6. How We Got Our Bible

The Originals

The Old Testament originals were penned between 1500-400 B.C. and the New Testament originals were penned between 40-100 A.D.

The Old Testament was written in Hebrew and some Aramaic. The New Testament was written in Greek.

Hebrew is read from right to left. Originally, Hebrew words were written with no vowels at all, only the consonants were written. Word divisions weren’t always marked with spaces, either.

The earliest Greek manuscripts were written in all capital letters with no spaces between words. Columns usually had a standard number of characters, so words would break in the middle and continue on the next line.

Ancient documents in Old Testament times were usually written on papyrus or animal skins.

Papyrus was produced by slicing thin sections of the papyrus reed (which grew in the Nile River in Egypt) and then layering them horizontally and vertically together and pressing them until they glued themselves together.

Animal hides would be scraped and tanned to make leather (like the Great Isaiah Scroll) or, by the New Testament times, stretched into very thin, fine parchment or vellum.

Sometimes, short documents would be inscribed on metal or tablets made of clay or stone. The Ketef Hinnom scrolls are an example of this. These are made of silver with a blessing etched into them that is very similar to one in Numbers. These date to around 600 B.C.

Longer documents (like the biblical books) would be sewn or glued edge to edge to make a long roll called a scroll in OT times.

By the time of the New Testament, papyrii and parchments were bound together in a Codex, which is where we get the form of our modern books from.

Handwritten texts are called manuscripts and the original manuscripts are called autographs.

The Manuscripts

Important documents that were meant to be read by lots of people needed to be copied. But there weren’t any printers or computers back then, so copies had to be hand written.

Copies of manuscripts were produced by professional scribes.

Does anyone want to guess where the autographs of the Old Testament are stored? (Trick question—none of the autographs have survived.)

This naturally raises a question—if we don’t have the original autographs of Genesis, or Psalms, etc., then how do we know that the copies that we have are accurate?

We can have confidence in the accuracy of our Bibles because we have thousands of copies of biblical manuscripts.

(Hebrew MSS: 252)

(LXX MSS: 2,263)

That’s over 2,500 MSS of the OT. Not all are complete OT MSS, of course, many are fragments or portions of books. But some are complete.

(NT MSS: 5,808)

That is an absurd number of MSS, especially when you compare it to what we have for other ancient documents.

(Other Ancient MSS: Homer’s Iliad—650 Euripides’ Tragedies—330 Works of Demosthenes—200 Josephus—55 Plato—7 Gospel of Thomas—4)

Scholars can compare the copies and easily see where mistakes were made in the copying process and the vast majority of the time are able to figure out what the original said

We can have confidence in the accuracy of our Bibles because most scribes were extremely careful in their work.

Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary I. The Hebrew Text

Hebrew scribes, in their endeavor to preserve the text from alteration or addition,

Some of the most famous scribes were the Masoretes. These Jewish scribes worked from around 500-1000 A.D. and are well-known for their extreme accuracy in copying. Every copy was meticulously reviewed for accuracy and consistency. If a copy had too many mistakes, it would be discarded and redone.

The Masoretes also preserved the pronunciation of Hebrew by writing in vowel points above and below the letters.

The Most Important MSS

Aleppo Codex

Language: Hebrew

Date: 10th Century A.D. (900s)

Masoretic Text

Originally contained the entire Old Testament, now missing 25% from a fire.

Leningrad Codex

Language: Hebrew

Date: 1008 A.D.

Masoretic Text

Entire Old Testament

Basis of the modern Hebrew Bible (BHS—Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia) and the basis of most of the text in our modern translations.

Latin Vulgate

Language: Latin

Date: 382 A.D.

Translator: Jerome

There was already a Latin translation called the “Vetus Latina,” or “Old Latin.” But it was a translation of a translation, so the Pope commissioned Jerome to revise and standardize the Latin translation of the Bible. This became the standard translation for the next 1,000 years until the Protestant Reformation in the 1500’s.

