Lost Books of The Bible

A week or so ago, I had bought a book from Chapters called "Lost Books of The Bible" by William Hone.  I had a really hard time reading this, when I first started .... I kept thinking "but this isn't the Bible", it created a real stumbling block to my reading.  Soooo, I googled the book, read some reviews on it and now I am slowly reading through it.  It is actually pretty interesting, so far .... it has even explained a few things that are missing from the Bible (like why Zacharias (or Zechariah) was killed in the temple).

So far, I have read two books from this book (1) The Gospel of the Birth of Mary and (2) The Protoevangelion.  Here are some of the things that I've learned from reading these two books (in no particular order):

• Mary's birth was foretold to her parents (Anna & Joachim) by an angel .... she was to be raised and educated in the temple.
• Mary had vowed her virginity to the Lord, it was a vow she was resolved never to break.
• Joseph was a widower, very far advanced in years, with children - he was chosen by God to be Mary's husband.
• Joseph married Mary and did not know her but kept her in chastity (??? does this mean that the siblings of Jesus, that are mentioned in the Bible, are Joseph's children from his first wife and not from Mary???).
• Zacharias was murdered in the entrance of the temple and the altar by Herod's servants because he would not tell Herod where his son John was being hid (Herod had commanded the killing of the infants when the wise men returned home another way and didn't tell Herod where Jesus was) - Elizabeth (John's mother) had taken him to the mountains to hide him so that he would not be found and killed.

So, as of right now, my conclusion on this book is that it is a pretty good read - I'm not sure how many of these books are 'man inspired' rather than God inspired ..... but, so far, a pretty good read.  ˚Ü˚