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Surprisingly, there is little in the way of either mainstream or evangelical literature widely available on the topic of the historical origins of the modern Bible. Divine inspiration may be claimed by many however had they ever personally studied this "evolution" of the Bible no one in their right mind could ever do such a thing once posessing the facts of just how we arrived at the New Testament which we have today; especially in light of the total rejection of the writings and teachings of the earliest Christian Church over the first two to three centuries before the rise of Roman Orthodoxy. However, the canon we know today is a collection of disparate manuscripts composed, edited, copied and translated by human hands over centuries. Errors of omission and commission could be and were made. Deciding what authors and books would be in or out of the holy scriptures was no simple matter. Traditional Christian scholarship of the last two millenia has started with the Bible and then interpreted history from a biblical foundation. Others who question and reject such presenations as if they were "divine truth" consign themselves to a different approach which turns this scheme of traditional Christian scholarship on its head. One must in such studies start with the historical setting, then interpret development of a Holy Bible within the imperatives of the early Christian culture. We look at the historical context in which the New Testament was created, then at the New Testament itself, then finally work our way back to the Old.
The first three centuries of the early evolving Christian church were marked – repeatedly – by dissension and disagreement between various groupings within the beginning Christian movement. Christians found time to disagree – often vehemently and even during times of intense Roman persecution.
Theological diversity in the early church is the main theme that constantly is connected with the canonization of the New Testament. Debates about the nature of Jesus as "the Christ" and the gospel message surfaced powerfully. More documents were written to express diverse theological opinions. Some writers rejected the Hebrew Scriptures; others rejected the humanness of Jesus; still others rejected his identity as God. As the church became more structured and institutional, its leaders sought to resolve the early diversity of opinions into an organized, official body of teaching, which became known as orthodoxy, or "right opinion." Other teachings were rejected as false, labeled "heresy," and vigorously attacked by orthodox leaders. The debates against heretical teachings led church leaders to hold councils of theologians to decide what beliefs were true, and which writings expressed those beliefs and could therefore be considered authoritative as Scripture. These councils decided the canon of Scripture and official church doctrine.
By the time of St. Augustine in the early fourth century, Rome had crumbled but Christianity emerged triumphant. This newly found imperial religion survived even as the empire itself collapsed. And with the closing of Christian ranks, a more uniform canon of the Holy Bible emerges.
Take note if you will in the following opinions of early Church Fathers the disagreements that appear continually concerning which "books" were considered "inspired" and deserving of inclusion into the New Testament and which were not; ask yourself what influences did the political, religious, and theological pressures from various waring factions among the earliest Christians sects, both geographically and "theologically", exert in the progressive selction and creation of the New Testament we have today. Lastly, ask yourself if God could have been involved in any of this and if He were, then what areas since the confusion and disgreement is continual throughout the centuries. I personally find it hard to see the "unity" of "the Faith" in any of this canonization knowing such things regarding how the emerging Roman Christian Church and its leaders determined both the "books" and the "theologies" which were to ultimately be included in the Bible I was given as a child. It does one well in light of this knowldge to begin his personal study into the origin of every Christian "dogma" taught in the New Testament to see if they have the same "meanings" to us today which they once carried when the ancients Spiritual Masters gave them to mankind in the beginning of time. If you do this then you see for yourseld the "radical reinterpretation" of most all Christian dogams expressed in the New Testament when compared with the ancient Spiritual Wisdom and Wisdom religions which express the Metaphysical understandings of the Universe, God, and man in it.
Clement of Alexandria who lived in the early third century placed in his deutero-canon, as having "inferior authority", Hebrews, Second John, Jude, which were considered by him not worthy of being placed in the Bible. He did however support for inclusion and the Revelation of Peter but not the Revelation of John (the Book of Revelation). He also included the Shepherd of Hermas, the First Epistle of Clement, the Second Epistle of Clement, and the Epistle of Barnabas in the Bible (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 139); all of which are not today in the Bible. He thus placed the Epistle to the Hebrews, Second John and Jude, as dubious authorities. The books he did support however, are not in the Bible and our New Testaments today. He recognized no distinct canon as of supreme authority (Ibid., 116), and he did not attach our idea of "uncanonical" as opposed to "canonical" to either of the Four Gospels or to any other books of the New Testament (Ibid., 139). Let us take time to see other information concerning Clement of Alexandria which helps explain his theological positions today in his writings and which explain his deviation from the "faith of the Jewish church."
