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#At some point in the past, mankind learned to depart from God's will and began to [[sin]].
#At some point in the past, mankind learned to depart from God's will and began to [[sin]].
#Because no one is free from sin, humanity cannot deal with God directly, so God revealed Himself in ways people could understand.
#Because no one is free from sin, humanity cannot deal with God directly, so God revealed Himself in ways people could understand.
#God called Abraham and his progeny to be the means for saving all of mankind.
#God called [[Abraham]] and his progeny to be the means for saving all of mankind.
#To this end, He gave the [[Halakha|Law]] to [[Moses]].
#To this end, He gave the [[Halakha|Law]] to [[Moses]].
#The resulting nation of Israel went through cycles of sin and [[repentance]], yet the prophets show an increasing understanding of the Law as a moral, not just a ceremonial, force.
#The resulting nation of Israel went through cycles of sin and [[repentance]], yet the prophets show an increasing understanding of the Law as a moral, not just a ceremonial, force.

Revision as of 08:01, 11 August 2006

Bible is

(see The Christian Bible below)
(see The Hebrew Bible below)

The Gutenberg Bible displayed by the
United States Library of Congress

For other uses, see Bible (disambiguation).

The Bible (Hebrew: תנ״ך tanakh, Greek: η Βίβλος hē biblos, "the book") (sometimes The Holy Bible, Scripture, Word of God), is the name used by Jews and Christians for their differing (and overlapping) canons of sacred texts. Roman Catholics include books which Protestants do not, Judaism accepts the Tanakh (or Old Testament to Christians), not the New Testament, Muslims may accept certain prophets. Roman Catholics have a different grouping for the ten commandments than Protestants. Many people who identify themselves as Christians, Muslims, or Jews regard the Bible as inspired by God yet written by a variety of imperfect men over thousands of years. Wide variations exist in interpretation and acceptance of the accuracy and legitimacy of various books and passages. Some denominations emphasize a strict literal interpretation, while others view the text more symbolically, or as a combination of literal truth and symbolism; yet others view the Bible as a story of a people in history struggling to understand a living God.

Composition and distribution

Composition

The Jewish, Catholic and Protestant Bibles are actually collections of what were originally a number of independent books.

For Jews, the term Bible refers only to the Hebrew Bible, also called the Tanakh, which includes the Five Books of Moses (the Torah) as well as the books of the Prophets and Writings.

The Bible as used by the majority of Christians comprises the Hebrew Scripture, known to Christians as the Old Testament or First Testament; and the New Testament, which describes the life and message of Jesus.

For Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans, and some Protestants, the Deuterocanonical books (various writings important in the Second-Temple period of Judaism) are considered to be part of the Old Testament and as such part of the Bible. While Jerome included the Deuterocanonical books (such as Tobias, Sirach, and Wisdom) in the publication of the Vulgate or Latin Bible, he called these books the Apocrypha. The Apocrypha are those books present in the Greek Septuagint Old Testament but not found in Pharisaic Hebrew Scripture or the modern Hebrew Bible. Protestants beginning with Luther do not consider the Apocrypha to be divinely inspired, but "good for reading." Some books considered deuterocanonical by certain Orthodox Churches are considered apocryphal by other Orthodox Churches and/or Catholics.

Distribution

The Bible is the most widely distributed book in the world. Both Hebrew Scripture and the Christian Bible have been translated more times and into more languages — more than 2,100 languages in all — than any other book. It is said that more than five billion copies of the Bible have been sold since 1815, making it the best-selling book of all-time. In some cities, the Bible is considered to be the most frequently stolen book. [1]

Because of Christian domination of Europe from the late Roman era to the Age of Enlightenment, the Bible has influenced not only religion but language, law and the natural philosophy of mainstream Western Civilization. The Age of Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution in Europe and America brought skepticism regarding the divine origin and historical accuracy of the Bible. Some scholars continue to use the Bible as a historical document, as there are archeological sites that match biblical descriptions of events and places, including possible sites for Sodom and Gomorrah, and the ruins remaining after the fall of Jericho.

