Protestants removed certain books which belong to the canon established by the early Church.

Hello Truescotsman, I appreciate your willingness to discuss/debate these issues. Yes, we are more dealing with the historical situation rather than the content of the deuterocanonicals, though we can discuss that as well in another debate if you would like. In response to what you said about the Council of Hippo, notice nothing in your quote of canon 24 demonstrates what was included in the Old Testament, so that quote alone does not prove the Council of HIppo maintained the Protestant canon of the Old Testament. As evidence that the Council of Hippo did approve of the Catholic canon, which includes the Deuterocanonicals, I offer the following quote from the famous Protestant historian, J. N. D. Kelly: "The same inclusive attitude to the Apocrypha was authoritatively displayed at the synods of Hippo and Carthage in 393 and 397 respectively, and also in the famous letter which Pope Innocent I dispatched to Exuperius, bishop of Toulouse, in 405" (J N D Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, 55-56). Just for good measure, Catholics also acknowledge the Council of Hippo listed the deuterocanonicals (I list this so you can see what I claimed was reliable according to both Protestants and Catholics about the Council of HIppo) "At the Synod of Hippo (393), and again at the Synod of 397 at Carthage, a list of the books of Holy Scripture was drawn up. It is the Catholic canon (i.e. including the books classed by Protestants as 'Apocrypha'). The latter synod, at the end of the enumeration, added, 'But let Church beyond sea (Rome) be consulted about confirming this canon'." (The Catholic Encyclopedia) The Council of Carthage also confirmed the Catholic canon, as it says: "It was also determined that besides the Canonical Scriptures nothing be read in the Church under the title of divine Scriptures. The Canonical Scriptures are these: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua the son of Nun, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings, two books of Paraleipomena, Job, the Psalter, five books of Solomon, the books of the twelve prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezechiel, Daniel, Tobit, Judith, Esther, two books of Esdras, two books of the Maccabees. Of the New Testament: four books of the Gospels, one book of the Acts of the Apostles, thirteen Epistles of the Apostle Paul, one epistle of the same [writer] to the Hebrews, two Epistles of the Apostle Peter, three of John, one of James, one of Jude, one book of the Apocalypse of John. Let this be made known also to our brother and fellow-priest Boniface, or to other bishops of those parts, for the purpose of confirming that Canon. Because we have received from our fathers that those books must be read in the Church. Let it also be allowed that the Passions of Martyrs be read when their festivals are kept." (B.F. Westcott, A General Survey of the History of the Canon of the New Testament (5th ed. Edinburgh, 1881), pp. 440, 541-2.) As to the claim the Council of Trent officially proclaiming the canon, we should note a previous ecumentical council already confirmed the Catholic canon (e.g. the Council of Florence) officially. The Council of Trent simply elevated the doctrine to a dogma. Thus, it is established that the early Church determined the deuterocanonicals were part of the canon, well before the Council of Trent. For this reason, it can legitimately be claimed that the Protestants removed certain books which belong to the canon established by the early Church, following Luther's example of rejecting the deuterocaononicals during his debate with Johann Eck, after Eck pointed out that purgatory is based on a 2 Maccabees. Protestants maintained the deuterocanonicals in their Bibles for several centuries, not aceepting them as Scripture, but as accepting them as profitable for historical appendix. In conclusion, I would like to quote again from the famous Protestant historian, J. N. D. Kelly, who concedes the Catholic claim that the early Church maintained the deuterocanonicals as part of the canon, as he says: "It should be observed that the Old Testament thus admitted as authoritative in the Church was somewhat bulkier and more comprehensive than the [Protestant Old Testament] . . . It always included, though with varying degrees of recognition, the so-called Apocrypha or deuterocanonical books. The reason for this is that the Old Testament which passed in the first instance into the hands of Christians was . . . the Greek translation known as the Septuagint. . . . most of the Scriptural quotations found in the New Testament are based upon it rather than the Hebrew.. . . In the first two centuries . . . the Church seems to have accept all, or most of, these additional books as inspired and to have treated them without question as Scripture. Quotations from Wisdom, for example, occur in 1 Clement and Barnabas. . . Polycarp cites Tobit, and the Didache [cites] Ecclesiasticus. Irenaeus refers to Wisdom, the History of Susannah, Bel and the Dragon [i.e., the deuterocanonical portions of Daniel], and Baruch. The use made of the Apocrypha by Tertullian, Hippolytus, Cyprian and Clement of Alexandria is too frequent for detailed references to be necessary" (Early Christian Doctrines, 53-54).