4 Things You Didn’t Know About the History of the Bible

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The Bible is probably the single most widely read book in all of human history. The path to this book’s dominance began with Constantine the Great following his conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. Before Constantine converted and took control of a reunified Roman Empire, Christians were living in the shadows as their religion was illegal, and those caught practicing it were tortured and murdered in various morbidly creative and deliberately public fashions. The support of the Roman Emperor, however, allowed Christians to come out of hiding and begin to share the Gospel openly. This allowed for numerous new converts hungry for the Scripture.

It was Gutenberg and the Protestant Reformation that crowned the Bible the king of literature. The Protestant Reformation emphasized the importance of individuals reading the Bible for themselves instead of relying on clergy to dictate their religion to them. Suddenly, having a Bible of their own was of utmost importance to everyday Christians, and Gutenberg’s miraculous invention, the printing press, allowed for the mass production of Bibles.

Many Christians pride themselves on their knowledge and memorization of what lies between the pages of the most popular and influential book to ever exist. Knowledge about the Bible itself, however, is far less common. Here are four things most Christians do not know about the history of the Bible.

Age of Canon

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Ask just about any Christian about the age of the Bible is, and the answer will likely be some variant of “roughly 2,000 years old.” Although the stories and information contained in the oldest sections of the New Testament are believed to date to shortly after Christ’s death, the Bible as it is known today is actually much younger. Although Athanasius’ Easter letter of A.D. 367 officially canonized the New Testament, modern Biblical canon was not finalized until the 5th century A.D. when the Book of Revelation was accepted by both the Eastern and Western Churches that would come to be called the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches respectively.

Also unknown or willfully ignored by many Christians is the fact that the choice of canonized books was very political. Certain books were excluded as they were seen as too friendly to ideas that were rejected by the clergy. Books that smacked of Gnosticism or Arianism, for example, were deemed heretical. Similarly, books that were seen as giving women too much power or independence, such as the Gospel of Mary or the Acts of Paul and Thecla, were excluded from Biblical canon.

Ghostwriters

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The Apostle Paul is one of the most widely quoted authors in the Bible. His many epistles are read almost constantly by Christians. Most Christians do not realize, however, that not all of the “Letters of Paul” were actually written by Paul. Of all of Paul’s letters, seven are generally accepted by scholars as being written by Paul of Tarsus. The accepted Pauline Epistles are 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philemon, Philippians, Romans and 1 Thessalonians. These have a style and tone that is different from the rest, as well as, in some cases, a subtly different message or view of the Gospel. These extra epistles are believed to have been ascribed to Paul by the writers themselves who were either looking to increase their authority or wished to give credit to their teacher for their ideas. Another theory is that the extra epistles may also have been ascribed to Paul by later readers due to either genuine misunderstandings about the authorship or to retroactively give Paul greater influence.

Paul is not the only Biblical writer to find himself with far more works to his name than he actually wrote. The Book of Isaiah is believed to have been written by not just two people, but at least three, and their works were retroactively ascribed to the prophet Isaiah, likely for much the same reason that Pauline writers signed their letters as Paul.

Hidden Books

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Much of the world has heard of and marveled at the amazing archaeological find that is the Dead Sea Scrolls. What most Christians do not always consider is what such discoveries mean about the Bible. A large majority of Christians believe that the Bible is complete and perfect in its current form. Many Christians do not even entertain the idea that there might be other gospels than the four contained in the modern canon, but dozens of “hidden” books have been discovered in recent years. Officially called Apocrypha, these lost texts cover a wide range of Biblical events. Some, such as the Infancy Gospel of Matthew, deal with Christ’s conception, birth or childhood. Others, such as the Gospel of Mary, focus on the disciples that were left behind after Christ’s death and resurrection.

The Apocrypha were not included in the canon for a variety of reasons, many of them political. The Acts of Paul and Thecla is famous for being seen as granting women far too much power and authority as Thecla behaves, in many ways, with all the independence and confidence of a male disciple. Other Apocryphal books, such as the Gospel of Thomas, were seen as being too Gnostic and were thus deemed heretical.

Many Versions

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How many books are there in the Bible? While it is uncommon to meet a Christian who can rattle the number off the top of their head, there are many Christians who would be able to list the books and count them. One would expect that each Christian would come up with the same number, but a Catholic, Baptist and Armenian Christian would all have a different list of books. While all Christian Bibles include the four Gospels, different versions of the Bible include different epistles of Paul and different denominations take different stances on disputed books and Apocryphal texts. This leads to Catholics owning Bibles with 73 books, Protestants holding Bibles with 66 books and the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church to use a Bible with a whopping 88 books.

Bible translations also vary more than most Christians realize. Minor word changes can make a great deal of difference in how the Scripture is interpreted, and the wrong choice of word can lead to an English Bible verse meaning something wildly different than the original Hebrew or Aramaic. Some Bibles also obscure certain events or cultural cues. The New Revised Standard Version, for example, is a popular translation in academic circles, but it fails to deal correctly with the “asherahs” that the Jews insisted on placing back in the Temple. These “asherahs” were representations of the goddess believed to be God’s wife. The NRSV reduces this important figure to a “sacred pole.” Returning a wife to her husband or a goddess to her temple makes a great deal more sense and explains God’s anger much better than a people who insist on reconstructing poles.

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The Bible may be the most famous book in the world, but that does not mean that it does not still have a few secrets. Even the most devout of believers do not know everything there is to know about this ancient text. From its ghostwriters to its politically tumultuous creation, believers could study the book for their entire lives and still not learn everything that the history of the Scripture can teach. There are scholars who do exactly that, only to discover that a perfect understanding of the history book they have read cover to cover in Sunday school still eludes them or that their understanding is tossed upside down by discoveries such as the Dead Sea Scrolls. While it can be frustrating, there is something fitting about the fact that the book filled with tales about the mysteries of God still has some stories to tell.