Reasons Why the Deuterocanon Belongs in the Bible
A Response To C.A.R.M.
Written back in 2009, Ryan Turner published a small summery of stock arguments against the Deuterocanon (the works of the Bible Protestants object to). I have decided to take the liberty of responding to them; making a quick source available to Catholics in response to these objections. These objections tend to fall into one of two categories. They are either false, or prove too much.
To speak of a claim as proving too much is to say that it would not only disprove the opposition’s position but one’s own. The first objection is one such example,
There are no clear, definite New Testament quotations from the Apocrypha by Jesus or the apostles. While there may be various allusions by the New Testament to the Apocrypha, there are no authoritative statements like “thus says the Lord,” “as it is written,” or “the Scriptures say.” There are references in the New Testament to the pseudepigrapha (literally “false writings”) (Jude 14–15) and even citations from pagan sources (Acts 17:22–34), but none of these are cited as Scripture and are rejected even by Roman Catholics. In contrast, the New Testament writers cite the Old Testament numerous times (Mt. 5; Lk. 24:27; Jn. 10:35) and use phrases such as “thus says the Lord,” “as it is written,” or “the Scriptures say,” indicating their approval of these books as inspired by God.
If this is true, then the following works of scripture would not be considered scripture because they are not quoted; Judges, Ruth, Ezra, Esther, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Lamentations, Obadiah, Jonah, and Zephaniah. If Protestants have other justifications for keeping these works, and rejecting the Deuterocanon, then this justification is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for what belongs in the canon.
The next claim is false,
Jesus implicitly rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture by referring to the entire accepted Jewish Canon of Scripture, “From the blood of Abel [Gen. 4:8] to the blood of Zechariah [2 Chron. 24:20], who was killed between the altar and the house of God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation (Lk. 11:51; cf. Mt. 23:35).”
Abel was the first martyr in the Old Testament from the book of Genesis while Zechariah was the last martyr in the book of Chronicles. In the Hebrew Canon, the first book was Genesis and the last book was Chronicles. They contained all of the same books as the standard 39 books accepted by Protestants today, but they were just arranged differently. For example, all of the 12 minor prophets (Hosea through Malachi) were contained in one book. This is why there are only 24 books in the Hebrew Bible today. By Jesus’ referring to Abel and Zachariah, He was canvassing the entire Canon of the Hebrew Scriptures which included the same 39 books as Protestants accept today. Therefore, Jesus implicitly rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture.
The Zechariah Jesus mentions is Zechariah son of Berechiah (cross reference Matt 23:35), however, the Zechariah of 2 Chronicles 24:20–21 is the son of Jehoiada. Zechariah son of Berechiah can be found in Zechariah 1:1. If this was not the case, this would entail a contradiction in scripture [1].
Furthermore, there is no evidence that the early Jews even arranged their books in some particular order during the time Christ roamed the earth (or even had a standard canon). There were 24 distant Jewish parties — or denominations- some of whom disputed the size and ordering of the canon [2]. Not to mention, there is no surviving codex from that time, and hence no way to prove the order nor the number of the Hebraic texts[3].
The next objection to the Deuterocanon is both false and proves too much.
The “oracles of God” were given to the Jews (Rom. 3:2) and they rejected the Old Testament Apocrypha as part of this inspired revelation. Interestingly, Jesus had many disputes with the Jews, but He never disputed with them regarding the extent of the inspired revelation of God.
If true, the verse would also invalidate the New Testament, given that those works were not yet written and given to the Jews. Another aforementioned point is that there was no one established Jewish canon at the time.
The verse is also falsely used when read in full context,
Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the benefit of circumcision? Great in every respect. First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God. What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it? May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written “That You may be justified in Your words, And prevail when You are judged.” — Romans 3:1–4
The first thing to notice is that the operative word is ‘were’ , that is the Jews were entrusted, the Old Covenant is no longer authoritative. Rather, the Catholic tradition is entrusted with the content of scripture [4]. Furthermore, the oracles of God include more than just scripture, but also the Urrim and Thummim (Numbers 27:21) and other prophetic devices, so the scope of the passage is much greater than scripture and cannot refer to a binding of the canon to Israel, anymore than it can bind prophecy to Israel [5].
The next objection is just plain false,
While the Dead Sea scrolls contain copies of several books of the Apocrypha, they contain far more copies of pseudepigraphal books like 1 Enoch that even the Roman Catholic church admits are clearly not inspired. What is important to note here, however, is that owning copies of a book does not imply belief in that book’s inspiration. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain a variety of community rules, historical documents, festival calendars, and other uninspired documents that the community found useful. The scrolls do not contain commentaries on the Apocrypha as they do for the Jewish Old Testament books, and they do not cite the Apocrypha authoritatively as scripture. This probably indicates that even the Essene community did not regard the Apocrypha as highly as the Jewish Old Testament books.
