by Rev. Terence H. Brown
The publicity given to the inclusion of the Apocrypha in the New English Bible has led many to enquire about the origin and character of this literature and its authority and place, if any, in Christian doctrine and worship. The appearance of the Apocryphal books in an English Bible is by no means a new development, however unfamiliar they may be to the great majority of English readers today. Eleven Apocryphal books were bound up with Coverdale’s Bible of 1535 printed at Antwerp, and the edition of 1537 printed in England. Tyndale did not translate these books completely, but his revised edition of his New Testament included the “Epistles from the Old Testament according to the use of Salisbury”. This service book, one of the forerunners of the Book of Common Prayer, included a list of “Gospels and Epistles” to be read on certain days. Some of the “Epistles” were passages from the Apocryphal Books, and Tyndale included six of these lessons in his translation. This part of Tyndale’s work was apparently not followed by either Coverdale or Rogers, and their version of the Apocrypha is quite independent. Tyndale’s fellow-labourer John Rogers included the Apocrypha, with the addition of the Prayer of Manasseh, in the edition of the work of Tyndale and Coverdale which he issued under the name of Thomas Matthews in 1537. In these editions the Apocrypha appeared separately after Malachi and was not interspersed with the Canonical Books.
The Reformers’ View
Thomas Cranmer’s revision of 1539 included the books under the title “Hagiographa”. In a preface said to be written by Calvin and translated by Cranmer a distinction is drawn between the authority of these books and the rest of the Old Testament . . . “In consideration that the books before are found in the Hebrew tongue received of all men, and that the other following, which are called Hagiographa, because they were not wont to be read, not openly and in common, but as it were in secret and apart, are neither found in the Hebrew nor in the Chaldee, in which tongue they have not of long been written. Wherefore, when thou wilt maintain anything for certain, rendering a reason for thy faith, take heed to proceed therein by the living and pithy Scriptures . . .”. This preface makes it quite clear that the Reformers did not regard the Apocrypha as of equal authority with the inspired Scriptures.
English Bibles of the 16th century
Taverner’s Bible of 1539 contained “The volume of the books called Apocrypha, conteigned in the common translacion in Latin, which are not found in the Hebrue, or in the Chaldee”. One edition of the Great Bible of 1540 contained the Apocryphal books interspersed with the canonical books, but subsequent editions had these books printed separately at the end of the Old Testament. One quarto edition of the Great Bible of uncertain date, but after 1549, contains the table of Epistles and Gospels to be read according to the Prayer Book, but omits the Apocrypha. The Geneva Bible of 1559 contains the Apocrypha preceded by an article entitled “The Argument” asserting that these books were not received by a common consent to be read and expounded publicly in the church, and that they could not be used to confirm a matter of doctrine excepting in instances where they are in agreement with the canonical Scriptures. Some copies of the 1599 edition of the Geneva Bible were issued without the Apocrypha, but the gap in the page numbers shows that the type-setting included the Apocrypha and that the binder made up some copies without these books. An edition published at Amsterdam in 1640 omitted the Apocrypha and inserted a defence between the Testaments. The Bishops’ Bible of 1568 included the Apocrypha translated by Dr. Parkhurst, Bishop of Norwich. It appears at the end of the Old Testament without any preface to describe their uninspired character. A quarto edition of the Bishops’ Bible dated 1575 appeared without the Apocrypha.
The A.V., R.V. and R.S.V.
When the time arrived for work to commence on the revision which was to become so widely known as the Authorised Version the Apocrypha had an established, if unwarranted, place in the printed English Bible and a committee of six scholars, among them Samuel Ward, Downes and Boys, laboured at Cambridge on this part of the undertaking. Scrivener was not greatly impressed by this part of their work. He wrote in the “Homiletic Quarterly” for October 1881, “It is well known to Biblical scholars that the Apocrypha received very inadequate attention from the revisers of 1611 and their predecessors, so that whole passages remain unaltered from the racy, spirited, rhythmical, but hasty, loose and most inaccurate version (being the first published in England) made by Coverdale for the Bible of 1536”. According to Rivington’s “Records of the Stationers Co.” quoted by Scrivener in “The Authorised Edition of the English Bible of 1611” Archbishop Abbot in 1615 forbade anyone to issue a Bible without the Apocrypha on pain of one year’s imprisonment. Nevertheless Norton and Bill, “Printers to the King’s most excellent Majesty” published in 1629 a small quarto edition without the Apocrypha, but this had “APO” after the tailpiece at the end of Malachi — indicating that the inclusion of the books was intended. The following year Robert Barker issued a reprint of this Bible with the Apocrypha between the Testaments.
John Canne, a leader of the English “Brownists”, fled to Amsterdam after the Restoration of Charles II and issued there in 1664 an octavo edition of the Authorised Version without the Apocrypha. This edition contains a “Preface to the Reader” by Canne and his marginal notes showing that the Bible is its own interpreter. In 1653, while he was in England during the Protectorate, Canne had been granted an exclusive licence to print this Bible for seven years.
Among the ancient volumes in the T.B.S. library are the following— A. V. Printed by John Field — Cambridge University Press 1662 without Apocrypha; A.V. with John Canne’s Preface and Marginal notes 1682 without Apocrypha; Geneva Bible with Apocrypha — printed in London 1578; A.V. with Apocrypha 1613, and many others.
