All the Bibles¶

Canonical Bible¶

As previously noted, the Bible consists of a number of books, but which ones is generally decided by the church organisations and religious communities who use them. The technical term for a definition of which books to include is called a canon.

There were many works produced around the time of the biblical books, and only some have found their way into the ordinary Bible in the pew. Many texts were written, and perhaps regarded as authoritative, by fringe groups, the kind of worshippers called heretical by the mainstream churches. These include non-canonical gospels and apocalypses, and form a fascinating world of para-biblical literature.

Since the early days of Christianity there has been a debate over which of these many texts should be regarded as scripture. Since the Reformation, the narrow Protestant canon has found widespread support. But other churches, including the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox, have traditionally accepted some further books as well.

New Testament (NT)¶

The NT contains two main types of book, gospels and letters, plus three that don't fit into those categories.

There are four canonical Gospels. The word gospel in its original meaning is the good news, and each one tells the story of the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth. The four of them are essentially anonymous, even though by long tradition they have names attached to them (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John).

The gospel of Luke also comes with a sequel, very likely by the same author, which is the Acts of the Apostles (usually referred to just as Acts). It is similar in its style to the Gospel of Luke, and continues the narrative of that book into the very early years of the Jesus movement.

Acts is one of the three exceptions as a book, because it is neither a gospel nor a letter. Another is Hebrews, which is not in fact a letter, but something like a sermon or essay, expounding the meaning of Jesus' death in the terms of Yahwist sacrificial theology. The last is Revelation (see below).

Following the gospels come the letters, written by early leaders of the movement in the decades after Jesus' death. Thirteen of these letters (from Romans to Philemon) claim to be by Paul of Tarsus, although modern scholars generally only accept roughly half of this number as genuine (opinions vary). The others may be pseudonymous, that is, they use Paul's name as a claim of authority although they are in fact by someone else. The genuine Pauline letters (whichever they are) go against the general rule that biblical books are undated and anonymous -- they can be fairly securely dated to the 50s and 60s of the first century CE, and a fair bit of background about Paul's life is contained in them and also in Acts. So we know something about their author and provenance. These letters are the earliest documents in the NT, probably pre-dating all the gospels by some decades.

Most of Paul's letters were addressed to individual church communities that he had founded or visited. Hence the titles, to the people in Corinth (the Corinthians), in Thessalonica, and so on. The letters from other early leaders (James, Peter, John, Jude) were addressed generally or universally to all believers. They are thus called the General Letters. Despite the traditional attributions, the authorship of these letters is not known for certain.

The last book, the Revelation of John (or just Revelation), is an apocalypse. This is a genre of (mainly) Jewish literature that flourished in the last few centuries BCE and the first centuries CE. It records visions about the last days leading up to a triumphant final judgement.

Old Testament (OT)¶

The Old Testament (OT) of Christian Bibles is derived from the Jewish scriptures. This collection is known as the Tanakh, an acronym for three words in Hebrew that mean Law, Prophets and Writings. The first five books form the Torah or Law. These are Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy (the Hebrew names are different from these, but for the sake of familiarity I will use the English titles).

The next category is the Prophets, and these fall into two subdivisions - the Former Prophets and the Latter Prophets. The former prophets consist of several of the books commonly regarded as "historical", namely Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings. The latter prophets include the major prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, plus a collection of twelve minor prophets which you'll find from Hosea to Malachi at the end of the Old Testament.

The last category is a catch-all of Writings, which are not generally accorded the same level of reverence as the Law or Prophets, although still regarded as scripture. Five of these form a group, often associated with particular yearly festivals, and are called the five megillot (scrolls). In Christian Bibles they have been split up and placed in separate locations. These five are the Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and Esther.

The other writings include Chronicles, which is a re-telling of the historical narrative from an alternate perspective, with a special focus on events in the books of Samuel and Kings. Associated with this are the books of Ezra and Nehemiah which continue the historical narrative somewhat further. The other Writings are the Psalms (a collection of hymns), Proverbs (a wisdom collection), the story of Job, and the prophecy of Daniel. This last book was possibly the very latest to be included in the Jewish canon (although it claims to have been written centuries earlier).

Deutero-Canon, or Apocrypha¶

A certain set of books, now often called the deutero-canon (second canon), were found in the early Greek translations. They were therefore inherited by the early church and became part of the Christian Bible. The books include Tobit, Judith, at least two books of Maccabees, one of the Esdras variants, Ecclesiasticus and a few others.

But these books were not present in the Hebrew Tanakh, and failed to be accepted into the Jewish canon. At a later date, when Christian reformers wanted to establish a sound basis for the OT based on the Tanakh, they excluded them from the new canonical definition.

These books may be found in modern Catholic Bibles, or in some versions they are separated into a section often named Apocrypha. Apocrypha means private or secret. As applied to books it is rather a vague term, and carries the suggestion of unreliability.

The Early Bible¶

Variation in the Bible¶

The contents of early Bibles was somewhat variable. After adopting the book form (rather than scrolls), a definite contents list became essential. Scrolls can easily be removed or added to a collection, but binding the documents into a book is more permanent.

There is only a small number of surviving ancient codices (plural of codex, meaning a bound volume). But even those we do have show a degree of variability in the books which are included. To illustrate this, consider the books of the Maccabees.

Among the books of the deutero-canon are two named after the Maccabees, a family of nationalist leaders renowned for gaining Judaean independence in the second century BCE. While these two books have been regarded as canonical (in some denominations), and are now in the deutero-canon, the next two books which bear the name have less of a claim to be accepted into the canon. However, they are to be found in early copies of the Bible.

Beyond these four, there are still other versions which result from the early spread of the stories and their translation into Syriac, Ethiopic and so on.

