The
New Testament (
GreekKoine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity . Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek...
: Καινὴ Διαθήκη,
Kainē Diathēkē) is the name given to the second major division of the
ChristianChristianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented by the revelations in the New Testament....
BibleThe Bible contains the central religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. Modern Judaism generally recognizes a single set of canonical books known as the Tanakh, or Hebrew Bible, as it is written almost entirely in the Hebrew language, with some small portions in Aramaic...
, the first such division being the much longer
Old TestamentIn Christianity, the Old Testament is the collection of books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions. In the Eastern Orthodox Church the comparable texts are known as the Septuagint, from the...
, both terms being associated with
SupersessionismSupersessionism and replacement theology are uniquely Christian interpretations of New Testament claims, viewing God's relationship with Christians as being either the "replacement" or "completion" of the promise made to the Jews and Jewish Proselytes...
. The New Testament is sometimes called the
Greek New Testament or
Greek Scriptures, or the
New CovenantThe term New Covenant is used in the Bible to refer to an epochal relationship of restoration and peace following a period of trial and judgment...
or the
New Law.
The original texts were written by various authors sometime after c. AD 45, most likely in
Koine GreekKoine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity . Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek...
(according to
Greek primacyGreek Primacy is the view that the Christian New Testament and/or its sources were originally written in Koine Greek. It is generally accepted by most scholars today that the New Testament of the Bible was written primarily, if not completely, in Koine or common Greek...
), the
lingua francaA lingua franca is a language systematically used to communicate between persons not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both persons' mother tongues.Lingua franca is a functionally defined term, independent of the linguistic history or...
of the eastern part of the
Roman EmpireThe Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean. The term is used to describe the Roman state during and after the time of the first emperor,...
. Rylands Papyrus 52 is generally accepted as the earliest extant record of a canonical New Testament, which dates somewhere between 117 AD and 138 AD.
Its books were gradually collected into a single volume. Although Christian denominations differ as to which works are included in the New Testament, and on the issue of the
Antilegomena"Antilegomena" was an epithet used by the Church Fathers to denote those books of the New Testament which, although sometimes publicly read in the churches, were not—for a considerable amount of time—considered to be genuine, or received into the canon of Scripture...
, the majority have settled on the same
twenty-seven book canonThe Biblical canon is the set of books Christians regard as divinely inspired and thus constituting the Christian Bible. Although the Early Church primarily used the Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures, the Septuagint or LXX, or the Targums among Aramaic speakers, the Apostles did not...
: it consists of the four narratives of the life and death of
JesusJesus of Nazareth —also known as Jesus Christ or occasionally Jesus the Christ—is the central figure of Christianity. Within most Christian denominations...
, called "
gospelA gospel is a writing that describes the life of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical texts: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John, probably written between AD 65 and 80...
s"; a narrative of the
ApostlesIn Christianity, apostles were missionaries among the leaders in the Early Church and, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jesus Christ himself. The term was also used, especially by the Gospel of Luke, for "the Twelve," Jesus' inner circle of disciples...
' ministries in the
early churchEarly Christianity is commonly known as the Christianity of the roughly three centuries between the Crucifixion of Jesus and the First Council of Nicaea in 325....
, probably by the same author as the Gospel of Luke, which it continues; twenty-one early letters, commonly called "epistles" in biblical context, written by various authors and consisting mostly of Christian counsel and instruction; and an
ApocalypticApocalypse is a term applied to the disclosure to certain privileged persons of something hidden from the majority of humankind. Today the term is often used to refer to the end of the world, which may be a shortening of the phrase apokalupsis eschaton which literally means "revelation at the end...
prophecyA prophecy is the message that has been communicated to a prophet which the prophet then communicates to others. In general, this message can involve divine inspiration, revelation, or interpretation. More specifically, it may be a professed psychic prediction. Confusion often exists between the...
.
Gospels
Each of the gospels narrates the life and death of
JesusJesus of Nazareth —also known as Jesus Christ or occasionally Jesus the Christ—is the central figure of Christianity. Within most Christian denominations...
of
NazarethNazareth is the capital and largest city in the North District of Israel. Known as "the Arab capital of Israel," the population is made up predominantly of Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel...
. The traditional author is listed after each entry; modern scholarship generally regards these as anonymous.
- The Gospel of Matthew
The Gospel of Matthew is one of the four canonical gospels in the New Testament. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle Matthew, son of AlphaeusMatthew the Evangelist , also called Levi, apostle and once a tax collector, composed the Gospel of Christ. It was first published in Judea in Hebrew for Hebrew Christians...
according to Papias, (see the Gospel according to the HebrewsThe Gospel According to the Hebrews written in Aramaic dialect but with Hebrew letters, was the most widely known of the non canonical gospels. Jerome states that most ancient Biblical scholars called it the true Gospel of Matthew or "Mattheai Authenticum"...
) Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus and Eusebius.
- The Gospel of Mark
The Gospel of Mark is the second of the four Canonical Gospels, but is believed by most contemporary scholars to be the first gospel written, on which the other two synoptic gospels, Matthew and Luke, were partially based....
, traditionally ascribed to Mark the EvangelistMark the Evangelist , is the traditional name of the author of the Gospel of Mark. Tradition identifies him with the John Mark mentioned as a companion of Saint Paul in Acts, who later is said to have become a disciple of Saint Peter. John Mark accompanied Paul and Barnabas on Paul's first...
, who wrote down the recollections of the Apostle Simon PeterSimon Peter , Pétros “Rock”, Kephas in Hellenized Aramaic) was a leader of the early Christian Church, who features prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. Peter was the son of John, and was from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee...
according to Papias, Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Eusebius.
- The Gospel of Luke
The Gospel of Luke is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension...
, traditionally ascribed to LukeLuke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer who the Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles....
, a physician and companion of the Apostle PaulPaul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, ...
according to Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Eusebius, Canon Muratori.
- The Gospel of John
The Gospel of John , is the last of the four canonical gospels. This non synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle John, son of ZebedeeJohn the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles....
according to Papias, Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Eusebius, Canon Muratori, Codex Vaticanus Alexandrinus.
The first three are commonly classified as the
Synoptic GospelsThe synoptic Gospels are three Gospels in the New Testament the Gospel of Matthew, the Gospel of Mark, and the Gospel of Luke, that display a high degree of similarity in content, narrative arrangement, language, and sentence and paragraph structures...
. They contain very similar accounts of events in Jesus' life. The Gospel of John describes several miracles and sayings of Jesus not found in the other three.
Acts
The book of
ActsThe Acts of the Apostles is the fifth book of the New Testament. It is commonly referred to as Acts and outlines the history of the Apostolic Age...
, also termed Acts of the Apostles or Acts of the
Holy SpiritIn Christianity, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God. In mainstream Christian beliefs he is the third person of the Trinity. As part of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit is equal with God the Father and with God the Son....
, is a narrative of the apostles' ministry after Christ's death and subsequent resurrection, which is also a sequel to the third gospel. Examining style, phraseology, and other evidence, modern scholarship generally concludes that Acts and Luke share the same author.
- Acts, traditionally ascribed to Luke
Luke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer who the Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles....
according to Clement of Alexandria, Eusebius, Canon Muratori.
Pauline epistles
The
Pauline epistlesThe Pauline epistles, Epistles of Paul, or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen New Testament books which have the name Paul as the first word, hence claiming authorship by Paul the Apostle. Among these letters are some of the earliest extant Christian documents...
(or
Corpus Paulinum) constitute those
epistleAn epistle is a writing directed or sent to a person or group of people, usually a letter and a very formal, often didactic and elegant one. The epistle genre of letter-writing was common in ancient Egypt as part of the scribal-school writing curriculum...
s traditionally attributed to
PaulPaul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, ...
. The authorship of a number of the other epistles is sometimes disputed
(see section on authorship below, and Authorship of the Pauline epistlesThe Pauline epistles are the thirteen books in the New Testament traditionally attributed to, and explicitly ascribed to, Paul of Tarsus. Some consider the anonymous Epistle to the Hebrews a fourteenth Pauline epistle...
).
- Epistle to the Romans
The Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans, also known as Romans, is the sixth book in the New Testament. Biblical scholars agree that it was written by the Apostle Paul to explain that Salvation is offered through the Gospel of Jesus Christ...
- First Epistle to the Corinthians
The First Epistle to the Corinthians, also known as First Corinthians, is the seventh book of the New Testament. The book, originally written in Greek, was a letter from Paul of Tarsus and Sosthenes to the Christians of Corinth, Greece....
- Second Epistle to the Corinthians
The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, also known as Second Corinthians, is the 8th book of the New Testament. The book, originally written in Greek, is a letter from Paul of Tarsus to the Christians of Corinth, Greece.-Composition:...
- Epistle to the Galatians
The Epistle to the Galatians, also known as Galatians, is the ninth book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul of Tarsus to a number of Early Christian communities in the Roman province of Galatia in central Anatolia...
- Epistle to the Ephesians
The Epistle to the Ephesians, also known as Ephesians, is the tenth book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul and is described by William Barclay as the "Queen of the Epistles"..-Composition:...
- Epistle to the Philippians
The Epistle of St. Paul to the Philippians, also known as Philippians, is eleventh book the New Testament. Biblical scholars agree that it was written by the St. Paul to the church of Philippi.This authentic Pauline letter was written c 62....
- Epistle to the Colossians
The Epistle of St. Paul to the Colossians, also known as Colossians, is the 12th book of the New Testament. It was written, , by Paul the Apostle to the Church in Colossae, a small Phrygian city near Laodicea and approximately 100 miles from Ephesus in Asia Minor..-Composition:During the first...
- First Epistle to the Thessalonians
The First Epistle to the Thessalonians, also known as First Thessalonians, is a book from the New Testament of the Christian Bible.The first letter to the Thessalonians was likely the first of Paul's letters, probably written by the end of A.D...
- Second Epistle to the Thessalonians
The Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, also known as Second Thessalonians, is a book from the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It is traditionally attributed to Paul, because it begins, "Paul, and Silvanus, and Timothy, unto the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord...
- First Epistle to Timothy
The First Epistle to Timothy is one of three letters in New Testament of the Bible often grouped together as the Pastoral Epistles, the others being Second Timothy and Titus. The letter, traditionally attributed to Saint Paul, consists mainly of counsels to his younger colleague and delegate...
- Second Epistle to Timothy
The Second Epistle to Timothy is one of the three Pastoral Epistles, traditionally attributed to Saint Paul, and is part of the New Testament.-Composition:...
