James More

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An introductory chapter written by James More for the book entitled THROUGH THE BIBLE by Thedora Wilson Wilson Published By Collins London and Glasgow 1938

HOW THE BIBLE CAME TO US
By

JAMES MORE

THESE four words introduce the wonderful and familiar story of the creation of the world. They should be written in letters of gold, for the beginning was God; before there was any form of creation there was God. And when He had created man and woman He slowly unfolded to them, by the Divine Spirit, His great love for them, and His power to guide them in the way of life. This revelation of Himself, given to His prophets and chosen people, was written down for the guidance of His children. That is our Bible.

It was God who made the Bible of the Jews, which they call the Old Testament, preparing the way for the fulfilment of His promise to send His Son into the world. It was God who made the New Testament, revealing to mankind how He "so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son."

In it is to be found God's revelation of Himself to man, and man's relation to God. It has surmounted the shocks of time, because it is true to life and satisfies the deepest yearnings of the human heart.

The story of our Bible is a tale of a great adventure. Although it was first completed nearly 1900 years ago it is still the key to life and the greatest book the world has ever known. The history of its transmission through the centuries is fascinating; it reveals the guiding hand of God in its path through many languages and versions, maintaining its spiritual power untouched.

To-day the Bible is at the very centre of our national life. Our Coronation service is essentially a great religious ceremony and one of the chief ordinances is The Presenting of the Holy Bible.
The Archbishop says these words:
"Our Gracious King; we present you with this Book, the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is wisdom; this is the royal Law; these are the lively oracles of God."

To tell the full story of the Bible itself from the earliest days of its formation to the present time is not possible within the scope of this introduction, but a brief sketch of the main features will tell us many things that will help us to treasure this greatest of all books
On the title pages of the modem English Versions of our Bibles, it is stated that these books are "Translated out of the original tongues and with the former translations diligently compared and revised." What were these "original tongues" and "former translations" and how have they been translated for us in the Bibles we use to-day?

THE OLD TESTAMENT

It is generally agreed that the Books of the Bible which we call the Old Testament (except a few written in Aramaic) were originally written in Hebrew, but as printing was not invented until A.D. 1454 we have to picture our early Bible in quite a different form from modem editions. It is not known when the first Hebrew Collections of Sacred Writings were made, but one of the earliest references to the Books of the Law is in Deuteronomy xxviii. 6i, and we find in Joshua viii. 32 that "he wrote there upon the stones a copy of the law of Moses."

This could not have been in writing as we now know it and we have therefore to thank the discoveries made by famous archaeologists among the ruins of the ancient cities of Assyria for enlightening us. It has been proved by the discovery of great numbers of tablets made of baked clay that this form of keeping historical records was in existence even before Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees for the country we now call Mesopotamia It is reasonable therefore to believe that the earliest of our Books of the Bible would be written on these tablets of baked clay.

The Hebrew language is a branch of the great Semitic (or Children of Shem) family of languages which were spoken by peoples of Babylonia, Arabia, Mesopotamia and Syria. Probably the writing was in Cuneiform, the wedge-shaped characters which were widely known throughout the whole of Palestine.

In the year A.D. 1887, the discovery of the famous Tel-el Amarna tablets in Egypt greatly increased our understanding of our earliest Biblical writings. These tablets, with wedge-shaped letters, date back to the time of Joshua. On the next stage we can throw very little light but we must remember that in the earliest days our Bible consisted only of the first five books which, we describe as the Pentateuch (Greek, pente five, and teuchos book). To the Jews these five books have always been their " Bible." No other books were ever held so sacred by them.

Egypt, since the early days when Abraham went down to it, has always played a vital part in our Bible history, and we owe a great debt to it for its help in the preservation of the Scriptures. It was in Egypt that use was first made of papyrus rolls. This material, 'resembling paper in many ways, was prepared from the fibres of the papyrus plant grown in the area of the River Nile. 'The fibres were laid in two layers running horizontally and perpendicularly After moistening and treatment with a preparation of glue the layers were put under pressure to make sheets. It was a simple matter to attach a number of these sheets together to form a roll.

We read in Isaiah viii. i, that the Lord spoke unto Isaiah:
"Take thee a great roll and write," and in Jeremiah xxxvi. 2, the word of God came unto Jeremiah: "Take, thee a roll of a book and write, therein." It cannot be said definitely whether these rolls would be made from papyrus or from prepared skins' of sheep or goats, but it is possible that both methods were used at that time.'

A roll was made up with a stick at each end and could be unrolled from one and rolled round the other as the reading proceeded. It was in this form that the Hebrew Scriptures came into common use from that period, and continued until about the end of the third century after the birth of our Lord. Then the use of vellum or parchment for manuscripts became general throughout the Eastern Mediterranean. This material, prepared from the skins of goats, sheep, or other animals, was found to be more durable than papyrus.

