Can I Trust the Bible?
Episode 1: The Right Books
The Christians in the first three centuries after Jesus’ death came to a quick agreement regarding what books did or didn’t have a direct connection with Jesus. First-century Judaism connected its understanding of scripture with God’s promises of deliverance and redemption. We see within the New Testament that, at that time, they were “looking for the Messiah” (John 1:41), waiting for “the redemption of Jerusalem,” and the “restoration of the Kingdom” (Luke 2:25, 38). In other words, the Jews within Jesus’ day did not view scripture as being complete. Rather, the story of Hebrew scripture (the Old Testament) was read within their day as a story in search of a conclusion. This set the stage for the writing of the New Testament books being that conclusion. Jesus established the New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31), and the natural question for the Jews of his day would have been “Here is the fulfillment of the promises of deliverance and redemption, so, where are the books?”
The Gospels and the Epistles of Paul positioned themselves at the nucleus of the New Testament scriptures. Christians did not pick or vote on which writings had the authority to grant them scriptural/canonical status but recognized the authority these documents already possessed. There was a conscious recognition that, when Jesus breathed on his disciples (John 20:22) and they received the Holy Spirit, Jesus’ authority was given to the Apostles. Therefore, only the books associated with having a direct relationship with this immediate Jesus group could even begin to be considered as holding scriptural status. The 27 books we call the New Testament are those books that were recognized as possessing this unique and inspired position.
Key Definitions
Canon – derived from the ancient Greek word kanōn (κανών) and the Semitic kánna (קָנֶה), was a word that originally referred to a reed stick. These sticks were used as measuring rods, and eventually the word became synonymous with the idea of a “standard” by which something was measured. Within early Christianity the idea of a “standard” by which someone discerned the proper books considered scripture was talked about under the category of what was or wasn’t “canonical.” The final canonical list that we use today finds its shape and order from Athanasius' Festal Letter (367 AD). Athanasius’ writing however, wasn’t a pronouncement of the canon, but merely a list of the books that had already been established and recognized as scripture for the centuries leading up to it.
Apocryphal – originating from the Greek word apocryphos (ἀπόκρυφος) meaning “strange,” “hidden,” or “secret.” The term became synonymous with non-canonical writings. It became customary within early Christianity to use the description of “apocryphal” for books that were being touted or considered scripture but did not have authentic connections for the criteria of canonicity.
Gnosticism – a modern term that included a group of mystic religious philosophies popular in the second and third centuries AD. Although there were many competing ideas within the umbrella of what we today consider “ancient Gnosticism” the common theme between all of them focused on an original perfect divinity and lesser divine beings (known as Aeons) that radiate out from the one pure divinity. Essential to Gnosticism is the idea that the physical world is evil and the spiritual world is pure. Gnostics believed that this world was created by an evil god (known as the Demi-Urge) who trapped spiritual beings within evil physical realities. To escape from this physical world one must realize, through secret knowledge (γνῶσις - gnosis in Greek, of where we get the group’s namesake) that they too are divine, and by this realization (knowledge revealed to humanity by Aeons) people can break free and release their divine spirit. Gnostic belief often appropriated already existing religious figures into the pantheon of the Aeons. Within “Christian Gnosticism” Jesus is portrayed as an Aeon who communicates this secret knowledge to his followers. Gnostic literature, such as the Gospel of Thomas, commandeered the names of key biblical characters in an attempt to popularize and legitimize these ideas.
Examples of Famous Gnostic Gospels:
The Gospel of Judas - Discovered in El Minya, Egypt in the 1970s;
The Gospel of Mary - Discovered in Cairo, Egypt in 1896;
The Gospel of Thomas - Discovered at Oxyrhynchus, Egypt in the 1890s,
- Discovered in the Nag Hammadi Dessert, Egypt in 1945;
Gospel of Philip - Discovered in the Nag Hammadi Dessert, Egypt in 1945;
Gospel of Peter - Discovered at Akhmim, Egypt in 1886.
Discussion Questions
Why did Wes and Andy go to Egypt to talk about the right books of the Bible?
From watching Episode 1, how would you explain what the Bible is?
Many books were not included in the Bible. What was the standard the early church used to acknowledge what was or wasn’t scripture?
In Episode 1, what arguments do Wes and Andy discuss for why the Nag Hammadi texts (such as the Gospel of Thomas) were not, and should not, be considered scripture?
What good reason do we have to trust that the books in our Bible today are the right ones?
Going Deeper:
The main criteria of New Testament canonicity for the early Christians had to do with a writing’s connection to Jesus – either someone who knew Jesus directly, or someone who knew someone who knew him personally. Given this standard, what would be the books that had obvious connections to Jesus that were included within our Bible? What canonical books might have had an indirect association. (For example, Luke was not an apostle, why would his Gospel have been considered scripture?)
