Truth Unites - Did Protestants Remove Books From the Bible?

Episode Date: February 22, 2025

Gavin Ortlund responds to the charge that Protestants removed books from the Bible, and have no historical precedent for their view of the canon.See the original video from Lila Rose: https://youtu.be/vfhK8jwMY70?si=e_woRkepccxXy3AcTruth Unites (https://truthunites.org) exists to promote gospel assurance through theological depth. Gavin Ortlund (PhD, Fuller Theological Seminary) is President of Truth Unites and Theologian-in-Residence at Immanuel Nashville.SUPPORT:Tax Deductible Support: https://truthunites.org/donate/Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/truthunitesFOLLOW:Website: https://truthunites.org/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truth.unites/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gavinortlundFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/TruthUnitesPage/

Did Protestants remove books from the Bible? What was the testimony of the early church and the medieval church about the canon of scripture? This is the topic that's been in discussion a lot. They actually various different places. It also came up from Alex Harado from the channel Voice of Reason on Lila Rose's podcast, and they were responding to some comments made by Wes Huff. Okay, we have what's referred to as the Jewish scriptures, the Tanakh, the Torah, the Nevi, and the Ketabin, what we would call the Old Testament.

And you have this other group of books, which is written after that group that group that the Jews considered scripture, what do we do with that? And for a lot of people within the early church, they looked at that and they said, the Jews never considered that scripture. The Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God, like Paul says, so therefore we don't consider them scripture. So he's wrong. He's wrong. Case closed. All right. No, just kidding. So Wes's words there in the clip referenced, quote, a lot of people within the early church. I typed that out so you can see that on the screen there. That's the particular point I'd like to pursue and defend and promote in this clip. And we can contrast that with Alex's perspective. That's the claim that they make and the way

that I respond to that is I say, okay, how come your canon cannot be found anywhere in the first 1,500 years? Because the 66 book canon of scripture that Protestants use today is not found anywhere. They try, they try and make arguments about certain church fathers that maybe held to the 66 book canon in the early church. There was almost no dispute. over the Old Testament, which is what we, you know, Catholics and Protestants dispute now. But in the early church, there was a lot of dispute over the New Testament. So who was right. And no matter who you pick or who is right, their canon doesn't match yours.

Why? So I think a lot of people just don't know the facts. Now I've gotten a little bit uncertain about how to feel about rebuttal videos on YouTube. You never wanted to feel like a gotcha. There's lots of downsides to it. So I want to say I'm really grateful for Lila Rose and her pro-life advocacy. I just, I like her and appreciate her a lot. And I don't know Alex until about the last few days,

but I've been watching a couple of his videos, and I've really enjoyed that. I hope I can get to know him better. But I just want to address these claims. I think it's very problematic to say things like your canon, the Protestant canon, can't be found anywhere in the first 1,500 years of church history. That's the claim that they make,

and the way that I respond to that is I say, okay, how come your canon cannot be found anywhere in the first 1,500 years? because the 66 book canon of scripture that Protestants use today is not found anywhere. In the early church, there was almost no dispute about the Old Testament. In the early church, there was almost no dispute over the Old Testament, which is what we, Catholics and Protestants dispute now. But in the early church, there was a lot of dispute over the New Testament.

And I'm just very jealous for the truth to be known about these things. So let's just walk through and let's just give examples from church history to show there was dispute in the early church about the canon. You can find lots of canon lists identical to or similar to the Protestant canon, and the Roman Catholic canon was not settled until the Council of Trent. These points can be, and often are, conceded by good Roman Catholic scholarship. Here's how the Catholic Encyclopedia puts it. In the Latin Church, all through the Middle Ages, we find evidence of hesitation about the character

of the Duderocanicals. There's a current friendly to them, another one distinctly unfavorable to their authority and sacredness, while wavering between the two are a number of writers whose veneration for these books is tempered by some perplexity as to their exact standing, and among those we note St. Thomas Aquinas, few are found to unequivocally acknowledge their canonicity. More briefly, Eves Congar puts it like this, an official definitive list of inspired writings did not exist in the Catholic Church until the Council of Trent. So let's ask, why do good Catholic scholars concede this? Let's go back to the early church and take a look. We'll have three sections, Jerome, then the East,

