People often hear that books were "removed from the Bible," usually with the Dead Sea Scrolls offered as proof. The real history is less dramatic and far more interesting: several Jewish writings from the centuries between Malachi and Matthew were widely read, some were treated as Scripture by some communities, and different churches drew the line in different places. Nothing was cut out in secret.
Timeline
c. 400 BC
The Hebrew Scriptures are essentially complete
Malachi closes the prophetic books. Jewish tradition holds that prophecy ceased with Malachi, and the writings we now call the Old Testament circulate as the Law, the Prophets and the Writings.
c. 280–130 BC
The Septuagint — the Hebrew Scriptures in Greek
Alexandrian Jews translate the Torah first, then the rest. Additional Jewish writings composed in this period travel with the Greek collection, which is how they later reach Christian Bibles.
c. 250 BC – AD 68
The Qumran library is copied and hidden
A separatist community copies biblical books alongside its own rules, hymns and expansions of Genesis. Every Old Testament book except Esther is represented.
167–160 BC
The Maccabean revolt
Antiochus IV desecrates the temple; the Hasmoneans fight back and rededicate it. The events are recorded in 1 and 2 Maccabees — books never found at Qumran.
c. 130 BC
A preface names three groups of Scripture
Ben Sira's grandson refers to 'the Law, the Prophets and the other books of our fathers' — the earliest clear witness to the threefold Hebrew collection.
AD 45–95
The New Testament is written
The apostles and their circle write letters and Gospels. They quote the Old Testament constantly — and never quote Tobit, Sirach, Judith or Maccabees as Scripture, though Jude alludes to 1 Enoch.
c. AD 90–100
Josephus counts twenty-two books
Against Apion lists a fixed Jewish collection and says that nothing written after the reign of Artaxerxes carries the same authority — the same books as the Protestant Old Testament, differently grouped.
AD 367 and 382–405
Christian lists and the Latin Bible
Athanasius' Easter letter lists the 27 New Testament books we now use. Jerome translates the Vulgate and argues that the extra Greek books are edifying but not canonical — the word he uses for them is apocrypha.
AD 1546 and after
The canons are formally fixed, and diverge
The Council of Trent declares the deuterocanonical books Scripture. Protestants follow the Hebrew canon and print the same books as an appendix. Eastern Orthodox and Ethiopian churches settle on wider lists again.
Which books, which church
| Writing | Protestant | Catholic | Orthodox | Ethiopian |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The 39 books of the Hebrew Bible | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| The 27 books of the New Testament | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| Tobit | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| Baruch & the Epistle of Jeremiah | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| 1 Maccabees | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Varies |
| 2 Maccabees | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Varies |
| Judith, Wisdom, additions to Esther & Daniel | Apocrypha | Scripture | Scripture | Scripture |
| Prayer of Manasseh | Apocrypha | Appendix | Scripture | Scripture |
| 1 Esdras / 3 Maccabees | Apocrypha | Appendix | Scripture | Varies |
| 1 Enoch | Not canonical | Not canonical | Not canonical | Scripture |
| Jubilees | Not canonical | Not canonical | Not canonical | Scripture |
| Qumran sectarian scrolls | Not canonical | Not canonical | Not canonical | Not canonical |
"Apocrypha" here means the books Protestants print between the Testaments as useful reading rather than as Scripture. Catholics call the same group deuterocanonical — a second canon, settled later, but still canon. Orthodox lists vary a little between national churches.
Why the canons diverged
The Hebrew-speaking synagogue settled on the books written in Hebrew before the age of Artaxerxes. The Greek-speaking church inherited the Septuagint, which circulated with additional writings bound in, and read them in worship for centuries. Jerome, translating the Latin Bible in the 380s, went back to the Hebrew and concluded the extra books were edifying but not canonical. Augustine disagreed. The Western church largely followed Augustine in practice and Jerome in theory until the Reformation forced the question, at which point Trent settled it one way and the Reformers the other.
Two points are worth holding on to. First, no doctrine of the Christian faith depends on the disputed books. Second, the disagreement is about a handful of writings at the edge, not about the Gospels, the letters of Paul, or the Law and the Prophets — those were never in question.
Jude quotes Enoch — what does that mean?
Jude 14–15 quotes 1 Enoch 1:9 almost word for word and introduces it with "Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied." That is the sharpest question in this whole area, and it deserves a straight answer.
Quoting a book is not the same as canonising it. Paul quotes the Cretan poet Epimenides in Titus 1:12 and the Athenian poets in Acts 17:28, and nobody concludes that Greek verse is Scripture. An inspired writer can affirm that a particular statement is true without endorsing the book it came from. What Jude affirms is that the Lord comes with his holy ones to judge — a claim the Old Testament makes repeatedly.
It is also worth noticing what Jude does not do. He does not appeal to Enoch's calendar, its astronomy, its tour of the heavens, or its elaborate angelology. He takes one sentence about judgment. The Ethiopian church went further and received the whole book; no other tradition did.
The rule Berean applies
The 66 books of the Protestant canon are the standard. Everything else in this library — the Apocrypha, the Qumran scrolls, the church fathers, the Gnostic gospels — is read as history and as evidence, and every claim it makes is tested against the apostles' doctrine (Acts 2:42). Being old is not the same as being true, and being copied at Qumran is not the same as being Scripture.
Read the writings
The Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran
What the caves actually contained
The Book of Jubilees
Genesis retold, with a calendar to defend
The Book of Tobit
An angel in disguise on the road to Media
Sirach (Ecclesiasticus)
A Jerusalem teacher's wisdom, c. 180 BC
1 Maccabees
The revolt, the temple, and Hanukkah
2 Maccabees
Martyrdom and resurrection before Christ
Baruch & the Epistle of Jeremiah
Confession in exile, and mockery of idols
The Prayer of Manasseh
Fifteen verses of repentance
The Book of Giants
The Watchers' children dream of the flood
The Genesis Apocryphon
The patriarchs in their own words
The Community Rule (1QS)
Sons of light, and how to join them
The War Scroll (1QM)
A liturgy for the last battle
Temple Scroll, 4QMMT & the Hodayot
Where Paul's 'works of the law' turns up