Have you ever wondered how we got the Bible?
Where did it come from? Who wrote it? Below are 4 myths debunked about the Word of God, as well as a timeline in history to help us get a bigger picture of how the Bible came together.
But first, we must consider what literature was like in “biblical times” (roughly 2500 BCE to 90 CE). The history of writing is an intriguing topic, which spans thousands and thousands of years, and it all started with simple pictures. Hieroglyphics, a form of pictorial writing, began in Egypt around 3200 BCE…
By the time period of Moses, however, writing had come a long way. And, in fact…
Moses was the first human author to write down any part of the biblical records we have today.
However, nobody in Moses’ day could run to Barnes & Noble or hop on Amazon to order their copy of Genesis or Deuteronomy. Though scribes would eventually make many copies of Moses’ words, the beginning of Jewish history was documented orally. It was the spoken word, passed down from generation to generation, which begs the questions…
How did we get the Bible? Where did all the books come from, and who got to decide if they were legit?
These are good, important questions. Let’s address and explore four common myths about the Bible and how it came to be…
Myth #1: A leather-bound, King James Version of the Bible fell out of the sky and into the laps of the early church members right after Jesus ascended to heaven in AD 35ish.
Short answer: Nope. The Bible was canonized over a period of several hundred years; though, the majority of the writings were fairly solidified by AD 90ish.
Long answer: The Bible is actually a collection of 66 different writings, from different parts of Jewish history; and yet, they are a beautiful tapestry telling the story of God. It is divided into two different sections, called testaments, and here is what each contains:
What’s in the Old Testament…
The Old Testament contains 39 books, which span the following parts of history:
– God’s creation of all things to God’s covenant with Noah…
– God’s call of Abram (i.e. Abraham) and his descendents, termed the Hebrew people…
– God’s call of Moses to lead those people out of Egyptian slavery and into a new land, which we know as Israel…
– God raising up judges to rule over His people, until the Hebrews (now termed “Israelites”) demanded a king…
– Hundreds of years of kings, including Saul, David, Solomon, and a bunch of really cruel, awful ones (with a few great ones in between *shout-out to Asa, Jehoshaphat, and Josiah*)…
– Numerous prophets of God… Women like Deborah and Huldah & men like Isaiah and Jeremiah (the full list is long) telling the people, in essence, to get their priorities straight, turn back to God, and get ready for someone to come (i.e. the Messiah), who would be the fulfillment of God’s plan for the world…
These 39 books were written by 24ish authors, from the days of Moses, around the 13th century BC, to the days of the prophet, Malachi, around 425ish BC.
*Now, you may notice that I’m using -ish a lot. We don’t know everything, friends. These authors didn’t have their writings bound with fancy book covers, displaying their names boldly in Times New Roman; and, we don’t have old newspaper headlines to solidify dates of important events. Scholars, archaeologists, and historians do the best they can here.
That pretty much wraps up the Old Testament. Onto the New…
What’s in the New Testament…
The 27 books of the New Testament (many of which are, technically, letters) are: the recordings of the life of Jesus (i.e. the Gospels), a history of the early church after Jesus’ ascension (i.e. The Acts of the Apostles), and a whole bunch of letters, most of which were written by the apostle Paul, but which also include letters from the apostle (disciple) Simon Peter, the apostle (disciple) John, and a few others as well.
These books/letters were all written between AD 50ish and AD 90ish, and they were circulated (and copied) amongst the churches, spanning from Jerusalem to Asia to Rome, and all kinds of places around and between.
Myth #2: The sixty-six books in our Bible are the only Jewish and Christian pieces of literature that exist.
Short answer: Nope, there are so many more writings in the realm of Jewish and Christian history; however, only certain books have been “canonized”, meaning they have been set apart as the most accurate, the most legitimate, and the least-debated of the scriptures.
Long answer: The word “canon” comes from the Greek, meaning “measuring rod”, and it refers to the religious texts agreed upon as a religious community to reflect the most authentic, legitimate truths of the faith. Throughout the history of the Jewish and Christian religions, the solidification of canons has been necessary, because of the breadth of writings surrounding their histories.
Perhaps the most widely-circulated canon of scripture is the Protestant canon, which contains the 66 books we have already spoken of; however, there are several others. For instance, perhaps just as widely-known, is the canon of the Catholic Church, which contains the Protestant canon’s 66 writings, plus 7 more, which the Catholic church regards as just as historically and biblically-sound.
