When people talk about "the Bible," you might assume they’re all referring to the exact same book. The Holy Bible isn’t just one book, actually. Depending on who you ask, it doesn’t even have the same number of books. Different branches of Christianity and Judaism count the books differently. Crazily enough, some include extra books you may not have even heard of.

Why all the variety? Well, it comes down to history, beliefs, and a few big decisions made by religious leaders hundreds and even thousands of years ago. In this article, we’re going to break it all down as simply as possible. We’ll go over how many books each major version of the Bible has. Then we'll explain why there are differences, and give you a clear picture of what’s included where.