The term "Bible" is sometimes used to describe scriptures of other faiths. Thus the Guru Granth Sahib is often referred to as the "Sikh Bible", and the Qur'an is sometimes referred to as the "Muslim Bible".[2] After the publication of the Book of Mormon in 1830, it was sometimes known as the "Golden Bible" to those outside of Mormonism. The word "bible" is sometimes used to describe a book on a factual subject that is comprehensive and authoritative; some books making such a claim include "Bible" in their title (e.g., "PC Engine Software Bible; guitarists handbook or guitarists bible").

The Hebrew Bible

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Main article: Tanakh

The Hebrew Bible (also known as the Jewish Bible, or תנ"ך, Tanakh in Hebrew) consists of 24 books. Tanakh is an acronym for the three parts of the Hebrew Bible: the Torah (Pentateuch), Nevi'im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings, or Hagiographia).

Torah

File:241530 7953 torah.jpg
The holy Jewish scripture: The Torah. In the background are the Star of David and a Menorah, two important symbols of Judaism.

The Torah, or "Teaching," is also known as the five books of Moses, thus Chumash or Pentateuch (Hebrew and Greek for "five," respectively).

The Pentateuch is composed of the following five books:

The Hebrew book titles come from the first words in the respective texts. The Hebrew title for Numbers, however, comes from the fifth word of that text.

The Torah focuses on three moments in the changing relationship between God and people.

  • The first eleven chapters of Genesis provide accounts of the creation (or ordering) of the world, and the history of God's early relationship with humanity.
  • The remaining thirty-nine chapters of Genesis provide an account of God's covenant with the Hebrew patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (also called Israel), and Jacob's children (the "Children of Israel"), especially Joseph. It tells of how God commanded Abraham to leave his family and home in the city of Ur, eventually to settle in the land of Canaan, and how the Children of Israel later moved to Egypt.
  • The remaining four books of the Torah tell the story of Moses, who lived hundreds of years after the patriarchs. His story coincides with the story of the liberation of the Children of Israel from slavery in Egypt, to the renewal of their covenant with God at Mount Sinai, and their wanderings in the desert until a new generation would be ready to enter the land of Canaan. The Torah ends with the death of Moses.

Traditionally, the Torah contains 613 mitzvot, or commandments, of God, revealed during the passage from slavery in the land of Egypt to freedom in the land of Canaan. These commandments provide the basis for Halakha (Jewish religious law).

The Torah is divided into fifty-four portions which are read in turn in Jewish liturgy, from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Deuteronomy, each Sabbath. The cycle ends and recommences at the end of Sukkot, which is called Simchat Torah.

The two Torahs

By the Hellenistic period of Jewish history, Jews were divided over the nature of the Torah. Some (for example, the Sadducees) believed that the Chumash contained the entire Torah, that is, the entire contents of what God revealed to Moses at Sinai and in the desert. Others, principally the Pharisees, believed that the Chumash represented only that portion of the revelation that had been written down (i.e., the Written Torah or the Written Law), but that the rest of God's revelation had been passed down orally (thus composing the Oral Law or Oral Torah). Orthodox and Masorti and Conservative (Progressive) Judaism state that the Talmud contains some of the Oral Torah. Reform Judaism also gives credence to the Talmud containing the Oral Torah, but, as with the written Torah, asserts that both were inspired by, but not dictated by, God.

The four sources

Main article: Documentary hypothesis

The documentary hypothesis posits that the Written Torah has its origins in sources who lived during the time of the monarchy or later, labeled J (Yahwists), E (Elohim), D (Deuteronomists), and P (Priests). These in turn may go back to oral traditions and/or draw on (and sometimes parody) earlier ancient Near Eastern mythology. Julius Wellhausen, who in the late 19th century gave this hypothesis a definitive formulation, suggested that these sources were edited together or redacted during the time of Ezra, perhaps by Ezra himself. Since that time Wellhausen's theory has been widely debated by critical scholars (e.g. Yehezkel Kaufman). The general opposion to JEDP is as follows: There is no existing proof for a redactor ever having lived. Also, the division of what text fits into any particular division of JEDP is purely arbitrary and based mostly on the particular scholar's speculation.

