Published August 24, 2024 at 11:40 PM

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When talking about the Bible, most Christians have been told that “your Bible is missing books”. Most Bibles have 66 books, but there are Bibles that have more. For example, Catholic Bibles like NABRE have 73 books, while some Orthodox Bibles have even more than that. The reason for this difference is the Apocrypha, as different Christian traditions have different apocryphal books in their canon.

This article will clarify the issue of the Apocrypha and give my opinion on its books.

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What Is The Apocrypha?

In simple terms, the Apocrypha is a collection of books that are respected by some Christian traditions, but not considered canon. Most books of the Apocrypha were written after Malachi, but before Matthew, placing them in the “400 Silent Years” period. There are also some that were written around the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD (and after this).

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Books of the Apocrypha

There are so many books of the Apocrypha, but below are the most popular ones:

• 1 Maccabees
• 2 Maccabees
• 3 Maccabees
• 4 Maccabees
• Judith
• Tobit
• Wisdom
• Sirach
• Baruch
• 2 Baruch
• Letter of Jeremiah (often included as Baruch chapter 6)
• Greek Esther
• Greek Daniel (Bel and the Dragon, Susanna, Prayer of Azariah, and Song of the Three Holy Children are added in)
• 1 Esdras (Greek Ezra)
• 2 Esdras
• Enoch
• Jubilees
• Jasher
• Prayer of Manasseh
• Psalm 151

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The Apocrypha you’re likely most familiar with is the Catholic Apocrypha, which includes:

1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Judith, Tobit, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch (with the Letter of Jeremiah as the 6th chapter), Greek Esther, and Greek Daniel

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The Eastern Orthodox Church agrees with the Catholic Apocrypha, but also includes:

Prayer of Manasseh, 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, 3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, Psalm 151

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The three most contentious books are Enoch, Jasher, and Jubilees:

Enoch is special because it is quoted by Jude. Some believe that we have the authentic Book of Enoch, while others argue that it is pseudepigrapha written during the Second Temple period (300 BC). Regardless, Enoch is intriguing because it is clearly quoted in the New Testament.

Jubilees is considered an expansion of Genesis and is believed to have been written around 100 BC. Some Christians read this book to fill in the gap on details not mentioned in the Bible, while others see it as someone adding fictional details to Genesis.

Jasher is undoubtedly the most contentious Apocrypha book. It is mentioned in Joshua, but the debate is over whether we have the original Book of Jasher. While some Christians believe that Jasher is authentic, most believe that what we have is a forgery from the Middle Ages, meaning the original book is lost.

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Why The Apocrypha Isn’t In The Bible

Now that we’ve discussed the basics of the Apocrypha, we can now discuss why the Apocrypha is not in the Bible. The main reason you will hear is that “Martin Luther removed 7 books from the Bible”. Catholics usually say this in defense of the 73-book Bible, which includes the 7 Apocrypha books. However:

MARTIN LUTHER DID NOT REMOVE 7 BOOKS FROM THE BIBLE!

What Martin Luther did was move the 7 Apocrypha books to their own section. Luther recognized that they were not part of the Jewish Tanakh (the Jewish canon was closed after Malachi), so he didn’t consider them scripture. They were still in the Bible, and considered books that were good to read, but were not authoritative. Luther is the main reason that a distinction is made between The Bible and Apocrypha, but he DID NOT remove the Apocrypha from the Bible.

As an aside, what Martin Luther SHOULD get criticized for is the fact that he moved Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation to the back of the New Testament because he disagreed with some of their theology (especially James). He considered these books “disputed” and made them the last 4 books in his NT canon.

However, Martin Luther had nothing to do with the Apocrypha being removed from the Bible; Luther even included it in his Bible. And nearly 100 years after Luther, the Apocrypha was still in the Bible. If you don’t believe me, look up the 1611 KJV Bible, and you’ll find that the Apocrypha section was still there. In fact, the Apocrypha was in the Bible until the 1800s.

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Bible Printing Companies Removed The Apocrypha In The 1800s

The Apocrypha being removed from the Bible was a decision made by Bible printing companies. Bibles were bulky and expensive to make on a printing press. In an effort to save money, Bible printing companies simply stopped printing the Apocrypha. They reasoned that Christians weren’t reading these books anyway, and they were right. The Apocrypha was not considered scripture, so people skipped out on reading these “optional” books. Christians don’t even read the 66 books that we have in the Bible, so it shouldn’t be surprising that they weren’t reading the Apocrypha either. In short, the Apocrypha was removed from the Bible to save money and paper.

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Conclusion: Should The Apocrypha Be Read?

I pray that this article brought some clarity to the topic of the Apocrypha. These books were respected works of literature, but they were not considered scripture. In light of this, my opinion of the Apocrypha will shock you.

I am in favor of Christians reading the Apocrypha, and believe that this section should have never been removed from our Bibles.

The LORD has put it on my heart to go and read the Apocrypha, so I got a KJV Bible with the Apocrypha still in it. What I have found is that these books are extremely helpful to read, and that Protestants trash them without even reading them.

For example, 1 Maccabees was a great book that filled in the gap of what was going on in the Greek period. This book reads like Kings and Ezra, and I believe that the only reason it isn’t in the Bible is because it was written after the canon was closed. I personally recommend that you go and read this book, and you’ll be impressed at how thorough and historically accurate it is.

I tend to agree with Protestants that these books are not authoritative, especially because some of them contain theological question marks. However, they are undoubtedly helpful to read. They help us understand the literature of the Jews and debunk the notion of there being “400 Silent Years” where nothing was happening to the Jews. These books are especially good at giving you a better understanding of how the Jews were feeling when they were Greek and Roman subjects.

So to close, the 66 books that we have in our Bibles are all that we need; we aren’t missing anything that will impact salvation. But I do recommend that Christians read the Apocrypha, as these books are not as bad as they are made out to be.

Thank you for reading and always remember to stay vigilant!