Talk:Apocrypha

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From reading the article, I get the impression that the term seems to have a negative connotation in most historical contexts. Wouldn't it be worthwhile adding Martin Luther's pointed yet somewhat balanced definition "Apocrypha: These Books Are Not Held Equal to the Scriptures, but Are Useful and Good to Read" (quoted from here)? --Anna (talk) 22:36, 19 May 2011 (UTC)Reply

The general term is usually applied to the books that the Protestant Christian Church considered useful but not divinely inspired. Is the term really restricted to "the Protestant Church"? Which Protestant church? Why is the sentence in past tense? What do you call texts that didn't make it into the Catholic (etc.) canon?--88.73.0.195 (talk) 02:43, 21 May 2011 (UTC)Reply

You may want to check this website is more detail about the truth of Apocrypha: http://www.thelostbooks.com/bookapocintro.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.5.220.10 (talk) 09:45, 5 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

I have seen references that say that King James First's translaters had translated the Apocrapha and that it was included in early translations of the Holy Bible. I wish to have his translation recognized for what it is. I plan to expand on this quite soon.

- RCNesland ---- — Preceding unsigned comment added by RCNesland (talk • contribs) 04:41, 17 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

I came to this page because I wanted to understand apocrypha better, and before the end of the introduction, I was assaulted by glaring untruths. I refer specifically to this part:

"The general term is usually applied to the books in the Roman Catholic Bible or the Christian old testament, and the Eastern Orthodox Bible, but not the Protestant Bible on their claim that it is not God's word. So, for Protestant denominations, it is misleading in this sense to refer to the Gospel according to the Hebrews or even the Gnostic writings as apocryphal, because they would not be classified in the same category: by Protestants they would be classified as a heretical subset of antilegomenae..."

I grew up in a protestant church, and they never referred to apocrypha as "not God's word" or "heretical". On the contrary, members of my church actively sought to read obscure apocryphal texts in order to more fully understand their religion. Another commenter here was asking "which protestant church?" and that indeed is a good question since there are so many that are so different. (For example, the Anglican church, which is protestant, is basically the same as the Roman Catholic church. Not the same as the protestants who go to Megachurches in America.)

To boot, the quoted section above is horribly written. This article badly needs a re-write by experts.Guypersonson (talk) 23:15, 3 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

I have attempted a rewrite of the introductory material only correcting some blatant errors and WP:POV. It's a step closer. Evenssteven (talk) 05:28, 25 May 2013 (UTC)Reply

There is a discussion on possible merger from Biblical apocrypha at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Bible#Should_article_Biblical_apocrypha_be_renamed_Apocrypha? – Fayenatic London 13:46, 1 June 2013 (UTC)Reply

User DGG added an "out of date" tag to this article on Dec 12, 2012 which stands to this day. However he did not offer an explanation or reason why he did and what he thought was out of date. Does the tag still apply or can it be removed? I should think, that, generally, when you add a maintenance tag to an article it would be appropriate to explain on the discussion page. I've asked him on his discussion page and I hope he comes back here to discuss the matter. ;) --Maxl (talk) 09:51, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

I highly recommend messaging the editor before proceeding -- JudeccaXIII (talk) 13:56, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

which I did, see my text! ;) --Maxl (talk) 14:35, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

(I am copying this from my talk page.) What was out of date was the use of only 19th and early 20th century sources. They are reliable only in a historical sense, for there have been enormous changes in our knowledge of the period since then for the Christian and Jewish apocrypha. Speaking only of data then unknown, the Dead Sea Scrolls, which have contents very relevant to both of these, had not even been discovered. The only use them, or of studies based on them, is in the article is as a see: reference. And these are only the best known: there have been other major new discoveries of documents from the period. Interpretations are not the same either. There has been over a century of work by hundreds of scholars of various persuasions since those older encyclopedic sources were written--perhaps the best know are Frank Moore Cross and Cross andElaine Pagels. There haas also much many recent books of the formation of both the Christian and Jewish canons. I assume there has been similar increases in knowledge of other religion's texts, though I have no knowledge about this. There was also a failure of attribution: it was not specified in the text what parts were copied from which particular of these older source=-nor is it even clear from the edit history.

