Over centuries, billions of people have read the Bible. Scholars have spent their lives studying it, while rabbis, ministers and priests have focused on interpreting, teaching and preaching from its pages.
As the sacred text for two of the worlds leading religions, Judaism and Christianity, as well as other faiths, the Bible has also had an unmatched influence on literatureparticularly in the Western world. It has been translated into nearly 700 languages, and while exact sales figures are hard to come by, its widely considered to be the worlds best-selling book.
But despite the Bibles undeniable influence, mysteries continue to linger over its origins. Even after nearly 2,000 years of its existence, and centuries of investigation by biblical scholars, we still dont know with certainty who wrote its various texts, when they were written or under what circumstances.
READ MORE: The Bible Says Jesus Was Real. What Other Proof Exists?
The Old Testament, or Hebrew Bible, narrates the history of the people of Israel over about a millennium, beginning with Gods creation of the world and humankind, and contains the stories, laws and moral lessons that form the basis of religious life for both Jews and Christians. For at least 1,000 years, both Jewish and Christian tradition held that a single author wrote the first five books of the BibleGenesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomywhich together are known as the Torah (Hebrew for instruction) and the Pentateuch (Greek for five scrolls). That single author was believed to be Moses, the Hebrew prophet who led the Israelites out of captivity in Egypt and guided them across the Red Sea toward the Promised Land.
Yet nearly from the beginning, readers of the Bible observed that there were things in the so-called Five Books of Moses that Moses himself could not possibly have witnessed: His own death, for example, occurs near the end of Deuteronomy. A volume of the Talmud, the collection of Jewish laws recorded between the 3rd and 5th centuries A.D., dealt with this inconsistency by explaining that Joshua (Moses successor as leader of the Israelites) likely wrote the verses about Moses death.
READ MORE: Inside the Conversion Tactics of the Early Christian Church
Rembrandt van Rijn, painting of Moses Breaking the Tablets of the Law, 1659.
Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images
That's one opinion among many, says Joel Baden, a professor at Yale Divinity School and author of The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis. But they're already asking the questionwas it possible or not possible for [Moses] to have written them?
By the time the Enlightenment began in the 17th century, most religious scholars were more seriously questioning the idea of Moses authorship, as well as the idea that the Bible could possibly have been the work of any single author. Those first five books were filled with contradictory, repetitive material, and often seemed to tell different versions of the Israelites story even within a single section of text.
As Baden explains, the classic example of this confusion is the story of Noah and the flood (Genesis 6:9). You read along and you say, I dont know how many animals Noah took on the ark with him, he says. In this sentence it says two of every animal. In this sentence, he takes two of some animals and 14 of any animals. Similarly, the text records the length of the flood as 40 days in one place, and 150 days in another.
READ MORE: Discovery Shows Early Christians Didn't Always Take the Bible Literally
To explain the Bibles contradictions, repetitions and general idiosyncrasies, most scholars today agree that the stories and laws it contains were communicated orally, through prose and poetry, over centuries. Starting around the 7th century B.C., different groups, or schools, of authors wrote them down at different times, before they were at some point (probably during the first century B.C.) combined into the single, multi-layered work we know today.
Of the three major blocks of source material that scholars agree comprise the Bibles first five books, the first was believed to have been written by a group of priests, or priestly authors, whose work scholars designate as P. A second block of source material is known as Dfor Deuteronomist, meaning the author(s) of the vast majority of the book of Deuteronomy. The two of them are not really related to each other in any significant way, Baden explains, except that they're both giving laws and telling a story of Israel's early history.
According to some scholars, including Baden, the third major block of source material in the Torah can be divided into two different, equally coherent schools, named for the word that each uses for God: Yahweh and Elohim. The stories using the name Elohim are classified as E, while the others are called J (for Jawhe, the German translation of Yahweh). Other scholars don't agree on two complete sources for the non-priestly material. Instead, says Baden, they see a much more gradual process, in which material from numerous smaller sources was layered together over a longer period of time.
READ MORE: Why Bibles Given to Slaves Omitted Most of the Old Testament
Just as the Old Testament chronicles the story of the Israelites in the millennium or so leading up to the birth of Jesus Christ, the New Testament records Jesuss life, from his birth and teachings to his death and later resurrection, a narrative that forms the fundamental basis of Christianity. Beginning around 70 A.D., about four decades after Jesuss crucifixion (according to the Bible), four anonymously written chronicles of his life emerged that would become central documents in the Christian faith. Named for Jesuss most devoted earthly disciples, or apostlesMatthew, Mark, Luke and Johnthe four canonical Gospels were traditionally thought to be eyewitness accounts of Jesuss life, death and resurrection.
12th-13th century depiction of evangelists Luke and Matthew writing the Gospels.
DeAgostini/Getty Images
But for more than a century, scholars have generally agreed that the Gospels, like many of the books of the New Testament, were not actually written by the people to whom they are attributed. In fact, it seems clear that the stories that form the basis of Christianity were first communicated orally, and passed down from generation to generation, before they were collected and written down.
