The Deuterocanonical Books

Doctrine and Covenants 91:1-6

1 Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you concerning the Apocrypha—There are many things contained therein that are true, and it is mostly translated correctly. 2 There are many things contained therein that are not true, which are interpolations by the hands of men. 3 Verily, I say unto you, that it is not needful that the Apocrypha should be translated. 4 Therefore, whoso readeth it, let him understand, for the Spirit manifesteth truth; 5 And whoso is enlightened by the Spirit shall obtain benefit therefrom; 6 And whoso receiveth not by the Spirit, cannot be benefited. Therefore, it is not needful that it should be translated. Amen.

The Deuterocanon is arguably the most famous "Apocrypha" of them all. The word Apocrypha originally exists to describe them. I felt it was only a matter of time I would make a post on it. But I did not feel up to the task, so I asked the Deseret Catholic, a former LDS convert to the Catholic Church, on X to give their opinion on the matter. I hope you enjoy.

Pearls from the Dust: The Lost Treasures of the Apocrypha

By Christopher West

To begin, I will ask Saint Francis de Sales to pray for us. In 1594 St. Francis was sent as a missionary to Chablais, Switzerland. This part of Switzerland had all become Protestant. His father feared that he would die as a martyr there. He knocked on doors, but they were all slammed in his face. He wondered how to evangelize to people through a slammed door. So he wrote little tracts that he stuffed under people’s doors. Tens of thousands of Protestants returned to the Catholic faith because of his humble efforts. He has become the patron saint of writers. Saint Francis de Sales, pray for us.

This idea that our dead are not far from us, and that they pray for us, and we ought to pray for them, is in the Bible. But Protestants have removed parts of the Bible, and they disagree on what the other parts mean. The LDS use the mangled, Protestant, version of the Bible, so they have likely not read these verses, thought their doctrine lines up with it. The most straightforward depiction of this ancient practice is in 2 Maccabees 12. Judas Maccabees, who with his family lead a successful rebellion against the Greeks who had desecrated the temple. The Maccabees helped to reconsecrate the temple, and established the tradition of Hanukkah. After a battle, Judas and his men went to collect the bodies of their fallen. They discovered that many of the dead had in their possession idols, in the form of small tokens. Judas and his men prayed for these dead men, that their sins might be “wholly blotted out.” They then took up a collection of money, two thousand drachmas of silver, “and sent it to Jerusalem to provide a sin offering.” In 2 Maccabees 12, we clearly see the ancient Jews prayed for their dead, and offered sacrifices in the temple on behalf of their dead. This ancient practice has continued as an unbroken tradition in the Catholic Church. 

This clear example of collecting money to help the souls of the dead irked Luther, who began his rebellion over this very practice. These sacrifices for the dead have come to be known as “indulgences” (there are also indulgences for the living). The Church agreed with Luther, that there had been abuses in the sale of indulgences, and the Church set restrictions in 1567 to end these abuses. But Luther wanted to extirpate the doctrine entirely, so he tore the books of Maccabees out of his Bible. He removed several other books, and he even removed parts of the book of Daniel, though he kept the rest of Daniel. The books he removed he slandered as “apocryphal” (of unknown origin) and “deuterocanonical” (second canon). But some books that Protestants call Apocrypha are not apocryphal, for they lie (Rev. 3:9). The Book of Sirach is not apocryphal at all. Jesus, the son of Sirach (Ben Sira) wrote it, around the years 219 B.C. to 196 B.C. The book of Maccabees is “the most important historical resource for our knowledge” of the period between Malachi and Christ, and was used “by later historians such as Josephus” as a primary source.¹ It contains the earliest reference to Hanukkah (the Feast of Dedication, see John 10:22). But some books in the Protestant canon are apocryphal. These include Esther, Hebrews, James, second Peter, second and third John, and Jude.² What they claim as a standard is not a standard, but is arbitrarily applied to get rid of troublesome doctrine.

