Matt Colby – Reasons to Believe – Class 4 – Development of Bible Canon

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As Christadelphians, we believe
that the Bible is the inspired

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word of God, and we say that
quite often.

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And we quote Second Timothy 3
verse 16.

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All scripture is given by
inspiration of God, but have you

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ever asked yourself the question
when you read Second Timothy 3,

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verse 16?
What is all scripture?

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And what did Paul mean when he
said that?

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Was you referring to the Bible
that we have in front of us

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right now, or or something else,
or some other version of it?

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And how do we know?
And if the Bible that we have in

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front of us really is fully
inspired by God, every single

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part of it, then wouldn’t we
expect that it should in some

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way stand apart?
That it should be unique and

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special among all of the other
literature in the world.

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That it should prove to us in
some way that it truly is

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inspired by God.
That’s the purpose of this last

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class for today.
And the truth is that the Bible

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is unique for a number of
reasons.

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It’s it’s unique because of its
continuity.

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As you may know, various books
in the Bible were written,

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sometimes over 1000 years apart,
by very different authors and

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different cultures and societies
and different geographic parts

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of the world.
And yet there’s this remarkable

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consistency throughout the whole
thing.

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The Bible is unique in its
circulation.

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Billions of copies have been
sold and circulated throughout

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the course of of human history.
And sometimes it might be said,

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if a book is #1 on the
bestseller list, that that book

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outsold the Bible.
And what’s it means if somebody

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says that is that it outsold the
Bible that particular month.

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Because what notebook has ever
done is touch the overall record

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of sales and distribution for
the Bible.

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The Bible is unique in its
number of translations, over

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2200 translations into different
languages.

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It’s unique because of its
survival.

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Some of the books we have,
especially in the Old Testament,

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have survived for thousands of
years and we have, as we’re

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going to see at the end of this
class, thousands of pieces of

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manuscript evidence.
And the similarity between all

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of those thousands of of
manuscripts is is remarkable,

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especially when you compare it
to all other ancient literature

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that we have out there.
Bible’s unique and the influence

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that it’s had on on human
literature.

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Somebody once said that if you
went to any major city in the

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world and you were to to destroy
all copies of the Bible, that

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you could then go to the the
city library and recreate the

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entire Bible just from quotes
from other pieces of literature

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that have quoted the Bible.
I don’t know if that’s true or

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not.
I suggest it’s probably largely

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true.
And over and above that, the

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Bible is unique because of the
influence that it has had on

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civilization.
It has very much guided the

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course of human history.
Wars have been fought.

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Millions of lives have been
lost.

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People have made decisions,
incredible decisions, terrible

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decisions based upon what is
written in these pages.

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And so the subject for this last
class is the development of the

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Bible Canon.
And that word, Canon, is one we

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don’t use too often today.
It’s spelled Canon.

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So it’s not the same as, you
know, the Canon that used to be

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used in warfare and in the
English, this word Canon, it

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didn’t come into use until at
least a few 100 years after the

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end of the last of the New
Testament books were written.

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And when it did finally come
into the English language, it

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came into the English language
actually specifically to

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describe the Bible itself and
what belongs within the Bible,

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which books belong within what
we call the Bible Canon.

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And in the English, the word
Canon.

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It comes from the word Cain.
Don’t think of a cane that you

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might walk around with.
Think of like a sugar cane or a

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Reed, because in ancient times a
Reed was actually used as an

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instrument of measurement.
But it’s found the root word is

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found before it was ever in
English.

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It was found in several ancient
languages.

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Also, it’s found in the ancient
Hebrew.

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We see it in the Old Testament.
It’s the word Kane.

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It means a Reed, and it’s in the
New Testament.

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In the Greek, it’s the word
Canon, and when it’s used in the

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Bible, it doesn’t mean the same
thing that it means now in the

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English when we talk about the
Bible Canon.

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But the origins of that meaning
are still there, so we won’t

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turn these passages up for the
sake of time.

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But there’s three different
places you’d find this word

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Canon in the New Testament, and
one of them is in Second

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Corinthians chapter 10, verses
13 to 16.

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And the Apostle Paul writes
about the area of his preaching.

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He says we’ve not gone beyond
the boundaries that God has set

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for us.
The word in the ESV that phrases

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the area of influence that God
has given us, So, So God gave

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instructions to Paul and he
said, this is where I want you

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to preach and I don’t want you
to go outside of these

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boundaries.
And the word that he uses to

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describe those boundaries is the
word Canon.

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It was like a line or a boundary
geographically that had been

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set.
And the other two places in the

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New Testament, if you’re writing
this down, are Galatians 6,

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verse 16, and Philippians
chapter 3 and verse 16.

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And both of those books use this
word to describe the rules by

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which we live our lives.
So the boundaries which God has

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set for us in our lives, we’re
we’re not supposed to do certain

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things and we’re supposed to do
other things.

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So.
So there’s a framework, A

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boundary within which we’re
supposed to live.

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And the word can own is used to
describe these things.

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So when this word would
eventually become used to

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describe what belonged in the
Bible, these were its origins.

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The word Canon, when we talk
about the Bible Canon is

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describing the boundaries within
which we find the inspired word

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of God.
So nothing outside of that

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boundary, but we want to know
what belongs inside of that

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boundary.
And you may know that there are

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some books that are not in our
Bible but that throughout

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history, for various reasons,
certain points in history,

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somebody thought they belonged
in there but they didn’t make it

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in they didn’t make the cut.
And we call those books the

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Apocrypha or any one of those
books.

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We’ll call it an apocryphal work
and the and the word apocryphal

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means of doubtful authenticity.
Now the question is why didn’t

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they make the cut and and the
books that we have in our Bible,

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why are they there?
And I had a friend in high

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school.
His name was John, and he went

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to a Baptist Church.
And we used to talk about things

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that we believed and the things
that we didn’t believe.

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And when high school was over,
we went our separate ways.

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And a few years later, I was
walking down the halls of my

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college and I ran into John.
I had no idea he went to that

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college.
In fact, maybe he didn’t because

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I never saw him there again.
But when I saw him, he said, do

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you still go to that church that
you used to go to?

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And I said, yes, I do.
And I said, do you still go to

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the church that that you used to
go to?

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And he said, no, I don’t.
And I said, oh, how come?

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And he said, well, did you know
that that there are all these

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apocryphal books that that
didn’t make it into the Bible?

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And and then it turns out that
it was just, you know, groups of

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humans who decided what books
belong in the Bible and what

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books don’t.
Then how can we trust that that

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that this is something special
and it was just people who put

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it together?
And you know, at the time I I

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had, I knew that there were
apocryphal works that that

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weren’t in the Bible.
You know, a lot of them are in

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the Catholic Bible, for example,
but they’re not in the Bible

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that we use.
But I had no idea why, why they

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were or weren’t in our Bible.
So I didn’t have an answer for

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John.
It’s one of my regrets.

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I’ve never seen him again, and I
wasn’t able to explain to him

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how we got the Bible that we
have today in our labs this

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afternoon.
But I hope to be able to explain

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it to you.
And as we do that, I hope that

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you’ll see that it’s a pretty
remarkable story.

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And for the rest of this class,
we’re going to split our

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thoughts into two different
parts.

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And it’s very simple.
First, we’re going to talk about

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the Old Testament, and then
we’re going to talk about the

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New Testament because the story
of how we got these two

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testaments, those stories are
very different from each other.

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So we’re going to start by
talking about the Old Testament

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of our Bible.
We sometimes refer to it as the

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Hebrew Scriptures, and it’s the
very same Bible that those of

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the Jewish faith would use
today.

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So the entire Jewish Bible, of
course, comprises what we would

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call the Old Testament.
And in a little bit we’ll talk

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about when we think it was
decided what should go into the

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Old Testament.
But to start with, I’m just

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going to talk to you a little
bit about some of the criteria

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that were used.
So it was an ancient group of

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rabbis, we believe, that
probably decided which books

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belonged in the Old Testament of
the Bible.

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It was a Jewish people and they
had very specific, rigorous

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criteria by which they would vet
every single holy book, or not a

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holy book as the case may be.
They asked a number of questions

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about every single book that
they had to consider, and the

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first one was this was the book
written by a prophet of God.

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Now now when we use the word
prophet, we often think about

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somebody who is telling the
future, and certainly that can

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be something that a prophet
does.

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But when the Bible talks about a
prophet, it means more than

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that.
A prophet is somebody who 4th

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tells the word of God, somebody
who God speaks through.

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So they could be making
prophecies about what’s going to

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happen in the future, but not
necessarily.

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They’re simply a teacher of God.
Was the book written by a true

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prophet of God?
And over and above that, the

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writer had to be confirmed by
special acts of God like

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miracles, undeniable proof that
God was working through this

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person or perhaps like telling
the future the kind of prophecy

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that we’re familiar with when we
use the word prophecy.

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And you you may remember one of
the one of the tests for an Old

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Testament prophet was that they
were supposed to give a prophecy

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in the short term that came to
pass that would have been

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unlikely to come to pass so that
people could see that it did

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come to pass and that would be
the proof.

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If they gave a short term
prophecy and it happened, then

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people could believe the other
things they said as well and

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maybe other prophecies about
what was going to happen a long

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time in the future.
And maybe both of these things

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were true.
They both performed miracles and

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they gave accurate prophecies
that people saw it come true.

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So the writer had to be a
prophet of God that was

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confirmed by miracles and or
special acts of God.

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But over and above that, that
wasn’t enough, although that was

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the probably some of the most
important criteria.

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Then the question would be
asked, does the message of the

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book tell the truth about God?
Because the Jewish people, more

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so than than any other ancient
people in the Jewish religion,

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more so than any other ancient
religion, had a very well

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defined sense of God.
They knew who he was.

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He’d revealed himself to Moses
in the burning Bush, and on the

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mountain he’d said, this is who
I am, This is what I stand for.

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These are my characteristics.
Here are the things I don’t

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tolerate.
Here’s what I love and that

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remain unchanged generation
after generation.

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And while other ancient
religions would mold and adapt

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to their circumstances, as
history went on, the Jewish God

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would remain unchanged.
That was intentional, because

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God tells us he does not change.
And so the Jewish people knew

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very well who their God was and
what he looks like.

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And so they had to ask the
question, does the message of

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00:12:05,320 –> 00:12:07,360
the book tell the truth about
God?

