My Grand-Father was a huge history buff. And he told me on more than one occasion that he read in history books about the Catholics hiding the Original Christian Bible. He told me after that was done, Christianity was constantly changed to suit the Catholic way. However he did not tell me what year this was done or who ordered it done, and why.

My question is, is this true did the Catholics really hide the Bible deep down in the Vatican’s vaults? If so who had it done, when and why?

Or did the book my Grand-Father read end up being wrong?

p.s. my Grandad was also born and raised as a Catholic and he was NOT a Mason or part of any other anti-catholic group, so these must have been hard words coming from a person who was born and raised as a Roman Catholic.

Edited spellings

Well, I cant tell you that its right or wrong, but I can offer a why. Think about it, if you have controle of a religious book which many people follow, you can slowly twist the followers into thinking/doing what you want.

Right on Stellar

Historically there have been two times the Bible was changed.
The first was when Constantine did it at the Nicean Conference which decided which gospels would form the New Testament.
The second was about 1200 AD by Augustus the 12th.
You have hints to what was actually supposed to be in the Bible if you research the Nag Hammadi Library, the Dead Sea Scrolls and a variety of texts that have been recovered like the Gospel of Mary.

It's sad, but I think the book has been compromised to a point, yes.

To my knowledge there was never an original Christian Bible. The Bible was not put into a complete book until 300 something AD by Constantine. Before this people had many writings that originated from the original Christians, but no one had all of the writings at once readable from front to back. Deception came from Constantine and his call to make the Bible, he and others decided what to put in the book and what to leave out. Many critical books like the Gnostic writings were left out because they where much to radical like supporting rights for woman. Hence the reign of the phallic Christian rule that still sickens the earth to this day.

i dont even think the bible that we read today is the real bible its a made up 1 by priests

Regardless, even if we are talking about the first book that the religous folk decided to term the Bible, wouldn't it make sense to hide it? I mean, if I had a book that I believed came from the Lord and Master of all existence, I would probably make sure it stayed in a steel safe, once some decent copies had been scanned.

i agree i belive its in a safe place somewhere maybe the pope knows where it is hehe

The Gnostic books also had some teachings in them that are generally considered incorrect. The biggest one is that the Gnostics teach that Christ did not have a corporeal body, but instead had an illusionary body for us to see. The underlying principal is that Christ was 100% divine. The problem is that if his body was not real, he did not suffer at all on the cross, and did not really die for us.

The jewish, by contrast, believe Christ was 100% human.

Contemporary theology from both the Fundamentalist and evangelical christians is that Christ was BOTH 100% human and 100% Divine, wholly and inseparably both.

A note about what the Bible IS may also be in order.

The definition most evangelical churches use is generally to the effect of "The inspired word of God, written by men."

Of course, men are fallible. Men are limited in their ability to understand God's will and inspiration. Men can only write things within the concepts with which they understand (which is why the bible seems to be chauvanistic in places-men at that time did not understand the concept of women being equal to men any more than we would understand the concept of furniture being equal to men). In other words, there is a lot of room for human error within the bible.

One thing that supports this fact is that archeologists have discovered versions of the old testament from several eras, and each has some changes from the previous. The earliest manuscripts actually contain no vowels at all, odd as that sounds>

The definition used by fundamentalist, which I reject, is that the Bible is the "Perfect word of God." This poses a lot of problems, and puts Fundamentalism in direct conflict with science and Darwinism. In my view this definition is too absolute, leaving no room for any error at all.

If you apply the evangelical definition, than it doesn't necessarily matter if the bible exactly matches the original manuscripts. Instead, what is important is God's message to us and his faithfulness to us (that's right, God is faithful to us, despite our shortcomings).

I read that they have altered the 'truth' .... (to suit their agenda). The catholic church has also kept vital information from the world concerning the christian bible and the world in which we live. Maybe some day they will let us in on this vital information.

Is it safe to say then that if the Bible is not complete, Islam and Judiasm may also not be completly completed ether. What I mean in, what is told in the Bible, Koran, And the Jewish Bible ( I dont konw if theres a word for it) may not be all completly true?

Another thing between Christians and Muslims is the Adam and Eve story. There both different.

And they can't be both true. Can they?

Maybe in alternate dimensions they can be?

hehe, j/k. I think there's a seed of truth in the stories that is self-evident to those seeking truth and no matter what evil people do to corrupt and control, that seed of truth will mature in the individual and grow and produce fruit in spite of them.

Getting hung up in teh details... does it matter more if the 2 theives on the cross were to the left or right of Jesus? or does it matter more that one of them asked for forgiveness and received it? Does it matter more if Jesus had his feet nailed with 2" iron tacks to the cross measured to a millimeter, or that he was there on a mission of peace, love, and forgiveness?

