Bible History ResearchHistory of the English Bible in detailSo let's have a look at the History of the English Bible in detail:
500 BC: Completion of All Original Hebrew Manuscripts which make Up The 39 Books of the Old Testament.
200 BC: Completion of the Septuagint Greek Manuscripts which contain The 39 Old Testament Books AND 14 Apocrypha Books. The Septuagint, commonly designated LXX, is the oldest Greek version of the Old Testament of the Bible, the title "seventy" referring to the tradition that it was the work of 70 translators (or 72 in some traditions). The translation was made from the Hebrew Bible by Hellenistic Jews during the period 275 - 100 BC at Alexandria. Initially the Septuagint was widely used by Greek - speaking Jews, but its adoption by the Christians, who used it in preference to the Hebrew original, aroused hostility among the Jews, who ceased to use it after about 70 AD. It is still used by the Greek Orthodox church.
100 BC: Dead Sea Scrolls. We have the Hebrew word kesheph showing up in the Qumran dead sea scrolls. The Scrolls are for the most part, written in Hebrew, but there are many written in Aramaic. Aramaic was the common language of the Jews of Palestine for the last two centuries B.C. and of the first two centuries A.D. The discovery of the Scrolls has greatly enhanced our knowledge of these two languages. In addition, there are a few texts written in Greek.
1st Century AD: Completion of All Original Greek Manuscripts which make Up The 27 Books of the New Testament.
37-95 AD: The Jewish historian Josephus comments on the preciseness of the Jewish scribes and their faithfulness in copying the Old Testament scriptures. "...for during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so bold as either to add anything to them; but it becomes natural to all Jews, immediately and from their very birth, to esteem those books to contain divine doctrines, and to persist in them, and, if occasion be, willingly to die for them." (Flavius Josephus, Against Apion 1:8).
360 AD: Laodocia Council meets to decide which books and writings will be accepted as Holy Scripture. The Greek Septuagint is accepted for the Old Testament. Criteria for the New Testament writings include that they must be written by an Apostle or during the time of the Apostles, that they must support true doctrine and must have wide spread usage.
390 AD: Jerome's Latin Vulgate Manuscripts Produced which contain All 80 Books (39 Old Test. + 14 Apocrypha + 27 New Test).
Vulgate (Latin vulgata editio, "popular edition") is the edition of the Latin Bible that was pronounced "authentic" by the Council of Trent. The name originally was given to the "common edition" of the Greek Septuagint used by the early Fathers of the Church. It was then transferred to the Old Latin version (the Itala) of both the Old Testament and the New Testament that was used extensively during the first centuries in the Western church. The present composite Vulgate is basically the work of St. Jerome, a Doctor of the Church. At first St. Jerome used the Greek Septuagint for his Old Testament translation, including parts of the Apocrypha; later he consulted the original Hebrew texts. It is used in Celtic monastaries in Britain. During this period the British within the Roman Empire use Latin as the official language.
500 AD: Scriptures have been Translated into Over 500 Languages.
600 AD: Codex Hilleli - The origin of its name is not known. According to Zacuto, this codex was written by a certain Hillel at about 600 of the common era. In his Chronicle, compiled about 1500, Zacuto expresses himself as follows: "In the year 4957, on the twenty-eighth of Ab (Aug. 14, 1197), there was a great persecution of the Jews in the kingdom of Leon at the hand of the two kingdoms that came to besiege it. At that time they removed thence the twenty-four sacred books which were written about 600 years before. They were written by R. Hillel ben Moses ben Hillel, and hence his name was given to the codex, which was called 'Hilleli.' It was exceedingly correct; and all other codices were revised after it. I saw the remaining two parts of it, containing the Former and Latter Prophets, written in large and beautiful characters; these had been brought by the exiles to Portugal and sold at Bugia in Africa, where they still are, having been written about 900 years ago. Kim i in his grammar on Num. x. 4 says that the Pentateuch of the Hillel Codex was extant in Toledo."