220
00:12:09,840 –> 00:12:14,520
And besides that, does it come
with the life transforming power

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00:12:14,520 –> 00:12:17,200
of God?
We might use the word

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00:12:17,240 –> 00:12:20,840
exhortational.
It couldn’t just be a historical

223
00:12:20,840 –> 00:12:22,760
account.
It couldn’t just contain facts.

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00:12:22,760 –> 00:12:25,360
It had to have the ability to
change your life in some way.

225
00:12:26,840 –> 00:12:30,360
Does the book come with the life
transforming power of God?

226
00:12:30,360 –> 00:12:35,640
And finally, was the book
accepted by the people of God?

227
00:12:36,480 –> 00:12:39,880
Because the Jewish nation was so
old, it had been around for

228
00:12:39,920 –> 00:12:43,560
centuries and centuries by the
time that the Old Testament was

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00:12:43,560 –> 00:12:46,520
was put together and we we use
the word ratified, which means

230
00:12:46,520 –> 00:12:49,080
it was officially decided.
This is the Old Testament.

231
00:12:49,080 –> 00:12:50,480
These are the books that belong
here.

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00:12:50,840 –> 00:12:54,480
The Jewish people had been
around so long at that time that

233
00:12:54,480 –> 00:12:56,520
it would be common knowledge
whether or not the people had

234
00:12:56,520 –> 00:12:58,520
historically accepted this book
or not.

235
00:12:59,080 –> 00:13:00,960
And that would be based on
whether it was written by a true

236
00:13:00,960 –> 00:13:04,040
prophet of God that had, in the
time when he was alive,

237
00:13:04,040 –> 00:13:06,080
performed miracles and
prophecies.

238
00:13:07,560 –> 00:13:09,640
But you know, what’s really
interesting is that there came a

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00:13:09,640 –> 00:13:14,680
point in Jewish history where
everybody alive at the time and

240
00:13:14,680 –> 00:13:17,760
the Jewish nation seem to have
agreed that we have any record

241
00:13:17,840 –> 00:13:20,600
of that God stopped talking to
them.

242
00:13:21,240 –> 00:13:24,840
He just stopped.
I find that really interesting

243
00:13:25,240 –> 00:13:29,880
because if, if this was all sort
of fictional, if it was made-up

244
00:13:29,920 –> 00:13:32,440
somehow by the Jewish people,
don’t you think they’d want to

245
00:13:32,440 –> 00:13:34,400
keep telling the world that God
is speaking to them?

246
00:13:35,200 –> 00:13:37,960
But there came a point when
everybody said the prophets

247
00:13:37,960 –> 00:13:41,280
don’t speak to us anymore, God
has left us.

248
00:13:42,080 –> 00:13:44,200
And that really marks the end of
the Old Testament.

249
00:13:44,200 –> 00:13:47,640
And you may know that there’s a
gap of about 400 years between

250
00:13:47,640 –> 00:13:50,600
the end of the Old Testament and
the beginning of the New

251
00:13:50,600 –> 00:13:52,920
Testament.
And we get this sense in those

252
00:13:52,920 –> 00:13:55,480
ancient Jewish writings from
that time that there was the

253
00:13:55,480 –> 00:13:57,680
sense of despair in the nation
of Israel.

254
00:13:58,320 –> 00:14:01,440
God is is not with us anymore.
His power has left us and he

255
00:14:01,440 –> 00:14:09,480
doesn’t speak with us.
And there are works that are

256
00:14:09,480 –> 00:14:13,760
apocryphal for the Old Testament
that are basically history

257
00:14:13,760 –> 00:14:17,000
books, and one of those is the
book of the Maccabees.

258
00:14:17,000 –> 00:14:18,960
There’s actually two of them.
There’s the 1st and 2nd

259
00:14:19,000 –> 00:14:22,040
Maccabees.
And Maccabees is a useful book

260
00:14:22,040 –> 00:14:24,800
because it tells the history of
the Jewish nation in that time

261
00:14:24,800 –> 00:14:27,800
period, that 400 years between
the close of the Old Testament

262
00:14:27,800 –> 00:14:29,120
and the beginning of the New
Testament.

263
00:14:29,400 –> 00:14:31,600
It’s useful as a historical
work, even though it doesn’t

264
00:14:31,800 –> 00:14:35,480
belong in the inspired word of
God, and it was kept out of that

265
00:14:35,480 –> 00:14:40,880
for a very specific reason.
Now in the in the Jewish Talmud,

266
00:14:40,880 –> 00:14:43,520
which is a writing of the
ancient oral traditions of the

267
00:14:43,520 –> 00:14:47,520
Jews, you’d find lots of
arguments between famous ancient

268
00:14:47,520 –> 00:14:50,560
rabbis and those are recorded
for us in those oral traditions.

269
00:14:50,560 –> 00:14:52,560
And we also find things like
this.

270
00:14:52,680 –> 00:14:55,240
There’s two versions of the
Talmud, the Jerusalem Talmud and

271
00:14:55,240 –> 00:15:00,720
the Babylonian Talmud.
And in the Babylonian Talmud it

272
00:15:00,720 –> 00:15:04,440
says when the last of the
prophets died, Haggai, Zechariah

273
00:15:04,440 –> 00:15:08,440
and Malachi, the Holy Spirit
took leave of Israel.

274
00:15:10,000 –> 00:15:14,320
The people realized that’s it,
God is not speaking to us

275
00:15:14,320 –> 00:15:17,000
anymore.
And here’s a quote from the

276
00:15:17,000 –> 00:15:20,600
first of Maccabees.
And it’s talking about the fact

277
00:15:20,600 –> 00:15:23,320
that they’re appointing a new
leader and they’re saying, well,

278
00:15:23,320 –> 00:15:25,840
we’re going to make this guy our
leader because we don’t have any

279
00:15:25,840 –> 00:15:28,480
people who God is speaking
through anymore.

280
00:15:28,480 –> 00:15:31,120
So he’s the best we have.
Therefore, the Jews and their

281
00:15:31,120 –> 00:15:33,680
priests are happy to have Simon
and his descendants as their

282
00:15:33,680 –> 00:15:37,840
leaders and high priests until a
true prophet appears.

283
00:15:42,440 –> 00:15:44,920
And here’s the historian
Josephus who we’ve quoted

284
00:15:44,920 –> 00:15:47,680
before.
And he starts by talking out in

285
00:15:47,680 –> 00:15:52,360
this, talking in this passage
about the fact that there’s no

286
00:15:52,360 –> 00:15:55,120
longer any succession of the
line of prophets that has

287
00:15:55,120 –> 00:15:57,520
stopped.
He talked about how important

288
00:15:57,520 –> 00:16:00,480
the Jews now treat their sacred
writings because God has stopped

289
00:16:00,480 –> 00:16:03,320
speaking to them.
He says it is true our history

290
00:16:03,320 –> 00:16:05,880
has been written since
Artaxerxes very particularly,

291
00:16:05,880 –> 00:16:09,080
but has not been esteemed of the
like authority with the former

292
00:16:09,080 –> 00:16:12,040
by our forefathers, because
there has not been an exact

293
00:16:12,040 –> 00:16:14,080
succession of the prophets since
that time.

294
00:16:14,440 –> 00:16:17,320
So he’s saying we have history
books of what happened after the

295
00:16:17,320 –> 00:16:19,440
prophets ceased.
But we don’t think those are

296
00:16:19,440 –> 00:16:22,600
nearly as important as the whole
holy books that we have, that

297
00:16:22,600 –> 00:16:27,400
were written by those prophets.
And how firmly we have given

298
00:16:27,400 –> 00:16:30,760
credit to these books of our own
nation is evident by what we do.

299
00:16:31,200 –> 00:16:34,720
For during so many ages, as have
already passed, no one has been

300
00:16:34,720 –> 00:16:38,320
so bold as to either add
anything to them, to take

301
00:16:38,320 –> 00:16:41,760
anything from them, or to make
any change in them.

302
00:16:42,920 –> 00:16:46,520
But it has become natural to all
Jews, immediately and from their

303
00:16:46,520 –> 00:16:49,280
very birth, to esteem these
books, to contain divine

304
00:16:49,280 –> 00:16:52,880
doctrines and to persist in
them, and if occasion be

305
00:16:53,000 –> 00:16:57,000
willingly to die for them.
The word is no new thing for our

306
00:16:57,000 –> 00:17:00,680
captives, many of them in number
and frequently in time to be

307
00:17:00,680 –> 00:17:04,000
seen to endure rats and deaths
of all kinds upon the theaters,

308
00:17:04,280 –> 00:17:07,760
that they may not be obliged to
say one word against our laws

309
00:17:08,000 –> 00:17:10,200
and the records that contain
them.

310
00:17:11,400 –> 00:17:14,280
And Josephus simply records the
mindset of the Jewish people in

311
00:17:14,280 –> 00:17:18,359
general when he talks about how
much they valued those holy

312
00:17:18,359 –> 00:17:22,560
sacred writings.
Because God wasn’t speaking to

313
00:17:22,560 –> 00:17:25,280
them anymore.
And all they had were the words

314
00:17:25,280 –> 00:17:28,119
of the prophets that had been
written in ancient Times Now.

315
00:17:29,480 –> 00:17:32,520
And many Jews would die for
those books, would endure

316
00:17:32,520 –> 00:17:36,080
torture because of them, so that
they wouldn’t say one word

317
00:17:36,080 –> 00:17:39,040
against them even if it meant
their lives.

318
00:17:40,400 –> 00:17:43,560
And throughout the history,
after the end of the Old

319
00:17:43,560 –> 00:17:47,440
Testament, there would be 3
Jewish groups that were charged

320
00:17:47,800 –> 00:17:53,200
with preserving and protecting
and copying forward those works,

321
00:17:53,200 –> 00:17:55,440
those sacred works of the Old
Testament.

322
00:17:56,160 –> 00:17:58,760
Three groups, and they proceed
chronologically through time.

323
00:17:58,760 –> 00:18:00,320
The first were known as the
Sulfurine.

324
00:18:00,960 –> 00:18:05,600
The word means scribes.
And the scribes preserved those

325
00:18:05,640 –> 00:18:09,440
Old Testament writings from
about the year 400 BC all the

326
00:18:09,440 –> 00:18:11,320
way through to about the year
200 AD.

