Wrong bible for first 1500 years?

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=mpdmed;7937561]I was referring to the missing books and the differences in translation (“Faith alone” Vs. “Faith). The fact that books are removed indicates that they did not belong.
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First, I want to thank you 👍 for recognizing that the Romans 3:28 issue is one mostly of translation, and this is evidenced by the fact that no English Bibles have “alone”
in Romans 3:28 as it isn’t needed.

As you can tell in my above post, I’m not convinced that they should be removed. I think it is important that, in dialogue, that we recognize that even amongst Catholics before Trant, there was permitted dispute regarding the D-C’s.
The success of any objective depends on clear, concise, correct information. The most important objective on earth in my opinion, is to spread of the word of God. If the collection of books and the translation of the bible was wrong from the beginning of Christianity, surely someone can explain why.
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While I agree in the first part, I don’t see it as a question of right or wrong, and translations are not transliterations. There has been dispute about the deuterocanon, and the Apocrypha (those outside the D-Cs), and even the Antilegomena since the earliest time of the Church.
Why would God allow the Word to be misinterpreted and lumped together with lesser books for the first thousand years of a campaign for which He gave his only Son.
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How could He stop these debates from that time forward without interfering in free will?

The more important question is, how do we get all of Christianity to agree on the same canon, beyond the 66 books we already agree on? And BTW, I would contend that Lutheranism may be the most open to the discussion, as our doctrinal statement, the Book of Concord, does not set a canon.

Jon
 
mpdmed said:
The answer to the question of which Bible to use seems obvious to me, I want the one Jesus used. But am I missing something? There is a world of non-catholic Christians that choose the latter. Why?
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Well, I have a couple of opinions on why. But they are just my opinions, I really can’t speak for them.

First, I think Martin Luther chose the Hebrew canon because he didn’t agree with some of the doctrines that the Catholic Church teaches. These doctrines are backed by scripture in the seven books that aren’t included in the Hebrew canon (although they are also in other books as well). Remember, Luther also wanted to throw out Revelations, James and Esther. He used the argument that the Rabbinic Jews used; there weren’t any copies of these books that had been originally written in Hebrew. But lo and behold, 500 years later the Dead Sea Scrolls were found and guess what? They include portions of the disputed books!!! So they were originally Hebrew books and the Rabbinical Jews were wrong and therefore so was Luther!! The true motivation of the Rabbinical Jews was (IMHO) that the Christians were using on the Septuagint.
“So thoroughly, indeed, did Christians appropriate the Septuagint as their version of the Scriptures that the Jews became increasingly disenchanted with it”
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Beginning Apologetics 7

So, the Jews wouldn’t use the Septuagint because the early Church was using it. Martin Luther quit using it because it contradicted what he believed. And now the current non-Catholics won’t use it because some renegade priest 500 years ago said not to and since Catholics use it, it must be wrong.

But like I said, that’s just my opinion.
 
1holycatholic said:
Are you sure about that? Jesus only refers to the Septuagint which doesn’t contain the New Testament.
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That’s because the New Testament wasn’t written yet. And Luther didn’t succeed in getting James, Esther and Revelation thrown out… So what’s different is the OT and I think the OP is inquiring about that.
 
Esdra said:
What would you do about it? The Schism and the “protestant rebellion”, as you call it, came from sin. - I can’t change that, and you also can’t change that.
But what we can do is building bridges and tearning walls downs insted of building them up.
And praying together is one option to do so. We can live in peace and “reconciled diversity”.
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You are a non-Catholic and yet you come to a Catholic forum and dis our Church - is that how you build bridges?
 
Esdra said:
Thank you Anna.
That link is really interesting.
Nevertheless, I use the New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition from 1989.
So, juding from Wikipedia this translation wouldn’t be used in an English (US) mass. 😉
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Actually,I plan to buy the NRSV-CE.

Are you asking which English translation is used in a U.S. Catholic Mass? If so, Catholics can better answer this.

Anna
 
JonNC said:
First, I want to thank you 👍 for recognizing that the Romans 3:28 issue is one mostly of translation, and this is evidenced by the fact that no English Bibles have “alone”
in Romans 3:28 as it isn’t needed.

As you can tell in my above post, I’m not convinced that they should be removed. I think it is important that, in dialogue, that we recognize that even amongst Catholics before Trant, there was permitted dispute regarding the D-C’s.

While I agree in the first part, I don’t see it as a question of right or wrong, and translations are not transliterations. There has been dispute about the deuterocanon, and the Apocrypha (those outside the D-Cs), and even the Antilegomena since the earliest time of the Church.

How could He stop these debates from that time forward without interfering in free will?

The more important question is, how do we get all of Christianity to agree on the same canon, beyond the 66 books we already agree on? And BTW, I would contend that Lutheranism may be the most open to the discussion, as our doctrinal statement, the Book of Concord, does not set a canon.

