APOCRYPHAL (books not included in the New Testament)

[Dover]

One of my favorite "hobbies" is to peruse the antique, rare and collectible book pages on ebay. Fascinating stuff, though I've rarely bought any. This one was really tempting, but I let it escape.
What was interesting to me is the age of this book relative to its subject matter. I guess I naively thought that all this interest in the Apocryphal was strictly a contemporary thing. This book is sold, but the auction page is still available to view (scroll down page):

http://cgi.ebay.com/c1820-COMPLETE-APOCRYPHAL-KEY-ANCIENT-MYSTERIES-OCCULT_W0QQitemZ170065116737QQihZ007QQcategoryZ29223QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Translated from the Original Tongues, and now First Collected into one Volume
Being approx. 186 years old and In very good condition, you're bidding on A RARE COPY of

THE
APOCRYPHAL
NEW TESTAMENT
Being All
THE GOSPELS, EPISTLES
and
OTHER PIECES NOW EXTANT
Attributed in the First Four Centuries to
JESUS CHRIST,
HIS APOSTLES, AND THEIR COMPANIONS
And Not Included in
THE NEW TESTAMENT
By Its Compilers

WILLIAM HONE, LUDGATE HILL, LONDON ... Not dated, but this appears to be the second edition, first edition was published in 1820 .. Believe this is still from the early 1800's

[az chela]

1. most of these bools are out there in differnt names

Book Of Enoch
Wisdom of sophia
the forgotten books of the bible
and many many more

[Tunkamerica]

2. I thought it was "apocrypha"

apocryphal is an adjective.

I used to have a paperback copy. It'd probably be more interesting to me now if I could find it.

[hashibabba]

3. Isn't the Apocrypha still a part of the Catholic Bible?

My understanding is that the Protestants threw out those 14 books for various reasons (at least some because they would contradict other parts of the Bible, or because they don't believe they were "inspired by God" like the other books they wanted included). I do have a version of the Bible with it included.

Apocrypha means hidden. The Catholic Apocrypha comes from books from the 400 years before Christ. According to the Protestants, that was a period when God's voice was silent. I'm just telling you what I read.

[TechBear_Seattle]

4. Those books are called the Deuterocanon

"Apocrypha" means "secret." As referencing books like Sirach, Wisdom, Tobit, etc., the term was used by Protestant reformers to mean books that the "heretics" held sacred but which were not part of either the Jewish or Christian canon.

The Orthodox churches, Roman Catholics and Anglicans group the books together as "deuterocanon", which means "second canon." The "protocanon", or "first canon," are the Old and New Testament.

[nealmhughes]

5. Officially, the Anglican Communion sees them as "good for example"

but not "worthy" enough to base doctrine or dogma upon. This includes Macabees, too!
It is hard to find a good Protestant version with the deuterocanonical books included.

[pansypoo53219]

6. looks newer to me

1870-1890. i have a mary baker eddy's sect copy of the apocrapha over 100 years old.
ooh, that section of ebay is very intoxicating. as i ain't got that kinda $, i do estate sales and i have gotten some awesome books of that caliber. reading a 1891 set of encyclopedia britannicas now. started with a 1903 one. sold some of my books for profit. did read the unread deco illustrated Decameron. damn that was good and now i have 2 other editions. i keep finding neat books. but luckily good book sales are not so common.
still want a complete 1903 set of EBs now.
ha! still on the 2nd A of 3.
also find some neat art.

just listed a book by alger hiss and another about his case. and one on madame curie. all 3 looked like good reads, but i read too slow.