Why is the Apocrypha in the Catholic Bible, but not the Protestant Bible?

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 keep the Catholic New Testament but change its Old Testament from the Catholic canon to the Jewish canon.

The books that were removed supported such things as
+ Prayers for the dead (Tobit 12:12; 2 Maccabees 12:39-45)
+ Purgatory (Wisdom 3:1-7)
+ Intercession of saints in heaven (2 Maccabees 15:14)
+ Intercession of angels (Tobit 12:12-15)

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

Martin Luther removed the apocrypha. Remember the Bible came from the Catholic Church. The Protestant version came 1,500 years later.

Catholic and Protestant Bibles both include 27 books in the New Testament. Protestant Bibles have only 39 books in the Old Testament, however, while Catholic Bibles have 46. The seven books included in Catholic Bibles are Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Wisdom, Sirach, and Baruch. Catholic Bibles also include sections in the Books of Esther and Daniel which are not found in Protestant Bibles. These books are called the deuterocanonical books. The Catholic Church considers these books to be inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Edit: A Catholic Answer always gets a thumbs down from fundies.

Answer 3

A part of the Apocrypha is in the Roman Catholic Bible. Not all of it.

The reason why it is not in the Protestant Bibles ( most of them anyway) is because they had certain inconsistencies which were obvious. ( Like calling Nebuchadnezzar the King of Assyria) .


I however am a Protestant that noticed something that was equally as obvious. And I am not the type of person to let that go. The word Apocrypha means 'hidden'. That's like dragging a string in front of a cat. lol

So I am reading the Apocrypha, unlike my Protestant brethren, and seeing a lot of things they miss. And oh, how they miss!

Answer 4

Because for a seemingly clandestine reason, someone decided to side with the Pharisees' standard of what was considered to be "inspired by God (namely, the Holy Spirit)" and remove certain books from the Bible. The book of Revelation was also ALMOST removed by the same "authority", but this movement failed.

This list of "legitimate" scriptures, known as "canon", were decided by the same group of corrupt Judaic priests (the Pharisees) who are also associated with the execution of Jesus. This "canonization of scripture" occurred in 70AD, at the Council of Jamnia. This was at the advent of the exponential growth of Christianity in the middle east and surrounding areas.

It's a little confusing why a Christian, 1500 years after the fact, would suddenly accept the authority of the same group of people, associated with the absolute denial of Jesus as the Messiah and his subsequent execution, to decide which scriptures were inspired and which were not.

Answer 5

the apocrypha books teach many things that are not true and are not historically accurate. while many catholics accepted the apocrypha previously, the roman catholic church officially added it to their bible at the council of trent in the mid 1500’s a.d., primarily in response to the protestant reformation. it supports some of the things that the roman catholic church believes and practices which are not in agreement with the bible. examples are praying for the dead, petitioning “saints” in heaven for their prayers, worshipping angels, and “alms giving” atoning for sins. some of what the apocrypha says is true and correct. however, due to the historical and theological errors, the books must be viewed as fallible historical and religious documents, not as the inspired, authoritative word of God.

Answer 6

i see you've gotten your avatar fixed. nice hat.

the books of the apocrypha were popular at the time the bible was canonized (which is the same time period in which the current church of rome was established, the sabbath was changed, and the jews started being heavily persecuted by the new roman church), and were well liked by emperor/ pope constantine, but the problem was that they were supposed to be old testament texts, but weren't canonized by the jews. the reason they weren't canonized by the jews is the same reasone that they were removed during the reformation; they contradicted the rest of the bible.

Answer 7

I heard that one reason is that Jesus never quoted from any of the Apocrypha.

Answer 8

Catholics need something to help them to prove what they believe so have many other books.
They even say there priests are another Christ.
see the following quote:-

"The priest is, indeed, another Christ, or in some way, he is himself a continuation of Christ." (Pope Pius XI, Encylical on the Priesthood)

Answer 9

Someone said "the bible came from the catholic church,,,,,,,Well from Acts to Antioc, no catholic, AND at ANTIOC they were called CHRISTIANS,,,,,,NOT catholics Now comes CONSTANUS!!!,,,,,,,,,,, But as one has already said, NOT inspired by God.

Answer 10

The KJV people left them out due to doctrinal issues (non-canonical) and/or dubious authorship.