READ MORE: What Did Jesus Look Like?
Names are attached to the titles of the Gospels (the Gospel according to Matthew), writes Bible scholar Bart Ehrman in his book Jesus, Interrupted. But these titles are later additions to the Gospels, provided by editors and scribes to inform readers who the editors thought were the authorities behind the different versions.
Traditionally, 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament were attributed to Paul the Apostle, who famously converted to Christianity after meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus and wrote a series of letters that helped spread the faith throughout the Mediterranean world. But scholars now agree on the authenticity of only seven of Pauls epistles: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, Philemon. These are believed to have been written between A.D. 50-60, making them the earliest known evidence for Christianity. Authors of the later epistles may have been followers of Paul, who used his name to lend authenticity to the works.
By the 4th century A.D., Christianity had been established as the dominant religion in the Western world, and the New and Old Testaments as its most sacred texts. In the centuries to come, the Bible would only become more central to the lives and faiths of millions of people around the world, despite the mystery surrounding its origins and the ongoing, complex debate over its authorship.
More here:
Who Wrote the Bible? - History
- How to beat the virus? It's in the Talmud - Jewish News [Last Updated On: July 12th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 12th, 2020]
- How Two-and-a-Half Tribes Ended Up Over the Jordan - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: July 13th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 13th, 2020]
- Don't hide from the sins of St. Louis - America Magazine [Last Updated On: July 13th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 13th, 2020]
- In Defense of King Louis IX | Thomas F. Madden - First Things [Last Updated On: July 13th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 13th, 2020]
- Jesus in the Talmud - Wikipedia [Last Updated On: July 13th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 13th, 2020]
- Learning From the Past: Reckless Jewish Kings Through the Ages - Algemeiner [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- The Oral Law -Talmud & Mishna - Jewish Virtual Library [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- The huppah - a beloved object of Jewish art - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- Fast of the 17th of Tammuz: Times and customs - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- Peter Beinart's one state solution sounds so perfect it's practically utopian - Haaretz [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- No One Will Change Your Life Like a Teacher - Algemeiner [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- 11 Thoughts and Sayings of Rav Simcha Zissel Ziv Broide the Alter of Kelm - Yeshiva World News [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- Dozens of Jewish graves and tombstones desecrated in the Jewish cemetery in Worms, one of the oldest in Europe - European Jewish Press [Last Updated On: July 14th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 14th, 2020]
- Death to Jews, swastikas drawn on gravestones in southern France - Forward [Last Updated On: July 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 17th, 2020]
- Barbra Streisand classic Yentl returns to big screen at The Drive In - Jewish News [Last Updated On: July 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 17th, 2020]
- Not all the statues need to come down - Forward [Last Updated On: July 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 17th, 2020]
- Nick Cannon and several other Black celebrities attended Farrakhans July 4 speech - Forward [Last Updated On: July 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 17th, 2020]
- Allford: Achoo! Sneezing through the centuries - The Kingston Whig-Standard [Last Updated On: July 18th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 18th, 2020]
- Q & A: Making Up For What We Missed (Part XIII) - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: July 18th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 18th, 2020]
- The seed that is sown | Community And Lifestyles - atchisonglobenow.com [Last Updated On: July 18th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 18th, 2020]
- The End of Anti-Semitism - Aish [Last Updated On: July 18th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 18th, 2020]
- Eicha - the question that reverberates throughout history - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: July 18th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 18th, 2020]
- A Traditional Jewish Approach to the Problem of Evil - My Jewish Learning [Last Updated On: July 19th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 19th, 2020]
- My article was controversial - and I talked to the haters - Forward [Last Updated On: July 19th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 19th, 2020]
- Guestwords: Let There Be Laughter - East Hampton Star [Last Updated On: July 19th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 19th, 2020]
- The Terrifying Feeling of Being Alone in the World - Aish [Last Updated On: July 19th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 19th, 2020]
- Faith Leaders Demand Action From New York City's Mayor to Ensure Safe Reentry for Those Leaving Rikers Island During COVID-19 Pandemic - Press Release... [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- Revision 1.13 The Mishnah and the Talmuds | Dan Peterson - Patheos [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- What's the truth behind wearing face masks? - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- 12 Facts Every Jew Should Know About the 9 Days - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- Musings of a rabbi in the period of pandemic - Jewish News [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- The Kingly Roots of Kitchri: Lentils With Love - Jewish Journal [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- We've got what it takes to endure these difficult days J. - The Jewish News of Northern California [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- Learn About the Holy Temple in Depth - Texts and Classes Describing the Holy Temple - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- Nation of Islam posts Farrakhans call for Jews to ditch the Talmud & be saved amid Nick Cannon antisemitism debacle - RT [Last Updated On: July 21st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 21st, 2020]
- Are Reports Of The Persecution Of Yemenite Jews Completely False? - Yeshiva World News [Last Updated On: July 23rd, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 23rd, 2020]
