What is the Bible? New Testament

Arrangement, Timeline, & Authorship

Arrangement

The literary arrangement of books of the New Testament is split by genre. Note that Luke and Acts are twin volumes, even though we often separate them in the Canon arrangement.

"The Order of the Books of the NT" from Menorah Bible.

Timeline and Authorship

In the time of the New Testament, dictating letters to scribes was a common occurrence. The process of having a scribe write down the words that were dictated was normal, and can be observed in the New Testament. The person recording the dictation is referred to as an amanuensis.

Dates adapted from “The Progress of Revelation” MacArthur Study Bible, Word Bibles, 1997. pg. xxxi.

For more dating information on the New Testament chronology see:

Gilbert, George H. “The New Chronology of Paul’s Life,” Bibliotheca Sacra 55, no. 218 (1898): 244-258.
Guthrie, Donald. New Testament Introduction. 3rd Edition. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity, 1970.
Hoehner, Harold. Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ. Grand Rapids. Zondervan. 2010. (recommended)
Jewett, Robert. A Chronology of Paul's Life. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1979.
Robinson, John A. T. Redating the New Testament. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976.
Riesner, Rainer. Pauls’ Early Period: Chronology, Mission Strategy, Theology. Grand Rapids, MI.: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1998.
Sweeney, James P. “Chronology of the New Testament,” ed. John D. Barry et al., The Lexham Bible Dictionary. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2016.

Language & Alphabets

Koine Greek

Koine Greek is also known as ‘Common Greek.’ Koine was the common language that became the lingua franca after Alexander the Great’s conquests and resulting Hellenization of the Mediterranean areas.

Koine Greek was mostly used from around 300 B.C. - A.D. 300. It replaced classical Greek and was the everyday-language Greek. There was a large geographical usage thanks to Alexander the Great vast area of conquest. The Septuagint, New Testament, and early Church fathers were written Koine Greek.

F.F. Bruce, The Books and the Parchments (Teppan, New Jersey. Fleming H. Revell, 1950, 1980), 11.

Greek Uncial Alphabet

Α alpha

Β beta

Γ gamma

Δ delta

Ε epsilon

Ζ zeta

Η eta

Θ theta

Ι iota

Κ kappa

Λ lambda

Μ mu

Ν nu

Ξ xi

Ο omicron

Π pi

Ρ rho

Σ sigma

Τ tau

Υ upsilon

Φ phi

Χ chi

Ψ psi

Ω omega

Greek Minuscule Alphabet

α alpha

β beta

γ gamma

δ delta

ε epsilon

ζ zeta

η eta

θ theta

ι iota

κ kappa

λ lambda

μ mu

ν nu

ξ xi

ο omicron

π pi

ρ rho

σ,ς sigma

τ tau

υ upsilon

φ phi

χ chi

ψ psi

ω omega

Word separation (scriptio discontinua) is characteristic of later manuscripts, circa A.D. 1000. Varied paragraph headings (kephalaia) exist in the papyri. Breathing and accent marks became a feature of the text generally with Miniscule manuscripts. Some late uncial manuscripts feature word separation and accent markings.

"It will be noticed on even the most casual inspection that most Greek manuscripts are written without separation between words and sentences. This kind of writing, called scriptio continua, is easiest to read when one is reading aloud, syllable by syllable. Occasionally the grouping of syllables into words is ambiguous. For example in Roman 7:14 ὄιδαμεν may be divided into ὄιδα μεν, and in 1 Tim. 3:16 the words ὁμολογουμένως μέγα ἐστὶν may be taken as ὁμολογουμέν ὡς μέγα ἐστὶν. In Lev. 5:1 uncial manuscripts read HΨΥΧHHAΝΟΜΟΣHΔΙΑCΤEΛΛΟΥCΑ , which in some editions of the Septuagint (Tichendorf; Swete) is read ἢ ψυχὴ ἡ ἄνομος ἡ διαστέλλουσα, whereas the same letters (in accord with the Hebrew) can be read ἢ ψυχὴ ἡ ἄν ὁμοςῃ διαστέλλουσα (Rahlfs).

It must not be thought, however, that such ambiguities occur frequently. In Greek it is the rule, with very few exceptions, that native Greek words can terminate only in a vowel (or dipthong) or in one of three consonants."

