Superheavy

This is a very elementary school level pair of questions, but what the heck...

When was the OT written, i.e. how long a time before the NT?
What's missing from between the testaments, and why don't we have that written anywhere?

Iasion

Hiya,

The OT and NT are both compilations, their various books were each written over a long period.

The oldest elements of the OT may go back perhaps as far as 10th C. BCE, it's latest layers are 2nd C. BCE.

The mainstream dating of the NT books range from the 50s (Paul) to as late as about 150.

There are a few books from "between" the Testaments, but there are also books not included in either during those periods. The pages below list all of them.

There is still much debate about these issues, especially the issue of how early the earliest layers are.

For more details, try these :
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/
http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/


Iasion

Superheavy

Thank you, I'll check the links out. The question occured to me today, I wondered - as both of the Testaments are collections of books and range over a long time - why we would call one Old and the other New. To me such terminology implies two tight groups with a clear division in time inbetween, as in "OT 400-300 BC and NT 100-200 AD". I guess it's more about content in this context (i.e. pre-Jesus vs. post-Jesus).

Iasion

Hiya,

Don't forget that it's the Christians who call it the "Old Testament" (in contra-distinction to their "New" one about Jesus.)

But,
the Jews don't call their scriptures the "Old Testament"; and their set of books is slightly different than the OT; and they don't recognise the NT.


Iasion

davidbach

From a Christian perspective, the "old" and "new" refer to ideas (covenants), not historical time.

Currently one might expect that writings about creationism would pre-date Darwin's theory. As we see, about 150 years on and the "old" is still with us!

David.

Malachi151

Something else to be aware of is that canonical texts of the Hebrew Bible, and thus Old Testament were originally written in Semitic languages. Around the 3rd century many Jewish writings began being written in Greek. All of the "New Testament" writings were also written in Greek.

There is a period from about the 2rd century BCE to the 1st century CE that is basically absent from mainstream Judeo-Christian texts because this period spans the time when Jewish writings were written in Greek, thus they didn't make official Jewish canons and are thus not generally included in the Old Testament. They also were not directly about Jesus, so they aren't in the New Testament either.

So, this "blank space" between the "Old Testament" writings and "New Testament" writings is due to the shift among Jews from writing in Hebrew to writing in Greek, and the rejection of Greek writings by Jews as official canon.

Superheavy

Damn, I'm learning stuff!

Malintent

My friend's Jewish mother says about the NT, "Anyone can write a sequel".

Toto

There are Jews who take offense at the term "Old Testament," and prefer the term Hebrew Scriptures.

The books written between the canonized Hebrew Scriptures and the "New" Testament are not missing, they were just not canonized. They are the Jewish Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, which you can find on Early Jewish Writings.

Clivedurdle

I strongly favour a first write near the rivers of Babylon as part of the process of creating a back story for a conquered people who had been allowed to return home and who previously were not a recognisable group except for a few funny habits like not eating pigs.

As for the sequel, second century, possibly late!