The only commentaries found from the Dead Sea Scrolls, that I am aware of, is the pesher on the Book of Habakkuk.
Many ancient Jews rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture. Philo never quoted the Apocrypha as Scripture. Josephus explicitly rejected the Apocrypha and listed the Hebrew Canon to be 22 books.3 In fact, the Jewish Community acknowledged that the prophetic gifts had ceased in Israel before the Apocrypha was written.
I do not consider two Jews to qualify as ‘many’, but sure, let’s suppose two is sufficient to call a many. This assertion would still remain false. Josephus’ Against Apion is typically used by Protestant apologists because he claims
For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another, [as the Greeks have,] but only twenty-two books, which contain the records of all past times; which are justly believed to be divine…It is true our history hath been written since Artaxerxes very particularly, but hath not been esteemed of like authority with the former by our forefathers, because there has not been an exact succession of prophet since that time…for during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so bold as either to add anything to them, to take anything from them, or to change anything in them[6]
As Gary Michuta notes, Josephus uses the word ‘exact’ before ‘succession of prophet since that time’, the significance is that (citing scholar Rebecca Gray) it refers to continuous and overlapping narrative [7]. Michuta further argues that the later writings of the Deuterocanon are not mentioned because they are irrelevant to the point at hand, given that Apion is only critical of the earliest texts of scripture [8].
Michuta even provides positive argumentation that he did accept the Deuterocanon. He cites Francis Gigot who writes,
At the close of his Antiquities of the Jews, a work which narrates the history between the Creation and the twelfth year of Nero, Josephus affirms that his only authorities have been sacred writing (heira bibloi), although in the course of his volume he freely used the first book of the Maccabees and transcribed literally several passages from the deutero-canonical fragments of the book of Esther [9]
Regarding Philo, Michuta answers this objection elsewhere,
Here, once again, we have an argument from silence. Since the disputed books were not quoted, it is reasoned, they must have been rejected. Could it be that Philo never found an opportunity to use them? Our objector attempts to make this suggestion implausible by noting that Philo made extensive use of the Old Testament implying that their omission must have been on purpose. Although it is true that Philo’s works contain a large number of quotations from the Old Testament, the number of books that he quotes from is relatively small. In fact, Philo fails to produce a single quote from the books of Ezekiel, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, Daniel, Esther and perhaps also Chronicles.
Yet, Philo must have been familiar with these texts since they (like the disputed books) would have been included in the Septuagint.1 It is true that Philo’s work does contain a large number of quotes. Some place the count at around 2050 quotations. However, a closer study as to where Philo derives his quotations is quite illuminating. Out of the two thousand and fifty some odd quotes from the Old Testament, the Torah (the first five books of the Bible) is quoted 2000 times, leaving only about 50 quotes that are drawn from the rest of the Scripture!2 For Philo, the Torah was the sum and summit of God’s revelation and all other sacred books were only commentary. Given this dependence upon the Torah, it would be perfectly reasonable to expect that both the “fringe” and the Deuterocanon were not likely to be used. Therefore, the argument based on Philo’s silence proves nothing
The next objection is plainly false. Turner claims,
The Catholic Church has not always accepted the Apocrypha. The Apocrypha was not officially accepted by the Catholic Church at a universal council until 1546 at the Council of Trent. This is over a millennium and a half after the books were written, and was a counter reaction to the Protestant Reformation
It should first be noted that if this is an argument against the Catholic Cannon, it should be doubly devastating for the Protestant Cannon as no council narrows the cannon to only those books.
If you check the notes of the page, Turner claims the Council of Florence was not ecumenical, despite the fact that Catholics claim it in fact was, and it took place over 100 years before, anticipating the reformation [10]. Further, local councils like the the synod of 397 at Carthage, and the council of Hippo, still reflected the mindset of the church at the time, and were not introducing any novel doctrine (a fact even agreed upon by the Protestant scholar FF Bruce) [11], rather the councils were called to combat Saint Jerome’s innovation [12]. Furthermore, even if Carthage and Hippo were not ecumenical, they still were, to use the words of Pope Nicholas the first, ‘part of the universal Law of the Church’; Pope Nicholas, considered them as such when citing Pope Innocent I who used those councils in his decree[12].
While Turner might cite Saint Jerome as being more knowledgeable on scripture than Saint Augustine (which I would agree upon), the fact remains Saint Jerome was the theological deviant on this particular topic. The next move Turner makes is an illustration of these kinds of mistaken uses of the church Fathers.