The Septuagint (LXX)

Language: Greek

Dates: 250-150 B.C.

Contained: the Old Testament

This Greek translation of the Old Testament was called the Septuagint (from the Latin septuaginta, “70”). The Septuagint is often abbreviated by the Roman numerals signifying 70, “LXX.” According to Jewish legend, 72 translators (six from each of the twelve tribes of Israel) worked independently of one another to translate the Old Testament and miraculously all produced identical translations. While the veracity of this legend is questionable, this translation was, nevertheless, a monumental accomplishment and proved to be extremely helpful to modern Hebrew scholars in understanding ancient Hebrew (by examining how Hebrew words were translated into Greek). Some of the oldest copies of the LXX were among the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in Qumran.

Since the Septuagint was completed and in wide circulation by the time of the New Testament, it would have likely been the version of the Hebrew Scriptures most frequently used by Jesus, the Apostles, and first-century Jewish synagogues and in the early Church. In fact, the Septuagint is often the version of the Old Testament that is quoted by the New Testament! It remains one of the most important source texts for many modern translations today.

The Great Uncial Codices

Language: Greek

Dates: 300-500 A.D.

Contained: the entire Bible.

They are called “Uncials” because of the style of writing—they’re in all capital letters with no spaces between words. These Codices are the first time the entire Bible was bound in a single volume. That had not been possible previously with scrolls.

The two most important Codices are Sinaiticus and Vaticanus.

The New Testament in Antiquity (2nd Edition): A Survey of the New Testament within Its Cultural Contexts Text Variants

A Scribe’s Complaint

Codex Vaticanus is one of the most important biblical texts we own. It is a vellum (animal skin) codex from the fourth century and is located in the Vatican. It has 759 sheets (617 Old Testament, 142 New Testament). Each sheet has three columns with forty-two lines to a column. It contains the entire Septuagint (except Maccabees and Manasseh). The New Testament lacks the Pastoral Epistles, Philemon, and Revelation. Because the ink was faded, at some point a later scribe decided to write over each letter. When something seemed unclear, he felt free to “correct” it.

There is an odd comment in the margin at

The Earliest Greek MSS

P45—Contains the Gospels and Acts

P46—Contains most of the Pauline Epistles and Hebrews; date: 3rd Century

P52—Widely believed to be the earliest NT MSS, containing portions of John 18:31–33, 37–38. It is significant because some scholars have dated this as early as within the first 20 years of the second century, which makes it only 20-30 years after the death of its author, John.

John 18:31–33 ESV

31 Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law.” The Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death.” 32 This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. 33 So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?”

John 18:37–38 ESV

37 Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” 38 Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, “I find no guilt in him.

We have at least 8 MSS fragments that date to the 2nd century containing portions of Matthew, John, Acts, and Revelation, and a further 64 MSS from the 3rd century.

Given how long MSS lasted back then, we have a lot of MSS that would have been copied when the autographs were still around for reference.

But, what about the OT? Of course, we have the Septuagint, Greek translations of the OT, that date back to 300-400 A.D. in Vaticanus and Sinaiticus. But, translation inevitably introduces variations, and our Masoretic Texts (Aleppo and Leningrad) have a good bit of difference between them and the Septuagint.

Up until 1947, the oldest Hebrew OT Manuscripts that we had were the Masoretic texts dating to the 900’s A.D. That’s over 1,000 years after the last OT book was authored. We knew that the Masoretes had copied accurately from what they had, but we had little way of verifying that the text had arrived to the Masoretes in good condition.

This is why the Dead Sea Scrolls are so important.

Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS)

In 1947, just two years after the end of WWII, a Palestinian herdsman was walking along the hills of Judea in the area of Qumran killing time. As the story goes, he found a cave and threw a rock into the cave. He heard the sound of pottery breaking, so he went in to take a look. What he found was a bunch of old manuscripts.