* Take a look at Philemon 1:24
Further Reading
Greg Lanier, How We Got the Bible?
John Meade, Scribes and Scripture
William Mounce, Why Should I Trust the Bible?
F.F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture
Michael J. Kruger, The Heresy of Orthodoxy
Can I Trust the Bible?
Episode 2: The Right Text
The way that the Christian Bible exists today is a product of modern convenience. After the invitation of the printing press in 1440, and the availability of relatively cheap and easy book production, the Bible in a single-bound volume with all 66 books included and indexed became the norm. However, the Bible for the first few centuries of its recognition as scripture existed mostly as independent and separate scrolls and books. Although there were some very early collections of Gospels (𝔓45) and collections of the letters of Paul (𝔓46), most of the earliest copies of these books were individual documents.
Despite existing in this form, the early Christians were very eager to spread the good news of Jesus and so copied and translated the books that we now call the Bible with great speed and regularity. By the 4th century copies of the biblical books existed across the ancient world and in multiple different languages. This meant that the gospel spread very quickly, however, because of the zeal of the message not all copies were done carefully, resulting in differing readings throughout the copies.
Key Definitions
Bible – stemming from the Koinē Greek word biblia (βιβλία), meaning “books,” this is the term that became associated specifically with “the books” of Christian scripture. The term in an ancient context would have meant “scroll” and is used several times within Scripture. For example, in Revelation 5:2, an angel asks the question “Who is worthy to break the seal and open the scroll (to biblion – τὸ βιβλίον).” In our modern Protestant context, the Bible would refer explicitly to the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments.
Manuscript – a word used to describe a hand-written document. The word itself comes from the medieval Latin manu (by the hand) and scriptus (written). Therefore, a manuscript is the term used for any written document that was hand-produced by a scribe or copyist.
Codex – referring to what we today would typically think of as “a book.” Although codices have been around since the third century BC, their popularity did not rise to prominence until the third century AD. By the fourth century AD, the codex began to replace the scroll as a preferred form of longer writing. Unlike scrolls, codices allowed writing on both sides of the pages and made it easy to locate and go back and forth between passages – a practice that is very hard to do when dealing with a scroll.
Papyrus – an ancient writing material made from the papyrus plant. The earliest surviving copies of the New Testament are written on this material.
Parchment – a common writing material from the 4th to 14th centuries made of animal skin. Tanners took the hides of animals, cleaned them, and scrapped them thin to produce large sheets. These sheets were folded into gatherings of parchment leaves, known as quires, which were often grouped together and bound into a codex.
Scroll – a single document written on parchment or papyrus that is rolled up. Scrolls could range in size from a few centimeters to many meters in length.
Fragment – a surviving section of an incomplete manuscript.
Septuagint – a modern term that refers to a stream of ancient translations into Greek of the Hebrew Bible and several other Jewish texts (also known by the abbreviation LXX). The translation project of the documents we now call the Septuagint took place between the third and first centuries BC. Many of the Greek quotations of the Old Testament found within the New Testament are quotations from the Septuagint.
Vulgate – a term derived from the old Latin word vulgata, meaning “common.” The Vulgate is a late fourth century AD translation of the Bible into Latin. The fourth-century theologian and linguist, Jerome, was commissioned by Damasus I, to translate the Bible out of Hebrew and Greek and into the “common language” of the people, i.e. Latin. The Latin Vulgate remained the official Bible of the Church between the fifth and 16th centuries.
Dead Sea Scrolls – a collection of 970 scrolls, dating between the third century BC and the first century AD, discovered in caves spread down the coast of the Dead Sea that exist in various stages of completeness. Although we are not entirely sure who wrote, copied, and stored all of the Dead Sea Scrolls, most of them are the product of the Jewish sect known as the Essenes. This collection includes all the books of the Old Testament (excluding Esther), as well as a number of Jewish books of theology and history. The preservation of these documents ranges from entire scrolls (like the Great Isaiah Scroll) to mere scraps of papyrus and parchment only millimeters in size.
Discussion Questions
Why did Wes and Andy go to Egypt to talk about the right texts of the Bible?
Why has copying and translating the Bible been a consistent goal of Jews and Christians from the beginning?
Why were so many manuscripts discovered in Oxyrhynchus and what is the significance of their discovery?
Despite the presence of copying errors and differences in the manuscript tradition, how does our knowledge of variances give us greater confidence that the Bible has been reliably preserved?
What good reason do we have that the text we possess has been faithfully maintained?
Going Deeper:
Wes and Andy mention John 5:4 as an example of a textual variant that made its way into the text based on a scribal notation in the margin (probably in the fourth century). Do these kinds of introductions into the text of the Bible over time affect its reliability as the Word of God? Why or why not?