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jmcrae
Guest
Probably because they were counting scrolls; not books. The scroll of Parapahelion, for example, contains six books, from I Samuel to II Chronicles.
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And His blessing also with you, Ruthie.
Do you have a link to this proclamation?
Jon
EDIT: And why would he translate and include them if he felt this way?
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
There were ‘political’ pressures on Martin Luther. It was when Martin Luther started deciding changes in the canon that those pressures questioned him. He didn’t have the support to go any further than choosing a different canon of the Old Testament.
It is widely known that Martin Luther referred to James as the 'Epistle of straw…" Of course now we read that his quotes were taken out of context.
It was Luther’s interpretation that brought him to the belief of ‘sola fide’, or faith alone, that he found contention with James.
It seems to be the contention was fitting scriptures to theology and not fitting theology to scriptures.
You can look up pro and con websites for information on Luther and this particular statement about the book of James.
In my opinion, it makes no sense, because he did not remove the book and the argument only exists for some to remain at odds with each other, separated by semantics.
Catholics say faith plus works and Protestants say, ‘no, faith alone.’ Catholics say, ‘faith without works is dead.’ Protestants say, ‘if you’re a believer, you’ll do good works.’ Aren’t the results the same? If you have faith, you’ll do the good works of the Lord?
It’s at this point it usually comes out, ‘works are not required for salvation.’ To a Catholic it sounds like, 'all you have to do is believe Christ came to earth to die for our sins and you have to do nothing else, including any works of God; prayer, reading scriptures or keeping His commandments even. Then it runs full circle and the response is, ‘if you believe, you’ll do those things!’
Different words, saying the same thing…semantics. People determined to keep a dispute alive and going, even if it means dividing the body of Christ.
Now it seems it, those books have always been a part of the canon and the response is, no, those books are useful reading, but they’re not scritpures. Scriptures teach us to be holy. Useful books teach us to be holy. Arguing and dividing the body of Christ does not.
If the canons are so an important argument, would someone please provide examples of those books being used, or a point of refutation, in these theological debates?
These are just my thoughts…
It is widely known that Martin Luther referred to James as the 'Epistle of straw…" Of course now we read that his quotes were taken out of context.
It was Luther’s interpretation that brought him to the belief of ‘sola fide’, or faith alone, that he found contention with James.
It seems to be the contention was fitting scriptures to theology and not fitting theology to scriptures.
You can look up pro and con websites for information on Luther and this particular statement about the book of James.
In my opinion, it makes no sense, because he did not remove the book and the argument only exists for some to remain at odds with each other, separated by semantics.
Catholics say faith plus works and Protestants say, ‘no, faith alone.’ Catholics say, ‘faith without works is dead.’ Protestants say, ‘if you’re a believer, you’ll do good works.’ Aren’t the results the same? If you have faith, you’ll do the good works of the Lord?
It’s at this point it usually comes out, ‘works are not required for salvation.’ To a Catholic it sounds like, 'all you have to do is believe Christ came to earth to die for our sins and you have to do nothing else, including any works of God; prayer, reading scriptures or keeping His commandments even. Then it runs full circle and the response is, ‘if you believe, you’ll do those things!’
Different words, saying the same thing…semantics. People determined to keep a dispute alive and going, even if it means dividing the body of Christ.
Now it seems it, those books have always been a part of the canon and the response is, no, those books are useful reading, but they’re not scritpures. Scriptures teach us to be holy. Useful books teach us to be holy. Arguing and dividing the body of Christ does not.
If the canons are so an important argument, would someone please provide examples of those books being used, or a point of refutation, in these theological debates?
These are just my thoughts…
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shawn38
Guest
It was not until Trent in 1546, almost 30 years after the beginning of the Reformation movement, that the RCC actually canonized their Bible as it stands today. The actions of none of the councils were unanimous or decisive until Trent . The list of books adopted was adopted simply by a majority vote. A large minority of every council refused to accept the list of the majority. Some advocated the admission of books that were rejected; others opposed the admission of books that were accepted. As late as the seventh century (629), at the sixth Council of Constantinople, many different canonical lists were presented for ratification.
The first council to address the issue was apparently Laodicea in Phrygia Pacatiana in 364 AD.