- Epistle to Titus
The Epistle to Titus is one of the three Pastoral Epistles , traditionally attributed to Saint Paul, and is part of the New Testament. It describes the requirements and duties of elders and bishops.-Composition:...
- Epistle to Philemon
The Epistle to Philemon is a prison letter to Philemon from Paul of Tarsus. Philemon was a leader in the Colossian church. This letter, which is one of the books of the New Testament, deals with forgiveness....
- Epistle to the Hebrews
The Epistle to the Hebrews is one of the books in the New Testament. Although sometimes credited to the Apostle Paul, the letter is anonymous. It has carried its traditional title since Tertullian described it as Barnabae titulus ad Hebraeos....
- about which modern scholars agree with OrigenOrigen was an early Christian scholar and theologian, and one of the most distinguished of the early fathers of the Christian Church. According to tradition, he is held to have been an Egyptian who taught in Alexandria, reviving the Catechetical School of Alexandria where Clement of Alexandria had...
(d 254) "Men of old time have handed it down as Paul's, but who wrote the Epistle God only knows" - few modern scholars believe it to be written by Paul.
General epistles
- See main article: General epistles
General epistles are books in the New Testament in the form of letters. They are termed "general" because for the most part their intended audience seems to be Christians in general rather than individual persons or congregations as is the case with the Pauline epistles...
Includes those Epistles written to the church at large (
catholic in this sense simply means
universal).
- Epistle of James
The Epistle of James is a book in the New Testament. The author identifies himself as "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ".-Composition:...
, traditionally by James, brother of Jesus and Jude ThomasSaint James the Just , , also known as James of Jerusalem, James Adelphotheos, or James, the Brother of the Lord, was an important figure in Early Christianity...
.
- First Epistle of Peter
The First Epistle of Peter is a book of the New Testament. It has traditionally been held to have been written by Saint Peter the apostle during his time as bishop of Rome or Bishop of Antioch, though neither titles are used in the epistle...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle Simon, called PeterSimon Peter , Pétros “Rock”, Kephas in Hellenized Aramaic) was a leader of the early Christian Church, who features prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. Peter was the son of John, and was from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee...
.
- Second Epistle of Peter
The Second Epistle of Peter is a book of the New Testament of the Bible, traditionally ascribed to Saint Peter, but in modern times widely regarded as pseudonymous....
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle Simon, called PeterSimon Peter , Pétros “Rock”, Kephas in Hellenized Aramaic) was a leader of the early Christian Church, who features prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. Peter was the son of John, and was from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee...
.
- First Epistle of John
The First Epistle of John is a book of the New Testament. This fourth catholic or "general" epistle is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of John and the other two epistles of John. This Epistle was written in Ephesus between the years 100-110...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle John, son of ZebedeeJohn the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles....
.
- Second Epistle of John
The Second Epistle of John is 63rd book of the New Testament and is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of John and the other two epistles of John. This Epistle is the shortest book in the Bible, comprising a mere thirteen...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle John, son of ZebedeeJohn the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles....
.
- Third Epistle of John
The New Testament Third Epistle of John The New Testament Third Epistle of John The New Testament Third Epistle of John (often referred to asThe Third Epistle of John is 64th book of the New Testament and is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of...
, traditionally ascribed to the Apostle John, son of ZebedeeJohn the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles....
.
- Epistle of Jude
The Epistle of Jude is second to last book of the New Testament and is attributed Jude, the brother of James the Just .- Composition :...
, traditionally ascribed to Jude Thomas, brother of Jesus and JamesJude is the third of the brothers of Jesus mentioned in the New Testament.-New Testament:Jude is mentioned in , which related people talking about Jesus:...
.
Revelation
The final book of the New Testament is the
Book of RevelationThe Book of Revelation, also called the Revelation of St. John, the Apocalypse of John, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ, is the last book of the New Testament. It may be shortened to Revelation but never Revelations...
. The authorship is attributed either to the Apostle
John, son of ZebedeeJohn the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles....
or to
John of PatmosJohn of Patmos is the name given to the author of the Book of Revelation in the New Testament. According to the text of Revelation, the author, who gives his name as "John," is living on the Greek island of Patmos. Many believe John was in exile. In Revelation, he writes to the seven Christian...
. For a discussion of authorship see
Authorship of the Johannine worksScholars have debated the authorship of the Johannine works since at least the third century...
.
Revelation is sometimes called The Apocalypse of John. It is also not read or used during church services by the
Eastern Orthodox churchThe Orthodox Church, also officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to in English speaking countries as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the world's second largest Christian communion, estimated to number 225 million members...
.
See also:
Apocalyptic literatureApocalyptic literature is a genre of prophetical writing that developed in post-Exilic Jewish culture and was popular among millennialist early Christians....
,
Bible prophecyBible prophecy, or "biblical prophecy" refers to passages in the Bible which predict future events and which are believed to be divinely inspired relevation...
Order
The New Testament books are ordered differently in different church traditions. For example most Protestant Bibles follow the Roman Catholic order, but the Lutheran order is different. Outside the Western European Catholic/Protestant world there are different orders in the Slavonic, Syriac and Ethiopian Bibles (Gospels, Acts, Catholic epistles, Pauline epistles, and Apocalypse).
Apocrypha
In ancient times there were dozens of Christian writings claiming apostolic inspiration, or for some other reason considered to have authority by some ancient churches, but which were not ultimately included in the 27-book New Testament canon. These works are considered "apocryphal", and are therefore referred to as the New Testament
ApocryphaApocrypha comes from the Greek word , which means those having been hidden away. The general term is usually applied to the books that were considered by the Church as useful, but not divinely inspired...
. It includes many writings unfavourable to the position of the orthodoxy, such as Gnostic writing. These apocryphal works are nevertheless important insofar as they provide an ancient context and setting for the composition of the canonical books. They also can help establish linguistic conventions common in the canonical texts. Examples of early apocryphal works are the
Gospel of ThomasThe Gospel According to Thomas , also known as The Gospel of Thomas, is a New Testament apocryphon, nearly completely preserved in a Coptic papyrus manuscript discovered in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt...
and the
Epistle to the LaodiceansAn Epistle to the Laodiceans, purportedly written by Paul of Tarsus to the Laodicean Church, is, according to some, mentioned in the canonical Epistle to the Colossians...
. The 4th century
Codex SinaiticusCodex Sinaiticus is one of the most important hand-written ancient copies of the Greek Bible. It is an Alexandrian text-type manuscript written in the 4th century in uncial letters...
includes with the Old and New Testaments the
Epistle of BarnabasThe Epistle of Barnabas is a Greek treatise with some features of an epistle containing twenty-one chapters, preserved complete in the 4th century Codex Sinaiticus where it appears at the end of the New Testament...
and
The Shepherd of HermasThe Shepherd of Hermas is a Christian literary work of the second century, considered a valuable book by many Christians, and considered canonical scripture by some of the early Church fathers. The Shepherd had great authority in the second and third centuries...
.
Language
The common languages spoken by both Jews and Gentiles in the Holy Land at the time of Jesus were
AramaicMost scholars believe that the historical Jesus primarily spoke Aramaic, with some Hebrew and Greek, although there is some debate in academia as to what degree. The towns of Nazareth and Capernaum, where Jesus lived, were primarily Aramaic-speaking communities, though Greek was widely spoken in...
,
Koine GreekKoine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity . Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek...
, and to a limited extent a colloquial dialect of Mishnaic Hebrew. It is generally believed that the original text of the New Testament was written in Koine Greek, the vernacular dialect in 1st century
Roman provinceIn Ancient Rome, a province was the basic, and until the Tetrarchy , largest territorial and administrative unit of the empire's territorial possessions outside of the Italian peninsula...
s of the Eastern Mediterranean, and later translated into other languages, most notably,
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
,
SyriacSyriac is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. Classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from the 4th to the 8th centuries...
, and
CopticCoptic or Coptic Egyptian is the final stage of the Egyptian language, a northern Afro-Asiatic language spoken in Egypt until at least the seventeenth century. Egyptian began to be written using the Greek alphabet in the first century...
. However, some of the Church Fathers seem to imply that Matthew was originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic, and there is another contention that the author of the
Epistle to the HebrewsThe Epistle to the Hebrews is one of the books in the New Testament. Although sometimes credited to the Apostle Paul, the letter is anonymous. It has carried its traditional title since Tertullian described it as Barnabae titulus ad Hebraeos....
wrote in Hebrew, which was translated into Greek by
LukeLuke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer who the Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles....
. Neither view holds much support among contemporary scholars, who argue that the literary facets of Matthew and Hebrews suggest that they were composed directly in Greek, rather than being translated, a view known as
Greek primacyGreek Primacy is the view that the Christian New Testament and/or its sources were originally written in Koine Greek. It is generally accepted by most scholars today that the New Testament of the Bible was written primarily, if not completely, in Koine or common Greek...
.
A very small minority of scholars consider the Aramaic version of the New Testament to be the original and believe the Greek is a translation (see
Aramaic primacyAramaic primacy is the view that the Christian New Testament and/or its sources were originally written in the Aramaic language. Aramaic primacy is asserted over and against Greek primacy .-Brief history:...
).
Etymology
Some believe the English term
New Testament ultimately comes from the Hebrew language.
New Testament is taken from the Latin
Novum Testamentum first coined by
TertullianQuintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian, was a prolific and controversial early Christian Berber author, and the first to write Christian Latin literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy...
. Some believe this in turn is a translation of the earlier
Koine GreekKoine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity . Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek...
Καινή Διαθήκη (pronounced in postclassical Greek as
Keni Dhiathiki). This Greek term is found in the original Greek language of the New Testament, though commonly translated as new covenant, and found even earlier in the Greek translation of the
Old TestamentIn Christianity, the Old Testament is the collection of books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions. In the Eastern Orthodox Church the comparable texts are known as the Septuagint, from the...
that is called the
SeptuagintThe Septuagint , or simply "LXX", referred to in critical works by the abbreviation ...
. At
JeremiahJeremiah was one of the prophets of the Hebrew Bible. His writings are put together in the Book of Jeremiah and traditionally, authorship of the Book of Lamentations is ascribed to him...
31:31, the Septuagint translated this term into Greek from the original
HebrewBiblical Hebrew, also called Classical Hebrew, is an archaic form of the Hebrew language in which the Hebrew Bible and various Israelite inscriptions were written....
ברית חדשה (b
erit chadashah). The Hebrew term is usually also translated into English as
new covenant.
As a result, some claim the term was first used by Early Christians to refer to the
new covenant that was the basis for their relationship with
GodGod is a deity in theistic and deistic religions and other belief systems, representing either the sole deity in monotheism, or a principal deity in polytheism....
