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Some helpful definitions

The Tanakh (also Tenakh or Tenak) is the Bible used in The of the was translated from . The name "Tanakh" is a Hebrew the Hebrew, probably in the second century. The New acronym formed from the initial Hebrew letters of the Testament of the Peshitta, which originally excluded Tanakh's three traditional subdivisions: The certain disputed books, had become the standard by the ("Teaching," also known as the Five Books of Moses), early 5th century, replacing two early Syriac versions of Nevi'im("Prophets") and ("Writings") - the . hence TaNaKh. The elements of the Tanakh are incorporated in various forms in Christian , in A ( for block of wood, book; plural codices) which, with some variations, it is called the "Old is a book in the format used for modern books, with Testament." According to the , much of the separate pages bound together and given a cover. It contents of the Tanakh were compiled by the "Men of was a Roman invention that replaced the scroll. The the Great Assembly" by 450 BCE, and have since term is now used only for (hand-written), remained unchanged. produced from Late Antiquity through the Middle Ages. is the Latin name of A is a copy of a portion of the version of the New Testament. The the New Testament made on papyrus. To date, over one first printed edition was produced by . Today hundred and twenty such papyri are known. In general, the designation Novum Testamentum Graece normally they are considered the earliest and best witnesses to refers to the Nestle-Aland editions, named after the the original text of the New Testament. scholars who led the critical editing work. The text, edited by the Institut für neutestamentliche A New Testament uncial is a copy of a portion of the Textforschung (Institute for New Testament Textual New Testament in Greek or Latin capital (or majuscule) Research) is currently in its 27th edition, abbreviated letters, written on or . The style of NA27. NA27 is used as the basis of most contemporary writing called Biblical Uncial orBiblical Majuscule. New Testament translations, as well as being the A New Testament minuscule is a copy of a portion of standard for academic work in New Testament studies. the New Testament written in a small, cursive Greek (Latin: "received text") is the name script (developed from Uncial). Most of the minuscules subsequently given to the succession of printed Greek are still written on parchment. Paper was used since the texts of the New Testament which constituted the 12th century. translation base for the original German , for A Lectionary is a book or listing that contains a the translation of the New Testament into English by collection of scripture readings appointed for Christian or , the , and for most Judaic worship on a given day or occasion. other -era New Testament translations throughout Western and Central Europe. Papyrus is a thick paper-like material produced from the pithof the papyrus plant, Cyperus papyrus,[1] a The or simply "LXX", is the wetland sedge that was once abundant in the Nile . version of the , translated in stages between the 3rd and 1st centuries BC in . It Parchment is a thin material made from calfskin, is the oldest of several ancient translations of the sheepskin or goatskin. Its most common use is as the Hebrew Bible into Greek, lingua franca of the eastern pages of a book, codex or . It is distinct from Mediterranean from the time of Alexander the Great leather in that parchment is not tanned, but stretched, (356-323 BC). The word septuaginta means "seventy" in scraped, and dried under tension, creating a stiff white, Latin and derives from a tradition that seventy (or yellowish or translucent animal skin. The finer qualities seventy-two) Jewish scholars translated the Pentateuch of parchment are called vellum. It is very reactive with (Torah) from Hebrew into Greek for Ptolemy II changes in relative humidity and is not waterproof. Philadelphus, 285–246 BC. The Peshitta (Syriac: simple, common) is the standard version of the Christian Bible in theSyriac language.

A basic timeline

~443 Completion of all the books of the original Hebrew manuscripts which make up the 39 books of the Old B.C. Testament

~285 The Septuagint Pentateuch was written. It is the oldest written Greek version of the Pentateuch. B.C.

~70 Completion of the Greek manuscripts which make up the 27 books of the New Testament A.D.

400 converts the Greek and Hebrew texts into the Latin , which is used by Roman Catholic A.D. church. It became the definitive and officially promulgated Latin version of the Bible of the Roman . In the 13th century it came to be called versio vulgata, which means "common translation". There are 76 books in the Clementine edition of the Vulgate Bible: 46 in the Old Testament, 27 in the New Testament, and three in the .

