Did the Christian "Church" commit numerous atrocit

[Skyweir]

Well I was looking at the premise that the Bible is divinely inspired.

If its not intended to be a literal record .. then what is it?

.. what purpose does it serve? Does god have anything to do with it at all?

[Rawedge Rim]

Well I was looking at the premise that the Bible is divinely inspired.

If its not intended to be a literal record .. then what is it?

.. what purpose does it serve? Does god have anything to do with it at all?

divinely inspired isn't the same as divinely dictated. And much of what was written in the Old Testament (Torah) was passed on in an oral tradition for a number of centuries before it was printed. Then over the years others copied the texts and "updated" them, probably introducing more contradictions.

[Fist and Faith]

I don't know how accurate the translation "God-breathed" is, but it gives the impression of more than "inspired".

[Skyweir]

Well I was looking at the premise that the Bible is divinely inspired.

If its not intended to be a literal record .. then what is it?

.. what purpose does it serve? Does god have anything to do with it at all?

divinely inspired isn't the same as divinely dictated. And much of what was written in the Old Testament (Torah) was passed on in an oral tradition for a number of centuries before it was printed. Then over the years others copied the texts and "updated" them, probably introducing more contradictions.

Interesting.

And what of the rest? The New Testament .. it wasnt a record till 100 years after the alleged events.

So so far you got a bunch of oral .... histories ..... and we know how corrupted that process is .. and not much else, some poetry? Some really great principles that I as an atheist live by ..

Archeological evidence today has identified so much fallacy and fiction in this record ..... so what good is it? What is divinely inspired? What parts are of god? Inspired of god?

[SoulBiter]

And what of the rest? The New Testament .. it wasnt a record till 100 years after the alleged events.

And what of that? There are many things that we consider recorded history that were not recorded until many years after the event. The new testament was a record of eye witnesses of the events of the time. Many of which (rulers of the time, burial sites, etc etc) can be corroborated by other texts of the period.

[Vraith]

And what of that? There are many things that we consider recorded history that were not recorded until many years after the event.


The new testament was a record of eye witnesses of the events of the time. Many of which (rulers of the time, burial sites, etc etc) can be corroborated by other texts of the period.

on the first---that's exactly the opposite of what real modern historians do.


ON THE OTHER HAND---THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT your second claim is saying.

Which is false.
Almost none of the new testament was written by eye-witnesses. NONE of it can be shown...or even extrapolated by any person with actual knowledge...to be contemporaneous.
Also, almost ALL of myth contains one or two physical/existential facts. Just like almost ALL of Stephen King contains true shit about the world---small areas of Maine, and song lyrics in particular. The REST of the story is bullshit. Bullshit with a purpose, but NOT real, provable, fact, true.

Look, just because Pilate was real, doesn't mean shit about the rest.

And, as a matter of literature/records fact---the OLD testament has more factual history than the new...which is ALL Spin-[fake]-Doctors.

Believe what you want. If you don't fuck with me, and it works for you, it's all good.
But the church killed and killed and killed and, whatever deluded/misdirected individuals may have wanted/intended [like "salvation"], power and control was its purpose---and the very DAY people start ceding issues BACK to them, power and control will reassert.
[[[and that's why the religion protection gov't actions are fucking dangerous, actual fucking evil. You may not think so...but you should think it through, and consider that so far ONLY Christ-cult people are protected.]]]

[wayfriend]

The new testament was highly edited by various "councils" for several hundred years, especially early on. Whatever didn't fit the current dogma was discarded. One must presume that other parts were changed to conform. Even King James whacked on it. So the concept of "historical accuracy" is almost impossible to ascertain and is certainly suspect.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council."

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

The new testament was highly edited by various "councils" for several hundred years, especially early on. Whatever didn't fit the current dogma was discarded. ...

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council."

[Skyweir]

Dear faithful Wos,
Im surprised and not sure we can treat wiki as a credible source and it contradicts everything I have learned and understood about the evolution of the New Testament, if you will .. and this

The Book

The Bible (from biblos, Greek for 'book') is the basis of two great religions, Judaism in the Old Testament and Christianity in the New Testament. In each case it brings together a group of documents to tell the story of the founders and early followers of the religion. In doing so it also explains their beliefs.

The conventional sources of historical evidence (archaeological remains, written documents) provide few traces of the Old Testament story and none at all of the events described in the New Testament. Yet in the Bible the early Jews and Christians provide an account of themselves which is unparalleled, among religious groups of those times, in its wealth of detail.

