Discussion Jumpstarter
Study leader reference - not a definitive answer
Question 3
David says early Christians wouldn’t even understand the category “Apocrypha” because “to them, these books were simply part of the Old Testament”; what does that reveal about how the earliest Christians assumed God guided His people in receiving Scripture, and how does that compare to modern Protestant instincts about guarding the canon?
Another way to ask: If early Christians didn’t think in terms of “Apocrypha,” what does that say about how they believed God guided His people in receiving Scripture? How does that compare to how many Protestants today try to protect the canon?
Discussion Jumpstarter
Direct Answer
Based on the speaker’s teaching, early Christians assumed the Scriptures they received in the churches (the Septuagint corpus) were simply “the Old Testament,” not a suspect add-on needing special labeling. Modern Protestant instincts often begin with suspicion—treating the extra books as a threat—whereas the earliest Christians treated them as normal Scripture.
- He stresses the seven books were “an intrinsic part of the Septuagint” and “were placed along with the other” wisdom and historical books, not separated.
- He says, “The early Christians never thought of these books as the Apocrypha… To them, these books were simply part of the Old Testament.”
- He notes the label “Apocrypha” came later through Jerome, who “gave them the name Apocrypha,” meaning “hidden.”
- He reports his “big shock” when reading earliest Christian writings (e.g., “First Clement”): they were “all quoting from the so-called Apocrypha” and “never make any distinction” between them and other Scripture.
- He generalizes: “virtually every early Christian writer quoted from these books… hundreds and hundreds of citations.”