The New Testament (Greek Koine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity (c.300 BC – AD 300). Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek. Original names were koine, Hellenic, Alexandrian and Macedonian (Macedonic); all on the contrast to Attic dialect. Koine was the first common supra-: Καινὴ Διαθήκη, Kainē Diathēkē) is the name given to the second major division of the Christian Bible The Bible refers to the sacred scriptures of Judaism and Christianity, usually compiled in a single volume. The Hebrew Bible contains 39 books. The Christian Bible adds to the Hebrew Bible some 27 more books, giving a total of about 66 books, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament The Old Testament is the collection of books that forms the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. The contents of the Old Testament canon vary from church to church, with the Orthodox communion having 51 books: the shared books are those of the shortest canon, that of the major Protestant communions, with 39 books. Unlike the Old Testament The Old Testament is the collection of books that forms the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. The contents of the Old Testament canon vary from church to church, with the Orthodox communion having 51 books: the shared books are those of the shortest canon, that of the major Protestant communions, with 39 books, the contents of the New Testament deal explicitly with Christianity Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the New Testament. Christianity comprises three major branches: Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy (which parted ways with Catholicism in 1054 A.D.) and Protestantism (which came into existence during the Protestant Reformation of the 16th, although both the Old and New Testament are regarded, together, as Sacred Scripture Scripture is that portion of literature deemed authoritative for establishing instructions within any of a number of specific religious traditions, especially the Abrahamic religions. Such bodies of writings are also sometimes known as the canon of scripture. They are often associated with the belief that they were either given directly, or. The New Testament has therefore (in whole or in part) frequently accompanied the spread of Christianity around the world, and both reflects and serves as a source for Christian theology Christian theology is discourse concerning Christian faith. Christian theologians use Biblical exegesis, rational analysis, and argument to understand, explain, test, critique, defend or promote Christianity. Theology might be undertaken to help the theologian understand Christianity more truly, make comparisons between Christianity and other. Phrases as well as extended readings directly from the New Testament are also incorporated into the various Christian liturgies A liturgy is a set form of ceremony or pattern of worship. Christian liturgy is a pattern for worship used by a Christian congregation or denomination on a regular basis. The New Testament has influenced not only religious, philosophical A philosophical movement is either the appearance or increased popularity of a specific school of philosophy, or a fairly broad but identifiable sea-change in philosophical thought on a particular subject. Major philosophical movements are often characterized with reference to the nation, language, or historical era in which they arose, and political A political movement is a social movement in the area of politics. A political movement may be organized around a single issue or set of issues, or around a set of shared concerns of a social group. In contrast with a political party, a political movement is not organized to elect members of the movement to government office; instead, a political movements Social movements are a type of group action. They are large informal groupings of individuals and/or organizations focused on specific political or social issues, in other words, on carrying out, resisting or undoing a social change in the Christian world Christendom, or the Christian world, has several meanings. In a cultural sense it refers to the worldwide community of Christians, adherents of Christianity. This community numbers in the billions of people of the world population, and is spread across many different nations and ethnic groups connected only by faith in Christ and observance of the, but also left an indelible mark on its literature Literature,, is the art of written works. Literally translated, the word means acquaintance with letters (as in the Arts and Letters"). In Western culture the most basic written literary types include fiction and nonfiction, art Art is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way to affect the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, photography, sculpture, and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a branch of philosophy known as aesthetics, and music Music is an art form whose medium is sound. Common elements of music are pitch , rhythm (and its associated concepts tempo, meter, and articulation), dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture. The word derives from Greek μουσική (mousike), "(art) of the Muses.".

The New Testament is an anthology, a collection of works written at different times by various authors. In almost all Christian traditions today, the New Testament consists of 27 books. The original texts were written beginning around A.D. 50 in Koine Greek Koine Greek is the popular form of Greek which emerged in post-Classical antiquity (c.300 BC – AD 300). Other names are Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Patristic, Common, Biblical or New Testament Greek. Original names were koine, Hellenic, Alexandrian and Macedonian (Macedonic); all on the contrast to Attic dialect. Koine was the first common supra-, the lingua franca A lingua franca is a language systematically used to communicate between persons not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both persons' mother tongues of the eastern part of the Roman Empire The Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean. The term is used to describe the Roman state during and after the time of the first emperor, Augustus where they were composed. All of the works which would eventually be incorporated into the New Testament would seem to have been written no later than the mid-second century.^[1]

