When was the Bible Written?

Christians claim that the New Testament was written about eighteen hundred years ago, by the disciples of Jesus Christ, who were personally acquainted with him; and that the Old Testament was written in Hebrew by the Jews several hundred years before that time. While infidels do not pretend seriously to dispute this, they often put on a look of great wisdom, and raise many doubts concerning it. They say, "Who knows that this is so? Where is the proof of it?" Some suggest that King James was the one who first collected the books of the Bible; others say that Constantine did it, while others say that there is nothing certain about it anyway. But it will be noticed that the wisest of them never dare argue the question with another; they never pretend to show who did write these books, nor just when they were written. We might leave the question right here, and demand of them to prove that these books were not written at the time and by the persons claimed by Christians. But we should have to wait forever. They will never attempt it.

We shall now show the reader that there is most overwhelming testimony conclusively proving that the Bible was written at the time claimed by Christians, and by the very men claimed by them to have written it. Our motto is, one thing at a time, and the nearest one first. We will begin then, with an undeniable fact:—

The Bible exists today. It lies upon our tables; it is read in our Sabbath-schools, and is preached from every week in thousands of pulpits. You can buy it in any bookstore throughout the world. Who will deny these facts? No one. But further, the Bible not only exists today in the English language, but it is translated into over two hundred and fifty different languages, including all the great languages of the world. But more than that, all the great leading civilized nations of this age not only receive it as the word of God, but have largely founded their laws upon its teaching. This is true of the United States, of England, of Germany, of France, of Russia, etc. There are about four hundred million people today who receive and believe this book. "Is there any other book so generally read, so greatly beloved, so zealously photographed, so widely diffused, so uniform in its results, and so powerful and blessed in its influences? Do you know any? If you cannot name any book which in these respects equals the Bible, then it stands out clear and distinct, and separate from all other authorship; and with an increased emphasis comes our question: Who wrote it?" Fables of Infidelity, p. 82.

Reader, is it not worth our while to carefully inquire where such a wonderful book as this came from? Let us go back a little farther in the history of the world. John Wesley, of whom everybody has heard as being a strong believer in this book, and a great Christian preacher, lived about one hundred years ago. Did he not make the Bible? No; because his father had it when he was a child, and out of it his mother taught him when he sat upon her knee. Wesley was the father of the Methodist church, but the Episcopal church existed two hundred years before John Wesley's time, and it had the very Bible which Wesley used. So we must go still farther back to find its origin.

Going back, then, about three hundred years, to the time of King James of England, we find that by his authority some forty-seven learned men were selected to translate the Bible into English. This reminds me that I have heard infidels state that King James was the man who first had the books of the Bible collected into one book and translated into English. Any intelligent reader would laugh at such a foolish claim. See how easily its absurdity can be shown. This same Bible was translated into the English language back, far back, of that, by Wycliffe, more than three hundred years before King James' time. So King James was not the author of the Bible, nor the one who first collected its books or translated it into English.

Some three hundred and fifty years ago, Martin Luther translated that same Bible into the German language. Luther found it printed in the Latin language, and it was by the reading of this book that he was converted to God. Nor was it a rare or new volume in Luther's day. Far from it. At that period it was scattered nearly all over the known world, and was implicitly believed by the leading civilized nations of the earth, as it is today. There were many millions of Catholics, and they all received it; and so there were millions of Greeks, who received it. Besides this, it was translated into scores of different languages, and circulated in many lands.

ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS OF THE BIBLE.

Another proof that the Bible was written many hundred years ago is found in the fact that we now "have nine hundred and seventy-two entire manuscripts of the different volumes of the Greek Testament, of which forty-seven are more than one thousand years old." Hist. of the Books of the Bible, by Prof. Stowe, p. 63. Among these is the Alexandrian manuscript, written about A.D. 325; the Vatican manuscript, written about A.D. 300; the Sinaitic manuscript, written at least as early as either of the other two; the Ephraim manuscript, about A.D. 350; and the Beza manuscript, written about A.D. 490.

"Here, then, we have accessible to us five manuscript copies of the Greek Testament, the most recent more than twelve hundred years old, and the most ancient reaching to an age of fifteen centuries. The proudest and most costly architectural structures of men have within that period either crumbled and moldered away, or become obsolete and unfit for their original use, though built of the most solid materials and put together with the utmost care; while we of this age can read the same fragile page of books which were in the hands of men forty-five or fifty generations before us." Hist. of the Books of the Bible, by Prof. Stowe, p. 78.

"It is about two hundred years from the death of the apostle John to the first full manuscript we have of the whole New Testament, though we have fragments and quotations from the very earliest periods, from the time of the apostle John himself." Ibid. p. 61. It is absolutely certain, then, that the very last of the books of the Bible were written, and in general circulation, and were read throughout all the churches, as early as fifteen hundred years ago.

This takes us back to the middle of the fourth century, or to A.D. 350. Here we might quote numerous celebrated authors of that very period, who not only mentioned the Bible, and quoted copiously from it, but wrote commentaries upon it. Thus did the celebrated scholar Jerome, who was born A.D. 330 and died A.D. 420, one of the most learned of the church fathers, particularly in everything pertaining to the Bible. His greatest work was the revision of the common Latin translation of the Bible, called the Vulgate. Besides this he wrote prefaces for the several books of Scripture, containing all that could be ascertained concerning the authors, times of writing, etc. He dwelt a long time in Palestine, the very place where Jesus and the apostles lived and taught. He gives a catalogue of the books of the New Testament in which he mentions the same books which we now have. The old Bible, then, was not new at that date.

