New Testament Manuscripts

Although the words printed on title page for the last 27 books of our Bible read "New Testament", nearly two thousand years have passed since the time of the story told in those pages, so that it is anything but "new" as far as books go.

We don’t have any of the original autographs (manuscripts penned by the authors) of the New Testament scriptures; all of what we have is from copies. Without the original writings, how can we check the accuracy and reliability of the New Testament? We can use the same tests (bibliographic, internal and external evidence) as we discussed for the Old Testament.

We have seen that the evidence for the reliability of the Old Testament writings is quite good — but there is even more evidence available to verify that the New Testament text we have today is reliable.

There are two main reasons for this. First, the original texts were written down very shortly after the events they descibe, rather than documenting an oral tradition after a long period of time. Second, the events described, and therefore the source documents, are much newer than events described by the Old Testament, so that we have a much better chance of finding documents that have survived through time and calamity.

Let's first take a look at the bibliographical evidence for the New Testament.

Copies

Greek Manuscript Evidence

The original language of most of the Old Testament was Hebrew, the language used by the Israelite nation. By the time of Jesus' birth, though, the Hebrew Scriptures had already been translated into Greek (the Septuagint, or LXX), and this translation was accepted by many Jews and by the Christians living at Jesus' time as authoritative Scripture.

The original language of the New Testament was Greek - a particular form called "koine", or "common Greek". By the time Alexander died in 323 B.C., most people in the world were bilingual, and Greek was the second language that everyone used. This "common man's" language was rich in meaning, subtlety, and descriptive power, so it naturally became the preferred language for trade and cultural exchange.

How many copies of the New Testament are available?

1. There are over 5,300 known ancient Greek manuscript copies (MSS) and fragments of the New Testament in Greek that have survived until today.
   
   
2. Counting an additional 10,000 Latin Vulgate and over 9,300 other early manuscript versions, this totals over 24,000 surviving manuscripts of the New Testament.
   
   
3. Compare this with other ancient historical writings:
   
   
1. Homer's Iliad – 643
2. Sophocles – 193
3. Caesar’s Gallic Wars – 10 Greek manuscripts
4. Annals of Tacitus – less than 20
5. Plato – 7

Rylands P52 - This is the oldest known New Testament fragment, showing parts of John 18:31-33.

Time

Scholars don’t all agree on the dating of the New Testament, but the evidence seems to indicate that all of the Gospels were written between about 45-75 A.D., and the rest of the books before 100 A.D., even though it is possible that the final compilation of Matthew or John may have been a little later. This means that the accounts of Jesus life were written within 15-45 years of Jesus’s death, very likely by eyewitnesses. Thus the period from the time of Jesus death in about 33 A.D. until the end of the first century has been called the "Eyewitness Period".

It is interesting to compare the dates of the oldest existing copies of other ancient literature with those of the surviving copies of the New Testament, to see how close these copies come to the originals in time:

The closer to the Eyewitness Period that a copy of a New Testament manuscript can be dated, the more reliable the text can be regarded, since it is assumed that eyewitnesses to the actual events could have had an opportunity to confirm or refute the testimony.

There are no other documents of antiquity that are as well attested bibliographically as the 27 books of the New Testament.

What are the existing New Testament copies like?

During the time of the early Christians, papyrus was the most common (and economical) writing material. Papyrus is made from a durable reed found in Egypt, in the Nile Valley. Papyrus fibers are glued together in a basketweave pattern, much like plywood, then left to dry in the sun.

Papyrus is durable, but papyrus documents will still deteriorate into dust over thousands of years unless they are stored under extraordinary conditions. The dry, arid deserts of the Middle East and northern Africa provide just the right climate to preserve documents made of papyrus, so it has been here that remains of most of the ancient papyrus documents, both Biblical and non-Biblical, have been found.

Another writing material used by ancient scribes was parchment. Parchment was made from the skin of "clean animals" (sheep or goats), and was used well into the late Middle Ages until replaced by paper. It was scarce and more expensive than papyrus, so it was used mainly for important documents.

Here are some of the most important New Testament manuscripts:

The Codex Sinaiticus (aleph), found near Mt. Sinai, and the Codex Alexandrinus (A), found near Alexandria in Egypt, are parchment copies of the whole New Testament. A codex is a form of book, as opposed to a scroll, that has leaves put together like the pages of a modern book.

