Who wrote the Bible ?

The bible, from the latin and greek word “biblia” means books.  It is a library of short books (or anthology = collection of writings).  The bible is composed of the “Old Testament” (“jewish bible”) and the “New Testament” (basis of Christianity).

What is a “testament”?  In the ancient use of the word it meant covenant.  As in a contract or pact or agreement or understanding between our creation entity (“God”) and his creation (people).  The New Testament is the new covenant brought about by the appearance of Jesus Christ, which supplements the original covenant.

The Old Testament used by Catholics is composed of 46 books (Protestants use an Old Testament with 39 books).  Written over the course of approximately 600

years (1,000 BC to 400 BC), primarily in Hebrew, the Old Testament includes topics such as law, philosophy, history, words of wisdom, and poetry.  The jewish bible is also known as the “Tanakh”, an acronym for the 3 category divisions of the Old Testament:

Torah (Law)

Nevi’im (Prophets)

Kethuvim (Writings)

The 39 or 46 books of the Old Testament describe the traditions, laws, and history of the Jewish people.  The “Torah” (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy) appears to have been written by several authors (5?) who compiled divinely inspired oral traditions and written traditions.  The Torah includes the famous 10 Commandments that Moses was divinely inspired to write.  The books in Prophets and Writings were written by different people at different times.

The Old Testament was not available as a single collection to the common man before the death of Jesus since books did not exist.  Writings were made on scrolls (papyrus or leather) and maintained by rabbis or other religious leaders.  The discovery of the “Dead Sea Scrolls” after 1947 and subsequent dating revealed that the scrolls were produced between roughly 300 years before Jesus Christ up to within the time of Jesus.  The scrolls, from clay pots in caves in the area of Qumran in Egypt, include portions of every book in the Old Testament (except the book of Esther).  The scrolls were written in Hebrew and Aramaic (the Syrian language spoken by Jesus and the community at the time).  The process of writing the books of the Old Testament arguably started in approximately 1,000 BC, with oral tradition before that passing down the information.  The official Jewish bible appears to have been finally compiled by 90 AD.  When the jewish diaspora (dispersion) occurred into the greek speaking world, Hebrew and Aramaic became less popular and holy scrolls began to be translated into greek (i.e. 250 BC).  The greek translation is known as the “Septuagint” which is the most popular translation used by Catholics.

After the amazing life of Jesus Christ as eye-witnessed by countless individuals, Christianity was born.  Starting with the eyewitnesses to Jesus’ experience, his appointed Apostles, and his disciples, information (tradition) was passed on verbally initially but recorded in writing relatively quickly during the first century AD.

The collection of writings that make up the “New Testament” include:

·         the 4 gospels,

·         the Acts of the Apostles,

·         21 letters attributed to (based on information obtained from) Paul, James, Peter, John, and Jude,

·         the Book of Revelation.

27 books in all in the New Testament.  These form the “canon” (rules) that are the authority of Christianity.

“Gospel” was derived and translated from a greek word meaning “good news”.  There is one overall gospel of Jesus Christ (the good news of Jesus Christ).

“The gospel according to Matthew” was written by an unknown author who appears to have attributed the book to the disciple Matthew because Matthew was responsible for some of the traditions (information) passed on verbally.  The gospel appears to have been written a short time after 70 AD (i.e. 70 to 80 AD).  Jesus was crucified and departed (resurrected) in 30 to 33 AD.

“The gospel according to Mark” is likely the first to have been written, in approximately 70 AD.  The book has been attributed to John Mark, cousin of Barnabas, and companion to Apostle Paul on a missionary journey, and an interpreter for Peter.

“The gospel according to Luke” has been attributed to a writer from 80 to 90 AD named Luke, a second generation Christian from Antioch (north of the holy land in modern day Turkey).  This gospel was written by a non-palestinian for a non-palestinian audience of gentiles (non-jews).

“The gospel according to John” appears to have been written by 1 or 2 individuals in 90 to 100 AD, but is attributed to the Apostle John because his verbal traditions may have formed the basis of much of this gospel information.

The “Acts of the Apostles” is really the second part of the book of Luke.  It focuses on the apostles Peter and Paul and their evangelism efforts.

The "letters" (a.k.a. epistles) were to churches and individuals in the Roman world, and are the first written documents of the early church.  13 of the “letters” are by the Apostle Paul or his immediate disciples and are the oldest writings in the New Testament (written between 50 and 60 AD).

“Revelation” uses extravagant symbolism and figurative language to convey messages about the faith.  Symbolic language was popular in 200 BC to 200 AD.  It encourages Christians to remain steadfast against challenges.  It is suspected that the book was written in 81 to 96 AD, the author “John” a prisoner on the island of Patmos (greek island in roman empire), imprisoned for being a Christian in the current Roman empire.  The author may have been a disciple of John the apostle based on the authority of the language and the focus on Asia.  The book of revelation includes a vision of the apocalypse (i.e. the 4 horsemen metaphor for the 4 phases of our destruction, etc).

Today there is more information to support the Bible than ever.  New ancient manuscripts are discovered periodically, adding to the historical accuracy.  Ancient manuscripts confirm that the text of the scripture has been copied reliably.  There are nearly 6,000 handwritten manuscripts of the New Testament written in greek.  Scribes copied ancient texts on papyrus and medieval parchment.  There are over 10,000 ancient manuscripts in Old Latin.  There are over 5,000 ancient manuscripts in other languages.  Put together, there is an enormous body of evidence that the original biblical texts were copied accurately and consistently.  Yes there are subtle variations in the 140,000 words in the New Testament in the translations, "but 99% of the variants do not change the meaning of the text, they are misspellings or differences in word order." [Gary Bates + Lita Cosner, CMI].