At what point did holy books stop being updated?

And for that matter, are there any core books that are still being actively updated? The bible hasn't been updated for a long time.

I could be wrong. I am extremely ignorant on theistic affairs. I'm also writing this at 18 mins past midnight.

Translations, annotations, and an incredible amount of exegeses don't count?

I think he might be asking about when the canon stuff is agreed upon. Translating a root text into another language wouldn't update the root text itself.

Translations are what people actually read, so them changing is important.

The New International Edition version of the Bible dates from 1965. It's been revised since then several times.

The New American Bible is also of similar vintage.

The Koran is in Classical Arabic, which is accessible to modern Arabic speakers, so it's not been quite as revised I believe.

Religion that have continuous revelation might be what you seek.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuous_revelation

this religion in theory can add new chapter to their holy book. ex: Community of Christ

or find new religion that the prophet still alive : raelian, etc

Old Testament was defined 70 AD, Council of Jamnia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Jamnia New Testament was defined in 325 at Nicaea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaean_Creed

I believe the Talmud is subject to pretty much constant addendum. It's basically the Universe Concordance for the Tanakh, containing a record of all the Rules Lawyering hashed out by millennia of Jewish intellectuals.

Continuous revelation sounds like it. Basically, what stops stuff from the modern era and back to when the religious books stopped being written being included as religious doctrine?

Depends on the religion in question. Basically anybody can start making their own addendum to any set of holy texts they like (or in fact their own new holy texts) and the only obstacle to that being "an update of a holy book" is how many people they can get to agree with them. The Book of Mormon was published in 1830, L. Ron Hubbard was adding stuff to Scientology pretty much until his death in the 1980s, etc.

I think once an organized church has settled on a core doctrine, it will become extremely difficult to change it, without alienating all the people who joined/were socialized under the original doctrine. You could hardly get the Catholic Church to add or delete a book from the Bible without causing all sorts of conflict. A serious effort to do this would probably break the church, creating a schism. They don't want to go through that again, and neither does anyone else. So holy books as a general rule only get changed when someone creates a break-away denomination, and proposes a new or revised set of holy books to be the core documents. Protestantism is full of these, for example.

After all, most holy books are based on the experiences of one or more holy persons. It would take the arrival of a new person recognized as a legitimate spokesperson for God to propose a new book with any credibility. That's very unlikely, for the reasons given above. Anyone claiming to speak directly for God is much more likely to found a whole new religion.

The Heathen lore stopped being updated when the Norse went Christian.

It might get updated again, but don't keep your hopes up: Modern society is too bland for saga-worthy heroics. Once the Heathens form tribes and start doing interesting stuff, there might be updates. If (a very big if) it ever happens.

I always figured that if the apocalypse happens and civilization falls, the next belief system will be based on a literal interpretation of Lord of the Rings.

Well, in Mormonism, the last update to our actual physical scripture books came in 1978.

However, new doctrine is being given even today, but in other forms such as pamphlets and sermons.

What was and wasn't going to be in The Bible was decided centuries ago. Adding or removing from that would be like adding or removing chapters from Lord of the Rings. But people's understanding of scripture changes over time, and there have been mountains of books written since then that either add to, illuminate or argue against The Bible.

Also different religions do update their own beliefs. The Catholics have the Catechism. Protestant denominations have their own books of doctrine that get revised regularly.

My understanding of Catholic doctrine is that they place Tradition on the same footing as Scripture. Which, as a priest explained to me, is because tradition came first. John Wesley, founder of Methodism, said that doctrine should come from Scripture, Tradition, Reason and Experience.

So while the Holy Books themselves stay the same, people's understanding of them changes. In that sense, revision is a continually ongoing process. Even people who claim to abide by "sola scriptura" aren't, because they're applying their own ideas and beliefs to scripture.