327
00:18:11,920 –> 00:18:14,000
After the scribes came the
Talmudists.

328
00:18:14,320 –> 00:18:17,640
And we’ve we’ve coded a number
of times from the Talmud, the

329
00:18:17,640 –> 00:18:19,120
Talmudists.
There’s a bit of an overlap

330
00:18:19,120 –> 00:18:21,280
between the Scribes and the
Talmudists.

331
00:18:21,760 –> 00:18:25,800
The Talmudists were in existence
from about 100 AD to about 500

332
00:18:25,880 –> 00:18:28,640
AD, and after the Talmudists
were the Masoretis.

333
00:18:29,680 –> 00:18:32,640
You may be this word may sound
familiar to you because you may

334
00:18:32,640 –> 00:18:34,800
know the King James Version of
the Bible is based on the

335
00:18:34,800 –> 00:18:39,720
Masoretic Text and the Masoretis
were in existence from about 500

336
00:18:39,800 –> 00:18:44,280
AD to about 950 AD.
And they came up with some ways

337
00:18:44,280 –> 00:18:47,640
of interpreting scripture like
vowel pointing because you may

338
00:18:47,640 –> 00:18:49,600
know the ancient Hebrew language
doesn’t have vowels in it.

339
00:18:49,600 –> 00:18:53,520
This is a way to sort of include
those and they would come up

340
00:18:53,520 –> 00:18:57,560
with their own specific rigid
system for copying the text.

341
00:18:58,480 –> 00:19:04,160
And one cop in common criticism
that that is made about the Old

342
00:19:04,160 –> 00:19:07,880
Testament is this.
The question is asked, why don’t

343
00:19:07,880 –> 00:19:10,920
we have any manuscripts that are
dated anywhere close to when

344
00:19:10,920 –> 00:19:12,720
some of these books were
originally written?

345
00:19:12,720 –> 00:19:15,320
The oldest Old Testament
manuscripts that we have date

346
00:19:15,320 –> 00:19:20,240
sometime between 250 and 300 BC,
but the oldest books in the Old

347
00:19:20,240 –> 00:19:22,560
Testament date hundreds of years
before that.

348
00:19:23,920 –> 00:19:26,920
And so how can we rely on the
manuscript copies that we have

349
00:19:26,920 –> 00:19:29,680
when they were these the
versions we have written perhaps

350
00:19:29,680 –> 00:19:34,920
hundreds of years after the
original author wrote on the

351
00:19:34,920 –> 00:19:39,720
scroll?
An answer is because in ancient

352
00:19:39,720 –> 00:19:42,640
times, of course, they didn’t
have the printing press, as you

353
00:19:42,640 –> 00:19:46,800
know, like we have or like has
changed our world today.

354
00:19:47,920 –> 00:19:50,880
And the writings that they had
were written on what we were

355
00:19:50,880 –> 00:19:54,200
known as papyrus scrolls.
Papyrus is actually made of

356
00:19:54,280 –> 00:19:57,080
reeds.
Reeds were stripped down and put

357
00:19:57,080 –> 00:19:59,360
it right angles to each other
and pressed to make a flat

358
00:19:59,360 –> 00:20:00,800
surface.
And that’s what they would write

359
00:20:00,800 –> 00:20:05,120
on in these ancient times.
The problem with papyrus was

360
00:20:05,120 –> 00:20:09,920
that it only lasted for about 1
full generation, maybe two at

361
00:20:09,920 –> 00:20:12,520
the most, before it
disintegrated and couldn’t be

362
00:20:12,520 –> 00:20:15,440
read anymore.
And so if you wanted to preserve

363
00:20:15,440 –> 00:20:19,760
an ancient writing then you had
to make a copy of it at least

364
00:20:19,760 –> 00:20:22,120
once per generation to keep it
going.

365
00:20:22,720 –> 00:20:26,240
So those scrolls in the most
ancient of times just didn’t

366
00:20:26,240 –> 00:20:29,480
survive.
They copied them forward,

367
00:20:29,480 –> 00:20:32,240
generation after generation in
those three groups I just

368
00:20:32,240 –> 00:20:34,960
mentioned, the Sulfurine, the
Talmudists, and the Masorettes.

369
00:20:35,280 –> 00:20:39,360
Those were the groups that were
responsible for preserving and

370
00:20:39,360 –> 00:20:44,880
copying forward those books,
those scrolls.

371
00:20:45,080 –> 00:20:47,720
And this is true not just of the
Bible, but if anything from that

372
00:20:47,720 –> 00:20:50,200
time period and further back,
ancient writings that we have

373
00:20:50,440 –> 00:20:53,680
would have had the same process.
So we have other ancient

374
00:20:53,680 –> 00:20:57,600
writings outside the Bible that
also have that same issue, The

375
00:20:57,600 –> 00:21:00,520
copies that we have.
Perhaps we don’t have that many

376
00:21:00,520 –> 00:21:03,360
of them and they don’t date that
far back anywhere close to when

377
00:21:03,360 –> 00:21:07,120
they were originally written.
But when it comes to how the

378
00:21:07,120 –> 00:21:10,800
Bible was preserved, this is
where it stands apart from any

379
00:21:10,800 –> 00:21:14,840
other ancient writing.
What I’m going to show you here

380
00:21:14,840 –> 00:21:16,840
is known as the rules of the
Talmudists.

381
00:21:18,080 –> 00:21:21,640
These are the rules by which the
Talmudists and the scribes

382
00:21:21,640 –> 00:21:25,320
before them.
This is these were the rules

383
00:21:25,320 –> 00:21:29,400
they adhered to when they were
copying a scroll to preserve it

384
00:21:29,480 –> 00:21:32,200
for another generation.
This is from the NASA hit

385
00:21:32,200 –> 00:21:34,840
Sulfurine, which means the
tractate of the scribes.

386
00:21:35,800 –> 00:21:39,080
A synagogue scroll had to be
written on the skins of clean

387
00:21:39,080 –> 00:21:44,640
animals prepared by a Jew,
fastened together with strings

388
00:21:44,640 –> 00:21:50,120
taken from clean animals, lined
and spaced so that every skin

389
00:21:50,120 –> 00:21:52,880
contains a certain number of
columns equal throughout the

390
00:21:52,880 –> 00:21:56,240
entire codex.
The length of each column could

391
00:21:56,240 –> 00:22:00,640
not extend over less than 48 or
more than 60 lines, and the

392
00:22:00,640 –> 00:22:04,160
breadth had to consist of
exactly 30 letters.

393
00:22:05,360 –> 00:22:08,520
The whole copy had to 1st be
lined of three Words were

394
00:22:08,520 –> 00:22:10,200
written without a line.
It’s worthless.

395
00:22:10,200 –> 00:22:14,240
They had to draw out a straight
line before they wrote that next

396
00:22:14,240 –> 00:22:16,400
line.
If they didn’t do that it to

397
00:22:16,400 –> 00:22:18,760
throw the whole thing out and
start over.

398
00:22:19,560 –> 00:22:23,360
The ink should be black, neither
red, green, nor any other color,

399
00:22:23,360 –> 00:22:26,160
and be prepared according to a
definite recipe.

400
00:22:27,040 –> 00:22:29,760
An authentic copy had to be the
exemplar from which the

401
00:22:29,760 –> 00:22:33,120
transcriber ought not in the
least to deviate.

402
00:22:33,400 –> 00:22:35,880
So when they copied a scroll,
they had to make sure that the

403
00:22:35,880 –> 00:22:40,960
scroll they were copying from
was certified copied by scribes

404
00:22:40,960 –> 00:22:44,640
that followed all of the same
rules that we’re reading and the

405
00:22:44,640 –> 00:22:47,040
rules of which we’re only about
halfway through right now, the

406
00:22:47,040 –> 00:22:50,640
ones we’re going to look at,
we’re so rigorous that they were

407
00:22:50,640 –> 00:22:54,280
100% confident that by the time
the scribe was finished copying

408
00:22:54,280 –> 00:22:58,160
the new scroll, they considered
it to be exactly the same as the

409
00:22:58,160 –> 00:23:02,640
old scroll, but more valuable
because this was a fresh copy,

410
00:23:03,200 –> 00:23:05,560
which means it was going to last
for another generation, and the

411
00:23:05,560 –> 00:23:08,080
old scroll, now it’s shelf life,
was going to be shorter.

412
00:23:09,520 –> 00:23:12,840
This is how confident they were
in their transcribing method.

413
00:23:13,640 –> 00:23:16,680
Now this is a big one.
No word or letter, not even a

414
00:23:16,680 –> 00:23:20,080
yod, which is the smallest
Hebrew symbol, must be written

415
00:23:20,080 –> 00:23:22,760
from memory, the scribe not
having looked at the codex

416
00:23:22,760 –> 00:23:25,560
before him.
Which means that if you’ve ever

417
00:23:25,800 –> 00:23:29,760
copied anything out by hand,
then probably what you would do

418
00:23:29,760 –> 00:23:32,920
is you’d you’d look at the
document you were copying from,

419
00:23:33,520 –> 00:23:36,720
and maybe you’d look at an
entire sentence and you say, OK,

420
00:23:36,760 –> 00:23:38,680
there’s the sentence, write down
the sentence.

421
00:23:40,360 –> 00:23:43,800
The laws of the scribes were
they couldn’t look at any more

422
00:23:43,800 –> 00:23:47,520
than a single symbol on the page
and write it by memory.

423
00:23:47,920 –> 00:23:50,120
It was not allowed, not even a
word.

424
00:23:50,400 –> 00:23:53,000
You couldn’t even look at a
whole word and then write that

425
00:23:53,000 –> 00:23:55,040
whole word.
You had to go letter by letter.

426
00:23:55,040 –> 00:23:58,000
So you’d write the letter, look
at the next letter, write that

427
00:23:58,000 –> 00:24:01,440
letter, look at the next one.
It wasn’t enough to go by memory

428
00:24:01,440 –> 00:24:05,200
even for an entire word.
Now Can you imagine how long

429
00:24:05,200 –> 00:24:08,240
that would take?
And this was very much a full

430
00:24:08,240 –> 00:24:10,320
time job.
Somebody was ascribed.

431
00:24:10,320 –> 00:24:14,320
This is what they did full time.
It would take a very, very long

432
00:24:14,320 –> 00:24:19,000
time just to copy out one scroll
between every continent.

