Hmm, a theological paradox.

As I have recently been re examining my religious self to better understand and organize my faith, I noticed something odd.

Much of the basic ideals behind mainline christianity isnt in what most refer to as the bible. The concrete stuff is there, God created hevean and earth, Jesus saves etc, but much of the background stuff isnt.

All the stories surrounding Adam and Eve, Lucifer's fall from heaven (The Life of Adam and Eve), the war in heaven (The books of Adam and Eve), specific definitions of heaven and hell (The Apocalypse of Saint Peter), early church history, and the catholic ideas of purgatory and praying so that a loved one doesnt burn (The Apocalypse of Saint Paul), are all missing! They are however in the collection of books known as the Apocrypha or "The Lost Books". The problem with this is that as a whole the church decided at the council of nicine that the origins of these books were too sketchy, and that they believed that these books may not in fact be the inspired word of God.

So why does mainline christianity and catholicism teach these ideas as fact, when the church as an institution decided that these books werent fact. So much is missing from this puzzle. Does anyone know where I could get a copy of the Apocrypha, either online or hardcopy?

Most good KJV bibles have apocryphal books between the old and new testaments. I have a book called 'The Other Bible' that has a lot of apocryphal stuffs in it. It has gnostics gospels and lost epistles and the sort. You wanna read something interesting then try coming upon a copy of the Gospel Of Barnabas. It will give you a lot of food for the thought. The Gospel Of Thomas is also a good read. The apocryphal old testament books are interesting too, most notiably any Enochian writings. Pick up a copy of the Dead Sea Scrolls too. That should be enough to keep ya busy for a while.

Latin Vulgate, don't confuse American Catholicism with Ture Laitn Rite Catholicism. One true, one's a bastardization, guess which one.

TRUE definition of apocrypha here : http:../../etext.lib.virginia.edu/apocrypha_exp.html