The two books known as 1Maccabees and 2Maccabees are sometimes counted in the canon of the Holy Sciptures and sometimes not. As far as I know, the Catholic Church counts them in while most of the Protestants hold them as Apocryphes.

Do any Protestant denominations hold them as canon?

But my most important question is actually different: do you know what were the reasons for some denominations to exclude the books from the Bible?

I am interested as I have just read them... bloody stories these are!  As far as I know that piece of history, the Machabean uprisings were very bloody indeed, but the thing is - in the Books it is all described in the way like "and they prayed to God for protection and God helped them and they killed over 30 thousand enemies, and they praised God...". Well.
Sure, these were different times. but not that much. In the age of Moses or Saul and David - yes, many centuries back, and IMPORTANT centuries from the point of view of the so called civilisation progress. Hammurabbi's "eye for an eye" was indeed a big progress, too.

But the Maccabees were there around 150 years before Christ. Sure, whatever the "progress", the days were no less bloody (they still are), but what I mean is that only 150 years later there comes Jesus and in the very same community he teaches that one should love his enemy, that who fights with sword, dies from sword (sorry if the quotes are inaccurate, I don't know the English version of Bible), that God sent his Son to the world because he loved all people so much... He was a real radical!

Bobi 1 Kenobi

B. Beware
O. Of
B. BOB 

This link was interesting

http://www.myjewishlearning.com/holidays/Hanukkah/TO_Hanukkah_History/
Revolt_334/Heroes/Omitting_Maccabees.htm

"It has also been suggested that the exclusion of the Books of the Maccabees can be traced to the political rivalry that existed
during the late Second Temple Period between the Sadducees and the Pharisees.
The Sadducees, a priestly class in charge of the Temple, openly rejected the oral interpretations that the Pharisees,
the proto-rabbinic class, openly promoted. The Maccabees were a priestly family, while the rabbis who may have determined
the final form of the biblical canon at Jamnia were descended from the Pharisees."

Perhaps the answer lies more within the realm of pragmatism and politics. The Books of Maccabees
describe the revolt led by the Maccabean family against the Syrian king, Antiochus Epiphanes. A couple
of centuries later, Jewish scholars found themselves in Jamnia with the Temple destroyed and
Jerusalem lost. Their circumstances were the result of their own failed revolt against the
Romans... Perhaps they felt it unwise to promote a text that heralded the successful outcome of a Jewish revolt.

...Ironically, this very internal/external struggle lies at the core of the Hanukkah story,
and perhaps it was this very struggle playing out again in history that prevented the
basic texts about Hanukkah from being included within the biblical canon."

BOB1 - I don't think any Protestant denomination views Macabees as part of the canon. I know their contents but haven't personally read them. And I think it was Luther who ended up pushing for removal of these books (I think). But I'm not sure what the situation was at the time, nor his reasons, except maybe trying to seperate his new movement from the Roman Catholic Church.

they are very bloody books, but the part that cannot be forgotten is the reasoning for teh fighting - Jews were being forced to denounce their religion, and they were fighting back.  

Jordan .

Bobi 1 Kenobi

B. Beware
O. Of
B. BOB