Epistles and Acts: AD 50-90

The holy book used by the early Christians is the Jewish Bible, known to Christians now as the Old Testament ('testament' meaning in this context a covenant between God and man). But from the middle of the 1st century AD texts begin to be written which will later be gathered into a New Testament, representing the updated covenant revealed by Christ.

The earliest such texts are the letters (or Epistles) written between about 50 and 62 AD by St Paul to various early Christian communities.

Next in chronological sequence comes the Acts of the Apostles, a description of the missionary efforts of Peter and others in Jerusalem and of Paul on his journeys.

This account is believed to be the work of Luke, who probably writes it between about AD 75 and 90. He has accompanied Paul on some of his travels, including his last journey to Rome. Much of Acts, therefore, is first-hand contemporary evidence of the events described.

An oral source: from AD c.30

The Gospels in written form are slightly later than the Epistles and Acts, but they contain oral texts from earlier times.

The first Christians, gathering for worship, repeat together their beliefs about the life, death and promises of Jesus Christ. These truths are what they have been told and taught; they are what they teach to new converts and to their own children. They are the joyful tidings of a better world which only Christians share. 'Good news' is what the word gospel means.

As the years pass, it makes sense to write down the sayings of Jesus and the stories about him which many Christians (but not all) know so well by heart. This is done in several places and in differing versions.

The earliest version to survive in the Bible is Mark's Gospel. It was probably written between AD 75 and 85, and it was used - together with other sources - as the basis for the Gospels of both Matthew and Luke, each written a few years later. The Gospel of John is later again (perhaps around AD 100) and differs from the other three in concentrating on spiritual issues more than biography. It is not until well into the 2nd century that the four Gospels are given their names (see Naming the Gospels).


Establishing the canon: 2nd - 4th century AD

By the middle of the 2nd century it becomes evident that a great many different and often contradictory passages of holy scripture are circulating among the various Christian churches, each claiming to offer the truth. (There is even a Gospel according to Judas Iscariot.) Which of these shall be accepted as the official canon? This becomes a subject of urgent debate among church leaders.

By the end of the century it is widely agreed that four Gospels, the Epistles of Paul and the Acts of the Apostles are authentic. But it is not until 367 that a list is circulated by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, which finally establishes the content of the New Testament.

Meanwhile the texts are being ceaselessly copied and recopied on papyrus and later on parchment. A few fragments survive from the 2nd century, but the earliest complete New Testament (the Codex Sinaiticus, in Greek, written probably in Egypt, now in the British Library) dates from the late 4th century.

By this time Jerome is working in Bethlehem on his Latin version of the Bible. The story of the New Testament evolves into the story of its translations.

Read more: www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextH ... z5M44QGLfy

[Skyweir]

www.helsinki.fi/teol/pro/_merenlah/oppi ... ewtest.htm


https://www.britannica.com/topic/New-Testament

As far as the New Testament is concerned, there could be no Bible without a church that created it; yet conversely, having been nurtured by the content of the writings themselves, the church selected the canon. The concept of inspiration was not decisive in the matter of demarcation because the church understood itself as having access to inspiration through the guidance of the Spirit.

Indeed, until c. AD 150, Christians could produce writings either anonymously or pseudonymously-i.e., using the name of some acknowledged important biblical or apostolic figure. The practice was not believed to be either a trick or fraud.

Apart from letters in which the person of the writer was clearly attested-as in those of Paul, which have distinctive historical, theological, and stylistic traits peculiar to Paul-the other writings placed their emphases on the message or revelation conveyed, and the author was considered to be only an instrument or witness to the Holy Spirit or the Lord. When the message was committed to writing, the instrument was considered irrelevant, because the true author was believed to be the Spirit.

By the mid-2nd century, however, with the delay of the final coming (the Parousia) of the Messiah as the victorious eschatological (end-time) judge and with a resulting increased awareness of history, increasingly a distinction was made between the apostolic time and the present. There also was a gradual cessation of "authentically pseudonymous" writings in which the author could identify with Christ and the Apostles and thereby gain ecclesiastical recognition.

The process of canonization was relatively long and remarkably flexible and detached; various books in use were recognized as inspired, but the Church Fathers noted, without embarrassment or criticism, how some held certain books to be canonical and others did not. Emerging Christianity assumed that through the Spirit the selection of canonical books was "certain" enough for the needs of the church. Inspiration, it is to be stressed, was neither a divisive nor a decisive criterion. Only when the canon had become self-evident was it argued that inspiration and canonicity coincided, and this coincidence became the presupposition of Protestant orthodoxy (e.g., the authority of the Bible through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit).

The need for consolidation and delimitation
Viewed both phenomenologically and practically, the canon had to be consolidated and delimited. Seen historically, however, there were a number of reasons that forced the issue of limiting the canon.