433
00:24:19,000 –> 00:24:22,280
The space of a hair or thread
must intervene between every new

434
00:24:22,280 –> 00:24:24,760
paragraph or section.
The breadth of nine continents

435
00:24:24,760 –> 00:24:26,880
must intervene between every
book.

436
00:24:26,880 –> 00:24:29,160
The space of three lines must
intervene.

437
00:24:29,680 –> 00:24:32,720
The 5th book of Moses must
terminate exactly with the line,

438
00:24:32,720 –> 00:24:36,360
but the rest need not do so.
So Can you imagine if you got to

439
00:24:36,360 –> 00:24:40,520
the end of Deuteronomy and I was
just a little short?

440
00:24:41,280 –> 00:24:43,280
Imagine the planning it would
take to make sure the very last

441
00:24:43,280 –> 00:24:45,920
line of Deuteronomy was one full
complete line.

442
00:24:46,080 –> 00:24:49,920
And if you messed up, throw the
whole thing out and start again.

443
00:24:52,120 –> 00:24:56,960
Besides this, the copyist had to
sit in full Jewish dress, wash

444
00:24:56,960 –> 00:25:00,720
his whole body, and not even
begin to write the name of God

445
00:25:00,720 –> 00:25:04,160
with a pen newly dipped in ink.
The idea is a pen newly dipped

446
00:25:04,160 –> 00:25:07,560
in ink will smudge very easily.
And you never wanted to smudge

447
00:25:07,560 –> 00:25:10,200
the name of God.
And should a king address him

448
00:25:10,200 –> 00:25:14,080
while writing that name, he must
take no notice of him.

449
00:25:16,080 –> 00:25:19,080
The roles in which these
regulations are not observed are

450
00:25:19,080 –> 00:25:22,680
condemned to be buried in the
ground or burned.

451
00:25:23,680 –> 00:25:27,640
If they didn’t comply with all
of these rules for everything,

452
00:25:27,640 –> 00:25:29,320
they copied whatever they were
writing.

453
00:25:29,320 –> 00:25:32,760
If they broke those rules or
they messed up, throw it out,

454
00:25:33,080 –> 00:25:36,400
burn it, destroy it.
We do not want that copy to live

455
00:25:36,400 –> 00:25:41,680
on.
This was how seriously they took

456
00:25:42,000 –> 00:25:46,160
the copying of their holy
writings.

457
00:25:47,760 –> 00:25:50,840
And the rigor with which the
Jewish scribes copied out these

458
00:25:50,840 –> 00:25:55,040
writings is unparalleled in any
other ancient society.

459
00:25:55,560 –> 00:25:58,240
Nobody else, no other society
that we have any record of,

460
00:25:58,280 –> 00:26:02,840
comes anywhere close to having
this kind of exact, precise

461
00:26:02,840 –> 00:26:07,880
detail put in to the laws by
which they had to copy a scroll,

462
00:26:09,120 –> 00:26:11,720
And I mentioned earlier, of the
Old Testament, we have thousands

463
00:26:11,720 –> 00:26:14,400
of manuscript copies of the
various books, some of them

464
00:26:14,400 –> 00:26:18,560
fragments, some of them entire
scrolls in the Old Testament.

465
00:26:19,200 –> 00:26:22,600
And remarkably, when you compare
them to each other, yes, there

466
00:26:22,600 –> 00:26:26,640
are differences, but they’re so
slight for the most part that

467
00:26:26,640 –> 00:26:29,280
the message has been preserved,
despite the fact that some of

468
00:26:29,280 –> 00:26:32,800
them are hundreds and even over
1000 years removed from the

469
00:26:32,800 –> 00:26:35,640
original source.
It’s what you might call

470
00:26:35,840 –> 00:26:39,600
miraculous, because no other
ancient work can demonstrate

471
00:26:39,600 –> 00:26:41,840
anything like that kind of
accuracy.

472
00:26:42,160 –> 00:26:45,360
Because the Jews believed this
was a matter of life and death,

473
00:26:46,080 –> 00:26:48,400
it was right in their law.
Deuteronomy chapter 4 and verse

474
00:26:48,400 –> 00:26:51,160
two, you shall not add to the
word of God that I command you,

475
00:26:51,360 –> 00:26:53,960
nor take from it that you may
keep the commandments of the

476
00:26:53,960 –> 00:26:56,920
Lord your God that I command
you.

477
00:26:57,680 –> 00:27:01,760
Imagine if we had to hand write
copies of bestsellers today.

478
00:27:02,480 –> 00:27:05,840
Best sellers today sometimes
sell in the millions of copies.

479
00:27:05,840 –> 00:27:08,720
Imagine if the printing press
was never invented and we had to

480
00:27:08,720 –> 00:27:11,680
hand rape over 1,000,000 copies
of a book.

481
00:27:12,000 –> 00:27:14,680
Imagine how different the
millionth copy of that book

482
00:27:14,680 –> 00:27:17,000
would be from the original if we
had to do that.

483
00:27:19,360 –> 00:27:22,520
And you start to realize how
incredible it is that all of

484
00:27:22,520 –> 00:27:25,280
those thousands of manuscripts
we have when we compare them to

485
00:27:25,280 –> 00:27:28,080
each other, both of the Old
Testament and the new, how

486
00:27:28,080 –> 00:27:34,200
similar they are to each other.
So at a certain point, the Old

487
00:27:34,200 –> 00:27:35,960
Testament Canon was officially
decided.

488
00:27:35,960 –> 00:27:38,920
It was ratified.
The Jewish leaders and rabbis

489
00:27:38,920 –> 00:27:41,200
said, this is it.
These are our holy books.

490
00:27:41,200 –> 00:27:45,680
And the Jewish Bible was
comprised of 24 books.

491
00:27:46,280 –> 00:27:49,120
Now you might be thinking, oh,
that’s strange because we have

492
00:27:49,120 –> 00:27:52,760
39 books in our Old Testament.
We’ll get there.

493
00:27:54,200 –> 00:27:56,600
It was comprised of four
different, sorry, three

494
00:27:56,600 –> 00:27:58,800
different sections.
The Hebrew Canon, the Hebrew

495
00:27:58,800 –> 00:28:01,360
Scriptures, the Torah, the Law
of Moses.

496
00:28:01,360 –> 00:28:05,680
Those first five books, the
Nabine, which were the prophets,

497
00:28:06,200 –> 00:28:09,800
and the Quetzu beam, which means
the writings.

498
00:28:10,600 –> 00:28:14,000
And this is the Hebrew Bible is
this is actually in this exact

499
00:28:14,000 –> 00:28:16,120
order if you were to look at a
Jewish Bible today.

500
00:28:16,640 –> 00:28:19,240
And what you’ll notice is that
actually all of the content of

501
00:28:19,240 –> 00:28:22,360
the Hebrew Bible is the exact
same as our Old Testament, but

502
00:28:22,360 –> 00:28:25,760
it’s in a different order.
We both start with Genesis, but

503
00:28:25,760 –> 00:28:29,560
while our Bible ends with
Malachi, the Hebrew Bible ends

504
00:28:29,560 –> 00:28:31,280
with Chronicles.
Malachi’s in there.

505
00:28:31,280 –> 00:28:34,200
It’s just not at the end.
And the books are grouped

506
00:28:34,200 –> 00:28:38,040
differently too.
So you might know that we have

507
00:28:38,280 –> 00:28:41,920
two books of Samuel and Kings
and Chronicles, but but the

508
00:28:41,920 –> 00:28:44,360
Jewish Bible, those are all
grouped into one book and we

509
00:28:44,360 –> 00:28:47,520
have 12 minor prophets.
But in the Jewish Bible, those

510
00:28:47,520 –> 00:28:51,280
12 are all just grouped into one
big book called the 12.

511
00:28:52,120 –> 00:28:54,480
And that’s why they have 24
books and we have 39.

512
00:28:54,480 –> 00:28:57,960
The content is the same, but
they’re organized in a different

513
00:28:58,240 –> 00:29:03,520
way.
And there’s an old theory that

514
00:29:03,520 –> 00:29:06,320
says that this Canon of the Old
Testament was officially

515
00:29:06,320 –> 00:29:10,880
ratified sometime in the 1st
century at a a gathering called

516
00:29:10,880 –> 00:29:14,880
the Council of Jamnia.
And nobody really believes that

517
00:29:14,880 –> 00:29:16,920
too much anymore.
And I don’t really either.

518
00:29:16,920 –> 00:29:18,280
I’ve looked at the evidence for
it.

519
00:29:19,280 –> 00:29:23,360
It’s pretty weak.
It would seem that the Old

520
00:29:23,360 –> 00:29:27,040
Testament, the Canon of the Old
Testament was actually this put

521
00:29:27,040 –> 00:29:31,160
together, finalized sometime
before Jesus.

522
00:29:31,160 –> 00:29:34,400
I want you to turn with me to
Luke chapter 24.

523
00:29:35,800 –> 00:29:41,200
And Jesus actually in a way
endorses the Old Testament

524
00:29:41,200 –> 00:29:43,160
Canaan that must have already
been in existence.

525
00:29:43,160 –> 00:29:45,840
I don’t know if you’ve ever
noticed this, but have a look at

526
00:29:45,840 –> 00:29:47,080
this.
Right at the end of the Gospel

527
00:29:47,080 –> 00:29:53,160
of Luke, Jesus is speaking to
his disciples in verse 44 of

528
00:29:53,160 –> 00:29:58,080
Luke chapter 24.
And Jesus said to them, these

529
00:29:58,080 –> 00:30:01,240
are my words, that I spoke to
you while I was still with you,

530
00:30:01,240 –> 00:30:03,920
that everything written about me
in the Law of Moses and the

531
00:30:03,920 –> 00:30:06,680
Prophets and the Psalms must be
fulfilled.

532
00:30:06,880 –> 00:30:08,640
Did you notice the three
categories?

533
00:30:08,920 –> 00:30:14,280
Everything written about me in
the Law of Moses, the Torah and

534
00:30:14,280 –> 00:30:20,160
the Prophets, the Nabim and the
Psalms, the Ketsu beam.

535
00:30:20,480 –> 00:30:22,920
And he makes reference to the
three categories in which the

536
00:30:22,920 –> 00:30:25,000
division of the Old Testament
was broken up.