He didn’t know what he had discovered, and it took some time for the importance of the discovery to come to light. But, once it did, archaeologists descended upon the caves in droves. They discovered more caves and even more manuscripts. The MSS dated from 200 B.C. to the first century A.D. More than 900 ancient documents were discovered.

Date: 200 B.C.—100 A.D.

Language: Hebrew

Contents: The entire Old Testament (except Esther), numerous other Jewish writings.

Pushed back our manuscript evidence for the Old Testament by over 1,000 years.

Non-biblical documents include: The Manual of Discipline (descriptions of how the Qumran community functioned); The Hymn Scroll (collection of hymns and psalms, dating from A.D. 1-50); The War Scroll (an apocalyptic description of a final war in which God would crush the forces of evil).

How We Got the Bible Old Testament Manuscripts among the Dead Sea Scrolls

The remaining 700 or so scrolls provide commentaries on the Old Testament as well as rules for living in the Qumran community. These community rules contain some of the more interesting portions of the Dead Sea Scrolls. According to the rules from Qumran, waving at someone with your left hand could result in ten days of punishment. Spitting or snorting at something that wasn’t supposed to be humorous warranted thirty days of penance. Mooning your neighbor merited a one-month time-out as well.

Biblical Contents: total of 232 Hebrew and Aramaic MSS containing portions of every OT book except Esther.

The DSS help inform us about Jewish practices and culture around the time of Jesus and before. They provide Hebrew and Aramaic MSS that pre-date our previously oldest Hebrew MSS by over 1,000 years. But how similar are they to the Masoretic texts?

The Great Scroll of Isaiah

24 ft. long scroll containing the entire book of Isaiah.

Date: 200-150 B.C.

Isaiah 1–39 (1) Mt and Dead Sea Scrolls

1QIsaa has probably received the most attention because it is quite old (200–150 BC), almost covers the whole book of Isaiah, and was the first to be published (in 1950). After careful examination, some found this and the other scrolls to be so similar to the MT (differing only in small details) that they concluded the scrolls added relatively little to the understanding of the original text of Isaiah.

Confirmed the reliability and accuracy of the Masoretic texts.

English Standard Version Textual Basis and Resources

The ESV is based on the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible as found in Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (5th ed., 1997), and on the Greek text in the 2014 editions of the Greek New Testament (5th corrected ed.), published by the United Bible Societies (UBS), and Novum Testamentum Graece (28th ed., 2012), edited by Nestle and Aland. The currently renewed respect among Old Testament scholars for the Masoretic text is reflected in the ESV’s attempt, wherever possible, to translate difficult Hebrew passages as they stand in the Masoretic text rather than resorting to emendations or to finding an alternative reading in the ancient versions. In exceptional, difficult cases, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Septuagint, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Syriac Peshitta, the Latin Vulgate, and other sources were consulted to shed possible light on the text, or, if necessary, to support a divergence from the Masoretic text.

The Dead Sea Scrolls correct the Masoretic Text only 18 times in the ESV. Most English translations follow a similarly conservative approach—the HCSB adopts Dead Sea Scroll readings 29 times, the NASB 14 times, and the NIV 30 times.

Some critical scholars had long argued that the book of Isaiah was compiled by as many as three different authors and didn’t take its final form until the first century B.C. Some argued for dividing Isaiah into “first,” “second,” and “third” Isaiah. But, the great scroll of Isaiah shattered those views. At the very least, it proved beyond a shadow of doubt that Isaiah had existed in its present form since at least the third century B.C. There was no division in the book—it was one cohesive scroll, and no evidence whatsoever of any additional authors.

And, it provided definitive evidence that the prophecies of Isaiah 53 and others that so clearly predicted Jesus’ sufferings and resurrection were written hundreds of years before his birth.

Yes, there are a few places where the DSS have helped us refine the accuracy of our OT’s in our modern Bibles. So, that’s a great find. But, they don’t radically change our OT.

