Why does the Protestant Bible not use the extra seven books of the Catholic Bible?

Answer 1

A:

At the time the Catholic Bible was established, Christians were unsure which books were considered by the Jews to be inspired. They included all the books of the Septuagint that appeared to be appropriate.

The Prostestants soon realised that some of the books in the Catholic Bible were never regarded as scripture by the Jews, and so removed them from their Bibles. The English King James Bible originally included all the Catholic books, but a later edition removed these.

Catholic AnswerThe "Catholic Bible" is composed of the Old Testament that was used by the Jews in the first century, in other words, the Bible that Our Blessed Lord, Jesus Christ used, the Septuagint. This was the Greek translation of the Bible made in Alexander and completed around 148 B.C. At that point Hebrew, as a spoken language was on its way out, and so the majority of Jews spoke Greek. The vast majority of the quotes in the New Testament are directly from this version of the Old Testament Scriptures - about 300 out of the 350 references in the New Testament. Thus Our Blessed Lord used the Septuagint for most of His quotes, and this was the Bible used by the Church continuously from then on. Supposedly, there was a Jewish Council "the Council of Jamnia" around 70 A.D., in which the surviving Pharisees removed the books of the Old Testament which referred to specifically Christian practices. (No one has ever been able to provide any evidence that such a Council ever happened) Even though many modern day Jewish practices are directly from the removed books (for instance Hanukkah refers to the miraculous burning of the candles in the restored Temple in the book of Maccabees). The Christian Church continued to use the entire Old Testament as the Jews who had rejected Jesus had no more authority over the Scriptures, especially as God, Himself (in Jesus) had chosen them.

Until Martin Luther came on the scene 1,500 years later and objected to those books of the Old Testament that supported specifically Christian practices - actually, he objected to ALL the books of the Old Testament, but that is another story. He also threw out books from the New Testament, with which he did not agree - the Letter of James is one well known example (he called it an Epistle of straw). The other protestant "reformers" objected to his mutilation of the New Testament and put those back in. Actually, they objected to the mutilation of the Old Testament as well, and put those books in the back of their Bibles, they were only removed hundreds of years later by other protestants.