Bruce M. Metzger, Manuscripts of the Greek Bible: An Introduction to Palaeography (Oxford University Press, 1981), 31.

Text Type Families & Manuscripts

Manuscript Materials

Materials

Papyrus
Parchment (animal skin) - Vellum (calf)
Paper - Much later (11th Century)

Making Manuscripts

(6:19)

Manuscript Construction

Construction Arrangement

Leaf or sheet
Scroll - sewn at sides and rolled up
Codex - sheets of material stacked and bound. Favorite church binding.

Categories of Manuscripts

Papyrus - denotated by 𝕻
Uncials - denotated by capital letter (Siglia) or number
Miniscules - denotated by number

Papyrus Manuscripts

Not physically robust
Fragmentary
The oldest fragments of New Testament
Generally oldest

“In other words, the papyri have confirmed various readings as authentic in the past 116 years, but have not introduced new authentic readings.”

Dr. Daniel Wallace http://www.dts.edu/read/wallace-new-testament-manscript-first-century/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_Testament_papyri

𝕻52 “St. John's fragment” John 18:31–33,37-38

A.D. 110-125

Uncial Manuscripts

Written in capitalized Greek letters (Uncials)
- There was no letter case at that time
Written in scriptio continua
Older than minuscule manuscripts
Often cited ones have capital letter designation (Siglia)

Minuscule Manuscripts

Written in small Greek letters (Minuscule)
- faster to write, more like cursive
More Accent Marks (Diacritics)
9th - 10th century
- Newer than Uncial manuscripts
Minuscule manuscripts up until the printing press
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_minuscule

Text Type Families

Textual variants were often copied and became part of the pedigree of a related document family. The New Testament variants fit well into four major families.

The Alexandrian Text
The Byzantine Text
The Western Text
The Caesarean Text

Text Type Family Locations

Transmission & Textual Criticism

Transmitting the Text

The transmission of the text of the New Testament would change during the different political climates of the ancient world. When Christianity was being persecuted, the nature and preservation of documents was different than when it was endorsed and nurtured by the Roman government.

Extant Manuscript evidence by Century

(1 hour)

Great Uncial Codices

א Sinaiticus A.D. 330-360

A Vaticanus A.D. 325-350

B Alexandrinus A.D. 400-440

C Ephraemi A.D. 450

D Bezae (partial) A.D. 400

These codices are believed to originally contain the whole Bible (Septuagint and New Testament).

Alexandrinus (A)

Alexandrinus is named for Alexandria, Egypt, where it resided for a long time.

Has two columns per page. Byzantine family. At British Library.

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Royal_MS_1_d_viii

Vaticanus (B)

Vaticanus is thought to be one of the oldest extant manuscripts of the entire Greek Bible. Has three columns per page. Alexandrian family. Lives at the Vatican.

Ephraemi Rescriptus (C)

Ephraemi Rescriptus was deciphered by Constantin von Tischendorf (1815-1874) in 1840-1843. It is a palimpsest manuscript, meaning it was overwritten with another text.

Byzantine Family. In Bibliothèque nationale de France (Paris).

Discovery of Sinaiticus (א)

Discovered by Constantin von Tischendorf at St. Catherine’s Monastery at Mt. Sinai in 1844. Sinaiticus has four columns per page. Alexandrian family. Named Aleph to precede Alexandrinus and Vaticanus. Parts exist at multiple places, mostly at British Library.

http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/

(2.3 minutes)

Bezae Cantabrigensis (D)

One column per page

Oldest Codex witness to the Western family.

At University of Cambridge.

YouTube: Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge - The Codex Bezae

Washingtonianus (W)

One column per page

Caesarean family

Lives at the Smithsonian

Around A.D. 400

History of the New Testament

Errors in Transmission

The same errors in copying manuscripts that affected the transmission of the Old Testament also affect the New Testament.

Geisler and Nix write:

New Testament variants. Because the New Testament manuscripts are so numerous, and because there were many private and ‘unofficial’ copies made, there are more variants in the New Testament than in the Old Testament.

How many variants are there? The gross number of variants increases with every new manuscript discovery.

a. In 1707 John Mill estimated about 30,000 variants in the known New Testament manuscripts. Many of the great manuscripts were discovered after that time.

b. By 1874, F. H. A. Scrivener counted nearly 50,000 variants.

c. To date there are over 200,000 known variants, and this figure will no doubt increase in the future as more manuscripts are discovered.