Oral tradition had begun to deteriorate in post-apostolic times, partly because many or most of the eyewitnesses to the earliest events of Jesus' life and death and the beginning of the church had died. Also, the oral tradition may simply have suffered in transmission. Papias (died c. 130), a bishop of Hieropolis, in Asia Minor, was said by Irenaeus (died c. 200), a bishop of Lugdunum (now Lyon, France) to have been an eyewitness of the Apostle John. Papias had said, "For I did not suppose that the things from the books would aid me so much as the things from the living and continuing voice." Eusebius (c. 260-c. 340), a church historian, reported these comments in his Ecclesiastical History and pointed out inconsistencies in Papias' recollections, doubted his understanding, and called him "a man of exceedingly small intelligence."

Large sections of oral tradition, however, which were probably translated in part from Aramaic before being written down in Greek-such as the Passion (suffering of Christ) narrative, many sayings of Jesus, and early liturgical material-benefitted by the very conservativism implicit in such traditions. But because the church perceived its risen Lord as a living Lord, even his words could be adjusted or adapted to fit specific church needs. Toward the end of the 1st century, there was also a conscious production of gospels. Some gospels purported to be words of the risen Lord that did not reflect apostolic traditions and even claimed superiority over them. Such claims were deemed heretical and helped to push the early church toward canonization.

Faced with heresy and claims to late revelations, the early church was constrained to retain the historical dimension of its faith, the ephapax, or the "once for all," revelation of God in Jesus Christ.

Impulse toward canonization from heretical movements
Gnosticism (a religious system with influence both on Judaism and Christianity) tended to foster speculation, cutting loose from historical revelation. In defense the orthodox churches stressed the apostolic tradition by focussing on Gospels and letters from apostolic lives and distinguished them from Gnostic writings, such as the Gospel of Truth (mentioned by Irenaeus) and now found in Coptic translation in a collection of Gnostic writings from Egypt; it is a Coptic manuscript of a Valentinian Gnostic speculation from the mid-2nd century-i.e., a work based on the teachings of Valentinus, a Gnostic teacher from Alexandria. In the same collection is the Gospel of Thomas in Coptic, actually a collection of sayings purporting to be the words of the risen Christ, the living Lord. This "gospel" also occurred in Greek (c. 140), and warnings against it as heretical were made by the Church Fathers in the 2nd to the 4th centuries.

In a general prophetic apocalyptic mood, another heresy, Montanism, arose. This was an ecstatic enthusiastic movement claiming special revelation and stressing "the age of the spirit." Montanus (died c. 175) and two prophetesses claimed that their oracular statements contained new and contemporary authoritative revelations. This break with the apostolic time caused vigorous response. An anti-Montanist reported that "the false prophet is one who speaks in ecstasy after which follow freedom . . . and madness of soul."

The single most decisive factor in the process of canonization was the influence of Marcion (flourished c. 140), who had Gnostic tendencies and who set up a "canon" that totally repudiated the Old Testament and anything Jewish. He viewed the Creator God of the Old Testament as a cruel God of retribution and the Jewish Law. His canon consisted of The Gospel, a "cleaned up" Luke (the least Jewish), and the Apostolikon (ten Pauline letters with Old Testament references and analogies edited out, without Hebrews, I and II Timothy, and Titus). This restrictive canon acted as a catalyst to the formation of a canon more in line with the thought of the church catholic (universal).

Late-2nd-century canons
By the end of the 2nd century, Irenaeus used the four canonical Gospels, 13 letters of Paul, I Peter, I and II John, Revelation, Shepherd of Hermas (a work later excluded from the canon), and Acts. Justin Martyr (died c. 165), a Christian apologist, wrote of the reading of the Gospels, "the memoirs of the Apostles," in the services, in which they were the basis for sermons. In his writings he quoted freely from the Gospels, Hebrews, the Pauline Letters, I Peter, and Acts. Justin's Syrian pupil, Tatian (c. 160), although he quotes from John separately, is best known for his Diatessaron (literally, "through four" [gospels], but also a musicological term meaning "choral" "harmony"), which was a life of Christ compiled from all four Gospels but based on the outline and structure of John. This indicates both that Tatian was aware of four gospel traditions and that their canonicity was not fixed in final form at his time in Syria. Although Tatian was later declared a heretic, the Diatessaron was used until the 5th century and influenced the Western Church even after four separated gospels were established.

