FACT: THE BIBLE IS A CATHOLIC HOLY BOOK!

Pope Damasus I was the bishop of Rome from October 366 to his death. He presided over the Council of Rome of 382 that determined the canon or official list of sacred scripture. He spoke out against major heresies in the church and encouraged production of the Vulgate Bible with his support for Jerome.

Council of Rome of 382 and the Biblical canon

One of the important works of Pope Damasus was to preside in the Council of Rome of 382 that determined the canon or official list of Sacred Scripture. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, states: A council probably held at Rome in 382 under Damasus gave a complete list of the canonical books of both the Old Testament and the New Testament (also known as the 'Gelasian Decree' because it was reproduced by Gelasius in 495), which is identical with the list given at Trent. American Catholic priest and historian William Jurgens stated: "The first part of this decree has long been known as the Decree of Damasus, and concerns the Holy Spirit and the seven-fold gifts. The second part of the decree is more familiarly known as the opening part of the Gelasian Decree, in regard to the canon of Scripture: De libris recipiendis vel non recipiendis. It is now commonly held that the part of the Gelasian Decree dealing with the accepted canon of Scripture is an authentic work of the Council of Rome of 382 A.D. and that Gelasius edited it again at the end of the fifth century, adding to it the catalog of the rejected books, the apocrypha. It is now almost universally accepted that these parts one and two of the Decree of Damasus are authentic parts of the Acts of the Council of Rome of 382 A.D." (Jurgens, Faith of the Early Fathers)

Jerome, the Vulgate and the Canon

Pope Damasus appointed Jerome as his confidential secretary. Invited to Rome originally to a synod of 382 convened to end the schism of Antioch, he made himself indispensable to the pope, and took a prominent place in his councils. Jerome spent three years (382–385) in Rome in close intercourse with Pope Damasus and the leading Christians. Writing in 409, Jerome remarked, "A great many years ago when I was helping Damasus, bishop of Rome with his ecclesiastical correspondence, and writing his answers to the questions referred to him by the councils of the east and west..."

In order to put an end to the marked divergences in the western texts of that period, Damasus encouraged the highly respected scholar Jerome to revise the available Old Latin versions of the Bible into a more accurate Latin on the basis of the Greek New Testament and the Septuagint, resulting in the Vulgate. According to Protestant biblical scholar, F.F. Bruce, the commissioning of the Vulgate was a key moment in fixing the biblical canon in the West.

Jerome devoted a very brief notice to Damasus in his De Viris Illustribus, written after Damasus' death: "he had a fine talent for making verses and published many brief works in heroic metre. He died in the reign of the emperor Theodosius at the age of almost eighty". Damasus may be the author of the anonymous Carmen contra paganos (song against the pagans).

[Source: Wikipedia]

Catholic Herald: Protestantism’s biggest problem: on whose authority do we interpret the scriptures?

Source: Catholic Herald

In the end, private interpretation isn't enough

On Saturday I joined a group of Anglican and Methodists in our village to walk around its familiar landmarks offering prayers. We started at the (pre-Reformation) Anglican church, moved on to the war memorial, then to the village school, thence to our popular local pub. A Methodist lady whom I know well told me sotto voce that she wasn’t going to join in praying for the pub to flourish. I remembered that Methodists forswear alcohol. Sotto voce I responded, “But what about Jesus’s first miracle at the marriage feast of Cana?” She replied, half-resigned, half-humorous: “Why do people always bring up Cana!”

Patheos: If The Bible Is Infallible Then So Is The Church

February 6, 2017 by K. Albert Little
Source: Patheos

Photo Credit: Dwight Stone.

A paradigm shift occurs when the number of compelling facts and figures from a competing world view other than your own forces you to concede your position—and adopt another.

It happens like this.

Facts and information enter your radar which you perhaps hadn’t considered before. They challenge your perspective, opinions, and ultimately, your view of the world. As more and more of these new arguments and ideas pile up the lens through which you’ve previously understood much of reality begins to look a bit foggy—the edges aren’t as crisply in focus as they used to be.

And on and on.

Eventually—and this may take a lifetime—the enormous pile of facts in the other, competing worldview appear to be more compelling. They make more sense; offer a more robust explanation of what you understand to be the world and you make a radical leap.

A paradigm shift.

This is what happens when an Evangelical Christian becomes a Catholic.

For me, one of those crucial pieces of information, which began as a question, orbited around the idea of an infallible Bible. Where did we get the Bible? And how did it get put together?

And what made us so sure it was the infallible Word of God?

This began, for me, the fateful journey towards a paradigm shift in my own life.

A journey into the Catholic Church.

In my early twenties, having been “saved” in the Evangelical church at the age of fifteen, I was embarrassed to not have an answer to that first question: Where did we get the Bible?

Sadly, up to that point in my life, it wasn’t even a question I’d considered. But, to be fair, it’d never been put to me either.

In my large Pentecostal church—where I clocked a good amount of Sunday mornings and Friday nights—the historical understanding of the timeline of the Bible ended with the final punctuation mark in the Book of Revelation and began again somewhere in the 1960’s (which was about when the oldest book in our church library would’ve been written).

There was, as there often is in Evangelical circles, a giant gaping hole in the middle of Church history.

As if nothing happened between the last book of the Bible being written and the preacher grasping it in his sweaty palms on a Sunday morning.

So it never occurred to me to ask either where we got it or how it was put together and when it was, finally, asked of me I had not discernable answer.

And that was worrying.

Digging around in familiar Protestant sources failed to make it any more clear.

The Bible, from a Protestant perspective, was hard to square.

Where exactly these books came from was fairly clear. In many cases the author identifies himself and their identity can be linked directly to the apostles and Jesus’s ministry. But why these particular books were included and others, as I learned, were intentionally left out was a complete mystery.

How do we, as Evangelicals, affirm these books to be infallible while declaring others to be not.

How do we know?

I was no closer to an answer, so I kept digging.

I learned that the biblical canon became relatively stable around about 400AD. The Protestant sources I read argued that these books, clearly, were collected together and considered canonical because they were the most read in and, thus, the most respected.

But why were they the most read while others weren’t?

As I dug deeper no satisfying answers emerged and even the best Protestant scholars admitted that the thesis of these particular books standing out of their own merit was weak.

Instead, it was the Church which affirmed these books as worthy to read, copy, and pass around amongst congregations. Congregations under the unequivocal authority of bishops who drew in a successive line tracing back to the apostles.

In other words, it was bishops like Augustine (who affirms a canon in his early writings) who authoritatively declared which books and letters, out of those being circulated, should carry weight.

And, finally, when these same bishops got together to make early pronouncements on the biblical canon in the 400’s it was through the authoritative mechanism of a Church Council. The same mechanism that Peter, Paul, et. al. used to sort out the earliest theological scramblings in Jerusalem (see Acts 15).