. About two centuries later at the time of
TertullianQuintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian, was a prolific and controversial early Christian Berber author, and the first to write Christian Latin literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy...
and
LactantiusLucius Caelius Firmianus Lactantius was an early Christian author .-Biography:Lactantius, a Latin-speaking native of North Africa, was a pupil of Arnobius and taught rhetoric in various cities of the Eastern Roman Empire, ending in Constantinople...
, the phrase was being used to designate a particular collection of books that some believed embodied this
new covenant.
TertullianQuintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian, was a prolific and controversial early Christian Berber author, and the first to write Christian Latin literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy...
, in the 2nd century, is the first currently known to use the terms
novum testamentum/new testament and
vetus testamentum/old testament. For example, in
Against Marcion book 3, chapter 14, he wrote:
This may be understood to be the Divine Word, who is doubly edged with the two testaments of the law and the gospelA gospel is a writing that describes the life of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical texts: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John, probably written between AD 65 and 80...
And in book 4, chapter 6, he wrote:
For it is certain that the whole aim at which he has strenuously laboured even in the drawing up of his Antitheses, centres in this, that he may establish a diversity between the Old and the New Testaments, so that his own ChristChrist is the English term for the Greek meaning "the anointed". It is a translation of the Hebrew . The term "Christ" was a title rather than a proper name. In the four gospels in the New Testament, the word "Christ" is nearly always preceded by the definite article...
may be separate from the Creator, as belonging to this rival god, and as alien from the law and the prophets.
LactantiusLucius Caelius Firmianus Lactantius was an early Christian author .-Biography:Lactantius, a Latin-speaking native of North Africa, was a pupil of Arnobius and taught rhetoric in various cities of the Eastern Roman Empire, ending in Constantinople...
, also in Latin, in the 3rd century, in his
Divine Institutes, book 4, chapter 20, wrote:
But all scripture is divided into two Testaments. That which preceded the advent and passion of Christ—that is, the law and the prophets—is called the Old; but those things which were written after His resurrection are named the New Testament. The Jews make use of the Old, we of the New: but yet they are not discordant, for the New is the fulfilling of the Old, and in both there is the same testator, even Christ, who, having suffered death for us, made us heirs of His everlasting kingdom, the people of the Jews being deprived and disinherited. As the prophet Jeremiah testifies when he speaks such things: [Jer 31:31–32] "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new testament to the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not according to the testament which I made to their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; for they continued not in my testament, and I disregarded them, saith the Lord." ... For that which He said above, that He would make a new testament to the house of Judah, shows that the old testament which was given by Moses was not perfect; but that which was to be given by Christ would be complete.
The
VulgateThe Vulgate is an early 5th-century Latin version of the Bible, largely the result of the labors of Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of old Latin translations...
translation, in the 5th century, used
testamentum in 2nd Corinthians 3:
(6) Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter but in the spirit. For the letter killeth: but the spirit quickeneth. (Douay-Rheims)
(14) But their senses were made dull. For, until this present day, the selfsame veil, in the reading of the old testament, remaineth not taken away (because in Christ it is made void). (Douay-Rheims)
However, the more modern NRSV translates these verses from the
Koine GreekKoine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity . Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek...
as such:
(6) Who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
(14) But their minds were hardened. Indeed, to this very day, when they hear the reading of the old covenant, that same veil is still there, since only in Christ is it set aside.
Thus, it is common to translate using either of two English terms,
testamentA will or testament is a legal declaration by which a person, the testator, names one or more persons to manage his estate and provides for the transfer of his property at death. For the devolution of property not disposed of by will, see inheritance and intestacy...
and
covenantA covenant, in its most general sense, is a solemn promise to engage in or refrain from a specified action.A covenant is a type of contract in which the covenantor makes a promise to a covenantee to do or not do some action. In real property law, the term real covenants is used for conditions tied...
, even though they are not synonymous.
Authorship
The New Testament is a collection of works, and as such was written by multiple authors. The traditional view is that all the books were written by apostles (e.g. Matthew and Paul), or disciples working under their direction (e.g.
MarkMark the Evangelist , is the traditional name of the author of the Gospel of Mark. Tradition identifies him with the John Mark mentioned as a companion of Saint Paul in Acts, who later is said to have become a disciple of Saint Peter. John Mark accompanied Paul and Barnabas on Paul's first...
and
LukeLuke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer who the Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles....
). However, in modern times, with the rise of rigorous historical inquiry and textual criticism, these traditional ascriptions have been rejected by some. While the traditional authors have been listed above, a modern, unsubstantiated critical view is discussed herein.
Seven of the epistles of Paul are generally accepted by most modern scholars as authentic; these undisputed letters include Romans, First Corinthians, Second Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, First Thessalonians, and Philemon.
Raymond E. BrownRaymond Edward Brown , was an American Roman Catholic priest and Biblical scholar. He was regarded as a specialist concerning the hypothetical ‘Johannine community’, which he speculated contributed to the authorship of the Gospel of John, and he also wrote influential studies on the birth and...
has this to say about Colossians: "At the present moment about 60 percent of critical scholarship holds that Paul did not write the letter" (An Introduction, p. 610; cited by earlychristianwritings.com). Liberal scholars usually question Pauline authorship for any other epistle, although there are conservative Christian scholars who accept the traditional ascriptions. However, almost no current mainstream scholars, Christian or otherwise, hold that Paul wrote Hebrews. In fact, questions about the authorship of Hebrews go back at least to the 3rd century ecclesiastical writer Caius, who attributed only thirteen epistles to Paul (Eusebius,
Hist. eccl., 6.20.3ff.). A small minority of scholars hypothesize Hebrews may have been written by one of Paul's close associates, such as
BarnabasSaint Barnabas of the first century, born Joseph, was an Early Christian convert, one of the earliest Christian disciples in Jerusalem. Like almost all Christians at the time , Barnabas was Jewish, specifically a Levite...
,
SilasSaint Silas or Saint Silvanus was a leading member of the early Christian community, who later accompanied Paul in some of his missionary journeys....
, or
LukeLuke the Evangelist was an Early Christian writer who the Church Fathers such as Jerome and Eusebius said was the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles....
, given that the themes therein seemed to them as largely
PaulinePauline Christianity is a term used to refer to a branch of Early Christianity associated with the beliefs and doctrines espoused by Paul the Apostle through his writings. Most of orthodox Christianity relies heavily on these teachings and considers them to be amplifications and explanations of the...
.
The authorship of all non-Pauline books have been disputed in recent times. Ascriptions are largely polarized between Christian and non-Christian experts, making any sort of scholarly consensus all but impossible. Even majority views are unclear.
The synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, unlike the other New Testament works, have a unique interrelationship. The dominant view among non-theologian scholars is the
Two-Source HypothesisThe Two-Source Hypothesis is an explanation for the synoptic problem, the pattern of similarities and differences between the three Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. It posits that the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke were based on the Gospel of Mark and a lost, hypothetical sayings...
. This hypothesis proposes that both Matthew and Luke drew significantly upon the Gospel of Mark and another common source, known as the
"Q Source"The Q document or Q is a postulated lost textual source for the Gospel of Matthew and Gospel of Luke. It is a theoretical collection of Jesus' sayings, written in Koine Greek...
(Q is derived from
Quelle, the German word for "source"). However, the nature and even existence of Q is speculative, and scholars have proposed variants on the hypothesis which redefine or exclude it. Most pro-Q scholars believe that it was a single written document, while a few contest that "Q" was actually a number of documents or oral traditions. If it was a documentary source, no information about its author or authors can be obtained from the resources currently available. The traditional view supposes that Mark was written first, and Matthew and Luke drew from it and the second chronological work; and some scholars have attempted to use their modern methods to confirm the idea. An even smaller group of scholars espouse Lukan priority.
Modern scholars are skeptical about authorship claims for noncanonical books, such as the
Nag Hammadi corpusThe Nag Hammadi library is a collection of early Christian Gnostic texts discovered near the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi in 1945. That year, twelve leather-bound papyrus codices buried in a sealed jar were found by a local peasant named Mohammed Ali Samman...
discovered in Egypt in 1945. This corpus of fifty-two Coptic books, dated to about 350–400, includes gospels in the names of
ThomasThe Gospel According to Thomas , also known as The Gospel of Thomas, is a New Testament apocryphon, nearly completely preserved in a Coptic papyrus manuscript discovered in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt...
,
PhilipThe Gospel of Philip is one of the Gnostic Gospels, a text of New Testament apocrypha, dating back to around the third century but lost to modern researchers until it was rediscovered by accident in the mid-20th century...
,
JamesThe Gospel of James, also sometimes known as the Infancy Gospel of James or the Protoevangelium of James, is an apocryphal Gospel probably written about AD 150. The Gospel of James may be the earliest surviving document attesting the veneration of Mary by stating her perpetual virginity and...
, John, and many others. Like almost all ancient works, they represent copies rather than original texts. None of the original texts has been discovered, and scholars argue about the dating of the originals. Suggested dates vary from as early as 50 to as late as the late second century for the gnostics. (See
Gospel of ThomasThe Gospel According to Thomas , also known as The Gospel of Thomas, is a New Testament apocryphon, nearly completely preserved in a Coptic papyrus manuscript discovered in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt...
and
New Testament ApocryphaThe New Testament apocrypha are a number of writings by early Christians that give accounts of Jesus and his teachings, the nature of God, or the teachings of his apostles and of their lives. These writings often have links with those books which are regarded as "canonical"...
.)
To summarize, the only books for which there are solid authorship consensuses among modern critical scholars are the Pauline epistiles mentioned above, which are universally regarded as authentic, and Hebrews, which is nearly always rejected. The remaining nineteen books remain in dispute, some holding to the traditional view, and others regarding them as anonymous or pseudonymic.
Date of composition
According to tradition, the earliest of the books were the letters of Paul, and the last books to be written are those attributed to John, who is traditionally said to have lived to a very old age, perhaps dying as late as 100, although this is often disputed.
IrenaeusSaint Irenaeus , was a Christian Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, then a part of the Roman Empire . He was an early church father and apologist, and his writings were formative in the early development of Christian theology...
of Lyons, c. 185, stated that the Gospels of Matthew and Mark were written while Peter and Paul were preaching in Rome, which would be in the 60s, and Luke was written some time later.
Most secular scholars agree on the dating of the majority of the New Testament, except for the epistles and books that they consider to be
pseudepigraphicalPseudepigrapha are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed authorship is unfounded; a work, simply, "whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past." The word "pseudepigrapha" is the plural of "pseudepigraphon" ; the Anglicized forms...
