A Short History of the Scriptures

How the Bible Came to Be:

A Quick Overview
A Long Oral Tradition (many centuries)
Like other ancient literature
e.g., Homer was orally transmitted for
centuries
Shared story with other
cultures of the ANE
Gilgamesh Epic
Enuma Elish

Psalms: A sung tradition

Much (if not most) of our faith is taught
orally and informally.

Think of your own experience.

Most of our Sacred Scripture consists of the
Hebrew Bible.

This was the only scripture known by Jesus

and the apostles, and first century
Christians.
1800 BCE Oral Traditions Form
(Abraham’s time)
1300 BCE First writing: Poetry, some
sayings of Moses
1000 BCE Solomon begins to collect
writings
500 BCE Pentateuch gathered (post Exile)
400 BCE Law, Prophets standardized
200 BCE Prophets, Writings gathered
300-100 BCE Translation into Septuagint
90 CE Council of Jamnia (Official Canon
of Hebrew Scriptures)
45-50 CE First letters of Paul
50-70 CE Gospel of Mark
63-70 Acts
70s Gospels Matthew, Luke
50-80 CE Gospel of John
90-100 CE Last canonical epistles
2nd Century Church leaders agreed upon 4
Gospels
353 CE Council of Laodicea CANON
397 CE Council of Carthage CANON
400 CE Vulgate (official Latin translation)
Ancient Hebrew---Nearly All of the Hebrew
Testament
22 letters
No vowels (added later)
Read from right to left

Some words you will recognize:

David, Shalom, Elohim, Yahweh
Biblical vocabulary only about 1,000 words
500 words comprised about 80% of text

No punctuation
No chapter breaks, titles, headings, or verse
breaks

Very primitive and simplistic by today’s

linguistic standards.
Official language of Persian
Empire
Parts of the book of Daniel
Phrases in the New Testament

Ordinary language of Palestine

Jesus would have spoken it.
Still spoken today in parts of Syria.
NT written in ‘common’ Greek
Everyday language widely used in the eastern
part of the Roman Empire.

No punctuation.
No chapter breaks.
No titles.
No verse numbering.
Scrolls (papyrus beaten together
in long strips)
Reed brushes
Black ink made from soot

modern scrolls

Not until 2nd CE were there “books” called

“codexes”. Writing material folded &
fastened together at one side.
Hebrew Bible

2nd Century Nash Papyrus (4 fragments)

Decalogue & Shema
8-10th Century Masoretic Text
12-13th Century Nablus Manuscripts

BUT. . . .
400 scrolls recovered---parts of 400 more
found (15,000 fragments, 500 manuscripts)
 Discovered by shepherds:
1946 to 1952

Caves southeast of Jerusalem (Qumran)

Qumran community, First century Jewish

community (ascetics)
Copies of every one of the OT books
except Esther
Scrolls hidden away in these remote caves
Copied by the Essenes, 200 BCE to 68 CE

Older by 1,000 years than the oldest

previous fragments found.
Shrine of the Book, Jerusalem

Complete book of Isaiah, 2000 years old

New Testament

130 CE Fragment of John’s Gospel

400 CE Codex Sinaiticus, earliest
complete mss of NT
B (Vaticanus) 300 CE*
Sin. (Sinaiticus) 350 CE
A (Alexandrinus) 450 CE*

These are the earliest NT documents.

*Nearly complete manuscripts.

5,300 known Greek manuscripts of the New
Testament
10,000 Latin Vulgates
9,300 other early manuscripts

24,000 manuscript copies of portions of the

New Testament in existence today!
 700 Aldhelm, Bishop of Sherborne
 700 Bede (Gospel of John) into Anglo-
Saxon
 871-901 King Alfred (Exodus, Psalms, Acts)
 14th C. Wycliffe: translation into the
English of the people
 1525 Tyndale
 1611 King James
 1946-1952 RSV (from King James)
 1961-1970 New English (British)
 1963 NAS (from American Revised)
 1966 Jerusalem Bible (R. Catholic)
 1978 NIV (completely new translation)
 1971 Living Bible (paraphrase)
 2003 The Message (paraphrase)
Translation

Or

Paraphrase???

What’s the difference?

 the WORD and the Hebrew Bible

For next week:

Read Pelikan Intro, Ch. 1 & 2

Who Else Needs a Book?