- There's space in the Jewish community for queer people. I just had to find it. - JTA News - Jewish Telegraphic Agency [Last Updated On: July 23rd, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 23rd, 2020]
- Glimpsing The Beis HaMikdash - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: July 23rd, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 23rd, 2020]
- Judaism, baseball, and the drive for normal - The Jewish Standard [Last Updated On: July 23rd, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 23rd, 2020]
- Digital Archive Takes Talmudic Approach to Americas Founding Texts - Jewish Week [Last Updated On: July 25th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 25th, 2020]
- Hope is a power you don't have to relinquish - St. Louis Jewish Light [Last Updated On: July 25th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 25th, 2020]
- In the Talmud, God admits Hes wrong. Theres a lesson there about free speech. - Forward [Last Updated On: July 25th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 25th, 2020]
- The Pope who Printed the Talmud - Aish [Last Updated On: July 25th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 25th, 2020]
- Love, community, mysticism: The intrigue and observance of Tu B'Av - thejewishchronicle.net [Last Updated On: July 29th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 29th, 2020]
- A burning house - A universal lesson | Shahar Azani | The Blogs - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: July 29th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 29th, 2020]
- Talmud's solution to the coronavirus dilemma: Save lives, or the economy? - Haaretz [Last Updated On: July 29th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 29th, 2020]
- Talmud and Midrash | Judaism | Britannica [Last Updated On: July 29th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 29th, 2020]
- What is the Talmud? Biblical Meaning & Definition [Last Updated On: July 29th, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 29th, 2020]
- Redeeming Relevance: When Moshe Threw a Book Across the Classroom - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: July 31st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 31st, 2020]
- One for Israel exposes abusive teachings of rabbis, explains that Jesus loves and esteems women [videos] - Patheos [Last Updated On: July 31st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 31st, 2020]
- The indomitable spirit of the Jewish people - The story of Yavne - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: July 31st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 31st, 2020]
- Preparing for Tisha B'Av During a World Pandemic - A 25-hour period of fasting and reflection begins on Wednesday night, July 29 - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: July 31st, 2020] [Originally Added On: July 31st, 2020]
- Even More Harm Than We Think - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: August 4th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 4th, 2020]
- Listen: Longtom on electro-shock treatment for Great Whites; Chas Smith continues his outspoken advocacy for kicking dogs. You see a good thick dog,... [Last Updated On: August 4th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 4th, 2020]
- The Real Reason the Beit HaMikdash Was Destroyed - The Jewish Voice [Last Updated On: August 4th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 4th, 2020]
- Why Is the Ketubah Written in Aramaic? - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: August 4th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 4th, 2020]
- In a pickle, Seth Rogen tells Haaretz what he really thinks about Israel and white supremacist Trump - Haaretz [Last Updated On: August 6th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 6th, 2020]
- Remembering The Wall (Part II) - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Tales Told to Tevye - The New Yorker [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Parashat Ekev: A different kind of theology - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- First lesbian woman to be appointed to Tel Aviv's religious council - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Our community together apart - The Australian Jewish News [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Tyranny, loss and leadership: What's on MIFF's menu - The Age [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Even though your heart may grow haughty - The Jewish Star [Last Updated On: August 7th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 7th, 2020]
- Adin Steinsaltz, Groundbreaking Talmud Translator, Dies - The New York Times [Last Updated On: August 8th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 8th, 2020]
- A Personal Relationship With God Is Reachable if We Believe in It - Algemeiner [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Berachos: The Key To Fearing Hashem - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Delaware to require teaching of the Holocaust, genocide - Forward [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Yeshiva Education - The Best of Both (OPINION) - BKLYNER - BKLYNER [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Cherish the Small Comforts that Bring Your Joy in an Unsettled World - Jewish Journal [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Mind Over Milkshakes - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Why Is the Ketubah Written in Aramaic? - Questions & Answers - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- The Survivors' Talmud: When the US Army Printed the Talmud - The Jewish Voice [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- The Life and Legacy of Torah Scholar and Prolific Author Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz - Jewish Journal [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- As The Night Gets Longer - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2020]
- Running a Jewish day school just got a lot more expensive and parents shouldn't be the only ones paying the price. - JTA News - Jewish Telegraphic... [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 17th, 2020]
- Heichal HaTorah Bais Medrash Enters Its Second Year with 40 Talmidim - Join us this Zman! - Yeshiva World News [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 17th, 2020]
- A sweet and sour history of Jews and pickles - The Jewish Star [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 17th, 2020]
- Holy Witnesses - Torah Insights - Parshah - Chabad.org [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2020] [Originally Added On: August 17th, 2020]
- End this year, with its curses! | Yaakov Jaffe | The Blogs - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: September 2nd, 2020] [Originally Added On: September 2nd, 2020]