600 AD: LATIN was the Only Language Allowed for Scripture.
820-850AD: The British Museum possesses 165 Bible manuscripts, the oldest of which is the Masoretic Bible written about 820-850. This contains the Pentateuch and consists of 186 folios, 55 of which were at one time missing, but have been added by a later hand.
900 AD: Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT) is the Hebrew text of the Tanach approved for general use in Judaism. It is also widely used in translations of the Old Testament of the Bible. It was primarily compiled, edited and distributed by a group of Jews known as the Masoretes between the first and tenth centuries C.E.. It has numerous differences when compared to the Septuagint, of both little and great significance. The oldest complete manuscripts of the Masoretic Text known to still exist date from approximately the ninth century, but there are many earlier fragments that appear to belong in the same textual family. These Hebrew manuscripts of the middle ages are in general agreement. The Biblia Hebraica by Kittel is the basic Hebrew Old Testament used by scholars and translators and is based on the Masoretic Text from this time period. However, with the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls manuscripts which date from around 168 BC to about 68 AD. Thus providing us with Hebrew manuscripts which outdate the previous manuscripts by about 1,000 years. What is interesting to the student of textual criticism and the believer in Biblical preservation, is the fact that a large number of the DSS agree with the Masoretic Text and against the Septuagint reading!. Although there are some manuscripts within the findings of the DSS which agree with the LXX and also reflect a differing Hebrew Text with a number of variants, the fact remains that we now have manuscripts dating from the time of Jesus or before which agree with the Masoretic Text. This give additional credence to the preciseness and integrity of the Hebrew scribes in their accuracy of reproducing the manuscripts throughout the ages. And, most importantly, it shows the preservation of the Old Testament Text in Hebrew by God. Additional manuscripts have also been found which support the Masoretic Text. Again Wurthwein informs us of the following: "Also important are the remains of fourteen scrolls with Biblical texts from the period before AD 73, discovered while excavating the rock fortress of Masada in the Judean desert in 1963-1965. These agree extensively with the traditional Biblical texts--only in the text of Ezekiel are there a few insignificant variants." (Ibid. p. 31). To these we can also add the Geniza Fragments which date from the fifth century AD. These manuscripts were discovered in 1890 at Cairo, Egypt. They were located in a type of storage room for worn or faulty manuscripts, which was called the Geniza. The fragments number around 200,000 and reflect Biblical texts in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic. The Biblical texts discovered support the Masoretic Text. Also noted those Masoretic Jews who compiled those editions from the manuscripts available to them were enemies of Christ.
995 AD: Anglo-Saxon (Early Roots of English Language) Translations of The New Testament Produced.
1008 AD: Codex Leningradensis For about six generations the Masoretic Text was reproduced by the ben Asher family. Moses ben Asher produced a text in 895 AD known as Codex Cairensis containing the writing of the Prophets. Codex Leningradensis dates to 1008 AD and was based on the work of Aaron ben Moses ben Asher, the son of Moses ben Asher. This Codex is the oldest manuscript containing the complete Bible. Some of the differences found within this family of manuscripts are the basis of Kittel's third edition of his Biblia Hebraica and has been used by scholars in producing modern translations of the Bible, such as the New International Version (1978), the New King James Version (1982), and the New Revised Standard Version (1989).
1104 AD: The Bodleian Library, Oxford, possesses 146 Bible manuscripts, the oldest of which dates from 1104.
1384 AD: Wycliffe is the First Person to Produce a (Hand-Written) manuscript Copy of the Complete Bible; All 80 Books.
1455 AD: Gutenberg Invents the Printing Press; Books May Now be mass-Produced Instead of Individually Hand-Written. The First Book Ever Printed is Gutenberg's Bible in Latin.
1516 AD: Erasmus Produces a Greek/Latin Parallel New Testament.
1522 AD: Martin Luther's German New Testament.
1525 AD: William Tyndale’s New Testament is completed. His translation is based on the Latin vulgate, Erasmus Greek and the original Greek manuscripts. His wording and sentence structures are found in most modern day translations of the Bible.