More than two hundred and fifty years later the English Revised Version of 1885 was in course of preparation, and although the Apocrypha had not formed part of the original scheme, the University Presses entrusted its revision to a special company composed of members of the committees engaged upon the work, and published it in 1894. The American Revised Standard Version also embraced the Apocrypha, although this was not included in the first editions, but was published several years later in 1957. Dean Weigle was chairman, and Bruce Metzger of Princeton Theological Seminary was secretary of the committee of ten scholars who worked on the R.S.V. Apocrypha. One of the most popular editions containing these books is the Oxford Annotated Bible (R.S.V.) with the Apocrypha, published by Oxford University Press in 1966. The Apocrypha continued to be included in many editions of the King James Version until the controversy arose in the 1820’s over the inclusion of these books in some of the foreign versions published by the British and Foreign Bible Society. After that time it became much more common for the A.V. to appear without the Apocryphal books, but the University Presses and H.M. Printers have continued to issue some editions containing them up to the present time.
Wyclif and Luther
Notwithstanding this long record of the inclusion of the Apocrypha in the English Bible, the Evangelical and reformed churches confidently reject these books and assert that they have no right to be regarded as part of the Divine revelation. Wyclif, the “Morning Star” of the Reformation, published a translation of the Holy Scriptures in 1380, long before the invention of printing. In his prologue he lists ‘twenty-five’ books of the Hebrew Canon, and adds, “Whatever book is in the Old Testament besides these twenty-five, shall be set among the Apocrypha, that is, without authority of belief”. (His twenty-five includes the Minor Prophets as one book). The Apocrypha was included in the versions of Wyclif and Purvey because it was in the Latin Vulgate upon which they were based. The complete edition of Martin Luther’s Bible appeared in 1534 with the Apocrypha separated from the rest of the Old Testament and placed between the Old and New Testaments under the title, “Apocrypha, that is, Books which are not to be considered as equal to Holy Scripture, and yet are useful and good to read.” Luther’s work was issued in parts beginning with the N.T. in 1522, followed by the Pentateuch in 1523, the Historical books and “Hagiographa” in 1524, Jonah in 1526, the rest of the Prophets at intervals, and then the whole Bible in 1534 and a revised edition in 1541.
During this period Zwingli, Pellican, Leo Judah and other scholars at Zurich used Luther’s work up to the end of the “Hagiographa” as the basis of a new translation, and added their original translation of the Prophets and Apocrypha. This Zurich Bible was issued in parts between 1524 and 1529 and in one volume in 1529 and 1530. The 1531 edition contained a new translation of the “Hagiographa”.
Meaning of “Hagiographa”
The word “Hagiographa” (Holy Writings) has been used in three different senses and it is important to ascertain the precise meaning of the writer when quoting from various works. The word is used in relation to the canonical Books constituting the third division of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Law, the Prophets and the Writings.
In one place Jerome uses “Hagiographa” of an Apocryphal Book, when he states that Tobit was cut off by the Jews from the Divine Scriptures and placed among the Hagiographa. He makes a similar reference to Judith, but some manuscript copies of his writings have “Apocrypha” is this place. In the middle ages “Hagiographa” and “Apocrypha” were often used indiscriminately when referring to the Apocrypha. Some writers have used the word Hagiographa in its literal sense when referring to the whole of the Scriptures as the Holy Writings.
The Church of England
The Articles of the Church of England when first issued in 1552 contained no list of the Books of the Bible, but the 6th Article of the revised Articles of 1562 gives a list of the Canonical Books accompanied by the declaration that, ‘the other books (as Jerome saith) the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners, but yet it doth not apply them to establish any doctrine’. The Article then enumerates 1 and 2 Esdras (that is 3 and 4 Esdras, the former being known in our Bible as Ezra and Nehemiah), Tobias, Judith, the rest of the Book of Esther, Wisdom, Jesus the Son of Sirach, Baruch the Prophet, the Song of the Three Children, the Story of Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, the Prayer of Manasses, and 1 and 2 Maccabees.
The Reformed Confessions of Faith
The Gallican Confession of 1561 and the Belgic Confession of the same year regarded the Apocrypha in the same way as the Helvetic Confession of 1566 which stated, “We do not deny that certain Books of the O.T. were named by the ancients apocryphal, by others ecclesiastical, as being read in the churches, but not adduced for authority in matters of belief: as Augustine, in the 18th Book of the City of God, Ch. 38 relates . . .” In the same year the Confession of the Dutch Churches rejected the authority of these books — “We make a distinction between those (the canonical books) and such as are called Apocryphal, which may indeed be read in the Church, and proofs adduced from them, so far as they agree with the canonical books, but their authority and force are by no means such that any article of faith may be certainly declared from their testimony alone, still less can they impugn or detract from the authority of the others”.
The Westminster Confession of Faith of 1647 was even more explicit — “The books called Apocrypha, not being of Divine confirmation, are no part of the Canon of Scripture; and therefore are of no authority in the Church of God; nor to be any otherwise approved, or made use of, than other human writings”. Three years before this the Long Parliament ordered that only the Canonical Books were to be read in church, but this order was rescinded after the Restoration.