Modern Christians today possesing their bible of 66 books. Roman Catholic has 73 books, where are the others?

Question

Others like the book of Judith, The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Barnabas, The fallen Asleep of Mary,The Gospel of Bartholomew, etc. (modern christians and Catholic doesnt have both of this books in their Bibles.)

Answer 1

OK, here goes,

The book of Judith is in the Catholic Bible. Martin Luther didn't personally believe it was inspired so he didn't add it to his translations. Even the original 1611 King James Version of the Bible has the "Apocryphal" books in it.

The Gospel of Thomas is Gnostic in origin and cannot be authenticated as the real inspired Word of God. It was written spuriously by an impostor and not Thomas. Besides this, it's sayings and teachings directly contradict the teachings of the Apostles.

The Gospel of Barnabas was indeed read in church's in the first century. It, however, wasn't deemed inspired because it wasn't written by the Apostles or anyone who was in direct contact with the Lord. It would be like quoting from a good book would be today. The book might have some good things to say but it's not inspired.

The falling asleep of Mary, or the Assumption of Mary is spurious and is not contained in the Catholic canon of scripture. It was developed at a far later date. Perhaps true, but not inspired.

The Gospel of Bartholomew wasn't written by Bartholomew as is the Gospel of Thomas. It, too, is Gnostic in origin. It has been traced have been written later then it indicates which suggests inaccuracies.

Answer 2

The 27 books of the New Testament were widely accepted by the members of the early church long before the leaders got around to proclaiming them the canon.

Just like today there were all kinds of pseudo-Christian groups coming up with "interesting" doctrine and writing gospels to back them up. The group called Gnostics wrote the gospel of Judas in this way.

The four Gospels that were chosen were the only ones to be written in the first century and by either the original Apostles or their close companions.

The mainstream Christians of the day had absolutely no problem with the 27 books selected as canon.

With love in Christ.

Answer 3

It's a bit of a story to explain why, so bear with me. The new testament is the same for protestants and Catholics. Only the OT differs. 2000 years ago, this OT, the Jewish canon, was still open. That is to say, Jewish scholars still considered it subject to change. So when this Jesus dude came along and they didn't believe in him, they sought to combat the massive amount of conversions going on. To do this, they took out seven books from their scripture - the seven they thought supported Christianity too much. Remember - their canon was not yet closed, so it was a perfectly acceptable thing to do. However, it did not stop the Christians, as they simply continued to use these 7 other books. 1500 years later, some scholars came along, Martin Luther one of them, and discovered that Jewish scholars removed 7 books 1500 years before, but did not at the time know why, and began to doubt whether Christians should be using them either, and so they declared them of questionable authenticity. The Catholic Church, at the council of Trent, reaffirmed what they had already declared in the councils of the late 4th century - that these seven books were indeed part of the Christian scriptures. This, like the actions of the Jewish scholars, was done to help combat the increasing dissent on this issue in the Church. But like when the Jewish scholars tried it, it did not work and the Protestant reformation came to full force. The seven books, called the deuterocanon by those who use them and apocrypha by those who don't, was kept in Protestant bibles in a separate section until the mid 1800's when it was decided that it was not worth the extra cost to print something they didn't believe was authentic.

Answer 4

I think the point is The church(s) have hidden the truth that does not fit their their Dogma instead of adjusting the dogma to fit the teachings of Jesus. People, christians, need to lighten up and give the books a bit of wiggle room. It is not all cut and dry absolute truth. If SOME of it was divinely inspired even that is filtered through the minds of people who had their own agenda. Look at the disagreement between Peter and Paul. They could not both be right, both talking from divine inspiration. One, or most probable both, were promoting their own political view.

Answer 5

Those are considered the Gnostic Gospels, many of them were not found until the late 1800's and most of them are only one or two pages and have been worn with age, many missing pieces in the writings where there are holes in the manuscripts.

Answer 6

ask those who were at the Council of Nicea they had a specific set of guidlines to follow. those that did not meet certain criteria where not placed in the 66 book combonation we refer to as the bible. it does not mean important things were not written and great wisdom can be gleened from it. it just means they are not in the traditional bible. and if they were inpired words of God I believe God would have interviened and placed them in by divine intervention.

Answer 7

There is a warning in the bible, not to add to or take away from Gods word.

Answer 8

Banned by the catholic church, mainly because they contradicted it's favorite themes. One major difference the church was concerned about was that these books suggested that you could be holy and devout by worshiping god in your own way. This contradicts the church's message that the only way to god and heaven is through the church.

Answer 9

Because they are not considered the Word of God. They are gnostic writings.

Answer 10

Guess they didn't make the cut. Must not have fit in with what the church was trying to achieve.


VLR