Apocrypha
About the Apocrypha
What these writings are, and why they are kept separate here.
What is the Apocrypha?
The Apocrypha is a collection of ancient Jewish writings associated with the biblical world and preserved in various historic Christian Bible traditions.
Journey 2 Christ uses the 66-book Protestant canon for its Bible. For that reason, these writings are presented in a separate library rather than as part of the Bible section.
Christian traditions differ in how these books are classified. Many Protestant traditions distinguish them from the canonical books of Scripture. Catholic and Orthodox traditions recognise various books found within these collections as deuterocanonical or canonical. The collections themselves also differ between traditions, so there is no single list that all of them share.
Why read the Apocrypha?
These writings help a reader understand the world surrounding the biblical text. Among other things they offer a view of Jewish history, of the Hellenistic period, of persecution and resistance, of wisdom traditions and religious practice, and of the cultural and political environment preceding the New Testament era.
They also have a long history of Christian reading. Early editions of the King James Version included them, and they have been read in various traditions for centuries.
They were not all written in the same period or for the same purpose, and they are best approached as a library rather than as a single work.
What will I find here?
A considerable range of literature. There is sustained history in the books of Maccabees, wisdom writing and moral instruction in Ecclesiasticus and the Wisdom of Solomon, religious narrative in Tobit and Judith, prayer in the Prayer of Manasseh, apocalyptic vision in 2 Esdras, and short accounts attached to Daniel and Esther.
Why are these books classified differently?
The short answer is that the question has a long history and was answered differently at different times and places.
Manuscripts of the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of Jewish scriptures, include works not found in the Hebrew scriptures. Early Christian writers used these works in varying ways and did not all agree on their standing. Western Christianity carried many of them forward in its Latin Bible.
During the Reformation, Protestant traditions generally drew a distinction between these writings and the canonical books, often grouping them separately under the heading Apocrypha while continuing to print them. The Catholic Church affirmed the canonical status of a number of them, where they are commonly described as deuterocanonical. Orthodox traditions include various of these writings, and their collections are not identical to one another.
This is a summary of a long history, not a settlement of it. Serious traditions have held considered positions here for centuries, and several paragraphs cannot do more than describe the shape of the question.
Journey 2 Christ's approach
Journey 2 Christ uses the 66-book Protestant canon in its Bible section. The Apocrypha is therefore kept separate, with its own routes, its own reading position and its own label wherever a reference appears.
These writings are included for historical, educational, literary and contextual reading.
Readers from traditions that classify some of these writings differently should understand that this separation reflects the Bible structure Journey 2 Christ has chosen. It is not a claim that all Christian traditions use the same canon, and it is not a judgement on traditions that receive these books differently.
The King James Version and the Apocrypha
Early editions of the King James Version, including the first edition of 1611, contained an Apocrypha section printed between the Old and New Testaments and set apart from both.
That a section was printed does not by itself establish that the translators regarded every book in it identically to the canonical books; it was presented as a distinct section. Later editions were frequently printed without it, for reasons that were practical, commercial and theological in varying measure, and no single explanation accounts for the change.
The text in this library is the King James Apocrypha.
Historical context
Approximate periods, given to place the writings rather than to date them precisely. Dating for several of these works is uncertain.
Persian period
The setting of the return from exile and the rebuilding of the Temple.
Hellenistic period
Greek language and culture spread across the eastern Mediterranean after Alexander. Jewish communities engage with a Greek-speaking world, and the Septuagint translation belongs to this period.
Maccabean period
Suppression of Jewish practice under Antiochus IV, the revolt that followed, the rededication of the Temple, and Hasmonean rule.
Roman period
Roman control of Judea, the political world in which the New Testament is set.
The Maccabean period
The books of Maccabees describe a period that shaped the world the New Testament is set in, and it is worth knowing the outline.
Judea came under Seleucid rule, one of the kingdoms that emerged after the death of Alexander. The Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes suppressed Jewish religious practice and desecrated the Temple in Jerusalem. Armed resistance followed, led by the priest Mattathias and his sons, and is known as the Maccabean revolt. It resulted in the recapture and rededication of the Temple, and eventually in a period of Jewish self-rule under the Hasmoneans.
The rededication of the Temple is commemorated in the festival of Hanukkah.
Terms you may encounter
- Apocrypha
- A term used, particularly in Protestant traditions, for a group of ancient writings distinguished from the canonical books of Scripture. Its literal sense is closer to 'hidden away', though that is not how the term functions today.
- Deuterocanonical
- A term used in Catholic and some other traditions for books received as canonical whose canonical status was recognised later than that of other books. It is not a synonym for Apocrypha: the two terms carry different judgements.
- Septuagint
- An ancient Greek translation of Jewish scriptures, made over time from roughly the third century BC. Manuscripts of it include works not found in the Hebrew scriptures, which is part of why this question arises at all.
- Canon
- The collection of books a tradition receives as Scripture. Different Christian traditions have different canons, and this is a matter of long-standing considered disagreement rather than confusion.
- Intertestamental
- A conventional term for the historical period between the settings of much Old Testament literature and the New Testament era. It describes a gap in the biblical narrative, not a gap in history, and not an absence of God.
Translation and source
King James Version Apocrypha. Standardized text of 1769, with Apocrypha/Deuterocanon.
Text obtained from eBible.org on 2026-08-31.