Expert: Elder Greg Madden - 4/25/2008

Question
QUESTION: I have recently started digging deeper into Catholicism, as the town I live in is predominately catholic and I question some of their beliefs.  Every so often I end up in a debate with some friends who are catholic and they quote scripture from these seven books and I wonder if I'm missing some valuable information without them or they aren't relevant to the bible.  I haven't been able to find a clear answer to why the catholic bible has more books than the protestant bible, could you help me?

ANSWER: Isaac,

Praise God for your desire and zeal to share the Truth of God's Word with your friends. Let me see if I can help.

Here is some background of the difference in the Bible you and I use, and the catholic one.

Protestant reformers in the 1500s decided to follow the official canon of Judaism for the Old Testament rather than the Septuagint, and the excluded material was placed in a separate section of the Bible called the Apocrypha. Protestant Bibles included the Apocrypha until the mid 1800s, but it was eventually dropped from most Protestant editions.

The Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches continue to base their Old Testament on the Septuagint. The result is that these versions of the the Bible have more Old Testament books than Protestant versions. Catholic Old Testaments include 1st and 2nd Maccabees, Baruch, Tobit, Judith, The Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), additions to Esther, and Susanna and Bel and the Dragon which are included in Daniel. Orthodox Old Testaments include these plus 1st and 2nd Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh, Psalm 151 and 3rd Maccabees.

Rest assured that you are not missing any valuable information, and that your Bible more than sufficed to help you. The extra books included in the catholic Bible were translated from the Septuagint (Greek translation, from Alexandria in Egypt). However the Bible we us was translated from the Masoretic Text which is the Hebrew text of the Jewish Bible (Tanakh).

I suggest that when discussing these "extra" book's you do some research on the, but stick with your Bible. After all, the catholic Bible does have all the books that is in our Bible.

Hope this helps. Please let me know if you have any further questions.

Elder Greg Madden



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Sorry.  I accidentally placed my follow up question in the rating, I was wondering if you could look at that?

Answer
Isaac,

I am sorry to get back with you so late. Busy time for me around here. Would you do me a favor? It would be easier for you to send me new question (don't use a follow up to this one) with you follow up questions. Then I would be happy to help you. I would appreciate it.

God bless!

Elder Greg Madden