Roman Catholics, why the add?

Question

No shouting match, just logical, level headed answers please.

The catholic bible has 7 more books called the apocrypha(which means added or hidden)

The jewish old testament has ALWAYS denied these books, Jesus or any other author in the NT has NEVER quoted from these books, Jerome in 452 ad said that they were ok but the church didn't ok them until the council of Trent in the 1500's.
(Around the time indulgences were being sold)

indulgence: A grace that was bought to keep yourself or family members out of Purgatory. ( I thought grace was a free gift)

Revelations tells us that anyone who adds or takes away from these books will be damned (paraphrase).
So my question is WHY DID THE CHURCH ADD THEM?!

David m. They WERE in circulation because they were written in 200 bc, that's my whole point, every other book in the Jewish OT is quoted in the NT except these 7. No, the Jews have never used these books as SCRIPTURE.

David m . Great dialogue (seriously).

Revelations 90 ad
rest of New testament between 40 and 80 ad.

It appears to me there was a NT

Answer 1

Cash.

I think you know the answer already.
They added.
SOOOOOOO!

Answer 2

They weren't added. I took a class on this and the Protestant assertion that those 7 books were added if false.

You have to go back at least 650 years before Christ. This will take you to the original Hebrew texts of the OT. Move ahead to around the year 300 and we arrive at the Hellenistic period, which was the Greek influence. During this time, an Egyptian king had the Hebrew texts translated into Greek since the Greek language was the official language of the time. This translation is known as the Septuagint. The books of the apocrypha were already there (note: this is pre-Jesus, pre-Catholic).

During Jesus' day, He and his apostles would have learned the OT from the Septuagint. This was their OT bible, so to speak. Unfortunately, 70 years later when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, the original Hebrew was destroyed. It wasn't until the year 90 AD that the Jews got together and reassembled their OT, only this time they threw out the 7 Apocrypha books.

Fast forward to the Protestant Reformation and the King James Version is written. The protestants decide not to keep the OT that came from the Septuagint (the translation Jesus studied off of), but to take the new OT canon the Jews made in 90 AD. This is why the Protestants have 7 fewer books than the Catholics, and why so many conflicts over interpretation.

God bless.

Answer 3

You need to get your info from more objective sources. You have obviously heard these false charges from some bigot and just posted them here without doing your own research.

The seven books you refer to have been called the dueterocanonical books since the time of Jerome. Only the Protestant reformers in the sixteenth century began calling them "apocrypha". They are quoted and referenced many times in the New Testament. No objective observer can deny the fact that Jesus and the apostles used the Septuagint (the Greek Old Testament which includes the seven books missing from the Masoretic text). Only one example will be given, on which rests the entire truth of Christianity.

Matthew 1:23 quoting Isaiah 7:14 states that "a virgin shall conceive", while the Masoretic text has "a young woman shall conceive". This is the verse used by nonbelievers to deny the virgin birth. There are many, many more examples like this in the Bible.

Your argument about Jerome defeats itself. Jerome, in A.D. 452, said the these books were OK because he submitted to the authority of the Catholic Church to define the canon of scripture. Jerome, who personally did not want the books included, recognized the authority of God's Church as the guardian of His Word. That is why they are included in his Vulgate translation. The Church had defined the canon during a span of several councils in the mid to late fourth century - not at the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent only reaffirmed the canon that had been undisputed for over a thousand years against the removal of the dueterocanonicals by the Reformers.

Again, you show your ignorance by posting a false definition of indulgences. An indulgence cannot be bought; grace is a free gift; some clerics did "sell" indulgences. Unfortunately, some greedy clerics took advantage of the ignorance of simple people. This does not mean that they were acting in accordance with Church teaching or that the Church condoned their actions. Luther was right to be angry about this activity, but fracturing the Church into schism was the worst way to try to deal with it. If he would have worked for reform within the Church, this heresy would have died soon enough - just as countless false teachings had in centuries past.