Luther justified his mutilation of scripture by pointing to the Jews, who also did not accept many Catholic books in their canon. This argument is odd on its face, since the Jews also reject the entirely of the New Testament. The Old Testament had been preserved in both Hebrew and in Greek. The New Testament was mostly written in Greek, because the Jews had been using a Greek version of the Old Testament for hundreds of years by the time Christ was born. The Greek version of the Old Testament was called the Septuagint (LXX), because seventy translators had converted it from Hebrew into Greek. Early Christians believed the translation to have been inspired by God. Luther believed that the Jewish Hebrew version was more ancient than the Christian Greek version. Luther’s belief was applied haphazardly, however, since some of the books he removed were also written in Hebrew (Tobias, Judith, Maccabees, and Ecclesiasticus).³ Luther was misguided by the scholarship at the time, for the Greek canon is over 1000 years older than the Hebrew canon. Such is the misfortune in trusting scholarship over the Holy Spirit. 

Protestants continue this practice of trusting current scholarship instead of the Holy Spirit. They continue to place their trust in the arm of flesh, for many Protestants doubt parts of the New Testament, notably the woman taken in adultery. Modern scholars say that the story was not in the earliest extant manuscripts of John. Saint Augustine, circa 450 A.D., was already familiar with this issue, and he wrote that enemies of the faith removed the story, worried that it might give their wives the wrong idea.⁴ Sadly, Protestants have sided with scholars and many of them no long hold this story to be the word of God. So they continue to chip away at the scriptures, tossed about by every wind of scholarship. Though the Protestants ignored scholarship when it reaffirmed the ancient date of the Greek canon. They preferred to keep the younger, Jewish canon that did not have the odd Catholic doctrines that are at least as old as the Maccabees.

Saint Francis asked the Protestants why they had removed books from the Bible. This question, and his thoughtful letters, brought tens of thousands of Protestants back to the Catholic faith (see The Catholic Controversy by Francis de Sales). And so I would invite the LDS to discern the spirits on this issue. Why do the LDS still use the mangled, abridged, Protestant Bible? Was the Protestant destruction of scripture inspired by God? Their own principles deny them this claim. Catholics claim to be the Church of Jesus Christ. By the guidance of the Holy Spirit and with the authority of Jesus Christ, the Catholic Church selected the books of the canon, and formally closed the canon.⁵ Protestants claim sola scriptura, that the scriptures alone are the judge of gospel truths. But the canon is not defined in the scriptures. So Protestants have to believe that the scriptures are inspired, but not the canon, not even their own version of it. The LDS have an open canon, and claim to have continuing revelation, so what is preventing them from reading the whole Bible?

Joseph Smith queried the Lord about the Apocrypha, which is the Protestant slur for excised sacred scripture. His revelation stated that they contained truth, but the Spirit would be needed to benefit from it (D&C 91). So, they remain largely neglected by the LDS. But the LDS pride themselves on having a direct conduit to heaven. And by this they do not mean just church leadership. Rather, every LDS member is supposed to have the ability to ask God directly about the truthfulness of scripture, and receive an answer. This is the basis of LDS testimonies. Why not apply that gift to the Apocrypha, and find the treasures buried therein? For a pearl of great price, a man would sell all that he has, and dig in the muck and the dirt for it. What greater pearl is there than the word of God? And if the Apocrypha contains the word of God, even if buried in dirt, then it would be worth digging into. The sealed portion of the Book of Mormon is hoped for, prayed for, yearned for by the LDS people. And why? Because it contains the word of God. That is what makes scripture precious. The LDS desire the word of God, and hope for the sealed portion. But here before them is an unsealed portion of scripture, if they would but invoke that same Spirit that they claim can help them discern truth from error.

Get your hands on the Bible, the entire Bible, not the abridged version. The Douay-Rheims version is close to the King James in wording and style. I have the Latin/English version. Ignatius Press just came out with a study Bible in the RSV Second Catholic version that is very good. May you find many pearls in your digging.

Note: The seven books removed by Protestants are: Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Wisdom, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), and Baruch.

2^nd Note: There are other actual apocryphal books that Christians have read throughout the ages, that are not canonical. These include Enoch, The Shepherd of Hermas, the Protoevangelium of James, Jubilees, and many others. They also contain many pearls.

 

¹ “Introduction to the First Book of the Maccabees,” Thomas, Hahn, and Mitch, Ignatius Study Bible, p.1636

² Francis de Sales, The Catholic Controversy, 2, 3.

³ Francis de Sales, The Catholic Controversy, 2, 4.

⁴ De conjugiis adulterinis, 2, 6

⁵ This process was complex. The wisdom of the whole body of the Church is taken into account. The long-standing practice of all members is considered part of sacred tradition, along with the official councils of bishops. Ordinary Church members played a role in defining the canon.