Apocryphal letter of Sultan Mohammed II to the Pope ("Notes et extraits pour servir à l'histoire des croisades au XVe siècle" / published byNicolas Jorga. Series 4: 1453-1476, Paris; Bucarest, 1915, pages 126-127
Apocrypha are works, usually written works, that are of unknown authorship, or of doubtful authenticity, or spurious, or not considered to be within a particular canon. The word is properly treated as a plural, but in common usage is often singular.
[1] In the context of the Jewish and Christian Bibles, where most texts are of unknown authorship, Apocrypha usually refers to a set of texts included in the
Septuagint but not in the
Hebrew Bible.
The word's origin is the
Medieval Latin adjective apocryphus, "secret, or non-canonical", from the
Greek adjective ἀπόκρυφος (apokryphos), "obscure", from the verb ἀποκρύπτειν(apokryptein), "to hide away".
[2]
Introduction
Apocrypha is commonly applied in Christian religious contexts involving certain disagreements about
biblical canonicity. Apocryphal writings are a class of documents rejected by some as being worthy to properly be called Scripture, though, as with other writings, they may sometimes be referenced for support. While writings that are now accepted by Christians as Scripture were recognized as being such by various believers early on, the establishment of a largely settled uniform canon was a process of centuries, and what the term "canon" (as well as "apocrypha") precisely meant also saw development. The canonical process took place with believers recognizing writings as being of God, subsequently being followed official affirmation of what had become largely established.
[3] The Roman Catholic church provided its first dogmatic definition of her entire canon in 1546, which put a stop to doubts and disagreements about the status of the Apocrypha, as well as certain other books, which had continued from the beginning of the NT church.
[4] The leader of the
Protestant Reformation,
Martin Luther, like the Catholic church father
Jerome (and certain others), favored the Masoretic canon for the Old Testament, excluding apocryphal books in his non-binding canon as being worthy to properly be called Scripture, but included most of them in a separate section, as per Jerome.
[5] Luther also doubted the canonicity of four New Testament books (Hebrews, James and Jude, and Revelation), which judgment Protestantism did not follow, but he did not title them Apocrypha.
Explaining the
Eastern Orthodox Church's canon is made difficult because of differences of perspective with the
Roman Catholic church in the interpretation of how it was done. Today Orthodox accept a few more books than appear in the Catholic canon.
Examples
Esoteric writings and objects
The word "apocryphal" (ἀπόκρυφος) was first applied[
who?] to writings which were kept secret because they were the vehicles of
esoteric knowledge considered too profound or too sacred to be disclosed to anyone other than the initiated. For example, the
disciples of the
Gnostic Prodicus boasted that they possessed the secret (ἀπόκρυφα) books of
Zoroaster. The term in general enjoyed high consideration among the
Gnostics (see
Acts of Thomas, pp. 10, 27, 44).
[6]
Renowned Sinologist
Anna Seidel refers to texts and even items produced by ancient Chinese sages as apocryphal and studied their uses during
Six Dynasties China (A.D. 220 to 589). These artifacts were used as symbols legitimizing and guaranteeing the Emperor's
Heavenly Mandate. Examples of these include talismans, charts, writs, tallies, and registers. The first examples were stones, jade pieces, bronze vessels and weapons, but came to include talismans and magic diagrams.
[7] From their roots in
Zhou era China (1066 to 256 B.C.) these items came to be surpassed in value by texts by the
Han dynasty (206 B.C. to A.D. 220). Most of these texts have been destroyed as Emperors, particularly during the Han dynasty, collected these legitimizing objects and proscribed, forbade and burnt nearly all of them to prevent them from falling into the hands of political rivals.
[7] It is therefore fitting with the Greek root of the word, as these texts were obviously hidden away to protect the ruling Emperor from challenges to his status as Heaven's choice as sovereign.
Writings of questionable value
"Apocrypha" was also applied to writings that were hidden not because of their divinity but because of their questionable value to the church. Many in
Protestant traditions cite Revelation 22:18–19 as a potential curse for those who attach any canonical authority to extra-biblical writings such as the Apocrypha. However, a strict explanation of this text would indicate it was meant for only the
Book of Revelation. Rv.22:18–19f. (KJV) states: "For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book." In this case, if one holds to a strict
hermeneutic, the "words of the
prophecy" do not refer to the Bible as a whole but to Jesus' Revelation to John.