and then early testimonies. I really hope I don't lose you on Jerome because we need to work through Jerome because he's so important, but there's a lot of others who are going to come in his wake. But let's work through Jerome because his view is very clear,

but it needs to be addressed because this gets contested at the popular level in ways that are kind of quirky. So for newcomers, in Jerome's preface to 1st and 2nd Samuel, 1st 2nd Kings,

he lists the books of the Old Testament in three sections, the law, the prophets, and the writings. And he defends a 22 book, Hebrew canon. These are the books that correspond to the Protestant canon, which are simply counted differently. Then he states his rejection to what he terms the apocryphal writings. You can see that term underlined there on the screen, and he gives several examples of such apocryphal books, which are included in the Roman Catholic canon today. Elsewhere, he reiterates his opposition to

books like Judith and Tobit and First and Second Maccabees. Now, this is well established, but here's how people try to get around this. And this is the quirky part. We just need to hopefully just address and put this to bed. People say, oh, but Jerome submitted to the judgment of the churches. You will hear this. This is all over the internet, even though it is wrong. It's one of those lines you wish people would look into more. So let's clear it up. Let's bring some clarity to this quote where Jerome supposedly submitted to the judgment of the churches. He's writing against Rufinus and he says, what sin have I committed in following the judgment of the churches? So now all we have to ask is, well, what is the judgment of the churches that he's talking about?

In context, he's not talking about, you know, Catholic versus Protestant canon stuff. Rather, he's talking specifically about two different Greek translations of the book of Daniel, the Septuagint and then a translation from theodotion, a second-century Jewish scholar. Both of these versions of Daniel have various additions that the Hebrew, Masoretic text, 12-chapter version of Daniel, lacks, the story of Susanna, Bell, and the Dragon, etc. This is part of the longer version of Daniel. So both of these different versions of Daniel, these two different Greek translations, have those additional materials. So what is at issue in this quote is not a Catholic versus a Protestant issue or anything in the ballpark of that. What's in view here is which is the better of these two

Greek translations, both of which have this additional material. Furthermore, Jerome's basis for preferring the Theodotian Daniel over the LXX Daniel, the subduigent Daniel, is its greater fidelity to the Hebrew. This is why immediately after this section, as you can see from what I put on the screen, the very next thing he says is a section entitled A Vindication of the importance of the Hebrew text of scripture. You can see the highlighted sections there, the famous quote, and then the next chapter. And in this section, Jerome advances the superiority of the Hebrew Old Testament.

quote, the Hebrew scriptures are used by apostolic men. They are used as is evident by the apostles and evangelists, our Lord and Savior himself. Whenever he refers to the scriptures, takes his quotations from the Hebrew. Furthermore, in his prologue to the book of Daniel, Jerome states that he doesn't know why. The churches went with the Theodotion Daniel over the LXX Daniel. There's no counsel or something that he's submitting to here. He's not sure why they went this way. Furthermore, at the end of this quote, you can see in what I emboldened, he states his own opinion that the Septuagint Daniel often differs from the truth and with proper judgment is repudiated. So he's not going against his own judgment in any way.

He holds the same judgment as what he sees the churches of having come to with respect to these two different versions of Daniel. But the most important point is just that the matter at hand is these two different Greek translations of Daniel, both of which have additional material. This is not a Catholic versus Protestant issue at all. So hopefully we can just put to bed this. submitting to the judgment of the church's claim. So far as I can tell, unless there's something I'm missing, something else out there, this is just a totally bogus claim. Totally bogus. He doesn't,

because people say this, they quote this and they say, oh, see, he's submitted to the Deutero-canonicals being scripture or something like that. Now, if there's any ambiguity about this, all we have to do is just look at the full corpus of Jerome's writings and letters from later in life. Here's a letter after the fourth-century councils that are supposed to have settled the canon, which they did not, to which Jerome is supposed to have submitted, which didn't change his opinion at all. So this is a letter written to a young woman seeking counsel about raising her daughter, and he's still advocating for the same canon here. You can see various portions of scripture that I've underlined, like the Psalms, Ecclesiastes, Job, New Testament books like the Gospels,

Acts and the epistles. Then he moves on to mention the prophets and the Heptituk. That means the first seven books of the Hebrew Bible, Genesis through judges. Kings and Chronicles. Kings will include Samuel there. Ezra and Esther. Ezra will include Nehemiah there and Song of Songs, which he says to read last, which is kind of funny.

