How the Bible was Created
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 2 Timothy 3:16
So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. Isaiah 55:11
The Bible is the inspired, infallible, and eternal word of God, which was penned by the servants of God, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. Matthewe 24:35
The first instance of God’s Word in writing was when God Himself wrote it down in the ten commandments on the stone tablets as recorded in Exodus 24:12
And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them.
The first five books of the Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, & Deuteronomy are called the “Torah”
Approximately 500 BC, the 39 Books that make up the Old Testament were completed, and continued to be preserved in Hebrew on scrolls.
Jesus and the apostles read and taught from the Old Testament that was written on these scrolls.
After the resurrection of Christ and the death of the apostles around the end of the First Century AD, the New Testament had been completed. It was preserved in the Greek language on papyrus,
These groupings of papyrus are called a “codex”
As copies of these manuscripts have been collected over the centuries, they have formed two groups.
The ‘Majority Text’ makes up 95% of 5,300+ existing manuscripts that are in agreement with each other and form the basis for the Textus Receptus which is also called the ‘Received Text’. The Textus Receptus is the text which the King James Bible translators used.
The ‘Minority Text’ consists of only 5% of the existing manuscripts. The main texts, Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, contradict each other over 3,000 times just in the gospels alone, and they disagree with the ‘Majority Text’ in 13,000 places.
Amazingly, modern Bible versions like the NIV and ESV are based on these ‘Minority Text’ manuscripts.
The first hand-written English language Bible was produced in 1383 AD by John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian. Wycliffe was well known throughout Europe for his opposition to the teaching of the organized Church of that era. The Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English, that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river.
In 1525 the Tyndale New Testament by William Tyndale became the first printed edition of the scripture in the English language to use the printing press. This enabled the distribution of several thousand copies. Tyndale was a gifted linguist and was fluent in French, Greek, Hebrew, German, Italian, Latin, and Spanish, in addition to English.
One of Tyndale's famous quotes was, "I defy the Pope, and all his laws; and if God spares my life, ere many years, I will cause the boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost!" Tyndale's works were burned as soon as the Bishop could confiscate them, but the printing press continued to print Tyndale's New Testament with one copy even ending up in the bedroom of King Henry VIII.
The Catholic church declared the Tyndale New Testament contained thousands of errors as they torched hundreds of these New Testaments which were confiscated by the clergy, when in fact, they actually contained no errors at all. Anyone caught with a copy of Tyndale's Bible was put to death by burning at the stake.
In 1536, after being hunted as a fugitive for many years, Tyndale was caught and condemned to be burned to death at the stake. Tyndale was strangled to death while tied at the stake, and then his dead body was burned.
In the 1550's, the Church at Geneva, Switzerland, was very sympathetic to refugees like Myles Coverdale and John Foxe (publisher of the famous Foxe's Book of Martyrs), as well as Thomas Sampson, William Whittingham and John Knox, who determined to produce a Bible that would educate their families while they continued in exile.
Their work known as the Geneva Bible was first published in 1560. The Geneva Bible was the first Bible to add numbered verses to the chapters, so that referencing specific passages would be easier.
In 1604 King James 'authorized' a new translation to be read in churches in England and beyond after it was first published in 1611 A.D. Later known as the 'Authorized Version' in 1814, the King James Version became a standard among English-speaking Christians.
The King James Version is considered one of the most accurate English translations in existence. A skilled committee of 54 translators worked for 7 years to carefully complete the King James translation project. They were "the best of the best" that England had to offer in Hebrew, Greek language studies, and biblical scholarship, with approximately a fourth of the translators being Puritans.
From approximately 1700 to 1950, the King James Bible was the preeminent book in England and America.
This page merely scratches the surface of the dedicated men of God who worked tirelessly, with some paying the ultimate sacrifice, to bring the Word of God to the common people.
Please visit our videos section for some very enlightening films on this subject.