Scholars who accept the documentary hypothesis differ as to whether these sources were or were not divinely inspired, and also differ over the nature and extent of their obligation to the 613 commandments and to the body of law represented in the Oral Torah. Nonetheless, each branch of Judaism recognizes both the Written and Oral Torahs as central to Jewish tradition, whether it be conceived of as sacred, national, or cultural.

Nevi'im

The Nevi'im, or "Prophets," tells the story of the rise of the Hebrew monarchy, its division into two kingdoms, and the prophets who, in God's name, judged the kings and the Children of Israel. It ends with the conquest of the Kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians and the conquest of the Kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians, and the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Portions of the prophetic books are read by Jews on the Sabbath (Shabbat). The Book of Jonah is read on Yom Kippur.

According to Jewish tradition, Nevi'im is divided into eight books. Contemporary translations subdivide these into seventeen books.

The eight books are:

  • I. Joshua or Yehoshua [יהושע]
  • II. Judges or Shoftim [שופטים]
  • III. Samuel or Shmu'el [שמואל] (often divided into two books; Samuel may be considered the last of the judges or the first of the prophets, as his sons were named judges but were rejected by the Hebrew nation)
  • IV. Kings or Melakhim [מלכים] (often divided into two books)
  • V. Isaiah or Yeshayahu [ישעיהו]
  • VI. Jeremiah or Yirmiyahu [ירמיהו]
  • VII. Ezekiel or Yehezq'el [יחזקאל]
  • VIII. Trei Asar (The Twelve Minor Prophets) תרי עשר
    1. Hosea or Hoshea [הושע]
    2. Joel or Yo'el [יואל]
    3. Amos [עמוס]
    4. Obadiah or Ovadyah [עבדיה]
    5. Jonah or Yonah [יונה]
    6. Micah or Mikhah [מיכה]
    7. Nahum or Nachum [נחום]
    8. Habakkuk or Habaquq [חבקוק]
    9. Zephaniah or Tsefania [צפניה]
    10. Haggai [חגי]
    11. Zechariah or Zekharia [זכריה]
    12. Malachi or Malakhi [מלאכי]

The Torah and the Nevi'im have an epical quality, although they have no human hero. Moses and David are, in many ways, antiheroes; one may consider the Children of Israel collectively to be the hero of the epic, or, if one must choose a single character, God.

Ketuvim

The Ketuvim, or "Writings," were probably written during or after the Babylonian Exile and were among the last books to be canonized. According to Rabbinic tradition, many of the psalms in the book of Psalms are attributed to David; King Solomon is believed to have written Song of Songs in his youth, Proverbs at the prime of his life, and Ecclesiastes at old age; and the prophet Jeremiah is thought to have written Lamentations. The Book of Job is the only biblical book that centers entirely on a non-Jew. The book of Ruth tells the story of a non-Jew (specifically, a Moabite) who married a Jew and, upon his death, followed in the ways of the Jews; according to the Bible, she was the great-grandmother of King David. Five of the books, called "The Five Scrolls" (Megilot), are read on Jewish holidays: Song of Songs on Passover; the Book of Ruth on Shavuot; Lamentations on the Ninth of Av; Ecclesiastes on Sukkot; and the Book of Esther on Purim. Collectively, the Ketuvim contain lyrical poetry, philosophical reflections on life, and the stories of the prophets and other Jewish leaders during the Babylonian exile. It ends with the Persian decree allowing Jews to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple.

Ketuvim contains eleven books:

הימים

Translations and editions

The Tanakh was mainly written in Biblical Hebrew, with some portions (notably in Daniel and Ezra) in Aramaic.