Collections of related texts such as letters All of these epistles present Paul as the author. Some classifications do include Hebrews, being anonymous, as a Pauline epistle instead of listing it with the general epistles, but authorship of Hebrews was disputed from the earliest of the Apostle Paul Paul of Tarsus, also called Saint Paul, Paul the Apostle, or the Apostle Paul, (Ancient Greek: Σαούλ , Σαῦλος (Saulos), and Παῦλος (Paulos); Latin: Paulus or Paullus; Hebrew: שאול התרסי‎ Šaʾul HaTarsi (Saul of Tarsus) (c.5 BC - c.67 AD), was a Jew who called himself the "Apostle to the Gentiles". According (a major collection of which must have been made already by the early second century)^[2] and the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (defended by Irenaeus of Lyon Saint Irenaeus , (2nd century AD – c. 202) was a Catholic Bishop of Lugdunum in Gaul, then a part of the Roman Empire (now Lyons, France). He was an early church father and apologist, and his writings were formative in the early development of Christian theology. He was a hearer of Polycarp, who in turn was a disciple of John the Evangelist in the late-second century as the Four Gospels) gradually were joined to other collections and single works in different combinations to form various Christian canons A Biblical canon or canon of scripture is a list or set of Biblical books considered to be authoritative as scripture by a particular religious community, generally in Judaism or Christianity. The term itself was first coined by Christians, but the idea is found in Jewish sources. The internal wording of the text can also be specified, for example: of Scripture. Over time, some disputed books, such as the Apocalypse of John The Book of Revelation, also called Revelation to John, Apocalypse of John , and Revelation of Jesus Christ is the last canonical book of the New Testament in the Christian Bible. It is the only biblical book that is wholly composed of apocalyptic literature and the Minor Catholic Epistles General epistles are books in the New Testament in the form of letters. They are termed "general" because for the most part their intended audience seems to be Christians in general rather than individual persons or congregations as is the case with the Pauline epistles. However, 2 John and 3 John are included in this group despite their were introduced into canons A Biblical canon or canon of scripture is a list or set of Biblical books considered to be authoritative as scripture by a particular religious community, generally in Judaism or Christianity. The term itself was first coined by Christians, but the idea is found in Jewish sources. The internal wording of the text can also be specified, for example: in which they were originally absent, and other works earlier held to be Scripture such as 1 Clement The Epistles of Clement are two letters ascribed to Saint Clement, an Apostolic Father, and the fourth Pope and Bishop of Rome, the Shepherd of Hermas The Shepherd of Hermas is a Christian literary work of the second century, considered a valuable book by many Christians, and considered canonical scripture by some of the early Church fathers.[citation needed] The Shepherd had great authority in the second and third centuries. It was cited as Scripture by Irenaeus. [ Along with the Apocrypha, it, and the Diatessaron The Diatessaron is the most prominent Gospel harmony created by Tatian, an early Christian apologist and ascetic. The term "diatessaron" is from Middle English ("interval of a fourth") by way of Latin, diatessarōn ("made of four [ingredients]"), and ultimately Greek, διὰ τεσσάρων (dia tessarōn) (" were excluded from the New Testament (see Antilegomena Antilegomena was an epithet the Church Fathers used to denote books of the New Testament that, although sometimes publicly read in the churches, were not—for a considerable amount of time—considered to be genuine, or received into the Biblical canon. They were thus contrasted with the "Homologoumena" (from Greek ομολογουμέν). Interestingly, although the Old Testament The Old Testament is the collection of books that forms the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. The contents of the Old Testament canon vary from church to church, with the Orthodox communion having 51 books: the shared books are those of the shortest canon, that of the major Protestant communions, with 39 books canon is not uniform within Christianity, with e.g. Roman Catholics The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with more than a billion members. The Church's leader is the Pope who holds supreme authority in concert with the College of Bishops of which he is the head. A communion of the Western church and 22 autonomous Eastern Catholic churches (called, Protestants Protestantism is one of the four major divisions within Christianity together with the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, and the Roman Catholic Church. The term is most closely tied to those groups that separated from the Roman Catholic Church in the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation, the Greek Orthodox Church The Greek Orthodox Church is the body of several churches within the larger communion of the Orthodox Church, sharing a common cultural tradition, and whose liturgy is traditionally conducted in Koine Greek, the original language of the New Testament, the Slavic Orthodox Churches Slavic Orthodox Churches are to be found in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro, Republic of Srpska and Macedonia, and they traditionally employ the Church Slavonic language in their liturgy, and the Armenian Orthodox Church The Armenian Apostolic Church is the world's oldest National Church and is one of the most ancient Christian communities. Armenia was the first country to adopt Christianity as its official religion in 301 AD, in establishing this church. The Armenian Apostolic Church traces its origins to the missions of Apostles Bartholomew and Thaddeus in the 1 differing as to which books are included in the Old Testament, the twenty-seven-book canon of the New Testament has, since at least Late Antiquity Late Antiquity is a periodization used by historians to describe the time of transition from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages, in both mainland Europe and the Mediterranean world. Precise boundaries for the period are a matter of debate, but noted historian of the period Peter Brown proposed a period between the second and eighth centuries, been almost universally recognized within Christianity Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the New Testament. Christianity comprises three major branches: Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy (which parted ways with Catholicism in 1054 A.D.) and Protestantism (which came into existence during the Protestant Reformation of the 16th (see twenty-seven book canon The Christian Biblical canon is the set of books Christians regard as divinely inspired and thus constituting the Christian Bible. Although the Early Church primarily used the Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures, the Septuagint or LXX, or the Targums among Aramaic speakers, the Apostles did not otherwise leave a defined set of new; exceptions include the New Testament of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is an Oriental Orthodox Christian church in Ethiopia. The Ethiopian Church was part of the Coptic Orthodox Church until 1959, when it was granted its own Patriarch by Coptic Orthodox Pope of Alexandria and Patriarch of All Africa, Cyril VI. It should not be confused with the Ethiopian Catholic Church, which, the canon of which—like that of the Old Testament—has not been unequivocally fixed and Martin Luther's attempt to exclude four books from the New Testament). The New Testament consists of four narratives of the life, teaching, and death of Jesus Jesus of Nazareth , also known as Jesus Christ or simply Jesus, is the central figure of Christianity, which views him as the Messiah foretold in the Old Testament. Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God (in the concept of the Trinity, he is God [as] the Son), who came to provide humankind with salvation and reconciliation with God by his, called "gospels A gospel is a writing that describes the life, ministry, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical gospels: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John although it is also used for non-canonical writings such as the Gospel of Thomas. The term "Gospel""; a narrative of the Apostles In Christianity, the Apostles were missionaries among the leaders in the Early Church and, in the Epistle to the Hebrews,[3:1] Jesus Christ himself. The term was also used, especially by the Gospel of Luke, for "the Twelve," Jesus' inner circle of disciples (students). They were, according to the Acts of the Apostles and Christian' ministries in the early church Early Christianity is commonly defined as the Christianity of the roughly three centuries between the Crucifixion of Jesus (c. 30) and the First Council of Nicaea (325). At first, the Christian church was centered in Jerusalem, and its leaders included James, Peter, and John. The first Christians were all Jewish or Jewish Proselytes, either by, called the "Acts of the Apostles The Acts of the Apostles , usually referred to simply as Acts, is the fifth book of the New Testament; Acts outlines the history of the Apostolic Age. The author is traditionally identified as Luke the Evangelist" and probably by the same author as the Gospel of Luke The Gospel According to Luke , generally shortened to the Gospel of Luke, is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension. The author is traditionally identified as Luke the Evangelist, which it continues; twenty-one letters, often called "epistles An epistle is a writing directed or sent to a person or group of people, usually a letter and a very formal, often didactic and elegant one. The epistle genre of letter-writing was common in ancient Egypt as part of the scribal-school writing curriculum. The letters in the New Testament from Apostles to Christians are usually referred to as" in the biblical context, written by various authors and consisting mostly of Christian counsel, instruction, and conflict resolution; and an Apocalypse An Apocalypse is a disclosure of something hidden from the majority of mankind in an era dominated by falsehood and misconception, i.e. the veil to be lifted. The term also can refer to the eschatological final battle, the Armageddon, and the idea of an end of the world. These perceptions may better be related to the phrase apokalupsis eschaton,, the Apocalypse of John The Book of Revelation, also called Revelation to John, Apocalypse of John , and Revelation of Jesus Christ is the last canonical book of the New Testament in the Christian Bible. It is the only biblical book that is wholly composed of apocalyptic literature.

