When Was The Bible Made

The Old Testament Was Finished In 435 Bc

If we date Haggai to 520 B.C., Zechariah to 520518 B.C. , and Malachi around 435 B.C., we have an idea of the approximate dates of the last Old Testament prophets.

Roughly coinciding with this period are the last books of Old Testament historyEzra, Nehemiah, and Esther. Ezra went to Jerusalem in 458 B.C., and Nehemiah was in Jerusalem from 445433 B.C. Esther was written sometime after the death of Xerxes-I in 465 B.C., probably during the reign of Artaxerxes I .

After approximately 435 B.C. there were no additions to the Old Testament canon. The subsequent history of the Jewish people was recorded in other writings, such as the books of the Maccabees, but these writings were not thought worthy to be included with the collections of Gods words from earlier years.

Who Wrote The Bible: The New Testament

Wikimedia CommonsA depiction of Jesus delivering the Sermon on the Mount.

Finally, the question of who wrote the Bible turns to the texts dealing with Jesus and beyond.

In the second century B.C. with the Greeks still in power, Jerusalem was run by fully Hellenized kings who considered it their mission to erase Jewish identity with full assimilation.

To that end, King Antiochus Epiphanes had a Greek gymnasium built across the street from the Second Temple and made it a legal requirement for Jerusalems men to visit it at least once. The thought of stripping nude in a public place blew the minds of Jerusalems faithful Jews, and they rose in bloody revolt to stop it.

In time, Hellenistic rule fell apart in the area and was replaced by the Romans. It was during this time, early in the first century A.D., that one of the Jews from Nazareth inspired a new religion, one that saw itself as a continuation of Jewish tradition, but with scriptures of its own:

Wikimedia CommonsPaul the Apostle

While the writings attributed to John actually do show some congruity between who wrote the Bible according to tradition and who wrote the Bible according to historical evidence, the question of Biblical authorship remains thorny, complex, and contested.

The Canon We Have Today Was Finalized In The Fourth Century Ad

In A.D. 367 the Thirty-ninth Paschal Letter of Athanasius contained an exact list of the twenty-seven New Testament books we have today. This was the list of books accepted by the churches in the eastern part of the Mediterranean world.

Thirty years later, in A.D. 397, the Council of Carthage, representing the churches in the western part of the Mediterranean world, agreed with the eastern churches on the same list. These are the earliest final lists of our present-day canon.

At the end of the last chapter in the final book in the biblical canon, John writes:

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.Revelation 22:18-19

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It Has Been Changing From Time To Time

The Word of God can’t change. It shouldn’t contradict with other statements said at different places in one book and it shouldn’t be having theories which are proven to be wrong by with facts. Bible is confusing how it can help billions to find out answers of their problems and why word of god is so confusing?

What Language Was The Bible Originally Written In

The Hebrew Bible was written in Hebrew. Its Greek translation, the , made it accessible in the Hellenistic period and provided a language for the New Testament and for the Christian liturgy and theology of the first three centuries CE. The Bible in Latin, the Vulgate, shaped the thought and life of Western people for a thousand years. Bible translation led to the study and literary development of many languages.

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The Bible Is Confirmed Through Gods Challenge To Other Religions

Throughout Isaiah 4046, God, speaking through the prophet, repeatedly challenges the false gods to prove themselves. Specifically, He challenges them to tell the future and bring it to pass.

Present your case, says the Lord. Bring forth your strong reasons, says the King of Jacob. Let them bring forth and show us what will happen let them show the former things, what they were, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them or declare to us things to come. Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods.

So here is the test for the other religions of the world. Can they accurately foretell future events? After all, only the all-knowing, all-powerful Creator knows everything that will happen and has the ability to bring it to pass. And God has established His righteous character through this unique ability. In Isaiah 41:26, the Lord asks, Who has declared from the beginning, that we may know? And former times, that we may say, He is righteous?

Most of the founders of the worlds religions never attempted to tell the future.7 Outside of the Bible, the other holy books of the world do not really include prophecies. The vague predictions of Nostradamus and demonstrably false prognostications of Edgar Cayce do not meet the biblical standard of 100 percent accuracy for a prophet .

Now take a look at what God says about His own ability in this area:

Bible Possibly Written Centuries Earlier Text Suggests

ByClara Moskowitz15 January 2010

Scientists have discovered the earliest known Hebrew writing an inscription dating from the 10th century B.C., during the period of King David’s reign.

The breakthrough could mean that portions of the Bible were written centuries earlier than previously thought.

Until now, many scholars have held that the Hebrew Bible originated in the 6th century B.C., because Hebrew writing was thought to stretch back no further. But the newly deciphered Hebrew text is about four centuries older, scientists announced this month.