537
00:30:26,200 –> 00:30:29,080
And even more interesting, I
think is just a few pages back.

538
00:30:29,080 –> 00:30:34,040
Come with me to Luke, Chapter
11, and I I wonder if, like me,

539
00:30:34,040 –> 00:30:35,880
you’ve ever wondered about this
verse.

540
00:30:35,880 –> 00:30:38,360
It seems strange, something that
Jesus says here.

541
00:30:40,160 –> 00:30:43,800
I’m going to read verses 50 and
51 of Luke Chapter 11.

542
00:30:44,240 –> 00:30:47,760
Jesus is talking to the
Pharisees of the time.

543
00:30:48,160 –> 00:30:50,320
He says the blood of all the
prophets shed from the

544
00:30:50,320 –> 00:30:53,600
foundation of the world will be
charged against this generation,

545
00:30:54,000 –> 00:30:58,720
from the blood of Abel to the
blood of Zechariah who perished

546
00:30:58,720 –> 00:31:00,720
between the altar and the
sanctuary.

547
00:31:00,920 –> 00:31:04,800
Yes, I tell you, it will be
required of this generation.

548
00:31:05,080 –> 00:31:08,040
So he’s saying your generation
is so wicked that you’re

549
00:31:08,040 –> 00:31:10,880
essentially guilty of all of the
innocent blood of the prophets

550
00:31:10,880 –> 00:31:14,520
that have shed and all of the
Holy Scriptures, which would

551
00:31:14,520 –> 00:31:17,800
have been the Old Testament that
we look at now that he was

552
00:31:17,800 –> 00:31:23,120
referring to in that time.
So why would he mention

553
00:31:23,960 –> 00:31:26,920
Zechariah the prophet?
The death of Zechariah the

554
00:31:26,920 –> 00:31:28,440
prophet.
Now the first one makes sense.

555
00:31:28,440 –> 00:31:32,400
He says from the death of Abel.
From the blood of Abel.

556
00:31:32,400 –> 00:31:35,560
That makes sense.
Abel was the first righteous

557
00:31:35,560 –> 00:31:38,320
prophet of God to be killed.
That was the first murder.

558
00:31:40,040 –> 00:31:43,560
But why Zechariah?
It’s a very obscure reference.

559
00:31:44,040 –> 00:31:45,760
We won’t turn there.
But you find it in Second

560
00:31:45,760 –> 00:31:47,960
Chronicles chapter 24 and verse
21.

561
00:31:48,280 –> 00:31:54,680
Zechariah, the prophet killed in
a holy place, and Jesus makes

562
00:31:54,680 –> 00:31:57,920
reference to it here.
It’s not one of the bigger

563
00:31:57,920 –> 00:32:01,520
stories in the Old Testament,
but if you were to look to look

564
00:32:01,520 –> 00:32:05,760
at the first and second books of
Chronicles, you’d find that in

565
00:32:05,760 –> 00:32:09,240
the book of Chronicles, this is
the very last death of a

566
00:32:09,240 –> 00:32:11,840
prophet.
And if you were there to then

567
00:32:11,840 –> 00:32:15,000
look at the order of the Hebrew
Bible of the Old Testament

568
00:32:15,000 –> 00:32:17,880
Canon, you’d see that the book
of Chronicles is the very last

569
00:32:17,880 –> 00:32:20,840
book of the Old Testament.
And what Jesus is essentially

570
00:32:20,840 –> 00:32:23,720
saying is from the beginning to
the end of the Old Testament

571
00:32:23,720 –> 00:32:26,720
because Zechariah is the last
righteous prophet to be killed

572
00:32:26,720 –> 00:32:30,200
at the end of the Hebrew Bible.
And by saying that, he’s once

573
00:32:30,200 –> 00:32:34,120
again, in a sense, endorsing the
full scope of what had must have

574
00:32:34,120 –> 00:32:38,160
been put together at this time,
the Old Testament Canon of the

575
00:32:38,160 –> 00:32:44,560
Bible, now in Nehemiah chapters
8 and 9, Nehemiah will bring the

576
00:32:44,560 –> 00:32:48,120
law, the Torah back to
Jerusalem, and Ezra the Scribe

577
00:32:48,120 –> 00:32:49,760
will read it in front of the
people.

578
00:32:51,600 –> 00:32:54,000
And we’ll find from writings,
ancient historical writings

579
00:32:54,040 –> 00:32:58,880
outside of the Bible, that it
wasn’t just the Old Testament

580
00:32:58,880 –> 00:33:01,680
that Nehemiah gathered.
In fact, he built a library.

581
00:33:02,360 –> 00:33:05,160
Here’s the Maccabees.
Once again it says these same

582
00:33:05,160 –> 00:33:07,880
facts are found in the royal
records and in the memoirs of

583
00:33:07,880 –> 00:33:11,080
Nehemiah, who established a
library and collected the

584
00:33:11,080 –> 00:33:14,120
writings of David, letters of
kings concerning offerings and

585
00:33:14,120 –> 00:33:16,040
books about the kings and
prophets.

586
00:33:16,760 –> 00:33:19,400
Judas also collected the books
that had been scattered because

587
00:33:19,400 –> 00:33:21,040
of the war, and we still have
them.

588
00:33:21,360 –> 00:33:24,280
If you ever have need of any of
these books, let us know and we

589
00:33:24,280 –> 00:33:28,440
will send them in.
The sense that we get is that at

590
00:33:28,440 –> 00:33:32,160
the very least Nehemiah’s time,
right after the exile, when he

591
00:33:32,160 –> 00:33:34,720
gathered all these sacred
writings in one place.

592
00:33:34,720 –> 00:33:38,240
Again, this was the beginning of
the Old Testament being

593
00:33:38,240 –> 00:33:41,520
officially ratified.
And it’s some time, we believe

594
00:33:41,800 –> 00:33:45,160
in those 400 years between the
Old Testament and the New that

595
00:33:45,160 –> 00:33:48,760
the Jewish people decided that
these are our holy sacred

596
00:33:49,000 –> 00:33:51,360
writings.
But I mentioned before that

597
00:33:51,360 –> 00:33:53,960
there are apocryphal works too.
That didn’t make it in.

598
00:33:54,200 –> 00:33:57,640
Here’s a list of most of the
major apocryphal books from the

599
00:33:57,640 –> 00:33:59,480
Old Testament.
It’s not exhaustive.

600
00:33:59,480 –> 00:34:01,640
It’s not all of them.
This is most of the major ones.

601
00:34:02,160 –> 00:34:06,240
So you have First and 2nd
Esdriss, the book of Tobit, some

602
00:34:06,240 –> 00:34:09,480
additions to the book of Esther,
The Wisdom of Solomon and

603
00:34:09,480 –> 00:34:12,080
Ecclesiasticus, which were
supposedly both written by

604
00:34:12,080 –> 00:34:15,480
Solomon Baruch, which was
supposedly written by Baruch the

605
00:34:15,480 –> 00:34:19,520
servant of Jeremiah Susanna,
which is supposed to be Daniel,

606
00:34:19,520 –> 00:34:22,760
chapter 13 Bell and the Dragon,
which is supposed to be Daniel,

607
00:34:22,760 –> 00:34:25,360
chapter 14.
The Song of the three Hebrew

608
00:34:25,360 –> 00:34:28,760
Children, the prayer of
Manasseh, and then First and 2nd

609
00:34:28,760 –> 00:34:30,800
Maccabees, which we have
actually quoted from a couple of

610
00:34:30,800 –> 00:34:33,360
times.
Now none of these made their way

611
00:34:33,360 –> 00:34:36,800
into the Old Testament, and most
of them for roughly the same

612
00:34:36,800 –> 00:34:40,360
reasons most of these books
abound.

613
00:34:40,360 –> 00:34:45,840
And historical and geographical
inaccuracies and anachronisms.

614
00:34:46,520 –> 00:34:49,480
So an anachronism is when
something is written about, but

615
00:34:49,480 –> 00:34:53,760
it’s out of place.
So if if the book was writing

616
00:34:53,760 –> 00:34:56,760
about a certain time period and
they mentioned a people that

617
00:34:56,760 –> 00:34:59,680
didn’t actually exist until a
few 100 years later, that would

618
00:34:59,680 –> 00:35:02,960
be an anachronism.
It’s an error, usually a time

619
00:35:02,960 –> 00:35:05,040
sensitive error that has been
made.

620
00:35:05,400 –> 00:35:09,680
So most of these books abound.
And those types of errors, they

621
00:35:09,680 –> 00:35:13,440
teach doctrines which are false
and foster practices that are at

622
00:35:13,440 –> 00:35:15,640
odds with scripture.
Remember we talked about the

623
00:35:15,640 –> 00:35:18,880
criteria which would be put
against any book that was being

624
00:35:18,880 –> 00:35:22,880
considered to be included in the
Old Testament sacred writings

625
00:35:22,880 –> 00:35:26,800
and they’d ask the question, is
it consistent with what we know

626
00:35:26,800 –> 00:35:30,200
about God?
And if it wasn’t, they wouldn’t

627
00:35:30,200 –> 00:35:32,840
include it.
They resort to literary types

628
00:35:32,840 –> 00:35:35,840
and display an artificiality of
subject matter and styling out

629
00:35:35,840 –> 00:35:37,640
of keeping with inspired
scripture.

630
00:35:37,920 –> 00:35:40,400
I don’t know if you’ve ever
noticed, but the Bible doesn’t

631
00:35:40,400 –> 00:35:44,040
read like a work of fiction.
It reads like a real historical

632
00:35:44,040 –> 00:35:47,080
account.
In works of fiction, especially

633
00:35:47,080 –> 00:35:51,240
from ancient times like this
one, we read about idealized

634
00:35:51,400 –> 00:35:54,080
heroes who are perfect in every
way.

635
00:35:54,400 –> 00:35:57,360
We have all kinds of dramatic
details that would never really

636
00:35:57,360 –> 00:35:59,840
happen in real life and in the
Bible.

637
00:35:59,840 –> 00:36:03,200
We read about real people,
people who were faithful but

638
00:36:03,200 –> 00:36:09,320
sometimes committed terrible
sins, and we read about the true

639
00:36:09,320 –> 00:36:11,840
course of events that we’re kind
of familiar with today.

