malcolan
06-11-2005, 04:50 AM
HOW WE GOT OUR BIBLE
How did we get our Bible? Did it just magically appear one day? How did the books we have in the Bible get there? Did someone just decide one day which books were inspired by God and which ones weren’t?
To begin with, the question of which books belong in the bible is called the question of the canon. The word “canon” means rule or measuring rod, and in relation to the Bible it refers to the collection of books which passed a test of authenticity and authority; it also means those books are our rule of life. How was this collection made?
THE TESTS FOR CANONICITY.
First of all, it is important to remember that these books were canonical even before any tests were put to them. That’s like saying some students are intelligent before any tests are given to them. The tests only prove what is already true. In the same way, neither the church nor councils made any book canonical or authentic, even though some people will tell you they did, nothing could be further from the truth. Either the book was authentic when it was written, or it isn’t, it wasn’t made so by some council. The church or its councils simply recognized certain books as the Word of God, and in time those so recognized were collected together in what we now call the Bible.
WHAT TESTS DID THE CHURCH APPLY?
1.) There was the test of the authority of the writer. As for the Old Testament, this meant the authority of the lawgiver or the prophet or the leader in Israel. As to the New Testament, the book had to be written or backed by an apostle in order to be recognized. In other words, it had to have apostolic signature or apostolic authorization. For example: Peter was the backer of Mark, and Paul was of Luke.
2.) The books themselves had to give some internal evidence of their unique character, as inspired and authoritative. The content had to commend itself to the reader as being different from an ordinary book in communicating the revelation of God.
3.) The verdict of the churches as to whether or not a book was canonical was important. Surprisingly, or maybe not, there was unanimity among the early churches as to which books belonged to the inspired number. Though it is true that a few books were temporarily doubted by a minority, no book whose authenticity was doubted by any large number of churches was later accepted and included in our Bible.
THE FORMATION OF THE CANON.
The canon of Scripture was, of course, being formed as each book was written, and it was complete when the last book was finished. When we talk about the formation of the canon, we actually mean the recognition of the books by the Church; and this did take some time. Many believe that all the books of the Old Testament canon were collected and recognized by Ezra in the fifth century B.C. References from later writers (90-100 A.D.) indicate this. The discussion at Jamnia (70-100 A.D.) seemed to assume that the 39 books we have in the Old Testament now were accepted as the cannon. Jesus, in effect, defined the canon of the Old Testament when He accused the scribes of being guilty of slaying all the prophets God had sent Israel from Abel to Zechariah. (Luke 11:51) The account of Abel’s death is, of course, found in Genesis; and that of Zechariah is in II Chron. 24:20-21, which is the last book of the Old Testament in the Hebrew Bible, not Malachi as it is in our English Bibles. And He didn’t include any of the apocryphal books that were in existence at that time.
The first church council to list all twenty-seven books of the New Testament was the Council of Carthage in 397 A.D. Of course individual books were acknowledged as Scripture before then, and most just after the era of the apostles. Some were debated for some time before being considered as canonical. It was a process that went on until each one proved its own worth by passing the tests of authenticity.
The twelve books of the Apocrypha were never accepted by the Jews or by Jesus, He never quoted from a single one of them. Though they were highly thought of they were never considered Scripture. The Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament done in the third century B.C.) included the Apocrypha along with the books of the Old Testament. Jerome (340-420 A.D.) in translating the Latin Vulgate made a difference between the Apocrypha and the canonical books, which gave it a secondary status. The Council of Trent (1548) recognized the Apocrypha as canonical, but the reformers rejected this. In our English Bibles the Apocrypha was set apart in the Coverdale, Geneva, and King James Versions. The first English Bible to exclude it entirely was an Amsterdam edition of the Geneva Bible published in 1640, and the first English Bible printed in America (the Aitken Bible, 1782) omitted it.
IS OUR PRESENT TEXT RELIABLE?