That's my opinion on it sorta.

The Catholic church does have a lot of traditions that are not biblically supported, and which are widely questioned.

The original versions of each of the books of the New Testament were written in greek, and are known as the septuigent. They are available to everyone who knows greek, and protestant bibles such as the King James version are all based on the septuigent, not the Roman Catholic latin version.

The original versions of each of the old testament books have been lost to history. Many of the books have several different manuscripts from various periods, and there is an "evolution" each of the books undergoes as it gets rewritten/updated. All of this occurred long before the Roman Catholic Chruch formed and got their hands on any of it. If you want a "true" Old Testament, well, no such thing exists that is known about.

As far as withholding vital information, the Catholic church during midevil times was known for being very restrictive in sharing information about the bible. Holding mass in Latin, "the Lord's Tongue" (according to the Catholics), is an example of that. How do you learn about Christ if the worship service is in a foriegn language?

Honestly, I think there are bigger issues to worry about.

I cant say this to be true or not and can offer no evidence but to the why part well I recommend you watch movie called "The Body" It falls into same line as you ask. In this a body is found in a cave (skeleton actually) in same areas Christ was said to been laid. This skeleton bares scarring similar as to what a person to have been crucified would have. Body was found in secret chamber in cave so now Catholics send Priest Antonio Bandares to prove this body is NOT Christ! All evidence points as to it actually being Christ's remains and the Catholic Leaders are going nuts! This film could help explain the why for you if your story is correct

The bible was written by over 40 different people from kings to priests and tax collectors doctor, just to name a few. The word bible comes from the word biblica, which means small library, because it is in fact 66 small books! So the fact that the original 66 books are all in the same place, would be phenomenal, because it wasn’t until a thousand years or so ago that some of the books were started to be brought together. And so much has changed and been changed down through time that to say they are anything like the original would be a little far fetched. The churches changes what needs to be changed to suit them? Why should we think it was any different a hundred or a thousand years ago, if anything it was worse.

This is such an interesting thread. I read something, years ago, that stated the catholic church would reveal certain things for the benefit of all mankind (at some point in the future), but for now information had to be sealed. This is the conspiracy, I suppose. What do you think?

The Fatma thing? Weren't they all read except the last one was only read partially?
Heard it was something about aliens...

Im sure there are some things the president dosen't even know about and I wouldn't believe that the pope has full knowledge of where the bible is, or if there is an original copy around.

Yes, I do recall that did happen already. In South Park their priest found the original copy of the bible under the vatican. Its too bad though cause it collapsed and many priests died... And I also believe a giant spider fits in somewhere in this story.

Aliens?...yes, that is what I read.

Thank-you for all your information. I am glad that I am not the only one who thinks something might not entirely be right in Christianality.

ofcorse it matters. Thats history. If you cannot get the details of history completly right, then theres no point in telling it at all. If you tell people details of events that are not true they will belive it is true. Then for generations to come that information will be passed down generatio to generation, but none of it would be true. And that is a lie. And telling something like that is wrong.

A Great Honest man in history may be precieved later on to be a Hated Brutual Dictator?

Does this Great Honoruable historical character diserve to be remember liked that if that was not true at all?

And the Freemasons, Ive read alot of things about them on this site that are infact NOT true. Such as for example, the Masons believe in the "Devil". This is not true but it is a common misconception.

Do you get my point?

I get your point.

Is it more important to have a paperclip, or to know the name and birthdate of who invented it?
Which is more important, the message, or the messenger?
The forged documents, or the truth they might be telling? Hmmm, that might be a bad example...

I gotta watch myself too, getting to my 'belief' area... The seed of truth, is wrapped in the story. If the fruit around the seed is damaged, the seed is still protected. Once the seed gains root, it grows and brings it's own fruit. If the story is damaged, the seed of His message, is still protected. When you think about the stories with acceptance, the seed grows and bears fruit. It's possible to eat the fruit and throw away the seed. It's possible to read the story, damaged or not, and never accept the seed into your thinking.

I can't contribute any more until I can think of another way of saying it. I do get your point though. Being true to the truth, history, and facts is very important, or you can wind up with things like the whole Noah debicle, or what Egypt might have done with their history.

