Is the apocrypha part of Jewish canons of scripture?

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Valke2 said:
We also believe in the ressurection of the just/rightous. The bottom line is, that the books of Macabee were not excluded because they were “too Christian”.
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from: COUNTING THE CANON By STEVEN L. KELLMEYER

By A.D. 70 Jerusalem and the Temple were razed by the Romans, the Levitical priesthood was destroyed and the Jewish faith was hemorrhaging followers to the rapidly spreading belief that Jewish prophecy had been fulfilled in Jesus. Because this belief spread most rapidly among the Jews of the Diaspora and the Gentiles of the eastern Mediterranean, the language of trade, koine Greek, and the Greek Septuagint was the common denominator between all the communities.

Jewish Christian oral teaching competed successfully against traditional Jewish oral teaching, and it used Jewish Scripture to do it. This sparked two movements within non-Christian Judaism. First, Jewish scholars began debating whether or not the Christians’ “Greek Scripture” was really Scripture. Second, around the year 200 , the rabbis began writing down Jewish religious and civil law and their commentaries on it, creating what would become the Talmud six centuries later. These Jews ultimately refused the deuterocanonical Old Testament books, probably because of theology (for example, 1 and 2 Maccabees teach the resurrection of the dead, while Wisdom chapters 1-5 contains an unsettlingly prophetic description of Christ’s passion and death) and because they were written in Greek, not Hebrew.
 
Maranatha said:
from: COUNTING THE CANON By STEVEN L. KELLMEYER

By A.D. 70 Jerusalem and the Temple were razed by the Romans, the Levitical priesthood was destroyed and the Jewish faith was hemorrhaging followers to the rapidly spreading belief that Jewish prophecy had been fulfilled in Jesus. Because this belief spread most rapidly among the Jews of the Diaspora and the Gentiles of the eastern Mediterranean, the language of trade, koine Greek, and the Greek Septuagint was the common denominator between all the communities.

Jewish Christian oral teaching competed successfully against traditional Jewish oral teaching, and it used Jewish Scripture to do it. This sparked two movements within non-Christian Judaism. First, Jewish scholars began debating whether or not the Christians’ “Greek Scripture” was really Scripture. Second, around the year 200 , the rabbis began writing down Jewish religious and civil law and their commentaries on it, creating what would become the Talmud six centuries later. These Jews ultimately refused the deuterocanonical Old Testament books, probably because of theology (for example, 1 and 2 Maccabees teach the resurrection of the dead, while Wisdom chapters 1-5 contains an unsettlingly prophetic description of Christ’s passion and death) and because they were written in Greek, not Hebrew.
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That is certainly not how I understand ancient jewish history. There was no “hemmoraging” of jews to Jesus, which is why Paul went outside the jewish world for followers. It is true that Jews in Greece were less connected to their religion and probably more inclined to follow Jesus. The rest of the writers conclusions seem to be completely erroneous because, as I’ve said, Jews believe in the resurrection of the dead. I’m not familar with the book of Wisdom. Is it known by another name?
 
Here’s what I found about the book of wisdom.

There are no surviving copies of the text in Hebrew. Although the author claims to be Solomon, many scholars believe that its language and ideas are of Greek origin and therefore the author is an Alexandrian Jew.

That would explain why it is not part of our canon.
It does not so much as prophesize jesus as it seems to have been used as a roadmap for the GOspel of Matthew. That is, I would argue that it was matthew that took from the book of Wisdom, the idea of a suffering servant. So while you may view it as prophecy in Wisdom, I would view the Gospel of Matthew as tailoring itself to the book of Wisdom.

In any event, the book of Wisdom is not the book(s) of Macabees, which is what I thought we were talking about.
 
Crumpy said:
I can’t answer the questions in your original post, but it’s easier to address the question in the title of the thread.

The answer is no. First and Second Maccabees were never part of Jewish scripture, to my knowledge. I have Jewish friends who have a Catholic bible, just so that they can read those scrolls.

The way I’ve heard it, those scrolls would have been lost, except that the Catholic Church considers them inspired.

That, incidentally, is the same reason that protestants do not accept them, because the Jews, in the first place, never considered them to be inspired.
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Maybe someone should tell the protestants that Jews don’t consider the New Testament to be inspired either.

But that might make their heads explode. :eek:
 
Valke2 said:
That is certainly not how I understand ancient jewish history. There was no “hemmoraging” of jews to Jesus, which is why Paul went outside the jewish world for followers. It is true that Jews in Greece were less connected to their religion and probably more inclined to follow Jesus. The rest of the writers conclusions seem to be completely erroneous because, as I’ve said, Jews believe in the resurrection of the dead. I’m not familar with the book of Wisdom. Is it known by another name?
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Well, we know for certain that the Christians were seen as a sect of the Jewish religion. When Claudius expelled Jews from Rome in the first century, the law cover Christians as well. Their numbers were growing fast and the Jewish authorities needed to resort to persecutions to stem the tide. There would have been obviously more hemmoraging if the Jewish authorities did not persecute the early Church. Beatings, expulsion and even killing early Christians was the norm.
 
Valke2 said:
Here’s what I found about the book of wisdom.

There are no surviving copies of the text in Hebrew. Although the author claims to be Solomon, many scholars believe that its language and ideas are of Greek origin and therefore the author is an Alexandrian Jew.

That would explain why it is not part of our canon.
It does not so much as prophesize jesus as it seems to have been used as a roadmap for the GOspel of Matthew. That is, I would argue that it was matthew that took from the book of Wisdom, the idea of a suffering servant. So while you may view it as prophecy in Wisdom, I would view the Gospel of Matthew as tailoring itself to the book of Wisdom.

In any event, the book of Wisdom is not the book(s) of Macabees, which is what I thought we were talking about.
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I would think it was the life of Jesus that was tailored to the book of Wisdom. If Christ existed in history and if he did what he said he did then you have to take him at his word. A dispassionate historical inquiry shows these are facts.
 
Maranatha said:
Well, we know for certain that the Christians were seen as a sect of the Jewish religion. When Claudius expelled Jews from Rome in the first century, the law cover Christians as well. Their numbers were growing fast and the Jewish authorities needed to resort to persecutions to stem the tide. There would have been obviously more hemmoraging if the Jewish authorities did not persecute the early Church. Beatings, expulsion and even killing early Christians was the norm.
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That there was fighting between the early jewish christians and the jews is not questioned. It was not extensive, from what I have read. And it had less to do with the rate of conversion as with the breach of theology. I never heard anyone dispute before that the majority of early christians came from the gentile population. I’ll have to dig up some books to confirm or retract.
 
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