Books

Gospels

Each of the four gospels in the New Testament narrates the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth. Since the second century, they have been referred to as "The Gospel of ..." or "The Gospel according to ..." followed by the name of the author. Whatever these admittedly early ascriptions may imply about the sources behind or the perception of these gospels, they appear to have been originally anonymous compositions.^[3]

• The Gospel of Matthew, ascribed to the Apostle Matthew. This gospel begins with a genealogy of Jesus and a story of his birth that includes a visit from magi and a flight into Egypt, and it ends with the commissioning of the disciples by the resurrected Jesus.
• The Gospel of Mark, ascribed to Mark the Evangelist, who (since he was not one of "The Twelve") later tradition held to have utilized the teaching of the Apostle Peter in his gospel. This gospel begins with the preaching of John the Baptist and the baptism of Jesus. Two different secondary endings were affixed to this gospel in the second century.
• The Gospel of Luke, ascribed to Luke, who was also not one of "The Twelve", but was mentioned as a companion of the Apostle Paul and as a physician.^[4] This gospel begins with parallel stories of the birth and childhood of John the Baptist and Jesus and ends with appearances of the resurrected Jesus and his ascension into heaven.
• The Gospel of John, ascribed to the Apostle John. This gospel begins with a philosophical prologue and ends with appearances of the resurrected Jesus.

The first three gospels listed above are classified as the Synoptic Gospels. They contain similar accounts of the events in Jesus' life and his teaching, due to their literary interdependence (see below under Authorship). The Gospel of John is structured differently and includes stories of several miracles of Jesus and his sayings not found in the other three. These four gospels that were eventually included in the New Testament were only a few among many other early Christian gospels. The existence of such texts is even mentioned at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke (Luke 1:1-4). Other early Christian gospels such as the so-called "Jewish-Christian Gospels" or the Gospel of Thomas, also offer both a window into the context of early Christianity and may provide some assistance in the reconstruction of the historical Jesus.

Acts of the Apostles

The Acts of the Apostles, also simply referred to as the "book of Acts" or "Acts", is a narrative of the apostles' ministry after Christ's death and resurrection, from which point it resumes and functions as a sequel to the Gospel of Luke. Examining style, phraseology, and other evidence, modern scholarship generally concludes that Acts and the Gospel of Luke share the same author. This is also suggested by the dedication to a certain "Theophilus" at the beginning of both works.^[5]

• The Acts of the Apostles, thought to have been written by the author of the Gospel of Luke for the reasons mentioned above.

Pauline epistles

The Pauline epistles (forming the Corpus Paulinum) constitute those epistles written in the name of the Apostle Paul. The authorship of a number of these is disputed (see below under Authorship). These letters were written to Christian communities in specific cities or geographical regions, often to address issues faced by that particular community. Prominent themes include the relationship both to broader "pagan" society, to Judaism, and to other Christians.^[6]

• Epistle to the Romans
• First Epistle to the Corinthians
• Second Epistle to the Corinthians
• Epistle to the Galatians
• Epistle to the Ephesians
• Epistle to the Philippians
• Epistle to the Colossians
• First Epistle to the Thessalonians
• Second Epistle to the Thessalonians
• Epistle to Philemon

Pastoral Epistles

The Pastoral Epistles are addressed to individuals with pastoral oversight of churches and discuss issues of Christian living, doctrine and leadership. They often address different concerns to those of the preceding epistles.

• First Epistle to Timothy
• Second Epistle to Timothy
• Epistle to Titus

Hebrews

Though the Epistle to the Hebrews does not internally claim to have been written by the Apostle Paul, in antiquity, certain circles began to ascribe it to Paul in an attempt to provide the anonymous work an explicit apostolic pedigree.^[7] In the third century, Origen wrote of the letter, "Men of old have handed it down as Paul's, but who wrote the Epistle God only knows."^[8]

• Epistle to the Hebrews, anonymous

Catholic epistles

The Catholic Epistles consist of both letters and treatises in the form of letters written to the church at large. The term "catholic" (Greek: καθολική, katholikē), used to describe these letters already in the oldest manuscripts containing them, here simply means "universal". The letters are therefore also referred to as the "General Epistles". The authorship of a number of these is disputed (see below under Authorship).

• Epistle of James, written by an author named "James", often identified with James, the brother of Jesus.
• First Epistle of Peter, ascribed to the Apostle Peter.
• Second Epistle of Peter, ascribed to the Apostle Peter, though widely considered not to have been written by him.^[9]
• First Epistle of John, ascribed to the Apostle John.
• Second Epistle of John, ascribed to the Apostle John.
• Third Epistle of John, ascribed to the Apostle John.
• Epistle of Jude, written under the name of Jude, the brother of Jesus and James.

Apocalypse of John

The final book of the New Testament is the Apocalypse of John, also known as the Book of Revelation. Its authorship has been attributed either to the Apostle John (in which case it is often thought that the Apostle John is John the Evangelist, i.e. author of the Gospel of John) or to another John designated "John of Patmos" after the island where the text says the revelation was received (1:9). For a discussion of authorship see Authorship of the Johannine works. The work opens with letters to seven churches and thereafter takes the form of an apocalypse, a literary genre popular in ancient Judaism and Christianity.^[10]

Order of the books in the New Testament

The order in which the books of the New Testament appear differs between some collections and ecclesiastical traditions. In the Latin West, prior to the Vulgate (an early 5th-century Latin version of the Bible), the Four Gospels were arranged in the following order: Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark.^[11] The Syriac Peshitta places the Major Catholic Epistles (James, 1 Peter, and 1 John) immediately after Acts and before the Pauline Epistles. The order of an early edition of the letters of Paul is based on the size of the letters: longest to shortest, though keeping 1 and 2 Corinthians and 1 and 2 Thessalonians together. The Pastoral Epistles were apparently not part of the Corpus Paulinum in which this order originated and were later inserted after 2 Thessalonians and before Philemon. Hebrews was variously incorporated into the Corpus Paulinum either after 2 Thessalonians, after Philemon (i.e. at the very end), or after Romans.

The New Testament of the 16th-century Luther Bible continues, to this day, to place Hebrews, James, Jude, and the Apocalypse last. This reflects the thoughts of the Reformer Martin Luther on the canonicity of these books.^[12]

Apocrypha

The books that eventually found a permanent place in the New Testament were not the only works of Christian literature produced in the earliest Christian centuries. The long process of canonization began early, sometimes with tacit reception of traditional texts, sometimes with explicit selection or rejection of particular texts as either acceptable or unacceptable for use in a given context (e.g., not all texts that were acceptable for private use were considered appropriate for use in the liturgy). These decisions were not necessarily based upon an assessment of the religious ideas or theology of the work in question (for other factors, see below under Canonization). Over the course of history, those works of early Christian literature that survived but that did not become part of the New Testament have been variously grouped by theologians and scholars. Drawing upon, though redefining, an older term used in early Christianity and among Protestants when referring to those books found in the Christian Old Testament though not in the Jewish Bible, modern scholars began to refer to these works of early Christian literature not included in the New Testament as "apocryphal", by which was meant "non-canonical". Collected editions of these works were then referred to as the "New Testament Apocrypha". Typically excluded from such published collections are the following groups of works: The Apostolic Fathers, the second-century Christian apologists, the Alexandrians, Tertullian, Methodius of Olympus, Novatian, Cyprian, martyrdoms, and the Desert Fathers. Almost all other Christian literature from the period, and sometimes including works composed well into Late Antiquity, are relegated to the so-called "New Testament Apocrypha". These "apocryphal" works are nevertheless important for the study of the New Testament in that they were produced in the same ancient context and often using the same language as those books that would eventually form the New Testament. Some of these later works are dependent upon (either directly or indirectly) books that would later come to be in the New Testament or upon the ideas expressed in them. There is even an example of a pseudepigraphical letter composed under the guise of a presumably lost letter of the Apostle Paul, the Epistle to the Laodiceans.

