A
SHORT HISTORY OF THE AV NEW TESTAMENT
These articles were first published in
Waymarks from August 1993 to date. They may therefore appear repetitive and
disjointed, for which I apologize.
It has been argued by some Bible critics that Christians were
not well educated in the 1st Century AD and therefore they were not
able to copy the New Testament documents without making many errors. They
relied, therefore, on unconverted monks and scribes. We regard this as
misinformation.
The New Testament documents reveal that reading was
common in the 1st. century AD, as the following verses indicate:
Have ye not read? (Matt.12:3; 19:4); Have
ye never read? (Matt.2l:l6); Thus the chief priests, Pharisees and Scribes
could read.
The elders could
read (Matt.21:42);
The Sadducees
could read (Matt.22:31);
A certain lawyer
could read (Luke lO:26);
The Jews could
read (John l9:26);
The Ethiopian also
(Acts 8:28); and Philip
(Acts 8:3O.);were able to read.
The ministers of
every synagogue could read (Acts l3:2l:
15:21);
Simon (Acts l5:l5); and the saints at Corinth could read
(2Cor.l:15);
The saints at Ephesus (Eph.3:4); and the saints at
Colosse (Col.4:,16); also could read.
at least some at Thessalonica were able to read. (1
Thes.5:27).
All of these could
read, and many more.
Many of those converted at Ephesus destroyed their Spiritist books (Acts
l9:l9). Paul had many books and parchments (2 Tim.4:13). Peter, a Fisherman,
could read and write. The apostles, elders and brethren wrote letters (Acts 15:23). The Corinthian believers
wrote letters (1 Cor.7:1; 18:.3). Others were used of God to write the books of
the New Testament. These were not all intellectuals and scholars. We conclude
that the standard of literacy was high in Apostolic days.
It is quite wrong
to suggest that most believers were illiterate in those days.
Literacy was high throughout the Roman
Empire and Grammar Schools were found in every city. Roman
children however were normally taught at home and those of the ruling classes
learned to read and write in Greek as well as Latin.
Early in church history the centre of Christian activity
and missionary endeavour moved from Jerusalem
to Antioch
(Acts 11:19). Antioch was a highly
cultured city of some half a million souls. It was the third largest city in
the Roman Empire. Being in Syria. the language
was Syriac ( very closely related to Aramaic). The New Testament Scriptures
were first written in Greek but a Syriac translation was made from the original
manuscripts which is considered by reliable scholars to be a 1st Cent. or early
2nd Cent. work. (J.N.D. agrees). This translation is known as the Peshitta, of
which copies are extant, and agree remarkably with the Received Text, and hence
with the A.V.
Eusebius tells us that the Apostle John began to collect
together the writings of our N.T. and his disciple Polycarp completed the task
in the 2nd. century. The writers knew they were writing Scripture of course,
even as they wrote it Peter confirms this,(2 Peter 3: 16)
Believers did not
need a convention of apostate clerics to tell them what was inspired of God and
what wasn't.
The last of the New Testament writers was the apostle
John. Thus his writings completed the
canon of Scripture and he began to collect all the N.T. writings together into
one book.
Further developments from the 2nd Cent. AD
Believers were making their own copies from the available
manuscripts, and believing in verbal inspiration, were very careful in their
copying. Any individual mistakes would have been quickly remedied when they
gathered together for their Bible studies
A complete Bible was available from the middle of the 2nd
Century. All believers knew what was Scripture and what was not. At the this
time, the first version (translation) was produced. It was the Syriac Peshitta.
Antioch in Syria
had become the Church Headquarters. Still in the 2nd. C, came the Italic, the
Gallic, and the Celtic (British) versions in Old Latin, and the Greek Catholic
version. The Old Latin version was used by the Waldensian believers for the
next 1000 years. All these were based on a common text described as Byzantine,
which is identical to the Received Text of the A.V. The Greek mss. which had
lain hidden for 1000 years came to light subsequent to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The vast majority of these Greek
mss. were found to be Byzantine in character.
Erasmus used a representative selection of these to
produce his first Greek N.T. in 1516. Stephens followed on in 1550, then Beza,
1598, and then Elzevir produced his Greek N.T. In 1624. This text became known
as the Received Text and has been shown to be consistent with the text existing
in the 2nd.C.
English versions were then produced from the works of
Erasmus and Stephens, viz., Tyndale's (1534), Coverdale's (1535), Matthews'
(1537), The Great Bible (1539), Geneva (1560) and Bishop's (1568). In 1611 the
King James Bible (A.V.) was produced. This was not strictly a revision, but a
fresh translation of the Stephens text and diligently compared with all the
other versions including Luther's. The language was kept as close to Tyndale's
as possible. From Apostolic days the Church has never been without a Bible. An
unaltered one too, because God is faithful, Who promised to preserve His own
word for all generations (Ps.12:6,7).
Wycliffe produced an English translation in 1380, but it
was based on Jerome’s Latin Vulgate.
From the beginning falsified copies of Scripture were
made. Paul warned against the many which corrupt the word of God (2Cor.2:17).
Others who would send out letters with his forged signature on them
(2Thes.2:2). The few of such which have been found come mainly from the hot
sands of Egypt,
far, far away from the true source of Byzantine Gospel activity. (Remember Byzantium is the old name
for Constantinople.) These corrupted mss.
became the basis for the Jesuit Rheims Bible of 1582 which was an attempt at
thwarting the work of the A.V. translators.
Greisbach, Lachman, Tischendorf and Tregelles all
produced Greek N.T.'s based on the Jesuit Bible and its two underlying mss.,
Vaticanus and Sinaiticus. Then, at the end of the 19th C., Westcott and Hort
used the work of these men to concoct a further Greek Text for the Revised
Bible. Almost all modern versions are based on the work of these latter two
men, both of them Mariolators.
There are therefore in effect two bibles. The A.V. with
its pedigree going back to the autographs and regarded by many as the Book of
the Reformation; and all modern versions, which are essentially Romish.
We are thankful for all the Lord's servants down through
the ages who have laboured to place in the hands of the Lord's people a Bible
in their own tongue. For the English speaking nations tist work was completed
in 1611 A.D. The meanings of the handful of archaic words can be discovered
from any good modern dictionary.