The New Testament was written in Koine Greek. But Jesus spoke Aramaic and Hebrew. The OT in Palestine never accepted the Deuterocanonical books. They were accepted among the Greek speaking Jews of the diaspora, but not by the Aramaic and Hebrew speaking Jews of Palestine. The authors of the NT quoted the Septuagint, simply because they were writing in Greek and that was the copy of the OT scriptures in Greek at that time in history. But if you pay close attention, Jesus never quotes from the Deuterocanonical books.
Yes, many early Christians used and accepted the Septuagint and the Deuterocanonical books, but there is no proof that Jesus or any Jews in Palestine ever accepted the Deuterocanonical books. In fact there is proof that they didn’t accept the Deuterocanonical books. The authors of the NT may have quoted from the Septuagint, but that doesn’t mean they accepted the Deuterocanonical parts of the Septuagint. And the Septuagint is a Greek translation that was made before the Deuterocanonical books were even written. Yet in the diaspora the Deuterocanonical books were added to the Septuagint because they were written in Greek. While in Palestine they were rejected because they were written in Greek. Do you follow me?
The criteria was kind of obvious, since it was obvious to Peter that Paul’s letters were scripture. Peter’s letters were scripture as well, because they met the same criteria as did Paul’s letters.
It seems that you are trying to argue that the church determined what the books of the Bible are to be, so the Church also gets to determine how to interpret them, and also gets to add tradition into an even par with scripture.
Finally, as I have stressed before, Jesus condemned the traditions of the Pharisees and Saducees, and he used scripture to do it. So what makes you think that he would accept the traditions of the church?
John, you assume that Jesus could only speak Aramaic and Hebrew, however, He may have used Greek at times. They is no proof one way or the other, however, there were many Jews in Jerusalem at various times that spoke Greek from the diaspora. There were many Romans. When he conversed with the centurion did Jesus use Aramaic or Greek? Jesus quoted the Septuagint. The early Church wrote and spoke Greek because Koine means common. It was the common language. That was why the the Septuagint was also commonly used by the Church.
Early Christians read the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint. It included the seven deuterocanonical books. For this reason, the Protestant historian J.N.D. Kelly writes, “It should be observed that the Old Testament thus admitted as authoritative in the Church was somewhat bulkier and more comprehensive [than the Protestant Bible]. . . . It always included, though with varying degrees of recognition, the so-called apocrypha or deuterocanonical books” (, 53). The authors of the New Testament quoted freely from the Septuagint—over 300 times.
Martin Luther makes a pertinent observation in the sixteenth chapter of his Commentary on St. John “We are obliged to yield many things to the papists [Catholics]—that they possess the Word of God which we received from them, otherwise we should have known nothing at all about it.”
Wis 2:12 “Let us lie in wait for the righteous man, because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions; he reproaches us for sins against the law, and accuses us of sins against our training.
Wis 2:13 He professes to have knowledge of God, and calls himself a child of the Lord.
Wis 2:14 He became to us a reproof of our thoughts;
Wis 2:15 the very sight of him is a burden to us, because his manner of life is unlike that of others, and his ways are strange.
Wis 2:16 We are considered by him as something base, and he avoids our ways as unclean; he calls the last end of the righteous happy, and boasts that God is his father.
Wis 2:17 Let us see if his words are true, and let us test what will happen at the end of his life;
Wis 2:18 for if the righteous man is God’s son, he will help him, and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries.
Wis 2:19 Let us test him with insult and torture, that we may find out how gentle he is, and make trial of his forbearance.
Wis 2:20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for, according to what he says, he will be protected.”
Wis 2:21 Thus they reasoned, but they were led astray, for their wickedness blinded them,
Wis 2:22 and they did not know the secret purposes of God, nor hope for the wages of holiness, nor discern the prize for blameless souls;
Wis 2:23 for God created man for incorruption, and made him in the image of his own eternity,
Wis 2:24 but through the devil’s envy death entered the world, and those who belong to his party experience it.
Protestants lost a lot in omitting that passage.
catholic.com/library/Old_Testament_Canon.asp
catholic.com/thisrock/2000/0009sbs.asp
Isa 1:18 “Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.
Isa 1:19 If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land;
Isa 1:20 but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
