The Songs Of The 3 Holy Children
This text is not found anywhere in the original Hebrew Bible and its not cited in Jewish writing either, but it does appear in some early translations. The origins of the text are obscure and no one knows if they were from the originally composed Hebrew text or if they came from another source.
At this point, there isnt a lot of information on this scripture and that could be the reason why it was never included in the Bible. Much of the text that couldnt identify a source was left out due to fear of inaccuracy.
Don Stewart : : Why Were The Books Of The Old Testament Apocrypha Rejected As Holy Scripture By The Protestants
The Old Testament Apocrypha consists of eleven or twelve books, depending upon how they are divided, that the Roman Catholic Church adds to the Old Testament. The Protestants reject these books as Holy Scripture for the following reasons.
1. The Apocrypha Has Different Doctrine And Practices Than Holy Scripture
There are doctrines and practices contained in the Apocrypha that are contrary to what the Scripture teaches. They include the following.
In the Apocrypha proof texts can be found to support the Roman Catholic doctrine of justification by human works and not faith alone. The Apocrypha contains the following verses.
For almsgiving saves from death and purges away every sin. Those who give alms will enjoy a full life .
In another place in Tobit it says.
So now, my children see what almsgiving accomplishes, and what injustice does it brings death! .
In the Book of First Maccabees it says.
Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness .
The Bible, on the other hand, says that a person is saved by grace through faith. It is not based upon our good works.
For by grace you are saved through faith, and this is not your own doing it is the gift of God – not the result of works, so that no one may boast .
The Non-biblical Doctrine Of Purgatory Is Taught In The Apocrypha
The doctrine of purgatory – a place of purging between heaven and hell – is taught in the Apocrypha. It says.
The Bible says that God’s creation was out of nothing.
The Problem Of People Wanting To Add To The Bible
Irenaeus explicitly said that the gnostics wrote many different gospels and books, but he, along with all other church leaders of the second through fourth centuries, regarded them as grossly inaccurate and harmful in what they taught. He warned, They adduce an unspeakable number of apocryphal and spurious writings, which they themselves have forged, to bewilder the minds of foolish men, and of such as are ignorant of the Scriptures of truth. It is from this religiona religion that is quite different from Christianitythat so many spiritual books were written that are now sometimes referred to as the lost books of the Bible. Although it may be rather obvious that the Gospel of Judas should not be part of the Bible, what about other books?
At various points in the history of the church, individuals have emerged who have challenged what books should be in the Bibleeither by wanting to eliminate some or to add others. The important point here is that the churches already knew what the books of the Bible were these were the ones they were already using in their teaching and worship. These books had just not been officially recognized.
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Examples Of False Scriptures
Today, and for thousands of years, the Apocrypha was not considered part of the holy canon, and for good reason. These books contain a large number of doctrinal errors, like in Tobit there is the command to use magic , that forgiveness of sins comes from alms giving , and that we are to make offerings of money for the sins of the dead . All of these clearly contradict the biblical doctrine that our sins are forgiven only through Christ and His shed blood, and putting our trust in Him. Not only do these books contain serious doctrinal errors, they contain historical errors too. For example, the Book of Judith states that Nebuchadnezzar was the king of the Assyrians when he was actually the king of the Babylonians, and the Baruch states that the Jews would serve in Babylon for seven generations , but Jeremiah 25 11 clearly states it will only be 70 years, so these are not just minor issuesthey are serious doctrinal issues with dozens of historical errors, so they are not trustworthy at all, and should not be considered part of the inspired Word of God, which is perfect and without error. The 66 books of the Bible are not a product of man, but the inspired Word of God .
How The Church Recognized What Was Scripture
The influence of the Holy Spirit in the hearts and minds of the early Christians was the primary factor influencing what particular documents the individual churches began to use as inspired and authoritative Scripture. But there were also some objective and rational standards:
Apostolic origin . From the very beginning, Christians devoted themselves to the apostles teaching . Originally, their teaching was spread orally, but once this teaching was written down, churches obtained copies of these documents as soon as they could and used them as the very Word of God for their beliefs and practice. Orthodoxy. The churches rejected out of hand any document that did not conform to the collection of essential teachings that all of the churches accepted. Usage. In the third and fourth centuries, no book was regarded as Scripture unless it had been widely used by the churches from the beginning. Of course, this latter standard rules out the possibility that any document can or should be added to the Bible now.