I see the current version is very little better including the lack of use of texts found in the 20th century (though two of them were at least mentioned, & one general book was added as a source in two small places)-- and the continuing failure of attribution.

I greatly regret not having had time to work on this & I appreciate being reminded. A great deal could be done merely summarizing the more specialized articles, which are substantially more up-to-date DGG ( talk ) 14:53, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

I see your point. There are two main sources which date to 1911 and 1913. Of course a lot of new facts may have surfaced since then, one of them the find of the Dead Sea scrolls, as you said. You're right, new sources need to be found for the article. --Maxl (talk) 17:18, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

"The differences can be found by looking here", where the words "looking here" are a link to another Wikipedia page, doesn't seem like acceptable form. I've never seen it in any other Wikipedia article. 73.46.208.17 (talk) 21:48, 21 August 2015 (UTC)Reply

I was surprised that were are no citation tags in this article, as it states one thing after another on the apocrypha without any references. And what was there was pretty stated or inferred much propaganda which Catholics are told, such as that the original LXX of the Hebrews contained the apocrypha, which cannot be proven and their is evidence against it, nor did later ones testify to an established inclusion of the apocrypha as they are not even close to being uniform. And that the Catholic canon was settled from the 4th c. till Luther and the Reformation came along and removed 7 books, which also is simply not true. For significant scholarly doubts about the nature of the Apocrypha continued for centuries and into Trent which provided the first infallible definition of the Catholic canon in 1546 - after Luther died. And who, as per ancient practice, separately included the doubtful books in his non-binding (he made that clear) translation, and had substantial support for his doubts about books he did not consider Scripture proper, though as with Jerome, he could quote truths from them (Paul could quote pagans).

Thus by God's grace, I added some referenced correction and balance to the article, though I expect someone to come along and delete it as being contrary to what they want history to say. See here if you want for more on this issue. Grace and peace thru the Lord Jesus (talk) 00:58, 24 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

This article suffered from a lack of organization and thus redundancy and seemed to have little editorial interest in this regard. Therefore I placed much of the lengthy Intro to a section under Christianity titled Disputes over canonicity. There are two related issues being dealt with as I see it, what "Apocrypha" means and where it is variously used, as well as why and how certain writings came to be classed as apocrypha. Hopefully the latter is better explained now and with less redundancy, and with many more references. Grace and peace thru the Lord Jesus (talk) 17:19, 27 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

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Hi,

I'm researching for an assignment and was wondering why there is no mention or references or main article to the apocrypha teachings of Islam? Judaism, Christianity, Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism are represented, but the 2nd largest religion isn't? An oversight maybe? When I finish my assignment, I'll be happy to created the glaring omission.

Also, why is there no mention of Scientology or the Book of Mormons? — Preceding unsigned comment added by MageIIan (talk • contribs) 01:30, 2 December 2016 (UTC)Reply

Relevance

  The Apocrypha fills in the history after Haggai and Zecharia. ||||

When it comes to Islam, you are simply the first person, as far as I can tell, to bring up the question. If we have Taoism and Confucianism, then it would make sense to have something for Islam as well, if there is a significant "Apocrypha" in Islam. I'm not as sure about Scientology. I'm not sure if they have any counterpart to the concept of "Apocrypha," and even if they do, I'm not sure if it's a good idea to have a section on every small religious movement in the world. It might clutter the article. Anyhow, thanks for the concern, and you're welcome to draw something up. Alephb (talk) 08:11, 26 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

​My understanding is that the primary Apocrypha as presently discussed in the this article is particular to Biblical or Judaeo-Christian Apocrypha (capital A).

