The Bible is record of events so in all fairness according to you no book fulfills prophecy, only the events do
Andrew,
Correct. So your claim that the book of First Maccabees fulfills a prophecy is ... well... absurd. True, that book (and thousands of others) records an EVENT that many opinionate fulfills that prophecy, but that's a whole other enchilada.
I disagreed with your claim. And the attempt to say that First Maccabees must be inerrant, fully/equally canonical, divinely-inscripturated words of God that legally must be included in every tome with "BIBLE" on the cover BECAUSE that BOOK (those pages) fulfills prophecy is ... well.... baseless.
Andrew said:
your 500 year old church tells you which books belong and which don't
No, Andrew. Altogether on purpose, the Lutheran Confessions are SILENT on this point. Luther himself was questioned about whether the Lutheran Church SHOULD declare what is and is not fully/equally canonical and his reply was that neither he or any denomination had such authority, that would need to come from an Ecumenical Council (the last ended around 800 AD).
Luther PERSONALLY just accepted ancient, ecumenical TRADITION.... and in his day, not all books were accepted EQUALLY but had various levels of canonicity. While nearly everyone agreed on 27 NT books since 400 AD (most Catholics had 28 but not officially...and some Orthodox churches had a different number, but 27 was common). BUT there were some books "spoken in favor" and some "spoken against" and the first "trumped" the later in terms of canonicity. BUT Luther included ALL of them in his tome - and by TRADITION, so do Lutherans today. The book Luther "removed" (that Catholics STILL whine about!) was the Epistle to the Leodiceans (that 28th book often found in Catholic tomes) but because it did NOT have strong Tradition. For the OT, Luther accepted FOUR levels - the Jews had 3 (Books of Moses, Histories and Prophets, Wisdom) to which Christians added a fourth, the DEUTEROcanonical (DEUTERO = secondary, under, lesser) - the first 3 could be used canonically, the last ONLY to support something found in the other levels. Catholics and Orthodox sometimes STILL call these DEUTEROcanonical (altough Protestants in English often use a term of derision, Apocrypha). Luther INCLUDED ALL the books commonly found in Catholic Bibles found in Germany at the time, accepting the TRADITION. This is one MORE book than the RCC now accepts. At the Council of Trent, the RCC essentially made it's UNIQUE collection all equally canonical (a view never seen before) and Protestants essentially followed suit - EXCEPT for the DEUTERO ones. There the common view (expressed by Luther) continued, made official and binding by the Anglican Church but never by Lutherans. Calvin of course, totally rejected them (something new) and Calvinism has had a huge impact on American Evangelicalism.
Andrew said:
Read the early church fathers if you dont believe me, they even quote from the "apocrypha" or second canon as words from the very mouth of Jesus The LORD Himself. Now where would they get that idea?
No one disagrees that there were leading Christians (4, 5 - maybe a dozen) who USED some DEUTEROcanonical books... and of course MANY, MANY other books too (books you probably do not accept). They quoted and used writings from each other, too (none of which you likely accept as canonical). Today, Christian pastors, teachers, theologians OFTEN quote from books, movies, songs, TV shows, newspapers, etc. that you don't accept as canonical. USING something doesn't make it canonical, my friend.
But YES, on extremely rare occasions.... a handful did so calling such "Scripture." Truth: The "consensus" on what is and is not inerrant, fully/equally canonical, divinely-inscripturated words of God was NOT perfect or universal. For the NT, "in" often were the Gospels/Acts, the 13 letters of Paul, First Peter, First John, But CONTROVERSAL (not a complete consensus) were 2 Peter, 2-3 John, Jude, James, Hebrews, Revelation, the Epistle of Barnabas, Gospel of Peter, Didache, Hermas, ALL of these were quoted "AS SCRIPTURE" by some, and REJECTED "AS SCRIPTURE" by some. The consensus was not perfect, not universal around ALL.
For the OT, it was much more fluid. Many Jews only accepted the 5 Books of Moses.... but some Jews quoted from MANY books, albeit not necessary EQUALLY. While the Jewish Council of Jamnia (90 AD) is claimed as "settling" things for Jews (it wasn't as perfect as some think) frankly there's no evidence Christians even knew about this (or likely, cared). But EFFECTIVELY, it seems early Christians just carried over the Jewish view at the time, with FOUR levels of canonicity - the fourth very loose with NO consensus on what is and is not in this category. I agree with you, it can be shown that a tiny handful of early leading Christians quoted from SOME and occasionally called such "Scripture" (remember, friend, the word only means "writing" and Christians referred to writings of ECF as "Scripture" too - the term does not necessarily mean inerrant, fully/equally canonical, divinely-inscripturated words of God). But the reality that readings from SOME were included in the Lectionary and were widely available in 400 AD all suggest there was SOME embrace of SOME (with NO agreement was to WHICH). But were they seen as inerrant? Fully/equally canonical to say the Books of Moses or the Letters of Paul? As verbally and divinely inscripturated words of God? THAT, my friend, is impossible to prove.... and seems quite unlikely. The view that everything found between the covers of a book with BIBLE written on the cover being EQUAL is something only clearly embraced in the last 400-500 years.
And something to consider, my brother. While there was a strong universal conensus around 27 NT books (although NOT perfect!), that's NEVER been true about these DEUTERO books. No two denominations that embrace ANY of them AT ALL agree on which books belong in such. ZERO. And yet this has never been a problem. Never an issue (until Calvin and Trent made it so in the mid-16th Century, and then ONLY in the West). Why? Well... to be blunt my friend.... no one cared much. There was little to nothing of theological consequence here, they were used FAR less than Calvin's 66... yes, much helpful (as is true in MILLIONS of books), much inspirational (as is true in MILLIONS of books) but frankly no reason to embrace them as fully canonical (or not) and thus while the RCC and EOC disagreed on much (and excommunicated each other over such) neither gave a rip about how they disagreed on what is and is not DEUTEROcanonical. They STILL disagree... and they STILL don't give a rip that they do.
Andrew...
Nathan's obsessive emotional rant that "someone" prohibited him from reading some books Calvin rejected is just nonsense. There is no law ANYWHERE... EVER.... that mandates what publishing houses put IN or leave OUT of tomes with "BIBLE" written on the cover. It's just a myth. Heck, just go to any bookstore or google it. And his claim that Christians won't read anything not found between the covers of a tome with "BIBLE" on the cover is just silly (he's never read the NY Times Best Seller List). And NO ONE here has remotely claimed that some books beyond Calvin's 66 can't be helpful or inspirational, he's perpetuating myth there, too. BUT he does seem to have swallowed a common (and kinda of understandable) MYTH among American "Evangelicals" that God in 33 AD send out this mass email to all Christians telling them exactly what books are (and are not) inerrant, canonical, divinely inscripturated words of God. And so everyone had the identical Bible with the same books accepted the same way. But he has a unique twist on this modern American myth.... he thinks God INCLUDED a bunch of books in that email (that he won't identify) and this unidentified "them" were IN every Bible until 500 years ago when some mysterious, unidentified person gathered up all Bibles in Europe and ripped out this "them" - and no one put 'em back. It's a unique twist on the myth I admit, but it's still MYTH. A myth he ENDLESSLY perpetuates, in post after post, thread after thread, every which way (and it seems with your support). He could care less about reality or history, just perpetuating this pure myth.
See post 78
Blessings.
- Josiah
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