(i.e., those thought not to be written by their traditional authors). For the gospels they tend to date Mark no earlier than 65 and no later than 75. Matthew is dated between 70 and 85. Luke is usually placed within 80 to 95. However a select few scholars disagree with this as Luke indicates in the book of Acts that he has already written the Gospel of Luke prior to writing the introduction to Acts. Acts is written in a journal form indicating that it may have been written during Paul's journeys which it documents. That would put Acts as early as the 60's and the Gospel of Luke earlier than that. This then could push back Mark into the late 50's if one believes that Mark is the source of some of Luke's material. Early church fathers rarely seem to support parts of that. For instance Irenaeus claims "Luke recorded the teachings of Paul, after the deaths of Peter and Paul. He wrote after the Hebrew Matthew, at around the same time as Mark, and before John." Clement though claims: "Luke was written before Mark and John and at the same time as Matthew. " When taken with Clement's writing on Mark, this means that Peter and Paul were alive at the time that Luke was written. The earliest of the books of the New Testament was First Thessalonians, an epistle of
PaulPaul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, Paul of Tarsus, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Paul, ...
, written probably in 51, or possibly
GalatiansThe Epistle to the Galatians, also known as Galatians, is the ninth book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul of Tarsus to a number of Early Christian communities in the Roman province of Galatia in central Anatolia...
in 49 according to one of two theories of its writing. Of the pseudepigraphical epistles, Christian scholars tend to place them somewhere between 70 and 150, with Second Peter usually being the latest.
In the 1830s German scholars of the
TübingenTübingen, a traditional university town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, is situated 30 km southwest of Stuttgart, on a ridge between the Neckar and Ammer rivers.-History:...
school dated the books as late as the third century, but the discovery of some
New Testament manuscriptsA biblical manuscript is any handwritten copy of a portion of the text of the Bible. The word Bible comes from the Greek biblion ; manuscript comes from Latin manu and scriptum...
and fragments, not including some of the later writings, dating as far back as 125 (notably Papyrus 52) has called such late dating into question. Additionally, a letter to the church at Corinth in the name of Clement of Rome in 95 quotes from 10 of the 27 books of the New Testament, and a
letter to the church at Philippi in the name of PolycarpPolycarp's Letter to the Philippians composed around 110 to 140 AD is described by Irenaeus as follows:This is one quote from the epistle:...
in 120 quotes from 16 books. Therefore, some of the books of the New Testament were at least in a first-draft stage, though there is negligible evidence in these quotes or among biblical manuscripts for the existence of different early drafts. Other books were probably not completed until later, if we assume they must have been quoted by Clement or
PolycarpPolycarp was a second century bishop of Smyrna. According to the Martyrdom of Polycarp, he died a martyr when he was stabbed after an attempt to burn him at the stake failed...
. There are many minor discrepancies between manuscripts (largely spelling or grammatical differences).
An alternative and much earlier datation has been proposed by John A. T. Robinson, on the ground that none of the writings in the new testament showed clear evidence of a knowledge of Jerusalem's temple's destruction, which should have appeared considering the importance of that event for Jews and Christians of that time. Thus, he argues that the whole new testament have been written before 70 A.D.
Canonization
The process of canonization was complex and lengthy. It was characterized by a compilation of books that the apostolic tradition considered authoritative in worship and teaching, relevant to the historical situations in which they lived, and consonant with the Old Testament.
Contrary to popular misconception, the New Testament canon was not summarily decided in large, bureaucratic church council meetings, but rather developed over many centuries.
Thus, McDonald states:
Although a number of Christians have thought that church councils determined what books were to be included in the biblical canons, a more accurate reflection of the matter is that the councils recognized or acknowledged those books that had already obtained prominence from usage among the various early Christian communities.
Similarly, from Patzia:
It appears that the books that finally were canonized are those that enjoyed a special status and were utilized both frequently and universally by the church.
However, this is not to say that no councils touched the issue of the canon. Some of these include the
Council of TrentThe Council of Trent was the 16th-century Ecumenical Council of the Roman Catholic Church. Considered to be one of the Church's most important councils, it convened in Trento between December 13, 1545, and December 4, 1563 in twenty-five sessions for three periods...
(also called the Tridentine Council) of 1546 for Roman Catholicism (by vote: 24 yea, 15 nay, 16 abstain), the
Thirty-Nine ArticlesThe Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion were established in 1563 and are the historic defining statements of Anglican doctrine in relation to the controversies of the English Reformation; especially in the relation of Calvinist doctrine and Roman Catholic practices to the nascent Anglican doctrine of...
of 1563 for the
Church of EnglandThe Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England, the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the oldest among the communion's thirty-eight independent national and regional churches...
, the
Westminster Confession of FaithThe Westminster Confession of Faith is a Reformed confession of faith, in the Calvinist theological tradition. Although drawn up by the 1646 Westminster Assembly, largely of the Church of England, it became and remains the 'subordinate standard' of doctrine in the Church of Scotland, and has been...
of 1647 for
CalvinismCalvinism is a theological system and an approach to the Christian life...
, and the
Synod of JerusalemThe Synod of Jerusalem was convened by Greek Orthodox Patriarch Dositheos Notaras in March, 1672. The occasion was the consecration of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, therefore it is also called the Synod of Bethlehem....
of 1672 for Eastern Orthodoxy. Although these councils did include statements about the canon, they were only reaffirming the existing canon which was reached by mutual agreement over many centuries—they were just making it official.
According to the
Catholic EncyclopediaThe Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to today as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language encyclopedia published in the United States. The first volume appeared in March 1907 and it was completed in April 1914...
article on the
Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the
Tridentine CouncilThe Council of Trent was the 16th-century Ecumenical Council of the Roman Catholic Church. Considered to be one of the Church's most important councils, it convened in Trento between December 13, 1545, and December 4, 1563 in twenty-five sessions for three periods...
."
In the first three centuries of the Christian church,
Early ChristianityEarly Christianity is commonly known as the Christianity of the roughly three centuries between the Crucifixion of Jesus and the First Council of Nicaea in 325....
, there seems not to have been a New Testament canon that was complete and universally recognized. Such non canonical gospels as the
Gospel according to the HebrewsThe Gospel According to the Hebrews written in Aramaic dialect but with Hebrew letters, was the most widely known of the non canonical gospels. Jerome states that most ancient Biblical scholars called it the true Gospel of Matthew or "Mattheai Authenticum"...
were widely read.
One of the earliest attempts at solidifying a canon was made by Marcion, c. 140 AD, who accepted only a modified version of Luke (
Gospel of MarcionThe Gospel of Marcion or the Gospel of the Lord was a text used by the mid-second century Christian teacher Marcion to the exclusion of the other gospels. Its reconstructed fragments now appear among the New Testament apocrypha...
) and ten of Paul's letters, while rejecting the Old Testament entirely. His unorthodox canon was rejected by a majority of Christians, as was he and his theology,
MarcionismMarcionism is an Early Christian dualist belief system that originates in the teachings of Marcion of Sinope at Rome around the year 144. Marcion believed Jesus Christ was the savior sent by God and Paul of Tarsus was his chief apostle, but he rejected the Hebrew Bible and Yahweh...
. Adolf Harnack in
Origin of the New Testament (1914)
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/harnack/origin_nt.v.vi.html argued that the orthodox Church at this time was largely an Old Testament Church (one that "follows the Testament of the Creator-God") without a New Testament canon and that it gradually formulated its New Testament canon in response to the challenge posed by Marcion.
The
Muratorian fragmentThe Muratorian fragment is a copy of perhaps the oldest known list of the books of the New Testament. The fragment is a seventh-century Latin manuscript bound in an eighth or seventh century codex that came from the library of Columban's monastery at Bobbio; it contains internal cues which suggest...
, dated at between 170 (based on an internal reference to
Pope Pius IPope Saint Pius I was Bishop of Rome, according to the "Annuario Pontificio," from 142 or 146 to 157 or 161, respectively. Others suggest that his pontificate was perhaps from 140 to 154.-Early life:...
and arguments put forth by
Bruce MetzgerBruce Manning Metzger was a professor at Princeton Theological Seminary and Bible editor who served on the board of the American Bible Society...
) and as late as the end of the 4th century (according to the Anchor Bible Dictionary), provides the earliest known New Testament canon attributed to mainstream (that is, not Marcionite) Christianity. It is similar, but not identical, to the modern New Testament canon.
The oldest clear endorsement of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John being the only legitimate gospels was written c. 180 AD. It was a claim made by Bishop
IrenaeusSaint Irenaeus , was a Christian Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, then a part of the Roman Empire . He was an early church father and apologist, and his writings were formative in the early development of Christian theology...
in his polemic
Against the Heresies, for example
III.XI.8: "It is not possible that the gospels can be either more or fewer in number than they are. For, since there are four zones of the world in which we live, and four principal winds, while the church is scattered throughout all the world, and the “pillar and ground” of the church is the gospel and the spirit of life; it is fitting that she should have four pillars, breathing out immortality on every side, and vivifying men afresh."
At least, then, the books considered to be authoritative included the four gospels and many of the letters of Paul, though, based on the arguments Irenaeus made in support of only four authentic gospels, some interpreters deduce that the
fourfold Gospel must have still been a novelty in Irenaeus's time..
Justin MartyrJustin Martyr was an early Christian apologist and saint. His works represent the earliest surviving Christian "apologies" of notable size.-Life:Most of what is known about the life of Justin Martyr comes from his own writings...
, Irenaeus, and
TertullianQuintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian, was a prolific and controversial early Christian Berber author, and the first to write Christian Latin literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy...
(all 2nd century) held the letters of Paul to be on par with the Hebrew scriptures as being divinely inspired, yet others rejected him. Other books were held in high esteem but were gradually relegated to the status of
New Testament ApocryphaThe New Testament apocrypha are a number of writings by early Christians that give accounts of Jesus and his teachings, the nature of God, or the teachings of his apostles and of their lives. These writings often have links with those books which are regarded as "canonical"...
.
Eusebius, c. 300, gave a detailed list of New Testament writings in his
Ecclesiastical History Book 3, Chapter XXV:
- "1... First then must be put the holy quaternion of the gospels; following them the Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of the Apostles is the fifth book of the New Testament. It is commonly referred to as Acts and outlines the history of the Apostolic Age...
... the epistles of PaulThe Pauline epistles, Epistles of Paul, or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen New Testament books which have the name Paul as the first word, hence claiming authorship by Paul the Apostle. Among these letters are some of the earliest extant Christian documents...
... the epistle of JohnThe First Epistle of John is a book of the New Testament. This fourth catholic or "general" epistle is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of John and the other two epistles of John. This Epistle was written in Ephesus between the years 100-110...
