Give Me the Bible!
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105 Your word is a lamp to my feet
and a light to my path.
130 The unfolding of your words gives light;
it imparts understanding to the simple.
How Did We Get the Bible?
How Did We Get the Bible?
People love books! The production and sale of literature is a multi-billion dollar business. Quora.com reports that the U.S. publishing industry gross alone gross 26 billion dollars per year. Imagine what the world-wide figure is!
Avid readers often look to the New York Times Best Seller List for their next read.
However, there is a book that is always conspicuously missing, and this book is history’s all-time best seller. Do you know what that book is? Of course—the Bible.
19 And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts; 20 knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, 21 for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.
This precious book that through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit upon mighty men of old guided God’s church through turbulent times for many years.
But the apostle Paul made a grave warning about the state of the church after his demise.
29 For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock.
30 Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves.
The Scriptures were slowly and subtly taken away from the common people. A distinction was made between the clegy and laity, and eventually only professional clergymen were trusted with reading and interpreting the Bible.
One of the church fathers, Origen promoted through his sermons and commentaries there were three levels of Biblical inpretation,
W. Ward Gasque, “Establishing Christianity: Challenges to the New Faith,” in Introduction to the History of Christianity, ed. Tim Dowley, Third Edition (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2018), 37.
3 Levels of interpretation:
To make matters worse the church of the Dark Ages only permitted the Bible to be distributed in Latin. The Latin scriptures were provided by Jerome who unfortunately made many errors in translation that served to propagate mysticism and error such as Marian worship.
16 And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.
17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
28 And the angel being come in, said unto her: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
28 And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”
As Pagan Rome began to fall being attacked by barbarian tribes, the Empire was eventually devided between Western Europre and Eastern Europe. The Pope of Rome was the chief religous ruler in the west, and eventually the head of the church and the state. While a Patriarch was the chief religious head in the east, stationed in Constantinople. The east and west were seperated not only by territory, but by doctrinal convictions. More so, Greek was spoken in the east, while Latin was spoken in the West.
Harry Rosenbery comically states a profound truth about the relationship between the East and the West.
Introduction to the History of Christianity (Third Edition) East–West Differences
The Greek-speaking East and the Latin West were also divided in language: ‘East and West could not understand each other because they could not understand each other!’
The church in the west was struggling with rampant corruption, through sale of indulgences, the immoral conduct of priests and bishops, assasinations of church officials orchastrated by competeing bishops, subjugation of the common people etc. One pope was especially notrious for running a brothel out of the papacy, having illegitamate children, and granting such children high positions in the church. Talk about nepotism!
More so, the Bible was only available in Latin, even to the scholars of the church, only Latin. (Pictured here is a page from an 8th century copy of the Latin Vulgate… oldest copy available).
The East had it share of issues also, but there was one important difference, Greek was the main language spoken, and Greek manuscripts were available to eastern scholars.
There were two factors that further disrupted the lives of the people in Western Europe, the “plague and the Turk.”
The bubonic plague killed millions of people, in fact we are told that it wiped out approximagely 1/3 of the population of the Catholic West! Popular preachers trumpeted that the plague “the scourge of God to punish the failings of Catholicism.”
Philip McNair, “Seeds of Renewal: The Origins of the Reformation,” in Introduction to the History of Christianity, ed. Tim Dowley, Third Edition (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2018), 308.
Much of the Eastern empire fell to the Turks and Constantinople stood tall for many years, but Constantinople finally fell in 1453 (p 308).
A remarkable event preceeded the fall of Constantinople, the invention of the Gutenberg press in approximately 1445 (p 313)
Something remarkable happened when Constantinople fell, scholars who had in their possession many Greek manuscripts of the Bible fled to Western Europe with their treasure in tow!
A humanist Scholar by the name of Erasmus collected Greek manuscripts and produced the Novum Instrumentum in 1516. Erasmus never dreamed what his work would ignite. Erasmus was rushed by a printer to produce his copy of the Greek NT, and thus it contained errors. But the work was done, and when other scholars got their hands on his work, the made necessary correction.
The the first time in the History of the Western Empire, the Greek NT was available for study.
A little known German monk who was desperately searching for peace obtained the Greek NT and turned the Christian World upside. What was his name, yes, Martin Luther! One year after Erasmus’s Greek NT was printed, the Protestant Reformation was born!
The Bible was put on the Pope’s list of banned books, they tried to bribe Luther, they threatened to kill him, but hear Luther’s timeless couragous words at the famous Edict of Worms.
“Unless I can be instructed and convinced with evidence from the Holy Scriptures or with open, clear, and distinct ground of reasoning, my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant, because it is neither safe nor wise to act against conscience. I can do no other. Here I stand. God help me. Amen”
After his powerful testimony, the papists condemend Luther as a criminal for challenging the authority of the pope, but praise be to God he was kidnapped for his own safety and taken the the Wartburg Castle were hid for 10 months and translated the Greek NT into German in 11 weeks. He eventually translated the OT also and produced a complete Bible in 1534.
The papist tried everything the could to keep the people in darkness and superstition, but it was too late, the Bible was passed from reformer to reformer who ensure that the Holy Scriptures were translated in French, in Dutch, in Swedish, in Danish, in Italian, in Spanish (even though the Spanish Inquisition made it impossible to produce a Bible in Spain), and yes in English. Before he translated the Bible into English, William Tyndale declared to the ignorant local clergy...
God spare my life, ere many years pass, I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more of the Scriptures than thou dost.’
A. N. S. Lane, “A Flood of Bibles: Scripture in the Vernacular,” in Introduction to the History of Christianity, ed. Tim Dowley, Third Edition (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2018), 350.
They strangled him and burned him at the stake, and it is alleged that as he was being burned and strangled he mumbled, “God open the eyes of the King of England.” Who later authorized the production of the KJV Bible.
Today friends the Bible has been translated into
Languages with Scripture
717 languages with a complete Bible – 5.75 billion people
1582 languages with a complete New Testament (some also have Old Testament portions) – 830 million people
1196 languages with some translated Bible portions – 457 million people
Friends, although the Bible is so precious, and so widely available, available on our phones in countless translation, on our tablets, computers, yet there is so much Biblical illiteracy. Friends the Bible came to us literally through, blood, sweat, and tears. It’s time to get back to the Bible.
105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
130 The entrance of Your words gives light; It gives understanding to the simple.