Whitaker's "Disputations on the Holy Scriptures Against the Papists," Ch.7, 67-71. Whitaker is dealing with the canon in general and, here, in particular, the Book of Baruch.
The photos below are from St. John's College, Cambridge, where Whitaker laboured in his work against the Romanist theologians, Bellarmine and Stapleton. Whitaker is fair, balanced, clear, academic, Reformed, and very Calvinistic.
http://www.archive.org/stream/disputationonhol00whituoft/disputationonhol00whituoft_djvu.txt
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CHAPTER VII.
OF THE BOOK OF BARUCH.
Order requires that we should now treat particularly of these several apocryphal scriptures : and first of those which are counted parts of the canonical books. Here, in the first place, what is commonly called "the book of Baruch" claims an examination. To confirm the authority of this book, our opponents avail themselves of four arguments. The first is, that there is a quotation made from the last chapter of Baruch in 2 Mace. ch. ii. The second, that the councils of Florence and Trent place this book by name amongst the canonical scriptures. The third, that the church takes some lessons from this book in her anniversary offices. The fourth, that many fathers produce testimonies from this book as canonical.
From these premises Bellarmine concludes that this book is truly canonical (Lib. i. c. 8). To these we can answer briefly : for the arguments are, as you see, altogether slight ones, and require no very long reply. Thus, therefore, I answer them severally.
To the first : The second book of Maccabees is apocryphal ; as I shall hereafter prove by demonstrative arguments. Now one apocryphal book cannot confirm by its testimony the authority of another apocryphal book. Therefore this is no argument.
To the second : We care nothing for those councils. They were popish and altogether antichristian assemblies. The papists may attribute as much weight to those councils as they please : we refuse to be pressed or bound by any such authority.
As to what is objected in the third place, — although the church used to read, and still does read, certain parts of this book, yet it by no means hence follows that the book is in the genuine and strict
sense canonical. For we have shewn above, from Jerome and other fathers, that the church was wont formerly to read books not canonical, for the benefit of the people in forming their morals, but
not for confirmation of the faith. Besides, what church is it whose example they object to us as an argument ? For we are so far from recognising in the custom of the Roman church the force of so
great an argument, that we count it a matter of very slight importance.
To the last: I acknowledge that some testimonies are cited from this book by the fathers ; and I add too that some of them believed this piece to be a part of Jeremiah. And, in truth, this book does seem preferable to the rest of the apocrypha : for everything in it, whether we consider the matter or the style, appears more august and suitable to the sacred character than in the other books. Nevertheless, the book is apocryphal, as you shall hear. There is no consequence in this reasoning : Some fathers thought this book a part of Jeremiah, therefore it is a part of Jeremiah. For those fathers were in error, as is manifest. Nor is there force in this inference: Some fathers cited testimonies from this book,
therefore the book hath canonical authority. For testimonies are often alleged from other books also, which are by no means to be esteemed canonical. Irenaeus cites the book of the Shepherd (as
Eusebius relates, Lib. v. c. 8) l ; but I suppose he did not deem that book part of the canonical scriptures. Yet, alleging a passage from it, he hath used the expression, "Well spoke the scripture which
says, &c." And Eusebius writes of him, "He receives the scripture of the Shepherd.'" And Nicephorus also attests the same, Lib. iv. c. 14. In like manner Athanasius, in his third oration against the Arians,
produces something from the book of Baruch : but the same writer does also, in the same oration, bring forward a testimony, to prove that the word is God, from the third of Esdras, which book our adversaries confess to be apocryphal. Testimonies out of this third book of Esdras are used also by Cyprian (Epist. lxxiv.) 2 ; by Augustine (Yet. ac Nov. Test. Qusest. 109 3 , and Civit. Dei, Lib. xviii.
c. 36) 4 ; and Ambrose (De bono Mortis, c. 10), in order to prove that souls are not extinguished with the body 5 . Now this book of Esdras is not canonical, as the papists themselves allow ; so that it is manifest that the cause is not concluded by this argument.