As I dug deep into the formation of the biblical canon I was flabbergasted because even the most robust of the Protestant theologians, R.J. Sproul, admits that the unless we afford some authority to the Catholic Church (we he doesn’t) we must admit that the Bible is, ultimately, “an fallible collection of infallible books.”

You can see my difficulties.

Unless we are to admit that the Catholic Church, with its hierarchy of bishops et cetera, held some kind of God-given authority and infallibility to collect up the Bible into its current form then we must be comfortable in admitting that maybe we got it wrong.

How can we trust that?

Because there is no infallible Table of Contents and nothing in the New or Old Testaments gives us a clue as to what should be in there.

Martin Luther, first-leg runner of the Reformation, actually wanted to remove certain pieces (like Hebrews and James) because they didn’t fit with what his interpretation of the salvation looked like. We know from history that these same sorts of disagreements happened in the first 400 years of the Church when there was no fixed canon.

Who’s to say that some letters and books weren’t removed then?

No one.

Unless we trust the Church.

I want to end with this,

In the first 400 years of Christian history, without a fixed canon, it had to have been the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, which maintained unity and helped its people to discern right, wrong, and understand its theology and teachings. Nevermind that most couldn’t read and even with a Bible it wouldn’t be much good; the Holy Spirit guided the authoritative teachers of the Church, first the apostles, and then their successors, in helping to discern important pieces of theology and identity.

It was in the first 400 years, before the serious concretization of the biblical canon, that important pieces of the Christian worldview like our understanding of the Trinity and the Person of Jesus were developed. These were developed and defended passionately by the Church at the time—before the Bible was canonized.

These developments happened within the context of a Church with an authority structure which also made decisions on how we can, and do, pray for the dead, the important place of the Blessed Virgin, the power and necessity of Baptism so save, and the unequivocal Real Presence of Christ in the Communion elements.

If we trust the Bible we have, how can we avoid trusting the Church?

In other words, if the Bible is infallible it can only be because it was put together by an infallible authority which is the Catholic Church.

The same Church which exists today, authoritatively governed by bishops who succeeded the men who collected the Bible, because Christ Himself said nothing would overcome it.

And, truly, if we trust the Bible but throw out everything else that the Church affirmed and taught prior to canonization than we’re doing nothing more than snacking as we please at a theological buffet. Established doctrinal norms like the Trinity and the Personhood of Jesus are not any more “evident in Scripture” than the Eucharist as Real Presence, the necessity of Baptism, and a Catholic understanding of the Communion of the Saints.

Like the canon of the Bible, these doctrines were affirmed by authority and rely, ultimately, on an extra-biblical source.

It was these struggles, as an Evangelical, which amounted merely to more information heaped onto an ever-growing pile of other compelling evidence. Answers without satisfactory questions; and the most I asked and received answers the more another way began to become more appealing.

These questions did have incredibly satisfying answers, I learned, found in the historic Church. A Church which claims continuity and historical pedigree stretching back to Jesus laying hands on a fisherman named Peter. And I’ve found, much to my delight, a spirituality, a historical grounding, and depth of faith and grace in this historic Church beyond anything I could’ve imagined before.

HOW DID THE BIBLE COME IN EXISTENCE?

PROTESTANTS THINK THE BIBLE CAME FROM THIN AIR... -CD2000

Source: SVMMA APOLOGIA

In the one-hundred-year period extending roughly from AD 50 to 150, a number of documents began to circulate among the churches, including epistles, gospels, memoirs, apocalypses, homilies, and collections of teachings. While some of these documents were apostolic in origin, others drew upon the tradition the apostles and ministers of the word had utilized in their individual missions.

For more than 300 years of Christianity, there was no definitive compilation yet into a single book of these ancient documents like what is known to the world at present. From the beginning it was expected that certain of these documents would be read in the public gatherings of the church, though there were disputes and questions over the authenticity of certain documents like the Letter to the Hebrews, Letter of James, Second Letter of Peter, Second and Third Letters of John, Letter of Jude and the Revelation, known as the Antilegomena. At that time, these materials were accepted by some local churches and others did not. However, because of the increase in the amount of documents being circulated (whether authentic or not), the Church found it necessary to discern and choose which of these materials are inspired by the Holy Spirit. How was it done? Below is the timeline of the compilation of the Holy Bible:

70 BC: The translation of the Old Testament books from Hebrew to Greek known as Septuagint (LXX) by the 70 Jewish scholars for the Jews in Diaspora in Alexandria. This is the Old Testament version used by the apostles and early Christians.

50-150 AD: The writing of the New Testament books and the circulation of other apocryphal documents.

96 AD: Some letters of Paul were known to Clement I, bishop of Rome, together with some form of the “words of Jesus”; but while Clement valued these highly, he did not regard them as “Scripture” (“graphe”), a term he reserved for the Septuagint.

100 AD: The Council of Jamnia, held in Yavneh, was a Jewish council at which the canon of the Hebrew Bible had been finalized. It excluded the seven books of the Old Testament which are part of its Greek version, the Septuagint. These books are regarded by the Church as inspired and are known as the deuterocanonical.

130-140 AD: Marcion of Sinope, a bishop of Asia Minor who went to Rome and was later excommunicated for his views, was the first of record to propose a definitive, exclusive, unique canon of Christian scriptures. He taught that there were two Gods: Yahweh, the cruel God of the Old Testament, and Abba, the kind father of the New Testament. Marcion eliminated the Old Testament as scriptures and, since he was anti-Semitic, kept from the New Testament only 10 letters of Paul and 2/3 of Luke’s gospel (he deleted references to Jesus’ Jewishness). His gospel is called the Gospel of the Lord.

145-163 AD: Justin Martyr, an early Christian apologist, mentioned the “memoirs of the apostles”, which Christians called “gospels” and which were regarded as on par with the Old Testament. In his works, distinct references are found to Romans, 1 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians, and 2 Thessalonians, and possible ones to Philippians, Titus, and 1 Timothy.

160 AD: Tatian the Assyrian, an early Christian theologian, composed a single harmonized “Gospel” by weaving the contents of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John together along with events present in none of these texts. The narrative mainly follows the chronology of John. This is called the Diatessaron [“(Harmony) Through Four”] and it became the official Gospel text of the Syriac church, centered in Edessa. He rejected Paul’s Letters and Acts of the Apostles.