The Sinaiticus (aleph), is dated at the fourth century, and contains contains fragments of Genesis and Numbers; Esther; Isaiah; Jeremiah; Lamentations; Joel; Amos-Malachi; several Apocryphal books; and the entire New Testament. This manuscript is currently at the British Museum in London.

Codex Vaticanus (B), another fourth century book, is located at the Vatican in Rome and is also a fairly complete Bible. The codex was brought to the Vatican from Constantinople as a gift to the pope in the fourteenth century. The Old Testament lacks Gen.1-46:28; portions of II Kings 2; and Psalms 105-137. The New Testament is missing Heb. 9:14; I and II Tim.; Titus and Revelation.

Neither Sinaiticus or Vaticanus contain the last twelve verses of Mark (Mark 16:9-20). This fact has given cause to skeptics for arguing that the Bible has been edited and fictional stories inserted. However, the verses are included in some earlier fragments, and in the writings of Church fathers, even ones cited by scholars as second century. These are the only two Greek manuscripts (Sinaiticus and Vaticanus), out of a total of 620 which contain the Gospel of Mark, that omit the verses.

The Codex Alexandrinus (A) is dated at the fifth century, is also at the British Museum. Alexandrinus contains a complete Bible (except for parts of Psalms) and includes other non-canonical books and fragments, the apocryphal III and IV Mach., also I and II Clem. Its origin is Egyptian. It differs from Vaticanus, especially in Judges. There is evidence that two different scribes wrote the manuscript.

Earlier still, fragments and papyrus copies of portions of the New Testament date from 100 to 200 years (180-225 A.D.) before Vaticanus and Sinaiticus. The outstanding ones are the Chester Beatty Papyrus (P45, P46, P47) and the Bodmer Papyrus II, XIV, XV(P46, P75).

Chester Beatty Papyrus (P45)

The Chester Beatty Papyrus (dated 200-250 A.D.), made public in 1931, contains the Gospels, Acts, Paul’s Epistles, and Revelation.

Bodmer Papyrus (P66, P72-75)

This collection of approximately fifty Greek and Coptic manuscripts was purchased by M. Martin Bodmer of Switzerland in 1955-56, and has been dated at around 200 A.D.

Most of the collection is located in the Bibliotheca Bodmeriana in Cologny (near Geneva). The exception is Pap. VIII (including 1 & 2 Peter), which was given as a gift to Pope Paul VI in 1969; it is in the Vatican Library. The documents were discovered in Egypt. They are from both codices and scrolls; most are papyri, but three are on parchment (Pap. XVI, XIX, and XXII).

The manuscripts include classical texts (e.g., Iliad, Odyssey, and Thucydides) and writings of the early churches, along with Old and New Testament texts.

From these five manuscripts alone, we can construct all of Luke, John, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, Hebrews, and portions of Matthew, Mark, Acts, and Revelation. Only the Pastoral Epistles (Titus, 1 and 2 Timothy) and the General Epistles (James, 1 and 2 Peter, and 1, 2, and 3 John) and Philemon are excluded.

Portion of a leaf from Codex Sinaiticus (Aleph)

Chester Beatty Fragment P45

These papyrus fragments have been the center of a controversial claim by German papyrologist Carsten Peter Thiede that three pieces of Matthew's gospel are actually the oldest New Testament fragments yet discovered. Thiede recently documented his ideas in a book called The Jesus Papyrus (1995), which later became the basis for a 1996 Time article Eyewitness to Jesus , and a TLC Documentary (aired Oct. 19, 1998) by the same name.

The papyrus scraps had been housed at the library of Magdalen College for more than 90 years, the gift of a British chaplain, Rev. Charles Huleatt, who bought them at an antiquities market in Luxor, Egypt. Using new tools such as a scanning laser microscope along with more conventional handwriting analysis, Thiede re-dates the fragments, previously dated in the mid- to late second century, to sometime between 30 and 70 A.D.

In three places on the Magdalen Papyrus, the name of Jesus is written as "KS", an abbreviation of the Greek word Kyrios, or Lord. Thiede considers this to be evidence that first century Christians considered Jesus to be divine. This use of an abbreviated "sacred name" is similar to the way the Old Testament writers emphasized the holiness of God's name by shortening it to "YHWH" (the tetragrammaton).