1008 Best known (Codex Leningradensis) of complete Old Testament is copied by the Ben Asher family. This test will be used by all future versions of the Bible. Despite how old these texts were, they were still written from one to two thousand years after the original autographs of the Old Testament. 1611 King James Version (known in England as The Authorized Version) is published. King James I (formerly King James VI of Scotland) authorized a new Bible to be created from the Bishop's Bible, The , Tyndale's Bible, Coverdale's Bible and . 50 scholars began in 1607 using the Hebrew Masoretic Text (900 AD) and the Greek Textus Receptus by Erasmus. 1630 , a 5th century completed manuscript was brought to England.

1830s Constanin von Tischendorf finds Greek text in monastery. Codex Sinaiticus is one of the most important hand-written ancient copies of the Greek Bible. It was written in the , in uncial letters. It came to the attention of scholars in the 19th century at the Greek Monastery of Mount Sinai, with further material discovered in the 20th century, and most of it is today in the . Originally it contained the whole of both Testaments. The Greek Old Testament survived almost complete, along with a complete New Testament, plus the of Barnabas, and portions of The Shepherd of Hermas. 1850s of Greek text dated 325 AD was found in The Vatican's library, where it had been since 1481, but not made available until now. It is written in Greek, on vellum, with uncial letters. It is one of the best manuscripts of Greek Bible. Codex Sinaiticus is its only one competitor. Until the discovery by Tischendorf of the Codex Sinaiticus, it was without a rival in the world. Early Discovery of thousands of papyri in showed that most documents written between 200-300 AD were 1900s written in Koine (common) Greek vs. the poetic form of Greek used by poets. This was the language of the people. This prompted scholars to translate from the Elizabethan English to the current language of the people. 1947 Discovery of gives 1000 yr older translations of major part of Old Testament. These were written between 250 BC and 70 AD. The scrolls are very similar to the Masoretic text, which confirms that the Masoretes took great care in its development. Other discoveries throughout the 20th century improve knowledge about the New Testament. They are written in Hebrew, and Greek, mostly on parchment, but with some written on papyrus. These manuscripts generally date between 150 BC to 70 AD. The scrolls are most commonly identified with the ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes. The Dead Sea Scrolls are traditionally divided into three groups: "Biblical" manuscripts (copies of texts from the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 40% of the identified scrolls; "Apocryphal" or "Pseudepigraphical" manuscripts (known documents from the Second Temple Period like Enoch, Jubilees, Tobit, , non-canonical , etc., that were not ultimately canonized in the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls; and "Sectarian" manuscripts (previously unknown documents that speak to the rules and beliefs of a particular group or groups within greater Judaism) like the Community Rule, War Scroll, ("Commentary") on Habakkuk, and the Rule of the Blessing, which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls. Accuracy of the New Testament Influence In "The Text Of The New Testament", and Earlier translations of the Bible, including compare the total number of variant- the Authorized King James Version, tended to rely on free verses, and the number of variants per page the Byzantine text-type, also known as the Majority among the seven major editions of the Greek NT Text. A number of translations began to use critical (Tischendorf, Westcott-Hort, von Soden, Vogels, Merk, Greek editions, beginning with the translation of Bover and Nestle-Aland) concluding 62.9%, or the in England in 1881-1885 (using 4999/7947, agreement.[9] They concluded, "Thus in 's Greek Text). A comparison of nearly two-thirds of the New Testament text, the twenty translations with 15,000 variant readings shows seven editions of the Greek New Testament which we the following percentages of agreement with the have reviewed are in complete accord, with no Nestle-Aland 27th edition (NA27): differences other than in orthographical details (e.g., the spelling of names, etc.). Verses in which any one Agreement Abbrev. Name of the seven editions differs by a single word are not with NA27 counted. This result is quite amazing, demonstrating a far greater agreement among the Greek texts of the NAS New American Standard 84% New Testament during the past century than textual ASV American Standard Version 84% scholars would have suspected […]. New American Standard NAU 83% Total Variant- Variants 1995 Update Book Number Free Percentage per NAB 83% Of Verses Verses- page Matthew 1071 642 59.9 % 6.8 ESV 83% Mark 678 306 45.1 % 10.3 Holman Christian Standard HCS 82% Luke 1151 658 57.2 % 6.9 Bible John 869 450 51.8 % 8.5 New Revised Standard NRS 82% Acts 1006 677 67.3 % 4.2 Version Romans 433 327 75.5 % 2.9 NET 80% 1 Corinth. 437 331 75.7 % 3.5 RSV 80% 2 Corinth. 206 200 78.1 % 2.8 Galatians 149 114 76.5 % 3.3 NIV New International Version 74% Ephesians 155 118 76.1 % 2.9 NJB New Bible 73% Philippians 104 73 70.2 % 2.5 REB 71% Colossians 95 69 72.6 % 3.4 JNT Jewish New Testament 70% 1 Thess 89 61 68.5 % 4.1 GNB 69% 2 Thess 47 34 72.3 % 3.1 1 Timothy 113 92 81.4 % 2.9 NLT 68% 2 Timothy 83 66 79.5 % 2.8 Douay-Rheims American DRA 61% Titus 46 33 71.7 % 2.3 edition Philemon 20 19 76.0 % 5.1 TLB 55% Hebrews 303 234 77.2 % 2.9 MRD Murdock Peshitta translation 51% James 108 66 61.6 % 5.6 NKJ New King James Bible 49% 1 Peter 105 70 66.6 % 5.7 2 Peter 61 32 52.5 % 6.5 KJV King James Version 47% 1 John 105 76 72.4 % 2.8 2 8 61.5 % 4.5 3 11 73.3 % 3.2 Jude 20 18 72.0 % 4.2 Revelation 405 214 52.8 % 5.1 Total 7947 4999 62.9 %

