Session 208: (from 2Maccabees 12 and 15) - Protestant Bible vs Catholic Bible | Use of Scripture

“Why Do Most Protestant Bibles Have 7 Fewer Books Than Catholic Bibles?” and “What Is The Lesson Here For Me Regarding Use Of Scripture?"

Martin Luther’s false idea of being saved by “faith alone”, at a moment in time, caused him to need to kick out books of the bible that disagreed with his beliefs. In addition to the 7 books of the Old Testament that he removed from his bible, (Tobit, Judith, 1and 2 Maccabees, Baruch, Wisdom, and Sirach) he also wanted to remove James, Hebrews, Jude, and Revelation from the New Testament! (But even his followers thought this was too radical.)

His rationale for removing the 7 Old Testament books was a JEWISH council of 90 AD that decided to eliminate all books not written originally in Hebrew or not written in the Jewish homeland, and other restrictions. 

The Church was already formed long before 90AD, of course, and was already using the books of the Septuagint, the most popular Jewish canon, where 2/3 of New Testament quotes from the Old Testament came from.  So, it is irrelevant what the Jews chose to edit out AFTER the Church was formed.

As we saw from Session 207, 2 Maccabees 12 talked about praying for the dead, which suggests Purgatory, and Chapter 15 suggests the Communion of the Saints, both of which Luther disagreed with.  The 90AD Jewish council gave him a (weak) excuse to eliminate them from his bible.

The legitimacy of these books were not seriously questioned for over 1100 years until Luther.

For us: Do I choose to ignore the teachings of the bible that make me uncomfortable or that I disagree with?