Jon
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Jon,
Very interesting comments. I didn’t know the Book of Concord does not set a Canon. So, I learned something today. 😉

If we look back through the history of Christianity, there was a “fluidity” for quite awhile regarding Books/Letters circulating and accepted as Scripture.

Sadly, as this thread so clearly demonstrates; there still is not an agreement throughout Christendom regarding the Biblical Canon.

I know the New Testament does quote some of the Deuterocanonical Books. I just found a link to N.T. and Church Father quotes of the Deuterocanonical Books. It’s nice to find this in one place.

So, for anyone who is interested, here is the Link: cathtruth.com/catholicbible/deut.htm

Jon, I always enjoy your comments. 🙂

Peace,
Anna
 
For the record, it was Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation that Luther removed from the canon of the NT. He placed them in an appendix at the back of his German translation of the Bible with prefaces explaining why he did not consider them scripture. He also removed Tobit, Judith, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, Wisdom, 1 and 2 Maccabees, and parts of Esther and Daniel from the canon of the OT. These were also prefaced and placed in his Bible in an appendix between the the OT and the NT.
 
1holycatholic said:
For the first few decades of the Church the texts that would later be declared canonical weren’t even written.

The Canon wasn’t even infallibly defined by the Church until the late fourth century.

Those Churches that are in union with the Holy See are in union with the Holy See. That includes the Canon of Scripture.
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Rather later than that. The CC did not set it in stone until after the Reformation.
Pre-schism, the various Christian churches had different canons. No one thinks this is an issue, and I’m not sure why you do.
 
JonNC said:
Actually, I wasn’t speaking of them in this way, which is why I said “Bibles”. The various Orthodox Churches use varying canons of the OT. The claim that the canon was infallibly set when many of the sees within the Church of that time don’t use the same canon is perplexing. And they clearly are not a non-issue if they are considered canon.

In addition is the question of the ecumenical nature of local and regional synods that are sometimes used to claim an inffalible setting of the canon in the 4th century.

I’m not totally convinced that the D-C’s shouldn’t, at least in some way, be included in the canon (correct, I’m not sure Luther, Jerome, Cajetan, etc were right), but the claim that local councils could set the canon infallibly seems debatable.
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There were multiple local councils East and West that addressed the Canon. They sought affirmation and promulgation of the Canon by the Bishop of Rome (which did occur.) This is an exercise of infallibility by the ordinary and universal Magisterium.
 
Bluegoat said:
Rather later than that. The CC did not set it in stone until after the Reformation.
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The Seventeenth Ecumenical Council lists the Canon of Scripture and it predates the Protestant Revolt by nearly a century.
Bluegoat said:
Pre-schism, the various Christian churches had different canons. No one thinks this is an issue, and I’m not sure why you do.
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Pre-schism there weren’t various Christian churches.
 
Bible Canon
Code: 
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.**
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mpdmed said:
I thought my original question, the subject of this forum, was a simple one but I still don’t have a simple answer. People are going off on tangents. Can anyone answer me honestly and without bias to one belief or another? I am Catholic and my question is not posed to prove a point to those who are not. I pose the question in order to better understand reality.

For a moment Let’s forget about differences in translation and interpretation. I believe the catholic Bible today contains all the books that were present when the Bible was originally crated. Is this right or wrong?
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Hello mpdmed, This is correct. 👍
 
1holycatholic said:
The Seventeenth Ecumenical Council lists the Canon of Scripture and it predates the Protestant Revolt by nearly a century.

Pre-schism there weren’t various Christian churches.
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:confused:
That is a bizarre thing to say. There were churches in the East, in the West, in India… all with different liturgies, and in some cases with different canons. Yes, they were in communion, which is my point - they were in communion despite having different canons.
 
Bluegoat said:
:confused:
That is a bizarre thing to say. There were churches in the East, in the West, in India… all with different liturgies, and in some cases with different canons. Yes, they were in communion, which is my point - they were in communion despite having different canons.
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I’m aware that there were different Catholic Churches with different liturgies, I assumed by you meant there were other Churches besides the Catholic Church (exception being the Non-Chalcedonians.)

In both Eastern and Western Catholic Churches there was one agreed on Canon established in the late fourth century by the ordinary and universal Magisterium. Have there been dissenters in the Church throughout history, obviously yes, but that doesn’t change anything.
 
1holycatholic said:
I’m aware that there were different Catholic Churches with different liturgies, I assumed by you meant there were other Churches besides the Catholic Church (exception being the Non-Chalcedonians.)

In both Eastern and Western Catholic Churches there was one agreed on Canon established in the late fourth century by the ordinary and universal Magisterium. Have there been dissenters in the Church throughout history, obviously yes, but that doesn’t change anything.
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But that is my point - there wasn’t one agreed on canon. There were differences throughout the Christian world.
 
Bluegoat said:
:confused:
That is a bizarre thing to say. There were churches in the East, in the West, in India… all with different liturgies, and in some cases with different canons. Yes, they were in communion, which is my point - they were in communion despite having different canons.
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Hello bluegoat, How can these churches be in communion if they had different canons?

Matthew
 
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