In the Bibliotheque Sacree, by the Dominicans j contact with the feelings that prevailed among the Richard and Giraud (Paris, 1822), the term is defined j Christians of Palestine, there the influence of the rig- to signify (1,) anonymous or pseudepigraphal books; orous limitation of the old Hebrew canon is at once (2,) those which are not publicly read, although they j conspicuous. This is seen in its bearing on the his- may be read with edification in private; (3,) those I tory of the canon in the list given by Melito, bishop which do not pass fur authentic and of divine author- I of Sardis (Euseb. 77. E. iv, 2C), and obtained by him ity, although they pass for being composed by a sacred from Palestine. Of its effects on the application of
author or an apostle, as the Epistle of Barnabas; and (4,) dangerous books composed by ancient heretics to favor their opinions. They also apply the name "to books which, after having been contested, are put into the canon by consent of the churches, as Tobit, etc." John applies it, in its most strict sense, and that which it lias borne since the fourth century, to books which, from their inscription, or the author's name, or the
the word, the writings of Cyril of Jerusalem and Je- rome give abundant instances. The former (Cafech. iv, 33) gives the canonical list of the 22 books of the O. T. Scriptures, and rejects the introduction of all "apocryphal" writings. The latter in his Epistle to Lata warns the Christian mother in educating her daughter against " omnia apocrypha." The Prologus Galeatus shows that he did not shrink from including
subject, might easily lie taken for inspired hooks, but under that title the books which formed part of the are not so in reality. It has also been applied by Je- \ Septuagint, and were held in honor in the Alexandrian rome to certain hooks not found in the Hebrew canon, j and Latin Churches. In dealing with the several but yet publicly read from time immemorial in the ! books he discusses each on its own merits, admiring
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some, speaking unhesitatingly of the "dreams," "fa- bles" of others. (3.) The teaching of Jerome influ- enced, though not decidedly, the language of the Western Church. The old spurious heretical writ- ings, the "Apocrypha" of Tertullian and Clement, fell more and more into the background, and were almost utterly forgotten. The doubtful books of the Old Testament were used publicly in the service of the Church, quoted frequently with reverence as Scrip- ture, sometimes, however, with doubts or limitations as to the authority of individual books according to the knowledge or critical discernment of this or that writer (comp. Bp. Cosins's Scholastic History of the Canmi). During this period the term by which they were com- monly described was not apocryphal but "ecclesiasti- cal." So they had been described by Rufinus {Ex- pos, in Symb. Apost. p. 26), who practically recognised the distinction drawn by Jerome, though he would not apply the more opprobrious epithet to books which were held in honor. (4.) It was reserved for the age of the Reformation to stamp the word Apocrypha with its present signification. The two views which had hitherto existed together, side by side, concerning which the Church had pronounced no authoritative decision, stood out in sharper contrast. The Council of Trent closed the question which had been left open, and deprived its theologians of the liberty they had hitherto enjoyed, by extending the Canon of Scripture so as to include all the hitherto doubtful or deutero- canonical books, with the exception of the two hooks of Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh, the evidence against which seemed too strong to be resisted (Sess. IV de Can. Script.). In accordance with this decree, the editions of the Vulgate published by authority con- tained the books which the Council had pronounced canonical, as standing on the same footing as those which had never been questioned, while the three which had been rejected were printed commonly in smaller type and stood after the New Testament. The Reformers of Germany and England, on the other hand, influenced in part by the revival of the study of Hebrew and the consequent recognition of the au- thority of the Hebrew Canon, and subsequently by the reaction against this stretch of authority, main- tained the opinion of Jerome and pushed it to its le- gitimate results. The principle which had been as- serted by Carlstadt dogmatically in his " de Canonicis Scripturis libellus" (1520) was acted on by Luther. He spoke of individual books among those in ques- tion with a freedom as great as that of Jerome, judg- ing each on its own merits, praising Tobit as a "pleas- ant comedy." and the Prayer of Manasseh as a " good model for penitents," and rejecting the two books of Esdras as containing worthless fables. The example of collecting the doubtful books into a separate group had been set in the Strasburg edition of the Scptua- gint, 1526. In Luther's complete edition of the Ger- man Bible, accordingly (1534), the books (Judith, Wis- dom, Tobias, Sirach, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Additions to Esther and Daniel, and the Prayer of Manasseh) were grouped together under the general title of "Apocry- pha, i. e. Books which are not of like worth with Holy Scripture, yet are good and useful to be read." In the history of the English Church, Wiclift" showed himself in this as in other points the forerunner of the Reformation, and applied the term Apocrypha to all but the "twenty-Jive" Canonical Books of the Old Testament. The judgment of Jerome was formally asserted in the sixth Article. The disputed books were collected and described in the same way in the printed English Bible of 1539 (Cranmer's), and since then there has been no fluctuation as to the applica- tion of the word (Smith). See Deutero-canonicat,. II. Biblical Apocrypha. — The collection of books to which this term is popularly applied includes the fol- lowing. The order given is that in which they stand in the English version.