I beleve the vatican has many books related to the books of the bible, written by scholors and monks. libraries have been robbed and burnt to the ground, like the library at alexandea. The point is this collect all the books that prove that what is written is true,or collect them becuase it proves what you beleve is fake.
ex. jesus was killed becuase political leaders and jewish presits had something to hide. Think of the crusades and what they collected to bring back to the church,
the spear that pirced christ side, the shroud, bones of saints, just think what they have that you havent seen that no body has since they came back from the crusades. This is the mystery of god, who do you beleve? men, men who dont like to fail who twist things to make iusses go their way or god the ever silent watcher who gave us the power of freewill, a wise man says nothing. Just as u are being tempted everyday, he tests u everyday with topics like this one. now thats said,
people are tricky, i beleve half of what i see and half of what i hear which is y i dont go to church, but some of what is in the bible is indeed true, most of the fantastic stories in it are for teaching morals and values, plus us having been so far removed from these events it is natural for us to question.
but for me it all comes down to who or what do u beleve...................................

The only part of the Bible I believe in is the Ten Commandments. I believe that thats how everyone should run there lives, however, with many people this is not the case. Even with many people who "feel God in there hearts".

As for things that have been hidden from the Crusades Gabriel,

The Shroud of TOurin has not been hidden and it is in a musuem in Europe I believe, however many people believe it to be a fake. And it has not been proven or disproven to being a fake.
The Spear the Purst Chrit side was believed to have been hidden by the Nazis, and in replace of that the Nazis devolped a new fake spear. However, I believe the Spear was never recovered, and remains hidden probably somewhere in Germany.

Here is a comical but factual answer to your questions:

http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0031/0031_01.asp

Please read the comic book at the end of this link. Then research for yourself from the references.

Some more places to look...

http://www.auc.org/Beliefs/bible.html
http://www.myfortress.org/manuscriptevidence.html
http://www.carm.org/questions/extrabiblical_accounts.htm
http://www.creationevidence.org/cemframes..../10reasons.html

Occult history* tells us that we are still emerging from the "Dark Ages", a time when knowledge was lost and ignorance reigned.
The same history tells us that in an effort to control the people and regain power, the clergy (or their equivalent), those who held the REAL power for many centuries, altered and changed many aspects of the ancient philosophy in order to keep their people in ignorance.
Of course it's possible that the Church has many fascinating documents hidden away ... but how would they explain having them and not releasing them to the people? Such a confession, although the offence was perpetrated centuries ago, would further undermine the Catholic Church's reputation with it's followers ... not to mention admitting that the organization has been corrupt for centuries ...

hey, maybe all that occult wisdom is true ....

* The Opening of the Third Eye, Vera Stanley-Alder (i think that's her name ....)

I am not a great defender of the bible or the 'faith' god knows(mmm) i have been kicked out of the only bible club i ever went too, for having 'ideas' and not 'understanding God' (uh?) However I do know that if you read the dead sea scrolls, (an apptitude towards reading dead languages would be helpful at this point), there are only a few errors in spelling of names ect which dont change the overall story of the bible and would suggest it remains in tact! Bored yet? Me too. I'm going to another thread before someone calls me names and kicks me outa here too lol

I just found this forum and began reading assorted posts and religion is always a great topic. Soooo here's my view.....
If you belive in god and the bible then due to what is said about him would it not be reasonable to assume such a powerful being would not allow his teachings to be altered to a point as they would be false or incorrect? It would seem since we are looking at baking in hell forever if we don't live by and follow the bible that that would be a good assumption. At least in my eyes. Otherwise this god is not all he is cracked up to be and there is no reason to have any faith what so ever in any part of the bible or christian faith. I suppose I have always seen that I should take the writings at face value or not at all.

Can I just point out that the freemasons are not an anti-catholic organization.

I happen to be a member and a catholic, they are not interested in your religious leanings, just your belief in a supreme being.

Just thought that needed clearing up.

your right gollum

In most countries the free masons have a massive catholic mebership.

However gollum in west of scotland you must agree that the masonic lodge and the orange order do have some shady links.

You have been listening to too many fire-and-brimestone fundamentalists.

God will not condemn us for not following every detail of the bible.

Take for instance Leviticas 15, which requires that any man who has a discharge (through sex or otherwise) must be considered unclean for 7 days and then must bath and present 2 turtledoves to the priest. Anyone who touches an unclean man or sits where an unclean man sat is then unclean for 7 days. How many Christians really do that?

In truth, it is not through our actions, or lack thereof, but through the Grace of Jesus that we are protected from hell.

As far as God protecting the bible, he does not intervene directly, but does work through his holy spirit to try to keep it reasonably pure. As far as the idea that the bible is the perfect word of God, I want to know where Abel's wife came from (since God only created Adam and Eve, according to the bible, and they only had 3 sons, Cain, Abel, and Seth). This in my mind is one example that shows that the bible is not God's perfect word, but instead is something else.