The original copies of the Old Testament were written on vellum (leather) or papyrus (an early type of paper) from the time of Moses (c. 1450 B.C.) to the time of Malachi (400 B.C.). Until the discovery of the Dead Seas Scrolls in 1947 we didn’t have any copies of the Old Testament earlier than 895 A.D. The reason for this is that the Jews were almost superstitious when it came to the text of Scripture and buried copies when they became too old for good use. The Masoretes (traditionalists), who between 600 and 950 A.D. added accents and vowel points and in general standardized the Hebrew text. They devised complicated safeguards for the making of copies. They checked each copy carefully by counting the middle letter of pages, books and sections. Someone has said that everything countable was counted.
When the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, they gave us a Hebrew text from the second to the first century B.C. of all but one book (Esther) of the Old Testament. This was a very important discovery because it gave a much earlier check on the accuracy of the Masoretic text, which has proved to be extremely accurate.
Other early checks on the Hebrew text are the Septuagint (Greek translation from the middle of the third century B.C.), the Aramaic Targums (paraphrases and quotes of the Old Testament), quotations in early Christian writings, and the Latin translation of Jerome (400 A.D.) which was made directly from the Hebrew text of his day. All of these assure us that we have an accurate text of the Old Testament.
There are more than 24,000 manuscripts and fragments of the New Testament that exist today. All this makes the New Testament the best-attested document in all of the ancient writings. The contrast is absolutely startling. The next closest one is Homer’s “Iliad” with 643 copies.
Not only are there so many copies of the New Testament in existence, but many of them are early. The approximately seventy-five papyri fragments date from 125 A.D. to the eighth century and cover parts of twenty-five of the twenty-seven books and about 40 percent of the text. The many hundreds of parchment copies include the great Codex Sinaiticus (4th century), the codex Vaticanus (also 4th century), and the Codex Alexandrinus (5th century). There are over 2,000 lectionaries (church service books containing Scripture portions), more than 86,000 quotations of the New Testament in the church Fathers, old Latin, Syriac and Egyptian translations dating from the third century. All of this, plus all of the scholarly work that has been done, assure us that we have today an accurate and reliable text of the New Testament, and it is supported by all the facts.
I trust that you found this of great interest. I do as our faith isn't based on conjecture and false hope, it is based on evidence.
How did we get our Bible? Did it just magically appear one day? How did the books we have in the Bible get there? Did someone just decide one day which books were inspired by God and which ones weren’t?
To begin with, the question of which books belong in the bible is called the question of the canon. The word “canon” means rule or measuring rod, and in relation to the Bible it refers to the collection of books which passed a test of authenticity and authority; it also means those books are our rule of life. How was this collection made?
THE TESTS FOR CANONICITY.
First of all, it is important to remember that these books were canonical even before any tests were put to them. That’s like saying some students are intelligent before any tests are given to them. The tests only prove what is already true. In the same way, neither the church nor councils made any book canonical or authentic, even though some people will tell you they did, nothing could be further from the truth. Either the book was authentic when it was written, or it isn’t, it wasn’t made so by some council. The church or its councils simply recognized certain books as the Word of God, and in time those so recognized were collected together in what we now call the Bible.
WHAT TESTS DID THE CHURCH APPLY?
1.) There was the test of the authority of the writer. As for the Old Testament, this meant the authority of the lawgiver or the prophet or the leader in Israel. As to the New Testament, the book had to be written or backed by an apostle in order to be recognized. In other words, it had to have apostolic signature or apostolic authorization. For example: Peter was the backer of Mark, and Paul was of Luke.
2.) The books themselves had to give some internal evidence of their unique character, as inspired and authoritative. The content had to commend itself to the reader as being different from an ordinary book in communicating the revelation of God.
3.) The verdict of the churches as to whether or not a book was canonical was important. Surprisingly, or maybe not, there was unanimity among the early churches as to which books belonged to the inspired number. Though it is true that a few books were temporarily doubted by a minority, no book whose authenticity was doubted by any large number of churches was later accepted and included in our Bible.
THE FORMATION OF THE CANON.