And then he gives a warning to avoid the apocryphal books, which you can see on screen here. So you can also read, by the way, letter 53, which also postates the 382 counsel. where Jerome, again, lists out a number of books from Scripture, and he doesn't include the Deuterocanicals. Though, to be fair, that letter is not a comprehensive list either, as letter 107, which I just cited is. So this is pretty clear. I mean, you know, again, there's a disconnect that happens between the popular level rhetoric and discussion and the scholarship. Here's how Ed Gallagher

puts it. He notes that some people try to say that Jerome changed his mind, though that discussion is actually a different kind of change. The question is whether his earlier view is a wider canon and then he narrows it. Nobody is talking about him widening his view of the canon laid in life or something like that. But even this other idea that his earlier view is a wider view of the canon, he says, is wrong. The available evidence indicates that Jerome consistently excluded the Deutero-canonical books from the Christian canon of Scripture. There seems then to be no reason to think that Jerome ever adhered to an Old Testament canon different from the one he endorsed in the, and that's a reference to the preface that I first quoted to Samuel and Kings. Moreover, there

are reasons to think that Jerome came to approve the narrower canon very early in his career. Jerome's theory regarding the Deutero Canonicals did not substantially develop. All our evidence indicates that he always considered them outside the canon. Again, even what debate there is is about his earlier views, not that he eventually came to accept the Dutero-canonical books as first-tier scripture or something like that. Gallagher also addresses Jerome's translation of Tobit and Judith, showing that the prefacees to these works demonstrate he didn't think they were canonical. This is another argument that you will sometimes hear. Jerome is clear and consistent on this matter, okay? And this is significant because Jerome is the greatest scholar of the early

church. What is perhaps most striking about Jerome's authority is that his opinion continues to be regarded as authoritative on this point all throughout church history up to the Council of Trent. So you can find, for example, Cardinal Cajetan, a major opponent of Luther in the 16th century, making his appeal to Jerome when he gets to the end of Esther and he explains why he excludes the Dutero-Cononical Books. He appeals to Jerome, as you can see from this quote on the screen. I told you before that these books were always contested all the way up to the Council of Trent, even after the Council of Florence, and even among leading Catholic cardinals, like Cardinal Jimonis, Cardinal Cajitan, et cetera, a few others.

Those are the two that I really know of. I've hunted down. And that tradition will appeal to Jerome. So what you have in the West is two different traditions. The tradition represented by Jerome, which we're going to see where that goes back earlier at the end of this video, and the tradition represented by Augustine. and these other significant fourth-century councils, especially North African councils,

that favor the Deutero-Cononical books. So you have this tension that succeeds into the medieval era. But just to be clear, Jerome is not the only person on this side of the tension in the West, who hold to a shorter canon. His friend Rufinus held the same view. As you can see on the screen here, Rufinus lists these books and then writes,

these comprise the books of the Old Testament. Rufinus proceeds to classify the Dutero-Cononical as not canonical, but rather ecclesiastical. What we're going to see as we go is there's different ways of cashing out the distinction between the Deutero-canonical books and the proto-canonical books, but the distinction is there. The canon list of Hillary is the same, and you can see here this idea, 22 books corresponding to the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. And just to note in that last sentence, Hillary acknowledges that some add Tobit and Judith

to make 24 books. Now, there's one point we need to make before we go on to the East. I hate for these videos to get too complicated, but this subject matter is extremely complicated. And we need to address one thing that I can anticipate will come up, even though I'm going to address it. I bet people will still miss my addressing it and just say it anyway. But these videos are a tough balancing act between technicality and clarity. I'm trying to be clear for popular level audience, but this gets really technical. So I at least need to mention one little wrinkle that I think plagues these discussions and creates confusion. So just hang with me for just one little clarification before we move on to the east. Many early Christians had a two-tier

canon. Tier one scripture and Tier two scripture, with the Deutero-canonical books often classified as Tier-2 scripture. Now, the exact nature of the distinction, you know, what makes something tier one and tier two? How do you regard Tier two? There's some variation. on that and some ambiguity on that at times. We saw Rufinus' distinction between canonical versus ecclesiastical. Sometimes it'll be the Tier 1 books are for dogma. Tier 2 are for edification. We'll see how Athanasius in the East cashes out this distinction in just a second.