Many church Fathers rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture, and many just used them for devotional purposes. For example, Jerome, the great Biblical scholar and translator of the Latin Vulgate, rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture though, supposedly under pressure, he did make a hurried translation of it. In fact, most of the church fathers in the first four centuries of the Church rejected the Apocrypha as Scripture. Along with Jerome, names include Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, and Athanasius.”
Aside from Saint Jerome, this claim is false. However, if Saint Jerome deviating from tradition constitutes a justification for deviating from doctrine, then the argument proves too much, as that would entail the heresies of Fathers like Tertullian and Origen (the acceptance of Montanism [13] and Universal salvation [14], respectfully), would likewise be respectable to hold. However, as previously argued, Saint Jerome was the deviant.
What’s worse, the scholarship that Saint Jerome used was built on a flawed inference. The main reason Saint Jerome had viewed the Hebrew (Masoretic) text as greater was that he was of the belief that the original language of the Masoretic text was the only rabbinical tradition which preserved the Hebrew; whereas today, we know better given that the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls indicate that the Septuagint tradition is a valid one in textual understanding[15].
Lastly, Saint Jerome himself would deviate from his own opinion, referring to Judith on equal footing with Ruth and Ester; that is, they are all mentioned in ‘sacred books’ [16]
Turner mentions other church Fathers, but these are false assertions.
Origen — He is mistakenly cited by Protestants because he qualifies his use of Wisdom as ‘not esteemed authoritative by all’, and omits mention of the Deuterocanon in his Commentary of the Psalms [17]. In terms of his qualification of Wisdom, he was referring to others like Julian Africanus, and the Jews, not necessarily of himself [18]. As to his omission of the Deuterocanon, Origen is not giving a list in accord to the books accepted by the church, but rather only as the Jews accepted them [19]. Not only did Origen not reject the Deuterocanon, but he defended them by way of defending the canonical status of Susanna, it would seem he accepted a part (if not all of) the Deuterocanon[20].
Saint Cyril of Jerusalem — Citing Saint Cyril as a Father who rejected the Deuterocanon as apocrypha, while false, is not wholly mistaken. It is not wholly mistaken because Saint Cyril does consider the Deuterocanon to be of a secondary rank to be read in churches, and not with the same ‘force’ as the Protocanon (the 22 book of Old Testament, Catholics, Protestants, and modern Jews accept, and the New Testament), he does not consider them to be apocryphal [21]. Furthermore, Cyril considered the Deuterocanonical sections of Daniel as part of the same work [22].
Saint Athanasius — This claim is also false, but not completely. While Athanasius rejected part of the Deuterocanon, he did not reject all of it. He accepted the Letter of Jeremiah and Baruch as scripture, and he rejected the book of Esther [23]. Although, he did accept Esther and the other books of the Deuterocanon as useful to learn the Christian Doctrine [23]. As Michuta writes,
For Christians today, there are only two categories of writing; inspired, canoncial scripture and uninspired Apocrypha; yet for Athanasius, there were three categories: “canonical” Scripture, the Scripture “that is read,” and the uninspired Apocrypha…How can we be sure that Athanasius held the Deuterocanon as sacred scripture?…Athanasius quotes both both Baruch and Susanna right alongside passages from Isaiah, Psalms, Romans, and Hebrews. [24]
The next claim is false,
The Apocryphal books were placed in Bibles before the Council of Trent and after but were placed in a separate section because they were not of equal authority. The Apocrypha rightfully has some devotional purposes, but it is not inspired.
The Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Vaticanus, and the Codex Alexandrinus all contain within them the books of the Deuterocanon, as did the Septuagint itself. Furthermore, John Wycliff himself intermixed the Deuterocanon with the rest of the books of the Old Testament [25].
For the next series of claims, we will have to look to scripture.
The Apocrypha contains a number of false teachings (see: Errors in the Apocrypha). (To check the following references, see http://www.newadvent.org/bible.)
The command to use magic (Tobit 6:5–7).
Forgiveness of sins by almsgiving (Tobit 4:11; 12:9).
Offering of money for the sins of the dead (2 Maccabees 12:43–45).
