In short
Ever heard of the books of 1 & 2 Maccabees, Tobit or Bel and the Dragon? These and about a dozen other books or sections of books are held by many to be a valid part of the Old Testament. I disagree, but so help me if I didn’t make you aware of them. Another example is “Additions to Esther,” which was my reasoning for including it in this week.
Why they are important
If we don’t know what is and is not Scripture, then how do we know what to believe? It’s necessary for any mature Christian to know more about these books than “oh, you mean the weird ones.”
Technical stuff!
Yes, please read this part! This lesson is worthless if you don’t.
Before we go any further, you need to be familiar with some academic Bible terminology:
- Canon of Scripture – It’s a fancy term for “the Bible”; it means “the books that WE think are part of the Bible.” Of course, “WE” is whoever is speaking, right? So, it’s a biased idea, but it is the way that people describe “the stuff in the Bible.”
- Deuterocanon – Books and writings that are not part the canon. Of course, this is subjective, too.
- Apocrypha – A SPECIFIC collection of books and writings that are deuterocanonical. The Catholic Bible contains the Apocrypha (so it is canonical to them).
Try not to confuse Deuterocanon with Apocrypha. I know it’s hard – I had to retitle this lesson because I misunderstood it.
The Apocrypha
- 1 & 2 Esdras (or 3 & 4 Ezra – where Nehemiah is 2 Ezra)
- Tobit
- Judith
- Additions to Esther
- Wisdom of Solomon
- Ecclesiasticus (or Sirach)
- Prayer of Manasseh
- 1 & 2 Maccabees
- Baruch
- Letter of Jeremiah
- Prayer of Azariah
- Susanna
- Bel and the Dragon
Baruch is Jeremiah’s scribe (legitimately – Jer 36:4), so sometimes Baruch (the book) is combined with the Letter of Jeremiah. The last three in the list above are collectively called “Additions to Daniel.”
Other deuterocanonical works
The most famous is 1 Enoch. Why? It’s actually quoted and cited in the book of Jude:
“It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, ‘Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him’” Jude 14.
Jude is considered canonical by most Christians (like 99%), but almost none put the book of Enoch in their canon. What this implies is that Jude was not quoting the Book of Enoch per se, but rather Enoch the man. Yet how Jude had access to the quote (and believed it to be true) is a mystery.
Theology and doctrine
First big thing to understand: all of these books come from the time AFTER the canonical Old Testament was written and most are from BEFORE the birth of Christ. So we have to look to the New Testament if we expect to see any of these works quoted.
NONE of the Apocrypha is quoted in the New Testament – again, the Apocrypha, as opposed to all Deuterocanon. So that already makes it hard to justify these books.
On the other hand, there are things in the Apocrypha that contradict orthodox Christian beliefs – for example, some books suggest paying for atonement of sins.
What do we make of these other books?
As for other deuterocanonical works, if they seem to be quoted in the Bible, they tend to fall in the category of the Jude quote.
It’s not like Paul says, “As you read in The Book of Jannes and Jambres…,” but somehow, he knows the names of the magicians (2Ti 3:8).
Even though these deuterocanonical books mention the same idea, it’s not to say that that book was the SOURCE of it.
The book(s) of 1 & 2 Chronicles shows us something about the formation of our Bible. Chronicles is an anthology of “canonical” Scripture (1 & Samuel and 1 & 2 Kings), PLUS a bunch of other research from sources we will never know about, to give additional detail to the stories.
And we kind of have to accept that ambiguity.
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