It is impossible to say when all the books of the Old Testament were written, but it is generally agreed that the structure as we have it to-day can be dated back to between the eighth and second centuries before Christ. In its final form, the date given by most modem critics is 120 B.C.

Broadly speaking, the Books of our old Testament were first of all written in Hebrew and, as printing was not invented, we must remember that all copies of the Scriptures had to be written by hand. The earliest copies, therefore, we describe as Manuscripts (Latin: Manus, hand; and scribere pp. scriptus, to write). In the making of these manuscripts, during the centuries before printing, errors would certainly creep in and the differences of meaning in many of the passages of the Bible to-day are largely due to this fact.

One would naturally assume that the oldest, manuscripts in existence would be of the Old rather than of the New Testament but actually this is not so. The oldest Hebrew manuscript of the Old Testament we possess cannot be dated earlier than the ninth century after Christ. There is, therefore, an interval of about a thousand years between the writing of the last book of the 0ld Testament and the date of our oldest manuscripts in Hebrew.

What happened during this important period? The most decisive event in Jewish history occurred in A.D. 70 when, after the Romans under Titus destroyed Jerusalem, great numbers of the Jews were driven from the Holy Land and scattered over the world. So great a veneration had the Jew for the sacred writings of his race that, faced with pagan religions and the rising tide of the new Christian faith, he, of necessity, built his whole moral and spiritual life round his sacred books. Effort was made to preserve the purity of the Scriptures and very rigid laws were enforced for the copying of the manuscripts. Old manuscripts, which had become torn, were destroyed by fire as soon as they could be replaced by new copies. It cannot be doubted, therefore, that during this long interval of a thousand years scrupulous fidelity to the written word of the originals was fully upheld.

About the year A.D. 100 a synod of the Jews fixed the list of accepted books in the Old Testament as we have it in our Bibles to-day. The Apocrypha (meaning "hidden" or" secret "), a number of books of sacred writings which had previously been recognised as almost equally inspired as the other books, was omitted. Until about a century ago the Apocrypha was included in all English Bibles.

Let us now turn to our manuscripts in Greek. As early as 300 B.C. the Jews were spreading all over the Eastern countries. They were losing their native Hebrew language by constant intercourse with the Greek speaking peoples and there was a growing need for Greek translations of the Scriptures. In Jerusalem itself; Hebrew had ceased to be the language of the people and the reading of the sacred books had to be interpreted by the Rabbis or Scribes into Aramaic, which was the language spoken by the Jewish people during the time of our Lord.

Egypt again plays its part in our story, for it was in the great city of Alexandria that the famous Septuagint translation in Greek was made. A special reason existed for this version (the name is derived from the Latin word meaning Seventy) being translated in Alexandria, for this city was a great centre of Greek learning and had a famous library. Large numbers of Jews had lived in Egypt for centuries before this time and it is recorded that Alexander the Great, when be founded the city and called it by his own name gave special recognition to the Jews by allowing them the privileges of citizenship and permission to celebrate the rites of their own faith.

It has been said that the idea of creating this Greek translation of the Old Testament was the outcome of a suggestion from the royal librarian at the building of the great library. To further this an embassy was sent to the High Priest at Jerusalem with the request that he should send to Alexandria six elders from each of the twelve tribes of Israel with copies of the Hebrew Law to make the Greek Translation for the University. Another version of the story is that the number of elders was seventy, that each one worked independently in a separate room, and that when the work of translation was completed and compared it was found that, word for word each copy was alike.

For various reasons these stories may be doubted, but they have been quoted by many of the earliest Christian writers, probably as an assurance that this version was properly authorised and that it was faithful to the original Hebrew text.

It was from this translation that the great Codex Sinaiticus was made, now one of the greatest literary treasures in the British Museum. This famous manuscript was discovered in 1844 by a great German scholar, Dr. Tischendorf, among a pile of old parchment's in a convent at the foot of Mount Sinai. Other famous manuscripts are the Codex Alexandrinus, which is also in the British Museum and the Coda Vaticanus, which is in the Vatican Library in Rome, both of which were written about the fourth century A.D. (The word Codex is from the Greek, meaning "a manuscript arranged in book form.") Here we find the first stage in the transition of our Bible from the Hebrew roil to the earliest approach to our modern style of book.

Early in our story we spoke of the discoveries of clay tablets in Mesopotamia. In Egypt, during the last 50 years many wonderful treasures of papyrus manuscripts have been unearthed; the greatest of these, found in 1930, being what is now called the Chester-Beatty papyri. Egypt with its clay dry soil has preserved this treasure in its sands for 1800 years. In any country with a damp climate such ancient papyri could not have survived the ravages of time. The Chester-Beatty papyri of the Old Testament in Greek, may be dated as early as A.D. 150. The value of this great discovery is beyond estimation and it is possible that still greater treasures of its kind may yet be revealed to us.