by Allen Dvorak<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Lost Books of the Bible! Are you missing books from your Bible?\u201d It is not uncommon to see such advertisements in the supermarket rags or at bookstores. Sometimes they hint at the idea that there has been some deliberate and\/or covert effort to exclude certain books from the New Testament.<\/p>\n
Americans love a good conspiracy! Tell me that someone (especially the government) is hiding something from me and my interest perks up. Further investigation, however, generally reveals that the advertisement is hoping to sell copies of Gnostic works or some of the apocryphal books from the period between the testaments.<\/p>\n
However, it is certainly fair to ask these questions: Can we have confidence that the New Testament of our Bible contains all of the books that God intended? Are there any included books that don\u2019t really belong?<\/p>\n
Since the word\u00a0canon<\/em> is commonly used to describe authoritative writings, by definition God determined the canon (via inspiration) of the New Testament. Canonization is essentially the process by which men recognized the books that were inspired by God (II Timothy 3:16).<\/p>\n The Roman Catholic Church claims to have \u201cgiven\u201d the biblical canon to the religious world. One dictionary of the Catholic faith states, \u201cThe\u00a0Canon of Holy Scripture<\/em>\u00a0is the list, made by the Church, of the inspired books which make up the Old and New Testament.\u201d\u00a0Although the early church (in a distributive sense) did pass judgment on the canon, there are at least two problems with that assertion. First, the Old and New Testament canons were recognized prior to the existence of the Roman Catholic Church with its distinctive characteristics, the claims of that church regarding Peter notwithstanding. Second, the various church councils (e.g., the synods of Hippo in A.D. 393 and Carthage in A.D. 397) that made declarations concerning the identity of the canon were merely stating what had already been widely accepted by Christians for some time.\u00a0In summary, there doesn\u2019t seem to be any historical evidence that the canon was determined by any universal (church) organization or any sub-group of the Lord\u2019s church.<\/p>\n Nevertheless, the canon of the New Testament is not the result of a list of books dropped from the heavens. The recognition of that canon was certainly a process that spanned a number of years, one that began when the first books of the New Testament were written.<\/p>\n The churches\/individuals who received correspondence from the apostles would have saved and copied such, recognizing the authority possessed by the writers. Of course, not all of the New Testament books were written by apostles, but apostolic authorship certainly provided\u00a0prima facie<\/em> evidence of inspiration (because of the Lord\u2019s promise to the apostles of Holy Spirit guidance; John 14:26; 15:26; 16:13) and thus a place in the canon. Peter gave Paul\u2019s epistles equal status with the \u201crest of the Scriptures<\/em>,\u201d (II Peter 3:15-16; it seems likely that Peter had in mind the Old Testament Scriptures).<\/p>\n There is also evidence that some inspired writings were being circulated (shared) fairly early in the history of the church. For instance, Paul gave instructions to his readers that they were to share their letters with other groups (Colossians 4:16). Paul\u2019s first letter to the Thessalonians was to be read \u201cto all the holy brethren<\/em>\u201d (I Thessalonians 5:27). It is thought, with the obvious reason (being addressed to seven local churches in Asia Minor), that Revelation was intended as a \u201ccircular\u201d letter.<\/p>\n There are several New Testament books whose widespread acceptance by early disciples required more time, primarily because of doubts concerning the identity of the author. Although early \u201ccanon lists\u201d (e.g., Muratorian Canon [c. A.D. 170]) and citations of New Testament documents as \u201cScripture\u201d by early church fathers are helpful in understanding the overall process of recognizing the canon, we should probably be cautious about making broad assumptions regarding the exact timing of the conclusion of that process.<\/p>\n The Mormons and the Muslims make a similar claim about the New Testament. They each affirm that the sacred book peculiar to their faith has been preserved without error, while at the same time claiming that contradictions with the Bible are caused by the corruption of the Scriptures. In other words, the same God who supposedly preserved The Book of Mormon and the Quran in flawless condition was unable, however, to do the same with the New Testament! Such claims impugn the omnipotence of the God of heaven.<\/p>\n Is our God sufficiently powerful to cause His word to be recognized and preserved? If God could not, through His providence, cause the correct books to be recognized as canonical, was Peter accurate when he described the gospel as \u201cthe word of God which lives and abides forever<\/em>\u201d (I Peter 1:23)? I believe that we can have confidence in the canon of the New Testament.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Allen Dvorak \u201cThe Lost Books of the Bible! Are you missing books from your Bible?\u201d It is not uncommon to see such advertisements in the supermarket rags or at bookstores. Sometimes they hint at the idea that there has been some deliberate and\/or covert effort to exclude certain books from the New Testament. Americans…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[660,130,1599],"class_list":["post-16531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-apocrypha","tag-canon","tag-roman-catholic-church"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12926,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/do-you-know-of-any-good-books-on-how-we-got-our-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":0},"title":"Do you know of any good books on how we got our Bible?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: You know of any good books on how we got our Bible and why we leave certain books out? I have two people who want to know a good book about this. I have read how we got our books, but I don't have those books anymore. I can't\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":94813,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-canon-of-the-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":1},"title":"The Canon of the Bible","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 28, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Inspired Books The Canon of the Old Testament - Part 1 The Canon of the Old Testament - Part 2 The New Testament Canon False Books The Book of Enoch The Book of Jasher The Apocrypha New Testament Apocrypha - Infancy Gospels","rel":"","context":"In "Audio"","block_context":{"text":"Audio","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/audio\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":17775,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-i-convince-my-brother-that-the-bible-is-complete\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":2},"title":"How do I convince my brother that the Bible is complete?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 14, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I was discussing baptism with my brother. He knows he needs to be baptized, but he doesn't have confidence in the Bible. He says he watches these shows that tell how corrupt men took books out of the Bible that really might be important. One example was that Mary\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15179,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-have-some-books-been-left-out-of-the-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":3},"title":"Why have some books been left out of the Bible?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 26, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: If the books in the Bible were written by apostles, was Moses considered an apostle? What of Isaiah and Samuel? Were they considered apostles? Is it not said in the book of Matthew that nothing was to be taken from the Old Testament? I'm just curious because if this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":25883,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/were-the-apocrypha-books-accepted-as-canon-before-the-council-of-trent\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":4},"title":"Were the Apocrypha books accepted as canon before the Council of Trent?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Again I question your dates. You say that the Catholic Church added the \"Apocryphal\" books to the Bible in 1546 AD. I'm assuming you are talking about the Council of Trent, the Church's response to the Reformation. You are correct in saying that the Church affirmed that the \"Apocryphal\"\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23098,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/books-missing-from-the-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":16531,"position":5},"title":"Books “Missing” from the Bible?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 2, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"by Ethan L. Longhenry In recent times we have seen an explosion of material alleging that the Bible that we have is not complete. Many theories have been advanced that speak of all kinds of other books that were \"banned\" from the Bible, \"taken out\" of the Bible, and other\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/BibleSearch.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16531\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}God LOST Some Books?<\/h2>\n