The Maccabees¶

The setting is the period when control over the territory of the Levant had passed from the Ptolemies of Egypt to the Seleucids of Syria in around 200 BCE. These two Hellenistic kingdoms had been vying for control here for more than a century.

In Judaea, the district surrounding Jerusalem, the policies of the Seleucid king Antiochus Epiphanes led to alienation and ultimately rebellion. Antiochus intended to impose Hellenic culture, including polytheistic religion and social norms such as public nudity for displays of athletics and wrestling.

Despite having the support of a local faction in the capital, these novelties incited strong opposition in the religiously conservative countryside. At one rural shrine, when asked to sacrifice to pagan gods, a priest called Matthias refuses and begins the rebellion. After his death, his sons take over in turn, starting with Judas Maccabeus. His surname (which may mean hammer) gives the name to the books.

1 and 2 Maccabees tell essentially this same story, although with different approaches. The first book is quite restrained, and follows the style of the Hebrew Bible's historical books. In contrast, the second book is told in a more highly charged and personal way, emphasising the divine rewards of the martyrs.

3 Maccabees is a prequel, its setting being a generation earlier than the rule of Antiochus Epiphanes, when Judaea was in the middle of the struggle between the Ptolemies and the Seleucids.

4 Maccabees is from the first century CE, although it is set in the reign of Epiphanes, before the Maccabee rebellion. According to its translator (Anderson in Charlesworth, see Bibliography), it is the work of a Hellenized Jew in the diaspora, possibly at Antioch or Alexandria. It mainly covers the martyrdom of a legal scholar called Eleazar, and an aged mother with seven sons, with some philosophical background.

Great Uncial Codices¶

The oldest nearly-complete Bibles date back to as early as the fourth century. By this time, argument over the canon had been raging for generations and had not yet been completely settled.

These surviving Bibles are the copies which today are central to determining the earliest form of the biblical text. They are carefully preserved and are the closest we have to an original. Yet every one of them differs from the others in its list of contents.

Let's consider the three best and most celebrated such codices - they are known as Sinaiticus, Vaticanus and Alexandrinus.

In the OT, they all contain the deutero-canonical books mentioned above, which in the standard modern form includes two books of Maccabees. To these, Sinaiticus adds the martyrdom story known as 4 Maccabees. Alexandrinus contains both 3 and 4 Maccabees, as well as Psalm 151, 14 Odes, the Epistle to Marcellinus, and a summary of the book of Psalms.

In the NT there are also differences. Sinaiticus includes the Epistle of Barnabas, and a visionary tract known as the Shepherd of Hermas which was extremely popular in the early church.

The NT in the Alexandrinus manuscript does not have these additional books, however it does contain two letters by Clement of Rome (only one believed genuine).

The third manuscript, Vaticanus, apparently represents a stricter canon. It excludes all the extra books in the NT but also goes further, leaving out the Revelation of John and several of the letters thought not to be by Paul.

Outside the Bible¶

Pseudepigrapha¶

Pseudepigrapha are texts falsely claiming to be by someone they are not.

The longish word just means falsely attributed. Pseud is false, and the epigraph is the portion of text at the start of the scroll, or on its outside, that announces its author and topic, for example, "The visions of X the prophet, seen in the reign of King Z".

So a pseudepigraphon (singular!) is a writing with a false name attached. The apparent author is ideally someone well-known, prophetic and dead. Such as Adam, Moses, Abraham or Isaiah.

Some of these are records of revelatory visions and heavenly journeys in which important information is passed along, such as when the Last Judgement is going to be. This category are described as apocalypses (from the Greek for revealed).

Only some of the pseudepigrapha are apocalyptic. In others, the pretended author leaves us their Testament, meaning teachings and knowledge which they pass on as their last words. The rest include a similar variety to the books in the Bible. There are collections of wisdom, pseudo-historical narratives, books of the Acts of one or other prophet.

The Enoch Tradition¶

Enoch attracts attention for being one of two individuals in the OT who apparently did not suffer death in the ordinary way. In Genesis, he is said instead to have walked with God.

Accordingly, he became early on a conduit for speculation about heavenly mysteries. The Enoch literature is vast and complex, and may date back several centuries BCE. The material we have today is from much later, and has spread and developed in various directions from its origins.

Jude, one of the minor letter-writers in the NT, even quotes from the Book of Enoch, showing that the canon wasn't as strictly defined then as it became somewhat later.

Apocalyptic Ezra¶

Like Enoch, Ezra became a popular focus of mystical speculation.

The canonical book of Ezra, and its companion book Nehemiah (the two share a number of connections) are not apocalyptic. Several centuries after them, probably near 100 CE, an author picked Ezra to be the narrator of an angelic discourse and a journey into the underworld.

This influential work sparked a tradition which resulted in more visions and question-and-answer sessions with angels that can now be found in Greek, Latin, Syriac, Ethiopic and other languages.

Later community writings¶

It didn't stop there. Because it is so easy to write on a piece of paper that you had a vision of heaven, and that you now know the secrets of the universe, everybody did it.

Islam¶

Muhammad, as is well-known, received the final revelation.

The Quran is the last wave from the flood of theistic literature coming out of that Tri-Continental region where Eurasia meets Africa. Meeting place of armies, trade, and ideas, this area became a seething cauldron of prophetic potential.

For over a thousand years people had been encountering the gods here. The Abrahamic stories had swept this way and that across the desert, twisting themselves into new forms. The Qu'ran echoes these, while associating them with events taking place in the lifetime of the Prophet.

Muhammad's message is mainly the reverberating call and refrain that Allah alone is to be obeyed, and that unbelievers will burn in hell.

Modern revivals¶

Every so often, someone becomes a prophet and pens a new addition to the biblical corpus. The most prolific such author in the modern age is probably Joseph Smith of the Mormons.