Luther questioned the canonicity
or inspired nature of four books of the New Testament. Which NT
books?
THE ANSWER IS .. E Luther even said that James "flatly denies" St. Paul. Concerning the Book of Revelation, he said, I "can nohow detect that the Holy Spirit produced it."
Concerning the Epistle of James, Luther sad "I refuse him a place among the writers of the canon of my Bible" (See John Dillinger's book, "Martin Luther: Selections from his writings" p. 35.
Fortunately, Luther removed some his more caustic remarks about Scripture in his later prefaces of New Testament books. But the question that begs answering is: How could Luther have been generating correct teachings from his doctrine of "Scripture Alone" if he was questioning which books were even Scripture, i.e. which books were inspired?
INFORMATION ON THE PROTESTANT REVOLT
http://ic.net/~erasmus/RAZ110.HTM (see point #9)
www.cin.org/users/james/files/deuteros.htm
http://matt1618.freeyellow.com/preface.html (Does Luther consider James Scripture?) http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2004_09_19_socrates58_archive.html (Luther's judgments concerning part of Scripture
http://ic.net/~erasmus/RAZ407.HTM
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/3975/sorigin.htm
Bible History: A Quick Summary
http://users.rcn.com/lanat/biblehistory.htm
For a more in-depth look at how
the Catholic Church determined the official canon of the Bible in the 4th
century, read Henry Grahams book Where we Got the Bible: Our Debt to the Catholic
Church.
www.canapologetics.net/html/luther.html
(Luther stuff)
www.gospelcom.net/chi/pastwords/chl162.shtml
(Luther-Calvin on trial)
www.catholic.net/rcc/Periodicals/Dossier/2001-10/article.html (Whos Who in the Reformation)
http://ic.net/~erasmus/RAZ110.HTM (The Apocrypha: Why It's Part of the Bible)
http://forums.bayard-inc.com/bayard3/read.php?f=2&i=149&t=149
(Scriptural Reference Guide)
Suggested Reading: The Characters of the Reformation by Hilaire Belloc
How the Reformation Happened by Hilaire Belloc
Here is an excerpt from "The Apocrypha: Why It's Part of the Bible"
Luther "rejected from the New Testament Canon ("chief books") Hebrews, James ("epistle of straw"), Jude and Revelation, and placed them at the end of his translation, as a New Testament "Apocrypha." He regarded them as non-apostolic. Of the book of Revelation he said, "Christ is not taught or known in it." These opinions are found in Luther's Prefaces to biblical books, in his German translation of 1522.] (See full article at http://ic.net/~erasmus/RAZ110.HTM )
Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin writes:
"The deuterocanonicals teach Catholic doctrine, and for this reason they were taken out of the Old Testament by Martin Luther and placed in an appendix without page numbers. Luther also took out four New Testament books -- Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation -- and put them in an appendix without page numbers as well. These were later put back into the New Testament by other Protestants, but the seven books of the Old Testament were left out. Following Luther they had been left in an appendix to the Old Testament, and eventually the appendix itself was dropped (in 1827 by the British and Foreign Bible Society), which is why these books are not found at all in most contemporary Protestant Bibles, though they were appendicized in classic Protestant translations such as the King James Version
(Read the full article at www.cin.org/users/James/files/deuteros.htm )
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