But what we have to see here is that many times the Tier 2 books can still be cited, can still be read, can still be used, and even cited as scripture. even while they are excluded from Tier 1 canon that establishes dogma. Okay? So I'm just flagging this because what happens is this. You'll find the same church father who will be citing a Deutero-canonical book like Tobit or something like that. They might even cite it as scripture. But then they won't include it in their canonical list and they'll explicitly state.

This is not a part of the canonical scriptures. And people get thrown off by this and both sides appeal to their point and we talk past each other. people need to know that a lot of times these citations are talking about tier two scripture. Okay? So let's just give an example of this with Jerome, because people will quote how Jerome cites the book of Syrac as scripture. And people say, look, there it's settled. But if you read Jerome's preface to the books of Solomon, he's very clear.

And what he thinks about Syrac, which is also called ecclesiasticus, and also the wisdom of Solomon. And he classifies them with, I'll just read this. emboldened part of the bottom. Therefore, just as the church also reads the books of Judith Tobias, that's Tobit and the Maccabees, but does not receive them among the canonical scriptures, so also one may read these two scrolls for the strengthening of the people, but not for confirming the authority of ecclesiastical dogmas. So hopefully, here's the point to take away from this, if that got too technical for you. Don't allow people to say, oh, look, this particular church father

cited a book as scripture, therefore that settles the question, when they don't even tell you in what sense they cited it as scripture or what they said about it or how they classified their canon list. You see, many of the church fathers have a distinction between first tier and second tier, and in many cases that distinction will concern differing levels of authority. And the Council of Trent comes along and takes that distinction off the table. So bear that in mind with Jerome and with these Eastern voices as we go. The best way to go is to look at their canon lists and just see what they explicitly tell you about these Dutero-Cononical books. We've seen that with Jerome.

Let's look to the east. So in the east, you actually have much more strong support for a shorter Old Testament canon. However, it is not exactly identical to the Protestant canon, though it's very close. This is from the Senate of Laodosia, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory of Nazianzus, who else? I'm forgetting someone, Athanasius. and then all the way up to John of Damascus in the 7th century, you'll find again this 22 book Hebrew canon based upon the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. The only exceptions and wrinkles in this are that Baruch is included as a part of Jeremiah,

and then you'll sometimes get little minor additions as well, like Susanna and the other additional material and Daniel included, and sometimes Esther is omitted. So you get these little wrinkles, but the majority of the Deuterocanonical books are excluded in this. Eastern tradition. Let's just document this. A Cyril of Jerusalem, his catechetical lectures, very important text. I need to read this whole quote, but here Cyril's rationale of the divine scriptures read the two and 20 books, but have nothing to do with the apocryphal writings. Study earnestly

these only, which we read openly in the church. Far wiser and more pious than yourself with the apostles and the bishops of old time, the presidents of the church who handed down these books. being therefore a child of the church trench not upon its statutes. And of the Old Testament, as we have said, study the two and 20 books, which if you are desirous of learning, strive to remember by name as I recite them. So note three things that I've emboldened here, and I'll leave this quote up. Number one, Cyril forbids the catechumans from reading the apocryphal books based upon church practice. Quote, these only which we read only in the church. That tells us about church practice in Jerusalem in the fourth century. Number two, he bases that church practice on apostolic tradition.