Language

The common languages spoken by both Jews and Gentiles in the Holy Land at the time of Jesus were Aramaic, Koine Greek, and to a limited extent a colloquial dialect of Mishnaic Hebrew. All of the books that would eventually form the New Testament were written in Koine Greek, the vernacular dialect in the Roman provinces of the Eastern Mediterranean at the time. These books were later translated into other languages, most notably, Latin, Syriac, and Coptic. However, some of the Church Fathers^[13] imply or claim that Matthew was originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic. Nevertheless, the Gospel of Matthew known today was composed in Greek and is neither directly dependent upon nor a translation of a text in a Semitic language, though the citation of texts from the Old Testament demonstrates that the author of the Gospel of Matthew did know Hebrew.^[14]

Authorship

The New Testament is a collection of works, and as such was written by multiple authors. Also, as discussed above, the authorship of many of the books of the New Testament is unknown, and the authorship of others is debated within contemporary New Testament scholarship.

Letters of Paul and Hebrews

Seven of the epistles of Paul are generally accepted by most modern scholars as authentic; these undisputed letters include Romans, First Corinthians, Second Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, First Thessalonians, and Philemon. The letters to the Ephesians and the Colossians are clearly related to one another in some way, and most modern scholarship regards one or both of these letters not to have been written by Paul.^[15]

The three letters now referred to as the Pastoral Epistles (1 and II Timothy and Titus) are absent in an early form of the corpus and for this and other reasons widely regarded today as not having been written by the Apostle Paul.^[16] Whatever their origin, it has been observed that 1 Timothy and Titus are more similar to one another than either is to 2 Timothy.

Questions about the authorship of Hebrews go back at least to the 3rd century ecclesiastical writer Caius, who attributed only thirteen epistles to Paul (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., 6.20.3ff.). A small minority of scholars hypothesize Hebrews may have been written by one of Paul's close associates, such as Barnabas, Silas, or Luke, given that the themes therein seemed to them largely Pauline. No scholars currently hold that Paul wrote Hebrews.^{[citation needed]}

Synoptic Gospels and Acts

The traditional view regarding authorship of the four canonical gospels is that they were written either by Apostles or by disciples working under the direction of Apostles. The two examples of the latter view are the Gospel of Mark^[17] and the Gospel of Luke^[18]. While the traditional authors have been listed above, these ascriptions cannot be substantiated by modern, historical-critical criteria. For example, the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, are interrelated. They describe many of the same events and attribute similar or identical sayings to Jesus. The dominant view among scholars explaining this interrelationship is the Two-Source Hypothesis. This hypothesis proposes that both the authors of Matthew and Luke drew significantly upon the Gospel of Mark and another common source, known as "Q" (derived from Quelle, the German word for "source"). The nature and even existence of a written source containing this material shared by both Matthew and Luke and designated as Q has been called into question by a few scholars, some of whom have proposed variants of the hypothesis either to nuance it or even to do away with it. Most scholars who acknowledge the existence of Q argue that it was a single written document, while a few suggest that "Q" was actually a number of documents or oral traditions. If, as it appears, it was a documentary source, no information about its author or authors can be obtained from the only form in which it is now recoverable.

As mentioned above, the author of Acts is thought to be the same person as the author of the Gospel of Luke.

Johannine Literature

The Gospel of John appears to be independent of the synoptic gospels. The traditional view was that the Gospel of John was an eyewitness account, composed by John, the Beloved Disciple of Jesus. Modern Historical Criticism has cast serious doubt on the validity of this position. However, interest in discerning historically reliable information contained in the Gospel of John concerning the historical Jesus is still very much alive.^[19] Raymond E. Brown summarises a prevalent theory regarding the development of this gospel.^[20] He identifies three layers of text in the Fourth Gospel (a situation that is paralleled by the synoptic gospels):

1. An initial version based on personal experience of Jesus;
2. A structured literary creation by the evangelist which draws upon additional sources;
3. The final harmony that presently exists in the New Testament canon.

None of the three Epistles of John (1 John, 2 John, and 3 John, now counted among the New Testament's Catholic Epistles), mention the name of their author(s) in the text. They have, however, also been thought to be by the author of the Gospel of John.

The Apocalypse of John, as discussed above, has also been thought to have been written by the evangelist, though it was likely composed by another "John".

James, Peter, and Jude

Dates of composition

The earliest works which came to be part of the New Testament are the letters of the Apostle Paul. Most scholars generally agree on the dating of many books in the New Testament, except for those some believe to be pseudepigraphical^{[citation needed]} (i.e., those thought not to be written by their traditional authors). The Gospel of Mark is dated from as early as the 50s, although most scholars date between the range of 65 and 72.^[21] Most scholars believe that Matthew and Luke were written after the composition of Mark as they make use of Mark's content. Therefore they are generally dated later than Mark although the extent is debated. Matthew is dated between 70 and 85. Luke is usually placed within 80 to 95. However a select few scholars disagree with this as Luke indicates in the book of Acts that he has already written the Gospel of Luke prior to writing the introduction to Acts. The earliest of the books of the New Testament was First Thessalonians, an epistle of Paul, written probably in A.D. 51, or possibly Galatians in 49 according to one of two theories of its writing. Of the pseudepigraphical epistles, scholars tend to place them somewhere between 70 and 150, with Second Peter usually being the latest.^{[citation needed]}

In the 1830s German scholars of the Tübingen school dated the books as late as the third century, but the discovery of some New Testament manuscripts and fragments from the second and third centuries, one of which dates as early as A.D. 125 (Papyrus 52), disproves a third century date of composition for any book now in the New Testament. Additionally, a letter to the church at Corinth in the name of Clement of Rome in 95 quotes from 10 of the 27 books of the New Testament, and a letter to the church at Philippi in the name of Polycarp in 120 quotes from 16 books. Therefore, some of the books of the New Testament were at least in a first-draft stage, though there is negligible evidence in these quotes or among biblical manuscripts for the existence of different early drafts. Other books were probably not completed until later, if we assume they must have been quoted by Clement or Polycarp. There are, however, many discrepancies between manuscripts, though the majority of the errors are clearly errors of transcription or minor in scope.