640
00:36:11,840 –> 00:36:16,280
When time and chance happeneth
to everyone, it reads like a

641
00:36:16,280 –> 00:36:20,280
true factual account.
But many of these books up here

642
00:36:20,280 –> 00:36:21,960
do not.
They read like a work of

643
00:36:21,960 –> 00:36:25,040
fiction, and so they were kept
out and they lack the

644
00:36:25,040 –> 00:36:27,560
distinctive elements that give
genuine scripture.

645
00:36:27,560 –> 00:36:31,120
It’s divine character, like
prophetic power and poetic and

646
00:36:31,120 –> 00:36:35,520
religious feeling.
So all of these books were put

647
00:36:35,520 –> 00:36:37,760
through the very rigorous test
of anything that was being

648
00:36:37,760 –> 00:36:40,280
considered by the Jewish rabbis
to be included in the Old

649
00:36:40,280 –> 00:36:42,840
Testament.
And they didn’t make the cut.

650
00:36:44,360 –> 00:36:47,200
They did not make the Old
Testament of our Bibles.

651
00:36:47,840 –> 00:36:51,840
And the process by which they
got there was fanatical.

652
00:36:52,360 –> 00:36:55,680
It was rigorous.
Now we’re for the sake of time,

653
00:36:55,680 –> 00:36:57,440
we need to start talking about
the New Testament.

654
00:36:57,440 –> 00:36:59,400
Now, I told you we’re going to
break this into two parts.

655
00:36:59,600 –> 00:37:00,840
We’ve talked about the Old
Testament.

656
00:37:00,840 –> 00:37:02,360
Let’s talk now about the New
Testament.

657
00:37:02,360 –> 00:37:05,680
Because the formation of the New
Testament Canon in the situation

658
00:37:05,680 –> 00:37:08,520
in New Testament times was very
different from the Old

659
00:37:08,520 –> 00:37:11,680
Testament.
God had before the time of

660
00:37:11,760 –> 00:37:13,200
Jesus.
He had stopped speaking to the

661
00:37:13,200 –> 00:37:14,560
people of Israel, and they knew
it.

662
00:37:15,240 –> 00:37:17,440
There were no prophets anymore.
All they had were their

663
00:37:17,440 –> 00:37:19,040
scriptures, their sacred
writings.

664
00:37:19,040 –> 00:37:23,120
But then Jesus came on the scene
and John the Baptist before him,

665
00:37:23,120 –> 00:37:25,920
and once again God was speaking
to his people, even though many

666
00:37:25,920 –> 00:37:30,280
of them wouldn’t acknowledge it.
And Jesus would send his

667
00:37:30,280 –> 00:37:33,640
apostles out into all the world
to preach the gospel message.

668
00:37:34,880 –> 00:37:38,720
And those early ecclesias, they
didn’t have the New Testament

669
00:37:38,720 –> 00:37:41,680
that we have today.
As time went on, maybe some of

670
00:37:41,680 –> 00:37:44,400
them would might have one or two
of the gospel accounts.

671
00:37:44,560 –> 00:37:46,760
Maybe they have one of the
letters of Paul or one of the

672
00:37:46,760 –> 00:37:48,320
other apostles, but that would
be it.

673
00:37:49,400 –> 00:37:51,760
And what they had instead were
the Holy Spirit gifts.

674
00:37:53,920 –> 00:37:56,440
Just like in the Old Testament
when they had men of God

675
00:37:56,440 –> 00:37:59,520
performing works to verify that
these truly were works of God,

676
00:37:59,520 –> 00:38:03,960
in the New Testament people were
given the Holy Spirit gifts.

677
00:38:04,360 –> 00:38:07,280
They didn’t have our New
Testament of the Bible, but they

678
00:38:07,280 –> 00:38:10,400
had plenty of evidence in front
of their eyes constantly that

679
00:38:10,400 –> 00:38:12,680
God was working in and amongst
them.

680
00:38:14,440 –> 00:38:18,480
But the apostles would die, and
with the apostles would go the

681
00:38:18,560 –> 00:38:21,120
the ability to pass on those
Holy Spirit gifts.

682
00:38:21,120 –> 00:38:24,040
And so when the apostles died,
those Holy Spirit gifts would

683
00:38:24,040 –> 00:38:27,040
die out too.
They’d fade after the deaths of

684
00:38:27,040 –> 00:38:30,840
the apostles, but the Christian
community would continue to

685
00:38:30,840 –> 00:38:34,840
spread by leaps and bounds.
That’s going to be the subject

686
00:38:34,840 –> 00:38:37,400
of our class tomorrow morning.
The rapid spread of

687
00:38:37,400 –> 00:38:42,280
Christianity, against all odds,
at a time when it should fail

688
00:38:42,280 –> 00:38:43,840
should have failed and it did
not.

689
00:38:45,400 –> 00:38:48,280
And there were a number of
factors in those early, first,

690
00:38:48,280 –> 00:38:52,320
few, 100 years after Jesus that
would pressure the early

691
00:38:52,320 –> 00:38:55,600
Christian leaders to start to
closely define which books

692
00:38:55,600 –> 00:38:58,160
belonged in the New Testament.
What does the New Testament

693
00:38:58,160 –> 00:39:01,680
Canon look like?
One of the earliest factors

694
00:39:01,720 –> 00:39:06,120
happened around the year 140 AD,
when a guy named Marcian who was

695
00:39:06,120 –> 00:39:08,600
a Christian but a very different
kind of Christian.

696
00:39:08,600 –> 00:39:11,280
He came up with his own theology
very different from what other

697
00:39:11,280 –> 00:39:15,160
Christians believed at the time,
Put together his own New

698
00:39:15,160 –> 00:39:17,920
Testament, he put together his
own Canon, and it was only

699
00:39:17,920 –> 00:39:20,040
comprised of a shorter version
of the Gospel of Luke.

700
00:39:20,040 –> 00:39:23,240
And 10 of the writings of the
Apostle Paul and Marcian is

701
00:39:23,240 –> 00:39:25,920
called Marcian the heretic
because nobody liked what he had

702
00:39:25,920 –> 00:39:28,360
to say.
But if Marcian the heretic was

703
00:39:28,360 –> 00:39:31,320
out there putting out his
version of the New Testament,

704
00:39:31,720 –> 00:39:34,760
then everybody else had felt the
pressure to say, OK, well, if

705
00:39:34,760 –> 00:39:37,480
he’s wrong, then what should the
New Testament actually look

706
00:39:37,480 –> 00:39:39,840
like?
So they started to feel pressure

707
00:39:39,840 –> 00:39:45,880
to ratify the New Testament
Canon, and throughout the 2nd

708
00:39:45,920 –> 00:39:48,280
century there was the
distribution of many.

709
00:39:48,280 –> 00:39:51,640
We call them spurious works,
obvious counterfeits of various

710
00:39:51,640 –> 00:39:54,960
different books clearly written
by impostors, especially in some

711
00:39:54,960 –> 00:39:59,320
of the Eastern churches.
And now that these counterfeit

712
00:39:59,320 –> 00:40:01,640
works were popping up, it became
even more important to define

713
00:40:01,640 –> 00:40:04,720
which ones were real, because
they couldn’t even answer that

714
00:40:04,720 –> 00:40:07,920
question sometimes.
And missionaries were being sent

715
00:40:07,920 –> 00:40:11,320
into foreign countries.
And the gospel messages in the

716
00:40:11,320 –> 00:40:13,440
sacred works had to be
translated into foreign

717
00:40:13,440 –> 00:40:15,920
languages.
So the question is, which books

718
00:40:15,920 –> 00:40:18,360
should we bother putting effort
into translating?

719
00:40:18,360 –> 00:40:21,360
We’ve got to define which books
truly are holy, which ones are

720
00:40:21,360 –> 00:40:23,960
inspired by God.
And finally, the nail in the

721
00:40:23,960 –> 00:40:27,200
coffin I think was in 303 AD
when the Roman Emperor

722
00:40:27,200 –> 00:40:31,640
Diocletian made an edict that
all Christian sacred books must

723
00:40:31,640 –> 00:40:37,120
be burned and destroyed, and
many Christians died protecting

724
00:40:37,120 –> 00:40:39,720
their books.
But the question became who

725
00:40:39,720 –> 00:40:43,280
wants to die for a book that
might be religious but maybe not

726
00:40:43,280 –> 00:40:45,680
sacred?
You’d really want to start to

727
00:40:45,680 –> 00:40:48,680
define which books truly were
inspired by God, because you

728
00:40:48,680 –> 00:40:53,080
might have to die for that work.
And so as the first few

729
00:40:53,080 –> 00:40:55,880
centuries rolled over, there
became there was a lot of

730
00:40:55,880 –> 00:40:59,720
pressure put on the New
Testament leaders to define, or

731
00:40:59,720 –> 00:41:02,720
the Christian leaders of that
time to define which books

732
00:41:02,720 –> 00:41:07,760
belonged in the New Testament.
And the test for canonicity in

733
00:41:07,760 –> 00:41:09,400
the New Testament is very
simple.

734
00:41:11,320 –> 00:41:15,480
They simply ask the question,
was the book either written by

735
00:41:15,480 –> 00:41:19,440
an apostle or did it have direct
Apostolic approval?

736
00:41:20,480 –> 00:41:23,240
That was it.
And it’s very similar to the Old

737
00:41:23,240 –> 00:41:26,240
Testament criteria that the book
had to be written by a confirmed

738
00:41:26,240 –> 00:41:29,400
prophet of God.
You see, God hadn’t spoken to

739
00:41:29,400 –> 00:41:32,200
them for 400 years.
And then came Jesus, who God

740
00:41:32,200 –> 00:41:34,840
spoke through the only one
speaking with the authority of

741
00:41:34,840 –> 00:41:37,200
God.
And now he was gone.

742
00:41:37,200 –> 00:41:39,400
And his apostles went throughout
the world, and they were

743
00:41:39,400 –> 00:41:41,280
speaking with the authority of
Jesus.

744
00:41:41,960 –> 00:41:45,160
So they were the only people
through whom God was speaking,

745
00:41:45,160 –> 00:41:47,360
but they were performing
miracles wherever they went,

746
00:41:47,360 –> 00:41:49,160
converting people all over the
world.

747
00:41:50,160 –> 00:41:52,920
It’s the only way to explain how
Christianity succeeded in the

748
00:41:52,920 –> 00:41:55,800
world in which it succeeded,
which we’ll talk about tomorrow

749
00:41:55,800 –> 00:42:01,560
morning.
And so it was a simple question.