185 AD: Irenaeus, bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, in his Adversus Haereses, denounced various early Christian groups that used only one gospel, such as Marcionism which used only Marcion’s version of Luke, or the Ebionites which seem to have used an Aramaic version of Matthew, as well as groups that used more than four gospels, such as the Valentinians (A.H. 1.11). Irenaeus declared that there can’t be either more or fewer than four, presenting as logic the analogy of the four corners of the earth and the four winds (3.11.8).

ca. 200 AD: Origen Adamantius, early Christian theologian, accepted 22 canonical books of the Hebrews plus Maccabees plus the four Gospels but Paul “did not so much as write to all the churches that he taught; and even to those to which he wrote he sent but a few lines.”

ca. 200 AD: The periphery of the canon was not yet determined as of this time. According to one list, the Muratorian Canon (named after Fr. Ludovico Antonio Muratori who discovered it at the Ambrosian Library in Milan in the 18th century), which was compiled at Rome, the New Testament was comprised of the 4 gospels; Acts; 13 letters of Paul (Hebrews is not included); 3 of the 7 General Epistles (1-2 John and Jude); and also the Apocalypse of Peter. Each “city-church” (region) still has its own Canon, which is a list of books approved for reading at Mass (Liturgy).

ca. 215 AD: Titus Flavius Clemens (Clement of Alexandria), an early Christian theologian, made use of an open canon. In addition to books that did not make it into the final 27-book New Testament but which had local canonicity (Barnabas, Didache, I Clement, Revelation of Peter, the Shepherd, the Gospel according to the Hebrews), he also used the Gospel of the Egyptians, Preaching of Peter, Traditions of Matthias, Sibylline Oracles, and the Oral Gospel. He did, however, prefer the four church gospels to all others, although he supplemented them freely with apocryphal gospels. He was the first to treat non-Pauline letters of the apostles (other than II Peter) as scripture-he accepted I Peter, I and II John, and Jude as scripture.

ca. 300 AD: The Alogi, an early Christian group, rejected the Gospel of John (and possibly also Revelation and the Epistles of John) as either not apostolic or as written by the Gnostic Cerinthus or as not compatible with the Synoptic Gospels.

300 AD: The Old Syriac was a translation of the New Testament documents from the Greek into Syriac. In the Coptic Versions, Coptic was spoken in four dialects in Egypt and the materials were translated into each of these four dialects.

ca. 303 AD: The making of what is currently known Codex Claromontanus canon (named after the town of Clermont-en-Beauvaisis in France from where it was procured by the Calvinist scholar Theodore Bezza in the late 16th century), a page found inserted into a copy of the Epistles of Paul and Hebrews, has the Old Testament, plus Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, 1–2,4 Maccabees, and the New Testament, plus 3rd Corinthians, Acts of Paul, Apocalypse of Peter, Barnabas, and Hermas, but missing Philippians, 1–2 Thessalonians, and Hebrews.

330 AD: Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, recorded his own New Testament canon which includes the holy quaternion of the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the epistles of Paul, the epistle of John, the epistle of Peter, the Apocalypse of John, the epistle of James and that of Jude, also the second epistle of Peter, and the second and third epistles of John.

331 AD: Roman Emperor Constantine I commissioned Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, to deliver fifty compiled Scriptures for the Church of Constantinople. Athanasius (Apostolic Constitution 4) recorded Alexandrian scribes around 340 AD preparing the Canon for Constans. Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus are among of these ancient compilations together with the Peshitta and Codex Alexandrinus.

350 AD: Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, included in his Catechetical Lectures (4.36) the Gospels (4), Acts, James, 1-2 Peter, 1-3 John, Jude, and Paul’s epistles (14), but listed the Gospel of Thomas as pseudepigrapha.

360 AD: The making of the so-called Cheltenham/Mommsen Canon (named after German classical scholar Theodor Mommsen who discovered it in 1886 from a 10th-century manuscript belonging to the library of Thomas Phillips at Cheltenham, England), which contains the 24-book Old Testament and 24-book New Testament that provides syllable and line counts but omits Hebrews, Jude and James, and questions the epistles of John and Peter.

363 AD: The Synod of Laodicea was one of the first synods that set out to judge which books were to be read aloud in churches. It canonized 22-book Old Testament and 26-book New Testament (excludes Revelation).

367 AD: In his Festal letter, Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, gave a list of exactly the same books as what would become the 27-book New Testament canon, and he used the word “canonized” (kanonizomena) in regards to them. He also listed a 22-book Old Testament and 7 books not in the canon but to be read: Wisdom of Solomon, Wisdom of Sirach, Esther, Judith, Tobit, Didache, and the Shepherd of Hermas.

374-377 AD: Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis, listed the following canon in his Panarion 76.5: Gospels (4), Paul’s epistles (13), Acts, James, Peter, 1-3 John, Jude, Revelation, Wisdom, Sirach.

380 AD: The redactor of the Apostolic Constitutions attributed a canon to the Twelve Apostles themselves as the 85th of his list of such apostolic decrees: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John; the fourteen Epistles of Paul; two Epistles of Peter; three of John; one of James; one of Jude; two Epistles of Clement; and the Acts of the Apostles.

382 AD: The Synod of Rome (presided by Pope Damasus) started the ball rolling for the definition of a universal canon for all city-churches. It listed the New Testament books in their present number and order.

ca. 382 AD: Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (Jerome), a Roman presbyter, was commissioned by Damasus I, bishop of Rome, to revise the Vetus Latina (“Old Latin”) collection of Biblical texts in Latin then in use by the Church. Once published, it was widely adopted and eventually eclipsed the Vetus Latina and, by the 13th century, was known as the “versio vulgata” (the “version commonly-used”) or, more simply, in Latin as vulgata or in Greek as βουλγάτα (“Vulgate”).

385 AD: Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop of Constantinople, produced a canon in verse which agreed with that of his contemporary Athanasius, other than placing the “Catholic Epistles” after the Pauline Epistles and omitting Revelation. This list was ratified by the Synod of Trullo of 692 AD.

inter 386-388 AD: John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople, was the first (in his Homilies on Matthew) to use the Greek phrase “ta biblia” (the books) to describe both the Old and New Testaments together.

393 AD: The Synod of Hippo Regius in North Africa accepted the present canon of the New Testament.

394 AD: Amphilochius, bishop of Iconium, in his poem Iambics for Seleucus, nephew of St. Olympias, discussed debate over the canonical inclusion of a number of books, and almost certainly rejects the later Epistles of Peter and John, Jude, and Revelation.

397 AD: The third Synod of Carthage, which refined the canon for the Western Church, sent it to Innocent I, bishop of Rome, for ratification. Its list is similar to the present canon of scriptures. In the East, the canonical process was hampered by a number of schisms.

ca 405 AD: Innocent I, bishop of Rome, in ratification of the canon defined by the Synod of Carthage, sent the list of the sacred books to Exsuperius, Gallic bishop of Toulouse, which was identical with that of the Ecumenical Council of Trent.

419 AD: The fourth Synod of Carthage reaffirmed the canon defined by the previous synod in its present number and order (similar to the Ecumenical Council of Trent).

551-62 AD: Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator, Roman statesman and writer, in his Institutiones Divinarum et Saecularium Litterarum, omitted 2 Peter, 2-3 John, Jude and Hebrews.