... the epistle of PeterThe First Epistle of Peter is a book of the New Testament. It has traditionally been held to have been written by Saint Peter the apostle during his time as bishop of Rome or Bishop of Antioch, though neither titles are used in the epistle...
... After them is to be placed, if it really seem proper, the Apocalypse of John, concerning which we shall give the different opinions at the proper time. These then belong among the accepted writings."
- "3 Among the disputed writings [Antilegomena
"Antilegomena" was an epithet used by the Church Fathers to denote those books of the New Testament which, although sometimes publicly read in the churches, were not—for a considerable amount of time—considered to be genuine, or received into the canon of Scripture...
], which are nevertheless recognized by many, are extant the so-called epistle of JamesThe Epistle of James is a book in the New Testament. The author identifies himself as "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ".-Composition:...
and that of JudeThe Epistle of Jude is second to last book of the New Testament and is attributed Jude, the brother of James the Just .- Composition :...
, also the second epistle of PeterThe Second Epistle of Peter is a book of the New Testament of the Bible, traditionally ascribed to Saint Peter, but in modern times widely regarded as pseudonymous....
, and those that are called the secondThe Second Epistle of John is 63rd book of the New Testament and is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of John and the other two epistles of John. This Epistle is the shortest book in the Bible, comprising a mere thirteen...
and third of JohnThe New Testament Third Epistle of John The New Testament Third Epistle of John The New Testament Third Epistle of John (often referred to asThe Third Epistle of John is 64th book of the New Testament and is attributed to John the Evangelist, traditionally thought to be the author of the Gospel of...
, whether they belong to the evangelistSaint John the Evangelist , or the Beloved Disciple, is traditionally the name used to refer to the author of the Gospel of John and the First Epistle of John. Traditionally he has been identified with John the Apostle...
or to another person of the same name. Among the rejected [Kirsopp Lake translation: "not genuine"] writings must be reckoned also the Acts of PaulThe Acts of Paul is one of the major works from the New Testament apocrypha, an approximate date given to the Acts of Paul is 160 C.E. The Acts were considered orthodox by Hippolytus, but were eventually regarded as heretical when the Manichaeans started using the texts.The discovery of a Coptic...
, and the so-called Shepherd, and the Apocalypse of PeterThe recovered Apocalypse of Peter or Revelation of Peter is an example of a simple, popular early Christian text of the second century; it is an example of Apocalyptic literature with Hellenistic overtones. The text is extant in two incomplete versions of a lost Greek original, one Koine Greek, and...
, and in addition to these the extant epistle of BarnabasThe Epistle of Barnabas is a Greek treatise with some features of an epistle containing twenty-one chapters, preserved complete in the 4th century Codex Sinaiticus where it appears at the end of the New Testament...
, and the so-called Teachings of the ApostlesThe Didache is the common name of a brief early Christian treatise...
; and besides, as I said, the Apocalypse of John, if it seem proper, which some, as I said, reject, but which others class with the accepted books. And among these some have placed also the Gospel according to the HebrewsThe Gospel of the Hebrews is a lost gospel preserved only in a few quotations of the Church Fathers. It was written in Aramaic dialect but with Hebrew letters, and was the most widely known of the non canonical gospels. The Gospel of the Hebrews was the gospel in use among Hebrew Christian sects,...
... And all these may be reckoned among the disputed books."
- "6... such books as the Gospels of Peter
The Gospel of Peter may have been a prominent passion narrative in the early history of Christianity, but over time it passed out of common usage. Only fragments survive...
, of ThomasThe Gospel According to Thomas , also known as The Gospel of Thomas, is a New Testament apocryphon, nearly completely preserved in a Coptic papyrus manuscript discovered in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt...
, of MatthiasThe Gospel of Matthias is a lost text from the New Testament apocrypha, ascribed to Matthias, the apostle chosen by lots to replace Judas Iscariot . The content has been surmised from various descriptions of it in ancient works by church fathers . There is too little evidence to decide whether a...
, or of any others besides them, and the Acts of AndrewThe Acts of Andrew , is the earliest testimony of the acts and miracles of the Apostle Andrew. The surviving version is alluded to in a third century work, the Coptic Manichaean Psalter, providing a terminus ante quem, according to its editors, M.R. James and Jean-Marc Prieur in The Anchor Bible...
and JohnThe Acts of John is a 2nd-century Christian collection of narratives and traditions, well described as a "library of materials" , inspired by the Gospel of John, long known in fragmentary form. The traditional author was said to be one Leucius Charinus, a companion of John, who was associated with...
and the other apostles... they clearly show themselves to be the fictions of heretics. Wherefore they are not to be placed even among the rejected writings, but are all of them to be cast aside as absurd and impious."
Revelation is counted as both
accepted (Kirsopp Lake translation: "Recognized") and
disputed, which has caused some confusion over what exactly Eusebius meant by doing so. From other writings of the church fathers, we know that it was disputed with several canon lists rejecting its canonicity. EH 3.3.5 adds further detail on Paul: "Paul's fourteen epistles are well known and undisputed. It is not indeed right to overlook the fact that some have rejected the
Epistle to the HebrewsThe Epistle to the Hebrews is one of the books in the New Testament. Although sometimes credited to the Apostle Paul, the letter is anonymous. It has carried its traditional title since Tertullian described it as Barnabae titulus ad Hebraeos....
, saying that it is disputed by the church of Rome, on the ground that it was not written by Paul." EH 4.29.6 mentions the
DiatessaronThe Diatessaron is the most prominent Gospel harmony created by Tatian, an early Christian apologist and ascetic. The term "diatessaron" is from Middle English by way of Latin, diatessarōn , and ultimately Greek, dia tessarōn The Diatessaron (c 160 - 175) is the most prominent Gospel harmony...
: "But their original founder, Tatian, formed a certain combination and collection of the gospels, I know not how, to which he gave the title Diatessaron, and which is still in the hands of some. But they say that he ventured to paraphrase certain words of the apostle [Paul], in order to improve their style."
The New Testament canon as it is now was first listed by
St. Athanasius, Bishop of AlexandriaAthanasius of Alexandria , also given the titles Athanasius the Great, Pope Athanasius I of Alexandria, and Athanasius the Apostolic, was a Christian theologian, bishop of Alexandria, Church Father, and a noted Egyptian leader of the fourth century. He is best remembered for his role in the...
, in 367, in a letter written to his churches in Egypt,
Festal Letter 39. Also cited is the
Council of RomeThe Council of Rome was a meeting of Catholic Church officials and theologians which took place in 382 under the authority of Pope Damasus I. The previous year, the Emperor Theodosius I had appointed the "dark horse" candidate Nectarius Archbishop of Constantinople...
, but not without controversy. That canon gained wider and wider recognition until it was accepted at the Third Council of Carthage in 397 and 419. Even this council did not settle the matter, however. Certain books continued to be questioned, especially
JamesThe Epistle of James is a book in the New Testament. The author identifies himself as "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ".-Composition:...
and
RevelationThe Book of Revelation, also called the Revelation of St. John, the Apocalypse of John, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ, is the last book of the New Testament. It may be shortened to Revelation but never Revelations...
. Even as late as the 16th century, theologian and reformer
Martin LutherMartin Luther changed the course of Western civilization by initiating the Protestant Reformation. As a priest and theology professor, he confronted indulgence salesmen with his The Ninety-Five Theses in 1517. Luther strongly disputed their claim that freedom from God's punishment of sin could...
questioned (but in the end did not reject) the
Epistle of JamesThe Epistle of James is a book in the New Testament. The author identifies himself as "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ".-Composition:...
, the
Epistle of JudeThe Epistle of Jude is second to last book of the New Testament and is attributed Jude, the brother of James the Just .- Composition :...
, the
Epistle to the HebrewsThe Epistle to the Hebrews is one of the books in the New Testament. Although sometimes credited to the Apostle Paul, the letter is anonymous. It has carried its traditional title since Tertullian described it as Barnabae titulus ad Hebraeos....
and the
Book of RevelationThe Book of Revelation, also called the Revelation of St. John, the Apocalypse of John, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ, is the last book of the New Testament. It may be shortened to Revelation but never Revelations...
. Even today,
German-languageGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
Luther BibleThe Luther Bible is a German Bible translation by Martin Luther, first printed with both testaments in 1534. This translation is considered to be largely responsible for the evolution of the modern German language....
s are printed with these four books at the end of the canon, rather than their traditional order for other Christians. Due to the fact that some of the recognized books of the Holy Scripture were having their canonicity questioned by Protestants in the 16th century, the Council of Trent reaffirmed the
traditional canon (that is for Catholics the canon of the
Council of RomeThe Council of Rome was a meeting of Catholic Church officials and theologians which took place in 382 under the authority of Pope Damasus I. The previous year, the Emperor Theodosius I had appointed the "dark horse" candidate Nectarius Archbishop of Constantinople...
) of the scripture as a
dogmaDogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, ideology or any kind of organization: it is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted or diverged from. The term derives from Greek "that which seems to one, opinion or belief" and that from , "to think, to suppose, to imagine"...
of the Catholic Church.
Early manuscripts
The early
New Testament manuscriptsA biblical manuscript is any handwritten copy of a portion of the text of the Bible. The word Bible comes from the Greek biblion ; manuscript comes from Latin manu and scriptum...
can be classified into certain major families or types of text. A "text-type" is the name given to a family of texts with a common ancestor. It must be noted that many early manuscripts can be composed of several different text-types. For example,
Codex WashingtonianusThe Codex Washingtonianus or Codex Washingtonensis, designated by W or 032 , ε 014 , also called the Washington Manuscript of the Gospels, and The Freer Gospel, contains the four biblical gospels and was written in Greek on vellum and palimpsest in the fourth or fifth century.- Description :The...
consists of only the four gospels, and yet, different parts are written in different text-types. Four distinctive New Testament text-types have been defined:
The
Alexandrian text-typeThe Alexandrian text-type is one of several text-types used in New Testament textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of biblical manuscripts...
is usually considered the best and most faithful at preserving the original; it is usually brief and austere. The main examples are the Codex Vaticanus,
Codex SinaiticusCodex Sinaiticus is one of the most important hand-written ancient copies of the Greek Bible. It is an Alexandrian text-type manuscript written in the 4th century in uncial letters...
and
Bodmer PapyriThe Bodmer Papyri are a group of twenty-two papyri discovered in Egypt in 1952. They are named after Martin Bodmer who purchased them. The papyri contain segments from the Old and New Testaments, early Christian literature, Homer and Menander. The oldest, P66 dates to c. 200. The papyri...
.