750
00:42:02,360 –> 00:42:06,440
Was this book either written by
an apostle or directly and and

751
00:42:07,640 –> 00:42:12,560
indisputably confirmed, endorsed
by an apostle?

752
00:42:12,560 –> 00:42:19,520
And in 367 AD, the first list of
the New Testament that looks

753
00:42:19,520 –> 00:42:22,360
exactly like our New Testament
today, with the 27 books that we

754
00:42:22,360 –> 00:42:25,560
have, was published by a man
named Athanasius.

755
00:42:26,800 –> 00:42:30,080
And shortly after that, two
other men, Jerome and Augustine,

756
00:42:30,080 –> 00:42:32,680
who are commonly referred to as
Saint Jerome and Saint Augustine

757
00:42:32,680 –> 00:42:36,040
published their lists which were
exactly the same as his list and

758
00:42:36,040 –> 00:42:39,040
they were just endorsing
Athanasius list.

759
00:42:40,160 –> 00:42:44,000
And a couple of decades later,
in 393 AD, the New Testament

760
00:42:44,000 –> 00:42:47,720
Canon was officially ratified.
It was known as the Synod of

761
00:42:47,720 –> 00:42:52,720
Hippo.
Now, there are a lot of

762
00:42:53,040 –> 00:42:55,360
apocryphal works in the New
Testament as well.

763
00:42:56,600 –> 00:42:59,160
And just to give you an idea of
what was happening in these

764
00:42:59,160 –> 00:43:02,320
early years of the Christian
community, here’s a quote from

765
00:43:02,320 –> 00:43:06,440
Justin Martyr sometime around
155 AD we quoted from him

766
00:43:06,440 –> 00:43:07,520
before.
He’s one of the earliest

767
00:43:07,520 –> 00:43:10,240
Christian apologist.
He’s describing what life was

768
00:43:10,240 –> 00:43:12,080
like in the Christian community
at that time.

769
00:43:12,080 –> 00:43:15,200
He said on the day called
Sunday, all who live in cities

770
00:43:15,200 –> 00:43:17,240
or in the country gathered
together to one place.

771
00:43:17,440 –> 00:43:20,040
And the memoirs of the apostles,
or the writings of the prophets

772
00:43:20,040 –> 00:43:22,680
are read as long as time
permits.

773
00:43:23,040 –> 00:43:26,520
And then, when the reader has
ceased, the president verbally

774
00:43:26,520 –> 00:43:30,440
instructs and exhorts to the
imitation of these good things.

775
00:43:30,560 –> 00:43:32,040
Which sounds pretty familiar,
doesn’t it?

776
00:43:32,040 –> 00:43:34,160
It’s a lot like our Sunday
mornings here.

777
00:43:34,480 –> 00:43:36,640
They’d read from the word of
God, and then they give an

778
00:43:36,640 –> 00:43:40,200
exhortation about it.
And as early as 155 AD, they had

779
00:43:40,200 –> 00:43:43,720
a collection of holy writings
from both the prophets and the

780
00:43:43,720 –> 00:43:45,600
apostles.
You’re familiar with those

781
00:43:45,600 –> 00:43:48,120
passages of the New Testament
that our faith is based on the

782
00:43:48,120 –> 00:43:52,160
foundation of the apostles and
the prophets.

783
00:43:52,440 –> 00:43:55,320
That’s a significant fact.
The book either had to be

784
00:43:55,320 –> 00:43:58,200
written by a prophet or an
apostle to be within the Canon

785
00:43:58,200 –> 00:44:03,080
of the Bible.
So here are here’s a list, again

786
00:44:03,080 –> 00:44:06,200
not exhaustive, but most of the
major apocryphal works of the

787
00:44:06,200 –> 00:44:08,920
New Testament.
We have the Didaki, which means

788
00:44:08,920 –> 00:44:13,200
the teaching of the 12, the Acts
of Paul and Thekla, the Epistle

789
00:44:13,200 –> 00:44:16,160
of Pseudo Barnabas, the Epistle
to the Corinthians, the 2nd

790
00:44:16,160 –> 00:44:18,720
Epistle of Climate, the Shepherd
of Hermes, the Gospel According

791
00:44:18,720 –> 00:44:21,400
to the Hebrews, the Seven
Epistles of Ignatius, the

792
00:44:21,400 –> 00:44:24,560
Epistle of Polycorp to the
Philippians, the Apocalypse of

793
00:44:24,560 –> 00:44:27,400
Peter and the Epistle to the
Laodiceans.

794
00:44:27,760 –> 00:44:30,320
And none of these works ever
enjoyed more than temporary

795
00:44:30,320 –> 00:44:34,200
recognition, maybe in one or two
ecclesias at a time.

796
00:44:34,760 –> 00:44:37,560
There was never a time when the
whole Christian community said

797
00:44:37,560 –> 00:44:39,440
yes.
We believe this book belongs

798
00:44:39,440 –> 00:44:42,920
here.
They all only enjoyed maybe at

799
00:44:42,960 –> 00:44:46,520
at most we would call it semi
canonical status.

800
00:44:47,240 –> 00:44:50,760
But the success that some of
them did enjoy for a period of

801
00:44:50,760 –> 00:44:53,000
time was usually due to the fact
that they would append

802
00:44:53,000 –> 00:44:59,040
themselves, attach themselves to
actual legitimate writings from

803
00:44:59,040 –> 00:45:02,280
the New Testament.
They attach themselves to books

804
00:45:02,280 –> 00:45:05,720
that were inspired, that did
belong in the New Testament.

805
00:45:05,720 –> 00:45:09,520
But the fact remains that no
major church, council or Canon

806
00:45:09,520 –> 00:45:13,240
ever included any of these books
as inspired parts of the New

807
00:45:13,240 –> 00:45:16,600
Testament.
So some examples of that.

808
00:45:16,720 –> 00:45:19,320
You may notice that in
Colossians chapter 4 and verse

809
00:45:19,320 –> 00:45:23,680
16, Paul says that he’d written
a letter to the Laodiceans.

810
00:45:24,640 –> 00:45:26,520
We don’t have that letter.
We don’t have the letter to the

811
00:45:26,520 –> 00:45:28,880
Laodiceans.
But you see up here the Epistle

812
00:45:28,880 –> 00:45:31,880
to the Laodiceans.
At some point in time, somebody

813
00:45:32,120 –> 00:45:34,560
thought, oh, here’s an
opportunity, we’re missing this

814
00:45:34,560 –> 00:45:35,840
letter.
I’ll write it.

815
00:45:36,240 –> 00:45:38,680
And they wrote the fictional
letter to the Laodiceans.

816
00:45:39,080 –> 00:45:41,800
It was very early on recognized
as a counterfeit.

817
00:45:41,800 –> 00:45:44,480
Nobody had ever seen it before.
All the New Testament works had

818
00:45:44,480 –> 00:45:47,000
all been written around the same
time, back when the apostles

819
00:45:47,000 –> 00:45:52,440
were alive.
First Corinthians chapter 5 and

820
00:45:52,440 –> 00:45:54,800
verse 9.
The Apostle Paul says that he

821
00:45:54,800 –> 00:45:57,040
had written an earlier letter to
the Corinthians, which would be

822
00:45:57,040 –> 00:45:59,840
1/3 letter to the Corinthians.
Now we only have two of the

823
00:45:59,840 –> 00:46:02,680
letters to the Corinthians,
which means there was a third

824
00:46:02,680 –> 00:46:05,920
one that we don’t have today.
But somebody took the

825
00:46:05,960 –> 00:46:09,400
opportunity to later on write a
fake epistle to the Corinthians

826
00:46:09,400 –> 00:46:11,840
to fill in that gap.
And you can see why some of

827
00:46:11,840 –> 00:46:14,280
these might have been accepted
by some people who are like, oh,

828
00:46:14,280 –> 00:46:17,200
it’s been found.
We found that third letter, and

829
00:46:17,200 –> 00:46:19,880
it would have been accepted
maybe by some people in some

830
00:46:19,880 –> 00:46:21,760
place until it was eventually
tossed out.

831
00:46:23,360 –> 00:46:27,200
And in the Old Testament we find
too that that there are works

832
00:46:27,200 –> 00:46:30,200
that are mentioned that were
written often by faithful

833
00:46:30,200 –> 00:46:32,560
people.
Nevertheless, they were not

834
00:46:32,560 –> 00:46:34,760
preserved and they’re not in our
Bible today, even though they

835
00:46:34,760 –> 00:46:37,720
were written by faithful people
because they’ve been lost to

836
00:46:37,720 –> 00:46:39,720
history.
First Chronicles chapter 29 and

837
00:46:39,720 –> 00:46:43,280
29 mentions the Chronicles of
Nathan the prophet and Gad the

838
00:46:43,280 –> 00:46:46,400
Seer, and we don’t have those we
know about Nathan the prophet.

839
00:46:46,400 –> 00:46:48,240
He was a true faithful prophet
of God.

840
00:46:48,240 –> 00:46:50,640
He wrote a book and we don’t
have it today.

841
00:46:51,080 –> 00:46:55,680
God didn’t decide to preserve it
so that we would have it in our

842
00:46:55,680 –> 00:46:58,160
Bible today, even though he was
a faithful man of God.

843
00:46:58,360 –> 00:47:02,520
First Kings chapter 4 and verse
32 says that Solomon wrote 3000

844
00:47:02,520 –> 00:47:08,040
Proverbs and 1005 songs.
And how many songs of Solomon do

845
00:47:08,040 –> 00:47:10,120
we have today?
Only one.

846
00:47:10,560 –> 00:47:14,360
What happened to the other 1004?
I’d suggest we also don’t have

847
00:47:14,360 –> 00:47:17,960
all of the 3000 Proverbs that
Solomon wrote either.

848
00:47:18,440 –> 00:47:20,840
And you see, there have been a
lot of faithful people

849
00:47:20,840 –> 00:47:22,880
throughout that ancient history
of the Jews.