The first clear witness to a catalog of authoritative New Testament writings is found in the so-called Muratorian Canon, a crude and uncultured Latin 8th-century manuscript translated from a Greek list written in Rome c. 170-180, named for its modern discoverer and publisher Lodovica Antonio Muratori (1672-1750). Though the first lines are lost, Luke is referred to as "the third book of the Gospel," and the canon thus contains [Matthew, Mark] Luke, John, Acts, 13 Pauline letters, Jude, two letters of John, and Revelation. Concerning the Apocalypse of Peter, it notes that it may be read, although some persons object; it rejects the Shepherd of Hermas as having been written only recently in Rome and lacking connection with the apostolic age. The Wisdom of Solomon (a Jewish intertestamental writing), is included in the accepted works as written in Solomon's honour.

Some principles for determining the criteria of canonicity begin to be apparent: apostolicity, true doctrine (regula fidei), and widespread geographical usage. Such principles are indicated by Muratori's argument that the Pauline Letters are canonical and universal-the Word of God for the whole church-although they are addressed to specific churches, on the analogy of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation; in a prophetic statement to the whole church, seven specific churches are addressed, then the specific letters of Paul can be read for all. Thus, the catholic status of the Pauline letters to seven churches is vindicated on the basis of the revelation of Jesus Christ to John, the seer and writer of Revelation. Wide usage in the church is indicated in calling Acts the Acts of all the Apostles and in the intention of the "general address"-e.g., "To those who are called," in Jude-of the Catholic (or general) Letters-i.e., I and II Peter, I, II, and III John, James, and Jude. The criterion of accordance with received teaching is plain in the rejection of heretical writings. The Muratorian Canon itself may have been, in part, a response to Marcion's heretical and reductive canon.

The criteria of true doctrine, usage, and apostolicity all taken together must be satisfied, then, in order that a book be judged canonical. Thus, even though the Shepherd of Hermas, the First Letter of Clement, and the Didache may have been widely used and contain true doctrines, they were not canonical because they were not apostolic nor connected to the apostolic age, or they were local writings without support in many areas.

During the time of the definitive formation of the canon in the 2nd century, apparent differences existed in the Western churches (centred in or in close contact with Rome) and those of the East (as in Alexandria and Asia Minor). It is not surprising that the Roman Muratorian Canon omitted Hebrews and accepted and held Revelation in high esteem, for Hebrews allows for no repentance for the baptized Christian who commits apostasy (rejection of faith), a problem in the Western Church when it was subjected to persecution. In the East, on the other hand, there was a dogmatic resistance to the teaching of a 1,000-year reign of the Messiah before the end time-i.e., chiliasm, or millenarianism-in Revelation. There was also a difference in the acceptance of Acts and the Catholic Letters. With the continued expansion of the church, particularly in the 2nd century, consolidation was necessary.

Canonical standards of the 3rd and 4th centuries
Clement of Alexandria, a theologian who flourished in the late 2nd century, seemed to be practically unconcerned about canonicity. To him, inspiration is what mattered, and he made use of the Gospel of the Hebrews, the Gospel of the Egyptians, the Letter of Barnabas, the Didache, and other extracanonical works. Origen (died c. 254), Clement's pupil and one of the greatest thinkers of the early church, distinguished at least three classes of writings, basing his judgment on majority usage in places that he had visited: (1) homologoumena or anantirrheta, "undisputed in the churches of God throughout the whole world" (the four Gospels, 13 Pauline Letters, I Peter, I John, Acts, and Revelation); (2) amphiballomena, "disputed" (II Peter, II and III John, Hebrews, James, and Jude); and (3) notha, "spurious" (Gospel of the Egyptians, Thomas, and others). He used the term "scripture" (graphe) for the Didache, the Letter of Barnabas, and the Shepherd of Hermas, but did not consider them canonical. Eusebius shows the situation in the early 4th century. Universally accepted are: the four Gospels, Acts, 14 Pauline Letters (including Hebrews), I John, and I Peter. The disputed writings are of two kinds: (1) those known and accepted by many (James, Jude, II Peter, II and III John, and (2) those called "spurious" but not "foul and impious" (Acts of Paul, Shepherd of Hermas, Apocalypse of Peter, Letter of Barnabas, Didache and possibly the Gospel of the Hebrews); finally there are the heretically spurious (e.g., Gospel of Peter, Acts of John). Revelation is listed both as fully accepted ("if permissible") and as spurious but not impious. It is important that Eusebius feels free to make authoritative use of the disputed writings. Thus canon and authoritative revelation are not yet the same thing.

