There could be NO PERCEPTIONS (AS Human) of God or anything/anyone else, without personality.

Personality is the foundational substrate of existence as humans. Personality is the foundational substrate of existence as "made in God's image." I cannot imagine of any humanness nor of any being created in God's image without personality.

It is simply THOROUGHLY UNTRUE that the ONLY place personality plays a role is in self-love, narcissism, arrogance and pride.

THAT'S SIMPLY OBJECTIVELY AND SUBJECTIVELY EMPHATICALLY UNTRUE.

[ScubieNuc]

Your construction on assumed, pretend reality is that Paul missed it by many country miles and was wholesale wrong in his scripting of the NT in many places.

Nevertheless, Protesties should be hauled up short on 286 of Paul's words just because RC's think it's convenient and fun to do.

Excellent point!

[Kolokotronis]

I just knew I was a clear as mud! :)

"If I'm following you correctly, and if you are using "doctrine" and "discipline" interchangeably, then that's very helpful, thanks."

I'm not! Discipline usually aries out of doctrine or dogma and is meant to guide us in living out dogma or doctrine. For example, fasting is a discipline which is designed to help us in theosis which is doctrine.

"If a bishop can grant a doctrinal pass, then I infer that without such a pass one is out of luck. That would mean that barring a pass one would "have" to follow all doctrine to be a "good" Orthodox."

In order to be a good Orthodox one has to believe all the doctrines; no pass on belief, just the for the rules (discipline).

"I would think that any Orthodox could hold any view he wanted as long as it didn't contradict anything that WAS on the books, including doctrine."

I suppose so, though there is very little "on the books" as you put it. We don't have a corpus of "canon law" as you would recognize it.

"Therefore, I would see the dividing line as being between doctrine and Orthopraxis. In the ballpark?"

Nope. Orthopraxis is an expression of doctrine and dogma. Lex orandi, lex credendi!

Comments, Kosta mou, Alex?

[Mad Dawg]

When there are differences like this, where each side can scarcely believe that the other side means what it is saying, there is usually some fundamental misunderstanding. The folks who can throttle back on the abuse and personal comments and interrogation techniques are usually the ones who are mot likely to get to the bottom of the misunderstanding.

It's clear that there's a disagreement. What's not clear is exactly what that disagreement is about. Blessed is he who can patiently re-examine what is painfully obvious to himself.

This is not intended as a rebuke. it's just that what I'm seeing is at this point scarcely more useful, informative, or educational than head-butting, and yet I am bewildered at the controversy. All these ringing declarations of first principles and common notions and yet no fruitful analysis....

[wmfights]

And in South and Central America--they've been doing it rather successfully.

Amen

Africa as well.