Tertullian included in his canon the Four Gospels, Acts, Epistles of Paul, First John, and Revelation (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 139). He placed in an appendix, as "not" authoritative, Hebrews, Jude, Second John, and First Peter (Ibid., p. 139), which are in the Bible now, and the Shepherd of Hermas, which is not; and he said nothing of James, Second Peter and Third John (Ibid., p. 139), which today are in the canon. If you take time to compared Tertullian views with the earlier Muratorian Canon please notice he is not in agreement with the Muratorian Canon established twenty years or more before his time as to which books should be considered in the Bible.
The Peshitta is the "simple" (translation). This version has had such a complex literary history that its origin has long been a matter of debate. As far back as it can be traced, it has been a Christian version, since it contains the New Testament as well as the Old Testament, and the extant copies of it have come from Christian hands. Yet the Old Testament shows such a strong Jewish influence that many scholars hold that it was, at least in part, of Jewish origin, though some explain it as of Jewish-Christian origin. It may have been produced at Edessa, though Kahle states that it came from the region of Adiabene, lying east of the Tigris, where King Isates and his mother Helena became Jewish proselytes in the 1st cent. a.d. There are passages in the Old Testament that are little more than transliterations of western Aramaic Targums into the Syriac script. While the text agrees in the main with the Masoretic Hebrew, it seems to have been revised on the basis of the LXX. Originally this Syriac version lacked Chr, Ezr, Neh, and Est, as well as the Apocrypha, all of which were added at a later date. The most valuable Syriac manuscript is the Codex Ambrosianus from about the 6th cent., now in Milan. A manuscript of Gen, Ex, Num, and Deut, from the monastery of St. Mary Deipara in Egypt, bears a date corresponding to a.d. 464, and is thus the oldest copy of the Bible in any language bearing a definite date
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the Peshitta (Syriac: "simple," or "common") is the Syriac version of the Bible, the accepted Bible of Syrian Christian churches from the end of the 3rd century AD. The name Peshitta was first employed by Moses bar Kepha in the 9th century to suggest (as does the name of the Latin Vulgate) that the text was in common use. The name also may have been employed in contradistinction to the more complex Syro-Hexaplar version. Of the vernacular versions of the Bible, the Old Testament Peshitta is second only to the Greek Septuagint in antiquity, dating from probably the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. The earliest parts in Old Syriac are thought to have been translated from Hebrew or Aramaic texts by Jewish Christians at Edessa, although the Old Testament Peshitta was later revised according to Greek textual principles. The earliest extant versions of the New Testament Peshitta date to the 5th century AD and exclude The Second Letter of Peter, The Second Letter of John, the Third Letter of John, The Letter of Jude, and The Revelation to John, which were not canonical in the Syrian church.
Davidson, in his The Canon of the Bible, p. 139, also attests that the Peshito, the Bible of Ancient Syriac Christians, omitted Second Peter, Second John, Third John, Jude, and Revelation, all of which are in our Bible (Ibid., 146).
The Latin rendering of the Bible probably originated in North Africa as early as a.d. 150. It is even possible that the Christians of North Africa adopted a translation of the Old Testament from Latin-speaking Jews. Tertullian (c. a.d. 160 – c. 230) knew the Old Latin Bible at least in part, and Cyprian (c. 200–258), bishop of Carthage, quotes frequently from both Testaments of this Bible. Only fragments of the Old Latin of the Old Testament have survived. Several of the Apochryphal books were incorporated unrevised into the Vulgate. As for the the rest of The Bible, scholars have been able to piece together manuscript fragments covering a considerable portion of the Old Testament. These, together with quotations in the early Latin Fathers, are our sources for the reconstruction of the Old Latin text of the Old Testament. Scholars distinguish 2 types of text: the African and the European. The Old Latin of the Old Testament was made from the Greek LXX, and its chief value today is as an aid in recovering the text of the LXX as it was before Origen’s revision of it.
What is important for us to notice is that the Old Latin version, the Bible of the early African Church, omitted the Epistle to the Hebrews, Second Peter, and James. The Epistle to the Hebrews was added subsequently as an anonymous book (Westcott, On The Canon of the New Testament, p. 254). Again we see no unity or agreement with those who came before and their "opinions" as to what was "God-breathed."
