re: Venial Sin my butt!

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Man made teachings.

What the Bible actually says.

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The Bible is man-made too.

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I wouldn’t rely on him as a source of historical truth. He gets his jollies twisting truth in order to deceive Christians, like his father Satan.

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There it is. We were missing some of that good ole Christian bigotry and hatred since Revelator hasn’t posted in a while. I’m glad you could come through, Foo.

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Dumbass cult bullshite.

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Christianity is literally a cult.

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You sound like a Muslim talking about the Qur’an.

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OK? I’m not a Muslim talking about the Qur’an.

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There it is. We were missing some of that good ole Christian bigotry and hatred since Revelator hasn’t posted in a while. I’m glad you could come through, Foo.

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You misinterpret pity for hatred. I don’t hate him but what I said is true based both on years of interaction with him as well as the teaching from the Scriptures regarding who our spiritual fathers are. Those who love God have Him as their father while those who reject God have Satan as their father.

And he is twisted due to sin, as all are or can be prior to their regeneration.

I pity him as I pity you and hope you both repent of your rejection of God and His Son Jesus but trust in Him by faith before it is too late for you to do it. I wouldn’t pray for salvation for someone I actually hated. I don’t hate any fellow image-bearers of God.

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hmm interesting question I'll take a stab at it.

are you speaking about inspired as in the same inspiration as the original language the scriptures were written in? No obviously not.

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First, thank you for engaging with the question

For context, the argument I’m addressing that the Catholic Bible is correct against the Protestant Bible because the books included in the Septuagint were regarded as Scripture due to the LXX being the most common Bible used during the time of Christ, and He and his followers—including the authors of the NT Scriptures—quoted from that translation of the OT.

The reasoning is this: if Jesus etc. quoted from the LXX then He/they must have believed all the contents of the LXX to be authoritative, so therefore the Catholic Bible—which includes other books from the LXX—is correct and the Protestant Bible that excludes those books is wrong.

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I don't know why my fellow Catholic didn't answer your question but I'm interested to see where this goes.

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I’ll cut to the chase since you are engaging: there are a few additional books/passages included in the LXX that are not included in the Catholic Bible, namely 3 and 4 Maccabees, Psalm 151, Prayer of Manasseh (this one is similar in Catholicism to what Luther was criticized for in being moved to an appendix in the Catholic Bible after being in the Vulgate for 1000 years), and 1 and 2 Esdras (different versions of Ezra and Nehemiah).

If the inclusion of the other deuterocanonical books is supported by the use of the LXX by Jesus and His disciples, then there is a logical problem for Catholics. Either Rome needs to canonize the other books/passages that are included in the LXX or there must be affirmation that simply being a part of the LXX doesn’t mean that Jesus and His disciples considered a book Scripture.

In conclusion, until Rome canonizes those other books/passages, Catholics should not use the argument that Jesus and His disciples quoted from the LXX as proof that their Bible is correct, especially given that those deuterocanonical books are never quoted from in the NT or referenced as Scripture in the same way as the OT was.

Mr. Misanthrope, you gave me a laugh with that story. I had similar experiences, as my childhood friends were split 50%/50% Protestant vs. Roman Catholic-Greek Orthodox and of varying degrees of sin nature. We did everything together, except when it came to really bad or hurtful choices, the a few protestant kids drew a hard line & resisted vs. the Catholic kids who said, "don't worry about it, we just go to confession, they'll make you say some Our Fathers and some Hail Marys." So that was my early exposure to Roman Catholicism and the Greek Orthodox.

Now I serve on the board of a Christian non-profit, split similarly between Protestants & Catholics. We serve together, eat together, pray together, socialize and bear fruit together. We are very alike on the essentials of theology and as practicing Christians. There are zero Protestant/Catholic debates & tension. Plus, (actually, the main point is) hundreds of public middle school kids are exposed to the truth of the gospel every week as a result. LINK: Youth For Christ

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You admit he “helped start the avalanche” and in the same sentence “nothing to do with…”. Why are you so dense that you can’t admit that it is Luther than defined your modern Protestant “apocrypha”?

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1) Luther helped start the avalanche of the Protestant Reformation. The Reformation had many theologians looking at all sorts of doctrines, not just those emphasized by Luther, so the avalanche was more broad than the books of the Bible, and the Reformers didn't review Luther's material on those books (or his translation) as the leader in order to know where to fall down on this subject. The Reformers looked at the content of the books, themselves, and engaged with the writings of the early church fathers as well as the agreed upon Scriptures to come to their conclusions. They didn't consult Luther to know where to stand as you seem to be implying by elevating his importance on this topic.

2) As I had mentioned, Luther had a poor view of additional books of Scripture that Protestants actually accept as canonical and authoritative, so his views on Scripture did not lead the Reformed view on Scripture.

