re deuterocanonicals esp sirach in article may athos rutgers edu revdak netcom com d andrew kille writes dave davis ddavis cass ma bull com wrote lots deleted with which i generally agree there is no inherently defensible argument for the inclusion or exclusion of the deuterocanonical books 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 lets talk about principles if we accept that god sets the standards for what ought to be included in scripture then we can ask is it authoritative is it prophetic is it authentic is it dynamic is it received collected read and used on these counts the apocrapha falls short of the glory of god to quote unger s bible dictionary on the apocrapha they abound in historical and geographical inaccuracies and anachronisms they teach doctrines which are false and foster practices which are at variance with sacred scripture they resort to literary types and display an artificiality of subject matter and styling out of keeping with sacred scripture they lack the distinctive elements which give genuine scripture their divine character such as prophetic power and poetic and religious feeling 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 but the problem with this argument lies in the assumption that the hebrew canon included the apocrapha in the first place and it wasn t until the sixteenth century that luther and co threw them out the jewish council you mentioned previously didn t accept them so the reformation protestants had good historical precedence for their actions jerome only translated the apocrapha under protest and it was literally over his dead body that it was included in the catholic canon the simple fact is that protestant exclusion roman inclusion orthodox inclusion of still other books or any other definition of a closed canon is the decision of a community of faith about what the standard collection of scripture shall be for that community they all are traditions of men whether one considers that to be a problem or not depends on which community happens to be yours and how you accept define authority within it i personally believe that the concept of a closed canon whether catholic protestant or orthodox is one that developed rather late in the history of the church and which has not served the church well how do you then view the words i warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book if anyone adds anything to them god will add to him the plagues described in this book and if anyone takes away from this book the prophecy god will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city rev surely this sets the standard and not just man made traditions it is also noteworthy to consider jesus attitude he had no argument with the pharisees over any of the ot canon john and explained to his followers on the road to emmaus that in the law prophets and psalms which referred to him the ot division of scripture luke as well as in luke taking genesis to chronicles the jewish order we would say genesis to malachi as scripture see dr lee macdonald s the formation of the christian biblical canon abingdon for a clear and faithful examination of the origins and issues of the canon i am not familiar with the book some other arguments you might like to consider are found in chapter of josh mcdowell s evidence that demands a verdict barney resson many shall run to and fro knowledge shall increase daniel