Determination of the canon in the 4th century
Athanasius, a 4th-century bishop of Alexandria and a significant theologian, delimited the canon and settled the strife between East and West. On a principle of inclusiveness, both Revelation and Hebrews (as part of the Pauline corpus) were accepted. The 27 books of the New Testament-and they only-were declared canonical. In the Greek churches there was still controversy about Revelation, but in the Latin Church, under the influence of Jerome, Athanasius' decision was accepted. It is notable, however, that, in a mid-4th-century manuscript called Codex Sinaiticus, the Letter of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas are included at the end but with no indication of secondary status, and that, in the 5th-century Codex Alexandrinus, there is no demarcation between Revelation and I and II Clement.

In the Syriac Church, Tatian's Diatessaron was used until the 5th century, and in the 3rd century the 14 Pauline Letters were added. Because Tatian had been declared a heretic, there was a clear episcopal order to have the four separated Gospels when, according to tradition, Rabbula, bishop of Edessa, introduced the Syriac version known as the Peshitta-also adding Acts, James, I Peter, and I John-making a 22-book canon. Only much later, perhaps in the 7th century, did the Syriac canon come into agreement with the Greek 27 books.

Developments in the 16th century
With the advent of printing and differences between Roman Catholics and Protestants, the canon and its relationship to tradition finally became fixed. During the Counter-Reformation Council of Trent (1545-63), the canon of the entire Bible was set in 1546 as the Vulgate, based on Jerome's Latin version. For Luther, the criterion of what was canonical was both apostolicity, or what is of an apostolic nature, and "was Christum treibet"-what drives toward, or leads to, Christ. This latter criterion he did not find in, for example, Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation; even so, he bowed to tradition, and placed these books last in the New Testament.

Texts and versions
Textual criticism
The physical aspects of New Testament texts
To establish the reliability of the text of ancient manuscripts in order to reach the text that the author originally wrote (or, rather, dictated) involves the physical aspects of the texts: collection, collation of differences or variant readings in manuscripts, and comparison in matters of dating, geographical origins, and the amount of editing or revision noted, using as many copies as are available. Textual criticism starts thus with the manuscripts themselves. Families of manuscripts may be recognized by noting similarities and differences, degrees of dependence, or stages of their transmission leading back to the earliest text, or autograph. The techniques used in textual studies of ancient manuscripts are the same whether they deal with secular, philosophical, or religious texts. New Testament textual criticism, however, operates under unique conditions because of an abundance of manuscripts and the rather short gap between the time of original writing and the extant manuscripts, shorter than that of the Old Testament.

Compared with other ancient manuscripts, the text of the New Testament is dependable and consistent, but on an absolute scale there are far more variant readings as compared with those of, for example, classical Greek authors. This is the result, on the one hand, of a great number of surviving manuscripts and extant manuscript fragments and, on the other, of the fact that the time gap between an oral phase of transmission and the written stage was far shorter than that of many other ancient Greek manuscripts. The missionary message-the kerygma (proclamation)-with reports of the Passion, death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ and collections of his deeds and sayings was, at first, oral tradition. Later it was written down in Gospel form. The letters of Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles who founded or corresponded with churches, were also collected and distributed as he had dictated them. All autographs of New Testament books have disappeared. In sharp contrast to the fact that the oldest extant full manuscript of a work by the Greek philosopher Plato (died 347 BC) is a copy written in 895-a gap of more than 1,000 years bridged by only a few papyrus texts-there was a time gap of less than 200 or 300 years between the original accounts of the New Testament events and extant manuscripts. In fact, a small (about 2.5 inches by 3.5 inches [6.4 by 8.9 centimetres]) papyrus fragment with verses from the 18th chapter of the Gospel According to John can be dated c. 120-130; this earliest known fragment of the New Testament was written 40 years or less after the presumed date of the production of that Gospel (c. 90).

Excluding papyri found preserved in the dry sands, as in Egypt (where the Gospel According to John was evidently popular judging from the large number of fragments found there), the approximate number of New Testament manuscripts dating from the 3rd to 18th centuries are: 2,000 of the four Gospels; 400 of Acts, Pauline, and Catholic letters together; 300 of Pauline letters alone; 250 of Revelation; and 2,000 lectionaries-i.e., collections of gospel (and sometimes Acts and letter) selections, or pericopes, meant to be used in public worship. Quotations from the Church Fathers-some of which are so extensive as to include almost the whole New Testament-account for more than 150,000 textual variants. Of the quotations in the Fathers, however, it is difficult to make judgments because the quotations may have been intended to be exact from some particular text traditions, but others may have been from memory, conflations, harmonizations, or allusions. Of the many New Testament manuscripts to date, however, only about 50 contain the entire 27 books of the New Testament. The majority have the four Gospels, and Revelation is the least well attested. Prior to the printing press (15th century), all copies of Bibles show textual variations.

