The origin and history of the Bible

How do we know that the 66 books in our Bibles were all inspired? What about other books? In this session we answer these questions. We also look at the manuscript evidence that our Bibles are reliable copies of what God originally caused to be written down. The Dead Sea Scrolls provide some fascinating and relatively recent evidence of the reliability of the Bible. Finally, we trace the history of the English Bible through to the most recent versions and discuss the problem of choosing a Bible to suit you.

Inspiration

The word inspiration literally means God-breathed. The Bible is "inspired" because the words have been breathed by God himself. The Apostle Paul described the Scriptures like this:

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.  (2 Timothy 3:16-17) 

Peter described the inspired prophets as

men [who] spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:21) 

Sometimes God seems to have inspired what they said word for word to the point when they did not always understand what they wrote (see 1 Peter 1:10-12). At other times, the writer seems to have had more freedom of expression although the thoughts expressed were inspired by God. For example, the writings of Paul are distinctive in their style and language used, but were still inspired by God.

The canon of Scripture

The "canon of Scripture" means those writings which are inspired. How do we know what books are part of inspired Scripture and what books are not? Some Bible writers stated explicitly: "This is the word of the LOW' or "This is what the LORD says ... " (e.g. Jeremiah 2.1; Joel L1). Other books do not claim to be inspired but they quickly became recognized as inspired because the person who wrote them was accepted as a prophet of God (e.g. Genesis, Song of Solomon).

The Bible provides two tests for deciding whether a prophet is inspired:

The Old Testament was well-established by the time of Jesus. The books had been accepted for centuries because they were recorded by prophets of God such as Moses, Isaiah and Ezra. These men had visions from God and made prophecies that came true. Therefore what they said and what they wrote were accepted as the work of God.

It did not take long for the New Testament writings to be considered "Scripture" also. For example, the gospel of Luke was considered Scripture by the time Paul wrote his first letter to Timothy (see 1 Timothy 5:18). Similarly, the writings of Paul were considered Scripture by the time Peter wrote his second letter (see 2 Peter 3:15-16).

The Apocrypha

Most. Bibles contain the 66 books mentioned in Study 1. But some Bibles, particularly Catholic Bibles, contain several additional Old Testament books. Most Catholic Bibles will contain an additional seven books in the Old Testament and several additions to other books. Some Bibles add up to seventeen extra books or parts of books.

These additions to the Old Testament are known as the "Apocrypha" (meaning "hidden" books). Protestants reject these books as uninspired-not part of the revealed word of God. They were written between about 200 BC and AD 100, well after the Old Testament was completed.

Old Testament Apocrypha

Title	Approximate date of writing
Psalm 151 Ecclesiasticus Tobit The Prayer of Manasseh Judith 1 Esdras Additions to Esther Song of the Three Young Men Susanna Bel and the Dragon 1,2&3 Maccabees 4 Maccabees The Wisdom of Solomon 2 Esdras Baruch	200 BC? 180 BC 180 BC 150 BC 150 BC 150 BC 100 BC 100 BC 50-100 BC 50-100 BC 50-100 BC AD 40 AD 40 AD 100 AD 100

Some of the books of the Apocrypha are mainly historical: for example, 1&2 Maccabees describe the history of the Jews about 150-100 years before Jesus. Other books are pure fiction: Tobit tells the story of a man named Tobit who travels with his guardian angel, Raphael, and fights off the demon Asmodeus with the organs of a fish! Another fictional story, Judith, contains major historical blunders: it says Nebuchadnezzar was the king of Assyria in Nineveh instead of the king of Babylon. Many of the books falsely claim to be written by people mentioned in the Bible. For example, Baruch claims to be written by Jeremiah's friend but was certainly written much later. Similarly Ecclesiasticus and the Wisdom of Solomon were written hundreds of years after Solomon, not by Solomon himself.

It is clear why some of these book should not be considered canonical (i.e., part of the inspired word of God). They contain historical and doctrinal errors and were not written by the person they claim. But others, like 1 Maccabees, seem reasonably factual and accurate. So why shouldn't these be part of our Bibles?

None of the books of the Apocrypha came from prophets and so they were never accepted by the Jews as inspired. The Jews sometimes quoted from the Apocrypha, but in the same way that we would quote Shakespeare interesting literature but definitely not the work of God.

It seems that about 100 years after Jesus, some non-Jewish Christians didn't understand that the books of the Apocrypha were not generally accepted, and thought they were part of the Old Testament. In this way, they came to be part of the Bibles of some Christians and are still used today.

There is also a New Testament Apocrypha which is not so well known. No-one suggests these books are inspired and they are not included in any Bibles.

New Testament Apocrypha

Title	Approximate date of writing
The gospel according to the Hebrews Epistle of Barnabas Epistle to the Corinthians The seven epistles of Ignatius Didache, teaching of the twelve Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians Shepherd of Hermas Second epistle of Clement Apocalypse of Peter Acts of Paul and Thecia Epistle to the Laodiceans	AD 65-100 AD 70-79 AD 96 AD 100 AD 100 AD 108 AD 115-140 AD 120-140 AD 150 AD 170 AD 350

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