The Abyssinian Church was a church that believed in "monophysitism." This was a Christian schismatic sect of the 5th and 6th centuries that maintained that Christ had only one (divine) nature, thereby opposing the orthodox doctrine that he was both divine and human. The Monophysites were mainly confined to the Eastern church and gained little strength in the West. At the directive of Pope Leo I, the Council of Chalcedon in 451 attempted to steer a middle course between the orthodox and Monophysite views. The resulting edict did not satisfy the Monophysites, and the controversy continued, the Monophysites being supported by the Copts and the Eutychian sect. The Eastern church, in an effort to suppress the heresy, in the first half of the 6th century excommunicated the Monophysites, who thereupon formally seceded from the parent church. The Monophysites split into two factions over controversies regarding the incorruptibility of Christ's body. After 560 a third faction, the Tritheists, arose; they interpreted the three persons of the Deity as three separate gods and hence were regarded by the other factions as heretics. In Egypt, Syria, and Mesopotamia the Monophysite congregations remained strong throughout the controversy. Although finally condemned in 680-81, at the sixth ecumenical council, Monophysitism continues in some churches to this day. The modern Abyssinian church, Armenian church , Coptic church , and Jacobite church are all Monophysitic bodies.
The Canon of the Abyssinian Church included at first, Enoch (of course since it taught an Angel-Messiah and not a human messiah), Fourth Esdras, the Ascension of Isaiah, the Jubilees, and Asseneth (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 206), books which are not now in the Bible and of several of which the world now never hears. The list was changed frequently, and many books were eliminated or inserted, but, generally speaking, it contained Judith, Tobit, First Maccabees, Second Maccabees, Wisdom of Jesus, Wisdom of Solomon, and even a book called the Apocalypse of Isaiah (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 206), none of which are in our Bible.
The Bibles of upper and lower Egypt are called "Coptic" as in the Coptic New Testaments. Of some 5 known Coptic versions, the most important are the Sahidic and the Bohairic.
(1) The Sahidic.
This version is the older version and was used in Southern (Upper) Egypt. It was formerly designated Thebaic, after the city of Thebes. Only fragments of this version are extant, but these fragments are of sufficient quantity to reconstruct the major part of the NT. The earliest manuscripts originate from the 4th cent. a.d..
(2) The Bohairic.
This version was current in Northern (Lower) Egypt and eventually replaced the other dialects. It is the Coptic used to this day in the church services, and the complete NT has been preserved in it. Both the Sahidic and Bohairic versions of the NT contain principally an Alexandrian (again we find the Alexandrian influence) type of text, similar to a text such as is found in the Codex Vaticanus.
The two canonical lists of upper and lower Egypt, called the Thebaic version, or version of Thebes, and the Memphitic version, or the version of Memphis, omitted Revelation (Westcott, On The Canon Of The New Testament, p. 266).
Origen (250 A.D.) included in his Old Testament list the Epistles of Jeremiah, First Maccabees, and Second Maccabees, which are not in our Bible, and he makes no mention of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, which are in our Bible (Euseb., Eccl. History, vi. 25). The omission of these twelve books is very singular, and Rufinus' Latin version (400 A.D.) kindly inserts them. Even if they were omitted by mistake, the error shows how careless and indifferent the Fathers were in stating what books were in the Bible. Origin did not formulate a consecutive list of the New Testament books, but passages gathered here and there from his works indicate what his opinion was (Ibid., 261). He apparently divided the New Testament books into three classes, authentic, unauthentic, and uncertain. The first included the Four Gospels, Acts, fourteen Epistles of Paul, First Peter, First John, and the Revelation of John. The second included the Shepherd of Hermas, thought he was rather inclined to place it in a higher class, the Epistle of Barnabas, the Acts of Paul, the Gospel according to the Hebrews, the Gospel ;of the Egyptians, and the Preaching of Peter (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 146). The third class included the Epistles of James, Jude, Second Peter, Second John, and Third John (Davidson, The Canon of the Bible, p. 146), all of which are in the Bible today.
As you can see again over the next one hundred years there was little unity or agreement on "what" was the Word of God among the early Church. Now, let us continue as we look at the 4th century views of the early Church Fathers.