Types of writing materials and methods
In Hellenistic times (c. 300 BC-c. AD 300), official records were often inscribed on stone or metal tablets. Literary works and detailed letters were written on parchment or papyrus, though short or temporary records were written or scratched on potsherds (ostraca) or wax tablets. Scrolls were made by gluing together papyrus sheets (made from the pith of the papyrus reed) or by sewing together parchment leaves (made from treated and scraped animal skins); they were written in columns and read by shifting the roll backward and forward from some wooden support on one or both ends. Such scrolls were used for literary or religious works and seldom exceeded 30 feet (nine metres) in length because of their weight and awkwardness in handling.

In contrast, the church used not scrolls but the codex (book) form for its literature. A codex was formed by sewing pages of papyrus or parchment of equal size one upon another and vertically down the middle, forming a quire; both sides of the pages thus formed could be written upon. In antiquity, the codex was the less honourable form of writing material, used for notes and casual records. The use of the book form testifies to the low cultural and educational status of early Christianity-and, as the church rose to prominence, it brought "the book" with it. Not until the time of the Roman emperor Constantine in the 4th century, when Christianity became a state religion, were there parchment codices containing the whole New Testament.

Some very early New Testament manuscripts and fragments thereof are papyrus, but parchment, when available, became the best writing material until the advent of printing. The majority of New Testament manuscripts from the 4th to 15th centuries are parchment codices. When parchment codices occasionally were deemed no longer of use, the writing was scraped off and a new text written upon it. Such a rewritten (rescriptus) manuscript is called a palimpsest (from the Greek palin, "again," and psao, "I scrape"). Often the original text of a palimpsest can be discerned by photographic process.

In New Testament times there were two main types of Greek writing: majuscules (or uncials) and minuscules. Majuscules are all capital (uppercase) letters, and the word uncial (literally, 1/12 of a whole, about an inch) points to the size of their letters. Minuscules are lowercase manuscripts. Both uncials and minuscules might have ligatures making them into semi-connected cursives. In Greco-Roman times minuscules were used for the usual daily writing. In parchments from the 4th to the 9th centuries, both majuscules and minuscules were used for New Testament manuscripts, but by the 11th century all the manuscripts were minuscules.

In these early New Testament manuscripts, there were no spaces between either letters or words, rarely an indication that a word was "hyphenated," no chapter or verse divisions, no punctuation, and no accents or breathing marks on the Greek words. There was only a continuous flow of letters. In addition, there were numerous (and sometimes variable) abbreviations marked only by a line above (e.g., IC for IHCOUC, or Jesus, and KC for kyrios, or Lord. Not until the 8th-9th century was there any indication of accents or breathing marks (both of which may make a difference in the meaning of some words); punctuation occurred sporadically at this period; but not until the Middle Ages were the texts supplied with such helps as chapters (c. 1200) and verses (c. 1550).

Occasionally, the parchment was stained (e.g., purple), and the ink was silver (e.g., Codex Argenteus, a 5th-6th-century Gothic translation). Initial letters were sometimes illuminated, often with red ink (from which comes the present English word rubric, based on the Latin for "red," namely ruber).

Types of manuscript errors
Since scribes either copied manuscripts or wrote from dictation, manuscript variants could be of several types: copying, hearing, accidental, or intentional. Errors in copying were common, particularly with uncial letters that looked alike. In early manuscripts OC (for hos, "[he] who"), for example, might easily be mistaken for the traditional abbreviation of God: _C (for _EOC, theos). Dittography (the picking up of a word or group of words and repeating it) and haplography (the omission of syllables, words, or lines) are errors most apt to occur where there are similar words or syllables involved. In chapter 17, verse 15, of John, in one manuscript the following error occurs: "I do not pray that thou shouldest take them from the [world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the] evil one" becomes "I do not pray that thou shouldst take them from the evil one." This is obviously a reading that omitted the words between two identical ends of lines-i.e., an error due to homoioteleuton (similar ending of lines).

Especially in uncial manuscripts with continuous writing, there is a problem of word division. An English example may serve to illustrate: GODISNOWHERE may be read "God is now here" or "God is nowhere." Internal evidence from the context can usually solve such problems. Corrections of a manuscript either above the line of writing or in the margin (and also marginal comments) may be read and copied into the text and become part of it as a gloss.