If there exists a subject properly called "Apocrypha" by scholars in other religions, then it really should be included here only if there is overlap in material that the religions consider Apocrypha or material considered canon by one but Apocrypha by the other. That could be the case with Islam, I don't know, yes there is some common canon, but there is so much non-common canon, that I wouldn't think comparison of apocryphal writings would be all that useful, I may be wrong. (Is there any Islam apocrypha about Christ or the Apostles? Is there any Christian apocryphal writing that is canon in Islam or vice versa? If there is then maybe it should be here)

Are the Confucian and Taoist and Buddhist apocrypha (little a?) not misplaced here? (Split proposal or reduction to "See also"?) Would there really be an article Confucian and Taoist Apocrypha? There is no article titled Buddhist Apocrypha (little or big 'a'); the link is actually to Post-canonical Buddhist texts. I don't think inclusion of either apocryphal or Apocrypha-like material from disparate religions in this article is appropriate except as a comparison, maybe. If such material is only an Apocrypha analog, it is not Apocrypha (cf., Ramadan is not Muslim Christmas). If there is actual Apocrypha scholarship under that term in other religions, but there is no common text, then it would be appropriate to have a distinct article (e.g., Zoroastrian Apocrypha, if there is such a subject (apparently there is, sort of, but it's in the Gnostic Apocrypha of Christianity, so ... )). IveGoneAway (talk) 01:55, 27 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

It might help if either this article were called "Biblical Apocrypha," or if it's lead where a little less ambiguous about its intended scope. Alephb (talk) 08:01, 27 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

Is this a problematic article, with editors assuming it is the article about Biblical Apocrypha, when it actually isn't? (I made that error, too. Shoot, it's right there in the hatnote and the lead.) There already is a Biblical apocrypha article. There was a discussion in 2013 of renaming it/merging it with Apocrypha. IveGoneAway (talk) 17:13, 27 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

Well, I think the issue is that the lead only, and the Introduction does too. It's true that after discussion of Judaism and Christianity there's a little bit on other religions, but those at first glance look like the sort of "me too!" sections that get tossed in for comparative purposes.

The opening sentence reads, "Apocrypha are works, usually written, of unknown authorship or of doubtful origin." I suppose we could take that as giving the scope of the article, but then we have the problem of writing a coherent article about works of unknown authorship / doubtful origin in general. Wouldn't it just basically become a giant list? (Not that I'm against that, but definitely the first two sections would need to be rewritten.) Alephb (talk) 18:25, 27 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

The Other section needs to be incorporated into the Christianity section. Editor2020 (talk) 20:39, 3 August 2020 (UTC)Reply

I have cleaned up and reorganized much of the article but have still not merged the Other sectiom. Editor2020 (talk) 18:01, 13 April 2021 (UTC)Reply

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Non-canonical. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 October 26#Non-canonical until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. SWinxy (talk) 01:09, 26 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Also 2 others - I'd urge people to comment there! Johnbod (talk) 16:07, 26 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Rafaelosornio changed the lead last year, but made this article redundant to Biblical apocrypha and put it at odds with its own content on other religions. I have restored the old lead, but some content has been lost that may deserve restoring somewhere, either in this article or another. Srnec (talk) 23:42, 19 April 2022 (UTC)Reply

User:Srnec, I have no objection with your edits other than the deletion of certain references, which I have restored. I have also restored two small clauses that provide context. Thanks for your understanding. With regards, Anupam^Talk 05:21, 20 April 2022 (UTC)Reply

The redirect Apocryphal has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 July 23 § Apocryphal until a consensus is reached. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 19:27, 23 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Of course they were just texts that didn’t make it into the bible. As those who study history know, mostly due to reasons of power and greed by the second and thirds sons of former nobility that chose religion as their career. Of course nowadays those exact people call them heresy and such, but of course we also know that reality is that the bible is just a compilation based on a certain agenda (which by itself isn’t wrong of course), and could have been very different, resulting in a very different religion today. With that being the point: “Apocrypha” are not any different from what’s in the bible.
So I think we’ll agree that this should not be presented as fact, as it is written now, that they are any more “doubtful” or “questionable” than any other fairy tale (or utter horror story) that actually made it into the bible. Let’s have the introduction be a condensed description based on that origin.
~2026-18538-52 (talk) 02:09, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply