What Is the Apocrypha? The Full List and Why the Count Keeps Changing
August 16, 2026
The Apocrypha is a set of books that sit between the Old and New Testaments in some Bibles and are missing from others. The original 1611 King James Version printed 14 of them in their own section. Most King James Bibles sold today print none.
That is the whole idea in two sentences. The trouble starts as soon as you try to count the books, because the number changes depending on which tradition you ask, and almost every source you find quietly uses a different list without saying so.
This piece gives you the actual lists side by side, so you can see where the numbers come from instead of guessing.
The short answer
Apocrypha is the Protestant name for a group of Jewish writings from roughly the last few centuries before Christ. They were part of the Greek Old Testament the early church used, they were printed in Protestant Bibles for over 200 years, and they were gradually dropped from most editions during the 1800s.
Catholics keep seven of these books as full scripture and call them deuterocanonical rather than apocryphal. Orthodox churches keep a slightly longer set again.
So there is no single Apocrypha. There are three overlapping lists, and the word means something a little different in each tradition.
The word itself
Apocrypha comes from a Greek word meaning hidden or put away. In its earliest use it was not an insult. It described writings kept back from general public reading, not writings judged false.
The negative sense came later. By the time of the Reformation, calling a book apocryphal was a way of saying it was useful but not authoritative, which is roughly the position most Protestant confessions still take: worth reading, not to be used to settle doctrine.
Catholics avoid the word for these seven books precisely because of that later sense. They use deuterocanonical, meaning second canon, which marks the order in which the church settled the question rather than a lower rank.
The 14 books in the 1611 King James Apocrypha
Here is what was actually bound into the first King James Version, in the order it was printed. This is the list most people mean when they say "the Apocrypha" in English.
| # | Book | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 Esdras | A retelling of the return from exile, overlapping Ezra and Nehemiah |
| 2 | 2 Esdras | A set of visions about judgment and the age to come |
| 3 | Tobit | A family story involving a journey, a marriage, and an angel in disguise |
| 4 | Judith | A widow saves her besieged town by walking into the enemy camp |
| 5 | Additions to Esther | Extra prayers and detail folded into the Esther narrative |
| 6 | Wisdom of Solomon | A reflection on justice, mortality, and living wisely |
| 7 | Ecclesiasticus, or Sirach | A long book of practical advice, close in feel to Proverbs |
| 8 | Baruch, with the Letter of Jeremiah | Exile, confession, and a warning against idols |
| 9 | The Song of the Three Children | An addition inside Daniel |
| 10 | The Story of Susanna | An addition inside Daniel, an early courtroom drama |
| 11 | Bel and the Dragon | An addition inside Daniel, exposing a fraudulent idol cult |
| 12 | The Prayer of Manasseh | A short penitential prayer attributed to a king of Judah |
| 13 | 1 Maccabees | The history of the revolt behind Hanukkah |
| 14 | 2 Maccabees | The same period retold, focused on the people who lived it |
Counts of 12, 14, or 15 all appear in print for this same section. The difference is only ever bookkeeping: whether the three Daniel additions are counted as one item or three, and whether the Letter of Jeremiah is counted separately from Baruch or as its sixth chapter.
Why a Catholic Bible has 7, not 14
This is the single most common point of confusion, and it is worth being precise about.
A Catholic Bible does not contain the 14-book Apocrypha. It contains seven whole books drawn from that group, plus the additions to Daniel and Esther folded directly into those books rather than printed separately.
| In the KJV Apocrypha | In a Catholic Bible? |
|---|---|
| Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1 and 2 Maccabees | Yes, as full scripture |
| Additions to Esther and Daniel | Yes, inside those books, not as separate items |
| 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh | No. Printed in an appendix in some Latin Bibles, outside the canon |
So the seven-book answer and the 14-book answer are both correct. They are answers to different questions. Seven is how many whole books a Catholic Bible has that a Protestant one does not. Fourteen is how many items the 1611 King James printed in its Apocrypha section.
For the full 73-book Catholic canon laid out book by book, see the 7 books in the Catholic Bible not in the Protestant Bible.
The Orthodox lists are longer again
Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches generally accept everything in the Catholic list and then some. Depending on the church, that can add:
- 1 Esdras, treated as canonical rather than appended
- 3 Maccabees, a separate book from 1 and 2
- Psalm 151, a short psalm at the end of the Psalter
- The Prayer of Manasseh, canonical in some traditions
- 4 Maccabees, usually in an appendix rather than the canon proper
The Ethiopian Orthodox canon is broader still and includes books such as Enoch and Jubilees that no other major tradition treats as scripture.
This is why a flat number is never quite right. The honest version is that the Old Testament canon has a settled core and a contested edge, and the Apocrypha is the name Protestants gave to that edge.
Why Protestant Bibles stopped printing it
The reformers of the 1500s chose to follow the shorter Hebrew list for the Old Testament, which set these books outside the canon. They did not throw them out. They moved them into a clearly labelled section of their own, between the testaments, and kept printing them.
Removal from the printed page came much later and for practical reasons as much as theological ones. Through the 1800s, Bible societies stopped funding editions that included the section, and printers followed the money. Within a couple of generations most English Bibles had no Apocrypha in them at all.
That is why a King James Bible from 1611 and a King James Bible from a shop today can have different tables of contents while claiming the same translation. What books were removed from the Bible walks through that history in more detail.
What is not the Apocrypha
A lot of books get called apocryphal in casual conversation that have nothing to do with this section. If you are looking for any of these, you are looking for a different category entirely.
- The Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Judas, the Gospel of Mary. These are New Testament apocrypha, written well after the books of the New Testament, and were never printed in the Apocrypha section of any Bible.
- 1 Enoch and the Book of Jubilees. Old, genuinely interesting, and canonical only in the Ethiopian tradition. Not in the King James Apocrypha.
- The Book of Jasher. Mentioned by name inside the Bible, which is why people go looking. The text sold under that name today is a much later work.
The 14-book list above is the whole of what "the Apocrypha" means when the word is used precisely.
How to read them for yourself
The seven books a Catholic Bible carries are all available here as full text. The Douay-Rheims is the traditional English Catholic translation and includes every one of them in its usual place in the Old Testament.
If you would rather meet them than study them, the random Catholic verse tool draws from the full 73-book canon, so it can drop you into Sirach or Tobit or Maccabees without you needing to know where to look. Each book also has its own page if you want to stay in one place: Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1 Maccabees, and 2 Maccabees.
Tobit is the friendliest starting point. It is short, it is a story rather than an argument, and it needs no background to follow. Sirach is the one to open if you want something substantial, at 51 chapters.
The three books in the King James Apocrypha that no Catholic Bible carries, 1 and 2 Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh, are not part of the text on this site.
Common questions
What is the Apocrypha in simple terms? A group of Jewish writings from the centuries just before Christ that appear in some Bibles and not others. Protestants call them apocryphal and treat them as useful but not authoritative. Catholics keep seven of them as full scripture.
How many books are in the Apocrypha? The 1611 King James printed 14 items. You will also see 12 and 15, depending on whether the Daniel additions are counted as one or three and whether the Letter of Jeremiah is split from Baruch.
What are the books of the Apocrypha? 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, Tobit, Judith, the additions to Esther, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch with the Letter of Jeremiah, the Song of the Three Children, Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, the Prayer of Manasseh, 1 Maccabees, and 2 Maccabees.
Is the Apocrypha the same as the deuterocanonical books? Nearly, but not quite. The deuterocanon is seven whole books plus additions to Daniel and Esther. The King James Apocrypha holds all of those and adds 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, and the Prayer of Manasseh, which Catholics do not treat as canonical.
Was the Apocrypha in the original King James Bible? Yes. The 1611 edition printed all 14 items in a section between the Old and New Testaments. Most modern King James Bibles leave the section out.
Why was the Apocrypha removed from the Bible? The reformers placed it outside the canon in the 1500s while still printing it. It disappeared from the printed page mostly in the 1800s, when Bible societies stopped funding editions that carried it.
Is the Book of Enoch part of the Apocrypha? No. Enoch is canonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition and was never part of the King James Apocrypha.
Which Bible has the Apocrypha today? Catholic Bibles carry the seven deuterocanonical books, including the Douay-Rheims. Orthodox Bibles carry those and more. Some Protestant study editions print the full 14-item section under the heading Apocrypha.