Here’s the list they included:
THESE are all the books of Old Testament appointed to be read: 1, Genesis of the world; 2, The Exodus from Egypt; 3, Leviticus; 4, Numbers; 5, Deuteronomy; 6, Joshua, the son of Nun; 7, Judges, Ruth; 8, Esther; 9, Of the Kings, First and Second; 10, Of the Kings, Third and Fourth; 11, Chronicles, First and Second; 12, Esdras, First and Second; 13, The Book of Psalms; 14, The Proverbs of Solomon; 15, Ecclesiastes; 16, The Song of Songs;17, Job; 18, The Twelve Prophets; 19, Isaiah; 20, Jeremiah, and Baruch, the Lamentations, and the Epistle; 21, Ezekiel; 22, Daniel.
No Tobit, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, Baruch, 1 & 2 Maccabees
And these are the books of the New Testament: Four Gospels, according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; The Acts of the Apostles; Seven Catholic Epistles, to wit, one of James, two of Peter, three of John, one of Jude; Fourteen Epistles of Paul, one to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, one to the Galatians, one to the Ephesians, one to the Philippians, one to the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, one to the Hebrews, two to Timothy, one to Titus, and one to Philemon.
Here’s books banned by the Council of Laodicea
Ephesians and Philippians
FOURTH SESSION COUNCIL OF TRENT CELEBRATED ON THE EIGHTH DAY OF APRIL, 1546
It has thought it proper, moreover, to insert in this decree a list of the sacred books, lest a doubt might arise in the mind of someone as to which are the books received by this council.
They are the following: of the Old Testament, the five books of Moses…and the Apocalypse of John the Apostle. The Bible version today.
The Protestants, due to various reasons, did not accept the Apocrypha and deuterocanonical books, but accepted the Hebrew OT.
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jmcrae
Guest
Okay, keep in mind that this was actually a few decades before we had any kind of canon at all, either of the New or the Old Testaments - the Council of Laodicea was making a proposal; they were not finalizing the canon. We didn’t have a final canon of the New Testament until 405 AD, and the Vulgate Bible that came about as a product of that final canon had the 46-book Old Testament canon.
Was there dispute over the Palestinian or the Septuagint canons, yes - St. Jerome was inclined to go with the Palestinian canon, until the Pope told him otherwise - the same Pope who gave us the 27-book New Testament.
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wmscott
Guest
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aspirant
Guest
I’m looking at the decrees of the Ecumenical Councils accepted by the Catholic Church, and the canon of scripture was defined a good 40 years before Martin Luther was a gleam in his parents’ eyes:
“The holy Roman church, founded on the words of our Lord and Saviour, firmly believes, professes and preaches one true God, almighty, immutable and eternal, Father, Son and holy Spirit… It professes that one and the same God is the author of the old and the new Testament – that is, the law and the prophets, and the gospel – since the saints of both testaments spoke under the inspiration of the same Spirit. It accepts and venerates their books, whose titles are as follows: Five books of Moses, namely Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; Joshua, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, Esdras, Nehemiah, Tobit, Judith, Esther, Job, Psalms of David, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Baruch, Ezechiel, Daniel; the twelve minor prophets, namely Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi; two books of the Maccabees; the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; fourteen letters of Paul, to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, two to the Thessalonians, to the Colossians, two to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon, to the Hebrews; two letters of Peter, three of John, one of James, one of Jude; Acts of the Apostles; Apocalypse of John.”
This is the list on which Trent’s was based.
So, where then did Cardinal Cajetan and others receive the right to question the D-C books?
Jon
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SemperReformada
Guest
This isn’t correct. Jerome did include the apocrypha in the Vulgate but also included his prologues to each apocryphal (deutero) book which clearly rejected their canonocity.Okay, keep in mind that this was actually a few decades before we had any kind of canon at all, either of the New or the Old Testaments - the Council of Laodicea was making a proposal; they were not finalizing the canon. We didn’t have a final canon of the New Testament until 405 AD, and the Vulgate Bible that came about as a product of that final canon had the 46-book Old Testament canon.
Was there dispute over the Palestinian or the Septuagint canons, yes - St. Jerome was inclined to go with the Palestinian canon, until the Pope told him otherwise - the same Pope who gave us the 27-book New Testament.
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
And God clearly saw that they were included…
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SemperReformada
Guest
…and God clearly saw that they were excluded.
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
Sorry SemperReformada, that’s not true. They are included and were included, until the 1500s when the reformers chose to choose a different canon. That exclusion was the decision of men.
They still exist in many Bibles today.
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SemperReformada
Guest
A different canon than whom? The early councils were merely provincial and settled nothing as history clearly proves.
It was a group of fallible men who decided to include the deutero’s in the canon. At the very least you surely recognize the councils of Hippo and Carthage were not ecumenical councils and it wasn’t until Trent that the Roman church decided to “infallibly” declare the OT canon.
