The New Testament Deuteros
It is ironic that Protestants reject the inclusion of the deuterocanonicals at councils such as Hippo (393) and Carthage (397), because these are the very same early Church councils that Protestants appeal to for the canon of the New Testament. Prior to the councils of the late 300s, there was a wide range of disagreement over exactly what books belonged in the New Testament. Certain books, such as the gospels, acts, and most of the epistles of Paul had long been agreed upon. However a number of the books of the New Testament, most notably Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 & 3 John, and Revelation remained hotly disputed until the canon was settled. They are, in effect, “New Testament deuterocanonicals.”
While Protestants are willing to accept the testimony of Hippo and Carthage (the councils they most commonly cite) for the canonicity of the New Testament deuterocanonicals, they are unwilling to accept the testimony of Hippo and Carthage for the canonicity of the Old Testament deuterocanonicals. Ironic indeed!
Regarding Bad Translations in the King James Version, review the link provided below as there are too many items to post here.
Bad Translations in the King James Version
Typically, when they started out and were in politically precarious positions, they preached the free exercise of private judgment and its corollary, tolerance of others’ public exercise of private judgment. However, once their own positions were consolidated and they saw the chaos that the public exercise of private judgment led to, they backed off of the principle and tried to reign it in. Historian Will Durant writes:
“It is instructive to observe how Luther moved from tolerance to dogma as his power and certainty grew. Among [the 95 Theses was the proposition] that ‘to burn heretics is against the will of the Holy Spirit.’ In the Open Letter to the Christian Nobility (1520) Luther ordained ‘every man a priest,’ with the right to interpret the Bible according to his private judgment and individual light; and added, ‘We should vanquish heretics with books, not with burning.’ … [But] Luther should have never grown old. Already in 1522 he was outpapaling the popes. ‘I do not admit,’ he wrote, ‘that my doctrine can be judged by anyone, even the angels. He who does not receive my doctrine cannot be saved’” (Durant, The Story of Civilization, volume 6 “The Reformation”], 420-2).
Thus in 1529, Luther wrote:
“No one is to be compelled to profess the faith, but no one must be allowed to injure it. Let our opponents give their objections and hear our answers. If they are thus converted, well and good; if not, let them hold their tongues and believe what they please…. In order to avoid trouble we should not, if possible, suffer contrary teachings in the same state. Even unbelievers should be forced to obey he Ten Commandments, attend church, and outwardly conform” (Letter of August 26, 1529 to Jos. Metsch).
Now that Luther’s own position had been secured, he was able to survey the anarchy caused by the principle he had used to rise to power–the public exercise of private judgment–and he was put in the same paradoxical position as a modern Protestant pastor, needing to preach private judgment to validate his own teaching, yet needing to prohibit the public exercise of private judgment to hold off the forces of chaos and keep the group together. Durant writes:
"Luther now agreed with the Catholic Church that ‘Christians require certainty, definite dogmas, and a sure Word of God which they can trust to live and die by.’ As the Church in the early centuries of Christianity, divided and weakened by a growing multiplicity of ferocious sects, had felt compelled to define her creed and expel all dissidents, so now Luther, dismayed by he variety of quarrelsome sects that had sprouted from the seed of private judgment, passed step by step from toleration to dogmatism. “All men now presume to criticize the Gospel,’ he complained; ‘almost every old doting fool or prating sophist must, forsooth, be a doctor of divinity.’ Stung by Catholic taunts that he had let loose a dissovent anarchy of creeds and morals, he concluded, with the Church, that social order required some cloture to debate, some recognized authority to serve as ‘an anchor of faith.’ … Sebastian Franck thought there was more freedom of speech and belief among the Turks than in the Lutheran states, and Leo Jud, the Zwinglian, joined Carlstadt in calling Luther another pope” (ibid., 423).
But everyone knows that Luther was a man of fierce temper. Surely this was responsible for his attitude and made him unique among the Reformers in his inconsistency with regard to private judgment. Right?
"Other reformers rivaled or surpassed Luther in hounding heresy. Bucer of Strasbourg urged the civil authorities in Protestant states to extirpate all who professed a ‘false’ religion; such men, he said, are worse than murderers; even their wives and children and cattle should be destroyed. The comparatively gentle Melanchthon accepted the chairmanship of the secular inquisition that suppressed the Anabaptists in Germany with imprisonment and death. ‘Why should we pity such men more than God does?’ he asked… He recommended that the rejection of infant baptism, or of original sin, or of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, should be punished as capital crimes. He insisted on the death penalty for a sectarian who thought that heathens might be saved, or for another who doubted that belief in Christ as the Redeemer could change a naturally sinful into a righteous man. He applauded… review at
cin.org/users/james/files/private.htm