Quote, who handed down these books, end quote. And number three, Cyril perceives this canon list to be authoritative. Note the word statutes. And this dire warning, you know, trench not upon the church's statutes. Okay, so which books exactly are we talking about? Well, the very next thing Cyril does is tell us, for of the law of the books of Moses are the first five, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and next, Joshua, the son of knave, and the book of judges, including Ruth, counted as seventh. Now, I'm not going to read through this whole thing. I'm a little sensitive to being tedious at reading too much. Just a couple of notes. You can see the 12 minor prophets clumped together as one book. That's partly how you get to the 22 number. First and second, Ezra's refer to Ezra and Nehemiah. You see the inclusion of Ruth with judges.

the inclusion of Baruch with Jeremiah, and also the letter of Jeremiah, another short edition. But this is a 22 book, Old Testament canon, similar to a Protestant canon. There is no Tobit, no Judith, no Maccabees, no wisdom of Solomon, etc. We also have Athanasius, famous defender of the deity of Christ, in his famous letter from 367, where he gives a very similar canon list to what we just said. Again, you see Jeremiah is with Baruch, and then you see the absence of Esther, but apart from this, this is very close to the Protestant canon. The Deuterocanicals are mostly excluded from Athanasius's canon list. Athenesias then distinguishes the Deutero-canonical books as not canonical, but rather merely to be read for the sake of edification, and he

distinguishes those from what he calls the secret writings. So now you have three kind of distinctions here with Athanasius. And this is similar to what we saw with Jerome, where the Deutero-canonical books can be read and cited and so forth, but they're not canonical scripture. That's the distinction you can see emboldened on the screen there from Athanasius. Now, this is the canon list that broadly tends to predominate for some time in the east. The same canon list is found in Gregory of Nazianzus. Again, same exceptions. A lot of this is coming out of the Synod of Laodicea. So you've got Baruch and the letter of Jeremiah with Jeremiah. additional material in Daniel, the absence of Esther, but all very close, shorter canon,

very close to Protestants, excluding most of the Duderotanicals. The same canon list is found in Amphiloquius, who is Gregory of Nazianzis's cousin. You also have a shorter canon list in Epiphanius, and you find this all the way into the 7th century with the so-called final father, John of Damascus, whom I've done some work in. You can see on the screen here this shorter 22-book canon for the Old Testament. This is why I find it astonishing when this claim of unanimity is made throughout church history. It's, this is, not only is their precedent, this is more of the dominant view in the East. So you've got the greatest scholar of the West, Jerome, and you've got this very powerful tradition in the East coming out of the Senate of Laodosia. And it's like,

no, you know, hopefully just walking through this will help clarify that for people. Now, one other clarifying remark before we go on to the last point about early voices, which is really important, so stick around for that. But somebody might say, but yeah, but this tradition in the east has little minor variations like Baruch enfolded and so on and so forth, so that's not the exact same as the Protestant canon, even if it's closer to that than the Catholic canon. Fair point, granted. We're not saying it's the exact same.

But if the criteria is being the exact same, then we can also point out that there are also smaller differences between the Old Testament canon accepted by Augustine and the councils of Hippo and Carthage in the 4th century versus the later Old Testament accepted by the Council of Trent. They weren't identical. They were close, but not identical, because the 4th century councils worked with the Septuagint version of 1st Esdras, which is not included in the canon list at the Council of Trent. So it's simply false that Trent reiterated exactly the earlier tradition. There are differences there as well. All right, last section of the video, most important.

We've looked at the east, we've looked at the west. But a lot of what we've looked at is like, you know, what comes to predominate a little into the patristic era. We're largely looking at like fourth century-ish time frame, testimonies. Jerome, Athanasius, Cyril, etc. These are 300-ish. Jerome goes a little further. So we have, and then we've seen some little wrinkles with like Baruch.

So the question rises, can we go back earlier? Might that bring greater clarity? Well, Eusebius gives us the canon list of Milito of Sartis, who lived back in the second century. And this is very close to the Jewish and Protestant canon. There's just a few wrinkles. The book of Esther is missing, although some have argued that that was an accidental omission. Others have argued it would be included in Ezra or Ezra. Nehemiah would be included in Ezra here, and Lamentations would be included in Jeremiah. And then there's some dispute about whether the reference to wisdom also on the screen here is a reference to the book of wisdom or just another term for Proverbs. A common older view, which you can see on the screen from this quote of Archibald Alexander, is that this is simply another name for Proverbs, but that is disputed today, and this is unclear. Now, when there's something that's unclear and I'm not sure about it, I just try to put it out there and let people be aware of what's in dispute. So it's unclear about Esther and the Book of Wisdom. We can, could grant, though, that let's just assume for the sake of argument that Esther is out and Book of

