Deuterocanon - Matters to Address

[Novocastrian]

The bottom line is that all bible Christians, as well as all pseudo-Christian sects like Mormonism and the Jehovah’s Witnesses are bound, for some odd reason, to the canon of the Pharisees (as introduced to Christianity by the reformers 1,500 years after Christ). If we look in Matthew 23, we see Jesus condemning the Pharisees seven-fold. This was not a recommendation to do as they do.

So, even though most bible Christians are not Lutheran, they obey Luther as to the books that he personally liked. Odd - especially if you reject the concept of a Pope. Do bible Christians forget that the Orthodox have also held the seven books as inspired since the earliest days? Yes, they do.

In fairness, Christ tells us to obey those on the seat of Moses in the same chapter!

Again, you seem to be missing some of the historical nuance. Traditional Protestants don’t just throw out the Deutero-canon. It’s still part of our Bible, part of our lectionary, etc; it’s just accorded a lower status than the canon proper. We read it, but don’t use it *alone *to establish doctrine, in the way that one might use a single saying from the Gospels to make a theological point.

 

[JamesTheJust]

With all due respect my friend, I’m of the position that there are no historical inaccuracies held within Scripture and Judas Thaddeus is looking to defend a position on the Deuterocanonical books. I have asked him to reconcile the beginning of Judith and I’m not interested in replies of, “well the Bible has lots of inaccuracies.” However, I would be more than interested in discussing supposed historical inaccuracies within Scripture perhaps in the Sacred Scripture section of the forum. I trust many Catholics and Protestants alike will be able to explain such discrepancies.

For this thread however, I’m interested in JT’s position on whether or not the beginning of Judith 1 has any errors at all, or if some of it’s true, or what parts are true.

I agree that Scripture is inerrant. However, you can’t just say, “Look at these apparent inaccuracies in Judith! That means Judith is not Scripture!” And then just completely ignore the inaccuracies in Daniel and Luke. Simply saying, “Well, those are Scripture, so they can’t be wrong” doesn’t cut it, because I can say the same thing about Judith! You have a double standard.

I urge you to read the articles to which I linked in an earlier post. They explain the supposed “errors” in the deuterocanonicals using two methods:

1. The deuterocanonicals, like Daniel, Esther, and Luke, are not history textbooks, so they don’t need to be historically inerrant.
2. The other explanation uses meticulous study of the original languages to actually reconcile the errors with history.

 

[JonNC]

I’ve recently started a project designed for the purpose of addressing certain problems which confused
Christians have concerning the Deuterocanon of the Holy Bible, and wouldn’t mind if I could be given a
number of reasons why it’s not accepted by the Protestants (Catholics aware of such reasons can an-
swer too). I’m not looking to argue in this thread, simply to collect supposed‒problems to analyze and
refute, perhaps I and other can come back at a later time and reveal some answers.

So Judith, Tobit, Maccabees . . . what’s the deal?

The dispute regarding these books starts in the early Church. What reasons did notables such as St. Jerome give for not considering them canonical? It’s not a rhetorical question, either. It seems to me to be important information on the topic.

Jon

 

[MommaduckofMany]

Cathoholic, thank you for taking the time to share what you did. It was very helpful. It is sad to see that when it comes to friends (Catholic, Orthodox, Baptist, and Jewish, in this case), the Jewish friend is given a break and more esteem by the Baptist than the Catholic or Orthodox…to the point of hurtfulness. To be fair though, I hold the Jewish friend in more esteem simply because of her life wisdom and honest conversations compared to the Baptist. (I’ve had interesting theological conversations with the Jewish friend with no intent to convert one another, just educational from both parties) One would think that shared Christiandom would be enough for kindness towards theological differences Unfortunately, in the South I cannot even cross myself in a restaurant without a suddenly loud commentary on some distant Catholic relative by some old biddies at a nearby table.

 

[Judas_Thaddeus]

Alright, I’ve been able to weed out seven issues to deal with so far, keep 'em coming.

 

[JamesTheJust]

Some more resources:
catholic-legate.com/Apologetics/Scripture/Articles/AreDCBooksPartOfTheBible.aspx
sites.google.com/site/apostolicapologetics/sacred-scripture/deuterocanon-apocrypha
jaysanalysis.com/2010/03/19/responses-to-recent-protestant-objections-on-the-deuterocanon/