Biblical Inerrancy: Where We Got the Bible

Many people are unaware of the background of the Bible, its divisions, and the material used for its production. This information may help some have a greater appreciation for how it was compiled.

1) Materials used:

Papyrus was the most common material used for writing in biblical times, made from reeds. Unfortunately, it is a perishable material, which is why the actual original autographs have been lost long since. It is only in exceptional conditions that papyrus survives for any length of time. The earliest manuscripts were written on papyrus, and unless they were stored in a very dry place (the desert sands of Egypt, or in caves such as where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found) they would likely not survive. Papyrus enjoyed popular use until about the third century A.D. Other writing “papers” of use in biblical times include parchment (prepared skins of animals), vellum (calf skin dyed purple, with gold or silver writing), ostraca (an unglazed pottery), stones and clay and wax tablets.

Chisels were used to write on stones, a metal stylus would be used to write on lay or wax tablets, and a pen, a pointed reed fashioned from rushes , was used for vellum, parchment and papyrus. The ink used was usually a compound of charcoal, gum and water.

Scrolls, or rolls, were made by gluing sheets of papyrus together and wrapping them around a stick. Writing was usually limited to one side. Some scrolls have been known to be 144 feet long! The average scroll was, however, only about 25-30 feet long. In order to make reading easier and less bulky, the codex or book was developed, which was assembling the papyrus leaves in leaf form and writing on both sides. J. Harold Greenlee states that Christianity was the prime reason for development of the codex-book form.

There are two primary types of writing. Uncial writing was a formal type of writing, characterized by more deliberate and carefully executed letters, each one separate from the others – much like all caps. Miniscule writing was more of a script or cursive writing, which was created for the production of books. Miniscule writing was not used for literary texts until about the 9th century A.D.

Greek manuscripts were written without any breaks between words, while Hebrew text was written without vowels. While both may be confusing to us, it was common practice for the times, and thus easy to read and understand.

2) Divisions of the Bible:

Chapters: The first divisions of the Old Testament (OT) were made prior to the Babylonian captivity (before 586 BC). The pentatuech (first 5 books) were divided into 154 groupings, intended to provide enough lessons to cover a three year cycle of reading. Around 165 BC the prophetic books of the OT were sectioned. Finally, after the Protestant reformation the Hebrew Bible followed the same chapter divisions as the Protestant OT, first placed in the margins in 1330.

The first paragraph divisions were made in the New Testament (NT) prior to the Council of Nicea (AD 325), perhaps as early as AD 250. In about 1227 the current chapter divisions were implemented by the eventual Archbishop of Canterbury, which was used in the Wycliffe Bible and is still the base for chapter divisions.

Verses: In the OT, the first verse indicators were merely spaces between words. After the Babylonian captivity, for the purpose of public reading and interpretation, space stops were employed, and still later additional markings were added. Unlike the rest of the text, the ‘verse’ markings were not regulated, but were made standardized in about AD 900.

Verse markings in the NT similar to our modern Bibles did not appear until the middle of the sixteenth century. They followed the development of chapters, apparently in an effort to make public reading easier and to facilitate cross referencing. They appear in a Greek NT in 1551, a Latin NT in 1555, and an English NT in 1557.

3) Which Books?

Many people are curious about why some books were included in the canon and some were not. The word canon is, in reference to scripture, “an officially accepted list of books”.

It is important to note that the Church did not create the canon; it did not determine which books would be called the Scriptures, the inspired Word of God. Instead, the church recognized, or discovered, which books had been inspired from their inception. Another way of saying this would be , “a book is not the Word of God because it is accepted by the people of God. Rather, it was accepted by the people of God because it is the Word of God.” Simply put, people cannot give a book divine authority! We can only recognize the divine authority given to it.