787 AD: The Second Ecumenical Council of Nicaea, which adopted the canon of Carthage. At this point, both the Latin West and the Greek / Byzantine East had the same canon. However, the non-Greek, Monophysite and Nestorian Churches of the East (the Copts, the Ethiopians, the Syrians, the Armenians, the Syro-Malankars, the Chaldeans, and the Malabars) were still left out. But these Churches came together in agreement, in 1442A.D., in Florence.

1199 AD: Innocent III, bishop of Rome, banned unauthorized versions of the Bible as a reaction to the Cathar and Waldensian heresies. The synods of Toulouse and Tarragona (in 1234 AD) outlawed possession of such renderings. But there is evidence of some vernacular translations still being permitted while others were being scrutinized.

ca. 1245 AD: Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, and Hugo Cardinal de Sancto-Caro, dominican titular bishop of Santa Sabina, developed different schemas for systematic division of the Bible. It was the system of Archbishop Langton on which the modern chapter divisions are based.

1380 AD: The first English translation of the Bible was by John Wycliffe, the founder of the anti-Catholic group named Lollardy. He translated the Bible into English from the Latin Vulgate. This was a translation from a translation and not a translation from the original Hebrew and Greek. Wycliffe was forced to translate from the Latin Vulgate because he did not know Hebrew or Greek.

1442 AD:  At the Ecumenical Council of Florence, the entire Church recognized the 27 books. This council confirmed the Roman Catholic Canon of the Bible which Damasus I, bishop of Rome, had published a thousand years earlier. So, by 1439 AD, all orthodox branches of the Church were legally bound to the same canon. This is 100 years before the Reformation.

1448 AD: The Hebrew Old Testament was divided into verses by a French Jewish philosopher and controversialist by the name of Isaac Nathan ben Kalonymus (Mordacai Nathan).

1456 AD: Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg, a German publisher and inventor of a movable type printing, produced the first printed Bible in Latin. Printing revolutionized the way books were made. From now on books could be published in great numbers and at a lower cost.

ca. 1500 AD: The first person to divide New Testament chapters into verses was an Italian Dominican biblical scholar Santi Pagnini, but his system was never widely adopted.

1514 AD: The Greek New Testament was printed for the first time by Erasmus. He based his Greek New Testament from only five Greek manuscripts, the oldest of which dated only as far back as the twelfth century. With minor revisions, Erasmus’ Greek New Testament came to be known as the Textus Receptus or the “received texts.”

1522 AD: Polyglot Bible, in which group of editors was led by Diego López de Zúñiga and funded by Jiménez Cardinal de Cisneros, was published. The Old Testament was in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin and the New Testament in Latin and Greek. Erasmus used the Polyglot to revise later editions of his New Testament. Tyndale made use of the Polyglot in his translation on the Old Testament into English which he did not complete because he died in 1534 AD.

1536 AD: In his translation of the Bible from Greek into German, Martin Luther, a former Catholic monk and priest who became the primary figure of the Protestant Reformation, removed four New Testament books (Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation) and placed them in an appendix treating them as less than canonical as well as the seven Old Testament books (Tobit, Judith, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Wisdom, Sirach, and Baruch plus the additional texts in Esther and Daniel) labelling them as apocryphal.

1546 AD: At the Ecumenical Council of Trent, the Catholic Church reaffirmed once and for all the full list of 27 books. The council also confirmed the inclusion of the Deuterocanonical books which had been a part of the Bible canon since the early Church and was confirmed at the councils of 393 AD, 373 AD, 787 AD and 1442 AD. At Trent, the Church of Rome actually dogmatized the canon, making it more than a matter of canon law, which had been the case up to that point, closing it for good.

1551 AD: Robert Estienne, a French printer and classical scholar, created an alternate numbering in his edition of the Greek New Testament which was also used in his 1553 publication of the Bible in French. Estienne’s system of division was widely adopted, and it is this system which is found in almost all modern Bibles.

1566 AD: Sixtus of Siena, a dominican theologian, coined the term “deuterocanonical” to describe the seven Old Testament books that had not been accepted as canonical by the Protestants but which appeared in the Septuagint; and defined for the Roman Catholics of the terms “protocanonical” and the ancient term “apocryphal” in his work Bibliotheca Sancta ex Præcipuis Catholicæ Ecclesiæ Auctoribus Collecta (Venice 1566). 

16th century to present AD: The HOLY BIBLE composed of 73 canonical books (46 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament) based on the infallible decree of the holy Catholic Church. Thus, the great Tridentine Council declared: “But if any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been used to be read in the Catholic Church, and as they are contained in the old Latin vulgate edition; and knowingly and deliberately contemn the traditions aforesaid; let him be anathema.”

THE TIMELINE of the development of the biblical canon is the living proof that the holy Bible was not handed down by Christ to His apostles as it is. The Bible did not even come down from the heavens as what it looks like at present. The truth is:

IT WAS THE CATHOLIC CHURCH WHO CHOSE WHICH BOOKS ARE INSPIRED AND COMPILED THEM INTO A SINGLE BOOK WHICH SHE CALLED THE BIBLE. THUS, IT IS THE BIBLE WHICH CAME FROM THE CHURCH AND NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND.

However, despite this historical fact, the holy Church did not claim authorship on those divine scriptures. For her, “God is the author of Sacred Scripture” (CCC 105). And, she added: “To compose the sacred books, God chose certain men who, all the while he employed them in this task, made full use of their own faculties and powers so that, though he acted in them and by them, it was as true authors that they consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and no more” (CCC 106).

Remember, “the Christian faith is not a religion of the book but of the Word of God, a word which is not a written and mute word, but the Word is incarnate and living” (cf. CCC 108).

Wala nga bang alam sa Biblia ang mga kaanib ng Iglesia Ni Cristo® maliban sa mga Ministro kaya't sa Pasugo na lamang sila sumasangguni?

Ka Cerio

Galit na galit ako sau last week when u posted na "INC members ay hindi nagbabasa ng Holy Bible", tamad at umaasa na lng sa ministro at hindi na sinusuri kung tama pa ba ang mga doktrina. Maraming INC Defenders ang na-offend at pina-unlike ka pa nga ni Ka Rebecca Job at Puting Agila. Lumipas ang aking galit at na-realize ko na tama po kayo, minumulat at pinapatamaan nyo lang pala kami. Ayon nga po pala sa doktrina sa loob ng INC, ang salita ng Diyos ay nakalihim sa hiwaga at ang tanging makakaintindi ng hiwaga ay ang mga ministro lamang. Kaya nga po ang alam lang namin basahin ay ang Pasugo. Bawat katiwala ng grupo ay obligado bumili ng limang kopya ng God's Message or Pasugo kada buwan. Kahit wala sa budget ay wala naman po kami magawa dahil nangongonsensya ang aming destinado na tungkulin namin ang gawaing pagpapalaganap. Hindi nila batid na kapos na kapos na nga ang aking sweldo para sa pang araw araw na tustusin sa aking pamilya. Salamat po sa patuloy ninyong paghahayag ng korupsyon at katotohanan. Ngayon ay nabigyang linaw sa akin at sa aking sambahayan na ang iglesia ay hindi na paglilingkod sa Diyos, pawang brainwashing na lang at puro pera pera na lng at ang pamamahala ay ginagawang gatasan kaming mga uto utong miyembro. I am praying na ma-guide ako ng Holy Spirit sa pagbabasa ng Holy Bible at mapag-aralan ko ang "New Covenant" na tinutukoy ninyo.