“It indicates that the Kingdom of Israel already existed in the 10th century BCE and that at least some of the biblical texts were written hundreds of years before the dates presented in current research,” said Gershon Galil, a professor of Biblical Studies at the University of Haifa in Israel, who deciphered the ancient text.

BCE stands for “before common era,” and is equivalent to B.C., or before Christ.

The writing was discovered more than a year ago on a pottery shard dug up during excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa, near Israel’s Elah valley. The excavations were carried out by archaeologist Yosef Garfinkel of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. At first, scientists could not tell if the writing was Hebrew or some other local language.

Finally, Galil was able to decipher the text. He identified words particular to the Hebrew language and content specific to Hebrew culture to prove that the writing was, in fact, Hebrew.

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Learn More About Ancient Inscriptions In Bible History Daily:

Ancient Military Correspondence: Send Wine Send wine: A newly deciphered letter from Israels Negev desert describes an exchange of supplies between two Judahite military officers.

Computer Program Learning to Read Paleo-Hebrew Letters Researchers from Tel Aviv University are developing a computer program that can read Paleo-Hebrew, a script used by the Israelites over 2,600 years ago.

Three Takes on the Oldest Hebrew Inscription In the May/June 2012 BAR, epigrapher Christopher A. Rollston considered four contenders as candidates for the oldest Hebrew inscription. Rollstons thoughtful discussion was met by dissenting responses from distinguished archaeological and Biblical scholars, including Yosef Garfinkel and Aaron Demsky.

Precursor to Paleo-Hebrew Script Discovered in Jerusalem Alan Millard examines the Proto-Canaanite script of the earliest alphabetic text ever found in Jerusalem. What can it tell us about literacy during the time of David and Solomon?

Ancient Aramaic Business Records In 2,000 Ancient Aramaic Business Scribbles in the September/October issue of BAR, Ada Yardeni explains how inscribed ostraca provide us with a window into the agricultural, economic and social life in the Hebron hills in the fourth century B.C.E.

The Phoenician Alphabet in Archaeology The Phoenician script was borrowed by the Israelites, Greeks and Romans. Learn what sorts of texts the Phoenicians wrote as revealed by a recent archaeological excavation.

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The Bible Today Is The Same As What Was Originally Written

Some people have the idea that the Bible has been translated “so many times” that it has become corrupted through stages of translating. That would probably be true if the translations were being made from other translations. But translations are actually made directly from original Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic source texts based on thousands of ancient manuscripts.

The accuracy of todays Old Testament was confirmed in 1947 when archaeologists found The Dead Sea Scrolls along today’s West Bank in Israel. “The Dead Sea Scrolls” contained Old Testament scripture dating 1,000 years older than any manuscripts we had. When comparing the manuscripts at hand with these, from 1,000 years earlier, we find agreement 99.5% of the time. And the .5% differences are minor spelling variances and sentence structure that doesn’t change the meaning of the sentence.

Regarding the New Testament, it is humanity’s most reliable ancient document.

All ancient manuscripts were written on papyrus, which didnt have much of a shelf life. So people hand copied originals, to maintain the message and circulate it to others.

Few people doubt Platos writing of The Republic. Its a classic, written by Plato around 380 B.C. The earliest copies we have of it are dated 900 A.D., which is a 1,300 year time lag from when he wrote it. There are only seven copies in existence.

*McDowell, Josh. The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict , p. 55.

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The Stories Of Christ And His First Followers

Jesus and his earliest followers were Jewish, and so they used and quoted the Jewish Scriptures. After Jesus died and was raised to life around A.D. 30, the stories about Jesus, as well as his sayings, were passed on by word of mouth. It wasnt until about A.D. 65 that these stories and sayings began to be gathered and written down in books known as the Gospels, which make up about half of what Christians call the New Testament. The earliest writings of the New Testament, however, are probably some of the letters that the apostle Paul wrote to groups of Jesuss followers who were scattered throughout the Roman Empire. The first of these letters, probably 1 Thessalonians, may have been written as early as A.D. 50. Other New Testament writings were written in the late first century or early second century A.D.

Books Written By Associates Of The Apostles

The details of the historical process by which these books came to be counted as part of Scripture by the early church are scarce, but Mark, Luke, and Acts were commonly acknowledged very early, probably because of the close association of Mark with the apostle Peter, and of Luke with the apostle Paul.

Paul even calls a portion of Lukes gospel Scripture in 1 Timothy 5:17-18:

Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching for the scripture says, You shall not muzzle an ox when it is treading out the grain, and, The laborer deserves his wages.