Hebrew Bible (or Tanakh) manuscripts

The Codex (c. 920 CE) and (c. 1008 CE) are the oldest complete Hebrew manuscripts of the Tanakh. The 1947 find at Qumran of the Dead Sea scrolls pushed the manuscript history of the Tanakh back a millennium from the two earliest complete codices (see Tanakh at Qumran). Before this discovery, the earliest extant manuscripts of the Old Testament were in Greek in manuscripts such as Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus. Out of the roughly 800 manuscripts found at Qumran, 220 are from the Tanakh. Every book of the Tanakh is represented except for the ; however, most are fragmentary. Notably, there are two scrolls of the Book of , one complete and one around 75% complete. These manuscripts generally date between 150 BCE to 70 CE. The is the most complete extant version of the Hebrew Bible. The codex was written in the 10th century CE. It is considered the most authoritative document in the masorah ("transmission"), the tradition by which the Hebrew Scriptures have been preserved from generation to generation. Surviving examples of response literature show that the Aleppo Codex was consulted by far-flung Jewish scholars throughout the Middle Ages, and modern studies have shown it to be the most accurate representation of Masoretic principles in any extant manuscript, containing very few errors among the millions of orthographic details that make up the Masoretic text. Thus, the Aleppo Codex is seen as the most authoritative source document for both the original biblical text and its vocalization. The Leningrad Codex (or Codex Leningradensis) is one of the oldest manuscripts of the complete Hebrew Bible produced according to the Tiberian mesorah; it is dated 1008 according to its . The Aleppo Codex, against which the Leningrad Codex was corrected, was the first such manuscript and is several decades older, but parts of it have been missing since 1947, making the Leningrad Codex the oldest complete codex of the Tiberian mesorah that has survived intact to this day. In modern times, the Leningrad Codex is most important as the Hebrew text reproduced in (1937) and Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (1977). It also serves scholars as a primary source for the recovery of details in the missing parts of the Aleppo Codex. Extant Tanakh manuscripts Manuscript Examples Language Date Hebrew, Paleo Hebrewand Dead Sea Scrolls Tanakh at Qumran c. 150 BCE - 70 CE Greek (Septuagint)

Codex Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, Septuagint Alexandrinus, and other earlier Greek 4th century CE papyri

Peshitta Syriac early 5th century CE

Vulgate Latin early 5th century CE

Aleppo Codex, Leningrad Masoretic Hebrew 10th century CE Codex and other incomplete mss