On the other extreme is the dating proposed by John A. T. Robinson. He claimed that, since he believed none of the writings in the New Testament showed clear evidence of a knowledge of the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem (in A.D. 70), which Robinson thought should certainly have appeared considering the importance of that event for Jews and Christians of that time, that every book which would come to form the New Testament was therefore written before A.D. 70.^[22] Given Robinson's appeal to the absence of evidence, his view is widely rejected by New Testament scholars.

Etymology of the term "New Testament"

Use of the term New Testament to describe a collection of writings can be traced back to the Latin Novum Testamentum first coined by Tertullian. Some believe this in turn is a translation of the earlier Greek καινὴ διαθήκη. This Greek phrase is found in the text of the New Testament itself, where it carries the meaning "new covenant" and is so translated (see Luke 22:20, 1 Corinthians 11:25, 2 Corinthains 3:6, Hebrews 8:8, and Hebrews 9:15; cf. 2 Cor 3:14). The phrase also appears earlier, in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament). In Jeremiah 31:31, the Septuagint used this Greek phrase to translate the original Hebrew ברית חדשה (b^erit chadashah). The Hebrew term is also usually translated new covenant.

As a result, some claim the term was first used by Early Christians to refer to the new covenant that was the basis for their relationship with God. About two centuries later at the time of Tertullian and Lactantius, the phrase was being used to designate a particular collection of books that some believed embodied this new covenant.^{[citation needed]}

Tertullian, writing in the early-third century, offers the first known use the terms novum testamentum/new testament and vetus testamentum/old testament. In Against Marcion book 3 (written in the early third century, c. A.D. 208), chapter 14, he writes of

the Divine Word, who is doubly edged with the two testaments of the law and the gospel^[23]

And in book 4, chapter 6, he writes that

it is certain that the whole aim at which he [Marcion] has strenuously laboured even in the drawing up of his Antitheses, centres in this, that he may establish a diversity between the Old and the New Testaments, so that his own Christ may be separate from the Creator, as belonging to this rival god, and as alien from the law and the prophets.^[24]

By the fourth century, the existence—even if not the exact contents—of both an Old and New Testament had been established. Lactantius, a Christian author of the third and fourth century who wrote in Latin, in his early-fourth-century Divine Institutes, book 4, chapter 20, wrote:

But all scripture is divided into two Testaments. That which preceded the advent and passion of Christ—that is, the law and the prophets—is called the Old; but those things which were written after His resurrection are named the New Testament. The Jews make use of the Old, we of the New: but yet they are not discordant, for the New is the fulfilling of the Old, and in both there is the same testator, even Christ, who, having suffered death for us, made us heirs of His everlasting kingdom, the people of the Jews being deprived and disinherited. As the prophet Jeremiah testifies when he speaks such things: [Jer 31:31–32] "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new testament to the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not according to the testament which I made to their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; for they continued not in my testament, and I disregarded them, saith the Lord." ... For that which He said above, that He would make a new testament to the house of Judah, shows that the old testament which was given by Moses was not perfect; but that which was to be given by Christ would be complete.^[25]

Canonization

The process of the canonization of the New Testament was complex and lengthy. It was characterized by a compilation of books that the apostolic tradition considered authoritative in worship and teaching, relevant to the historical situations in which they lived, and consonant with the Old Testament.^[26]

Contrary to popular misconception, the New Testament canon was not summarily decided in large church council meetings, but rather developed over many centuries. On this, New Testament scholar Lee Martin McDonald has written that:^[27]

Although a number of Christians have thought that church councils determined what books were to be included in the biblical canons, a more accurate reflection of the matter is that the councils recognized or acknowledged those books that had already obtained prominence from usage among the various early Christian communities.

Some synods of the Fourth Century published lists of canonical books (e.g. Hippo and Carthage). The existing 27-book canon of the New Testament was reconfirmed (for Roman Catholicism) in the 16th century with the Council of Trent (also called the Tridentine Council) of 1546 ,^[28] the Thirty-Nine Articles of 1563 for the Church of England, the Westminster Confession of Faith of 1647 for Calvinism, and the Synod of Jerusalem of 1672 for Eastern Orthodoxy. Although these councils did include statements about the canon, when it came to the New Testament they were only reaffirming the existing canon.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council."

In the first centuries of the Christian church, Early Christianity, there was no single New Testament canon that was universally recognized.^[29]

One of the earliest attempts at solidifying a canon was made by Marcion, c. A.D. 140, who accepted only a modified version of Luke (Gospel of Marcion) and ten of Paul's letters, while rejecting the Old Testament entirely. His canon was increasingly rejected by other groups of Christians, as was his theology, Marcionism. Adolf Harnack in Origin of the New Testament (1914)[3] observed that the church at this time was largely an Old Testament Church (one that "follows the Testament of the Creator-God") without a New Testament canon and that it gradually formulated its New Testament canon in response to the challenge posed by Marcion.

The Muratorian fragment, dated at between 170 (based on an internal reference to Pope Pius I and arguments put forth by Bruce Metzger) and as late as the end of the 4th century (according to the Anchor Bible Dictionary), provides the earliest known New Testament canon attributed to mainstream (that is, not Marcionite) Christianity. It is similar, but not identical, to the modern New Testament canon.

The oldest clear endorsement of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John being the only legitimate gospels was written c. 180 AD. It was a claim made by Bishop Irenaeus in his polemic Against the Heresies, for example III.XI.8: "It is not possible that the gospels can be either more or fewer in number than they are. For, since there are four zones of the world in which we live, and four principal winds, while the church is scattered throughout all the world, and the “pillar and ground” of the church is the gospel and the spirit of life; it is fitting that she should have four pillars, breathing out immortality on every side, and vivifying men afresh."

At least, then, the books considered to be authoritative included the four gospels and many of the letters of Paul, though, based on the arguments Irenaeus made in support of only four authentic gospels, some interpreters deduce that the fourfold Gospel must have still been a novelty in Irenaeus's time.^[30]. Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian (all 2nd century) held the letters of Paul to be on par with the Hebrew scriptures as being divinely inspired, yet others rejected him. Other books were held in high esteem but were gradually relegated to the status of New Testament Apocrypha.

Eusebius, c. 300, gave a detailed list of New Testament writings in his Ecclesiastical History Book 3, Chapter XXV:

"1... First then must be put the holy quaternion of the gospels; following them the Acts of the Apostles... the epistles of Paul... the epistle of John... the epistle of Peter... After them is to be placed, if it really seem proper, the Apocalypse of John, concerning which we shall give the different opinions at the proper time. These then belong among the accepted writings."