One definition I have heard, which makes sense, is that it is the inspired word of God written by man. Men of course are fallible. Men are limited in their ability to understand God's inspiration and logic. Men who only understand things withing the frame of their understanding.

so independent 1 do we simply decide what to exclude to follow and see as reasonable for the way of a christian or does society do that? yes I agree man is fallible and the bible is not correct but would be true to the whole. that is the point I was trying to make. so opinions on what to follow?

tt.

Yeah and they left out heaps of books too. The Book of Enoch was the original Bible and there books on Solomon and Noah, stuff on Adam and Eve, Ezra etc which are MUCH MORE in depth and more amazing than what is written in what is commonly recognized as our present Bible. There's also stuff from the NT that they left out.

There are a lot of books that were left out of the old testament. Surprising, the catholic church includes more books than the protestant church, 7 more to be precise.

The books that are not in the bible are called the apocraphyl writings. Many of the Old Testament apocraphyl books are considered to have some validity to them. The book of Enoch does add details to the Genesis story, however I am not sure if their is a clear concensus on which was written first, Genesis of Enoch.

All of the New Testament apocraphal books are considered to be heresies of various sorts. Some present the idea that Jesus had a special level of heaven for a select group of people who are in on a special secret, and too many are called Gospels (ie.. the Gospel of Mary Magdeline, the Gospel of Peter, the Gospel of Timothy, etc...)

outstanding independent! I am pleased I found this forum. Being in the church until the age of 18 I learned a great deal as well as traveling in central america doing mission work and have fought within myself with a variety of issues that are based solely upon christianity and the bible. I am familiar the the quotes you gave and with the apocraphal writings. and as far as which is right for the deciding. simply a personal level is the only solution that makes any sense for myself. My parents have always said "Don't forsake the Assembly" but my response has always been an assembly is a group of people, I don't need a special building in order to learn and congregate to worship. Mabye I am wrong or mabye not but that is simply a question that will not be answered in this life and I feel the world is in for a rude awakening when the end finally comes and people see that sitting in a pew for 50 yrs singing the same songs reading the same passages year after year has gotten them nothing. There has to be the desire and action by all to know what is there.
I know people that have been christians all there lives and still don't know simple small facts of the bible since it is not taught fully from cover to cover. ex.... noah took 2 unclean and 7 clean animals on the ark. Not the little 2 by 2 song they teach my kids. that may be trivial to some but it is a bad start to a wonderful book of knowledge. No one knows what a Nephiliam is and that would fascinate children and adults alike to open the mind to something that is not mundane and old fashion. well I am getting off track and have forgotten what I my point was but I know I will enjoy this forum....

Mission work is a very good and rewarding experience for anyone who engages in it. I have not had the opportunity to engage in any mission work, but I have heard so many good stories about the successes of mission work in changing peoples lives.



Wherever 2 or 3 are gathered in my name, I am there. (I would site a reference to that verse, but I can't find it at the moment). The point of that verse though is clear, whether you attend "church" on Sunday or gather for small bible studies, you are engaging with Christ and building faith in him.

Too many people do just sit in the pews, without getting involved or putting energy into understanding the word of God. There is value to attending worship on sunday, but that value comes in direct proportion to what you put into it.

A few years ago I started attending a smaller protestant church (as opposed to the giant Catholic ones I grew up in). Everyone at the church volunteers a lot of time on various things to keep the church running, and I think everyone takes away a lot from each other's efforts. Very few people just "sit in the pews." I teach confirmation classes and assist with the liturgy, both of which have been rewarding for me, and hopefully a benefit to the church.



On the item with Noah, if I can add a little bit, there are actually 2 seperate accounts which both conflict. Genesis 6:19-20 says 2 of each, while Genesis 7:2 says 7 (or 7 pairs) of all clean animals, and 2 (or 2 pairs) of all unclean animals. It is an interesting tidbit that not a lot of people know about. The later seems more likely, as there are lists of what animals constitute clean and unclean, and a lot of species would not fall on either list and thus would not be on the ark. Thus, questions such as "how did Noah travel to South America to get all of their species of animals on the ark?", "How did Noah get to Australia and get Kangaroos on the Ark?", and "How did Noah find room for all of the millions of species of animals on the ark?" are no longer relevant.

The Nephilim (Genesis 6:4). They have a very minor spot in the Bible. Our church maintains a couple of theories on what they were, with the most likely being fallen angels, but their is another theory that they are the offspring of angels who fornicated with human women.