Origen, in Commentaries on Matthew, distinguishes between writings which were read by the churches and apocryphal writings: γραφὴ μὴ φερομένη μέν ἒν τοῖς κοινοῖς καὶ δεδημοσιευμένοις βιβλίοις εἰκὸς δ' ὅτι ἒν ἀποκρύφοις φερομένη (writing not found on the common and published books in one hand, actually found on the secret ones on the other).
[8] The meaning of αποκρυφος is here practically equivalent to "excluded from the public use of the church", and prepares the way for an even less favourable use of the word.
[6]
Spurious writings
In general use, the word "apocrypha" came to mean "false, spurious, bad, or heretical." This meaning also appears in Origen's prologue to his commentary on the
Song of Songs, of which only the
Latin translation survives: De scripturis his, quae appellantur apocryphae, pro eo quod multa in iis corrupta et contra fidem veram inveniuntur a majoribus tradita non placuit iis dari locum nec admitti ad auctoritatem.
[6] "Concerning these scriptures, which are called apocryphal, for the reason that many things are found in them corrupt and against the true faith handed down by the elders, it has pleased them that they not be given a place nor be admitted to authority."
Other
Other uses of apocrypha developed over the history of Western Christianity. The
Gelasian Decree (generally held now as being the work of an anonymous scholar between 519 and 553) refers to religious works by
church fathers Eusebius,
Tertullian and
Clement of Alexandria as apocrypha.
Augustine defined the word as meaning simply "obscurity of origin," implying that any book of unknown authorship or questionable authenticity would be considered apocryphal. On the other hand,
Jerome (in Protogus Galeatus) declared that all books outside the Hebrew canon were apocryphal.
[6] In practice, Jerome treated some books outside the Hebrew canon as if they were canonical, and the Western Church did not accept Jerome's definition of apocrypha, instead retaining the word's prior meaning (see:
Deuterocanon). As a result, various church authorities labeled different books as apocrypha, treating them with varying levels of regard.
Origen (who stated that "the canonical books, as the Hebrews have handed them down, are twenty-two"),
[9] Clement and others cited some apocryphal books as "scripture," "divine scripture," "inspired," and the like. On the other hand, teachers connected with
Palestine and familiar with the
Hebrew canon excluded from the canon all of the Old Testament not found there. This view is reflected in the canon of
Melito of Sardis, and in the prefaces and letters of Jerome.
[6] A third view was that the books were not as valuable as the canonical scriptures of the
Hebrew collection, but were of value for moral uses, as introductory texts for new converts from
paganism, and to be read in congregations. They were referred to as "
ecclesiastical" works by
Rufinus.
[6]
These three opinions regarding the apocryphal books prevailed until the
Protestant Reformation, when the idea of what constitutes canon became a matter of primary concern for
Roman Catholics and
Protestants alike. In 1546 the Catholic
Council of Trent reconfirmed the canon of Augustine, dating to the second and third centuries, declaring "He is also to be anathema who does not receive these entire books, with all their parts, as they have been accustomed to be read in the Catholic Church, and are found in the ancient editions of the Latin
Vulgate, as sacred and canonical." The whole of the books in question, with the exception of
1 Esdras and
2 Esdras and the
Prayer of Manasseh, were declared canonical at Trent.
[6] The Protestants, in comparison, were diverse in their opinion of the deuterocanon early on. Some considered them divinely inspired, others rejected them. Anglicans took a position between the Catholic Church and the Protestant Churches; they kept them as Christian intertestamental readings and a part of the Bible, but no doctrine should be based on them.
John Wycliffe, a 14th-century Christian Humanist, had declared in his biblical translation that "whatever book is in the Old Testament besides these twenty-five shall be set among the apocrypha, that is, without authority or belief."
[6] Nevertheless, his translation of the Bible included the
apocrypha and the
Epistle of the Laodiceans.