"3 Among the disputed writings [Antilegomena], which are nevertheless recognized by many, are extant the so-called epistle of James and that of Jude, also the second epistle of Peter, and those that are called the second and third of John, whether they belong to the evangelist or to another person of the same name. Among the rejected [Kirsopp Lake translation: "not genuine"] writings must be reckoned also the Acts of Paul, and the so-called Shepherd, and the Apocalypse of Peter, and in addition to these the extant epistle of Barnabas, and the so-called Teachings of the Apostles; and besides, as I said, the Apocalypse of John, if it seem proper, which some, as I said, reject, but which others class with the accepted books. And among these some have placed also the Gospel according to the Hebrews... And all these may be reckoned among the disputed books."

"6... such books as the Gospels of Peter, of Thomas, of Matthias, or of any others besides them, and the Acts of Andrew and John and the other apostles... they clearly show themselves to be the fictions of heretics. Wherefore they are not to be placed even among the rejected writings, but are all of them to be cast aside as absurd and impious."

Revelation is counted as both accepted (Kirsopp Lake translation: "Recognized") and disputed, which has caused some confusion over what exactly Eusebius meant by doing so. From other writings of the church fathers, we know that it was disputed with several canon lists rejecting its canonicity. EH 3.3.5 adds further detail on Paul: "Paul's fourteen epistles are well known and undisputed. It is not indeed right to overlook the fact that some have rejected the Epistle to the Hebrews, saying that it is disputed by the church of Rome, on the ground that it was not written by Paul." EH 4.29.6 mentions the Diatessaron: "But their original founder, Tatian, formed a certain combination and collection of the gospels, I know not how, to which he gave the title Diatessaron, and which is still in the hands of some. But they say that he ventured to paraphrase certain words of the apostle [Paul], in order to improve their style."

The New Testament canon as it is now was first listed by St. Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, in 367, in a letter written to his churches in Egypt, Festal Letter 39. Also cited is the Council of Rome, but not without controversy. That canon gained wider and wider recognition until it was accepted at the Third Council of Carthage in 397 and 419^[31]. Even this council did not settle the matter, however. Certain books continued to be questioned, especially James and Revelation. Even as late as the 16th century, the Reformer Martin Luther questioned (but in the end did not reject) the Epistle of James, the Epistle of Jude, the Epistle to the Hebrews and the Book of Revelation. To this day, German-language Luther Bibles are printed with these four books at the end of the canon, rather than in their traditional order as in other editions of the Bible. In light of this questioning of the canon of Scripture by Protestants in the 16th century, the (Roman Catholic) Council of Trent reaffirmed the traditional western canon (i.e., the canon accepted at the fourth-century Council of Rome), thus making the canon of Scripture dogma in the Catholic Church. }

Early manuscripts

Like other literature from antiquity, the text of the New Testament was (prior to the advent of the printing press) preserved and transmitted in manuscripts. Manuscripts containing at least a part of the New Testament number in the thousands. The earliest of these (like manuscripts containing other literature) are often very fragmentarily preserved. Some of these fragments have even been thought to date as early as the second century (i.e., Papyrus 90, Papyrus 98, Papyrus 104, and famously Rylands Library Papyrus P52, though the early date of the latter has recently been called into question).^[32] For each subsequent century, more and more manuscripts survive that contain a portion or all of the books that were held to be part of the New Testament at that time (for example, the New Testament of the fourth-century Codex Sinaiticus, once a complete Bible, contains the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas), though occasionally these manuscripts contain other works as well (e.g., Papyrus 72 and the Crosby-Schøyen Codex). The date at which a manuscript was written, however, does not necessarily reflect the date of the form of text it contains. That is, later manuscripts can, and occasionally do, contain older forms of text or older readings.

Some of the more important manuscripts containing an early text of books of the New Testament are:

• The Chester Beatty Papyri (Greek; the New Testament portions of which were copied in the third century)
• The Bodmer Papyri (Greek and Coptic; the New Testament portions of which were copied in the third and fourth centuries)
• Codex Bobiensis (Latin; copied in the fourth century, but containing at least a third-century form of text)
• Uncial 0171 (Greek; copied in the late-third or early fourth century)
• Syriac Sinaiticus (Syriac; copied in the fourth century)
• Schøyen Manuscript 2560 (Coptic; copied in the fourth century)
• Codex Vaticanus (Greek; copied in the fourth century)
• Codex Sinaiticus (Greek; copied in the fourth century)
• Codex Vercellensis (Latin; copied in the fourth century)
• Curetonian Gospels (Syriac; copied in the fifth century)

Textual variation

As with all literature transmited through the copying of manuscripts by hand, a number of changes found their way into the text of the New Testament.^[33] Textual criticism involves reconstructing the history of the textual transmission transmission of a work of literature, from its earliest recoverable form(s) and bringing attention to and explaining subsequent variations. Textual critics specializing on the New Testament have identified variants and interpolations both incidental and intentional.

The most notable passages that are either certain, likely, or possible additions to (i.e., interpolations into) the original text of the New Testament include:

• the endings of Mark, see Mark 16
• Jesus sweating blood in Luke (Luke 22:43-44)
• John 5:4
• the story in John of the woman taken in adultery, the Pericope Adulterae (John 7:53-8:11)
• an explicit reference to the Trinity in 1 John, the Comma Johanneum (1 John 5:7b–8a)
• Romans 16:24
• 1 Corinthians 14:33-35

Most of this variation took place within the first three Christian centuries. By the fourth century, textual "families" or types of text become discernable among New Testament manuscripts. A "text-type" is the name given to a family of texts with similar readings due to common ancestors and mutual correction. Many early manuscripts, however, contain individual readings from several different earlier forms of text. Modern texual critics have identified the following text-types among textual witnesses to the New Testament:

The Alexandrian text-type is usually considered to generally preserve many early readings. It is represented, e.g., by Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus and the Bodmer Papyri.

The Western text-type is generally longer and can be paraphrastic, but can also preserve early readings. The Western version of the Acts of the Apostles is, notably, 8.5% longer than the Alexandrian form of the text. Examples of the Western text are found in Codex Bezae, Codex Claromontanus, Codex Washingtonianus, the Old Latin (i.e., Latin translations made prior to the Vulgate), as well as in quotations by Marcion, Tatian, Irenaeus, Tertullian and Cyprian.

A text-type referred to as the "Caesarean text-type" and thought to have included witnesses such as Codex Koridethi and minuscule 565, can today be described neither as "Caesarean" nor as a text-type as was previously thought. However, the Gospel of Mark in Papyrus 45, Codex Washingtonianus and in Family 13 does indeed reflect a distinct type of text.