If you want to say that it was a decision of men to exclude them please have the honesty to say that it was also a decision of men to include them, at last up until Trent.
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aspirant
Guest
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SemperReformada
Guest
No, it wasn’t. Even at Trent there was debate as to whether or not the deutero’s belonged in the canon of inspired scripture. Don’t you think the Tridentine fathers would have realized that there had already been an infallible decision regarding the canon?
The early councils were merely provinical and this is why Jerome’s prologues to each deuterocanonical book were included in the Vulgate and I am sure you know that the prologues clearly expressed Jerome’s negativity regarding the deutero’s. Don’t you think it odd that the Roman church would declare the OT canon using the charism of infallibility and then turn aournd and promulgate the Vulgate which contaiend text clearly rejecting the canonical status of several books?
Augustine who presided at the North African councils recognized the councils were not infallibly declaring anything with regards to the OT canon and wrote a letter describing how to ascertain what was and what wasn’t canonical based in part on what the greater number of churches were using. Had the earlier councils been seen as infallible it would have been a slam dunk for Augustine to simply say the Hippo and Carthage had already setteld the issue but this isn’t what we see.
The final, “infallible” decision to include the deutero’s in the canon was at Trent.
Why didn’t the Catholic’ of the day, such as the Tridentine fathers realize there already was an infallible decree regarding the OT canon? The answer is they didn’t realize it because there wasn’t one.
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
**Melito, bishop of Sardis, an ancient city of Asia Minor (see Rev 3), c. 170 AD produced the first known Christian attempt at an Old Testament canon. His list maintains the Septuagint order of books but contains only the Old Testament protocanonicals minus the Book of Esther.
The Council of Laodicea, c. 360, produced a list of books similar to today’s canon. This was one of the Church’s earliest decisions on a canon.
Pope Damasus, 366-384, in his Decree, listed the books of today’s canon.
The Council of Rome, 382, was the forum which prompted Pope Damasus’ Decree.
Bishop Exuperius of Toulouse wrote to Pope Innocent I in 405 requesting a list of canonical books. Pope Innocent listed the present canon.
The Council of Hippo, a local north Africa council of bishops created the list of the Old and New Testament books in 393 which is the same as the Roman Catholic list today.
The Council of Carthage, a local north Africa council of bishops created the same list of canonical books in 397. This is the council which many Protestant and Evangelical Christians take as the authority for the New Testament canon of books. The Old Testament canon from the same council is identical to Roman Catholic canon today. Another Council of Carthage in 419 offered the same list of canonical books.
Since the Roman Catholic Church does not define truths unless errors abound on the matter, Roman Catholic Christians look to the Council of Florence, an ecumenical council in 1441 for the first definitive list of canonical books.
The final infallible definition of canonical books for Roman Catholic Christians came from the Council of Trent in 1556 in the face of the errors of the Reformers who rejected seven Old Testament books from the canon of scripture to that time.**
Just as it was fallible men that included them, it was fallible men that excluded them
In fact, it was fallible men that wrote them, defined the canon, translated and interpreted them. Do we discount the whole Bible now?
Just as God had the power to inspire the word written, Christ had the power to build a Church. Build or inspire, they both came from God. The Church actually came before the New Testament. Why did God choose that order?
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SemperReformada
Guest
Just so you and I are on the same page it seems we agree that Trent was the first infallible definition of the OT canon. This does not mean that the deutero’s were not in use before Trent only that Trent was the first infallible decree on the OT canon.Melito, bishop of Sardis, an ancient city of Asia Minor (see Rev 3), c. 170 AD produced the first known Christian attempt at an Old Testament canon. His list maintains the Septuagint order of books but contains only the Old Testament protocanonicals minus the Book of Esther.
The only thing I would add is that Augustine who I believe presided over both councils realized that these were provincial councils and certainly not ecumenical councils capable of defining or settling the matter for the church.
prodigalson:
I’m quite sure the Reformation was part of the reason the OT canon was finally infallibly declared but let’s not lose site of the fact that there had been a school of thought from he beginning which was hostile to the inclusion of the deuteros as canonical.
Just so we are clear on what I understand the council of Florence to have accomplished let’s look at the below piece from the Catholic Encyclopedia.
.
Now. how definitive RC Christians saw Florence as being I do not know. There was debate at Trent among the council fathers with regards as to whether or not the deutero’s were canonical so one might think if Florence was viewed as definitive there would have been no debate among the council fathers regarding their inclusion in the canon. If you are unfamiliar of the debate occured I can post on that later.
prodigalson:
I don’t fully agree that the Reformation was the only cause of the decison on the OT canon though. As I mentioned before there was opposition to including the deutero’s from the beginning. Nonetheless I am sure the debate reached it’s peak during the years of the Reformation.
