The Bible is a collection of sacred texts or scriptures that Jews and Christians consider to be a product of divine inspiration and a record of the relationship between God and humans. With estimated total sales of over 5 billion copies, it is widely considered to be the most influential and best-selling book of all time.
But where exactly did the Bible come from? How did we end up with the version of the Bible that exists today? To understand the origins of the Bible, we need to go back to the very beginning.
The Old Testament/Hebrew Bible
The first section of the Bible is the Old Testament, which contains many of the foundational stories of Judaism and Christianity, including the creation of the world, the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt, and the establishment of Israel as God’s chosen people. For Jews, these texts make up what is known as the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh.
The Old Testament is a collection of writings produced over a span of almost 1000 years, from approximately 1200 BCE to 100 BCE. The oldest texts are believed to be the five books of the Torah – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. According to tradition, these were given to Moses by God on Mount Sinai. Modern scholars believe they were written by multiple authors over several centuries, then edited and compiled together later on.
The next major section of the Old Testament is the prophets – these include the major prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and the 12 minor prophets such as Hosea and Micah. The prophets spoke messages from God to warn, encourage, or admonish the Israelites. Their writings include both their oracles as well as some narratives about their activities.
The final section of the Old Testament is the Writings, which includes books like Psalms, Proverbs, Job, and Esther. This diverse group includes histories, wisdom literature, liturgical poems and songs, and other genres.
According to Jewish tradition, the canon of the Hebrew Bible was formalized by the Men of the Great Assembly in 450 BCE. The Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered in the 1940s and 50s, contained Hebrew manuscript fragments dating back to 150 BCE that follow the same canon. This provides evidence that the Old Testament canon had already been fixed by the 2nd century BCE.
Development of the Old Testament
The Old Testament texts were originally written on scrolls of papyrus or parchment. Scribes called Sopherim meticulously copied these texts by hand and ensured their accurate transmission. Synagogues would keep a careful copy of the Torah scrolls.
With the rise of the Roman Empire, Greek became the common language of the eastern Mediterranean. Between 250-150 BCE, the Hebrew Old Testament was translated into Greek in Alexandria, Egypt. This translation is known as the Septuagint. It was the primary Bible for Greek-speaking Jews and later the early Christian church.
A standardized Hebrew text of the Old Testament was not fully developed until well into the medieval era. The Masoretes were Jewish scribes between the 7th and 10th centuries CE who added vowels and other marginal annotations to the texts to ensure proper grammar and pronunciation. This became known as the Masoretic Text, the authoritative Hebrew text still used today.
The Apocrypha
In addition to the canonized books, there were other Jewish writings from the period not included in the Hebrew Bible. These are known as the Apocrypha. They include books like Judith, Tobit, and Maccabees. The Septuagint included these books, as did the Latin Vulgate Bible. As a result the Apocrypha were accepted as scripture in the early Christian church. However, Jewish and most Protestant groups consider the Apocrypha to be non-canonical.
The New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian Bible, recording the life and teachings of Jesus Christ as well as the subsequent growth of the early church. The New Testament canon consists of 27 books written in the late 1st century CE.
The first four books – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John – are known as the gospels, which provide accounts of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The book of Acts details the early growth of the church after Jesus’ ascension. It is followed by the epistles or letters written by church leaders like Paul to various early churches and individuals.
The final book is Revelation, which describes prophetic visions seen by the apostle John on the island of Patmos. Its apocalyptic imagery has been subject to a variety of interpretations, but ultimately affirms God’s triumph over evil and suffering.
Development of the New Testament Canon
The books of the New Testament circulated amongst early Christian communities as individual manuscripts. There was no immediately established New Testament canon like for the Old Testament. By the mid-2nd century CE, early church fathers like Justin Martyr and Irenaeus were referring to core New Testament texts like the gospels and some epistles as scripture.
Around 367 CE, Athanasius of Alexandria provided the earliest known list of the 27 books of our current New Testament canon. This list was ratified by the councils of Hippo (393 CE) and Carthage (397 CE). By the early 5th century CE, the New Testament canon as we know it today was fully recognized.
Manuscript Transmission
Like the Old Testament texts, the books of the New Testament were copied by hand in manuscript form. This manual copying inevitably led to textual variations and errors accumulating over time. Pre-Gutenberg Bibles from the 13th and 14th centuries demonstrate the variations between regionally made translations.
The introduction of the printing press in the 15th century allowed Bibles to be mass-produced at a faster rate with increased consistency and accuracy. Important early printed Bibles like the Gutenberg Bible and Tyndale New Testament improved access and further standardized Biblical texts.
Translation into English
While some parts of the Bible had been translated into Old English in previous centuries, the first complete translation of the Bible into English was undertaken by John Wycliffe and his associates in the late 14th century. Between 1382 and 1384, they produced the Wycliffe Bible, which was banned soon after due to church restrictions on unauthorized translation.
In 1525, William Tyndale produced the first print translation of the New Testament into Early Modern English. Tyndale used newly developed Renaissance techniques of linguistics and textual analysis for translation. His translation formed the basis of subsequent English Bibles like the Coverdale Bible and Matthew Bible.
The most influential English Bible was the 1611 King James Version, also known as the Authorized Version. Completed by a team of scholars at the behest of King James I, it became the standard Bible for English-speaking Protestants. Its elegant Elizabethan language had a lasting impact on English literature.
In 1885, the Revised Version was published, which updated the KJV into more modern English. The discovery of older biblical manuscripts compelled scholars to revisit the translation. Further discoveries led to the Revised Standard Version in 1952, and the New Revised Standard Version in 1989, which is the preferred academic translation today.
There are numerous English translations marketed for different purposes, from study Bibles like the ESV to simplified versions like the New Living Translation. However, all major translations draw from the same ancient source manuscripts to provide God’s word in the vernacular tongue.
Archaeological Discoveries
Archaeological excavations in the Near East continue to uncover artifacts that provide tangential evidence relating to biblical events and figures. Important finds include:
- The Tel Dan Stele (c. 841 BCE) containing the earliest extra-biblical reference to the “House of David.”
- The Caiaphas Ossuary noting the burial of the Jewish high priest Caiaphas mentioned in the gospels.
- The Pilate Stone inscription (c. 36 CE) documenting Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea during Jesus’ crucifixion.
- The House of Peter’s excavation under Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome supporting its identification as Peter’s home church.
While these kinds of artifacts cannot definitively prove the Bible’s divine inspiration, they confirm aspects of the biblical record and the context within which its narratives unfolded.
The Bible Canons
In summary, the contents of the Christian Bible emerged over more than a millennium in ancient Israelite and Mediterranean contexts, before being compiled into canonical form by Jewish and Christian authorities in late antiquity. The different Bibles used today include:
- Hebrew Bible – The Masoretic Text of the Jewish Tanakh, containing the Torah, Nevi’im, and Ketuvim.
- Protestant Bible – Old Testament based on the Hebrew Bible, Apocrypha removed, and the 27 books of the traditional New Testament canon.
- Catholic Bible – Includes the deuterocanonical books of the Apocrypha in the Old Testament.
- Orthodox Bible – Contains additional books considered canonical in the Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox churches.
While differing in some contents, all bibles are considered by believers to faithfully represent God’s word anddeeds in ancient times. They provide continuity to God’s eternal teachings and the promise of salvation to mankind across generations. The preservation and spread of the Judeo-Christian scriptures played a vital role in human intellectual history and the advancement of civilization.