Protocanonical books Protocanonical books The protocanonical books are those books of the Old Testament that are also included in the Hebrew Bible (the Tanakh) and that came to be considered canonical during the formational period of Christianity. The term "protocanonical" is often used to contrast these books to the deuterocanonical books or apocrypha, which "were sometimes doubted" by some in the early church, and are considered non-canonical by most Protestants. There are typically 39 protocanonical books in most Christian bibles, which correspond to the 24 books in the Jewish Tanakh. The list of protocanonical books is Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua,
Development of the Old Testament canon phrase "Old Testament", which is associated with Supersessionism. The first list of Old Testament books compiled by a Christian source is recorded by the 4th century historian Eusebius. Eusebius describes the collection of a 2nd century bishop, Melito of Sardis. Melito's list, dated to circa 170, the result of a trip to the Holy Land (probably the famous library at Caesarea Maritima) to determine both the order and number of books in the Hebrew Bible, instead seems to follow the order of the books presented in the Septuagint. Melito's list, as cited by Eusebius, as follows: According to Archibald Alexander,