Translation History

The Middle Ages

382 A.D. Latin Vulgate: The Bible of the Catholic Church for over 1,000 years.

1008 A.D. The Lenningrad Codex: The oldest complete Masoretic Hebrew Bible.

900-1000 A.D. The Wessex Gospels: The oldest English Scripture portions. (Old English/Anglo Saxon)

1380’s A.D. The Wycliffe Bible: The first complete English Bible translation. (Middle English)

Translated from the Latin Vulgate into Middle English

“Holy Scripture is the highest authority for every believer, the standard of faith and the foundation for reform.”

—John Wycliffe

1455 A.D. The Gutenberg Bible: The first book ever printed on a printing press. (Latin Vulgate)

The Protestant Reformation

1516 A.D. Erasmus Greek/Latin New Testament: Renewed interest in translating from the source Hebrew and Greek texts.

1517 A.D. Martin Luther: The Protestant Reformation begins. Luther translates a German NT in 1522.

1526 A.D. Tyndale New Testament: The first modern English translation of the New Testament.

1535 A.D. Coverdale Bible: The first complete modern English translation of the Bible.

1537 A.D. Matthews Bible: The first complete modern English translation of the Bible entirely from Greek and Hebrew.

1539 A.D. The Great Bible: The first legal (authorized) English Bible translation.

1551 A.D. Stephanus Greek/Latin New Testament: The first Bible with verse numbers.

1560 A.D. Geneva Bible: The first study Bible; the Bible of the Protestant Reformation and the Pilgrims.

1568 A.D. Bishop’s Bible: The “rough draft” of the KJV; the second English Bible authorized by the Church of England.

1582 A.D. Douay-Rheims Bible: The first Roman Catholic English Bible translation; translated from the Vulgate.

1611 A.D. King James Bible: The most popular and best-selling English Bible translation of all time.

The Modern Era

KJV Revisions

Numerous printings and revisions in the 1600’s

Original 1611 Edition: Printed by Robert Barker in Gothic black letter type. It contained many typographical errors, with two main versions produced in the first year: the "He" and "She" Bibles, named for differences in Ruth 3:15.

Early Revisions: Due to rushed printing, errors were common. A 1612 edition included the "Printers" error in Psalm 119:161, and the 1631 "Wicked Bible" famously omitted "not" in the 7th Commandment.

Major Revisions (1629 & 1638): Cambridge University Press led the first major revisions to correct these mistakes.

1760 A.D. Cambridge Revision of the KJV

1769 A.D. Oxford Revision of the KJV

Benjamin Blayney's revision updated spelling, punctuation, and capitalization to match 18th-century standards. It also removed the Apocrypha.

This became the basis of all future KJV printings.

Modern Bible Translations

1881 A.D. English Revised Version and 1901 American Standard Version

1952 A.D. Revised Standard Version (1989 NRSV)

This translation is a revision of the American Standard Version (ASV) of 1901, and was intended to be a readable and literally accurate modern English translation which aimed to "preserve all that is best in the English Bible as it has been known and used through the years" and "to put the message of the Bible in simple, enduring words that are worthy to stand in the great Tyndale-King James tradition." The RSV was the first translation of the Bible to make use of the Dead Sea Scroll of Isaiah...

1971 AD: The New American Standard Bible (NASB)

A "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" of the Bible.

1973 AD: The New International Version (NIV)

A "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" of the Bible.

1982 AD: The New King James Version (NKJV)

1990 AD: The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

Further revision of 1952 RSV, (itself a revision of 1901 ASV), criticized for "gender inclusiveness".

2002 AD: The English Standard Version (ESV)

Published as a translation to bridge the gap between the accuracy of the NASB and the readability of the NIV. Some regard it as a revision of the RSV and NRSV.

Modern translations:

Are undertaken in the same spirit as the KJV—to put the Bible in the tongue of commoners.

Have access to more manuscripts than the translators of the KJV.

Have access to older manuscripts than the translators of the KJV.

The Last Translations