So, when it comes to considering whether a newly discovered document like the Gospel of Judas should be made part of the Bible, it fails on every ground. Although it claims to be from Judas , there are good historical reasons for concluding that it did not . Furthermore, the teaching of this book is gnostic and contradicts most essential Christian doctrines. And, finally, it was never used by the church and was actually condemned.
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The Discovery Of Canonicity
But how was canonicity discovered? First, the books had the ring of self-vindicating authority. Moses claimed to be the mouthpiece of God. The Old Testament prophets repeatedly said, And the word of the Lord came to me. The lives of the prophets and the strong affirmation that their message came from God was accepted by the Jewish nation.
This explains why the canonicity of the Book of Esther was, for a time, in doubt. Since the name of God does not appear in the book, some thought it lacked self-vindicating authority. But closer inspection showed that the providence of God was so evident in the story that it had the authenticity that gave it acceptance.
A second test was that of authorship. it had to have been written by a man of God. Was the author, they asked, a spokesman for redemptive revelation, either a prophet in the Old Testament times or an apostle in the new?
For example, Paul in the New Testament argued that his message was authoritative because he was an apostle, not sent from men, nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ, and God the Father . The Book of 2 Peter was disputed in the early church because some doubted that it had been written by Peter. The writing style appeared different from 1 Peter, hence the doubt. But within time the church was convinced that Peter the apostle was the author, therefore the book was accepted.
The Gospel Of Thomas And Scripture
The Gospel of Thomas was a forgery written in the third or fourth century AD. The Gospel of Thomas claims to have been written by the Apostle Thomas, but it wasnt.
The Early Church rejected the Gospel of Thomas as heretical as it contained many heretical teachings of things Jesus supposedly said and did.
None of it is true, though. For example, the Gospel of Thomas has Jesus saying in saying, Blessed is the lion that a person will eat, and the lion will become human and in saying, Every woman who makes herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven.
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How Many Books Were Removed From The Bible
Even the Vatican church and even the Roman Catholic church have a very long history of deception and corruption. Aside from committing acts of genocide several centuries past from the Cathars to sexually abusing children in more contemporary times, its absolutely among the most corrupt organizations ever.
From the year 1611 that the Bible was translated out of Latin to English. Back then, the Bible comprised a total of 80 books along with also the past 14 books, which now have been excluded, composed the ending of the Old Testament and were as follows:
- 1 Esdras
- Baruch with the epistle Jeremiah
- The Songs of the 3 Holy children
- The history of Susana
- 2 Maccabees
The Lost Books And Scripture
The Lost Books refer to a collection of writings in the 12th and 13th centuries in Latin and published as The Lost Books of the Bible and the Forgotten Books of Eden in the 1920s. These writings include books called the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha along with apocryphal New Testament writings.The Old Testament section of the Lost Books includes eight books: The Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan, The Secrets of Enoch , Psalms of Solomon, The Odes of Solomon, The Letter of Aristeas, The Fourth Book of Maccabees, The Story of Ahikar, and The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs. The modern translation of some books came from Ethiopia.The New Testament section includes a wide variety of writings, ranging from the Infancy Gospel of Thomas to the Epistle of Clement to the Apostles Creed, writings of the early church fathers, and late works that were falsely attributed to earlier writers .
These books were not originally written with the intent to become part of Scripture, nor were these works lost but known to the original audience and not accepted as the historical writings of Scripture.
Some of these wise sayings include vital historical information. Though not inspired as Scripture, some writings have played a vital role in the Churchs history.
Each book in the Lost Books Collection must be individually studied to understand its historical importance, impact, and degree of accuracy.
For further reading:
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Books Banned From The Bible: What Is Missing From Our Bible Today And Why
Summary: Most Christians have little awareness of how the Church selected which books should comprise our Bible. Fewer still know something useful about the Apocrypha. Many Evangelical Christians engaged in the current-day Bible Prophecy community are too enamored with certain books scholars label pseudepigrapha. This lengthy article intends to sort out these issues and explain why the Protestant Bible should include readings from the Septuagint in a number of places where the Masoretic Text was corrupted by rabbis in the second century. It also makes the case that the reason the Apocrypha was left out of current day Bibles was because of cost, convenience, and hatred against Catholics. It was not for theological reasons.