Some time in the 2nd or 3rd century BC, the Torah was translated into Koine Greek, and over the next century, other books were translated (or composed) as well. This translation became known as the Septuagint and was widely used by Greek-speaking Jews, and later by Christians. It differs somewhat from the later standardized Hebrew (Masoretic Text). This translation was promoted by way of a legend that seventy separate translators all produced identical texts, indicating that the translation was divinely inspired.

From the 800s to the 1400s, Jewish scholars today known as Karaites Masoretes compared the text of all known Biblical manuscripts in an effort to create a unified, standardized text. A series of highly similar texts eventually emerged, and any of these texts are known as Masoretic Texts (MT). The Masoretes also added vowel points (called niqqud) to the text, since the original text only contained letters. This sometimes required the selection of an interpretation, since some words differ only in their vowels— their meaning can vary in accordance with the vowels chosen. In antiquity, variant Hebrew readings existed, some of which have survived in the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea scrolls, and other ancient fragments, as well as being attested in ancient versions in other languages.

Versions of the Septuagint contain several passages and whole books beyond what was included in the Masoretic texts of the Tanakh. In some cases these additions were originally composed in Greek, while in other cases they are translations of Hebrew books or variants not present in the Masoretic texts. Recent discoveries have shown that more of the Septuagint additions have a Hebrew origin than was once thought. While there are no complete surviving manuscripts of the Hebrew texts on which the Septuagint was based, many scholars believe that they represent a different textual tradition ("vorlage") from the one that became the basis for the Masoretic texts.

Jews also produced nonliteral translations or paraphrases known as targums, primarily in Aramaic. They frequently expanded on the text with additional details taken from Rabbinic oral tradition.

The Christian Bible

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A Bible handwritten in Latin, on display in Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. This Bible was transcribed in Belgium in 1407 for reading aloud in a monastery.

The Bible as used by the majority of Christians comprises the Hebrew Scripture, known to Christians as the Old Testament or First Testament; and the New Testament, which relates the life and teachings of Jesus, the letters of St Paul and other disciples to the early church and the book of Revelation.

For Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, and some Protestants, the Deuterocanonical books (various writings important in the Second-Temple period of Judaism) are considered to be part of the Old Testament.

There are many different translations of the Bible in current use.

Theology

While individual books within the Christian Bible present narratives set in certain historical periods, most Christian denominations teach that the Bible itself has an overarching message.

There are among Christians wide differences of opinion as to whether particular incidents as described in the Bible are to be interpreted as literal history or whether they are mythologized history or pure mythology, and as to what meaning should be attached to various prophecies.

However Christians in general are in agreement as to the Bible's basic message. A general outline, as described by C.S. Lewis, is as follows:

  1. At some point in the past, mankind learned to depart from God's will and began to sin.
  2. Because no one is free from sin, humanity cannot deal with God directly, so God revealed Himself in ways people could understand.
  3. God called Abraham and his progeny to be the means for saving all of mankind.
  4. To this end, He gave the Law to Moses.
  5. The resulting nation of Israel went through cycles of sin and repentance, yet the prophets show an increasing understanding of the Law as a moral, not just a ceremonial, force.
  6. Jesus brought a perfect understanding of the Mosaic Law and a "new Law" of love and salvation.
  7. By His death and resurrection, all who believe are saved and reconciled to God.

The Old Testament

The Septuagint (Greek translation, from Alexandria in Egypt under the Ptolemies) was generally abandoned in favor of the Masoretic text as the basis for translations of the Old Testament into Western languages from Saint Jerome's Vulgate to the present day. In Eastern Christianity, translations based on the Septuagint still prevail. Some modern Western translations make use of the Septuagint to clarify passages in the Masoretic text that seem to have suffered corruption in transcription. They also sometimes adopt variants that appear in texts discovered among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

A number of deuterocanonical books which are part of the Greek Septuagint but are not found in the Hebrew Bible are often referred to as the Apocrypha. Most modern Protestant traditions do not accept the Apocrypha as canonical, although Protestant Bibles included them until around the 1820s. However, most other Christians (including members of the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox Churches) include the Apocrypha as part of the Old Testament. The Roman Catholic Church recognizes seven such books (Tobit, Judith, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, and Baruch), as well as some passages in Esther and Daniel. Various Orthodox Churches include a few others, typically 3 Maccabees, Psalm 151, 1 Esdras, Odes, Psalms of Solomon, and occasionally 4 Maccabees.