Increasing standardization of distinct (and once local) text-types eventually gave rise to the Byzantine text-type. Since most manuscripts of the New Testament do not derive from the first several centuries, that is, they were copied after the rise of the Byzantine text-type, this form of text is found the majority of extant manuscripts and is therefore often called the "Majority Text." As with all of the other (earlier) text-types, the Byzantine can also occasionally preserve early readings.

Establishing a critical text

The textual variation among manuscript copies of books in the New Testament prompted attempts to discern the earliest form of text already in antiquity (e.g., by the third century Christian author Origen). The efforts began in earnest again during the Renaissance, which saw a revival of the study of ancient Greek texts. During this period, modern textual criticism was born. In this context, Christian humanists such as Lorenzo Valla and Erasmus promoted a return to the original Greek of the New Testament. This was the beginning of modern New Testament textual criticism, which over subsequent centuries would increasingly incorporate more and more manuscripts, in more languages (i.e., versions of the New Testament), as well as citations of the New Testament by ancient authors and the New Testament text in lectionaries in order to reconstruct the earliest recoverable form of the New Testament text and the history of changes to it.^[34]

Relationship to earlier and contemporaneous literature

The books which later came to form the New Testament, like other Christian literature of the period, originated in a literary context that reveals relationships not only to other Christian writings, but also to Graeco-Roman and Jewish works. Of singular importance is the extensive use of and interaction with the Jewish Bible and what would become the Christian Old Testament. Both implicit and explicit citations, as well as countless allusions, appear throughout the books of the New Testament, from the Gospels and Acts, to the Epistles, to the Apocalypse.^[35] Other early Jewish and Graeco-Roman literature, though far less utilized, is also cited in books that would come to form the New Testament.

Early versions

The first translations (usually called "versions") of the New Testament were made beginning already at the end of 2nd century. The earliest versions of the New Testament are the translations into the Syriac, Latin, and Coptic languages..^[36] These three versions were made directly from the Greek, and are frequently cited in the apparatuses of modern critical editions.

Syriac

Syriac was spoken in Syria, and Mesopotamia, and with dialect in Palestine, where it was known as Aramaic. Several Syriac translations were made and have come to us. Most of the Old Syriac, however, as well as the Philoxonian version have been lost.

Tatian, the Syrian, created the Diatessaron, a gospel harmony written in Syriac around A.D. 170 and the earliest form of the gospel not only in Syriac but probably also in Armenian.

In the nineteenth century, manuscript evidence was discovered for an "Old Syriac" version of the four distinct (i.e., not harmonized) gospels. These "separated" (Syriac: da-Mepharreshe) gospels, though old, have been shown to be later than the Diatessaron. The Old Syriac gospels are fragmentarily preserved in two manuscripts: the fifth-century Curetonian Syriac and the Sinaitic Syriac from fourth or fifth century. No Old Syriac manuscripts of other portions of the New Testament survive, though Old Syriac readings, e.g. from the Pauline Epistles, can be discerned in citations made by Eastern fathers and in later Syriac versions. The Old Syriac version is a representative of the Western text-type. The Peshitta version was prepared in the beginning of the 5th century. It contains only 22 books (neither the Minor Catholic Epistles of 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, and Jude, nor the Apocalypse of John were part of this translation).

The Philoxenian probably was produced in 508 for Philoxenus, Bishop of Mabung.^[37]

Latin

The Gospels were likely translated into Latin as early as the last quarter of the second century in North Africa (Afra). Not much later, there were also European Latin translations (Itala). There are about 80 Old Latin mansucripts. The Old Latin versions often contain readings with a Western type of text.

The bewildering diversity of the Old Latin versions prompted Jerome to prepare another translation into Latin - the Vulgate. In many respects it was merely a revision of the Old Latin. There are currently around 8,000 manuscripts of the Vulgate.

Coptic

There are several dialects of the Coptic language: Bohairic (northern dialect), Fayyumic, Sahidic (southern dialect), Akhmimic, and others. The first translation was made by at least the third century into the Sahidic dialect (cop^sa). This translation represents a mixed text, mostly Alexandrian, though also with Western readings.^[38]

A Bohairic translation was made later, but existed already in the fourth century. Though the translation makes less use of Greek words than the Sahidic, it does employ some Greek grammar (e.g., in word-order and the use of particles such as the syntactic construction μεν — δε). For this reason, the Bohairic translation can be helpful in the reconstruction of the early Greek text of the New Testament.^[39]

Other ancient translations

The continued spread of Christianity, and the foundation of national churches, led to the translation of the Bible—often beginning with books from the New Testament—into a variety of other languages at a relatively early date: Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic, Persian, Soghdian, and eventually Gothic, Old Church Slavonic, Arabic, and Nubian.^[40]

Modern translations

Historically, throughout the Christian world and in the context of Christian missionary activity, the New Testament (or portions thereof) has been that part of the Christian Bible first translated into the vernacular. The production of such translations grew out of the insertion of vernacular glosses in biblical texts, as well as out of the production of biblical paraphrases and poetic renditions of stories from the life of Christ (e.g., the Heliand).

The 16th century saw the rise of Protestantism and an explosion of translations of the New (and Old) Testament into the vernacular. Notable are those of Martin Luther (1522), Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples (1523), the Froschau Bible (1525–1529, revised in 1574), William Tyndale (1526, revised in 1534, 1535 and 1536), the Brest Bible (1563), and the Authorized Version (also called the "King James Version") (1611). Most of these translations relied (though not always exclusively) upon one of the printed editions of the Greek New Testament edited by Erasmus, a form of this Greek text emerged as the standard and is known as the Textus Receptus. This text, based on a handful of manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type, was the basis for other translations from the Greek until the latter part of the 19th century.

Translations of the New Testament made since the appearance of better critical editions of the Greek text (notably those of Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, and von Soden) have largely used them as their base text. Unlike the Textus Receptus, these have a pronounced Alexandrian character. Standard critical editions are those of Souter, Vogels, Bover, Merk, and Nestle-Aland (the text, though not the full critical apparatus of which is reproduced in the United Bible Societies' "Greek New Testament"). Notable translations of the New Testament based on these most recent critical editions include the Revised Standard Version (1946, revised in 1971), La Bible de Jérusalem (1961, revised in 1973 and 2000), the Einheitsübersetzung (1970, final edition 1979), the New American Bible (1970, revised in 1986), the Traduction Oecuménique de la Bible (1988, revised in 2004), and the New Revised Standard Version (1989).

