deuterocanonicals esp sirach dave davis writes let my state my point as provocatively as possible after going through several study bibles i m leaning heavily towards the assertion that sirach the wisdom of ben sira or ecclesiasticus is directly referenced by james in fact i think sirach is more directly referenced by james than job or ruth is referenced in any nt verse i ve seen good point the new testament does not quote ezra nehemiah esther ruth job ecclesiastes or song of songs just as it does not quote from the deuterocanon but if the non quotation of the former does not disqualify them neither does the non quotation of the later and the wisodm of solomon was quite clearly an influence on st paul especially in the letter to the romans cf especially romans and wisdom stuff deleted i think everyone would agree that principles that cannot be consistently applied are not very useful as principles so if we are to exclude them not accord them the authority of scripture we would appear to require other reasons what might these reasons be tradition always a fav with episcop tradition is equivocal on this subject sirach i believe is in vaticanus sinaiticus i don t know if it is listed in the muratorian canon the oldest list i know of sirach and the others are discussed by the fathers as scripture but not unanimously true not all accepted them as scripture though niether were all the books of the new testament so accepted which puts to the lie the whole argument of the books being excluded because they were debated and not universally accepted hebrews the apocalypse peter esther and others were debated at various times but eventually retained as for the codexes you mention both vaticanus and sinaitcus include the deuterocanon bothe of the new and old testaments and vaticanus i think inlcudes clement the shepard of hermas and the epistle of baranabas as for the muratorian canon it deals with the new testament only though it is very valuable in its witness to those books my interim conclusion is that protestant exclusion of at least one of these writings is one of those traditions of men one hears of so often they were excluded during the reformation and that appears to be the reason many people continue to exclude them any takers i can be reasonable if all else fails show me where i m wrong you re not wrong it is a tradition of men to exlcude them as i will explain below that nothing be read in the church under the nmae of divine scripture except the canonical scriptures and the canoncial scriptures are genesis exodus leviticus numbers deuteronomy joshua judges ruth four books of kingdoms being samuel and kings two books of paralpomenon being chronicles job the psalter of david the five books of solomon being proverbs ecclesiastes song of songs wisdom of solomon and misatributed to him the wisdom of jesus son of sirach the books of the twelve minor prophets isaiah jeremiah being jeremiah the lamentations baruch and the letter all of which were formerly counted as one ezekiel daniel tobit judith esther two books of ezra being ezra and nehemiah two books of maccabees and of the new testament four books of the gospel one book of the acts of the apostles thirteen letters of paul the apostle one letter of the same to the hebrews two of peter the apostle three of john one of the apostle jude one of the apostle james one book of the apocalypse of john council of hippo statute ad this same list was promulgated again at the third council of carthage ad and at the sixth council of carthage ad at which council the same list was enumerated with the words because we have recieved from the fathers that these are the books to be read in the church which ought to quiet those who assert in the name of holy scripture we do understand those books of whose authority there was never any doubt in the church as the episcopal church does in removing the deuterocanon from the realm of scripture though the episcopalians hold them in high regard and read them in the church they are not counted as scripture by them and may not be used to prove dogma the lutherans hold out similarly earlier mention of the so called apocrypha as divine scripture can also be found and below i inlcude only a portion of the quotes calling it divine scripture that could be found among the writings of the fathers and this is the reason why the law of the old testament is reckoned as consisting of twenty two books so that they may correspond to the number of letters in the hebrew alphabet it is to be noted also that by adding to these tobias and judith there are twenty four books corresponding to the number of letters used by the greeks st hillary of poitiers commentaries on the psalms prologue ad the twenty two books according to the hebrews are jeremiah with lamentations and the letter reckoned as one and also there is maccabees origen commentaries on the psalms psalm ad divine scripture addressing itself to those who love themselves and to the boastful says most excellently baruch follows st clement of alexandria the instuctor of children ad i learned accurately the books of the old testament proverbs of solomon and also wisdom st melito of sardes fragment found in eusebius history of the church and dating from crica ad book it is likewise decreed now indeed we must treat of the divine scriptures what the universal catholic church accepts and what she must shun the list of the old testament wisdom one book ecclesiasticus one book tobit one book judith one book of maccabees two books st damasus i pope the decree of damsus section ad i would think this enough though more can be shown that the church has always accepted the deutero canon though parts have been disputed by various persons for if disputes involving the new testament deutero canon does not disqulaify those books i e hebrews james peter john jude revelation in protestant eyes than neither should it disqulaify the old testament books and i must point out that the jews only drew up their canon in ad years after the founding of the christian religion upon the cross why should we adhere to a canon that was drawn up by the faithless in reaction to the chrsitian use of the greek septuagint which includes the deutero canon as early as ad st justin had already accused the jews of mutilating the canon of scripture by their removal of certain books protestants apparently prefer to think that god s revelation was limited by a decree of the jews in the ordering of their the jews faithless canon and that he could not use other people like the apostles in drawing up the canon the apostles were most certain users of the septuagint as some of the old testament quotes use the wording of the septuagint and not the hebrew and the septuagint includes the deuterocanon
