Bellarmine makes the exception:
They contain things that conflict with the canonical books and historical truth.
§ 234. [V] These books contain material that does not at all agree with canonical Scripture and historical truth. The story about the sacred fire and ark and tabernacle and altar placed and hidden on some mountain by Jeremiah (2 Maccabees 2:4) does not agree with the history of the kings according to the prophet Jeremiah. This happened either before the Chaldeans took the city, which could not have happened because Jeremiah was in prison until the destruction of the city (Jer. 37:18; 38:28), or it happened after the city was taken, which also cannot be said because the Chaldeans carried off all the vessels of the temple (2 Kings 25:13).
Bellarmine makes the exception:
That could well have happened both before and after the plundering of the city and temple: before—to be sure, not at the time of Zedekiah but of Jehoiakim—when Jeremiah was free and could, therefore, have carried off the tabernacle and ark with the king’s consent. This could have happened, too, after the city had been taken because the soldiers who were pillaging the city did not carry off the tabernacle and ark, as is clear from Jer. [52]:18, where we have a list of everything the Chaldeans took from the temple of the Lord, down to the basins and dishes, but the ark and tabernacle are not mentioned.
We respond. (1) 2 Maccabees 2:1 says, “It is also found in the records of the prophet Jeremiah that he ordered those who were leaving to take the fire [with them].” Verse 4: “It was also in the same writing that, since a divine answer was given to the prophet, he commanded that the tabernacle and ark accompany him.” But nothing about this matter occurs in the canonical writing of Jeremiah. (2) Neither Ezra nor Nehemiah, however, report anything about this miraculous concealing of the ark and tabernacle. (3) It is not likely that the ark, tabernacle, and altar of incense were carried off at the time of Jehoiakim because divine worship at the temple in Jerusalem flourished until the time of Zedekiah. Before the captivity, the priests would not have allowed the altar, ark, and tabernacle to be taken away nor could that removal have occurred after the destruction of the city and the temple. For who would believe that the Chaldeans would have spared the ark, covered over as it was with gold, when they carried off the basins and other vessels of lesser value? It says clearly in 2 Chron. 36:18 that “all the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the temple—all these they brought to Babylon.” And in v. 19: “And they burned the house of God, so that all its precious utensils were destroyed.” In Jer. 52:17ff. not only the gold and silver vessels but also the bronze vessels are said to have been carried away with them into Babylon before the temple was burned. How, then, could the ark have survived after the capture and burning of the temple?
** In 2 Maccabees 1 the Jews are said to have been deported into Persia, though they were deported to Babylon of the Chaldees. Rayhing makes the exception that the name “Persia” is being taken in a more general sense for neighboring Chaldea (Ench., p. 891). First Maccabees 6:5 and Chrysostom (Matthew, homily 6) say the Jews were freed from Persian captivity. We respond. When the message was brought to Antiochus (1 Maccabees 6) that his army had been slain in Judea, he was not in Babylon but in Persia on the way to Babylon (v. 4). Chrysostom calls it a Persian captivity not because of the proximity of Persia and Babylon but because the king of Persia, who had occupied the monarchy of Chaldea, took them captive. **
(4) The author of 2 Maccabees (2:8) adds that Jeremiah foretold that “those things again would be manifested in the congregation of the people.” After the Babylonian captivity, however, the Jews did not find nor keep that ark, that tabernacle, that altar—something that the rabbinic scholars themselves admit. (Cf. Kimchi, on Haggai 1; Massecheth Joma, as Drusius quotes him in Observat., bk. 15, c. 16; and Galatinus, De arcan., bk. 4, c. 10.)
Bellarmine objects: “Jeremiah is not speaking about that congregation that existed at the time of Cyrus. Rather, he is either speaking about the last time that will closely precede the Day of Judgment or he is saying that we must take this statement—that the ark would appear—to have a mystical meaning, that is, that Christ would come in the flesh in a new congregation of the people.” We respond. The first explanation is not possible. You see, once the sacrifices and ceremonies of the Old Testament have been removed, there will be no further use for ark or altar in the New Testament. His second explanation with respect to an allegory is true, but it does not fit the words of that fictitious Jeremiah: “The place will be unknown until God gathers the congregation of His people together and shows His mercy. Then the Lord will reveal these things (note: these things are able to be revealed), and the majesty of the Lord will appear. A cloud will also appear as was shown to Moses also.”