A (Catholic) word on the Apocrypha:

The Jews in Egypt translated their choices of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek in the second century before Christ. This translation, called the Septuagint, had wide use in the Roman world because most Jews lived far from Palestine in Greek cities. Many of these Jews spoke only Greek.

The early Christian Church was born into this world. The Church, with its bilingual Jews and more and more Greek-speaking Gentiles, used the books of the Septuagint as its Bible. Remember the early Christians were just writing the documents what would become the New Testament.

After the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, with increasing persecution from the Romans and competition from the fledgling Christian Church, the Jewish leaders came together and declared its official canon of Scripture, eliminating seven books from the Septuagint.

The Christian Church did not follow suit but kept all the books in the Septuagint.

1500 years later, Protestants decided to change its Old Testament from the Catholic canon to the Jewish canon. The books they dropped are sometimes called the Apocrypha.

With love in Christ.

Please do not put too much reliance on Apochryphal works…they often contain errors and do not always remain in the path of the true Word of God. I’m sure many of the books were inspired, but due to the fact that they contain errors, it should be read with caution. The Holy Bible as found in the King James Version, New International Version and such, NOT catholic copies, although may present some puzzling connotations, are NEVER INCORRECT proving the infallability of the Word of God. To learn more, visit http://www.khouse.org and look for a download regarding the apochrypha.