In addition, there are other documents (and “gospels”, even) that have not been canonized; and yet, they certainly exist. Here are a few:
The Books of Enoch I-III
There are two Enochs mentioned in scripture: one in Genesis 4, the son of Cain, and one in Genesis 5, the father of Methuselah. The latter Enoch is the one speculated to have written the trilogy. In these ancient Hebrew texts, the writer speaks of fallen angels (which coincides with the Nephilim referenced in Genesis 6), gives greater description on the events surrounding Noah’s time period, and shines light on why the flood was morally necessary.
Why isn’t it included in the Bible?
The Books of Enoch have actually been composed from numerous fragments found over the course of hundreds of years. Indeed, in its earliest form, the Books are a collection of pieces, having never discovered a full document.
In addition, historians have dated these fragments between the years of 300 and 200 BC, which would mean they were written only a few hundred years before Jesus was born. This timeline does not bode well for the Books’ legitimacy. And, though it is true that the New Testament author, Jude, does reference Enoch in his letter, this does not give credibility to the entirety of Enoch’s writings, only to the small fragment Jude happens to reference.
The Gospels of Thomas
That’s right. There are two gospels, supposedly written by the disciple/apostle, Thomas – The Infancy Gospel of Thomas and The Coptic Gospel of Thomas.
Let’s begin with the Infancy Gospel… Believed to have been written around the 2nd century CE, this writing is a biography of Jesus’ life as a child, from age 5 to age 12. This Gospel seems to have been well-known by religious circles in the 2nd century, though, not in a good way. As recorded by Origen of Alexandria and several other scholars of the time period, most Christian communities believed this biography to be heretical and fictitious. Though it may seem intriguing to read about Jesus as a youngster – crafting birds out of clay before making them fly, striking his neighbors blind after they complain about Joseph and Mary, and using his powers for a bit of mischief and malevolence – the Gospel’s lack of authentic authorship, dating, and the rejection of the document from such an early time in the Christian communities, has caused it to be rejected from the biblical canons.
Onto The Coptic Gospel of Thomas… Discovered near Egypt in the year 1945, this writing is not a biography of Jesus, but rather a collection of sayings by him. Though many of the sayings seem to correlate with the sayings of Jesus recorded in the canonized Gospels, and Thomas makes his authorship known from the beginning, writing “These are the hidden words that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas Thomas wrote them down”, Thomas’s gospel has a very different tone than the canonized gospels, and also makes no mention of Jesus’ death, crucifixion, or resurrection. When found in 1945, it was dated to ~ AD 340, roughly 170 years after Thomas would have lived, and, though it has been translated into many languages and used in some Christian circles since 1945, there is still not enough evidence for its belonging to a canonized set of texts.
Myth #3: Once the Bible was canonized, THEN the Jewish and Christian communities had writings to study about their faith.
Short answer: Nope. These communities were already using, studying, and referencing these books and letters (which actually helped in the canonization process, since Peter would reference Paul… Paul would reference Luke… and so on.) Those who participated in the canonization simply took what the communities were already using and put them together into one entity.
Long answer: As we have said, the scriptures we know as “the Bible” were composed mostly separate from one another, over thousands of years. Though we could get a doctoral degree in the study of this history and still barely scratch the surface, here is a brief timeline, to get a “big picture” view of how it all came together:
Timeline of Biblical Canonization:
Sometime after Creation through 425ish BC – The three sections of the Hebrew Bible (i.e. The Old Testament) were written over the course of hundreds of years. These are: the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings, which comprise the 39 books of our OT.
~ 200 BC – The three sections of the Hebrew Bible were translated into Greek, called The Septuagint. There was very little debate concerning the writings included in this translation.
~ AD 70-80 – Though somewhat discredited, there is historical evidence to suggest that a council was formed at a location named Yavneh (i.e. Jamnia), in Northern Israel, in order to solidify the Jewish (i.e. Old Testament) canon. Though, to this point, there hadn’t been much debate about the majority of the writings, any debate about a book’s inclusion mostly revolved around:
- Ezekiel (Have you read chapter 16? Yup, it was banned from all synagogues.)
- Ecclesiastes (Some felt it was too pessimistic and celebrated hedonism.)
- Song of Solomon (Is it about the church? Is it about sex? What’s it about?! To this day, it makes churchgoers blush, as it did Jewish rabbis as well.)
- Esther (The author is anonymous. There is no mention of God, and it celebrates a very, um, “intoxicated” holiday called Purim.)