Ang inyong kapatid kay Kristohesus na ating tagapagligtas,

Ka Lawrence

Source: Iglesia ni Santos

WHY ARE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFERENT? WHO ORIGINALLY COMPILED THE BIBLE?

Modern-day Protestant pastors (even Born-Again) and Iglesia Ni Cristo® paid ministers avoided talking this topic by all honesty to their followers for fear of opening their hearts to the TRUTH about the CANONICAL ORIGIN of the WORD OF GOD called The BIBLE and WHO COMPILED them! -CD2000

Catholic Online: Catholic Bibles contain, and have always contained, all of the books of the Bible that have been traditionally accepted by Christians dating back to the time of Jesus. These accepted books total 46 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament. Protestant Bibles, however, have seven fewer books in their Old Testament. These seven books excluded in the Protestant Bible are Baruch, Sirach, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith and the Wisdom of Solomon, plus portions of Esther and Daniel.

These books were rejected by Protestant Reformers in the 1500s because elements in these books did not support certain Protestant theology and doctrines. Prior to the sixteenth century, however, all Christians used Bibles containing all 46 books of the Old Testament.

During the first century, there was much debate among the early Christians as to what made up the canon of Scripture.

The Church, having been given authority by Jesus Christ and under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, compiled the Bible in the form that it exists today.

Basic Apologetics for Everyone

By Aloysius Kayiwa-Staff Apologist 

(Source: The Splendor of the Church Blog)

What is Apologetics? Apologetics is a branch of Theology. It comes from an ancient Greek word (apologia) which literally means an apology. An apology (an ancient sense of the word) meaning to make a reasoned defense or justification of something. In the New Testament the word apologia is found at many places such as Act 22:1, 1 Peter 3:15 etc.

“In your hearts reverence Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to make a defense to anyone who calls you to account for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and reverence. ” (1 Peter 3:15, RSV)

Apologetics is all about knowing why we do what we do and believe what we believe. It is building the case for our Faith, learning how to explain and defend our Faith with confidence and ease. Apologetics is an important part of the Church’s work. In Jude 3 we are told to "Contend for the faith, which was once for all delivered to the saints."

To my Catholic brothers and sisters,we should always remember these facts:

1. The Bible is a Catholic book!

2. The One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church gave it to the world!

3. There is nothing in the Bible that contradicts anything in the Catholic Faith.

4. There is nothing in the Catholic Faith that contradicts anything in the Bible.

These are important facts to keep in mind because a lot of time people will quote loads of passages from the Bible to “claim” that the Catholic Church is wrong. As a Catholic Christian, you should point to them that you believe everything the Bible says, however, you disagree with their private interpretation of those passages.

The reasons you do not agree with their personal interpretations are:

I. The Bible verse has been taken out of context.

II. They are reading into the Biblical text what isn’t there in order to force the interpretation of the text to conform to certain preconceived ideas or theories.

If you are ever asked a question about the Catholic Faith that you cannot answer, don’t worry. There is an answer, you just need to go and find it. Use that situation as an opportunity to learn about your faith. Ask a Catholic Priest, a Catechist, an Apologist or get some good Catholic books and CDs that explain the Faith. As Catholic Christians, we need to read the Bible, study it, and pray it daily. It is our book. We need to use it to bring our precious separated brothers and sisters back to the Church. Also learn to detect heretical doctrines(1 Timothy 4:16, 2 Timothy 4:3) promoted by cults like Jehovah’sWitnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Ang Dating Daan, Iglesia Ni Cristo, Mormons etc who exploit people with fabricated fantasies disguised as “gospel”. The condemnation of these wolves like Eli Soriano has been long hovering above them and their destruction has not been sleeping( 1 Peter 2:1-3)

Some basic Apologetics rules and advice:

1. Pray to the Holy Spirit to give you wisdom to choose your words and courage to share your faith.

2. Learn a little bit more about your Faith each and every day by reading the Scripture,Church History and the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

3. Aim at winning souls (for Christ) not arguments.

4. Always remember that the conversion of hearts is the job of the Holy Spirit not you. Just plant the seeds and let the Holy Spirit take care of the rest.

If you keep these things in mind, then you are on the right path of becoming a very effective Apologist and Evangelist for the Catholic Faith. Thank you.

Yes! We OWN the Bible! The CHURCH own it!

A 'MUST-READ' quotation of all members of Manalo's Church, the INC^{® before it's too late.}
The Bible Centenary and the Catholic Church

Amid the general jubilation over the three hundredth anniversary of the appearance of King James’s version of the Bible, I think it would be a pity if we did not make mention of that great Church to which, under God, we owe our possession of the sacred Scriptures—I mean of course, the Roman Catholic Church. Without striking one single jarring note, I hope, in the universal chorus, yet I feel it would be rather ungenerous, and indeed historically unjust, did we not turn our eyes at least in passing to that venerable figure standing in the background surveying our celebrations, and, as it were, saying, “Rejoice over it, but remember it was from me you got it.” As a Scotsman, who cannot forget that it is the Bible that has made Scotland largely what she is today, I yield to no one in veneration of the inspired Scriptures and in admiration of the incomparably beautiful Authorized Version. Still, honor to whom honor. We shall only be awarding a just meed of praise and gratitude if we frankly and thankfully recognize that it is to a council (or councils) of the R.C. Church that we owe the collection of the separate books into our present Canon of the New Testament, and that to the loving care and devoted labor of the monks and scholars of that Church all through the ages we are indebted, not only for the multiplication and distribution of the sacred volume among the faithful when as yet no printing press existed, but even for the preservation of the Book from corruption and destruction. It is, then, undoubtedly true to say that, in the present order of Providence, it is owing to the Roman Catholic Church that we have a Bible at all. And no one will be a bit the worse Christian and Bible-lover if he remembers, this notable year, that it is to the Mother Church of Christendom he must look if he would behold the real preserver, defender, and transmitter of the “Word that endureth for ever.” - HENRY GREY GRAHAM

What is the relationship of Catholics with the Bible?