The first quotation from Scripture is found in Deuteronomy 25:4, but the second quotation, The laborer deserves his wages, is found nowhere in the Old Testament. It does occur, however, in Luke 10:7 .

So here we have Paul apparently quoting a portion of Lukes gospel and calling it Scripture. We see evidence that very early in the history of the church the writings of the New Testament began to be accepted as part of the canon.

Similarly, Jude apparently was accepted by virtue of the authors connection with James and the fact that he was the brother of Jesus.

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Archaeology Confirms The Bibles Historical Accuracy

Archaeologists have consistently discovered the names of government officials, kings, cities, and festivals mentioned in the Bible — sometimes when historians didn’t think such people or places existed. For example, the Gospel of John tells of Jesus healing a cripple next to the Pool of Bethesda. The text even describes the five porticoes leading to the pool. Scholars didn’t think the pool existed, until archaeologists found it forty feet below ground, complete with the five porticoes.1

The Bible has a tremendous amount of historical detail, so not everything mentioned in it has yet been found through archaeology. However, not one archaeological find has conflicted with what the Bible records.2

In contrast, news reporter Lee Strobel comments about the Book of Mormon: “Archaeology has repeatedly failed to substantiate its claims about events that supposedly occurred long ago in the Americas. I remember writing to the Smithsonian Institute to inquire about whether there was any evidence supporting the claims of Mormonism, only to be told in unequivocal terms that its archaeologists see ‘no direct connection between the archaeology of the New World and the subject matter of the book.'” Archaeologists have never located cities, persons, names, or places mentioned in the Book of Mormon.3

Archaeology consistently confirms the historical accuracy of the Bible.

Chapters And Verses Of The Bible

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The chapter and verse divisions did not appear in the original texts they form part of the paratext of the Bible. Since the early 13th century, most copies and editions of the Bible present all but the shortest of these books with divisions into chapters, generally a page or so in length. Since the mid-16th century editors have further subdivided each chapter into verses each consisting of a few short lines or sentences. Esther 8:9 is the longest verse in the Bible. Sometimes a sentence spans more than one verse, as in the case of Ephesians 2:89, and sometimes there is more than one sentence in a single verse, as in the case of Genesis 1:2.

The Jewish divisions of the Hebrew text differ at various points from those used by Christians. For instance, in Jewish tradition, the ascriptions to many Psalms are regarded as independent verses or parts of the subsequent verses, whereas established Christian practice treats each Psalm ascription as independent and unnumbered, making 116 more verses in Jewish versions than in the Christian. Some chapter divisions also occur in different places, e.g. Hebrew Bibles have 1 Chronicles 5:27-41 where Christian translations have 1 Chronicles 6:1-15

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How Old Is The Bible

New research provides more clues about the age of the world’s most popular book.

Some in the collection of texts that comprise the Bible are sacred to over 54% of the worlds population who believe in Abrahamic religions. These include Christianity, Islam, Judaism and smaller religions like Rastafari. Of course, there are big differences between the religions in which particular stories they believe in and how they believe in them, but the oldest Biblical stories are at the core of all the major Abrahamic traditions.

Suffice it to say, this kind of writing success is without parallel in its popularity, influencing generations of humans for millennia. While there can be plenty of arguments about the origins of various Biblical texts, what does science have to say about how old they are?

The first thing to point out is that, of course, there is no one Bible. There have been different versions in history and different religions interpret the texts in their own way, adding or taking away. The commonly-used English-language version is the King James Bible, which was printed in 1611. But the oldest text would have to be the Hebrew Bible or the Tanakh.

New high-tech research used ground-breaking technology of virtual unwrapping to read a highly-damaged ancient scroll, finding it to contain the Old Testament Book of Leviticus and dating it to 300 A.D. The so-called En-Gedi scroll thus became one of the oldest Biblical texts in existence. But not the oldest.

Alphabetical List Of New Testament Authors

• James: The book of James
• John: Gospel of John, 1st John, 2nd John, 3rd John, Revelation
• Jude: Book of Jude
• Luke: Gospel of Luke, Acts of the Apostles
• : Gospel of Mark
• Matthew: Gospel of Matthew
• Paul: Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, 1st and 2nd Timothy, Titus, Philemon
• Peter: 1st and 2nd Peter

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What Belongs In The Bible

There was no Bible as we know it for the first 350 years of Christianity. Jesus did not give his Apostles a list of the books of the Bible before he ascended into heaven. Rather, the early leaders of the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, discerned which books belonged in the Bible. This process took centuries.

Some criteria for determining the canon of Scripture were as follows:

• Special relation to God, i.e., inspiration
• This means that, guided by the Holy Spirit, the leaders of the early Church discerned that these books were inspired by God