In our study on the book of Daniel, we have exclusively limited ourselves to only using and referencing the 12 canonical chapters of Daniel, excluding later apocryphal additions.  

The 2 apocryphal works added to Daniel were:

  1. Susanna (added c. 100 B.C.).  Summary:

She was the beautiful wife of a leading Jew in Babylon, to whose house the Jewish elders and judges frequently came.  Two of these became enamored of her and tried to seduce her.  When she cried out, the two elders said they had found her in the arms of a young man.  She was brought to trial.  Since there were two witnesses who agreed in their testimony, she was convicted and sentenced to death.

But a young man named Daniel interrupted the proceedings and began to cross-examine the witnesses.  He asked each one separately under which tree in the garden they had found Susanna with a lover.  When they gave different answers they were put to death and Susanna was saved. (Earle, R., How We Got Our Bible, as qtd by McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 31, 1999)

  1. Bel and the Dragon (added c. 100 B.C.).  Summary: 

…It really contains two stories.

In the first, King Cyrus asked Daniel lwhy he did not worhip Bel, since that deity showed his greatness by daily consuming many sheep, together with much flour and oil.  So Daniel scattered ashes on the floor of the Temple where the food had been placed that evening.  In the morning the king took Daniel in to show him that Bel had eaten all the food during the night.  But Daniel showed the king in the ashes on the floor the footprints of the priests and their families who had entered secretly under the table. The priests were slain and the temple destroyed.

The story of the dragon is just as obviously legendary in character.  Along with Tobit, Judith, and Susanna, these stories may be classified as purely Jewish fiction.  They have little if any religious value. (Earle, R., How We Got Our Bible, as qtd by McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 31, 1999)

We do not consider these writings to carry the same authority and power as Scripture, or be necessary to include in a Daniel Bible study, for the following reasons:

  • Though the earliest extant copies of the Septuagint (Septuagint was the Greek translation of Old Testament Scriptures written c. 250-150 B.C.) include the Apocrypha, “Whether or not the Septuagint also contained the Apocrypha is impossible to say for certain, since although the earliest copies of the Septuagint available today do include the Aprocrypha – placed at the end – these are dated in the fifth century and therefore cannot be relied upon to tell us what was common half a millennium earlier.  Significantly, neither Jesus nor any of the apostles ever quoted from the Apocrypha, even though they were obviously using the Greek Septuagint.  Josephus was familiar with the Septuagint and made use of it, but he never considered the Apocrypha part of the Scriptures.” (Edwards, B. H., “Why 66?” In Ken Ham’s, The New Answers Book 2, 2008).

*  In 1 Maccabees (written by Jews about 100 B.C.), the author states that the time of prophets (i.e. prophets of the likeness of those who wrote the Scriptures with authority) had ceased, and was presumably relegated to the distant past (1 Macc. 4:45-46; 9:27, cf. 14:41).  This means that Jews at that time would have rejected the 2 apocryphal books of Daniel as not having the authority of Scripture.

  • Similarly, in 2 Baruch (another apocryphal work), the writer states, “The prophets have fallen asleep,” (85:3).
  • “Philo, Alexandrian Jewish philosopher (20 B.C. – A.D. 40), quoted the Old Testament prolifically, and even recognized the threefold classification, but he never quoted from the Apocrypha as inspired.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 31, 1999)
  • Josephus (Jewish historian born c. A.D. 37/38) wrote that the apocryphal literature (including 2 books of Daniel), “has not been deemed worthy of equal credit with the earlier records [of Scripture],” and attributes this to the fact that the authority and inspiration of the Old Testament writers was absent in the apocryphal writings: “because of the failure of the exact succession of the prophets” (Against Apion 1.41). 
  • “Rabbinic literature reflects a similar conviction in its repeated statement that the Holy Spirit (in the Spirit’s function of inspiring prophecy) departed from Israel. ‘After the latter prophets Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi had died, the Holy Spirit departed from Israel, but they still availed themselves of the bath qol’ (Babylonian Talmud, Yomah 9b, repeated in Sota 48b, Sanhedrin 11a, and Midrash Rabbah on Song of Songs, 8.9.3).” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, pp. 56-57, 1994)
  • “The Qumran community (the Jewish sect that left behind the Dead Sea Scrolls) also awaited a prophet whose words would have authority to supersede any existing regulations (see 1 QS 9.11), and other similar statements are found elsewhere in ancient Jewish literature (see 2 Baruch 85.3 and Prayer of Azariah 15). Thus, writings subsequent to about 435 B.C. were not accepted by the Jewish people generally as having equal authority with the rest of Scripture.” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 57, 1994)
  • Jesus and the New Testament authors/speakers “quote various parts of the Old Testament Scriptures as divinely authoritative over 295 times, but not once do they cite any statement from the books of the Apocrypha or any other writings as having divine authority.” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 57, 1994)
  • There is no record of Jesus disputing with the Jews regarding the books found in Old Testament Canon, presumably because it was agreed upon by all of them that the Old Testament Canon ceased around time of 450 B.C., and thus excluded apocryphal literature.
  • In Luke 11:51 (also Matthew 23:35), Jesus makes the statement that Abel was the first martyr (as recorded in Genesis) and Zechariah the last martyr (as recorded at the end of 2 Chronicles).  Chronologically there were other martyrs after Zechariah, but the range Jesus gives shows His endorsement of the established Hebrew Scriptures of that time period, which placed Genesis as the first book and 2 Chronicles as the last book (and excluded the Apocrypha!).  
  • In Luke 24:44, Jesus identifies the three divisions of the Old Testament that were recognized at that time, further endorsing His agreement with the Old Testament Canon, and its divisions, that excluded the apocryphal writings.