The Church existed before the Bible. The Catholic Church, founded by Jesus Christ, was teaching and preaching the word of God for many years before a word of the New Testament was written and for the greater part of a century before it was completed.

The truths enunciated by her divine founder were deep in her heart and fresh in her memory; she was busily engaged in imparting these orally to mankind. Christ wrote nothing; neither did He command the apostles to write. He commissioned them to teach His doctrines to all mankind.

"Go ye into the whole world", He said, "and preach the gospel to every creature". The apostles fulfilled the command of Christ by their oral preaching. Peter, Matthew, John, James and Jude, supplemented their preaching by writing.

It is well to remember, however, that the Church was a going concern, a functioning institution, teaching, preaching, administering the sacraments, saving souls, before the New Testament saw the light of day.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH: THE MOTHER OF THE BIBLE

The Catholic Church is not the child of the Bible, as many non-Catholics imagine, but its mother. The canon or list of books which make up the Old and New Testaments was determined by Catholic Church. The declaration of the Catholic Church that the books of both the Old and the New Testaments are all inspired by God constitutes the sole authority for the universal belief of both Catholics and Protestants in their inspired character.

The Catholic Church is the mother of the New Testament. It was written in its entirety by Catholics. If she had not scrutinized carefully the writings of her children, rejecting some and approving others as worthy of inclusion in the canon of the New Testament, there would be no New Testament today. If she had not declared the books composing the New Testament to be the inspired word of God, we would not know it.

With the possible exception of St. John, none of the apostles ever saw all the writings which now make up the New Testament. If the Church had not preserved the Bible, shielding it from the attacks of barbarians, copying it in her monasteries throughout the long centuries before the art of printing was invented, the modern world would be without the Bible.

The Catholic Church derives neither her existence nor her teaching authority from the Bible. She had both before the New Testament was born; she secured her being, her teachings, her authority directly from Jesus Christ. That "the Bible alone privately interpreted is the sole rule of faith" is something not found in the Bible itself. It would exclude from Christianity the countless millions who have not been able to read... Read more...

The Catholic Church is complete!

Many Protestant sects including the pseudo-Chritian sect founded by Felix Manalo in the Philippines (The Iglesia ni Cristo®) would be surprised by the fact that the Catholic Church is the only Church that is COMPLETE. Out of the many claimants, only the Catholic Church has complete history, complete teachings, councils, doctrines, dogmas, lineage, patrimony etc.

Such that we were founded by Jesus in 33AD; we have 266 Popes, we have 21 ecumenical councils, we have 73 Books of the Bible and we have complete doctrines!

In reverence, Pope Benedict Lifting up the Gospel books.

Speaking of the Books of the Bible, Protestant churches and the Iglesia ni Cristo® of Manalo are helpless when we talk on HOW THE BIBLE CAME TO US. To this day, still many of their followers lived in total ignorance accusing the Catholic Church of having "ADDED" 7 more books.

In TRUTH it was Martin Luther who REMOVED the 7 books (highlighted in red) which had been approved 1500 years before the birth of Protestantism by the same CHURCH OF CHRIST in 382 AD through Pope Damasus I, reaffirmed in the Councils at Hippo (393 AD) and Carthage (397 AD); reaffirmed by Pope Innocent I in 405 AD; re-affirmed at the Council of CArthage in 419 AD; re-affirmed at the Council of Trent in 1546 in response to Martin Luther's removing of the 7 books (source: Catholic 101).

Of course Protestant pastors and ministers including those paid ministers of Manalo's INC Church do not tell these facts to their followers with all honesty. They lie so as to keep their members deceived and remained anti-Catholics.

So how many books are there in the original Bible before the Protestant Reformation?

Here is the surprise!  (Source: Wiki-Answers)

There are seventy-three books in the Canon of the Catholic Bible; forty-six in the Old Testament and twenty-seven in the New Testament. The canon of Scripture refers to the final collection of inspired books included in the Bible. The Catholic Bible contains seven books that do not appear in the Protestant Old Testament. These seven writings are called the deuterocanonicals or the Second Law. Protestants usually call these writings the Apocrypha (meaning hidden), books they consider outside the canon. These seven writings include 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, Sirach, Wisdom, and Baruch, along with additional passages in Daniel and Esther. Before the time of Christ, these writings were included in the Jewish Greek Septuagint (LXX)-the Greek translation of Jewish Scripture-but they were not included in the Hebrew Masoretic text.

Until the Protestant Reformation the Catholic Bible was the only edition since, obviously, there were no "denominations" that wanted to revise the Bible.

Millions attended the Iglesia Ni Cristo Grand Bible Exposition in the Philippines

The media said, "Millions attended the Iglesia Ni Cristo Grand Bible Exposition in the Philippines" (Source: iReport/CNN)

But whose Bible did they use for their "Grand Bible Exposition"? Remember, the Iglesia of Manalo do not have a Bible version of their own.

In their desire to appear "Biblical" in their teachings, they couldn't help but relied on CATHOLIC (and other PROTESTANT) versions of the Bible! (History can prove the Bible is Catholic).

In their official magazine called PASUGO, the INC of Manalo stressed that the Catholic Church is not for Christ for for the devil.

PASUGO Agosto 1962, p. 9:

“Kaya ang tunay na anti-Cristo, ang mga Papa ng Iglesia Katolika Apostolika Romana. At ang tunay na ampon ng anti-Cristo ay ang mga Katoliko.”

PASUGO Oktubre 1956, p. 1:

“Ang Iglesia ni Cristo ay nagdaos ng pamamahayag sa Lunsod ng Davao. Nagsalita roon si Kapatid na Felix Manalo at ang kasama niyang mga Ministro. Ipinahayag doon ng mga nagsalita na ang Iglesia Katolika Romana ay hindi itinatag ni Cristo kundi itinatag ng Diablo."

PASUGO Disyembre 1965, p. 5:

“Kaninong Ministro kung ganyan ang mga Paring Katoliko? Mga Ministro ni Satanas na Diablo."

And yet admitted in the same official magazine that the Catholic Church was the original Church of Christ.

PASUGO Abril 1966, p. 46:

“Ang Iglesia Katolika na sa pasimula ay siyang Iglesia ni Cristo."

And to EXPOSE their HYPOCRISY, the CHURCH which they accused of being of the devil and founded by Satan was RESPONSIBLE in giving the ENTIRE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY with the SACRED SCRIPTURES.

THE BIBLE: Our Debt to the Catholic Church!

Without the Catholic Church, there is no Bible -Tanbooks.com

Pope Benedict XVI - Successor of St. Peter holding the Bible with utmost respect and holiness.
(Source: Why Catholics Do That)

Article Source: CatholicTruth

Versions of the Bible are translations of the Bible into other languages. The following are the most important versions or translations of the Bible.