1536 AD: Tyndale executed. Tyndale did not live to complete his Old Testament translation. On May 21, 1535, he was arrested and later executed for heresy at Vilvorde, Belgium, on October 6, 1536. His dying prayer was that the Lord would open the eyes of the King of England. He left behind a manuscript containing the translation of the historical books from Joshua to 2 Chronicles that was finally published in 1537.
1535 AD: Myles Coverdale's Bible; The First Complete Bible to be printed in the English Language (80 Books: O.T. & N.T. & Apocrypha).
1537 AD: Matthews Bible; The Second Complete Bible to be Printed in English. Done by John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers (80 Books).
1539 AD: The "Great Bible" Printed; The First English Language Bible to be Authorized for Public Use (80 Books).
1560 AD: The Geneva Bible is printed. Verses are added for the first time in this edition. It is also the first translation of the Bible based entirely on the original Hebrew and Greek. It was translated by exiles from England living in Geneva during the Catholic Mary Tudor’s reign. The majority of the translation is attributed to William Whittington a relative of John Calvin.
1568 AD: The Bishops Bible Printed; The Bible of which the King James was a Revision (80 Books).
1609 AD: The Douay Old Testament is added to the Rheimes New Testament (of 1582) Making the First Complete English Catholic Bible; Translated from the Latin Vulgate (80 Books).
1611 King James Version. The stated purpose of the King James translation was “"not to make a bad version good, but to make a good one better, or out of many good ones one principal good one.” It is primarily a re-translation of the Bishop’s Bible. 54 men work on translation using all the widely accepted versions up to then including Bishop’s, Geneva, Matthews, Coverdale and Tyndale translation as well as looking at original manuscripts. All available copies of the original manuscripts are brought in. It is found that the Hebrew manuscripts are virtually identical while there is wide variations in the Greek manuscripts as they have been hand copied and handed down. The 54 men work as teams checking each other’s work. It was printed originally with all 80 books including the Apochrypha again as a separate section.
1613-1901: At that time until today translations have continued as translators gained a better understanding of the Hebrew language and the Greek writers. 300 corrections were made in the 1613 version of the King James Version. In the 18th century Bishop Challoner made revisions to the Rheims-Douay Bible removing some Latin terms and adding the use of King James translation in some areas.
Modern Versions do not use the Masoretic Text
The modern Bible versions do not use the Hebrew Masoretic Text. Instead, they use the Leningrad Manuscript (B19a or "L") edited by Ben Asher, Or the Greek Septuagint (LXX).
So let's have a look at the History of the Mishnah detail:
c285 BC: 'Septuagint' translation of Old Testament into greek
63 BC? Dead Sea Scrolls deposited near Qumran
90-135 AD: Rabbi Aqiba ben Joseph begins writing down Mishnah in Jabneh and Jaffa
180 AD: expansion by Nathan ha Bibli of Pirke Avot (Avot, Pirke Aboth, Pirqe Avoth, Pirkei Avot, Pirke Avos, Sayings of the Fathers, Ethics of the Fathers) a compilation of non-legalistic wisdom dating back to 300BC, ultimately added to Mishnah
c190 AD: definitive form of Mishnah redacted by Judah ha Nasi
c200-425: Palestinian Gemarah composed at Tiberias, Sepphoris, and Caesarea (commentaries on Mishnah), termed 'Jerusalem Talmud' (Yerushalmi)
c219-505: Mesopotamian Gemarah composed (commentaries on Mishnah, mostly in aramaic) termed 'Babylonian Talmud'
500-900: Masoretic text of Hebrew Bible established which is what the KJV is based upon
c850: Babylonian Talmud becomes basis of 'Halakah' legal code for classical/orthodox Judaism
1135-1204: Moses Maimonides (attempts to reconcile Aristotle with Judaism)
c1180: Moses Maimonides writes Misbneh Tarab (talmudic law)
c1200: development of kabbalah?
c1580: R Yosef Karo writes "Beyt Yosef" and "Shulhan 'Arukh" (talmudic law)
http://www.jesus-christ-forums.com/home/viewtopic.php?t=2287
| View dfilename Return Home |