The canon of Scripture was, of course, being formed as each book was written, and it was complete when the last book was finished. When we talk about the formation of the canon, we actually mean the recognition of the books by the Church; and this did take some time. Many believe that all the books of the Old Testament canon were collected and recognized by Ezra in the fifth century B.C. References from later writers (90-100 A.D.) indicate this. The discussion at Jamnia (70-100 A.D.) seemed to assume that the 39 books we have in the Old Testament now were accepted as the cannon. Jesus, in effect, defined the canon of the Old Testament when He accused the scribes of being guilty of slaying all the prophets God had sent Israel from Abel to Zechariah. (Luke 11:51) The account of Abel’s death is, of course, found in Genesis; and that of Zechariah is in II Chron. 24:20-21, which is the last book of the Old Testament in the Hebrew Bible, not Malachi as it is in our English Bibles. And He didn’t include any of the apocryphal books that were in existence at that time.
The first church council to list all twenty-seven books of the New Testament was the Council of Carthage in 397 A.D. Of course individual books were acknowledged as Scripture before then, and most just after the era of the apostles. Some were debated for some time before being considered as canonical. It was a process that went on until each one proved its own worth by passing the tests of authenticity.
The twelve books of the Apocrypha were never accepted by the Jews or by Jesus, He never quoted from a single one of them. Though they were highly thought of they were never considered Scripture. The Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament done in the third century B.C.) included the Apocrypha along with the books of the Old Testament. Jerome (340-420 A.D.) in translating the Latin Vulgate made a difference between the Apocrypha and the canonical books, which gave it a secondary status. The Council of Trent (1548) recognized the Apocrypha as canonical, but the reformers rejected this. In our English Bibles the Apocrypha was set apart in the Coverdale, Geneva, and King James Versions. The first English Bible to exclude it entirely was an Amsterdam edition of the Geneva Bible published in 1640, and the first English Bible printed in America (the Aitken Bible, 1782) omitted it.
IS OUR PRESENT TEXT RELIABLE?
The original copies of the Old Testament were written on vellum (leather) or papyrus (an early type of paper) from the time of Moses (c. 1450 B.C.) to the time of Malachi (400 B.C.). Until the discovery of the Dead Seas Scrolls in 1947 we didn’t have any copies of the Old Testament earlier than 895 A.D. The reason for this is that the Jews were almost superstitious when it came to the text of Scripture and buried copies when they became too old for good use. The Masoretes (traditionalists), who between 600 and 950 A.D. added accents and vowel points and in general standardized the Hebrew text. They devised complicated safeguards for the making of copies. They checked each copy carefully by counting the middle letter of pages, books and sections. Someone has said that everything countable was counted.
When the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, they gave us a Hebrew text from the second to the first century B.C. of all but one book (Esther) of the Old Testament. This was a very important discovery because it gave a much earlier check on the accuracy of the Masoretic text, which has proved to be extremely accurate.
Other early checks on the Hebrew text are the Septuagint (Greek translation from the middle of the third century B.C.), the Aramaic Targums (paraphrases and quotes of the Old Testament), quotations in early Christian writings, and the Latin translation of Jerome (400 A.D.) which was made directly from the Hebrew text of his day. All of these assure us that we have an accurate text of the Old Testament.
There are more than 24,000 manuscripts and fragments of the New Testament that exist today. All this makes the New Testament the best-attested document in all of the ancient writings. The contrast is absolutely startling. The next closest one is Homer’s “Iliad” with 643 copies.
Not only are there so many copies of the New Testament in existence, but many of them are early. The approximately seventy-five papyri fragments date from 125 A.D. to the eighth century and cover parts of twenty-five of the twenty-seven books and about 40 percent of the text. The many hundreds of parchment copies include the great Codex Sinaiticus (4th century), the codex Vaticanus (also 4th century), and the Codex Alexandrinus (5th century). There are over 2,000 lectionaries (church service books containing Scripture portions), more than 86,000 quotations of the New Testament in the church Fathers, old Latin, Syriac and Egyptian translations dating from the third century. All of this, plus all of the scholarly work that has been done, assure us that we have today an accurate and reliable text of the New Testament, and it is supported by all the facts.
I trust that you found this of great interest. I do as our faith isn't based on conjecture and false hope, it is based on evidence.