Wisdom is in, nonetheless, this is very close to a Protestant canon. It excludes all, or maybe, or at least most of the Deutero canonical books. Now, let's just pause for a moment and reflect on how significant this is from Milito. This is an early testimony. Second century, if Eusebius is correct in what he transmits to us. Melito is often regarded as an apostolic father. These are the earliest church fathers who are regarded as closest to the apostles. Many think Milito personally knew Polycarp and Ignatius, who are disciples of John. So he's very close to the Johannine community. We're talking right here after the apostles, you know. And so we have a testimony to a canon list that early on. This is very significant. Jerome himself cites a reference to Milito in a lost work

of Turtullian as a prophet because of his oratorical genius. And talks, you know, so the point here is that Milito was a highly regarded figure in his day. And Philip Schaft tells us that Milito visited Palestine specifically to seek information about the Jewish canon. So Milito's testimony is very important. Some people try to wriggle out of this, just like they'll try to wriggle around Jerome. They'll try to wriggle out of this by saying that Melito is just reporting the Jewish canon, rather than advocating for this canon as a Christian canon. This is probably one of the weaker

arguments I've heard about this. Melito introduces this canon list as concerning our entire faith, and he calls them the books of the Old Testament, which Jews would never call their scriptures. This is a Christian Old Testament, going back very early. By the way, guess who else Eusebius identifies with the 22 Hebrew, 22 book Hebrew canon? Origin, 22 book canon. And this is very important because origin is a very significant early Christian thinker, and you can note the stated rationale being tradition for origin's view. Unless he's merely reporting what the Jewish people have done in this passage, irrespective of the church's view, which seems unlikely, this is another very interesting

early appeal to tradition. See, this is what I'm trying to get into in this third section here. It's like, okay, we got this strong tradition in the east. We have Jerome. in the West, but what ultimately is that coming out of? And we want to look at these early traditions to see what goes back to Jesus and the apostles. There's a little bit of wrinkles with origin. I'm not going to work through here. Some have argued that Maccabees, he includes, but I don't think that's right. But nonetheless, 22-book canon with origin. Also very early on is the Brianneus list, which was discovered in the 19th century, which also corresponds very closely with the Jewish and Protestant canon. So this is a really important and neglected resource that many scholars will date

back to the second century as well. And if you want more on that, see this outstanding book by Ed Gallagher and John Mead, a fantastic book. They have a great discussion of origin and the Briannaeus list. I'm not going to comb through this exhaustively in this video. I'll state the main point, and that is what Protestants are motivated by in our effort to discern the truth about the canon of scripture is not merely the testimony of individual figures like Jerome or Athanasius or Cyril or even Molito in isolation. But what that reveals about what goes back to the earliest canon list that goes back to Jesus and the apostles. That is what ultimately has authority for us. And Protestants have good reasons for thinking that this shorter canon list is the one that goes back

to the first century. Now there's, of course, more to say about that, especially first, from the New Testament evidence and from internal problems in the Deutero-Canonical books. But the focus of this video has been to give counter examples from church history to show how widely off-base it is. When people say that there's no precedent for the Protestant canon in earlier church history, as though it was sort of settled and Protestants came along and removed books out of the canon, that is not correct. You can't remove books from a place that they don't yet occupy.

And the status of the Deutero-Cononicals was disputed all the way up into the 1500s. That's acknowledged. If you look around and poke around on this. So what really is going on here is the Protestants are adhering to one early tradition following Jerome and corresponding closely to many Eastern fathers, while the Roman Catholic Church is following another early tradition, following Augustine and various local councils. And then the debate becomes which of these traditions is correct. But neither one had established dominance by the 16th century. The Protestant view has important early testimonies in its favor, going back to the second century. We know that Jerome was familiar with Molito, who gave us perhaps the earliest canon list.

Jerome was a very good historian and scholar of the Bible. So the upshot is, not only does the Protestant canon have historical support, it has that historical support that is most likely to be the earliest, closest to the apostles.