How are the variants counted? There is an ambiguity in saying that there are some 200,000 variants in the existing manuscripts of the New Testament because those represent only 10,000 places in the New Testament. If one single word is misspelled in 3,000 different manuscripts, it is counted as 3,000 variants or readings. Once this counting procedure is understood, and the mechanical (orthographic) variants have been eliminated, the remaining significant variants are surprisingly few in number. It should be remembered that the production of multiple copies of manuscripts by printing and photocopying are relatively recent developments in the production of books.
How did variants occur? In order to understand fully the significance of variant readings, and to determine which are the correct or original .readings, it is necessary to examine first just how those variants came into the text. Careful students of textual criticism have suggested two classes of errors: intentional and unintentional.

From Geisler and Nix. A General Introduction to the Bible. Moody Press. 1986. Pg 468.

Comparison of Other Ancient Writings

Author Earliest Copy Number of Copies

Caesar 900 A.D. 10
Plato (Tetralogies) 900 A.D. 20
Tacitus (Annals) 1100 A.D. 20
also minor works 1000 A.D. 1
Pliny the Younger (History) 850 A.D. 7
Thucydides (History) 900 A.D. 8
Suetonius 950 A.D. 8
Herodotus (History) 900 A.D. 8
Sophocles 1000 A.D. 100
Catullus 1550 A.D. 3
Euripedes 1100 A.D. 9
Demosthenes 1100 A.D. 200
Aristotle 1100 A.D. 5
Aristophanes 900 A.D. 10

From Gleason Archer, A Survey of Old Testament Introduction, Pg. 27.

Overall there are 5,600 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament. There exist even some partial papyrus manuscripts from possibly the first century.

Of the variants in the texts, at least 95% are insignificant changes; such things as spelling or word order.

This adds up to a fantastic amount of agreement from the massive amount of textual witness.

Higher Criticism

Lower criticism involves the manuscript and textual evidence. Higher criticism takes aim at the internal content of the Scriptures. An example of Higher Criticism in the Old Testament is the Documentary Hypothesis (JEDP). In the New Testament, there are theories about the construction of the Gospels that follow similar reasoning.

Modern example of Higher Criticism bring practiced on the New Testament:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Seminar

Some Issues with Higher Criticism

Man is the standard and arbiter of truth
Presuppositions approaching issues
Enthroning Reason and Rationalism
Does science a disservice
Does history a disservice

Conclusion

“So definite is the evidence for the New Testament that no less a scholar than Sir Frederic Kenyon could write:

The interval then between the dates of original composition and the earliest extant evidence becomes so small as to be in fact negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established.

Add to their proximity to the autographs not only the multiplicity of the New Testament manuscripts, but the prolific quotation by the early church Fathers and the plurality of early versions, and without entering into the mechanics by which the character of the New Testament text is established, it can be readily understood why no book from the ancient world comes to us with more abundant evidence for its integrity than does the New Testament.”

From Geisler and Nix. A General Introduction to the Bible (Moody Press. 1986), 405.

References

Recommended books:

Hoehner, Harold. Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ. Grand Rapids. Zondervan. 2010.
Geisler and Nix. A General Introduction to the Bible. ISBN 0802429165
House, H. Wayne. Chronological and Background Charts of the New Testament. ISBN 0310416418

Additional helpful books:

Aland, Kurt and Barbara. The Text of the New Testament. ISBN 0802840981
Archer, Gleason . A Survey of Old Testament Introduction
Metzger, Bruce Manning. The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration. ISBN 0195003918

More information:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rylands_Library_Papyrus_P52

Exercise

Take two minutes to copy the following information via hand written note. Then have someone else check it for errors.

ΟΥΤΩΣ ΓΑΡ ΗΓΑΠΗΣΕΝ Ο ΘΕΟΣ ΤΟΝ ΚΟΣΜΟΝ ΩΣΤΕ ΤΟΝ ΥΙΟΝ ΤΟΝ ΜΟΝΟΓΕΝΗ ΕΔΩΚΕΝ ΙΝΑ ΠΑΣ Ο ΠΙΣΤΕΥΩΝ ΕΙΣ ΑΥΤΟΝ ΜΗ ΑΠΟΛΗΤΑΙ ΑΛΛ ΕΧΗ ΖΩΗΝ ΑΙΩΝΙΟΝ

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