[10]
Martin Luther did not class apocryphal books as being Scripture, but in both the
German (1534) and
English (1535) translations of the Bible, the apocrypha are published in a separate section from the other books, although the Lutheran and Anglican lists are different. In some editions (like the Westminster), readers were warned that these books were not "to be any otherwise approved or made use of than other human writings." A milder distinction was expressed elsewhere, such as in the "argument" introducing them in the
Geneva Bible, and in the Sixth Article of the
Church of England, where it is said that "the other books the church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners," though not to establish doctrine.
[6] Among some other Protestants, the term apocryphal began to take on extra or altered connotations: not just of dubious authenticity, but having spurious or false content.
[3] not just obscure but having hidden or suspect motives.[
citation needed] Protestants were (and are) not unanimous in adopting those meanings. The
Church of England agreed, and that view continues today throughout the
Lutheran Church, the worldwide
Anglican Communion, and many other denominations.[
citation needed] Whichever implied meaning is intended, Apocrypha was (and is) used primarily by Protestants, in reference to the books of questioned canonicity.
Catholics and
Orthodox sometimes avoid using the term in contexts where it might be disputatious or be misconstrued as yielding on the point of canonicity. Thus the respect accorded to apocryphal books varied between Protestant denominations. Most Protestant published Bibles that include the apocryphal books will relocate them into a separate section (rather like an appendix), so as not to intermingle them with their canonical books.
According to the
Orthodox Anglican Church:
On the other hand, the Anglican Communion emphatically maintains that the Apocrypha is part of the Bible and is to be read with respect by her members. Two of the hymns used in the American Prayer Book office of Morning Prayer, the Benedictus es and Benedicite, are taken from the Apocrypha. One of the offertory sentences in Holy Communion comes from an apocryphal book (Tob. 4: 8–9). Lessons from the Apocrypha are regularly appointed to be read in the daily, Sunday, and special services of Morning and Evening Prayer. There are altogether 111 such lessons in the latest revised American Prayer Book Lectionary [The books used are: II Esdras, Tobit, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, Three Holy Children, and I Maccabees.] The position of the Church is best summarized in the words of Article Six of the Thirty-nine Articles: "In the name of Holy Scripture we do understand those canonical Books of the Old and New Testament, of whose authority there was never any doubt in the Church... And the other Books (as Hierome [St. Jerome] saith) the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine."
With few exceptions, the 66 book Protestantism canon (such as listed in the
Westminster Confession of 1646)
[11] has been well established for centuries, and with many today contending against the Apocrypha using various arguments.
[12][13][14]
Metaphorical Usage
The adjective apocryphal is commonly used in modern English to refer to any text or story considered to be of dubious veracity or authority, although it may contain some moral truth. In this broader metaphorical sense, the word suggests a claim that is in the nature of
folklore,
factoid or
urban legend.
Texts
Judaism
Although traditional rabbinical Judaism insists on the exclusive canonization of the current 24 books in the
Tanakh, it also claims to have an oral law handed down from
Moses. The
Sadducees—unlike the
Pharisees but like the
Samaritans—seem to have maintained an earlier and smaller number of texts as canonical, preferring to hold to only what was written in the Law of Moses
[15] (making most of the presently accepted canon, both Jewish and Christian, apocryphal in their eyes). Certain circles in Judaism, such as the
Essenes in Judea and the
Therapeutae in
Egypt, were said to have a secret literature (see
Dead Sea scrolls). Other traditions maintained different customs regarding canonicity.
[16] The Ethiopic Jews, for instance, seem to have retained a spread of canonical texts similar to the
Ethiopian Orthodox Christians,
[17] cf Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol 6, p 1147. A large part of this literature consisted of the apocalypses. Based on prophecies, these apocalyptic books were not considered scripture by all, but rather part of a literary form that flourished from 200 BCE to CE 100.