Oldest extant mss c.11th century CE, oldest mss Samaritan alphabet available to scholars 16th century CE

Targum Aramaic 11th century CE

The Masoretic Text (MT) is the Hebrew text of the Jewish Bible (Tanakh). It defines not just the books of the Jewish canon, but also the precise letter-text of the biblical books in Judaism, as well as their vocalization and accentuation. The MT is also widely used as the basis for translations of the Old Testament in Protestant Bibles, and in recent decades also for Catholic Bibles. The oldest extant manuscripts of the Masoretic Text date from approximately the ninth century AD, and the Aleppo Codex (once the oldest complete copy of the Masoretic Text, but now missing its Torah section) dates from the tenth century. Manuscript construction An important issue with manuscripts is preservation. Distribution of Greek manuscripts by century [10] The earliest New Testament manuscripts were New Testament written on papyrus, a plant that grew abundantly in Lectionaries the Egyptian Nile Delta. This tradition continued on Manuscripts to as late as the 8th century. Papyrus becomes Century Papyri Uncials Minuscules Uncials Minuscules brittle and deteriorates with age. The dry climate of Egypt allowed for some papyrus manuscripts to be 2nd 2 - - - - partially preserved, but, with the exception of P77, c. 200 4 - - - - no New Testament papyrus manuscript is complete, with many consisting only of a single fragmented 2nd/3rd 1 1 - - - page. 3rd 28 2 - - - However, beginning in the 4th century, parchment 3rd/4th 8 2 - - - (also called vellum) began to be the common 4th 14 14 - 1 - medium used for New Testament manuscripts. It wasn't until the 12th century that paper, which was 4th/5th 8 8 - - - invented in 1st century China, began to gain 5th 2 36 - 1 - popularity in biblical manuscripts. 5th/6th 4 10 - - - Script and other features 6th 7 51 - 3 - The handwriting found in New Testament manuscripts varies. One way of classifying 6th/7th 5 5 - 1 - handwriting is by formality: book-hand vs. cursive. 7th 8 28 - 4 - More formal, literary Greek works were often written in a distinctive style of even, capital letters called 7th/8th 3 4 - - - book-hand. Less formal writing consisted of cursive 8th 2 29 - 22 - letters which could be written quickly. Another way of dividing handwriting is between uncial (or 8th/9th - 4 - 5 - majuscule) and minuscule. The uncial letters were a 9th - 53 13 113 5 consistent height between the baseline and the cap height, while the minuscule letters had ascenders 9th/10th - 1 4 - 1 and descenders that moved past the baseline and 10th - 17 124 108 38 cap height. Generally speaking, the majuscules are earlier than the minuscules, with a dividing line 10th/11th - 3 8 3 4 roughly in the 11th century. 11th - 1 429 15 227 The earliest manuscripts had hardly, if any, 11th/12th - - 33 - 13 punctuation or breathing marks. The manuscripts 12th - - 555 6 486 also lacked word spacing, so words, sentences, and paragraphs would be a continuous string of letters 12th/13th - - 26 - 17 (scriptio continua), often with line breaks in the 13th - - 547 4 394 middle of words. Bookmaking was an expensive endeavor, and one way to reduce the number of 13th/14th - - 28 - 17 pages used was to save space. Another method 14th - - 511 - 308 employed was to abbreviate frequent words, such as the nomina sacra. Yet another method involved the 14th/15th - - 8 - 2 palimpsest, a manuscript which recycled an older 15th - - 241 - 171 manuscript. Scholars using careful examination can sometimes determine what was originally written on 15th/16th - - 4 - 2 the material of a document before it was erased to 16th - - 136 - 194 make way for a new text (for example Codex

Ephraemi Rescriptus and the Sinaitic Palimpsest). Dating the New Testament manuscripts

Earliest extant manuscripts The earliest manuscript of a New Testament text is a business card sized fragment from the of John, Rylands Library Papyrus P52, which dates to the first half of the 2nd century. The first complete copies of single New Testament books appear around 200, and the earliest complete copy of the New Testament, the Codex Sinaiticus dates to the 4th century.[26] The following table lists the earliest extant manuscript witnesses for the books of the New Testament.

