Deuterocanonical Books

The deuterocanonical books (from Greek deuteros, second + kanon, rule) are the books accepted as canonical by the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches but not by Protestants or in the Hebrew Bible. The Roman Catholic Church uses the term to distinguish them from the protocanonical books (universally accepted), while Protestant traditions call the same writings the Apocrypha (Greek, "hidden things"). The books include: Tobit, Judith, 1–2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Baruch, and additions to Daniel (Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, the Prayer of Azariah) and Esther. They were written primarily in the intertestamental period (c. 300 B.C. – 100 A.D.) and were included in the Septuagint. Jerome, while translating the Vulgate, placed them in the Bible but noted their secondary status. Luther removed them from the OT canon but included them as an appendix. The Council of Trent (1546) formally declared them canonical for Roman Catholics. Protestant scholarship values them as historical and religious literature illuminating Second Temple Judaism, but does not grant them scriptural authority alongside the canonical OT.