*  “The Jewish scholars of Jamnia (A.D. 90) did not recognize the Apocrypha.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)

  • “The earliest Christian evidence is decidedly against viewing the Apocrypha as Scripture, but the use of the Apocrypha gradually increased in some parts of the church until the time of the Reformation.” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 57, 1994)
  • Roger Beckwith, who has established himself as an imminent scholar on the issue of the Old Testament Canon’s use in the church, writes, “The inclusion of various Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in the canon of the early Christians was not done in any agreed way or at the earliest period, but occurred in Gentile Christianity, after the church’s breach with the synagogue, among those whose knowledge of the primitive Christian canon was becoming blurred…On the question of the canonicity of the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha the truly primitive Christian evidence is negative,” (Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church and Its Background in Early Judaism, pp. 436-437, as qtd in Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 58, 1994, emphasis mine)
  • The earliest Christian list of Old Testament books that exists today is by Melito, bishop of Sardis, writing about A.D. 170.  In this list he names NONE of the Apocrypha, and includes every book of the Old Testament canon except Esther (this book was sometimes doubted in parts of the early church as canonical, but eventually they agreed with the Jews that it is rightfully in the Canon). (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 58, 1994)
  • “Many of the great Fathers of the early church spoke out against the Apocrypha – for example, Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, and Athanasius.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • Though Jerome included the apocrypha in his Latin Vulgate translation of the Bible (completed A.D. 404), he said that the apocrypha, “were not ‘books of the canon’ but merely ‘books of the church’ that were helpful and useful for believers.” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 58, 1994).
    • “At first Jerome refused even to translate the apocryphal books into Latin, but later he made a hurried translation of a few of them.  After his death and ‘over his dead body’ the apocryphal books were brought into his Latin Vulgate directly from the Old Latin Version.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • “No canon or council of the Christian church recognized the Apocrypha as inspired for nearly four centuries.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • “Many Roman Catholic scholars through the Reformation period rejected the Apocrypha.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • “Luther and the Reformers rejected the canonicity of the Apocrypha.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • “Not until A.D. 1546, in a polemical action at the counter-Reformation Council of Trent (1545-63), did the apocryphal books receive full canonical status by the Roman Catholic Church.” (Geisler and Nix, as qtd in McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p. 32, 1999)
  • E. J. Young writes about the apocryphal books, saying:
    • There are no marks in these books which would attest a divine origin
    • Some of them contain historical, chronological and geographical errors
    • They justify falsehood and deception
    • They make salvation depend upon works of merit
    • Etc. (Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 59, 1994)
  • Unger’s Bible Dictionary states concerning the Apocryha:
    • They abound in historical and geographical inaccuracies and anachronisms
    • They teach false doctrines and deceptive practices at variance with accepted Scripture
    • They resort to literary types and display an artificiality of subject matter and styling out of keeping with inspired Scriputre
    • They lack prophetic power and poetic and religious feeling (McDowell, New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, pp. 29-30, 1999)

For further reading on this subject, we recommend the following sources:

  • Beckwith, R.T. “Canon of the Old Testament”
  • Beckwith, Roger – Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church…
  • Bentzen, A. Introduction to the Old Testament, vol. 1, 1948
  • Birdsall, J. N. “Apocrypha”
  • Bruce, F. F. – The Canon of Scripture
  • Carons, Woodbridge – Hermeneutics, Authority, and Canon
  • Edwards, B. H., “Why 66?” In Ken Ham’s, The New Answers Book 2. 2008
  • Green, W. H. – General Introduction to the Old Testament: The Canon
  • Grudem – Systematic Theology, Chap. 3, 1994.
  • Harris, R. L. “Chronicles and the Canon in N. T. Times.” JETS. Vol. 33, no. 1 (March 1990): 75-84.
  • Harris, R. L.  Inspiration and Canonicity of the Bible: An Historical and Exegetical Study
  • Kline, M. G. The Structure of Biblical Authority. 1972
  • Leiman, S. Z. The Canonization of Hebrew Scripture: The Talmudic and Midrashic Evidence. 1976.
  • McDowell, Josh. The New Evidence That Demands A Verdict. 1999.
  • McRay, J. R. “Bible, Canon of.” In EDT, pp. 140-141.
  • Metzger, Bruce M. The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance. 1987.
  • Packer, J. I. “Scripture.” NDT, 627-31.
  • Westcott, Brooke Foss.  The Bible in the Church… 1901.
  • Wenham, J. Christ and the Bible, 1972.
  • See Grudem, McDowell, and Answers bibliography

Brian Holda

February 8, 2012