Errors of hearing are particularly common when words have the same pronunciation as others but differ in spelling (as in English: "their, there"; "meet, meat"). This kind of error increased in frequency in the early Christian Era because some vowels and diphthongs lost their distinctive sound and came to be pronounced alike. For example, the Greek vowels e, i, and u and the diphthongs ei, oi, and ui all sounded like the ee (as in "feet"). Remarkable mistranslations can occur as, for example, in I Corinthians, chapter 15, verse 54: "Death is swallowed up in victory"-becomes by itacism (pronunciation of the Greek letter e) "Death is swallowed up in conflict" (neikos). Another problem of itacism is the distinction between declensions of the 1st and 2nd persons in the plural ("we" and "you") in Greek, which can sound the same (hemeis, "we"; humeis, "you"), because the initial vowels are not clearly differentiated. Such errors can cause interpretative difficulties.

A different category of error occurs in dictation or copying, when sequences of words, syllables, or letters in a word are mixed up, synonyms substituted in familiar passages, words read across a two- (or more) column manuscript instead of down, or assimilated to a parallel. Intentional changes might involve corrections of spelling or grammar, harmonizations, or even doctrinal emendations, and might be passed on from manuscript to manuscript. Paleographers-i.e., scientists of ancient writing-can note changes of hands in manuscript copying or the addition of new hands such as those of correctors of a later date.

Paleography, a science of dating manuscripts by typological analysis of their scripts, is the most precise and objective means known for determining the age of a manuscript. Script groups belong typologically to their generation; and changes can be noted with great accuracy over relatively short periods of time. Dating of manuscript material by a radioactive-carbon test requires that a small part of the material be destroyed in the process; it is less accurate than dating from paleography.

Critical scholarship
Textual criticism of the Greek New Testament attempts to come as near as possible to the original manuscripts (which did not survive), based on reconstructions from extant manuscripts of various ages and locales. Assessment of the individual manuscripts and their relationships to each other can produce a fairly reliable text from various readings that may have been the result of copying and recopying of manuscripts. It is not always age that matters. Older manuscripts may be corrupt, and a reading in a later manuscript may in reality be ancient. No single witness or group of witnesses is reliable in all its readings.

When Erasmus, the Dutch Humanist, prepared the Greek text for the first printed edition (1516) of the New Testament, he depended on a few manuscripts of the type that had dominated the church's manuscripts for centuries and that had had its origin in Constantinople. His edition was produced hastily, he even translated some parts for which he did not have a Greek text from Jerome's Latin text (Vulgate). In about 1522 Cardinal Francisco Jimenez, a Spanish scholarly churchman, published his Complutensian Polyglot at Alcala (Latin: Complutum), Spain, a Bible in which parallel columns of the Old Testament are printed in Hebrew, the Vulgate, and the Septuagint (LXX), together with the Aramaic Targum (translation or paraphrase) of Onkelos to the Pentateuch with a translation into Latin. The Greek New Testament was volume 5 of this work, and the text tradition behind it cannot be determined with any accuracy. During the next decades new editions of Erasmus' text profited from more and better manuscript evidence and the printer Robert Estienne of Paris produced in 1550 the first text with a critical apparatus (variant readings in various manuscripts). This edition became influential as a chief witness for the Textus Receptus (the received standard text) that came to dominate New Testament studies for more than 300 years. This Textus Receptus is the basis for all the translations in the churches of the Reformation, including the King James Version.

Large extensive New Testament critical editions prepared by the German scholars C. von Tischendorf (1869-72) and H. von Soden (1902-13) had Sigla (signs) for the various textual witnesses; they are complex to use and different from each other. The current system, a revision by an American scholar, C.R. Gregory (adopted in 1908), though not uncomplicated has made uniform practice possible. A more pragmatic method of designation and rough classification was that of the Swiss scholar J.J. Wettstein's edition (1751-52). His textual apparatus was relatively uncomplicated. He introduced the use of capital Roman, Greek, or Hebrew letters for uncials and Arabic numbers for minuscules. Later, a Gothic P with exponents came into use for papyri and, in the few cases needed, Gothic or Old English O and T with exponents for ostraca and talismans (engraved amulets). Lectionaries are usually designated by an italicized lowercase l with exponents in Arabic numbers.

Known ostraca-i.e., broken pieces of pottery (or potsherds) inscribed with ink-contain short portions of six New Testament books and number about 25. About nine talismans date from the 4th to 12th centuries; they are good-luck charms with a few verses on parchment, wood, or papyrus. Four of these contain the Lord's Prayer. These short portions of writing, however, are hardly of significance for a study of the New Testament textual tradition.

Texts and manuscripts
In referring to manuscript text types by their place of origin, one posits the idea that the major centers of Christendom established more or less standard texts: Alexandria; Caesarea and Antioch (Eastern); Italy and Gallia plus Africa (Western); Constantinople, the home for the Byzantine text type or the Textus Receptus. While such a geographical scheme has become less accurate or helpful, it still serves as a rough classification of text types.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/biblic ... #ref597954

[Skyweir]

And as to its evolution

The New Testament canon developed, or evolved, over the course of the first 250-300 years of Christian history.

www.churchhistory101.com/docs/New-Testament-Canon.pdf

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

@Sky,

What on earth are you talking about?

