You’d think the answer is simple. It isn’t. If you grew up in a Protestant church, you probably learned there are 39 books in the Old Testament. Easy. You might have even memorized them in a catchy song. But then you pick up a Catholic Bible and suddenly there are 46. Or you talk to an Orthodox friend and they’re looking at 49 or even more depending on the specific tradition. It’s confusing.
The number of books of the Old Testament isn't just a math problem; it's a window into 2,000 years of history, theology, and some pretty intense arguments between bishops and scholars.
Honestly, it’s about the "Canon." That’s the fancy word for the official list. When people ask how many books are in there, they’re usually asking which ones "count" as scripture. The reality is that different groups of Christians—and the Jewish community—answer that question differently. It’s not that people are adding new stuff today; it’s that they never fully agreed on where to draw the line centuries ago.
The Protestant 39: The Standard Most People Know
Most English Bibles sold in the US follow the Protestant canon. This list of 39 books matches the Hebrew Bible exactly, though the order is different. If you open a Jewish Tanakh, you’ll see the same content, but they group them into 24 books. They combine the twelve minor prophets into one "Book of the Twelve" and keep Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles as single volumes instead of splitting them into "1 and 2."
Why 39?
Reformers like Martin Luther wanted to go back to the Hebraica Veritas—the Hebrew truth. They decided that if it wasn't in the Jewish Hebrew scriptures, it shouldn't be in the Christian Old Testament. This was a bit of a "back to basics" movement in the 1500s. Before that, things were a lot more fluid.
You’ve got the Pentateuch (Genesis to Deuteronomy), the Historical books, the Poetic books like Psalms and Job, and then the Prophets. It feels complete. It ends with Malachi, which in the Christian arrangement, points nicely toward the New Testament. But this 39-book limit actually dropped some books that had been used by Christians for over a millennium.
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Why the Catholic Bible Has 46 Books
If you go to a Catholic Mass, you’ll hear readings from books like Tobit, Judith, or Wisdom. These are part of what Catholics call the "Deuterocanon"—literally the "second canon."
It’s not that they are considered "lesser" scripture now, but they were recognized at a different point in history. The Catholic number of books of the Old Testament sits at 46 because they stuck with the Septuagint. The Septuagint was the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures used by Greek-speaking Jews and the early Apostles.
Back in the day, most early Christians didn’t speak Hebrew. They spoke Greek. So, the Bible they used included these extra books that were circulating in the Greek world. When the Church was formalizing the list at councils like Hippo (393 AD) and Carthage (397 AD), they included these books because they were already being read in the liturgy.
It’s a different vibe. Tobit is a story about a man blinded by bird droppings and an angel in disguise. Maccabees tells the story of the Jewish revolt that gave us Hanukkah. If you only read the 39 books, you miss the historical "gap" between the end of the Old Testament and the start of the New.
The Missing Links: What the Deuterocanon Includes
- Tobit and Judith: Narrative stories of faith and bravery.
- 1 and 2 Maccabees: Crucial history of the 2nd century BC.
- Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach: "Wisdom literature" that sounds a lot like Proverbs.
- Baruch: Written from the perspective of Jeremiah’s scribe.
- Additions to Esther and Daniel: Extra chapters and prayers that aren't in the Hebrew versions.
The Orthodox Variations: It Gets Even Bigger
If you think 46 is a lot, the Eastern Orthodox traditions say "hold my incense."
The Greek Orthodox Church generally recognizes several more books, such as 3 Maccabees and 1 Esdras. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church has the largest canon of all, including books like Enoch and Jubilees. For them, the number of books of the Old Testament can climb into the 50s.
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Why the discrepancy? Geography and isolation.
The Ethiopian church, for example, was isolated for centuries. They preserved ancient Jewish texts that the rest of the world basically lost or threw away. When Western scholars "rediscovered" the Book of Enoch in the 1700s, the Ethiopians were basically like, "Yeah, we’ve been reading this the whole time."
How the Council of Trent Settled the Score (For Some)
For a long time, the "list" was a bit loose. People had their favorites. But the Protestant Reformation changed everything. When Luther started questioning the authority of certain books—and even suggested the New Testament book of James was an "epistle of straw"—the Catholic Church had to double down.
At the Council of Trent in 1546, the Catholic Church officially and dogmatically defined the number of books of the Old Testament as 46. They issued an "anathema" (basically a formal excommunication threat) against anyone who said these books weren't sacred.
This was the final divorce between the Protestant and Catholic Bibles. Before this, you’d often find the "extra" books in the back of Protestant Bibles in a section called the "Apocrypha." Even the original 1611 King James Version had them! It wasn’t until the 1800s that Bible societies started printing Bibles without the Apocrypha to save on printing costs and because of growing theological pressure.
Why Does This Even Matter Today?
You might think this is just ancient history, but it changes how you read the text.
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If you are researching the "Intermediate State" of the dead or praying for the deceased, you’ll find support for those ideas in 2 Maccabees. If you only have 39 books, those concepts might seem like they came out of nowhere.
Also, the New Testament writers were clearly reading these "extra" books. The Book of Hebrews mentions people being "tortured, refusing to accept release" (Hebrews 11:35), which is almost certainly a reference to the martyrs in 2 Maccabees. Jude explicitly quotes the Book of Enoch.
Even if you don't believe these extra books are "divinely inspired" in the same way as Genesis or Isaiah, they provide the essential cultural "glue" that explains how the world changed from the time of the Persian Empire to the time of Jesus.
Quick Reference for Book Counts
- Jewish Tanakh: 24 books (same content as Protestant OT, just grouped differently).
- Protestant Old Testament: 39 books.
- Catholic Old Testament: 46 books.
- Eastern Orthodox: 49 to 50+ books (varies by specific national church).
Common Misconceptions About the Canon
A big mistake people make is thinking that the "extra" books were "added" by the Catholic Church in the 1500s. That’s factually wrong. They were in the Bibles used by the vast majority of Christians for 1,500 years. The real historical shift was the Protestants removing them from the primary status they had held.
Another misconception is that the Jewish community "voted" on a final list at a place called the Council of Jamnia around 90 AD. Most modern scholars, like Timothy Lim or Lee Martin McDonald, now think this "council" is a bit of a myth. The Hebrew canon was likely settling down much more organically over a long period.
Actionable Steps for Exploring the Old Testament
If you want to actually understand the number of books of the Old Testament and what they contain, don't just take a side. Explore the texts.
- Get a Bible with the Apocrypha. Look for a "New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) with Apocrypha" or a "Common English Bible (CEB) with Apocrypha." Reading these books will give you a much better handle on the history leading up to the New Testament.
- Compare the Table of Contents. If you have a friend from a different tradition, look at your Bibles side-by-side. See where the order changes. The Catholic and Protestant Bibles generally follow the same order until the end, but the Orthodox Bibles often move things around.
- Read 1 Maccabees. Even if you don't view it as "scripture," it’s a gripping historical account of the Jewish fight for independence. It explains why everyone in the New Testament was so obsessed with a Messiah who would kick out the Romans.
- Check out the Dead Sea Scrolls. Researching the findings at Qumran shows us that ancient Jews were reading a huge variety of texts, many of which didn't make it into anyone’s "official" list. It helps put the whole "canon" debate into perspective.
The bottom line is that the Bible is a library, not a single book. And like any library, different librarians have different ideas about what belongs on the "essentials" shelf. Knowing why those choices were made helps you appreciate the complexity of the faith traditions that have preserved these texts for millennia.