Evo

Does anyone know what the oldest bible we have to date is, besides some of the dead sea scrolls? I have heard the Codex Vaticanus? Does anyone know anything about this? I have also heard of some africian gospels uncovered which left the divinity of jesus out.

Do the dead sea scrolls contradict or reinforce the current bibles?

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Sea_Scrolls

Bill

First question: what do you mean by your use of the word "Bible" when you ask this question? Are you talking about the oldest known descendant of St. Jerome's Latin Vulgate Bible? (Jerome wrote it out circa 400 CE.) I don't know the answer to that one, but it may well be: Of course, individual books from the modern Bible have more ancient roots. Most of the New Testament books have reasonably reliablly dated copies which were originated sometime in the second century CE (the 100s). Oh, certainly!

I would presume that many people know bits and pieces of the answer(s) to your question(s) and would gladly give them if we could only figure out exactly what you are asking for here. An alleged "sect" of Christianity was supposedly written about by a Jew circa 1000 CE which maintained that Jesus was not divine. However, from the context, I suspect that the Jew was writing about Islam, and Islam came much later.

Nonetheless, I strongly suspect that several sects who did not believe Jesus was divine existed from the first century onward. The Unitarian movement picked up on that idea much later in the process (16th to 17th century). The Dead Sea Scrolls contain reasonably good copies of various Old Testament books. Some of those books have some very interesting variations on the currently "accepted" text. Studying those variations is actually a major undertaking for scholars.

But the Dead Sea Scrolls don't contain an entire "Bible" because such a book did not exist at any time prior to the burial of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

== Bill

Evo

Bill, thanks for the reply

my question mainly deals with where are the oldest tangiable (ie i could go put my hands on it) versions of the complete or almost complete bibles. Is it locked somewhere in the basement of the vatican?

I don't care to deal with the speculation of when the gospels where written. Do we have any of the actual complete gospels from 60-100CE? I have heard of small parts still exist.

Bill

As I indicated above, there was no such thing as a "complete ... bible" until St. Jerome composed the Latin Vulgate Bible around 400 CE. Prior to that time, there were many Bible books in circulation, and there were many DIFFERENT lists of books that ought to be included in a "cannonical set" of Bible books. But there was no "complete ... bible" until St. Jerome.

St. Jerome's Vulgate Bible was widely produced, and I would imagine that there are many copies dating from the 5th century (401-500 CE). I would suspect that the Vatican itself probably has the oldest surviving copy, but I don't know for certain.

==========

By the way, there are still to this day arguments over which books belong in the Cannonical set of Bible books. The various Orthodox churches have never recognized the authority of the Vatican to set the Cannonical list for all time, and so many branches of Orthodoxy have "extra books" and/or they omit some books. But in general, such variations are minor, usually involving less than 5 books, more or less.

== Bill

SLD

Interesting discussion, but is there any truth to this idea that the Dead Sea Scrolls contain some secrets about the early Christian church as explained in Evo's synopsis of the book the Dead Sea Scrolls Deception? Or is that just another nut case theory?

SLD

Evo

Ok so what is the oldest book, of the bible, that is still around?

for example do we have a book of exodus that outdates st. jerome's book?

Celsus

See these two threads, particularly the posts by CX:

Manuscript evidence and the New Testament

CX's "Aleph" refers to Codex Sinaiticus

the Rylands Papyrus fraud (early dating)

The latter thread discusses some of the issues about p52, the earliest known manuscript that contains a New Testament verse.

Joel

P.S. Peter, that first thread should be in the sticky...

Iasion

Greetings Evo,

Absolutely not.
Kirsten Thiede pushes a crackpot theory that the Magdalen fragment also called 7Q5, is a 1st century fragment of G.Matthew - a view roundly rejected by scholars.
It is certain we do not have ANY original Gospel manuscripts, merely later copies of copies. The Gospels seem to be totally unknown even to Christians, until early-mid 2nd century.


The earliest manuscripts include :

P52
is the most famous of papyrus manuscripts, it is a tiny fragment of a few verses of G.John. It is celebrated as the (proably) earliest Gospel fragment written perhaps 100-150CE (not everyone agrees it is this early.)


P90
A few verses of G.John, perhaps 2nd century.


P64+67
A few verses of G.Matthew, dated about 200CE


P66
Most of G.John, dated about 200CE


P75
Much of G.Luke and parts of G.John, dated about 200CE


Codex Vaticanus
This manuscript certainly is a famous early "bible" and is sometimes called the first "(almost) complete bible" (some books and passages are mising) - it may be from the set of 50 that the Emperor Constantine ordered in the 330s.

Codex Sinaiticus
From the same period as Vaticanus and similarly famous, it is not quite complete. It also contains some non-canonical works (Barnabas and Hermas).


Iasion

Bill

Those would be Old Testament books from the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are certainly written no later than 70 CE, and probably up to a century or two earlier than that. I'm unaware of any actual "put your hands on it" Bible books that predate those.

Certainly, the Septuagint predates those, but again, we don't have any original copies of that; only copies of copies of uncertain provinance. And, prior to the Dead Sea Scrolls discovery, the Jewish version of the Old Testament was recognized as having been corrupted until it was compiled in Hebrew in the 6th century. (See the Septuagint article, above.) So, the process of reconstructing what the Old Testament books actually said back when those books were first written down is a really difficult proposition. There just isn't enough evidence to get us back much before the Septuagint and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

== Bill

Iasion

Greetings all,

This may be of interest,

a high resolution facsimile edition of the Codex Vaticanus :

http://www.linguistsoftware.com/codexvat.htm


Very nice indeed - I want one !


Iasion