POSSIBLE ERRATA
POSSIBLE ERRATA
Assessing my own work-product, the main problem is that Biblindex starts to become incomplete in the fourth century, and I was forced (by my own technological incompetence, no doubt) to use the old search form.[1] My work used other sources and databases (finding many later citations beyond the Biblindex data) and is an upgrade to the existing scholarship (e.g., a 2017 book counted pages of an index from a 2004 book), but still, better analyses can always be performed with better data. I think my own finds are reasonably complete and my conclusions should hold up through 450 AD—but if you want to confirm or dispute that, you just have to do all the work yourself.
In addition, all such data is flawed, dependent as it is upon proper indexing. There are duplicates, mistaken omissions, etc., let alone actual gaps from missing Fathers and works. I note problems where I found them. But exact numbers are just fake certainty; there is already a large margin of error simply in terms of what documents we still possess to try to index.[2]
There is one category of evidence discussed herein that I believe is indeed complete to the best of my knowledge after all due investigation: no Protestant books or websites I reviewed showed me additional “negative evidence” from the early Church against any of the Apocrypha as Scripture. What I discuss is all anyone I read mentioned. I am by no means claiming that there is not more out there somewhere, but I am claiming that I looked and did not find it.
Otherwise, there are basically three types of evidence discussed herein. First, there are impeccably Protestant books that provide all the main background details and analysis. For the most part, they are also the sources which identify the several hundred possible Biblical references to the Apocrypha noted herein. Unless noted, I found no one who disagreed with any such points they made (which is not to say that all spoke to the point), and I checked an awful lot of books (e.g., over 100 commentaries just on Matthew).
Second, I cite to the Jewish Study Bible and other basic, secondary Jewish sources. The Jews are in no way pro-Apocrypha and have every reason to agree with all the Protestant claims if they thought there was any basis for them. I viewed simply noting their views on their own canon as sufficient, since a discussion of primary sources would not fit in this book anyway.
And third, I used original source data (well, translations with many footnotes) from the Fathers. I cite to online sources (e.g., the New Advent site) so that you do not have to buy a book just to see a quote in context. Still, I consulted other sources to confirm translations (more for major works of major Fathers, and less for the more obscure sources). Quibbles can be made over individual instances, but in bulk, such quibbling is not being honest.
Beyond those categories, the quality of my evidence varies, and of course starts to involve unscholarly sources like Google and Wikipedia. Everything I cited seems to be the common view, but by all means double check all such things to your heart’s content. Questioning the credibility of such sources is not the problem, the problem is not questioning scholarly sources.
The scope of this work is also incomplete: First, I do not really discuss Esther, the Epistle of Jeremiah, or the other additions to Daniel. But they should never be forgotten when discussing the Apocrypha. E.g., Josephus uses the parts of Esther that Protestants claim were never part of his canon.
Second, there were other Books that had at least a little support in the early Church (including some Books accepted by the Orthodox and some rejected even by them; and definitely including 1 Enoch). But showing and analyzing the support (and limits to the support) for those books would make this a two-volume work. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. (Matthew 6:34). It is crucial to note, however, that those books lack any serious canon list support, which made the Catholic books the obvious cut off point.
Third, I do not cover the Septuagint evidence/debate, or the physical scraps of paper that have been found, etc. To me, the core of a Bible-based Christian analysis is the New Testament and the writings of the early Church, the rest of the evidence is more ancillary (and, as noted many times, the Jews do not feel it all adds up to a certain 22 Book canon at the time of Christ).[3]
Fourth, I use a 450 AD cut-off date, which fully covers Jerome, Rufinus, and the various Councils, plus a few decades to track the aftermath of all that. 450 AD is also within the range of dates that one could pick for the beginning of the Middle Ages (Rome was sacked on 24 August 410 AD; the Huns invaded Italy in 452 AD; the last Emperor of Rome in the West was deposed in 476 AD). And 450 AD also avoids the Oriental Orthodox schism that occurs in 451 AD (they accept all the Apocrypha, incidentally).[4] Lastly, nothing happens with the canon lists after 419 AD until 550 AD. Thus, 450 AD seems like the best place to end my “early” Church analysis. Beyond that, none of the claims I was researching were based on the idea that it was the Church of the Middle Ages that correctly determined the canon (in fact, Kruger’s entire model is based on vilifying the Church of the Middle Ages).[5]
Otherwise, there is all my bias. If I saw it as bias, I would not have said it. So, I am afraid that all of it is up to you to notice and sort out. However, personally, I do not see endless repetition of inconvenient facts as bias. It is simply a technique to drill those facts into the brain (Matthew is the Gospel to the Jews, as perhaps you have heard?), and like most lawyers, I just see it as presenting all the evidence in context: that you do not like hearing the fact being mentioned is exactly why it needs to be said over and over.
Finally, I presume that minor mistakes, inconsistencies, and illogic are plentiful herein. All I can say is that (a) I have been finding incredibly stupid errors in my own work product every day while writing this, (b) if I knew where the remaining errors were, then they would not be there, and (c) if I thought such things had any chance at all to change the final outcome, then I never would have started to write this book, let alone finished it.
But then my journey began with a Book that explained the “why” of a truth that I had been proving my entire life: it is a simple trick to deceive a man. Most especially when “thou art the man.”
[1] www.biblindex.org/citation_biblique/search; vs. www.biblindex.org/en/quotations/search.
[2] That Augustine is missing from the database I can search is notable. If nothing else, it kept him (the main man often accused of promoting the Apocrypha) from biasing the data toward the Apocrypha; I do not know that it is actually true that he would have cited to them more, but it might be; and yet without his cites in the database, the Apocrypha still hold up under analysis.
[3] Note, however, that the “Apocryphal pieces” of Daniel, Jeremiah and Esther have an additional Biblical claim attached to them, regarding whether a Biblical reference to the “canonical pieces” of the Septuagint versions of the Books implies that the Septuagint versions with their “Apocryphal pieces” are the real Scriptures.
[4] The schism occurred over the nature of Christ. They hold to Miaphysitism, while we heretics (as they see us) hold to Dyophysitism. A Bible-based Christian should actually start by proving to herself that Dyophysitism is correct, then move on to minor disputes among Dyophysites, like Protestantism versus Catholicism.
[5] William Webster has assembled dozens of quotes from the sixth to fifteenth centuries where Fathers agreed with Jerome (www.christiantruth.com/articles/canon/); Gary G. Michuta’s Why Catholic Bibles are Bigger contains quotes from dozens more who disagreed with Jerome. Gallagher’s upcoming The Apocrypha through History: The Canonical Reception of the Deuterocanonical Literature might also be a helpful resource for such an analysis. Otherwise, the Middle Ages are beyond my scope, but many of the claims about them actually relate back to the era I am covering. For example, you can see that Webster claims that “Those books were permissable to be read in the Church for the purposes of edification but were never considered authoritative for the establishing of doctrine,” then quotes medieval writers saying the same thing. Yet, as their own proof, they were all just citing to Jerome, Rufinus, Athanasius, etc. Such claims are not good evidence of the actual facts on the ground in the Church before those Fathers, as we have seen. Still, the quotes would have value for counting medieval monks to figure out what the evidence shows about the Middle Ages.