It would be kind of hard to write about something before it happened wouldn’t it?
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
The Old foretells the New, through prophesy, ‘typology’ and the New fulfills the Old, most evident when New Testament writings refer to Old Testament writings.
(I cannot credit the source I received these from as they are in my notes, but not the source I got them from. I apologize to the one who provided the research.)
**Heb 11:35, “…Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, that they might find a better resurrection.” The only place in the O.T. that you will find reference to that is 2 Macc 7:1-29. The first half of Heb 11:35 is found in 1 Kings 17:23 and 2 Kings 4:36.
Heb 11:38, “They wandered in deserts and mountains…”
This is found in 1 Macc 2:28-30 and 2 Macc 5:27.
Jn 10:22, “Now there took place at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication…” The inauguration of this feast is found in 1Macc 4:36 & 52-59.
Jn 14:23, “…If anyone love Me, he will keep My word…” This is in Sir 2:18.
Rom 9:21, " is not the potter master of his clay…" Found in Wis 15:7
1Pet 1:6-7, “…gold which is tried by fire…” See Wis 3:5-6
Rom 1:20-23, “For since the creation of the world…” Found in Wis 13:1-7
Mt 7:12, Lk 6:31, “…all that you wish men to do to you, even so do you also to them…” Extension of Tob 4:15
Lk 25 35-36, “I was hungry and you gave me food…I needed clothes and you clothed me.” Based on Tob 4:16.
Rev 21:18, “And the material of its wall was jasper; but the city itself was pure gold, like pure glass.” See Tob 13 end.
Mt 13:43, “Then the just will shine forth…” Found in Wis 3:7
Mt 27:42, “…if He is the King of Israel, let Him come down now from the cross…” See Wis 2:18-20.
Lk 24:4, “…two men stood by them in dazzling raiment.” Found in 2 Macc 3:26.
Rom 11:33, “…How inscrutable are His judgments and how unsearchable are His ways.” Found in Judith 8:14.
1 Cor 10:20, “…they sacrifice to demons, not to God…” Found in Baruch 4:7.
Matt 11:25-30 and Sir 51
Romans 1:18-32 and Wis 13-14
Hebrews 1:3 and Wisdom 7:26**
(I cannot credit the source I received these from as they are in my notes, but not the source I got them from. I apologize to the one who provided the research.)
**Heb 11:35, “…Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, that they might find a better resurrection.” The only place in the O.T. that you will find reference to that is 2 Macc 7:1-29. The first half of Heb 11:35 is found in 1 Kings 17:23 and 2 Kings 4:36.
Heb 11:38, “They wandered in deserts and mountains…”
This is found in 1 Macc 2:28-30 and 2 Macc 5:27.
Jn 10:22, “Now there took place at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication…” The inauguration of this feast is found in 1Macc 4:36 & 52-59.
Jn 14:23, “…If anyone love Me, he will keep My word…” This is in Sir 2:18.
Rom 9:21, " is not the potter master of his clay…" Found in Wis 15:7
1Pet 1:6-7, “…gold which is tried by fire…” See Wis 3:5-6
Rom 1:20-23, “For since the creation of the world…” Found in Wis 13:1-7
Mt 7:12, Lk 6:31, “…all that you wish men to do to you, even so do you also to them…” Extension of Tob 4:15
Lk 25 35-36, “I was hungry and you gave me food…I needed clothes and you clothed me.” Based on Tob 4:16.
Rev 21:18, “And the material of its wall was jasper; but the city itself was pure gold, like pure glass.” See Tob 13 end.
Mt 13:43, “Then the just will shine forth…” Found in Wis 3:7
Mt 27:42, “…if He is the King of Israel, let Him come down now from the cross…” See Wis 2:18-20.
Lk 24:4, “…two men stood by them in dazzling raiment.” Found in 2 Macc 3:26.
Rom 11:33, “…How inscrutable are His judgments and how unsearchable are His ways.” Found in Judith 8:14.
1 Cor 10:20, “…they sacrifice to demons, not to God…” Found in Baruch 4:7.
Matt 11:25-30 and Sir 51
Romans 1:18-32 and Wis 13-14
Hebrews 1:3 and Wisdom 7:26**
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Prodigal_Son1
Guest
I felt there might be some who have not read through this thread and would be interested in my thoughts I had posted earlier?
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