The Rylands Library Papyrus P52, also known as the St John's fragment, measures only 3.5 by 2.5 inches at its widest. Manuscript Book Condition The front contains lines from the Gospel of :31–33, in Date Greek, and the back (verso) contains lines from verses 37–38. Matthew c. 200 Fragments 18:31-33 (recto) Mark c. 250 Large Fragments ΕΙΠΟΝ ΑΥΤΩ ΟΙ Luke c. 200 Fragment ΙΟΥΔΑΙΟΙ ΗΜΙΝ ΟΥΚ John c. 125-160 Fragment ΕΞΕΣΤΙΝ early 3rd ΑΠΟΚΤΕΙΝΑΙ OYΔΕΝΑ ΙΝΑ Ο Acts Fragment cent.[27] ΛΟΓΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΙΗΣΟΥ ΠΛΗΡΩΘΗ ΟΝ ΕΙΠΕΝ Romans c. 175-225 Fragments ΣΕΜΑΙΝΩΝ ΠΟΙΩ ΘΑΝΑΤΩ 1 Corinthians c. 175-225 Fragments ΗΜΕΛΛΕΝ ΑΠΟΘΝΕΣΚΕΙΝ 2 Corinthians c. 175-225 Fragments ΕΙΣΗΛΘΕΝ ΟΥΝ ΠΑΛΙΝ ΕΙΣ ΤΟ ΠΡΑΙΤΩΡΙΟΝ Ο Galatians c. 175-225 Fragments ΠΙΛΑΤΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΕΦΩΝΗΣΕΝ Ephesians c. 175-225 Fragments ΤΟΝ ΙΗΣΟΥΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΙΠΕΝ Philippians c. 175-225 Fragments ΑΥΤΩ ΣΥ ΕΙ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΤΩΝ ΙΟΥΔΑΙΩN Colossians c. 175-225 Fragments 1 Gospel of John 18:37-38 (verso) c. 175-225 Fragments Thessalonians ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΕΙΜΙ ΕΓΩ ΕΙΣ 2 ΤΟΥΤΟ ΓΕΓΕΝΝΗΜΑΙ ΚΑΙ (ΕΙΣ ΤΟΥΤΟ) ΕΛΗΛΥΘΑ ΕΙΣ ΤΟΝ 3rd/4th cent. Fragment Thessalonians ΚΟΣΜΟΝ ΙΝΑ ΜΑΡΤΥΡΗΣΩ ΤΗ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ ΠΑΣ Ο ΩΝ 1 Timothy c. 350 Complete ΕΚ ΤΗΣ ΑΛΗΘΕIΑΣ ΑΚΟΥΕΙ ΜΟΥ ΤΗΣ 2 Timothy c. 350 Complete ΦΩΝΗΣ Titus c. 200 Fragment ΛΕΓΕΙ ΑΥΤΩ Ο ΠΙΛΑΤΟΣ Philemon 3rd cent. Fragment ΤΙ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΑΛΗΘΕΙΑ ΚΑΙ ΤΟΥΤΟ ΕΙΠΩΝ Hebrews c. 175-225 Fragments ΠΑΛΙΝ ΕΞΗΛΘΕΝ James 3rd cent. Fragment ΠΡΟΣ ΤΟΥΣ ΙΟΥΔΑΙΟΥΣ 1 Peter 3rd/4th cent. Fragments ΚΑΙ ΛΕΓΕΙ ΑΥΤΟΙΣ ΕΓΩ ΟΥΔΕΜΙΑΝ 2 Peter 3rd/4th cent. Fragments ΕΥΡΙΣΚΩ ΕΝ ΑΥΤΩ 1 John 3rd cent. Fragment ΑΙΤΙΑΝ 2 John 3rd/4th cent. Fragment 3 John c. 350 Complete Jude 3rd/4th cent. Fragments Revelation c. 275 Fragment