850
00:47:23,120 –> 00:47:27,160
They did right things and they
may have been completely sound

851
00:47:27,160 –> 00:47:30,080
and what they wrote and worth
reading, but they’ve been lost

852
00:47:30,080 –> 00:47:35,200
to us because the Canon of
Scripture was very precisely

853
00:47:35,600 –> 00:47:39,680
copied down to us through the
generations in a very specific

854
00:47:39,680 –> 00:47:42,600
way.
Now we started out by saying

855
00:47:42,600 –> 00:47:45,000
that if we truly believe that
the Bible is the inspired word

856
00:47:45,000 –> 00:47:48,520
of God, then it should in some
way prove that to us.

857
00:47:48,520 –> 00:47:52,280
It should separate itself by its
very characteristics from all

858
00:47:52,280 –> 00:47:54,000
other writings that we have.
Because we don’t believe that

859
00:47:54,000 –> 00:47:56,760
anything else is the inspired
word of God except for the books

860
00:47:56,760 –> 00:47:59,680
that we find here.
And just come with me to Psalm

861
00:47:59,680 –> 00:48:04,040
chapter 12.
I’m going to read verse six.

862
00:48:04,040 –> 00:48:09,760
In the first half of verse 7,
Psalm chapter 12, starting at

863
00:48:09,760 –> 00:48:16,720
verse 6, the words of the Lord
are pure words, like silver,

864
00:48:16,800 –> 00:48:20,840
refined in a furnace, on the
ground, purified 7 times.

865
00:48:21,400 –> 00:48:26,760
You, O Lord, will keep them.
Now, if we believe those words,

866
00:48:26,760 –> 00:48:30,920
if we believe that God himself
has preserved this message for

867
00:48:30,920 –> 00:48:34,880
over the course of several
thousand years for us here so

868
00:48:34,880 –> 00:48:38,800
that he can speak to us today in
his legitimate, genuine voice,

869
00:48:41,280 –> 00:48:46,840
then once again, don’t you think
that these books, that this

870
00:48:46,840 –> 00:48:50,200
Bible should somehow, over and
above all other works, prove

871
00:48:50,400 –> 00:48:53,560
that it’s special?
And we’ve talked about how the

872
00:48:53,560 –> 00:48:55,440
Old Testament in the New
Testament was formed.

873
00:48:55,440 –> 00:48:59,200
We’ve talked about how
incredible it was, the the

874
00:48:59,200 –> 00:49:02,320
rigorous procedures of the
scribes as they copied out the

875
00:49:02,320 –> 00:49:04,840
Old Testament.
We’ve talked about all the books

876
00:49:04,840 –> 00:49:06,800
that were kicked out of the
Bible because they didn’t

877
00:49:06,800 –> 00:49:09,880
belong, because it was
considered to be a matter of

878
00:49:09,880 –> 00:49:12,120
life and death.
Whether or not a book truly was

879
00:49:12,120 –> 00:49:14,400
truly did belong within the
Canaan of the Bible.

880
00:49:15,480 –> 00:49:19,360
And when historians are looking
at manuscript evidence for any

881
00:49:19,360 –> 00:49:22,360
kind of ancient historical
writing or event, there’s two

882
00:49:22,360 –> 00:49:25,760
main questions they ask.
And the first one is this.

883
00:49:26,480 –> 00:49:30,200
What is the gap in time between
the oldest manuscript that we

884
00:49:30,200 –> 00:49:33,800
have for this particular writing
and when it was originally

885
00:49:33,800 –> 00:49:36,920
written, when that author
originally lived?

886
00:49:37,480 –> 00:49:39,680
And to give you an example of
what that might look like with

887
00:49:39,680 –> 00:49:42,680
some other historical works that
we use for sources for our

888
00:49:42,680 –> 00:49:45,320
ancient history, here’s some
examples.

889
00:49:45,320 –> 00:49:48,080
I apologize for the font size.
It’s smaller than I like to to

890
00:49:48,080 –> 00:49:51,560
have it normally, but I had to
fit these all on the screen.

891
00:49:51,960 –> 00:49:55,880
Pliny the Younger, the Roman
governor, who also wrote some

892
00:49:55,880 –> 00:49:58,760
history that we used today.
So we so we know what happened

893
00:49:58,760 –> 00:50:01,240
in Asia around the time that he
lived.

894
00:50:01,480 –> 00:50:07,200
Pliny the Younger, about 750
years from the oldest manuscript

895
00:50:07,200 –> 00:50:10,160
we have to when Pliny actually
lived.

896
00:50:11,200 –> 00:50:14,680
Caesar, Julius Caesar and his
work the Gallic Wars, about 1000

897
00:50:14,680 –> 00:50:18,560
years.
Plato about 1200 years.

898
00:50:19,120 –> 00:50:25,040
Aristotle about 1400 years,
Sophocles about 1400 years,

899
00:50:25,600 –> 00:50:30,880
Euripides about 1500 years.
These are the average time gaps,

900
00:50:30,880 –> 00:50:33,360
the kind of thing we see when
we’re looking at works that are

901
00:50:33,360 –> 00:50:36,640
this old.
And then we get to the Old and

902
00:50:36,640 –> 00:50:43,640
the New Testaments and the Old
Testament just about 150 years,

903
00:50:45,040 –> 00:50:49,600
and the New Testament no more
than 50 and perhaps less.

904
00:50:51,200 –> 00:50:55,040
The oldest manuscript copies we
have from the New Testament were

905
00:50:55,040 –> 00:50:58,160
perhaps written when some of the
last of the apostles, maybe

906
00:50:58,160 –> 00:51:02,400
John, was even still alive.
There is no other ancient

907
00:51:02,400 –> 00:51:05,520
historical work that even comes
close when it comes to the time

908
00:51:05,520 –> 00:51:08,080
gap between when it was
originally written in the oldest

909
00:51:08,080 –> 00:51:12,400
manuscript copies that we have.
And the Bible, statistically, in

910
00:51:12,400 –> 00:51:15,920
this way sets sets itself apart
from any other ancient work.

911
00:51:16,720 –> 00:51:19,880
Now, the other major question
that historians will ask is how

912
00:51:19,880 –> 00:51:24,440
many manuscript copies do we
have of this particular work?

913
00:51:24,440 –> 00:51:26,480
Because they like to be able to
take those copies and put them

914
00:51:26,480 –> 00:51:29,000
side by side and compare them to
each other because they’re often

915
00:51:29,000 –> 00:51:34,360
quite different from each other.
So this list is similar to the

916
00:51:34,360 –> 00:51:36,560
last one, but not all.
The names aren’t exactly the

917
00:51:36,560 –> 00:51:40,880
same for Plato.
Seven.

918
00:51:41,360 –> 00:51:44,640
Now these numbers include both
manuscript fragments and

919
00:51:44,640 –> 00:51:46,840
manuscript copies of entire
scrolls.

920
00:51:48,000 –> 00:51:50,680
Thucydides is considered to be
one of the most accurate ancient

921
00:51:50,680 –> 00:51:55,120
historians. 7 Pliny the Younger,
7.

922
00:51:55,600 –> 00:51:59,440
Herodotus, 8.
Euripides, 9.

923
00:51:59,640 –> 00:52:03,480
Caesar with his Gallic Wars 10.
Tacitus 20.

924
00:52:03,760 –> 00:52:07,960
Aristotle, 49.
Josephus, somewhere around 127,

925
00:52:08,200 –> 00:52:13,160
Sophocles 193.
And then we come to the Old

926
00:52:13,160 –> 00:52:20,560
Testament somewhere around
10,010 thousand, and then we

927
00:52:20,560 –> 00:52:23,280
come to the New Testament and at
last count when I checked,

928
00:52:23,840 –> 00:52:28,760
24,970.
And to put this in even more

929
00:52:28,760 –> 00:52:31,440
perspective, if you were to
compare the Bible, let’s say the

930
00:52:31,440 –> 00:52:34,560
New Testament, to the writing
that had the second most amount

931
00:52:34,560 –> 00:52:37,320
of manuscript copies outside the
Bible, it wouldn’t be a

932
00:52:37,320 –> 00:52:39,800
historical work.
It would actually be a fictional

933
00:52:39,800 –> 00:52:45,560
work.
Homer’s the Iliad at 643, in

934
00:52:45,560 –> 00:52:47,840
second place, after the Old and
New Testaments.

935
00:52:50,040 –> 00:52:54,320
Just by the way, In case you’re
curious, of those 24,970 just

936
00:52:54,320 –> 00:52:57,920
under 5700 are in the original
Greek, about 10,000 in Latin,

937
00:52:58,120 –> 00:53:00,160
and the rest in various other
languages.

938
00:53:03,000 –> 00:53:07,080
Did God preserve his words?
Has he shown that to us?

939
00:53:07,480 –> 00:53:11,120
Has he set these words apart
from any other thing that we

940
00:53:11,120 –> 00:53:13,480
could read, that we could find,
that we could get our hands on,

941
00:53:13,480 –> 00:53:17,080
that we could delve into?
And the answer is absolutely, He

942
00:53:17,080 –> 00:53:20,840
has, in just about every way
that counts.

943
00:53:21,880 –> 00:53:25,400
The Bible that we have in front
of us has set itself apart from

944
00:53:25,480 –> 00:53:28,480
any other human work that has
ever been written because we

945
00:53:28,480 –> 00:53:32,000
believe that it was more than
that, that it truly was inspired

946
00:53:32,000 –> 00:53:34,720
by God.
And if it was inspired by God,

947
00:53:34,720 –> 00:53:37,920
that means that when you read
it, you’re having a conversation

948
00:53:37,920 –> 00:53:40,680
with God because he’s speaking
to you through his word, and

949
00:53:40,680 –> 00:53:42,320
you’re speaking to him when you
pray.

950
00:53:43,840 –> 00:53:50,160
And if God truly is speaking to
us through this word, well, then

951
00:53:50,720 –> 00:53:52,360
I imagine we should listen,
shouldn’t we?

952
00:53:53,360 –> 00:53:55,480
And that should be only the
first step, recognizing that

953
00:53:55,480 –> 00:53:57,680
this truly is the word of God.
If we acknowledge that he

954
00:53:57,680 –> 00:54:01,480
exists, that Jesus truly was the
Son of God, that he was raised

955
00:54:01,480 –> 00:54:04,520
from the dead, then that means
that God can and will raise us

956
00:54:04,520 –> 00:54:07,160
from the dead.
And if this truly is God’s

957
00:54:07,160 –> 00:54:14,480
message to us, well, then truly
this book is more important than

958
00:54:14,680 –> 00:54:16,960
anything else in this life.