*As you can see, however, all four of these won in the canonization war, so we can easily read them today.
~ AD 50ish – 95ish – The books and letters, which make up our New Testament, were written and began to circulate amongst churches throughout the Roman empire. Some churches received many. Some churches received few. The apostles – like Paul, Silas, Apollos, and many others – traveled from church to church, helping the congregations understand the gospel, writing letters to them about the essence of the Christian faith.
– AD 170 – The first “canon” is compiled, called the Muratorian Canon. This list included 22 of the 27 New Testament books, leaving out Hebrews, James, 1st & 2nd Peter, and 3rd John.
– AD 363 – The Council of Laodicea forms and compiles a list of 26 books, including all of our New Testament writings, except for Revelation.
– AD 393 – The Council of Hippo meets in northern Africa, declaring that all 27 books should be canonized.
– AD 397 – The Council of Carthage meets in northern Africa, also solidifying the canonization of the 27 New Testament books, as well as the 39 Old Testament books.
~ AD 500 – The scriptures have, by now, been translated into multiple languages, not limited to Egyptian, Coptic, Ethiopian, and Armenian versions.
– AD 1381-1382 – English theologian, John Wycliffe, and a team of associates, began to translate the 39 Old Testament books, 27 New Testament books, and 14 Apocryphal books (not included in most canonizations) into English.
– AD 1455 – After the invention of the printing press in Germany, Johannes Gutenberg produces the first printed Bible, in Latin.
– AD 1611 – The King James Version of the Bible is published. It is said to be the most printed book in the history of the world.
– AD 1947-1956 – The Dead Sea Scrolls are discovered.
– AD 1973 – The New International Version (NIV) of the Bible is published.
*If you want even more info, here is a much more detailed timeline (which I think is fascinating): The Bible Timeline
Myth #4: Since the Bible was put together by fallible humans, spanning thousands of years, it is obviously not written (or inspired) by God.
Short answer: Since the beginning of creation, God has shown Himself to speak through, and work in, the fallible lives of humans. Indeed, the fact that the writings of scripture were recorded over thousands of years, and yet, when placed together, the story of God’s redemptive plan remains intact is, itself, a miracle of God.
Long answer: If we had the time to research the countless “coincidences” in the course of canonizing scripture, our minds would most-assuredly be blown. For instance, in 1947, a young boy happened across some broken jars in a cave. After time, it was discovered that these were biblical writings dating as early as 300 BC. To this day, over 200 copies of writings, all of which are recognized in our biblical canon, have been found: 36 copies of Psalms… 29 copies of Deuteronomy… 21 copies of Isaiah… and the list goes on. Scholars say that the transmission of the texts, from copy to copy, were so faithfully transcribed that not even Shakespeare’s writings were transmitted so adequately.
In one of his last letters, before being martyred for the faith, the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, “But as for you, continue in what you have learned… how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” (2 Timothy 3:14-15)
Paul wasn’t speaking about a leather-bound New Living Translation. (Little did he know, that wouldn’t be available until 1996.) Paul was talking about the holy scriptures of God that had guided the Jewish faith for hundreds and hundreds of years, and which were now being fulfilled in the good news of Jesus Christ. As he goes on to say…
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness… ~ 2 Timothy 3:16
The Lord God speaks… works… inspires… breathes life… in the midst of our broken, human history.
As Paul wrote to the church in Colossae…
For in Him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. ~ Colossians 1:16-17
The Bible is the history of God’s relationship with His people – His broken, rebellious, hard-to-manage, unfaithful people.
What history went through in order to get His Words of life into our hands today is, in itself, a miracle and only the work of a Living God.
May we cling to, dive into, and cherish the Bible that we have today. To us, owning a Bible (or, perhaps, several) may seem commonplace; but, friends, may we realize that it is only by the power of God that His Word is sustained. And, it will be – now and forever.
As the Lord God proclaimed long ago, through the prophet Isaiah…
As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish… so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. ~ Isaiah 55:10-11
Written by Danielle Walker
Get the Live, Move, Be Who You Are Seven-Day Devotional delivered directly to your Inbox! Simply sign up at the bottom of any page on this website.
For more evidence concerning the Old Testament, watch Lost & Found: An Explanation of the Dead Sea Scrolls
Ever wondered exactly WHO Jesus picked as his disciples? Read The Twelve Disciples of Jesus: Who They Were & Why It Matters