The book of Revelation condemns anyone who adds or takes away from THIS book - not THESE books. By "this book" John was referring to his Apocalypse, not the Bible - which he had no idea of. That being said - I agree that anyone who intentionally adds or takes away from scripture is subject to severe judgment. If you believe that, you should make darn sure that the charges you are leveling against the Catholic Church are true. Or else, the fathers of your tradition have removed some books from scripture - also condemnable.

Answer 4

The books of the Bible were first hand written unto scrolls. Many of the scrolls were hidden during war time. Many got destroyed or lost. No one had a complete set of the Old Testament scrolls. When the Jewish, Catholic and Protestant Church leaders decided send out people to find as many scrolls as possible., there was debates as to which ones belong in the Bible. The Catholics decided upon 7 more than the others because the style of these books matched what had already been discovered.
The selling of indulgences was a mistake and the Church has admitted this many times. But at that time, there was war, disease and much suffering. The Church was trying to rebuild the Vatican and needed the money. This was one way of getting that money.
The book of Revelation was written in code. Unless you have discovered the code, which no one has yet done, you can not take it literally.

Answer 5

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 keep the Catholic New Testament but 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 6

We do not call them Apocrypha. We did not add them. The seven books were in the Jewish Bible at the time of Christ and are all Old Testament (Jewish) books. When St. Jerome did the first Latin Translation, the Vulgate which is frequently referenced when doing new translations, those books were still part of the Jewish Bible and were therefore kept in the Bible like the entire Old Testament which they are from. These books were all originally written in Hellenistic Greek during the Jewish diaspora. Later Rabbis removed them from the Jewish Canon for the reason that they were not written in a Jewish language. We retained them because we were no longer under Jewish authority. So my question is, why did the Protestant Movement remove them? BTW when St. John wrote Revelations there was no New Testament yet

Answer 7

There are many examples in the New Testament of references to the Greek version of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, which included these books. St Luke, for example, quotes the Septuagint version of the prophecy of Isaiah concerning the Virgin who would conceive. The early church, which was at first made up of Jewish members, used the Bible you are dismissing.

Answer 8

Because the "Reformers" accused the Roman Church of teaching things that were not in the bible. So they added them to the bible at the Counsel of Trent, because these "Apocrypha" books DID teach some of the things that the R.C. was teaching. So, in other words, they were put in as an "answer" to the Protestent Reformation....theBerean......NOTE to DAVID M ABOVE: They were NOT in the jewish Old Testament. They were NEVER considered part of the O.T. canon. Just interesting jewish lititure. NOTHING MORE. You need a history lesson....theBerean

Answer 9

Catholics do not view the Bible as the WORD of God. They "say" that they use scripture and tradition to make decisions, but that is not true-they only rely on tradition. It was not until 1960 that catholics were officially "free" to read the Bible. This is actually a "new" thing for them. But you are correct in that catholics did add books to the Bible at the council of Trent around 1660. They will 'waffle' as to why.

Actually those books ""were"" included in the first edition of the King James Bible in 1611. But there was such an uproar in the Christian community that they were removed in the very next edition. King James wanted to re-unite the churches, he was attempting to woo the Vatican-it backfired. Those books were never ever part of scripture, never never.

Answer 10

It has to do with essential doctrines of faith.

The reformers saw contradictory docrines that were more harmful then helpful.

It can be argued that the Apocraphyl books are sincere books of the period and should be added for their historical benefit, but they weren't considered doctrinally consistent with Christianity.

I know there are as many Jewish sects as there are Christian denominations, but Jews generally accept them as being historical, but don't place them on the same plane as the Torah. The Torah is considered the Word of God, whereas the other writings and the prophets are something less.

The problem with this "second class acceptance" is where it ends. Should the Kaballa be included too? The list goes on.

And I have a tendancy to agree with them as far as Old Testament books go (that the Torah is perfect, and everything else flawed to varying degrees). But when it comes to the New Testament, Jesus trumps all else.
.

Answer 11

They werent added, they were a part of the Old Testament,and still are in Catholic Bibles. Martin Luther "removed" them completely