The Missing Books

The Protestant version of the Old Testament excludes seven books and several parts of two more.
* Tobias
* Judith
* Wisdom
* Ecclesiasticus
* Baruch
* I Machabees
* II Machabees
* Parts of Esther
* Parts of Daniel

The Protestant reformers labeled these books and select passages "Apocrypha" (i.e. spurious, uninspired) in a calculated attempt to make them appear unreliable in the eyes of uninformed and uneducated readers. Thus, while they were inventing the doctrine of "sola Scriptura" with the one hand, with the other hand the reformers were modifying the Scriptura to better conform to their novel teachings.

Isn't it a dangerous game to tinker with the Word of God? You bet.

The rationalization was that they were reverting to an older, purer form of the old Jewish Scriptures that excluded said books and chapters. The Septuagint version, they argued, was newer and scribed by the 70 Jews of the Diaspora in Alexandria in 250 BC; they were not the Scriptures of the Jews of Palestine. As such, the Protestants would not use that version; rather, it was to be the Palestinian version of the Scriptures for them.

At a gloss this might seem plausible. The position turns out to be terminally weak, however.First, to give credit for the correct component. There were in fact two versions of the Jewish Scriptures in the 1st century AD.
(1) The Massoretic Hebrew Scriptures
(2) The Septuagint Greek Scriptures

Now for the additional details that help shed the proper light on the matter.
* Both versions were used by the Jews of the time of Christ.
* The original Hebrew version of the Palestinian Scriptures had been lost (wars and occupations and various calamities, you see).
* The copies of the Hebrew original had many errors -- thus, there was no longer an authoritative Hebrew version.

What's more:
* The New Testament contains about 350 references, quotations, and citations to both sets of Jewish Scriptures. Of the 350 references, only 50 were of the Palestinian Hebrew version; Christ and His Apostles relied on the Greek version about 300 times. The ratio is 6:1 - that is, over 85% of the references our Lord and the Apostles made to the Old Testament Scriptures used the Septuagint
* In the 2nd century AD, Jewish Rabbis used the Greek Septuagint to correct the errors of the Hebrew version to establish an authoritative Hebrew Scripture.

In light of these facts, why would the 16th century Protestant reformers exclude books, if not for greater certainty that they were relying on the more accurate documents?

The most probable explanation is that they sought to exclude history and teachings that supported the Catholic position and undermined the Protestant one. For example, the Catholic teaching of saying prayers for the dead -- i.e. assisting the souls in Purgatory -- is seen clearly in II Macchabees 12:46: "It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins."

The reason the Catholic Church has historically condemned unauthorized translations of the Bible is not because She fears competition or that She dreads a loss of control, but that the alternate translations are unreliable and that people can go to Hell because of the misinformation they contain and the material they lack. Besides, the Catholic Church who wrote the New Testament also compiled the Bible; of course She should have final say on who gets to use Her material.

Who Should We Read?

Fr. Robert Barron writes a conciliar Catholic blog called Word on Fire. In an essay published Friday, he described his experience dealing with militant aggressive atheists who engage in seek-and-destroy missions against people like himself.

By way of suggesting a suitable apologetic response, Father wrote, "Have we read the great Christian apologists -- G.K. Chesterton, C.S. Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, Ronald Knox, Fulton Sheen -- and can we wield their arguments against those who are coming at us? In my own Catholic Church, we sadly jettisoned much of our rich apologetic tradition in the years after Vatican II, convinced that it would be better to reach out positively to the culture. Well, at least part of that culture has turned pretty hostile, and it is high time to recover the intellectual weapons that we set aside."

Betrayed again by Vatican II. Not that the atheists were surprised; in fact, they were instrumental in getting the Church to let down its guard at the Council so that the anti-religionists could take a more free hand in assaulting the works of God. To their eternal shame, most of the Churchmen of the time allowed the Church's enemies to largely have their way.

For the record, even better apologists to read are men like Fr. Henri Le Floch, Bp. Antonio Castro de Mayer, Abp. Marcel Lefebvre, and Cdl. Alfredo Ottaviani.

The Next Heritage Tour

Today I hop on a series of flights that will land me in Vienna, Austria, good Lord willing. This will be the start of my next pilgrimage, which will wind its way through the Austrian countryside, through a bit of Germany, and end in Switzerland.

