How the Bible Came to Be
Psalms 12:6-7 (NKJV)"The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. You shall keep them, O Lord. You shall preserve them from this generation forever."
Words written down by David appproximately 3000 years ago. Now amazingly and unfathomably through dark ages in a dark world, the words of the Lord have indeed been preserved. The chronology below traces the preservation of the scriptures and informs us how we know they are almost exactly like the original texts.
15th-13th centuries BC- Moses writes the first five books of the Bible- the Torah.
6th century BC- the Old Testament priest and scribe Ezra collects and arranges the books of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament.
250-100 BC- a Greek translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint is produced. This version contains the Apocrypha.
2nd century BC- Papyrus, a plant that can be cut into strips and pressed into sheets of writing material is used for writings. Any book written on papyrus was called codex. This was the most common form of New Testment publication of original manuscripts.
45-100 AD- the New Testament books are written by the followers of Jesus.
90 AD- Council of Jamnia where the Jewish elders reject the Apocrypha from the Hebrew Bible.
3rd century AD- the earliest translations of the Bible are in Latin, Coptic, and Syriac.
200's AD- Church fathers accept the gospels and Paul's letters as part of New Testament. Origen lists 21 approved books, while Eusebius lists 22.
397 AD- The standard of 27 New Testament books is accepted at the Synod of Carthage.
435 AD- Jerome translates the Latin Vulgate Bible which would be the most basic Bible for the next 1000 years
500's-900's AD- a group of Jewish scribes are netrusted with the task of making copies of the Hebrew Bible. They develop a meticulous system of counting the number of words in each book of the Bible to make sure they have copied it accurately. Any scroll found to have an error is burned according to Jewish law.
450-600 AD- Christianity reaches Britain but Anglo-Saxon pagans drive Christian Britonsa into Wales. In 596 AD, Augustine of Canterbury begings evangelization again. Between 676 and 1020 AD, the scriptures are read and translated into Old English by different scholars in England.
1066 AD- Norman conquest happens and French becomes the official language in England. No more English Bibles are produced until the 14th century.
1382 AD- the first English Bible is produced by the followers of John Wycliffe who were called Lollards. During his lifetime, Wycliffe wanted common people to have the Bible. He also criticized a number of church practices and policies. Lollards included his criticisms in the preface of the Wycliffe Bible. This Bible is banned and burned. Forty years after his death, his bones are exhumed and burned for heresy.
1408 AD- in England it becomes illegal to translate or read the Bible in common English without the permission of a bishop.
1455- World's first printing press with moveable metal type invented in Germany by Johann Gutenberg. This is perhaps the single most important event to influence the spread of the Bible. Later in the century, the Gutenburg Bible was the first book ever printed.
1516 AD Erasmus, a Greek scholar and a priest, publishes a Greek translation and more accurate Latin translation of the New Testament. His goal is that everyone be able to read the Bible. His text becomes the basis of the Textus Receptus and is later used by Martin Luther, William Tyndale, and the King James translators.
1522- Martin Luther translates the New Testament into German.
1525 AD- William Tyndale, priest and Oxford Scholar translate the New Testament from Greek, but cannot get approval to publish it in England. He moves to Germany and prints Bibles, smuggling them into England in sacks of corn and flour. In 1536, Tyndale is burned at the stake. Tyndale's translation forms the basis of the King James Version.
1535 AD- The Coverdale Bible is translated by Miles Coverdale. This is the first complete Bible to be printed in English.
1537- The Matthew's Bible is the first Bible published with the king's permission. It relies heavily on Tyndale's version. It is translated by John Rogers under the pen name Thomas Matthews, and has a tribute to him on the last page of the Old Testament.
1539 AD- The Great Bible is placed in every church by order of Thomas Cranmer, archbishop under King Henry VIII. This Bible was Miles Coverdale's revision of the Matthew's Bible and was chained to the church pillars to discourage theft.
1555 AD- England's Queen Mary bans Protestant translations of the English Bible. Thomas Cranmer and John Rogers are burned at the stake along with 300 men, women, and children.
1560 AD- exiles from England flee to Geneva, Switzerland. There they translate the geneva Bible which contains notes by John Calvin. It is the first Bible to use Roman type instead of black letter and the first Bible to be divided into chapters and verses. The 1640 edition is the first English Bible to omit the Apocrypha.
1568- a new translation called the Bishops Bible begins under Queen Elizabeth. It is translated by several bishops of the church of England to answer the Geneva Bible.
1582-1609- The Rheims-Douai Bible translated into English from the Latin Vulgate by Catholic scholar Gregory Martin while in exile in France. It becomes the standard translation of the Catholic church.
1604-1611 King James I of England hires a team of 54 scholars to undertake a new Bible translation called the King James Version using the Bishops Bible and Tyndale's Bible as well as available Hebrew and Greek manuscripts including the Masoretic Text and Textus Receptus. The edition used today was revised in 1769.
1629 AD- Codex Alexandrius, a 450AD copy of the New Testament and perhaps the most reliable copy of the book of Revelation is made available to Western scholars.
mid 19th century- Codex sinaiticus, the earliest complete copy of the New Testament copied in 350 AD is found by Count Von Tischendorf in St. Catherine's Monastery near Mount Sinai
1889- Codex Vaticanus, earliest and probably best known copy of the New Testament from 325 AD is released to scholars by the Vatican Library.
1947- The Dead Sea Scrolls found in a cave by a shepherd, contian the oldest known copies of portions of the Old Testament. The scroll of Isaih found in these is the earliest known copy of any portion of the Hebrew Bible, dating back to 100 BC. It gives overwhelming confirmation of the reliability of the Masoretic copies.
1900's More than 100 New Testament manuscripts found in Egypt.
The above mentioned manuscripts from 1629 on along with new understanding of ancient languages are the basis for the modern English translations.
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