1. Septuagint. The oldest Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament is known as the Septuagint, and was made between 300 and 130 B.C. It derives its name from the seventy or seventy two translators to whom it is attributed. According to a legend, Ptolemy II (284-247 B.C.) wished to have a copy of the Law of Moses in his famous library in Alexandria. At his request the high priest sent seventy two scholars (six from each of the twelve tribes) from Jerusalem to Alexandria to translate the Law into Greek.

The Septuagint contains all the forty-five books of the Old Testament. It was used by the Apostles and early Christians and helped greatly in the spread of revealed truths among the Greek pagans. Many Jewish and pagan converts obtained their first knowledge of the Bible through the Septuagint.

Origin of the Bible: Honest Questions to Protestants and the Iglesia ni Cristo

1. What is the meaning of the word "Bible"? 
2. Was the Bible originally one book? When did the "volume" style come into vogue? 
3. What is the meaning of the word "Testament"? How were the Old and the New Testaments sealed? 
4. What was the original language of the Old Testament? Of the New Testament? 
5. What were the three styles of writing in antiquity? \
6. How were the books of the Old Testament grouped? of the New Testament? 
7. When was the Bible divided into chapters? into verses? by whom? 
8. What is a Biblical autograph? What materials were used in the composition of the original books of the bible? 
9. Name the four oldest Bibles. 
10. What is a version? 
11. Describe the origin of the Septuagint version; of the Old Latin version; of the Vulgate. 
12. Describe the origin of the Rheims-Douay Version; of the Confraternity edition of the New Testament. 
13. Name three Protestant versions.

Answers: Click HERE

1. Why was Luther opposed to St. James's Epistle? 
2. What change did the King James Bible introduce into I Corinthians 11:27? 
3. What changes introduced by the King James Bible were inspired by the Reformers' doctrine on original sin? 
4. Was the long ending, which Protestants today add to the Lord's Prayer, contained in the first and oldest Bibles? 
5. What is the correct division and interpretation of the Angelic Hymn, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will"?

Answers: Click HERE!

As Catholics were responsible for writing the New Testament (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit), the Catholic Church doesn't "interpret" the Bible. We explain it. Protestants can only "interpret", because they are not the author (guided by the Holy Spirit), and therefore, can only guess at the possible meaning of a chapter, passage or phrase, just as anyone can only guess at any author's intentions in any other book. As the author, the Catholic Church is the only proper authority to consult in matters pertaining to the Bible.

The Catholic Bible

"As Catholics were responsible for writing the New Testament (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit), the Catholic Church doesn't "interpret" the Bible. We explain it. Protestants can only "interpret", because they are not the author (guided by the Holy Spirit), and therefore, can only guess at the possible meaning of a chapter, passage or phrase, just as anyone can only guess at any author's intentions in any other book. As the author, the Catholic Church is the only proper authority to consult in matters pertaining to the Bible."

-Catholic Truth

Jehovah or Yahweh?

"Whereas the name Jehovah appears in the King James Version and other Bible translations, some prefer to use the name Yahweh instead of Jehovah. Which name is correct?

"The most ancient Bible manuscripts were written in the Hebrew language. In the Hebrew Scriptures, the divine name occurs almost 7,000 times and is spelled with four consonants—YHWH or JHVH. These four-consonant words are commonly called the Tetragrammaton, or Tetragram, derived from two Greek words meaning "four letters." Now the question of accurate pronunciation arises because early Hebrew writing consisted of consonants with no vowels to guide the reader. So whether the pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton becomes Yahweh or Jehovah depends on which vowels the reader supplies to the four consonants. Today many Hebrew scholars prefer Yahweh as the true pronunciation."

-from Watch Tower, Jehovah's Witnesses official website "Identifying the Only True God"

Sola Scriptura: Whose Scriptures?

Photo Source: Scriptures Speak

Article Source: Catholic Apologetics.info

The KJV vs. NKJV

The reason this is so intriguing should be obvious, one of the two pillars of Protestantism is "scripture alone" yet these two bibles do not agree. If two bibles disagree, which one is wrong, are both wrong? Both claim that you cannot add to or take from the word of the Lord, yet they differ. Why? Which one is right? How much do they differ? Does it affect doctrine? Who changed it? Some of the verses are total opposites, other verses are simply not saying the same thing. 

For example in the NKJV compared with the (old) KJV there are 66 omissions of the word "Lord", 51 omissions of "God", 44 omissions of "repent", 50 omissions of "heaven", 23 omissions of "blood", and the terms "devils", "damnation", "Jehovah", and "new testament" are completely omitted.

How about that  "hell". The NKJV removes the word "hell" 23 times. By replacing "hell" with "Hades" and "Sheol"! The Jehovahs Witness "Bible" does this as well and  the New International Version is guilty of the same stratagem. Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary defines Hades: "the underground abode of the dead in Greek MYTHOLOGY". By making it "much clearer" - Do they turn Hell into MYTHOLOGY? But the should be nothing new to the readers of the KJV with nine refeances to unicorns and over 30 to dragons mythology is standerd reading . It must be noted, Hades is not always a place of torment or terror! The Assyrian Hades is an abode of blessedness with silver skies called "Happy Fields". In the satanic New Age Movement, Hades is an intermediate state of purification!

Who in their right mind would think "Hades" or "Sheol" is "up-to-date" and "much clearer" than "hell"? The NKJV makes over 100,000 word changes from the old 1611 KJV. There are 2,922 fewer words in the New Testament of the NKJV. Thus, the NKJV is shorter (In The New Testament) than that of the King James Bible by about the total number of words contained in I and II Peter combined!

Letter to PASUGO: "Why not publish your own Bible?"

Letter to the Editor: PASUGO dated March 1996, p.2 YOUR PREACHERS USE different translations of the Bible in delivering a sermon. I was thinking that you do this to suit your own set of reasoning. But upon speaking to a member of your Church I was informed that it is necessary to use different translations of the Bible for there are Bible translations that contain mistranslated verses. If this is true, Why don't you publish your own Bible and put all the correct translation of the verses in it? And given the premise that there are translations that contain errors, how are we to know which one is right? Carlos Reyes Dagupan City, Philippines Editor's Reply: Your suggestion that the Iglesia ni Cristo publish her own Bible with all the correct translation of mistranslated verses is both well-meaning and appealing. It would be truly convenient and handy to have just one Bible with all the verses that we cite or quote from different translations gathered in one compendium. By publishing her own Bible, the Iglesia ni Cristo will in effect have a "sanitized" version of the Scriptures--tailor made for her teachings. This is the very thing that the Iglesia ni Cristo avoids, that is, to be accused of manipulating the Scriptures to suit her doctrines. How, then, are we to know which particular translation of the Bible to use, for example in delivering a sermon? Apostle Paul states the guiding principle to the doctrines of the Bible, thus: "This is what we speak, not in words taught by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words." (I Cor.2:13, New International version) Therefore, there must be no contradiction between the different version of the Bible because spiritual things are compared to spiritual truths. But one may ask, "Who is in a position to compare spiritual things to spiritual truths?" Are all preachers that we see and hear nowadays are qualified to compare spiritual things with spiritual truths, more so preach the gospel? Apostle Paul answers us, thus: "And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!" (Rom. 10:15, New King James Version) A preacher of the Gospel therefore must be sent by God. Why must he be sent by God? Apostle John states, thus: "The one whom God has send speaks God's words, because God gives him the fullness of his Spirit. (John 3:34, Today's English Version) Moreover, the messenger sent by God is entrusted with the ministry and message of reconciliation (cf. II Cor. 5:18-20) Therefore, even if there are translations of the Bible that contain mistranslated verses, the commissioned preachers of God can identify them because they have been given God's spirit for them to understand His will written in the Bible (cf. I Cor. 2:12)