Vienna
Vienna (German: Wien) is the capital of Austria. The former capital of the Holy Roman Empire, Vienna is a cultural center for music and the arts, science, and fine cuisine. The city is 50% Catholic, and is home to numerous beautiful churches; my stops will include St. Stephen's Cathedral (which houses the miraculous icon of Maria Potsch and the body of St. Valentine) and the Church of St. Mary where the relics are kept of St. Clement Mary Hofbauer, patron of Vienna.

Danube Excursion
Overlooking the Danube is the baroque basilica of Maria Teferl, which is my next stop. After that I'll visit the renowned Benedictine Abbey of Melk, with its famous library and scriptorium; the whole is embellished with a vast array of marble sculptures and brilliantly colored frescoes.

Salzburg
Salzburg is next, with a stop in Mariazell, who 800 year old shrine is the chief Marian pilgrimage site in Austria. Then a visit to the church of Maria Plain and other sacred sites.

Altotting
I'll hop across the German border for a second visit to Altotting, returning to Salzburg in the evening.

Innsbruck
Innsbruck is next, for some sight-seeing and souvenir gathering.

St. Gallen
I cross the Swiss border this time, arriving at the Benedictine abbey of St. Gallen and its famous library.

Einsiedeln
The Benedictine monastery of Our Lady of the Hermits in Einsideln is next.

Fribourg
A tour of the Gothic cathedral of Fribourg is my next destination; from there I'll go to the church of St. Michael, which houses the remains of the Jesuit St. Peter Canisius. Afterward, the Abbey of St. Maurice, where the Theban Legion was martyred.

Econe
A personal high point of the trip, Econe is a small town where Abp. Marcel Lefebvre formed the first seminary of the SSPX and so commenced Operation Survival. His tombs is in the seminary crypt, where I will go to pay my respects and offer my petitions. The next day I will attend the ordinations of several new traditional priests.

Geneva
I'll get only a peek of Geneva: it's where the will be that will carry me back to the States.

One Year In

June 7th marked my first anniversary with my employer. When someone hits the anniversary of their hire date at my company, the custom is for their manager to send out a humorous email to the entire office. Below is the installment for yours truly.

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Dear team,

Join me in congratulating the one and only Sean in his first year.

Everyone that had the opportunity of working with Sean (Speedy) can speak of his design skills, commitment, work ethics, collaborative spirit and plain awesomeness. Sean is been travelling a lot lately but if you happen to see him at the office please give him a hand shake or a hug or mess with his gray hair. It’s great to have people like Sean in our company.

Opting Out of Opting Out

In this blog entry I described how Orlando airport had decided to opt out of TSA involvement of its airport security and privatize its screening processes.

In this news article we see that TSA has abruptly rescinded the option to do any such thing.

From the article: "TSA stopped the program with little warning and without adequate justification" and "TSA agents actively protested the airport’s attempt to privatize, going so far as to stand at gates in uniform and tell passengers they would be less safe if the airport joined the SPP."

The old Bait and Switch is alive and well.

Travel Tale

The flight to Hartford today involved three airplanes.

Plane #1 got off the ground, but a stuck rudder meant the plane could not achieve the necessary speed to reach flying altitude, so the pilot returned to Atlanta airport 15 minutes after taking off.

Plane #2 didn't even get that far: passengers were seated, and then the pilot came on saying that this plane had a mechanical problem as well.

Plane #3 could have left at 5:00 pm or 10:00 pm, depending on who you asked at which time, but we finally made it into the air at 1:15 pm.

Considering the flight was originally scheduled to depart at 7:25 AM, it made for an unusually long day.

Hopefully all the travel kinks are now out of the way for my next big trip...

They Get One Right

Pentecost Sunday

Source

From the article: "In late March, the doctrinal committee of the US bishops’ conference warned the faithful about a book by Fordham University theologian Sister Elizabeth Johnson, Quest for the Living God: Mapping Frontiers in the Theology of God. The committee said that the book 'contains misrepresentations, ambiguities, and errors that bear upon the faith of the Catholic Church as found in Sacred Scripture, and as it is authentically taught by the Church’s universal magisterium.' The committee noted that it had a pastoral duty to issue the warning, given Sister Johnson’s prominence and popularity and the book’s use as a 'textbook for the study of God' at Catholic universities. The warning generated angry complaints from members of the Catholic left who always find it shocking and 'controversial' when bishops exert themselves to defend Church teaching."

Well done, U.S. bishops: you have warned people about an angry feminist agitator who is abusing her role to remake reality after her own image.

Hat Tip: Helmut