The Biblical Canon

Basically, circa pre-Hasmonean - around the time of the fiasco at the hands of Antiochus Ephiphanes with his not-at-all-appreciated 'piggie loves Zeus' remodeling scheme for temple through the last of the Herods and the seige of Jerusalem (by Titus) which was in 70AD, there were 3 basic sects of Judaism: Pharisees, Saducees, and the Essenes.

We don't hear hardly anything about the last group in the canon because they defected and went off to live in the desert/wilderness away from Jerusalem when they supposedly could no longer tolerate/stomach the way things were going; it was bad enough that the temple had been defiled and even though the Macabee revolt regained control over the temple after which it was cleansed and consecrated (and the 'Festival of Lights' or Chanakah was instigated to celebrate!) the Hasmonean dynasty took over the rule of the Jews in Jerusalem as Priests/Kings - and this was unacceptable to the Essenes', it seems, because #1 the Kings were NOT of the house of David and the priests were NOT of the Levite priestly lineage (Zadokites).

So they took to themselves - it is probable that they settled (at least in part) along the dead sea (Qumran) - and before that community was massacred by the Romans somewhere around 70AD (can't remember off hand, please forgive me) they must have hurriedly stashed their treasured writings, scriptures, and misc. community records - and what has been salvaged is what we know as the Dead Sea Scrolls.

VERY interesting, IMO....

I'll dig you up some links...

Biblical Canon?

i may be wrong, but i thought it only applied to Catholics not Christainity in general?

Or maybe just anyone interested in studying the bible. Check this out - I think 'canon' is just a general term for what is considered 'bible' regardless of who is reading that 'bible.'

At least that's the way I've always understood it. Course I could be wrong, too.

maybe we can just ignore the underlying religious tone of this ol' tome and look at the moral and philosophical implications instead

then we can see if the non-canonical books fit in

if they do, then why not put them in?

If you know Jesus, you know He is The Word and He dwells inside you and provides for you insights and understandings into things that noone else can give you or take away.

In other words, it doesn't matter what is missing or contained within the Bible, because all the "missing pieces" are contained within those who believe. And all those who don't believe are only fooled into thinking that they have the "secret" because they have books or manuscripts that remain locked away or hidden.

The irony is that if they had The Word dwelling inside them, they'd know that all that is hidden is more than known.

The Law is the Living Word of the Living God. God did not write the Law in Books but in your HEART".
- Gospel of the Essenes
- Attributed to Jesus Christ

Originally posted by stalkingwolf

The Law is the Living Word of the Living God. God did not write the Law in Books but in your HEART".
- Gospel of the Essenes
- Attributed to Jesus Christ

well, well, well... I missed this but what an apt passage. I have been doing some research and my own thread came up on google. Funny, I couldn't find the link to the lost books and thankfully I found the link with my first post.

I have just read Enoch again and sometimes, I think we only see what we want to see. But this time I read it, I felt very angry.

My point is...the Watchers and women bred, the offspring were then destroyed. That seems to me like punishiing innocents. Not only, does God destroy the Earth with the flood, God also punishes the offspring.

How can anyone destroy innocents? Is it there fault they were born?

Maybe those books have been left out of the Bible because they raise some deeper truths? Perhaps it is best that we don't analyse everything too much. Keep the faith by only reading what we have in front of us.