The Bible is controversial, inside and outside of the church. Anyone with experiential knowledge of the Bible and people's reactions to it realizes this. Just as the Bible itself is controversial, so is a collection of books called the apocrypha which various denominations hold different stances towards. Containing books like Judith, Susanna, and Bel and the Dragon, the apocryphal works remain highly controversial, partially because Catholicism allows these books into the canon of Scripture while Protestants exclude them from it. The Old Testament apocrypha is a collection of more than ten books that people have dissented the divine origins of for centuries. Versions of the Bible throughout history have included varying amounts of apocryphal works and have placed them in different locations throughout the Bible, sometimes after the New Testament books and sometimes in other spots.
Christians, my past self included, have labeled the apocrypha theologically false, although not completely bereft of historical insight, because it allegedly contradicts the Bible. Now, I just admitted that I have used this argument in the past. However, there is a major flaw in it. That flaw is that the Bible itself, according to both non-Christians and Christians, can seem to have contradictions. But many of the examples people often point to can be easily harmonized and therefore aren't really contradictions, just paradoxes or illusory problems or nuanced truth claims. If the Bible can seem to possess contradictions without actually having any, then it is at least possible that the same is true about the apocrypha.
Of course the apocrypha may actually contradict the Bible, but I highly doubt that most Christians who believe that conclusion have given the same amount of thought to analyzing the alleged inconsistencies in the apocrypha as they have to figuring out if the Bible has contradictions or not. I would need to read and study the apocrypha again before I make further specific claims about its individual books, but I have noticed that perhaps the most popular argument against the divine inspiration of the apocrypha simply isn't logically consistent with what Christians know elsewhere. If the Bible is not full of contradictions though on a superficial level some may seem to exist, then Christians need to consider that the same is possibly true about the apocrypha.
Some of the apocrypha's books actually provide great insight into Jewish culture and attitudes. Susanna is about how two evil men commit capital perjury against Susanna by accusing her falsely of adultery, exemplifying the process of Mosaic Law when it comes to trials, witnesses, and implementation of the Law (especially Deuteronomy 19:16-21). 1 and 2 Maccabees tell of how the Jews resolutely fought against foreign oppressors led by the historical figure Antiochus Epiphanes. Bel and the Dragon recounts an alleged addition to the boom of Daniel where Daniel exposes the deceitful practices of a cult of the deity Bel and cleverly kills a dragon. Either way, the apocrypha is not totally deficient of value from an academic or historical perspective.
Does the apocrypha legitimately belong in the canon of the Bible? I do not know, but I do know that the falsity of some of its books does not mean that all of them are invalid, just as I know that the appearance of contradictions between the Bible and the apocrypha or the apocrypha and itself--or the Bible and itself--does not necessarily mean that any actual contradictions exist. What I am about to say next is nothing more than articulation of a subjective preference, but I personally would rather appreciate the existence of books inspired by God outside of the Bible I carry around with me so frequently. This would mean that we humans have been allowed more special revelation by God than many Christians have imagined to be the case--something I do not at all find unfavorable to me. Though I will likely not have time to intensively read the apocrypha until the summer, I have indeed realized that some Christians, my former self included, have fallaciously and inconsistently judged the apocrypha to be false on very logically unsatisfactory grounds. Until then, I am thankful for this realization. It is time that Protestants at least admit their fallacies when they have resorted to unsound arguments in order to stave off an idea of the canon that is foreign and unfamiliar to them.
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