The New Testament

The New Testament is a Christian collection of 27 books with Jesus as its central figure, written primarily in Koine Greek in the early Christian period. Nearly all Christians recognize the New Testament (as stated below) as canonical scripture. These books can be grouped into:

Original language

The New Testament was probably completely composed in Greek. The three main textual traditions are sometimes called the Western text-type, the Alexandrian text-type, and Byzantine text-type. Together they compose the majority of New Testament manuscripts. There are also several ancient versions in other languages, most important of which are the Syriac (including the Peshitta and the Diatessaron gospel harmony), Ge'ez and the Latin (both the Vetus Latina and the Vulgate).

Some scholars believe in Aramaic primacy — that parts of the Greek New Testament are actually a translation of an Aramaic original, in particular, the Gospel of Matthew. Of these, a small number accept the Syriac Peshitta as representative of the original. The idea that the original language of the New Testament was not entirely Greek also comes from Bishop Papias of Phrygian Hierapolis who wrote Five books entitled, Exposition(s) of the Lord’s Report(s) (written somewhere around 150 AD).[1] There are no extant copies of the works in question, but there are fragments of his work from quotations and allusions made by men like Eusebius, an early Church father who quotes Papias as having said the following:

"[…] Mark made no mistake in writing down some things as he recalled them. For he paid heed to one point, namely, not to leave out any of the things he had heard, or to say anything false in regard to them." […] Matthew, however, wrote the Logia in the Hebrew tongue, and every man interpreted them as he was able." [2]

Logia here is Greek and is being translated as “word(s) [of the Lord].”

Historic editions

File:Codex Gigas.jpg
The Devil's Bible from the 13th century, held at the Royal Library in Sweden.

The earliest printed edition of the New Testament in Greek appeared in 1516 from the Froben press. It was compiled by Desiderius Erasmus on the basis of the few recent Greek manuscripts, all of Byzantine tradition, at his disposal, which he completed by translating from the Vulgate parts for which he did not have a Greek text. He produced four later editions of the text.

Erasmus was a Roman Catholic, but his preference for the textual tradition represented in Byzantine Greek text of the time rather than that in the Latin Vulgate led to him being viewed with suspicion by some authorities of his church.

The first edition with critical apparatus (variant readings in manuscripts) was produced by the printer Robert Estienne of Paris in 1550. The type of text printed in this edition and in those of Erasmus became known as the Textus Receptus (Latin for "received text"), a name given to it in the Elzevier edition of 1633, which termed it the text nunc ab omnibus receptum ("now received by all"). Upon it, the churches of the Protestant Reformation based their translations into vernacular languages, such as the King James Version.

The discovery of older manuscripts, such as the Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Vaticanus, led scholars to revise their opinion of this text. Karl Lachmann’s critical edition of 1831, based on manuscripts dating from the fourth century and earlier, was intended primarily to demonstrate that the Textus Receptus must finally be rejected. Later critical texts are based on further scholarly research and the finding of papyrus fragments dating in some cases from within a few decades of the composition of the New Testament writings. It is on the basis of these that nearly all modern translations or revisions of older translations have, for more than a century, been made, though some still prefer the Textus Receptus or the similar "Byzantine Majority Text".

The canonization of the Bible

Main article: Biblical Canon

It has been theorized that the canonical status of some books was discussed between 200 BC and AD 100, though it is unclear at what point during this period the Jewish canon was decided. Protestants cite the Jewish canon, among other reasons, as their basis for not including the deuterocanonical books (known as the Apocrypha to Protestants) in their canon.