Intertestamental
During the
birth of Christianity, some of the Jewish apocrypha that dealt with the coming of the Messianic kingdom became popular in the rising
Jewish Christian communities. Occasionally these writings were changed or added to, but on the whole it was found sufficient to reinterpret them as conforming to a
Christian viewpoint. Christianity eventually gave birth to new apocalyptic works, some of which were derived from traditional Jewish sources. Some of the Jewish apocrypha were part of the ordinary religious literature of the
Early Christians. This was strange, as the large majority of Old Testament references in the New Testament are taken from the Greek
Septuagint, which is the source of the
deuterocanonical books[18] as well as most of the other biblical apocrypha.
[19]
Slightly varying collections of additional Books (called deuterocanonical by the Roman Catholic Church) form part of the
Roman Catholic,
Eastern Orthodox and
Oriental Orthodox canons. See
Development of the Old Testament canon.
The
Book of Enoch is included in the biblical canon only of the
Oriental Orthodox churches of Ethiopia and Eritrea. The
Epistle of Jude quotes the book of Enoch, and some believe the use of this book also appears in the four gospels and
1 Peter.
[20][1] The genuineness and inspiration of Enoch were believed in by the writer of the
Epistle of Barnabas,
Irenaeus,
Tertullian and
Clement of Alexandria and much of the early church. The epistles of Paul and the gospels also show influences from the
Book of Jubilees, which is part of the Ethiopian canon, as well as the
Assumption of Moses and the
Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, which are included in no biblical canon.
The high position which some apocryphal books occupied in the first two centuries was undermined by a variety of influences in the Christian church. All claims to the possession of a secret tradition (as held by many
Gnosticsects) were denied by the influential theologians like
Irenaeus and
Tertullian, which modern historians refer to as the
Proto-orthodox, the timeframe of true inspiration was limited to the apostolic age, and universal acceptance by the church was required as proof of apostolic authorship. As these principles gained currency, books deemed apocryphal tended to become regarded as spurious and heretical writings, though books now considered deuterocanonical have been used in liturgy and theology from the first century to the present.
Christianity
Disputes over Canonicity
The actual status of the books which the Catholic church terms Deuterocanonicals ("second canon) and Protestantism refers to as Apocrypha has been an issue of disagreement which preceded the Reformation. Many believe that the pre-Christian-era Jewish translation (into Greek) of holy scriptures known as the
Septuagint, a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures originally compiled around 280 B.C., originally included the apocryphal writings in dispute, with little distinction made between them and the rest of the
Old Testament. Others argue that the Septuagint of the first century did not contain these books but were added later by Christians,
[21][22] The earliest extant manuscripts of the Septuagint are from the fourth century, and suffer greatly from a lack of uniformity as regards containing apocryphal books,
[23][24][25] and some also contain books classed as
Pseudepigrapha, from which texts were cited by some early writers in the second and later centuries as being Scripture.
[3]
While a few scholars conclude that the Jewish canon was the achievement of the Hasmonean dynasty,
[26] it is generally considered to not have been finalized until about 100 A.D.
[27] or somewhat later, at which time considerations of Greek language and beginnings of Christian acceptance of the Septuagint weighed against some of the texts. Some were not accepted by the Jews as part of the
Hebrew Bible canon and the Apocrypha is not part of the historical Jewish canon.
Early church fathers such as
Athanasius,
Melito,
Origen, and
Cyril of Jerusalem, spoke against the canonicity of much or all of the apocrypha,
[21] but the most weighty opposition was the fourth century Catholic scholar
Jeromewho preferred the Hebrew canon, whereas Augustine and others preferred the wider (Greek) canon,
[28] with both having followers in the generations that followed. The Catholic Encyclopedia states as regards the Middle Ages,
In the 16th century, the Protestant reformers challenged the canonicity of the books and partial-books found in the surviving Septuagint but not in the
Masoretic Text. In response to this challenge, after the death of Martin Luther (February 8, 1546) the ecumenical
Council of Trent officially ("infallibly") declared these books (called "deuterocanonical" by Catholics) to be part of the canon in April, 1546 A.D. While the Protestant Reformers rejected the parts of the canon that were not part of the
Hebrew Bible, they included the four New Testament books Luther held as doubtful canonicity along with the Apocrypha in his non-binding canon (though most were separately included in his bible,
[3] as they were in some editions of the KJV bible until 1947).