If Thiede is correct, the gospel of Matthew is not the secondhand account of copyists who wrote it decades later than the time of Jesus, as the higher critics claim. Rather, it means that the fragments contain eyewitness testimony by people who lived at the same time as Jesus.

While these conclusions apparently confirm the evangelical Christian's view of the New Testament, there are strong criticisms by many scholars of Thiede's techniques and of his qualifications as a payrologist, so the dating is by no means irrefutable.

Rylands Papyrus (P52)

One of the earliest surviving pieces of New Testament Scripture is a fragment of a papyrus codex containing John 18:31-33 and 37, called the Rylands Papyrus (P52). This papyrus was found in Egypt, and has been dated at about 125 A.D.

Before this document was discovered, critics had dated the Gospel of John much later, and thus concluded that the Apostle John could not have written the letter ascribed to him. This document is accepted much more universally than the Magdalen fragments as being the earliest extant copy of a New Testament text.

This manuscript evidence creates a bridge of extant papyrus and parchment fragments and copies of the New Testament stretching back to within the first century.

Location

Copies of the New Testament have been found throughout the middle east: Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Turkey, Greece, and Italy.

Assuming that the fragments remained close to their original venue until discovered, such varied locations would make collusion very difficult.

Variation

In addition to the actual Greek manuscripts, there are more than 1,000 copies and fragments of the New Testament in Syria, Coptic, Armenian, Gothic, and Ethiopic, as well as 8,000 copies of the Latin Vulgate, some of which date back almost to Jerome’s original translation in 384-400 A.D.

Bible skeptics are sometimes quick to point out that since there is variation between the different versions of ancient manuscripts that we have, the original text must have been rescended (edited or modified on purpose) to form some doctrine not originally intended. It is a fact that the two earliest codices (Codex Sinaiticus [Aleph], and Codex Vaticanus [B]) differ in some 3000 places.

Surprisingly, it is actually because of such discrepancies, rather than in spite of them that these early manuscripts are so valuable. These variations show that:

1. There was no deliberate early recension, and therefore no systematic and intentional corruption of the text, and
   
   
2. When Aleph and B do agree, the combined stories they tell must go back quite far.

Scholars have estimated that their agreement went back ten generations and must be located near the beginning of the second century.

B. F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort, the creators of The New Testament in Original Greek, comment:

"If comparative trivialities such as changes of order, the insertion or omission of the article with proper names and the like are set aside, the works in our opinion still subject to doubt can hardly mount to more than a thousandth part of the whole New Testament."

Small changes and variations in manuscriptsaffect none of the central Christian doctrines, nor do they change the message.

TLC Video "Eyewitness to Jesus"

The Canon

The modern Bible contains 39 books in the Old Testament and 27 books in the New Testament. These 66 books are the only writings that all Christians consider fully inspired. Since the books of the Bible were written down over thousands of years, and by many different authors, how do we know that these words are correct, and are what God has always intended for us to use as His own?

The books that are present in our Old Testament were universally accepted by the authors of the New Testament and by the oral tradition of the Church at the time of Christ, and were quoted from and endorsed by Jesus Himself.

There is little dispute by Christians over which Old Testament writings were considered Holy Scripture during the first century, although there are a number of ancient church writings considered inspired by Roman Catholics and Anglicans that are included in the Old Testaments of certain versions of the Bible. These writings are considered valuable but not inspired by Evangelical Christians. These books have been given the name Apocrypha (meaning "hidden," "secret," or "profound").

After the beginning of the Church, the accounts of Jesus' life and teachings were taught directly to believers by the Apostles and by their followers who were approved by the Apostles. First century Christians also circulated documents — either written or approved by the apostles — which contained eyewitness accounts of Jesus' life and authoritative explanations of the doctrines of the new Church. These documents often quoted from each other and presented the same message from different perspectives and in different styles. Hundreds of other documents were written and circulated, but the Church quickly rejected spurious documents and established the authority of those that were genuine.

There is no dispute by Christians over which New Testament writings are inspired as Scripture. The list of Bible documents considered authoritative and genuine, and thus inspired, is called the Canon.