To the books accepted by Judaism as canonical, Christianity subsequently added those of the New Testament, the 27-book canon which was finally fixed in the 4th century. Catholicism mostly considers certain deuterocanonical books to be part of the Old Testament, though Protestantism in general accepts only the books in the canon of Judaism as part of the Old Testament and uses the term Apocrypha for the deuterocanonical books. Thus, the Protestant Old Testament has a 39-book canon—the number varies from that of the books in the Tanakh (though not in content) because of a different method of division—while the Roman Catholic Church recognizes 46 books as part of the canonical Old Testament.

Canonicity is distinct from questions of human authorship and the formation of the books of the Bible; which are issues of higher criticism and textual criticism.

Bible versions and translations

In scholarly writing, ancient translations are frequently referred to as "versions", with the term "translation" being reserved for medieval or modern translations. Bible versions are discussed below, while Bible translations can be found on a separate page.

The original texts of the Tanakh were in Hebrew, although some portions were in Aramaic. In addition to the authoritative Masoretic Text, Jews still refer to the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, and the Targum Onkelos, an Aramaic version of the Bible.

Early Christians produced translations of the Hebrew Bible into several languages; their primary Biblical text was the Septuagint. Translations were made into Syriac, Coptic,Ge'ez and Latin, among other languages. The Latin translations were historically the most important for the Church in the West, while the Greek-speaking East continued to use the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament and had no need to translate the New Testament.

The earliest Latin translation was the Old Latin text, or Vetus Latina, which, from internal evidence, seems to have been made by several authors over a period of time. It was based on the Septuagint, and thus included books not in the Hebrew Bible.

Pope Damasus I assembled the first list of books of the Bible at the Council of Rome in 382 A.D. He commissioned Saint Jerome to produce a reliable and consistent text by translating the original Greek and Hebrew texts into Latin. This translation became known as the Latin Vulgate Bible and was declared by the Church to be the only authentic and official bible. The Douay-Rheims New Testament, a direct translation of the Latin Vulgate, was first published by the English College at Rheims in 1582 A.D. The Douay-Rheims Old Testament was first published by the English College at Douay in 1609 A.D. The first King James Version was published in 1611. More recently, the New American Bible was first published in 1970 and the New International Version was published in stages between 1973 and 1984.

The work of Bible translation continues, including by Christian organisations such as Wycliffe Bible Translators (wycliffe.org), New Tribes Missions (ntm.org) and the Bible Societies (biblesociety.org). Of the world's 6,900 languages, 2,400 have some or all of the Bible, 1,600 (spoken by more than a billion people) have translation underway, and some 2,500 (spoken by 270m people) are judged as needing translation to begin [3].

Differences in Bible Translations

See also: Bible translations: Approaches.

As Hebrew and Greek, the original languages of the bible, have idioms and concepts not easily translated, there is an on going critical tension about whether it is better to give a word for word translation or to give a translation that gives a parallel idiom in the target language. For instance in the English language Protestant translations of the Christian bible, translations like the New Revised Standard Version and the New American Standard Version are seen as more "word for word" translations, whereas translations like the New International Version and New Living Version attempt to give relevant parallel idioms. The Living Bible and The Message are two paraphrases of the bible that try to convey the original meaning in contemporary language. The further away one gets from word to word translation, the text becomes more readable while relying more on the theological understanding of the translator. Further, Greek, like some of the latin languages, uses the male gender of nouns and pronouns to refer to groups that contain both sexes. This creates some difficulty in determining whether a noun should be translated using terms that refer to men only, or men and women inclusively. Some translations avoid the issue by directly translating the word using male only terminology, whereas others try to use inclusive language where the translators believe it to be appropriate. One translation that attempts to use inclusive language is the New Revised Standard Version.

The introduction of chapters and verses

Main article: Chapters and verses of the Bible; see Tanakh for the Jewish textual tradition.

The Hebrew Masoretic text contains verse endings as an important feature. According to the Talmudic tradition, the verse endings are of ancient origin. The Masoretic textual tradition also contains section endings called parashiyot, which are indicated by a space within a line (a "closed" section") or a new line beginning (an "open" section). The division of the text reflected in the parashiyot is usually thematic. The parashiyot are not numbered.

