The Camouflage Canon - Paperback

by Simon Schwengler (Author)

What if the Bible you're reading isn't the same Bible your neighbor trusts?

Catholics count seventy-three books. Evangelicals count sixty-six. Somewhere between the two, seven "extra" books -- the Apocrypha -- hang in the balance, along with three deeply strange inspired books: Esther, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon, but do you know which two books omit God's name?

The Camouflage Canon goes straight to the evidence. Drawing on the Dead Sea Scrolls, the best translations, and centuries of manuscript history, Simon Schwengler traces how the Hebrew canon was actually compiled -- and why some books made the cut while others, despite being found alongside Scripture at Qumran, did not.

You'll walk through the case for and against the Apocryphal books, then dig into the hardest questions surrounding Esther, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon -- books skeptics love to point to and believers often can't defend. Was Esther "camouflaged" into the canon despite never naming God? Does Song of Solomon's sensuality disqualify it from Scripture? Does Ecclesiastes contradict the rest of the Bible, or complement it?

Written for Evangelicals and Catholics who want more than inherited assumptions, this book returns again and again to one question: what does the text itself say?

If you've ever wondered which books belong in your Bible, the evidence is waiting. Start reading The Camouflage Canon today.