The papists object, that these books of Esdras are not cited by those fathers as sacred and canonical, but that the book of Baruch and the rest are cited and mentioned by them in such a manner as to shew that they thought them to be truly canonical. Therefore there is no analogy between the two cases. I answer, that they are indeed styled by them sacred, and scriptures, but in a certain general sense. For most of them did not suppose that the books were sacred in such a sense as to leave no difference between them and the books which are truly divine and canonical. This John Driedo, one of the chief popish writers, expressly testifies in the case of this very book of Baruch. For thus he writes (de Cat.
Script. Lib. i. c. 4. ad Difficult. 11): "So Cyprian, Ambrose, and the other fathers cite sentences from the book of Baruch, and from the third and fourth of Esdras, not as if they were canonical books, but as containing salutary and pious doctrines, not contrary, but rather consonant to our faith 6 ." A papist answers the objection of the papists : for in these words he denies that the book of Baruch is either canonical, or cited as such by those fathers. Melchior Canus too (Lib. xn. c. 6) writes thus of this same book: "For, as Ave have shewn in the second book, the church hath not placed the book of Baruch in the number of the sacred writings so certainly and clearly, as to make it a plain catholic verity that it is a sacred piece, or a plain heresy that it is not. That book, therefore, or any other, which may be called in question without heresy, can not produce certain and evident verities of the catholic faith 7 ." From this testimony of Canus I collect, in the first place, that the book of Baruch is not clearly canonical : in the next, that we may deny its canonicity without heresy : lastly, that no firm and evident verity of the
catholic faith can be derived from this book; — an evident proof that the book itself is apocryphal, since all canonical books are fit to produce certain and evident verities of the catholic faith.
Aquinas, however, in his Commentary upon Jude, says, that it is " lawful to derive a testimony to the truth from an apocryphal book," since Jude the apostle hath cited a passage from the apocryphal book of Enoch, v. 14. But, although I by no means deny that it is just as much lawful to quote a passage from an apocryphal book, as from a profane author, — as Paul cites an Iambic line from Menander, 1 Cor. xv. 33, a hemistich from Aratus, Acts xvii. 28, and an heroic verse from Epimenides the Cretan, Tit. i. 12 ; yet I do not think that this passage, which Jude recites, is taken from an apocryphal book, because Jude uses the term TTpoeipYirevae, " he prophesied. 11 Consequently, he hath adduced this as a prophetical testimony : unless, perhaps, he used the word prophet here in the same sense as Paul when he called Epimenides a prophet ; though, indeed, he does not style him a prophet simply, but a prophet of the Cretans.
We have now sufficiently shaken the authority of this book. For I ask, who wrote it? Either Baruch himself, or Jeremiah, is counted the author of the book. But neither of them could have written it ; as is clear from hence — that it was written in Greek, not in Hebrew, as Jerome tells us, and as the book itself shews. For Jerome says, in the preface to Jeremiah 1 , that this book is not read by the Hebrews, nor extant amongst them, and that it was therefore wholly omitted by him. But if it had been written by that Baruch, or by Jeremiah himself, it would doubtless have appeared in Hebrew, not in Greek : for Jeremiah spoke in Hebrew, and published his prophecies in the Hebrew language ; and Baruch was Jeremiah's scribe, and committed many things to writing from Jeremiah's lips, as we find in Jerem. xxxvi. 4. Besides, the very phraseology and diction is Greek, not so condensed, nervous, sedate, and majestic as the style of scripture is wont to be. In the Epistle of Jeremiah, which is recited in Chap, vi., the expression, " Ye shall be there seven generations," (v. 2), is new and foreign to the Hebrew idiom : for in the Hebrew books the term "generation" is never used to designate a period often years, as Francis Junius hath correctly observed. Whoever wrote this book was a Greek, or wrote in Greek. Consequently he was neither Baruch nor any other of the prophets. Thus we prove by inevitable deduction that this book must be necessarily esteemed apocryphal.
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