In early manuscripts (most importantly in Tiberian Masoretic manuscripts, such as the Aleppo codex) an "open" section may also be represented by a blank line, and a "closed" section by a new line that is slightly indented (the preceding line may also not be full). These latter conventions are no longer used in Torah scrolls and printed Hebrew Bibles. In this system the one rule differentiating "open" and "closed" sections is that "open" sections must always begin at the beginning of a new line, while "closed" sections never start at the beginning of a new line.

Another related feature of the Masoretic text is the division of the sedarim. This division is not thematic, but is almost entirely based upon the quantity of text.

The Byzantines also introduced a chapter division of sorts, called Kephalaia. It is not identical to the present chapters.

The current division of the Bible into chapters and the verse numbers within the chapters have no basis in any ancient textual tradition. Rather, they are medieval Christian inventions. They were later adopted by many Jews as well, as technical references within the Hebrew text. Such technical references became crucial to medieval rabbis in the historical context of forced debates with Christian clergy (who used the chapter and verse numbers), especially in late medieval Spain. Chapter divisions were first used by Jews in a 1330 manuscript, and for a printed edition in 1516. However, for the past generation, most Jewish editions of the complete Hebrew Bible have made a systematic effort to relegate chapter and verse numbers to the margins of the text.

The division of the Bible into chapters and verses has often elicited severe criticism from traditionalists and modern scholars alike. Critics charge that the text is often divided into chapters in an incoherent way, or at inappropriate rhetorical points, and that it encourages citing passages out of context, in effect turning the Bible into a kind of textual quarry for clerical citations. Nevertheless, the chapter divisions and verse numbers have become indispensable as technical references for Bible study.

Stephen Langton is reputed to have been the first to put the chapter divisions into a Vulgate edition of the Bible, in 1205. They were then inserted into Greek manuscripts of the New Testament in the 1400s. Robert Estienne (Robert Stephanus) was the first to number the verses within each chapter, his verse numbers entering printed editions in 1565 (New Testament) and 1571 (Hebrew Bible).[3][4]

References

  • Berlin, Adele, Marc Zvi Brettler and Michael Fishbane. The Jewish Study Bible. Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN 0195297512
  • Anderson, Bernhard W. Understanding the Old Testament (ISBN 0139483993)
  • Dever, William G. Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did they Come from? Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2003. ISBN 0802809758.
  • Ehrman, Bart D. Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005. ISBN 0060738170.
  • Head, Tom. The Absolute Beginner's Guide to the Bible. Indianapolis, IN: Que Publishing, 2005. ISBN 0789734192.
  • Hoffman, Joel M. In the Beginning. New York University Press. 2004. ISBN 0814736904.
  • Lienhard, Joseph T. "The Bible, The Church, and Authority." Liturgical Press, Collegeville, Minnesota, 1995.
  • Miller, John W. The Origins of the Bible: Rethinking Canon History Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1994. ISBN 0809135221.
  • Riches, John. The Bible: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 0192853430
  • Finkelstein, Israel and Silberman, Neil A. The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001. ISBN 0684869136.
  • Taylor, Hawley O., "Mathematics and Prophecy," Modern Science and Christian Faith, Wheaton,: Van Kampen, 1948, pp.175-183.
  • Wycliffe Bible Encyclopedia, subject: prophecy, page 1410, Moody Bible Press, Chicago, 1986
  • Wycliffe Bible Encyclopedia, subject: Book of Ezekiel, page 580, Moody Bible Press, Chicago, 1986
  • On gender neutality. gender-neutral bible translations.

See also

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Commentaries

  1. ^ Paul Allan Mirecki, The Anchor Bible Dictionary, v. 1, p. 624
  2. ^ Translated by Rev. V. H. Stanton, D.D., Ely Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge. Author of “Gospels” in the Dictionary of the Bible
  3. ^ www.vision2025.org
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