The
Western text-typeThe Western text-type is one of several text-types used in textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of Greek New Testament manuscripts...
has a fondness for paraphrase and is generally the longest. Most significant is the Western version of Acts, which is 10% longer. The main examples are the
Codex BezaeThe Codex Bezae Cantabrigensis, designated by Dea or 05 , δ 5 , is an important codex of the New Testament dating from the fifth-century. It is written in an uncial hand on vellum and contains, in both Greek and Latin, most of the four Gospels and Acts, with a small fragment of the Third...
,
Codex ClaromontanusCodex Claromontanus, symbolized by D
p or 06 , δ 1026 , is a Greek-Latin diglot uncial manuscript of the New Testament, written in an uncial hand on vellum. The Greek and Latin text on facing pages.- Description :The codex contains the Pauline epistles on 533 leaves, by...
,
Codex WashingtonianusThe Codex Washingtonianus or Codex Washingtonensis, designated by W or 032 , ε 014 , also called the Washington Manuscript of the Gospels, and The Freer Gospel, contains the four biblical gospels and was written in Greek on vellum and palimpsest in the fourth or fifth century.- Description :The...
,
Old Latin versionsVetus Latina is a collective name given to the Biblical texts in Latin that were translated before St Jerome's Vulgate Bible became the standard Bible for Latin-speaking Western Christians. The phrase Vetus Latina is Latin for Old Latin, and the Vetus Latina is sometimes known as the Old Latin...
(prior to the
VulgateThe Vulgate is an early 5th-century Latin version of the Bible, largely the result of the labors of Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of old Latin translations...
), and quotes by Marcion,
TatianTatian the Assyrian was an early Christian writer and theologian of the second century.Tatian's most influential work is the Diatessaron, a harmony of the four gospels that became the standard text of the four gospels in the Syriac-speaking churches until the 5th-century, when it gave way to the...
,
IrenaeusSaint Irenaeus , was a Christian Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, then a part of the Roman Empire . He was an early church father and apologist, and his writings were formative in the early development of Christian theology...
,
TertullianQuintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, anglicised as Tertullian, was a prolific and controversial early Christian Berber author, and the first to write Christian Latin literature. He also was a notable early Christian apologist and a polemicist against heresy...
and
CyprianSaint Cyprian was bishop of Carthage and an important early Christian writer. He was born around the beginning of the 3rd century in North Africa, perhaps at Carthage, where he received an excellent classical education...
.
The
Caesarean text-typeCaesarean text-type is the term proposed by certain scholars to denote a consistent pattern of variant readings that is claimed to be apparent in certain Greek manuscripts of the four Gospels, but which is not found in any of the other commonly recognized New Testament text-types; the Byzantine...
is a mixture of Western and Alexandrian types and is found in the
Chester Beatty PapyriThe Chester Beatty Biblical Papyri or simply the Chester Beatty Papyri are a group of early papyrus manuscripts of biblical texts. The manuscripts are in Greek and are of Christian origin. There are eleven manuscripts in the group, seven consisting of portions of Old Testament books, three...
, in
Codex KoridethiThe Codex Koridethi, also named Codex Coridethianus, designed by Θ, 038, or Theta , ε 050 , is a 9th century manuscript of the four Gospels. It is written in Greek with uncial script in two columns per page. There are gaps in the text: Matthew 1:1–9, 1:21–4:4, and 4:17–5:4 are missing.The letter...
, and is quoted by Eusebius,
Cyril of JerusalemCyril of Jerusalem was a distinguished theologian of the early Church . He is venerated as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the Anglican Communion...
and Armenians.
The
Byzantine text-typeThe Byzantine text-type is one of several text-types used in textual criticism to describe the textual character of Greek New Testament manuscripts. It is the form found in the largest number of surviving manuscripts, though not in the oldest...
is the textform that is contained in a majority of the extant manuscripts and thus is often called the "Majority Text." The origin of this text is debated among scholars. Some scholars, observing that few Byzantine readings exist among early uncial manuscript witnesses, contend that the text formed late and contains conflated readings. Other scholars look to the sheer number of consistent witnesses to the Byzantine textform, and the existence of readings which parallel the Byzantine textform in very early translations, as evidence that the Byzantine textform is probably the closest text to that originally penned by the New Testament authors. The Byzantine textform can be found in the Gospels of
Codex AlexandrinusThe Codex Alexandrinus is a 5th century manuscript of the Greek Bible,
[The Greek Bible in this context refers to the Bible used by Greek-speaking Christians who lived in Egypt and elsewhere during the early history of Christianity...]
, later
uncialUncial is a majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek scribes. Uncial letters are written in either Greek, Latin, or Gothic.-Development:...
texts and most minuscule texts.
The 1611 King James Version of the English New Testament was translated from what came to be known as the
Textus ReceptusTextus Receptus is the name subsequently given to the succession of printed Greek texts of the New Testament which constituted the translation base for the original German Luther Bible, for the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale, the King James Version, and for most...
, a text derived from the later editions of Erasmus' printed Greek New Testament. That in turn was based on a handful of manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type.
Most modern English versions of the New Testament are based on critical reconstructions of the Greek text, such as the Nestle-Alands'
Novum Testamentum GraeceNovum Testamentum Graece is the Latin name of the Greek-language version of the New Testament. The first printed edition was the Complutensian Polyglot Bible by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, printed in 1514, but not published until 1520...
Greek New Testament or the
United Bible SocietiesThe United Bible Societies is a worldwide association of bible societies. In 1946 in Haywards Heath as an effort to coordinate the activities of the bible societies, delegates from 13 countries formed the UBS, with headquarters in London and in Geneva.As of January 2006 the UBS has 141 member...
' (sometimes referred to collectively as the NU-Text), which have a pronounced Alexandrian character.
Early versions
The first translations (usually called "versions") of the New Testament were made in the end of 2nd century into
SyriacSyriac is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. Classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from the 4th to the 8th centuries...
,
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
, and
CopticCoptic or Coptic Egyptian is the final stage of the Egyptian language, a northern Afro-Asiatic language spoken in Egypt until at least the seventeenth century. Egyptian began to be written using the Greek alphabet in the first century...
languages. These three versions were made directly from Greek, before a revision of Greek text, and they are always cited in modern critical apparatus.
Syriac versions
Syriac was spoken in
SyriaSyria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south and Israel to the southwest....
, and
MesopotamiaMesopotamia "land between the rivers" is a name for the Tigris–Euphrates region in the eastern Mediterranean, largely corresponding to Iraq, as well as northeastern Syria, some parts of southeastern Turkey, and some parts of the Khūzestān Province of southwestern...
, and with dialect in
PalestinePalestine is a conventional name used, among others, to describe a geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands.As a geographical term, Palestine can also refer to 'ancient Palestine,' an area...
, where it was known as Aramaic. Several Syriac translations were made and have come to us. It is possible some translations were lost.
TatianTatian the Assyrian was an early Christian writer and theologian of the second century.Tatian's most influential work is the Diatessaron, a harmony of the four gospels that became the standard text of the four gospels in the Syriac-speaking churches until the 5th-century, when it gave way to the...
, the Syrian, about A.D. 170, prepared
DiatessaronThe Diatessaron is the most prominent Gospel harmony created by Tatian, an early Christian apologist and ascetic. The term "diatessaron" is from Middle English by way of Latin, diatessarōn , and ultimately Greek, dia tessarōn The Diatessaron (c 160 - 175) is the most prominent Gospel harmony...
, a harmony of the four gospels which he made in
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
. After his return to Syria he translated it into Syriac. Probably it was the first translation part of New Testament from Greek into other language.
Since the 19th century there has been evidence supporting the existence of an Older Syriac version published at about the same time as the Diatessaron, or even a little earlier (
CuretonianusThe Curetonian Gospels, designated by the siglum syrcur, are contained in a manuscript of the four gospels of the New Testament in Old Syriac, a translation from the Aramaic originals, according to William Cureton differing considerably from the canonical Greek texts, with which they had...
, Syrus Sinaiticus from 5th or 4th century). They contain text of the four gospels. The text of Acts and the
Pauline EpistlesThe Pauline epistles, Epistles of Paul, or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen New Testament books which have the name Paul as the first word, hence claiming authorship by Paul the Apostle. Among these letters are some of the earliest extant Christian documents...
has not survived to our time. We know only citations made by Eastern fathers. Old Syriac version is a representative of the
Western text-typeThe Western text-type is one of several text-types used in textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of Greek New Testament manuscripts...
.
The
PeshittaThe Peshitta is the standard version of the Christian Bible in the Syriac language.The Old Testament of the Peshitta was translated from the Hebrew, probably in the second century...
version was prepared in the beginning of the 5th century. It contains only 22 books (2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude, and Revelation were not translated).
The Philoxenian probably was produced in 508 for Philoxenus, Bishop of Mabung.
Latin versions
The Gospels were translated into Latin during the last quarter of the second century in North Africa (
Afra). There were not many later European Latin translations (
Itala), while the African Latin manuscripts are not numerous (
Itala about 80 mss.). The
Old LatinVetus Latina is a collective name given to the Biblical texts in Latin that were translated before St Jerome's Vulgate Bible became the standard Bible for Latin-speaking Western Christians. The phrase Vetus Latina is Latin for Old Latin, and the Vetus Latina is sometimes known as the Old Latin...
versions support the Western type of text.
Because of ununiformed text Old Latin versions, interpolations, and corruption
JeromeSaint Jerome was a Christian priest and apologist. He was the son of Eusebius, of the city of Strido, which was on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia...
prepared another translation -
VulgateThe Vulgate is an early 5th-century Latin version of the Bible, largely the result of the labors of Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of old Latin translations...
. In fact it was only a revision of Itala, and only the Gospels were revised precisely. We have 8,000 copies of Vulgate.
In the order of the versions Latin version usually stands at the beginning in the apparatus.
Coptic versions
The Coptic language was used in several dialects: Bohairic (northern dialect), Fayyumic, Sahidic (southern dialect), Akhmimic, and others. The first translation was made in the end of the 2nd century into Sahidic dialect (cop
sa). This translation was a representative of
Alexandrian text-typeThe Alexandrian text-type is one of several text-types used in New Testament textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of biblical manuscripts...
.
A Bofairic translation was made a little later, because Greek language was more influenced in a North, than in a South. Probably it was made in the beginning of the 3rd century. It was a very literal translation, a lot of Greek words, and even some grammar forms (f.e. syntactic construction μεν — δε) were incorporated to this translation. For this reason, bohairic translation is more helpful in reconstruction early Greek text than any other ancient translation.