AFAICT (that is, without reading every line of your wall-o'-text), your posted Sources and the Wiki Source posted by WF are -- at least, on the main -- saying the same thing.

What, exactly, is the point at issue? What is supposed to be different, again?

[wayfriend]

All that is gold does not glitter
Not all those who wander are lost
Everything posted need not be
Slamming someone's earlier post.
-- J.R.R. Tolkien

[Fist and Faith]

I was going to say the same thing, but figured I'd let you handle it.

[Rawedge Rim]

And what of that? There are many things that we consider recorded history that were not recorded until many years after the event.


The new testament was a record of eye witnesses of the events of the time. Many of which (rulers of the time, burial sites, etc etc) can be corroborated by other texts of the period.

on the first---that's exactly the opposite of what real modern historians do.


ON THE OTHER HAND---THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT your second claim is saying.

Which is false.
Almost none of the new testament was written by eye-witnesses. NONE of it can be shown...or even extrapolated by any person with actual knowledge...to be contemporaneous.
Also, almost ALL of myth contains one or two physical/existential facts. Just like almost ALL of Stephen King contains true shit about the world---small areas of Maine, and song lyrics in particular. The REST of the story is bullshit. Bullshit with a purpose, but NOT real, provable, fact, true.

Look, just because Pilate was real, doesn't mean shit about the rest.

And, as a matter of literature/records fact---the OLD testament has more factual history than the new...which is ALL Spin-[fake]-Doctors.

Believe what you want. If you don't fuck with me, and it works for you, it's all good.
But the church killed and killed and killed and, whatever deluded/misdirected individuals may have wanted/intended [like "salvation"], power and control was its purpose---and the very DAY people start ceding issues BACK to them, power and control will reassert.
[[[and that's why the religion protection gov't actions are fucking dangerous, actual fucking evil. You may not think so...but you should think it through, and consider that so far ONLY Christ-cult people are protected.]]]

And exactly what do you base your assertion that the New Testament was not written by actual eye witness' to the events they proported?

As for the rest of your post under that assertion, I'm gonna have to just be blunt and say it is pure bovine excrement.

[Skyweir]

+JMJ+

@Sky,

What on earth are you talking about?

AFAICT (that is, without reading every line of your wall-o'-text), your posted Sources and the Wiki Source posted by WF are -- at least, on the main -- saying the same thing.

What, exactly, is the point at issue? What is supposed to be different, again?

Fair point .. I can see how this was confusing LOL .. I do, do this a lot

And Wos you are absolutely 100 percent right

That is a giant wall of text .. .. perhaps I should delete it?

So I was pointing out that not only was the New Testament a book that evolved over time .. it was based on a range of sources, oral sources, and some sources that were construed by persons who had no direct involvement with any of the NT characters at all, but claimed inspiration etc etc .. the rest is pretty much self evident hopefully

[Skyweir]

All that is gold does not glitter
Not all those who wander are lost
Everything posted need not be
Slamming someone's earlier post.
-- J.R.R. Tolkien

Wow .. how awesome is this ^^^^^^

Love it .. kudos Wayfriend .. nicely done

[Skyweir]

Rawedge if I can just direct you upthread to that "wall of text" which pretty much covers off on how the NT came to be .. and it is exactly as V asserts in his post.

And honestly I think its pretty common knowledge and also accepted by the Catholic church itself .. again upthread youll find a LOL wiki source that Wayfriend posted setting that out for your convenience

And the Tridentine Council happened about 1500 years after Christ .. so if that is accurate .. theres that

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Fair point .. I can see how this was confusing LOL .. I do, do this a lot

And Wos you are absolutely 100 percent right

That is a giant wall of text .. .. perhaps I should delete it?

So I was pointing out that not only was the New Testament a book that evolved over time .. it was based on a range of sources, oral sources, and some sources that were construed by persons who had no direct involvement with any of the NT characters at all, but claimed inspiration etc etc .. the rest is pretty much self evident hopefully

Alrighty. Groovy.

[Vraith]

I'm gonna have to just be blunt and say it is pure bovine excrement.

I include that under my statement that you are free to believe what you want.
But you shouldn't expect me to believe it. And you [nor anyone] should force me [nor anyone] to believe it. Especially when the history...in fact from eyewitnesses and evidence unlike your claim...supports certain things. And they're not your things.