The Bible comprises 24 books for Jews, 66 for Protestants, 73 for Catholics, and 78 for most OrthodoxChristians. These books vary in length from a single page of modern type to dozens of pages. All but the shortest are divided into chapters, generally a page or two in length. Each is further divided into verses of a few short lines or sentences. Pasuk (plural pesukim) is the Hebrew term for verse. The Jewish divisions of the Hebrew text differ at various points from those used by Christians. For instance, in Jewish tradition, the ascriptions to many Psalms are regarded as independent verses, making 116 more verses, whereas the established Christian practice is to count and number each Psalm ascription together with the first verse following it. Some chapter divisions also occur in different places, e.g. 1 Chronicles 5:27-41 in Hebrew Bibles is numbered as 1 Chron 6:1-15 in Christian translations.

Chapters The original manuscripts did not contain the chapter and verse divisions in the numbered form familiar to modern readers. Some portions of the original texts were logically divided into parts following the ; for instance, the earliest known copies of the use Hebrew letters for paragraph divisions. (This was different from the acrostic structure of certain texts following the Hebrew alphabet, such as Psalm 119 and the .) There are other divisions from various sources which are different from what we use today. The Old Testament began to be put into sections before the Babylonian Captivity (586 BC) with the five books of Moses being put into a 154-section reading program to be used in a three-year cycle. Later (before 536 BC) the Law was put into 54 sections and 669 sub-divisions for reading. By the time of the Council of Nicaea in AD 325, the New Testament had been divided into paragraphs, although the divisions were different from the modern Bible. An important canon of the New Testament was proclaimed by Pope Damasus I in the Roman synod of 374. Pope Damasus also induced Jerome, a priest from Antioch, to undertake his famous translation of the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments, from Hebrew and Greek into Latin, the official language of the time. This translation is known as the Vulgate. The Church continued to finance the very expensive process of copying and providing copies of the Bible to local churches and communities from that point up to and beyond the invention of the printing press, which greatly reduced the cost of producing copies of the Scriptures. Churchmen Archbishop Stephen Langton and Cardinal Hugo de Sancto Caro determined different schemas for systematic division of the Bible between 1227 and 1248. It is the system of Archbishop Langton on which the modern chapter divisions are based.[1][2] Verses It is presently unknown how early the Hebrew verse divisions were incorporated into the books that comprise the . However, it is beyond dispute that for at least a thousand years the Tanakhhas contained an extensive system of multiple levels of section, paragraph, and phrasal divisions that were indicated in Masoretic vocalization and cantillation markings. One of the most frequent of these was a special type of punctuation, the sof passuq, symbol for a full stop or sentence break, resembling the colon mark (:) of English and Latin orthography. With the advent of the printing press and the translation of theBible into English, Old Testament versifications were made that correspond predominantly with the existing Hebrew full stops, with a few isolated exceptions. A product of meticulous labour and unwearying attention, the Old Testament verse divisions stand today in essentially the same places as they have been passed down since antiquity. Most attribute these to Rabbi Isaac Nathan around 1440.[2] The first person to divide New Testament chapters into verses was Italian Dominican biblical scholar Santi Pagnini (1470–1541), a system that was never widely adopted.[3] created an alternate numbering in his 1551 edition of the Greek New Testament. The first English New Testament to use the verse divisions was a 1557 translation by William Whittingham (c. 1524-1579). The first Bible in English to use both chapters and verses was the Geneva Bible published shortly afterwards in 1560. These verse divisions soon gained acceptance as a standard way to notate verses, and have since been used in nearly all English Bibles. Statistics

The following apply to the King James Version of Bible in its modern Protestant form, i.e. including the New Testament but none of thedeuterocanonical books.