Why Were Some Books Removed From The Bible And Is It A Sin To Read Them
Q. Why were some books removed from the Bible and is it a sin to read them?
I believe you are talking about the so-called Apocrypha. That term refers to books that were written in Greek within the Jewish community in the centuries before Christ. Those books are distinct from the Old Testament because they were written in Greek, not Hebrew, and they are distinct from the New Testament because they were written before Christ came, not after. So there is already something about them that sets them apart as different from the books that all Christians accept as inspired Scripture.
Nevertheless, after lengthy discussion and debate in the few centuries after Christ, regional councils in the western part of the Roman Empire, at Hipppo in 393 and Carthage in 397, approved adding these books to the canon of Scripture, as long as this decision was ratified by the central authority in Rome.
Eastern Orthodox Bibles include all the books in the Catholic Apocrypha along with several more. However, it classifies all these apocryphal books as Anagignoskomena , meaning that they are read during services of worship, but that they are not as authoritative as the other books. Orthodox theologians sometimes call the apocryphal books deuterocanonical to indicate their secondary , using this term differently from Catholics, for whom it describes how these books were received after first being disputed.
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Bible 101 On The Apocrypha And Pseudepigrapha
Its not understood all that well. How did the Christian Church settle on the books that should be included in our Bible? There are a number of erroneous ideas about how this happened. And there is little understanding about the books that were once included in the Christina Bible and later were banished. And today, there are a number of books that have become popular but are excluded as well.
It is rather astonishing when you think about it, that Christianity relies upon its Bible to define what we believe and how we should live our lives, but generally speaking, we dont know how we arrived at the 66 books that we call the Bible.
There are 39 books in our Old Testament . There are 27 books in our New Testament . But do you know that this arrangement has only been the case for about 150 years? Up to the time of the Reformation, the Bible of the Church was the in the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Vulgate in the Western Roman Catholic Church. The Bible we know today that has only 66 books would not come into vogue until late in the eighteenth century and for matters of cost and convenience not Theology.
Books Left Out Of The Bible
The books left out of the Bible is a question that Christians always ask themselves as far as matters concerning the Bible are brought up. Some books that some critics think ought to have been included were left out.
The Bible contains the 39 books of the old testament thatform the Judaism and the 27 books of the New testament. No church created the Canon, but the churchesand councils gradually accepted them according to the list that the believersrecognized as acceptable and non-acceptable.
Just like the new Canon of the old testament, there is no single date as to when the Canon of the new testament was accepted. The period between the first and second centuries after Christ saw many scriptures circulate among many Christians. At that time, some of the churches were using books that came to be pronounced as the Bible. By the end of the fourth century, the Canon had been settled and accepted as 66 booklets the other books left out of the bible wasnt included.
Then it turned out puzzling as to why some books left out of the bible while others were included. What informed the exclusion of other edifying scriptures and inclusion of the puzzling ones such as Jude. We try to explore the possible reasons as to why some books were left out of the Bible. But first, here is the list of books left out of the bible:
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Where Can You Find An Original Bible
Keep in mind that there is no such thing as an original Bible. The Bible consists of a large number of books and stories that were compiled over time. As a result, there cant be just one original Bible.
The books of the Bible were written by many different people at different points in time. Over the centuries many different interpretations have resulted, creating a diverse range of translations and inclusions or exclusions of books, such as the Apocrypha.
How The Books Were Collected
Some of the Old Testament books were immediately recognized as authoritative. Moses, after he wrote a book, put it in the Ark of the Covenant . After the temple was built, the sacred writings were kept there . Early on, God commanded the kings to write for themselves a copy of the law. And he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God . As the prophets spoke Gods word, saying, Thus saith the Lord, they also recognized that their message had to be recorded for future generations.
The Jews realized that special revelation ceased with the prophet Malachi . In the Talmud we read, Up to this point the prophets prophesied through the Holy Spirit from this time onward incline thine ear and listen to the sayings of the wise.
But what determined whether a book was considered part of the canon? Obviously, there were other books in existence that did not merit classification with the sacred writings. Examples are The Book of the Wars of the Lord and The Book of Jashar .
The criterion was, first, that the book had to agree with the Torah, the first five books of Moses. But this was not the only test. Some books that agreed with the Torah were also excluded. For example, Elijah wrote a book that likely met this standard yet it was not a part of the canon. And, of course, we must ask how the Torah itself became accepted.
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