Passing over many witnesses which we might introduce, let us go back a little farther, to another important era, to the Council of Nice, A.D. 325. This is one of the most noted eras in the history of the church or of the world. It was just the time when the paganism of the Roman empire gave way before the triumphant progress of Christianity, after a struggle of three hundred years. Constantine, the Roman emperor, had publicly indorsed Christianity just previous to this epoch. A great council of bishops, priests, and leading ministers of the world, was convened at Nice. Three hundred and eighteen bishops of all nations, from Spain to Persia, were gathered here. The Emperor Constantine presided in person. Many days were spent in earnestly discussing the doctrine of the trinity, and other matters pertaining to Christianity. The list of the books of the Bible was carefully reexamined by this council, and again published to the world. "Ah," says the infidel, "that is probably the time the Bible was made. Here is the origin of Christianity, or at least this is the council which decided what books should be received as Scripture, and what should not." But there is not a word of truth in either of these assertions. Let us look at the facts:-

"There did exist then, undeniably, in the year 325, large numbers of Christian churches in the Roman empire, sufficiently numerous to make it politic, in the opinion of infidels, for a candidate for the empire to profess Christianity; sufficiently powerful to secure his success, notwithstanding the desperate struggles of the heathen party; and sufficiently religious, or, if you like, superstitious, to make it politic for an emperor and his politicians to give up the senate, the court, the camp, the chase, the theater, and weary themselves with long prayers and longer speeches of preachers about Bible religion. Now that is certainly a remarkable fact, and all the more remarkable if we now inquire, How came it so? for these men, preachers, prince, and people, were brought up to worship Jupiter and the thirty thousand gods of Olympus, after the heathen fashion, and leave the care of religion to heathen priests, who never troubled their heads about books or doctrines after they had offered their sacrifices. In all the records of the world there is no instance of a general council of heathen priests to settle the religion of their people. How happens it, then, that the human race has of a sudden waked up to such a strange sense of the folly of idolatry and the value of religion? The Council of Nice and the Emperor Constantine and his counselors making a Bible, is a proof of a wonderful revolution in the world's religion—a phenomenon far more surprising than if the Secretary of State, and the Senate, and the President should leave the Capitol and post off to Boston, to attend the meetings of a Methodist Conference assembled to make a hymn book. Now, what is the cause of this remarkable conversion of prince, priests, and people? How did they all get religion? How did they get it so suddenly? How did they get so much of it?

"The infidel gives no answer, except to tell us that the austerity, purity, and zeal of the first Christians, their good discipline, their belief in the resurrection of the body, and the general judgment, and their persuasion that Christ and his apostles wrought miracles, had made a great many converts. [Gibbon.] This is just as if I inquired how a great fire originated, and you should tell me that it burned fast because it was very hot. What I want to know is, how it happened that these licentious Greeks, and Romans, and Asiatics became austere and pure,—how these frivolous philosophers suddenly became so zealous about religion—what implanted the belief of the resurrection of the body, and the judgment to come, in the skeptical minds of these heathen scoffers— and how did the pagans of Italy, Egypt, Spain, Germany, Britian, come to believe in the miracles of one who lived hundreds of years before, and thousands of miles away, or to care a straw whether the written accounts of them were true or false? According to the infidel account, the Council of Nice and the Emperor Constantine's Bible-making is a most extraordinary business—a phenomenon without any natural cause, and they will allow no supernatural—a greater miracle than any recorded in the Bible.

"If we inquire, however, of the parties attending that council, what the state of the case is, we shall learn that they believed—whether truly or erroneously we are not now inquiring, but they believed—that a teacher sent from God had appeared in Palestine two hundred and ninety years before, and had taught this religion which they had embraced." Fables of Infidelity, pp. 87, 88.

But a difference of opinion had grown up as to the exact nature of this teacher in whom they believed; whether he were an angel from heaven, or God himself. They assembled to discuss this solemn question, and "through the whole of the discussions, both sides appealed to the writings of the apostles, as being then well known, and of unquestioned authority with every one who held the Christian name. These facts, being utterly indisputable, are acknowledged by all persons, infidel or Christian, at all acquainted with history."

"Here, then, we have the books of the New Testament at the Council of Nice well known to the whole world; and the council, so far from giving any authority to them, bowing to theirs—both Arian and Orthodox, with one consent acknowledging that the whole Christian world received them as the writings of the apostles of Christ. There were venerable men of fourscore and ten at that council; if these books had been first introduced in their lifetime, they must have known it. There were men there whose parents had heard the Scriptures read in church from their childhood, and so could not be imposed upon with a new Bible. The New Testament could not be less than three generations old, else one or other of the disputants would have exposed the novelty of its introduction from his own information. The Council of Nice, then, did not make the New Testament. It was a book well known, ancient, and of undoubted authority among all Christians, ages before that council. The existence of New Testament Scriptures, then, ages before the Council of Nice, is a great fact."—Fables, pp. 89, 90.

We will have more to say on this point hereafter.