Chapters ƒ There are 929 chapters in the Old Testament and 260 chapters in the New Testament. This gives a total of 1,189 chapters (on average, 18 per book). ƒ Psalm 117 is the middle chapter of the Bible, being the 595th Chapter.[4] ƒ Psalm 117 is also the shortest chapter of the Bible. ƒ Psalm 119 is the longest chapter of the Bible. Verses ƒ There are 23,145 verses in the Old Testament and 7,957 verses in the New Testament. This gives a total of 31,102 verses,[5] which is an average of a little more than 26 verses per chapter. ƒ Contrary to popular belief, Psalm 118 does not contain the middle verse of the Bible. The King James Version has an even number of verses (31,102), with the two middle verses being :1-2.[6] ƒ :25 ("Eber, Peleg, Reu") is the shortest verse in the Old Testament. ƒ :16 ("παντοτε χαιρετε", "Rejoice always") is the shortest verse in the original Greek of the New Testament.[7] ƒ :8 ("Dicet enim") is the shortest verse in the Latin Vulgate.[8] ƒ :35 ("") is the shortest verse in most English translations. Some translations — including the New International Version, New Living Translation, New Life Version, Holman and New International Reader's Version — render Job 3:2 as "He said". However, this is a translators' condensation of the Hebrew which literally translated is "And Job answered and said." ƒ :9 is the longest verse in the Masoretic Text. The discovery of several manuscripts at Qumran (in the Dead Sea Scrolls) has reopened what is considered the most original text of 1 Samuel 11; if one believes that those manuscripts better preserve the text, several verses in 1 Samuel 11 surpass Esther 8:9 in length. The Old Testament of the Hebrew Bible compares manuscript versions of the following sources (dates refer to the oldest extant manuscripts in each family):

Manuscript Examples Language Date Hebrew, Paleo Hebrew and Dead Sea Scrolls Tanakh at Qumran c. 150 BCE - 70 CE Greek(Septuagint) Codex Vaticanus, Codex Septuagint Greek 4th century CE Sinaiticus and other earlier papyri Peshitta Syriac early 5th century CE Vulgate Latin early 5th century CE Aleppo Codex, Leningrad Codex and Masoretic Hebrew 10th century CE other incomplete mss Oldest extant mss c.11th century CE, oldest mss Samaritan Pentateuch Samaritan alphabet available to scholars 16th century CE Aramaic 11th century CE

The New Testament The New Testament has been preserved in more than 5,300 Greek manuscripts, 10,000 Latin manuscripts and 9,300 manuscripts in various other ancient languages including Syriac, Slavic, Ethiopic and Armenian. New Testament textual critics have sorted the witnesses into three major groups, called text-types. The most common division today is:

Text type Date Characteristics Bible version This family constitutes a group of early and well-regarded texts, including Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus. Most of this tradition appear to come from around Alexandria, Egypt. It The Alexandrian contains readings that are often terse, shorter, somewhat NIV, NAB, TNIV, text-type 2nd-4th rough, less harmonised, and generally more difficult. The family NASB, RSV, ESV, (also called century CE was once thought to be a very carefully edited third century EBR, NWT, LB, ASV Minority Text) recension but now is believed to be merely the result of a ,NC, GNB carefully controlled and supervised process of copying and transmission. It underlies most modern translations of the New Testament. This is also very early and comes from a wide geographical area stretching from North Africa to Italy from Gaul to . It is The Western text- 3rd-9th found in Greek manuscripts and in the Latin translations used type century CE by the Western church. It is much less controlled than the Alexandrian family and its witnesses are seen to be more prone to paraphrase and other corruptions. This is a group of around 80% of all manuscripts, the majority of which are comparatively very late in the tradition. It had KJV, NKJV, The Byzantine text- become dominant at from the 5th century on Tyndale, type 5th-16th and was used throughout the Byzantine church. It contains the Coverdale, Geneva, (also called century CE most harmonistic readings, paraphrasing and significant Bishops' Bible, Majority Text) additions, most of which are believed to be secondary readings. Douay-Rheims, JB, It underlies the Textus Receptus used for most Reformation-era NJB, OSB translations of the New Testament.