First let us look at the incident which takes place in Tobit,
Then the angel said to him: Take out the entrails of the fish, and lay up his heart, and his gall, and his liver for thee: for these are necessary for useful medicines. And when he had done so, he roasted the flesh thereof, and they took it with them in the way: the rest they salted as much as might serve them, till they came to Rages the city of the Medes. Then Tobias asked the angel, and said to him: I beseech thee, brother Azarias, tell me what remedies are these things good for, which thou hast bid me keep of the fish? — Tobit 6:5–7
I see no use of magic, but rather the angel instructing Tobias in use of the of a fish for medicine is an example of folk knowledge. Compare it to the following verses in Genesis,
And Jacob took green rods of poplar, and of almond, and of plane trees, and pilled them in part: so when the bark was taken off, in the parts that were pilled, there appeared whiteness: but the parts that were whole remained green: and by this means the colour was divers. And he put them in the troughs, where the water was poured out: that when the flocks should come to drink, they might have the rods before their eyes, and in the sight of them might conceive [Emphasis mine]— Genesis 30:37–38
Neither Jacob’s acceptance of rod’s causing Goats to breeds, nor Tobias’ use of fish entrails for medicine constitute magic, rather they are merely folk notions, ones God might even use for the sake of providence. The next verses —Tobit 4:11; 12:9 — is only true in the context of the Old Testament, alms giving is no more necessary for salvation than circumcision. As to 2 Maccabees 12:43–45, rejecting them because they entail Catholic doctrine is either question begging, or a fallacious appeal to consequence.
The last objection is false,
The Apocryphal books do not share many of the chararacteristics of the Canonical books: they are not prophetic, there is no supernatural confirmation of any of the apocryphal writers works, there is no predictive prophecy, there is no new Messianic truth revealed, they are not cited as authoritative by any prophetic book written after them, and they even acknowledge that there were no prophets in Israel at their time (cf. 1 Macc. 9:27; 14:41).
The Deuterocanon contains the very crucifixion of Jesus as prophecy,
Let us therefore lie in wait for the just, because he is not for our turn, and he is contrary to our doings, and upbraideth us with transgressions of the law, and divulgeth against us the sins of our way of life. He boasteth that he hath the knowledge of God, and calleth himself the son of God. He is become a censurer of our thoughts. He is grievous unto us, even to behold: for his life is not like other men’s, and his ways are very different. We are esteemed by him as triflers, and he abstaineth from our ways as from filthiness, and he preferreth the latter end of the just, and glorieth that he hath God for his father. Let us see then if his words be true, and let us prove what shall happen to him, and we shall know what his end shall be. For if he be the true son of God, he will defend him, and will deliver him from the hands of his enemies. Let us examine him by outrages and tortures, that we may know his meekness and try his patience. Let us condemn him to a most shameful death: for there shall be respect had unto him by his words. These things they thought, and were deceived: for their own malice blinded them. — Wisdom 2:12–21
The next claim is that the Deuterocanon itself acknowledges prophecy has ended (citing Macc. 9:27; 14:41). The first of these verses reads,
And there was a great tribulation in Israel, such as was not since the day, that there was no prophet seen in Israel.
The second reads,
And that the Jews, and their priests, had consented that he should be their prince, and high priest for ever, till there should arise a faithful prophet:
The first verse is referring to a prior time in Israel (see Lamentations 2:9), and the second verse no more rules out the existence of prophets than saying “he should be their prince, and high priest for ever, till there should arise a devoted soldier ” would rule out the existence of some devoted solider (only that one had not yet appeared) [26].
This about sums up my relatively lengthy post. My next post will give some arguments for the Deuterocanon. For a good summary of the Catholic position, I would recommend Gary Michuta’s Why Catholic Bibles are Bigger; The Untold Story of the Lost Books of the Protestant Bible. It was the source of most of this blog post, and as you have read, does an excellent job of dismantling the common Protestant apologetic.
References
[1] Gary G. Michuta, Why Catholic Bibles are Bigger, 20
[2] Ibid, 13
[3] Ibid, 21
[4] Ibid, 12
[5] Ibid, 13
[6] Ibid, 52 — Citing Against Apion, 1.41
[7] Ibid, 54
[8] Ibid
[9] Ibid, 55 — Citing Francis E. Gigot , General Introduction to the study of the Holy Scripture, 33
[10] The Catholic Encyclopedia, edited by Kevin Knight, here
[11] Gary G. Michuta, Why Catholic Bibles are Bigger, 161–162
[12]Ibid, 196 — citing Pope Leo
[13] John Chapman. “Tertullian.” The Catholic Encyclopedia. here
[14] Ferdinand Prat, “Origen and Origenism.” The Catholic Encyclopedia. here
[15] Gary G. Michuta, Why Catholic Bibles are Bigger, 141
[16] Ibid, 150
[17] Ibid, 92
[18] Ibid, 93
[19] Ibid, 93–94
[20] Ibid, 91
[21] Ibid, 116
[22] Ibid
[23] Ibid, 109
[24] Ibid, 110 — Cites Athanasius’ Four Discourse Against the Arians. Discourse 1.12
[25] Ibid, 219
[26] Ibid, 19
