What About the Apocrypha (Part 4)

We are near the end of a series of posts considering the Apocrypha, and whether they should be considered as part of the canon. In this post, we will look at the use of the Apocrypha since the time of the Reformation.

The Reformation of the 16th century caused the Church, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, to reconsider many questions of doctrine and practice. This even included the question of which books belonged in the canon of Scripture.

In short, the opinion of the Reformers was that the books of the Apocrypha were useful for edification, but not for doctrine. In essence, they followed the position of Jerome and Athanasius. For this reason, they were included in the translation of the Bible by Martin Luther and virtually all English translations of the Bible up until the 20th century! In this, the translators were following the practice of Jerome and the Septuagint before him. And like Jerome and the early Jews they held the same opinion – we include these because they are important and are worth reading, but they are not to be considered as part of the Bible. To highlight this fact, Luther and many English translations placed the Apocrypha in a separate section between the Old and New Testaments, thus clearly indicating their subordinate status.

At the Council of Trent in 1546, the Roman Catholic Church declared that the Apocrypha was officially part of the Canon of Scripture. In this they directly opposed the Reformation, and also the opinion of Jerome. However, they were following the opinion of Augustine, and that of the early Council of Rome (382), and Synod of Hippo (393) in which Augustine held sway. This is the position of the Roman Catholic Church to this day.

The Eastern Orthodox Church declared the Apocryphal books found in the Septuagint to be part of the canon at the councils of Jassy (1642) and Jerusalem (1672). This is not surprising since the Eastern Orthodox Church uses the Septuagint as its Old Testament, rejecting the Hebrew text. Bishop Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Church, writes “In the west these books are often called the ‘Apocrypha’. These were declared by the Councils of Jassy (1642) and Jerusalem (1672) to be ‘genuine parts of Scripture;’ most Orthodox scholars at the present day, however, following the opinion of Athanasius and Jerome, consider that the Deutero-Canonical Books, although part of the Bible, stand on a lower footing than the rest of the Old Testament.” In practice, these books are rarely used in the liturgy and practice of the Eastern Church.

Next time we will finish this look at the Apocrypha by looking at some words of Jesus to see if they help us determine which books should be considered as part of the Old Testament canon.

In Christ,

Bret