[38] Protestantism therefore established a 66 book canon with the 39 books based on the ancient Hebrew canon, along with the traditional 27 books of the New Testament. Protestants also rejected the Catholic term "deuterocanonical" for these writings, preferring to apply the term "apocryphal" which was already in use for other early and disputed writings. As today (but along with others reasons),
[21] various reformers argued that those books contained doctrinal or other errors and thus should not have been added to the canon for that reason. The differences between canons can be seen under
Biblical canon and
Development of the Christian biblical canon.
Explaining the
Eastern Orthodox Church's canon is made difficult because of differences of perspective with the
Roman Catholic church in the interpretation of how it was done. Those differences (in matters of jurisdictional authority) were contributing factors in the
separation of the Roman Catholics and Orthodox around 1054, but the formation of the canon which Trent would later officially definitively settle was largely complete by the fifth century, in not settled, six centuries before the separation. In the eastern part of the church, it took much of the fifth century also to come to agreement, but in the end it was accomplished. The canonical books thus established by the undivided church became the predominate canon for what was later to become Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox alike. The East did already differ from the West in not considering every question of canon yet settled, and it subsequently adopted a few more books into its Old Testament. It also allowed consideration of yet a few more to continue not fully decided, which led in some cases to adoption in one or more jurisdictions, but not all. Thus, there are today a few remaining differences of canon among Orthodox, and all Orthodox accept a few more books than appear in the Catholic canon. The
Psalms of Solomon,
3 Maccabees,
4 Maccabees, the
Epistle of Jeremiahthe
Book of Odes, the
Prayer of Manasseh and
Psalm 151 are included in some copies of the Septuagint,
[39] some of which are accepted as canonical by Eastern Orthodox and some other churches. Protestants accept none of these additional books as canon either, but see them having roughly the same status as the other Apocrypha.
New Testament Apocrypha
New Testament apocrypha—books similar to those in the
New Testament but almost universally rejected by Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants—include several gospels and lives of apostles. Some were written by early Jewish Christians (see the
Gospel according to the Hebrews). Others of these were produced by
Gnostic authors or members of other groups later defined as
heterodox. Many texts believed lost for centuries were unearthed in the 19th and 20th centuries, producing lively speculation about their importance in early
Christianity among religious scholars,[
citation needed] while many others survive only in the form of quotations from them in other writings; for some, no more than the title is known. Artists and theologians have drawn upon the New Testament apocrypha for such matters as the names of
Dismas and
Gestas and details about the
Three Wise Men. The first explicit mention of the
perpetual virginity of Mary is found in the
pseudepigraphical Infancy Gospel of James.
Before the fifth century, the Christian writings that were then under discussion for inclusion in the canon but had not yet been accepted were classified in a group known as the ancient
antilegomenae. These were all candidates for the New Testament and included several books which were eventually accepted, such as:
The Epistle to the Hebrews,
2 Peter,
3 John and the
Revelation of John (Apocalypse). None of those accepted books can be considered Apocryphal now, since all Christendom accepts them as canonical. Of the uncanonized ones, the Early Church considered some heretical but viewed others quite well. Some Christians, in an extension of the meaning, might also consider the non-heretical books to be "apocryphal" along the manner of Martin Luther: not canon, but useful to read. This category includes books such as the
Epistle of Barnabas, the
Didache, and
The Shepherd of Hermas which are sometimes referred to as the
Apostolic Fathers. The
Gnostic tradition was a prolific source of apocryphal gospels. While these writings borrowed the characteristic poetic features of apocalyptic literature from Judaism, Gnostic sects largely insisted on allegorical interpretations based on a secret apostolic tradition. With them, these apocryphal books were highly esteemed. A well-known Gnostic apocryphal book is the
Gospel of Thomas, the only complete text of which was found in the Egyptian town of
Nag Hammadi in 1945. The
Gospel of Judas, a Gnostic gospel, also received much media attention when it was reconstructed in 2006.
Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians as well as Protestants generally agree on the canon of the
New Testament, see
Development of the New Testament canon. The
Ethiopian Orthodox have in the past also included
I & II Clement and
Shepherd of Hermas in their
New Testament canon.