Versions in other languages
After A.D. 300 were made other translations into
ArmenianThe Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
,
GeorgianGeorgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 3.9 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...
, Ethiopic,
GothicGothic is an extinct Germanic language that was spoken by the Goths. It is known primarily from the Codex Argenteus, a 6th century copy of a 4th century Bible translation, and is the only East Germanic language with a sizable corpus...
, Old Church Slavonic, and other languages (Arabic, Nubian,
PersianPersian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is widely spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and to some extent in Iraq and Bahrain, and has a status of official language in the first three countries under different names...
, Soghdian). Armenian, Georgian, and Ethiopic are often cited in critical apparatus, but Gothic, and Slavonic are cited very rarely.
Additions
Over the years, there have been a number of possible additions to the original text, such as:
- Matt 16:2b-3
- Mark 16:9-20
- Luke 22:19b-20,43–44
- John 5:4
- John 7:53-8:11
The Pericope Adulterae or Pericope de Adultera is a traditional name for a famous passage about an adulterous woman—verses of the Gospel of John...
- 1 John 5:7b–8a
The Comma Johanneum is a comma contained in most translations of the First Epistle of John published from 1522 until the latter part of the nineteenth century, owing to the widespread use of the third edition of the Textus Receptus as the sole source for translation...
- Romans 16:24
In addition, there are a large number of variant readings, see
Bruce MetzgerBruce Manning Metzger was a professor at Princeton Theological Seminary and Bible editor who served on the board of the American Bible Society...
's
Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (1994) for details.
Authority
All Christian groups respect the New Testament, but they differ in their understanding of the nature, extent, and relevance of its authority. Views of the authoritativeness of the New Testament often depend on the concept of
inspirationInspiration may refer to:* Artistic inspiration, sudden creativity in artistic production* Biblical inspiration, the doctrine in Judeo-Christian theology concerned with the divine origin of the Bible...
, which relates to the role of God in the formation of the New Testament. Generally, the greater the role of God in one's doctrine of inspiration, the more one accepts the
doctrine
Doctrine is a codification of beliefs or "a body of teachings" or "instructions", taught principles or positions, as the body of teachings in a branch of knowledge or belief system...
of
biblical inerrancyBiblical inerrancy is the doctrinal position that, in its original form, the Bible is totally without error, and free from all contradiction; "referring to the complete accuracy of Scripture, including the historical and scientific parts."...
and/or authoritativeness of the Bible. One possible source of confusion is that these terms are difficult to define, because many people use them interchangeably or with very different meanings. This article will use the terms in the following manner:
- Infallibility relates to the absolute correctness of the Bible in matters of doctrine.
- Inerrancy relates to the absolute correctness of the Bible in factual assertions (including historical and scientific assertions).
- Authoritativeness relates to the correctness of the Bible in questions of practice in morality.
Christian scholars such as Professor
Peter StonerPeter Stoner was Chairman of the Departments of Mathematics and Astronomy at Pasadena City College until 1953; Chairman of the science division, Westmont College, 1953-57; Professor Emeritus of Science, Westmont College; Professor Emeritus of Mathematics and Astronomy, Pasadena City College.Stoner...
see the Bible having compelling and detailed fulfilled
Bible prophecyBible prophecy, or "biblical prophecy" refers to passages in the Bible which predict future events and which are believed to be divinely inspired relevation...
and argue for the Bible's inspiration. This is argued to show that the Bible is authoritative, since it is argued that only God knows the future. A common objection in the West regarding this matter is that the burden of proof is on
miracleA miracle is a perceptible interruption of the laws of nature, such that can be attempted to be explained by divine intervention, and is sometimes associated with a miracle worker. Many folktales, religious texts, and people claim various events they refer to as "miraculous". People in different...
s, which, by
Occam's RazorOccam's razor , entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem , is the principle that can be popularly stated as "when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better." The principle is attributed to 14th-century English...
, should only be considered when all ordinary explanations fail.
C. S. LewisClive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as Jack, was an Irish-born British novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist...
,
Norman GeislerNorman L. Geisler is a Christian apologist and the co-founder of Southern Evangelical Seminary outside Charlotte, North Carolina, where he formerly taught. He has taught at the university and graduate level for fifty years and has spoken or debated in all fifty states and in twenty-five...
,
William Lane CraigWilliam Lane Craig is an American philosopher and theologian known for his contributions to the philosophy of religion, the philosophy of time, philosophical theology, and historical Jesus studies. One of the most visible contemporary proponents of natural theology, Craig has contributed to a...
, and Christians who engage in
Christian apologeticsChristian apologetics is a field of Christian theology that aims to present a rational basis for the Christian faith, defend the faith against objections, and expose the perceived flaws of other world views...
have argued that miracles are reasonable and plausible. . On the other hand, in the West those who do not believe in miracles often use the arguments of
David HumeDavid Hume was a Scottish philosopher, economist, historian and a key figure in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...
, Benedict de Spinoza, or the arguments of
DeismDeism or is a religious and philosophical belief that a supreme being created the universe, and that this can be determined using reason and observation of the natural world alone, without a need for either faith or organized religion...
.
All of these concepts depend for their meaning on the supposition that the text of Bible has been properly interpreted, with consideration for the intention of the text, whether
literalLiteral may refer to:*Literal and figurative language, taken in a non-figurative sense.*Literal translation, the close adherence to the forms of a source language text.*Literal legal interpretations also referred to as Strict constructionism....
historyHistory is the study of the human past, with special attention to the written record. Scholars who write about history are called historians. It is a field of research which uses a narrative to examine and analyse the sequence of events, and it often attempts to investigate objectively the patterns...
,
allegoryAllegory is a figurative mode of representation conveying a meaning other than the literal. An allegory is a device that can be presented in literary form, such as a poem or novel, or in visual form, such as in painting or sculpture...
or
poetryPoetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
, etc. Especially the doctrine of inerrancy is variously understood according to the weight given by the interpreter to scientific investigations of the world.
Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy
For the Roman Catholic and
Eastern OrthodoxThe Orthodox Church, also officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to in English speaking countries as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the world's second largest Christian communion, estimated to number 225 million members...
churches, there are two strands of revelation, the Bible, and the (rest of the)
Apostolic TraditionApostolic succession is the doctrine in some of the more ancient Christian communions that the succession of bishops, in uninterrupted lines, is historically traceable back to the original Twelve Apostles. Apostolic succession is not the same as the Petrine supremacy . As a general rule,...
. Both of them are interpreted by the teachings of the church. In Catholic terminology the teaching office is called the
MagisteriumThe Magisterium is the "teaching authority of the Roman Catholic Church". The word is derived from Latin magisterium, which originally meant the office of a president, chief, director, superintendent, etc...
; in Orthodox terminology the authentic interpretation of scripture and tradition is limited, in the final analysis, to the Canon Law of the
Ecumenical councilAn ecumenical council is a conference of the bishops of the whole Christian Church convened to discuss and settle matters of Church doctrine and practice...
s. Both sources of revelation are considered necessary for proper understanding of the tenets of the faith. The Roman Catholic view is expressed clearly in the
Catechism of the Catholic ChurchThe Catechism of the Catholic Church is an official exposition of the teachings of the Catholic Church. A provisional, "reference text" was issued by Pope John Paul II on October 11, 1992 — "the thirtieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council" — with his apostolic...
(1992):
§ 83: As a result the church, to whom the transmission and interpretation of RevelationIn religion and theology, revelation is the revealing or disclosing, or making something obvious and clearly understood through active or passive communication with supernatural entities . It is believed that revelation can originate directly from a deity, or through an agent, such as an angel...
is entrusted, does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from the holy Scriptures alone. Both scripture and tradition must be accepted and honoured with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.
§ 107: The inspired books teach the truth. Since therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures.
Protestantism
Following the doctrine of
sola scripturaSola scriptura is the doctrine that the Bible is the only infallible or inerrant authority for Christian faith, and that it contains all knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness. Consequently, Sola Scriptura demands that no doctrine is to be admitted or confessed that is not found directly...
, Protestants believe that their traditions of faith, practice and interpretations carry forward what the scriptures teach, and so tradition is not a source of authority in itself. Their traditions derive authority from the Bible, and are therefore always open to reevaluation. This openness to doctrinal revision has extended in
LiberalLiberal Christianity, sometimes called liberal theology, is an umbrella term covering diverse, philosophically informed religious movements and ideas within Christianity from the late 18th century and onwards...
Protestant traditions even to the reevaluation of the doctrine of Scripture upon which the Reformation was founded, and members of these traditions may even question whether the Bible is infallible in doctrine, inerrant in historical and other factual statements, and whether it has uniquely divine authority. However, the adjustments made by modern
ProtestantsProtestantism is a branch within Christianity, containing many denominations with some differing practices and doctrines, that principally originated in the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation. It is considered to be one of the major divisions within Christianity, together with the Roman...
to their doctrine of scripture vary widely.
American evangelical and fundamentalist Protestantism
Certain American conservatives,
fundamentalistsFundamentalist Christianity, also known as Christian fundamentalism or fundamentalist evangelicalism, is a movement that arose mainly within British and American Protestantism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among conservative evangelical Christians, who, in a reaction to liberal...
and evangelicals believe that the scriptures are both human and divine in origin: human in their manner of composition, but divine in that their source is God, the Holy Spirit, who governed the writers of scripture in such a way that they recorded nothing at all contrary to the truth. Fundamentalists accept the enduring authority and impugnity of a prescientific interpretation of the Bible. In the United States this particularly applies to issues such as the
ordination of womenIn general religious use, ordination is the process by which a person is consecrated . The ordination of women is a controversial issue in religions where either the rite of ordination, or the role that an ordained person fulfills, has traditionally been restricted to men because of cultural...
,
abortionAn abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo. An abortion can occur spontaneously due to complications during pregnancy or can be induced, in humans and other species...
, and
homosexualityHomosexuality is the romantic or sexual attraction or behavior among members of the same sex, situationally or as an enduring disposition. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is considered to lie within the heterosexual-homosexual continuum of human sexuality, and refers to an individual’s...
. However, although American evangelicals are overwhelmingly opposed to such things, other evangelicals are increasingly willing to consider that the views of the biblical authors may have been culturally conditioned, and they may even argue that there is room for change along with cultural norms and scientific advancements.
Both fundamentalists and evangelicals profess belief in the inerrancy of the Bible. In the US the fundamentalists' stronger emphasis on literal interpretation has led to the rejection of
evolutionIn biology, evolution is change in the genetic material of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. Though changes produced in any one generation are normally small, differences accumulate with each generation and can, over time, cause substantial changes in the population, a...