What makes a book canonical? There are three main considerations by the early Church, sometimes referred to as "Roots and Fruits":

• The Book was written by an Apostle
• The teachings of the Book honored Christ and were consistent with the teachings of the Apostles already accepted by believers — a "rule of faith"
• The document has been accepted and circulated by Christians since the earliest days of the Church

Old Testament Canon

There were two versions of the Old Testament used by Jews before the Church came into existence. The Hebrew version, which was used in Palestine, contained all of the books that are found in the present-day Old Testament of a Protestant Bible. This list is called the Palestinian Canon.

Several centuries before Jesus' time, the Jewish community in Egypt (Alexandria) translated the Old Testament into Greek. This Greek translation included a few books that were not present in the Hebrew version. Their list of books is called the Alexandrian Canon, and the translation is called the Septuagint. The earliest complete Bible manuscripts, Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Vaticanus, and the Codex Alexandrinus all contain the Septuagint version of the Old Testament.

The books that are on the Alexandrian list but not on the Palestinian list are those that make up the Old Testament Apocrypha. There are nearly 300 quotations from the Old Testament books in the New Testament, and all of these except one (the extra-canonical book Enoch is quoted in Jude 1:6) are from the Septuagint.

New Testament Canon

The first five books of the New Testament, Matthew–Acts, were generally accepted by the Church from the beginning. By the end of the first century, the four Gospels and Paul's letters had been collected together in codices (books with pages, as distinguished from scrolls) affirming Paul's letters as authoritative along with the Gospel accounts. We learn from Tertullian that by 150 A.D., the Church in Rome had compiled a list of these New Testament books, which accepted as authorative for believers there.

Beginning in the second century, there had not been a universal acceptance of 2 and 3 John, 2 Peter, Jude, and Revelation, and several new writings were being proposed for inclusion including the Epistle of Clement, the Epistles of Barnabas, and The Shepeherd of Hermas. This time also saw the beginnings of separation of the Churches of the East and the West. There were also some heretical teachings creeping into the Church, like gnosticism, supported by with falsely attributed writings like the Gospel of Thomas. Even Hebrews began to be doubted because of its unknown authorship.

Because of the introduction of heretical doctrine, and because those who lived with Jesus and those that knew them personally were growing old and dying, Church leaders recognized the need to create a list of writings that would preserve the accounts and teachings as they were accepted and taught by the Apostles.

In about A.D. 230, Origen listed books that were not disputed as belonging to Scripture, and this list included the previously excluded books of Hebrews, 2 and 3 John, 2 Peter, James and Jude.

Between 218 and 418, fourteen councils of eastern Christian leaders met in Carthage, in North Africa, to decide once and for all which writings should be considered genuine for the whole Church. The Church councils tended to reject any writing that did not conform to the three basic standards of canonical writings, and tended to follow the practice referred to by Josh McDowell as "when in doubt, throw it out".

In A.D. 367, Bishop Athanasius of the eastern Church issued a list of 27 New Testament books in his Easter Letter. In the west in A.D. 382, a local council in Rome issued the same list. Jerome and Augustine both cite list of 27 books at about the same time.

The New Testament Canon was officially confirmed in its present and final form by the eighth council of Carthage in 397, and its 27 documents were accepted as authoritative, even though most believers had already accepted them from the very beginning. The matter never again came up for dispute at an Ecumenical Council.

The Church by the fifth century now had a written source of authority equivalent to that of Jesus while He was alive on earth. The Church has reasserted the validity of the New Testament books over the years.

Can the Church decide what is contained in Scripture? Is this Biblical? Consider this verse:

The earliest Church believed and acted under the assumption that they had the authority to decide matters of faith, doctrine, and practice. The decisions that were made by the Church about the Canon were based on this authority, and have served her well over the centuries.

If the 66 books of the Modern Bible were not the true Word of God, an accurate record of the witness and teachings delivered through the Apostles and by those who directly followed them, then it would seem to be much less likely that we would have such a consensus today.

Catalog of New Testament Papyri & Codices 2nd–10th Centuries

Dating the Oldest New Testament Manuscripts

Pope Damasus (ca. 304-384) who helped set the Canon of Scripture with Jerome's help.