CD2000 ANSWER:

The Bible did not fall from heaven as a book.  And this  Bible we have today DID NOT COME from other churches, not even the Iglesia ni Cristo. Whether they  like it or not, the BIBLE was made possible through the AUTHORITY of the CHURCH.  And this CHURCH is NOT the Iglesia ni Cristo of Manalo but the CHURCH founded by CHRIST-- the ONLY-- ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC APOSTOLIC CHURCH of CHRIST.

In 382 AD, the CHURCH (not the Iglesia ni Cristo) through the leadership of Pope Damasus, a saintly pope.

Catholic BIBLE SCHOLARS convened and DECIDED which BOOKS should be part of the present Bible we have today. But the FINAL CANON of the SCRIPTURES was FINALIZED only during the COUNCIL of TRENT in the 16th Century (Read also SCRIPTURE TRANSLATIONS!)

Ang kapal naman ng mga mukha nila kung bababuyin lang nila ang Aklat na HINDI SA KANILA!

Therefore, there is NO WAY that the INC of Felix Manalo could publish it's own "Bible" just like the Jehovah's Witnesses founded by Charles T. Russel who deliberately CORRUPTED the SCRIPTURES!

If they do, they would CHANGE words such as "church of GOD" to "church of Christ" to suit their teachings.

Biblically speaking their paid MINISTERS are intellectually INCOMPETENT and so they've GOT NO RIGHT to do so. Whether they like it or not, history of the BIBLE PRODUCTION, the CHURCH has played an active role ever since.

The Bible Societies DO NOT even recognize their own paid ministers to have that SINCERITY, HONESTY and COMPETENCY to be called "Scholars" in that respect.  They do not have that LOVE of the SCRIPTURES but rather, they look at the Bible as their SERVANT!

In truth, the INC of Manalo are HELPLESS.  They are STILL HEAVILY RELYING on CATHOLIC and PROTESTANT versions of the Bible whom Manalo and his successors CONSIDER apostates!

YES, they LITERALLY RELY on BIBLES from APOSTATES!!!! That is one among the many HYPOCRISIES in the Iglesia ni Cristo of Manalo.

So, now that you know why they can't publish their own Bibles, you better have to think twice why believe it's the 'true" church when they've got nothing in history to prove that!

Read First the Church, then the New Testament!

Israel Pounded Islamists in Gaza against Egypt border attacks

Judaism and Islam both have the Law of Retaliation: "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth". Bloodshed will never end. Jesus came to perfect the Law. "But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil. When someone strikes you on (your) right cheek, turn the other one to him as well." -Matthew 5:38. Please pray for our elder brethren (Jews) and our younger brethren (Muslims) that they may finally find God in peace (Shalom-Salam). -CD2000

By Adel Zaanoun, AFP

RAFAH, Palestinian Territories (AFP) - Israeli planes killed seven Palestinians and wounded another six in Gaza Friday in retaliation for suspected Islamist militants killing eight Israelis near the Egyptian border.

Two of the Gaza dead were members of the Popular Resistance Committees, a radical Islamist group that Israel blames for Thursday's fatal ambushes in the southern Negev desert. Two more were from Islamic Jihad.

Kashmiri translation of Bible completed, the work of a convert

by Nirmala Carvalho
The books of the Old and New Testaments, along with eight volumes of apocrypha, were officially presented at Guntur, in Andhra Pradesh. The initiative is a collaborative effort between the Diocese of Jammu-Srinagar and the Bible Society of India.

Guntur (AsiaNews) - The official Kashmiri translation of the Bible has been completed and officially presented. The work was carried out by Predhuman K Joseph Dhar, and was published officially by the Bible Society of India at Guntur, in Andhra Pradesh, in a ceremony Feb. 19, 2011 to coincide with celebrations of the bicentenary of its existence .

The drafting of a translation of a Bible in Kashmiri was launched in 1994 in collaboration with the Diocese of Jammu-Srinagar, on the initiative of the late Kunnunkal Hippolytus a scholar, and the bishop of the diocese, Father Jim Borts, a Mill Hill missionary who has been in service in Kashmir since 1963. The present translation is made up of all the books of the Old and New Testaments, as well as eight apocryphal books. Predhuman K. Joseph Dhar, a noted scholar, journalist, writer and educator, is a convert to Catholicism, and belongs to a very old and conservative family of the Shavite Brahminical order.

Where We Got the Bible: Our Debt to the Catholic Church

Photo Source: Catholic Gift Store

by The Right Rev. HENRY G. GRAHAM,

Author of "Hindrances to Conversion," etc.

Twenty-second Printing

Nihil Obstat et Imprimatur JOANNES RITCHIE, Vic. Gen.
Glasguae.

Dedicated to all lovers of the written word.

'In which are certain things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, to their own destruction.' 2 Peter iii. 16

'I would not believe the Gospel unless moved thereto by the authority of the Church.' - St. Augustine (Contra Epis. Manich., Fund., n. 6.)

CONTENTS

Preface
IntroductionChapter I.     Some Errors Removed
Chapter II.    The Making of the Old Testament
Chapter III.   The Church Precedes the New Testament
Chapter IV.   Catholic Church Compiles the New Testament
Chapter V.    Deficiencies of the Protestant Bible
Chapter VI.   The Originals and their Disappearance
Chapter VII.  Variations in the text Fatal to the Protestant Theory
Chapter VIII. Our Debt to the Monks
Chapter IX.    Bible Reading in the 'Dark Ages'
Chapter X.     Where then are all the Mediaeval Bibles?
Chapter XI.    Abundance of Vernacular Scriptures before Wycliff
Chapter XII.   Why Wycliff was Condemned
Chapter XIII.  Tyndale's Condemnation Vindicated by Posterity
Chapter XIV.  A Deluge of Erroneous Versions
Chapter XV.   The Catholic Bible (Douay)
Chapter XVI.  Envoi

Read MORE...