sashang

How is the Bible made? Where are the original documents? Who decides what is put in the Bible and what is ommitted?

Kilgore Trout

I don't know who decided on the Hebrew bible. In the Council of Nicea, during the 4th century, a lot of church leaders got together and decided what was fit to be in the NT, and what exactly christians are supposed to believe. They knew that if they didn't get their story straight, christianity would become too fractured with everybody believing what they want. There were may gospels that didn't make it into the bible, but they are no less legitimate than the ones that made it. The council had to say the books in the NT were written by the holy spirit, and the rest were written by the devil in order to solidify their authority. It didn't hurt that anybody who disagreed was persecuted.

No one has the "originals." The oldest copies are, I think, from the fourth century.

sashang

Where do the Dead Sea scrolls fit in the picture? They're a recent discovery (definately weren't discovered in the 4th Century).

Brave Sir Robin

In that case...

OOPS.

Kilgore Trout

The Dead Sea scrolls are books from the Hebrew bible. I was talking about the NT. I believe the Dead Sea scrolls are the oldest copies of books from the Hebrew bible.

Legion

Also, when the Protestants split from Catholicism, they dropped a few books from the Old Testament that the Catholics consider canonical: Tobit, Judith, a longer Esther, 1 & 2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, and Baruch.

Additionally, the Eastern Orthodox Church also has a different Old Testament from Protestants; there's includes: Enoch, Jubilees, 3rd Ezra, 4th Ezra, Tobit, Judith, an expanded version of Esther, 1 Macabees, 2 Macabees, 3 Macabees, Psalms with an extra chapter, Proverbs (shortened version), Taasgas (the other part of Proverbs, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, Baruch (which included Jeremiah) .

So, what makes up the Bible depends on who you ask. The Jews and Protestants have the same Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) but in different orders. The Catholic Church has a longer Old Testament, and the Eastern Orthodox Church has an even longer than that Old Testament.

In the U.S., however, since the Protestants greatly outnumber the Catholics and the Orthodox, what they consider to be the Bible is pretty much what the general public knows to be the Bible.

Legion

The Dead Sea Scrolls do not exclusively include the Hebrew Bible. There are many other works that are part of that as well, including numerous commentaries, apocryphal writings, pseudepigraphal writings, some wisdom literature, and other writings related to the life of the community (rules and regulations, that sort of thing). Far more than just the Hebrew Bible.

And btw, if I remember correctly, the writings from the Hebrew scriptures were LXX (Septuagint) translations.

sashang

It would be true to say that the Protestant version of Christianity (started by Martin Luther right?) is only about 500 years old?

Legion

Who decides depends on which tradition you ask. The original documents do not appear to exist any longer, though I suspect in many cases there were no "original documents" per se, but more evolving works that underwent numerous redactions and editings.

NT fragments are scattered about through the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th centuries with more complete copies coming in the 4th and 5th and later.

The oldest OT manuscripts are the Masoretic texts from the Middle Ages (which added vowells, accent markings, punctuation, spaces, etc. to the text) and the LXX/Septuagint (a Greek translation) from before that. I don't know how old the LXX fragments are, but the translating was likely done somewhere between the 4th century BCE and around the time of Christ.

Legion

Well, I wouldn't put it quite like that, but it is more or less accurate to say that Protestantism as a unique entity apart from Catholicism was formed during the Reformation about 500 years ago.