Minority Text versus Majority Text The New Testament portion of the English translation known as the King James Version was based on theTextus Receptus, a Greek text prepared by Erasmus based on a few late medieval Greek manuscripts of the Byzantine text- type. However, following Westcott and Hort, most modern New Testament textual critics have concluded that the Byzantine text-type was formalised at a later date than the Alexandrian and Western text-types. Among the other types, the Alexandrian text-type (Minority Text) is viewed as more pure than the Western and Byzantine text-types, and so one of the central tenets of current New Testament textual criticism is that one should follow the readings of the Alexandrian texts unless those of the other types are clearly superior. Most modern New Testament translations now use an Eclectic Greek text that is closest to the Alexandrian text-type. The United Bible Societies's Greek New Testament (UBS4) and Nestle Aland (NA 27) are accepted by most of the academic community as the best attempt at reconstructing the original texts of the Greek NT. A minority position represented by The Greek New Testament According to the Majority Text edition by Zane C. Hodges and Arthur L. Farstad argues that the Byzantine text-type (Majority Text) represents an earlier text-type than the surviving Alexandrian texts. The argument states that the far greater number of surviving later Byzantine manuscripts implies an equivalent preponderance of Byzantine texts amongst lost earlier manuscripts; and hence that a critical reconstruction of the predominant text of the Byzantine tradition would have a superior claim to being closest to the autographs.

Luke 11:2 in Codex Sinaiticus

A page from Codex Vaticanus shows a medieval (the marginal note between columns one and two) criticizing a predecessor for changing the text: "Fool and knave, leave the old reading, don't change it!"

From the Aleppo Codex, Deuteronomy.

John 1:1-7 Codex Alexandrinus Codex Ebnerianus, Minuscule 105, (12th), :5b-10 Byzantine illuminated manuscript, 1020

A Brief Schematic History of the English Bible

Bible Bible Sample Verse Bible Bible Sample Verse Translation :13 Translation 2 Corinthians 10:13 Amplified® We, on the other hand, will not boast beyond our New We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, Bible (AMP) legitimate province and proper limit, but will keep International but will confine our boasting to the field God has within the limits [of our commission which] God has Version (NIV) assigned to us, a field that reaches even to you. allotted us as our measuring line and which reaches New We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, and includes even you. International but will confine our boasting to the field God has English But we will not boast beyond limits, but will boast Version (NIV) assigned to us, a field that reaches even to you. Standard only with regard to the area of influence God New King We, however, will not boast beyond measure, but Version (ESV) assigned to us, to reach even you. James Version within the limits of the sphere which God appointed Good News As for us, however, our boasting will not go beyond (NKJV) us--a sphere which especially includes you. Translation certain limits; it will stay within the limits of the New Living But we will not boast of authority we do not have. (GNT) work which God has set for us, and this includes Translation Our goal is to stay within the boundaries of God's our work among you. (NLT) plan for us, and this plan includes our working there Holman We, however, will not boast beyond measure, but with you. Christian according to the measure of the area of ministry New Revised We, however, will not boast beyond limits, but will Standard that God has assigned to us, which reaches even Standard keep within the field that God has assigned to us, Bible (HCSB) you. Edition to reach out even as far as you. King James But we will not boast of things without our (NRSV) Version (KJV) measure, but according to the measure of the rule The Message We're not, understand, putting ourselves in a which God hath distributed to us, a measure to league with those who boast that they're our reach even unto you. superiors. We wouldn't dare do that. But in all this New American But we will not boast beyond measure but will keep comparing and grading and competing, the quite Bible (NAB) to the limits God has apportioned us, namely to miss the point. We aren't making outrageous claims reach even to you. here. We're sticking to the limits of what God has set for us. But there can be no question that those New American But we will not boast beyond our measure, but limits reach to and include you. Standard, within the measure of the sphere which God Updated apportioned to us as a measure, to reach even as Todays New We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, (NASB) far as you. International but will confine our boasting to the sphere of Version service God himself has assigned to us, a sphere New But I won't brag more than I should. Instead, I will (TNIV) that also includes you. International brag only about what I have done in the area God Reader's has given me. It is an area that reaches all the way Version (NIrV) to you. A “parallel” Bible contains multiple versions side by side. The earliest eample is the . Hexapla (Ἑξαπλά: Gr. for "sixfold") is the term for the edition of the Old Testament compiled by of Alexandria, which placed side by side: ƒ Hebrew ƒ Hebrew transliterated into Greek characters ƒ Aquila of Sinope ƒ the Ebionite ƒ Septuagint ƒ