, which contradicts the doctrine of
creationismCreationism refers to the religious belief that humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe were created in some form by a supernatural being or beings, commonly a single deity...
.
Evangelicals, on the other hand, tend to avoid interpretations of the Bible that would directly contradict generally accepted scientific assertions of fact. They do not impute error to biblical authors, but rather entertain various theories of literary intent which might give credibility to human progress in knowledge of the world, while still accepting the divine inspiration of the scriptures.
Within the US, the
Chicago Statement on Biblical InerrancyThe Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy was formulated in October of 1978 by more than 200 evangelical leaders at a conference sponsored by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy, held in Chicago. The statement was designed to defend the position of Biblical inerrancy against a...
(1978) is an influential statement, articulating evangelical views on this issue. Paragraph four of its summary states: "Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God's acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God's saving grace in individual lives."
Critics of such a position point out that there are many statements that Jesus makes in the gospels or that Paul makes in his epistles, even to the point of making them commands, which are not taken as commands by most advocates of
biblical inerrancyBiblical inerrancy is the doctrinal position that, in its original form, the Bible is totally without error, and free from all contradiction; "referring to the complete accuracy of Scripture, including the historical and scientific parts."...
. Examples of this are Jesus' command to the disciples to sell all they have and give the money to the poor so as to gain treasure in the
Kingdom of HeavenKingdom of Heaven may refer to:* Kingdom of God, a foundational theological concept in Christianity, Judaism, and Islam* Kingdom of Heaven , a 2005 film, directed by Ridley Scott...
(Mark 10:21), or Paul's calls to imitate him in
celibacyCelibacy is defined as the lifestyle of someone who is, and is striving to remain, unmarried all his/her life. It is also used to describe a state of life where one chooses to abstain from all sexual activities...
(1 Cor 7:8). Other sections of the Bible, such as the second half of John chapter six, where Jesus commands that the disciples eat his flesh and drink his blood, are interpreted by most adherents of biblical inerrancy as symbolic language rather than literally, as might be expected from the statements of the doctrine. Supporters of biblical inerrancy generally argue that these passages are intended to be symbolic, and that their symbolic nature can be seen directly in the text, thus preserving the doctrine.
American mainline and liberal Protestantism
Mainline American Protestant denominations, including the
United Methodist ChurchThe United Methodist Church is a Methodist Christian denomination which traces its roots back to the evangelical, holiness, revival movement of John and Charles Wesley within the Anglican Church. As such, the church's theological orientation is decidedly Wesleyan. It contains both liturgical and...
, Presbyterian Church USA, The Episcopal Church, and
Evangelical Lutheran Church in AmericaThe Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is a mainline Protestant denomination headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA officially came into existence on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three churches and currently has about 4,633,887 baptized members...
, do not teach the doctrine of inerrancy as set forth in the Chicago Statement. All of these churches have more ancient doctrinal statements asserting the authority of scripture, but may interpret these statements in such a way as to allow for a very broad range of teaching—from evangelicalism to skepticism. It is not an impediment to ordination in these denominations to teach that the scriptures contain errors, or that the authors follow a more or less unenlightened ethics that, however appropriate it may have seemed in the authors' time, moderns would be very wrong to follow blindly. For example,
ordination of womenIn general religious use, ordination is the process by which a person is consecrated . The ordination of women is a controversial issue in religions where either the rite of ordination, or the role that an ordained person fulfills, has traditionally been restricted to men because of cultural...
is universally accepted in the mainline churches,
abortionAn abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo. An abortion can occur spontaneously due to complications during pregnancy or can be induced, in humans and other species...
is condemned as a grievous social tragedy but not always a personal
sinSin is a term used mainly in a religious context to describe an act that violates a moral rule, or the state of having committed such a violation. Commonly, the moral code of conduct is decreed by a divine entity, i.e...
or a crime against an unborn person, and
homosexualityHomosexuality is the romantic or sexual attraction or behavior among members of the same sex, situationally or as an enduring disposition. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is considered to lie within the heterosexual-homosexual continuum of human sexuality, and refers to an individual’s...
is increasingly regarded as a genetic propensity or morally neutral preference that should be neither encouraged nor condemned. In North America, the most contentious of these issues among these churches at the present time is how far the ordination of gay men and lesbians should be accepted.
Officials of the Presbyterian Church USA report: "We acknowledge the role of scriptural authority in the Presbyterian Church, but Presbyterians generally do not believe in biblical inerrancy. Presbyterians do not insist that every detail of chronology or sequence or prescientific description in scripture be true in literal form. Our confessions do teach biblical infallibility. Infallibility affirms the entire truthfulness of scripture without depending on every exact detail."
Those who hold a more liberal view of the Bible as a human witness to the glory of God, the work of fallible humans who wrote from a limited experience unusual only for the insight they have gained through their inspired struggle to know God in the midst of a troubled world. Therefore, they tend not to accept such doctrines as inerrancy. These churches also tend to retain the social activism of their evangelical forebears of the 19th century, placing particular emphasis on those teachings of scripture that teach compassion for the poor and concern for
social justiceSocial justice is a notion used to describe a society with a greater degree of economic egalitarianism through progressive taxation, income redistribution, or even property redistribution, policies aimed toward achieving that which developmental economists refer to as equality of opportunity and...
. The message of personal
salvationIn religion, salvation is the concept that God or other Higher Power, as part of Divine Providence, "saves" humanity from spiritual death or eternal damnation by providing for them an eternal life...
is, generally speaking, of the good that comes to oneself and the world through following the New Testament's
Golden RuleThe ethic of reciprocity, more commonly known as the Golden Rule, is an ethical code that states one has a right to just treatment, and a responsibility to ensure justice for others. Reciprocity is arguably the most essential basis for the modern concept of human rights, though it has its critics...
admonition to love others without hypocrisy or prejudice. Toward these ends, the "spirit" of the New Testament, more than the letter, is infallible and authoritative.
There are some movements that believe the Bible contains the teachings of Jesus but who reject the churches that were formed following its publication. These people believe all individuals can communicate directly with God and therefore do not need guidance or doctrines from a church. These people are known as
Christian anarchistsChristian anarchism is any of several traditions which combine anarchism with Christianity. Christian anarchists believe that freedom is justified spiritually through the teachings of Jesus. This has caused them to be critical of government and Church authority. Some believe all individuals can...
.
Latter-day Saints
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or Mormons) accept the Bible (including the New Testament) as the word of God, so long as it is "translated correctly".
Messianic Judaism
Messianic JudaismMessianic Judaism is a religious movement that differs from mainstream Christianity and from Judaism by combining elements of each into a single faith....
generally holds the same view of New Testament authority as evangelical Protestants.
See also
- Gospel harmony
A Gospel harmony is an attempt to merge or harmonize the canonical gospels of the Four Evangelists into a single gospel account, the earliest ancient example being the Diatesseron by Tatian in the second century...
- Non-canonical books referenced in the Bible
Several texts are mentioned in the Tanakh and New Testament, yet do not appear in the canon of the respective works. Scholars consider some of these to be lost works, while others are viewed as pseudepigraphal.- Tanakh references :...
- List of Gospels
- Expounding of the Law
The Expounding of the Law , called by some the Antithesis of the Law, is a highly structured part of the Sermon on the Mount in the New Testament of the Christian Bible...
- New Testament view on Jesus' life
The four canonical gospels of the New Testament are the primary sources of information for the doctrinal Christian narrative of Jesus' life. There is not a single New Testament "view" of Jesus' life, the four gospels tell different but dependent stories...
- Textual variants in the New Testament
Textual Variants arise when copyists make intentional or accidental changes to a text they are reproducing. Some common changes are the deletion or repetition of words when the copyist's eye returns to a similar word in the wrong location of the original text. If his eye skips to an earlier word,...
- Novum Testamentum Graece
Novum Testamentum Graece is the Latin name of the Greek-language version of the New Testament. The first printed edition was the Complutensian Polyglot Bible by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, printed in 1514, but not published until 1520...
- Authorship of the Pauline epistles
The Pauline epistles are the thirteen books in the New Testament traditionally attributed to, and explicitly ascribed to, Paul of Tarsus. Some consider the anonymous Epistle to the Hebrews a fourteenth Pauline epistle...
Further reading
- A.H. McNeile, An Introduction to the Study of the New Testament, second edition revised New Testament Introduction, D. Guthrie, Inter-Varsity Press, Leicester 1976.
- Raymond E. Brown
Raymond Edward Brown , was an American Roman Catholic priest and Biblical scholar. He was regarded as a specialist concerning the hypothetical ‘Johannine community’, which he speculated contributed to the authorship of the Gospel of John, and he also wrote influential studies on the birth and...
: An Introduction to the New Testament (ISBN 0-385-24767-2)
- Interpreting the New Testament. An Introduction to the Principles and Methods of N.T. Exegesis, H. Conzelmann and A. Lindemann, translated by S.S. Schatzmann, Hendrickson Publishers. Peabody 1988.
- Burton L. Mack
Burton L. Mack is a writer and John Wesley Professor in early Christianity at the Claremont School of Theology in Claremont, California. He is also active at the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity. Mack is primarily a scholar of Christian origins, approaching it from the angle of social...
: Who Wrote the New Testament?, Harper, 1996
- Bruce J. Malina: Windows on the World of Jesus: Time Travel to Ancient Judea. Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville (Kentucky) 1993
- Bruce J. Malina: The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology. 3rd edition, Westminster John Knox Press Louisville (Kentucky) 2001
- Bruce J. Malina: Social Science Commentary on the Gospel of John Augsburg Fortress Publishers: Minneapolis 1998
- Bruce J. Malina: Social-Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels Augsburg Fortress Publishers: Minneapolis 2003
- Randel McCraw Helms: Who Wrote the Gospels?
- Detlev Dormeyer: The New Testament among the Writings of Antiquity (English translation), Sheffield 1998
- H.C. Thiessen, Introduction to the New Testament, Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids 1976
- Ekkehard Stegemann and Wolfgang Stegemann: The Jesus Movement: A Social History of Its First Century. Augsburg Fortress Publishers: Minneapolis 1999
- Wolfgang Stegemann: The Gospel and the Poor. Fortress Press. Minneapolis 1984 ISBN 0800617835
- Theodor Zahn
Theodor Zahn or Theodor von Zahn was a biblical scholar born in Rhineland, Prussia . He was professor of Theology at Erlangen, and distinguished for his eminent scholarship in connection with the matter especially of the New Testament canon. He stood at the head of the conservative New Testament...
, Introduction to the New Testament, English translation, Edinburgh, 1910.
External links
Source text of New Testament
Greek
General references
Development and authorship