At least five principles have been applied to guide the recognition and collection of divinely inspired books. They are:

1. Was the book written by a prophet of God? “If it was written by a spokesman of God, then it is the Word of God.”
2. Was the writer confirmed by acts of God? Frequently miracles separated the true prophets from the false ones – Moses to prove his al of God in Exodus 4:1-9, Elijah to triumph over the false prophets of Baal, Jesus when “attested to…by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through him (Acts 2:2). The miracle is the sign to substantiate the sermon.
3. Did the message tell the truth about God? As God cannot contradict Himself, nor can He utter what is false, no book with false claims can be the Word of God. For reasons such as these, the church fathers maintained the policy, “if in doubt, throw it out”. This enhanced the validity of their discernment of the canonical books. It is almost humorous that many claim there are “so many contradictions in the Bible”, when canon was selected based, in part, upon an absolute certainty of the absence of contradiction!
4. Does it come with the power of God? Since the church fathers believed the Word of God is living and active, and consequently ought to have a transforming force for edification and evangelization. If the message of a book did not affect its stated goal, if it did not have the power to change a life, then God was apparently not part of the message.
5. Was it accepted by the people of God? Whatever debate there may have been about a book’s place in the canon, the people in the best position to know its prophetic credentials were those who knew the prophet who wrote it. Hence, despite all later debate about the canonicity of some books, the definitive evidence is that which attests to its original acceptance by the contemporary believers. Basically, when a book was received, collected, read, and used by the people of God as the Word of God, it was regarded as canonical. This practice is seen in the Bible itself – one example is when the apostle Peter acknowledges Paul’s writings as Scripture on par with OT scripture (2 Pet 3:16).

Those tests were applied to the both testaments. The NT has the additional test of divine inspiration through apostolicity – however, merely being written by an apostle was not the test. Apostolic authority, through apostolic approval, was the primary test of canonicity. This apostolic authority is never detached from the authority of the Lord himself, and is not the authority of the apostle alone. For example, whenever Paul defends his authority as an apostle, e bases his claim solely upon his commission by the Lord.

The NT books were initially collected for a number of reasons: their prophetic nature, the needs of the early church for instruction and assurance, the rise of heretical teachings (a false canon was developed as early as AD 140 by the heretic Marcion who attempted to propagate his false teachings through it), the circulation of spurious writings, missions to other cultures, and persecution. The NT canon was recognized as early as AD 367 by Athanasius of Alexandria, whose letter to the churches lists the very 27 books we still have in the NT. He was followed soon by Augustine and Jerome, and the list was made official by the Synod of Hippo in AD 393. Even before these, Justin Martyr (100-165), Irenaeus (180) and Ignatius (AD 50-115) made reference that the canon was acknowledged even then by the church.

The OT canon is even less in dispute, as it had been solidified by 150 BC at the latest, and likely by about 400 BC. The Jews acknowledged that the prophets had fallen silent since Malachi (450-430 BC) and that no new inspired works had been written since Chronicles (400 BC). This is even noted in Maccabees and 2 Baruch, apocryphal books which are not canon. Although the Jewish and Christian OTs have different numbers of books, the writings are the same – the Christian church has merely broken down Kings, Chronicles, Samuel, and Ezra-Nehemiah into two books each, and has further broken down the book of “The Twelve” into the individual books for each of the minor prophets. Also, the church has changed the order, going with a topical arrangement instead of the previous Jewish order of books.

Conclusion – while the books of the Bible were written hundreds, and some over a thousand, years ago, the Bible of today has been subject to greater scrutiny than most people are aware in its formation. It has remained relatively unchanged since the fourth century, and the tests for inclusion of the books of the Bible have ensured its theological and historical reliability. (Note: I have left out a discussion of why other books (such as Maccabees, Tobit, Gospel of the Hebrews, etc, were not included. If more than one or two people are interested in the subject, I can do that in an additional post as well). This information should address the question of, “why does book X have to be considered as reliable as book Y?”

The only question remaining must be – how can we be sure that the books we have today are the books that were actually written? I will address it in two posts – Old and New Testament.