Definitely the Church has altered the BIble to its wishes.The projection of christ as a "non-human" species is a proof for that.History reveals christ as a normal person ,some one like buddha...but BIBLE puts it other way...making him a Hero


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Simply, i have one response to this topic. The accusation that the Catholic church delibirately hid or changed the bible to suit their way is simply an anti-Catholic view of the church, a way to tear the church down and a way to discredit it. Let's look at the facts...the Catholic church has been around 2000 years, along with its brethren churches (the greek orthodox, coptic orthodox and so forth) and was the ONLY Christian denomination (besides heretical sects, gnostics and so forth) until Martin Luther came along (who by the way is quoted as saying on his deathbed "What have i done? I have split our mother from her children" in reference to the Church). The Christian denominations today owe their formations to the Catholic church and quite simply... they owe their Christianity to those who held on and passed it on the correct way for the 1500 yrs before Luther.

And to say that the bible has been altered is to say that you don't trust in the providence of God to protect His "word" to man on Earth. You can not have that much distrust in God's providence...in man yes, but not in God.

The Roman Catholic Church did not "change" an existing Bible. The CHRISTIAN CHURCH (the only one at the time) formed the New Testament by selecting the books that it would contain out of almost hundreds of writings that could have been found at the time. At this time all the NT books had been, were letters and memoirs of the Apostles. All of the NT authors were Jewish except Luke who was a gentile doctor. The church chose the cannon of books to be the NT and grouped it with the Old Testament. The books that were left out of the NT were left out for good reason. Some were written almost 100 years after Christ and others were written to take a place in the OT. The church made no changes to the OT. The other books were found to be NOSTIC, which is where the author has gone beyond the teachings of Christ trying to add to or take away or manipulate his teachings.
Books like Enoch, Gospel of Timothy, Gospel of Mary, the Protoevangelion, and others where all found to be GNOSTIC and where left out. The church also had no evidence of who the authors where and could not be proven to be inspired.

The only major change to the bible was by the protestant reformers following what they thought were the teachings of Martin Luther. In this event the Apocryphal books where removed from the bible. And also sections of other OT books (Esther I believe) and they debated on whether to remove the book of Revelations.

The Catholic Canon of the Bible is the oldest Canon still in use today. All fundamental Catholic teachings are either found completely in, or are based upon this canon of writings.

The dead see scrolls where examples of the writings that religious groups studied before the canon was formed. These writings were demanded destroyed by the church for there GNOSTIC teachings and that order of men chose to hide these writings in hopes that at some point the church would change its view. As you can see they never did. No early church father, or early leader of the church has ever been known to quote these GNOSTIC writings because either they had not been popular in the core religious body of the church or because the fathers of the church knew that they where not inspired. Or, both!

Hope this helps somebody! All of these facts can be found in a History Channel Documentary that I will look up the name of later, that is if you desire, so e-mail me if you are interested. I might even have a copy.

God Bless,
Joshua

I just have to say that you need to read very VERY deeply into the history and true teachings of the Masons. Every pastor, priest, brother, or deacon I have known that was a meber ran away as fast as they could have when they really looked deep at the true teachings of the Masons.

"Just like your faith, before you claim to be something, you better know what it means!"

~Joshua

Most likely ( in response to OP )

concepts such as hell , certain prophecies , and other such lore dont seem to fit in with Jesus's teachings which were more on how to live ones life .

As a sidenote, Martin Luther never wanted to break from the Catholic church. He just wanted to change some practices that he thought were wrong, and the Pope at that time refused to even listen. Martin Luther, for his part, was very bull-headed and refused to back down, and as a result was excommunicated.

Ironically, at that time most people thought the church needed to be reformed in some ways, and after he left and after a few other reformation movements (The calvinists, the anabaptists, and the Church of England) the fear of more break-offs led the Catholics to introduce some reforms at the Council of Trent.

The main point is that the Catholic Church carried the torch of Christianity for 1,500 years, sharing it with the orthodox churches for part of that time.

that comes from a college history web site.

As for the Nicean Council, they decided which of the gospels would be considered true, in many ways altering the bible by removing books, choosing which ones would be accepted, deciding the status of Jesus as son of God or prophet and deciding what the "message" of the church was. All presided over by a pagan.

Later on it was decided that women should not have a seat of authority in the church and a full fledged plan was set out to minimize women's role in the bible and church. this plan was very succesful.

And as an extra bonus when you celebrate Christmas, you're celebrating the birthday of Mithras, a pagan deity who was the son of the High god(whatever the name was) through a virgin birth, he was then tortured to death and later ressurected. The church decided to celebrate this day as the birth of Jesus in order to win over converts from a very powerful pagan religion by insinuating that the story of Mithras was in reality the story of Jesus despite Mithras being around for hundreds(?) of years before Jesus.

Thank you for clarifying...that is what i meant