What is the difference between a Catholic bible compared to other bibles?

Answer 1

The New Testament canon of the Catholic Bible and the Protestant Bible are the same with 27 Books.

The difference in the Old Testaments actually goes back to the time before and during Christ’s life. At this time, there was no official Jewish canon of scripture.

The Jews in Egypt translated their choices of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek in the second century before Christ. This translation of 46 books, called the Septuagint, had wide use in the Roman world because most Jews lived far from Palestine in Greek cities. Many of these Jews spoke only Greek.

The early Christian Church was born into this world. The Church, with its bilingual Jews and more and more Greek-speaking Gentiles, used the books of the Septuagint as its Bible. Remember the early Christians were just writing the documents what would become the New Testament.

After the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, with increasing persecution from the Romans and competition from the fledgling Christian Church, the Jewish leaders came together and declared its official canon of Scripture, eliminating seven books from the Septuagint.

The books removed were Tobit, Judith, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Wisdom (of Solomon), Sirach, and Baruch. Parts of existing books were also removed including Psalm 151 (from Psalms), parts of the Book of Esther, Susanna (from Daniel as chapter 13), and Bel and the Dragon (from Daniel as chapter 14).

The Christian Church did not follow suit but kept all the books in the Septuagint. 46 + 27 = 73 Books total.

1500 years later, Protestants decided to change its Old Testament from the Catholic canon to the Jewish canon. The books they dropped are sometimes called the Apocrypha.

Here is a Catholic Bible website: http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/bible/

With love in Christ.

Answer 2

At the time of Jesus, Judaism did not yet have an official set of books. The Old Testament had not yet been formed. Jesus and the Apostles used a wider range of books than Protestants currently use. In fact, they quote from the books Protestants call the Apocrypha as scripture.

The principle of truth in the Catholic, Orthodox and Coptic Churches is that whatever the apostles did is correct as long as it was held throughout the Church and has been held so across all time. The apostles used the Septuagint and quote from it.

Quite a bit later, in order to preserve Judaism following the expulsion, the rabbis began the process of determining for the Jewish people, which books are in the only testament. Christians books were written in Greek and clearly this was leading them to error. So they adopted a principal that works written in Greek cannot be inspired since obviously God would only speak Hebrew. This removed the books called now by Protestants, the Apocrypha as they were written by Jews in exile in the centuries before Christ initially in Greek.

The Church did not switch to the Jewish canon in part because it was an attack on Christianity and in part because the apostles and Jesus did something else. They saw the Jews as rejectors of God and Jesus (as God Himself) must be right. Therefore the Catholic Church did not alter its bible to fit the Jewish changes.

This issue sat dormant for about 1500 years. Then Luther came along and had a serious problem. While he correctly diagnosed the Churches problems, his solutions wouldn't work. He rejected the papacy and the episcopate, but in doing so he also rejected the only authorizing party for the bible. The canon or list of books of the bible were created by the work of the fathers, but defined by Pope Damasus in the year 397. If you reject the pope, there is no bible.

So Luther rejected the pope and started picking his own books from scratch. He excluded the books called the apocrypha on the grounds the Jews must know what they are doing, not having access to the reasons due to the limitations of medieval life. Further, he started reviewing two groups of New Testament works, the protocanonicals and the deuterocanonicals.

The protocanonicals are works like Luke's Gospel that everyone always accepted. The deuterocanonicals at one point included works like 1st Clement, the Shepherd, 2 John, James, Jude and Revelations. 1st Clement did not make it because even though it is older than almost all scripture, Clement was acting on his own authority as Pope after Peter's martyrdom. The Shepherd was clearly a later work. Other works, like the Didache, probably should have made it.

Luther took the shortened Old Testament and also shortened the New Testament. He excluded James, Jude and Revelations from the bible. Basically, he excluded the books that disagreed with Protestantism and in particular Lutheranism. Further, he narrowed the standard of truth from that which was handed down by the apostles, which inlcudes the scriptures but there are other things left to us from the apostles outside the scriptures. He narrowed it to only the scriptures and only his scriptures.

Later Lutherans returned James, Jude and Revelations to the bible.

It is true that Orthodox have a slightly longer old testament. The Septuagint wasn't uniform and so a few versions include an additional psalm and the prayer of Manassah. It is largely irrelevant however if you reject sola scriptura in the first place. It is a big deal for a Protestant, but not so important for anyone else.

Answer 3

There are essentially three sets of Bibles - Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox. This website does a nice, clear break down of the differences: http://www.bible.ca/b-canon-orthodox-catholic-christian-bible-books.htm . In addition to the books in the Protestant Bible, the Catholic Bible contains these:

Tobit
Judith
Additions to Esther
Wisdom of Solomon
Ecclesiasticus
Baruch
Epistle of Jeremiah
Song of the Three Children
Story of Susanna
Bel and the Dragon
Prayer of Manasseh
1 Maccabees
2 Maccabees

The Orthodox Bible contains all the books in the Catholic Bible and also
1 Esdras
3 Maccabees
4 Maccabees
Psalm 151

Answer 4

The main difference between Catholic and other versions of the Bible is found in the table of contents. The Catholic version of the Bible contains 73 books of Scripture. Most other Holy Bibles contain 66. The difference is that the Catholic canon includes 7 Old Testament books that are not found in the other Bible. The New Testament is the same in both Bibles (27 books).

The seven OT books at issue are Tobit, Judith, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (or Ecclesaisticus) and Baruch. The Catholic Bible’s OT also contains some extra verses or chapters in the books of Daniel and Esther. These are reffered to as the Apocryphal books.

Why are they not included in other Bibles, they are not cohesive with regards to Bibles theme. These are writings that some have included in certain Bibles but that have been rejected by others because they do not bear evidence of having been inspired by God. The Greek word a·po′kry·phos refers to things “carefully concealed.” (Mark 4:22; Luke 8:17; Col. 2:3) The term is applied to books of doubtful authorship or authority or those which, while considered to be of some value for personal reading, lacked evidence of divine inspiration. Such books were kept apart and not read publicly, hence the thought of “concealed.” At the Council of Carthage, in 397 C.E., it was proposed that seven of the Apocryphal books be added to the Hebrew Scriptures, along with additions to the canonical books of Esther and Daniel. However, it was not until as late as 1546, at the Council of Trent, that the Roman Catholic Church definitely confirmed the acceptance of these additions into its catalog of Bible books. These additions were Tobit, Judith, additions to Esther, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, three additions to Daniel, First Maccabees, and Second Maccabees.

Answer 5

The Catholic bible has more books in it. Protestant bibles had books removed because they were not deemed "holy" or "important to spiritual growth" or something like that. I think I also heard a rumor that the 10 Commandments were a little different. Different order on a few, I think. That could be wrong, but I heard it somewhere.

Other then that, no they are the same.

Answer 6

It is authentic in its interpretation guaranteed by the Holy Spirit through the Apostolic Catholic Church. It has been modified over the years as far as language is concerned for the ease of reading but the meaning has not changed. Other bibles cannot make this claim because there is but only one Church which Christ instituted for humanity.

Answer 7

Martin Luther removed some of the books from what is now called the "Catholic Bible".

Answer 8

the version that was authorized to be read by the Catholic church. and really it is not that different than others.

Answer 9

Catholics will tell you it's the "REAL" Bible.

Answer 10

Do the Catholic have their own bible?!!!! I did not know that!Whatever, it must have sections where paedphile and washiping the Pope and Bishops is permissable!!!!!