The New Testament

#1 – All of the original manuscripts of the 27 books of the New Testament are extinct.  No translation of the Bible can claim that it is derived from the original “autographs”  or the original manuscripts written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, Peter, Jude, or James.

#2 -The first mention of what we would call a Bible is in 367 A.D.  A first mention of a compendium of all 27 books of the Bible, as we speak of it today, was in 367 A.D., by Athanasius

Keith & Roth maintain that it was around 250 A.D. and state that  Origen likely produced a complete list of all 27 New Testament books – more than a hundred years before Athanasius.

#3 – The evidence suggests that there was a recognized “canon” of New Testament books that were used long before the 4th century, which was understood as the New Testament books, in distinction to the Old Testament canon, which had already been recognized as God’s Word for centuries.

#4 – We have over 5000 complete or partial copies, or copies of copies, of the 27 N.T. books of the New Testament, in the Greek language.

#5 – The accuracy of the copies between each other is rated at 99.5%.  Some of the differences involve and include whether it was “verily” or “verily, verily.”

Note: For an important comparison . . . .

#6 – We also have early 1st-century commentaries and writings that quote verses and portions of the New Testament in Greek and other languages.

#7 – We also have copies of the 27 books of the Bible in other languages.  There are over 19,000 copies of the Greek New Testament manuscripts in other languages.  The most well-known is the Latin Vulgate translation completed by Jerome in 382 A.D.

#8 – During the first century, the primary way that the Word of God was communicated was orally.  The Lord’s apostles and other church leaders were the “walking” and “talking” communicators of God’s Word.  John, the last apostle, died around 100 A.D.

We are no different than the believers of the Lord’s day.

They relied upon the Old Testament Scriptures, written by men, affirmed by His people to be composed of 39 books, written over decades of time by vastly different men, declared to be authoritative and true, and relied upon by His people for centuries.

That is as simple as it gets!