3) Luther didn't "define" the apocrypha at all. He recognized the lack of scriptural warrant for the apocryphal books that others did throughout the history of the church. You make it seem like what Luther did was novel and the rest of the Protestants merely followed suit. That's not the case at all. The rejection of the apocrypha was something that Luther and the other Reformers agreed upon, but because they had a common understanding of the history of the text and the marks of Scripture, not because Luther went first and the rest followed. Luther and the Reformers saw that there was 1000+ years of historical disputation of the apocrypha as canonical or authoritative.

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Who was “many”? You mean a very small minority. Some church fathers like Origen were later branded heretics. There were varied opinions, but the council of Rome in 382CE set the canon officially, despite what a minority of church members thought of certain books.

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From the papacy to the bishopric to the priesthood, there have been many men who disagreed with the status of the apocryphal books as being on equal footing with the rest of Scripture in terms of authority. I have mentioned a few different times in this thread that Cardinal Cajetan--the Catholic Cardinal that questioned and disputed with Luther regarding his theology--had a differing view than what the Council of Trent finalized.

My point in bringing that to light on this conversation is to state that Catholics are wrong to insinuate that Catholicism has always been unified on this issue. It wasn't until the 1500's that the debate was officially closed even within Catholicism due to the anathema imposed on those who denied the apocrypha.

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Oh good idea. Let’s see what Jerome wrote - in 402CE after the council of Rome 382CE - on the subject of the books in the Septuagint that weren’t in the Masoretic text of the time…

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Here's what Jerome said in his preface to the book of Judith:

Among the Jews, the book of Judith is considered among the apocrypha; its warrant for affirming those [apocryphal texts] which have come into dispute is deemed less than sufficient. Moreover, since it was written in the Chaldean language, it is counted among the historical books. But since the Nicene Council is considered to have counted this book among the number of sacred Scriptures, I have acquiesced to your request (or should I say demand!): and, my other work set aside, from which I was forcibly restrained, I have given a single night's work, translating according to sense rather than verbatim. I have hacked away at the excessively error-ridden panoply of the many codices; I conveyed in Latin only what I could find expressed coherently in the Chaldean words. Receive the widow Judith, example of chastity, and with triumphant praise acclaim her with eternal public celebration. For not only for women, but even for men, she has been given as a model by the one who rewards her chastity, who has ascribed to her such virtue that she conquered the unconquered among humanity, and surmounted the insurmountable. ( Source)

Jerome, as far as I can tell, coined the term "apocrypha" long before Luther came on the scene. He also didn't see this book as worthy of his time to translate but gave in to the demand by the Pope to translate it.

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Martin Luther defined the modern meaning of apocrypha. I’m not talking about the Greek word meaning “hidden” but the modern Protestant meaning and context of it being a collection of Judith, Baruch, Maccabees, etc. That specific group of books and texts.

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Oh, the "modern meaning of apocrypha", you say? That's a little different than what you initially said, which was "Luther is credited with coining the term “apocrypha”"

It seemed you were saying that the term, itself, originated from Luther rather than just the "modern meaning" of the term (which means the same as how Jerome used it--so even here, Luther didn't invent something new).

Glass houses, and all that.

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Ok… yes, the deleted the books.

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Again, not including books in the Bible that are not authoritative Scripture is not "deleting" (or removing) Scripture, which is the allegation. We're arguing over what the contents of the Bible (God's authoritative word) are, and if books do not belong there, removing them isn't removing "Scripture" but removing non-Scripture.

If you want to say again that Protestants eventually began to remove the apocrypha from their Bibles, then I'd be fully on board with that statement.

The issue I had originally was when you said "This is common knowledge: Protestants deleted books of the Bible"

You then said, "When they deleted what you would call the “apocrypha”, they simply quit printing those books dispersed in their new canon but moved them to a separate section within the Bible.

You clarified your statement and I appreciated it.

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Yes… the Protestants deleted the books. No correction was made.

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You clarified "Bible" to "apocrypha", which was the issue I had with your original statement.

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Well you’ll have to throw the word “universal” in the trash based on your definition. To you, if there is one holdout in a million, then it isn’t universal.

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It wasn't one holdout in a million Christians, but many holdouts from leadership and important theologians within the faith. When a Pope talks about apocryphal books in terms of being in a separate category, even if he's in the overall minority, that holds some weight in the discussion when we're talking about "universal" (meaning, without dissent) agreement.

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Maybe you should try making a lucid, rational point next time, because what you actually wrote and are defending makes you seem like a retard

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Thank you for the feedback. My long and detailed comments, arguments, and explanations to you (and others) in the past are done for this very purpose (to make a lucid, rational point). I'm willing to accept that I was unclear, but I do go out of my way to make myself clear. Perhaps you should do some self-examination, as well.