Authority

Though all Christian churches accept the New Testament as Scripture, they differ in their understanding of the nature, extent, and relevance of its authority. Views of the authoritativeness of the New Testament often depend on the concept of inspiration, which relates to the role of God in the formation of the New Testament. Generally, the greater the role of God in one's doctrine of inspiration, the more one accepts the doctrine of biblical inerrancy and/or authoritativeness of the Bible. One possible source of confusion is that these terms are difficult to define, because many people use them interchangeably or with very different meanings. This article will use the terms in the following manner:

• Infallibility relates to the absolute correctness of the Bible in matters of doctrine.
• Inerrancy relates to the absolute correctness of the Bible in factual assertions (including historical and scientific assertions).
• Authoritativeness relates to the correctness of the Bible in questions of practice in morality.

All of these concepts depend for their meaning on the supposition that the text of Bible has been properly interpreted, with consideration for the intention of the text, whether literal history, allegory or poetry, etc. Especially the doctrine of inerrancy is variously understood according to the weight given by the interpreter to scientific investigations of the world.

Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and classical Anglicanism

For the Roman Catholic Church, there are two sources of revelation: Scripture and Tradition. Both of them are interpreted by the teachings of the church. The Roman Catholic view is expressed clearly in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992):

§ 83: As a result the church, to whom the transmission and interpretation of Revelation is entrusted, does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from the holy Scriptures alone. Both scripture and tradition must be accepted and honoured with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence. § 107: The inspired books teach the truth. Since therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures.

In Catholic terminology the teaching office is called the Magisterium.

The Eastern Orthodox churches do not accept this two-source theory; rather, they hold that there is only sone source of revelation, Holy Tradition, of which Scripture is the most important part ^[41].

Traditional Anglicans believe that "Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation," (Article VI), but also that the Catholic Creeds "ought thoroughly to be received and believed" (Article VIII), and that the Church "hath authority in Controversies of Faith" and is "a witness and keeper of Holy Writ" (Article XX) ^[42]. Classical Anglicanism, therefore, like Orthodoxy, holds that Holy Tradition is the only safe guardian against perversion and innovation in the interpretation of Scripture; in the famous words of Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells: "As for my religion, I dye in the holy catholic and apostolic faith professed by the whole Church before the disunion of East and West, more particularly in the communion of the Church of England, as it stands distinguished from all Papal and Puritan innovations, and as it adheres to the doctrine of the Cross."

Protestantism

Following the doctrine of sola scriptura, Protestants believe that their traditions of faith, practice and interpretations carry forward what the scriptures teach, and so tradition is not a source of authority in itself. Their traditions derive authority from the Bible, and are therefore always open to reëvaluation. This openness to doctrinal revision has extended in Liberal Protestant traditions even to the reevaluation of the doctrine of Scripture upon which the Reformation was founded, and members of these traditions may even question whether the Bible is infallible in doctrine, inerrant in historical and other factual statements, and whether it has uniquely divine authority. However, the adjustments made by modern Protestants to their doctrine of scripture vary widely.

American evangelical and fundamentalist Protestantism

Certain American conservatives, fundamentalists and evangelicals believe that the scriptures are both human and divine in origin: human in their manner of composition, but divine in that their source is God, the Holy Spirit, who governed the writers of scripture in such a way that they recorded nothing at all contrary to the truth.^{[citation needed]} Fundamentalists accept the enduring authority and impugnity of a prescientific interpretation of the Bible.^{[citation needed]} In the United States this particularly applies to issues such as the ordination of women, abortion, evolution, and homosexuality. However, although American evangelicals are overwhelmingly opposed to such things, other evangelicals are increasingly willing to consider that the views of the biblical authors may have been culturally conditioned, and they may even argue that there is room for change along with cultural norms and scientific advancements.^{[citation needed]} Both fundamentalists and evangelicals profess belief in the inerrancy of the Bible.

Evangelicals, on the other hand, tend to avoid interpretations of the Bible that would directly contradict generally accepted scientific assertions of fact. They do not impute error to biblical authors, but rather entertain various theories of literary intent which might give credibility to human progress in knowledge of the world, while still accepting the divine inspiration of the scriptures.^{[citation needed]}

Within the US, the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) is a statement, articulating evangelical views on this issue. Paragraph four of its summary states: "Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God's acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God's saving grace in individual lives."^[43]

American mainline and liberal Protestantism

Mainline American Protestant denominations, including the United Methodist Church, Presbyterian Church USA, The Episcopal Church, and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, do not teach the doctrine of inerrancy as set forth in the Chicago Statement. All of these churches have more ancient doctrinal statements asserting the authority of scripture, but may interpret these statements in such a way as to allow for a very broad range of teaching—from evangelicalism to skepticism. It is not an impediment to ordination in these denominations to teach that the scriptures contain errors, or that the authors follow a more or less unenlightened ethics that, however appropriate it may have seemed in the authors' time, moderns would be very wrong to follow blindly. For example, ordination of women is universally accepted in the mainline churches, abortion is condemned as a grievous social tragedy but not always a personal sin or a crime against an unborn person, and homosexuality is recognized as a genetic propensity or morally neutral preference that should be neither encouraged nor condemned. In North America, the most contentious of these issues among these churches at the present time is how far the ordination of gay men and lesbians should be accepted.

Officials of the Presbyterian Church USA report: "We acknowledge the role of scriptural authority in the Presbyterian Church, but Presbyterians generally do not believe in biblical inerrancy. Presbyterians do not insist that every detail of chronology or sequence or prescientific description in scripture be true in literal form. Our confessions do teach biblical infallibility. Infallibility affirms the entire truthfulness of scripture without depending on every exact detail."^[44]

Those who hold a more liberal view of the Bible as a human witness to the glory of God, the work of fallible humans who wrote from a limited experience unusual only for the insight they have gained through their inspired struggle to know God in the midst of a troubled world. Therefore, they tend not to accept such doctrines as inerrancy. These churches also tend to retain the social activism of their evangelical forebears of the 19th century, placing particular emphasis on those teachings of scripture that teach compassion for the poor and concern for social justice. The message of personal salvation is, generally speaking, of the good that comes to oneself and the world through following the New Testament's Golden Rule admonition to love others without hypocrisy or prejudice. Toward these ends, the "spirit" of the New Testament, more than the letter, is infallible and authoritative.

There are some movements that believe the Bible contains the teachings of Jesus but who reject the churches that were formed following its publication. These people believe all individuals can communicate directly with God and therefore do not need guidance or doctrines from a church. These people are known as Christian anarchists.

Latter-day Saints

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or Mormons) accept the Bible New Testament and Bible as a whole as the inspired word of God.^[45]

Messianic Judaism

Messianic Judaism generally holds the same view of New Testament authority as evangelical Protestants.

In the liturgy

Despite the wide variety among Christian liturgies, texts from the New Testament play a role in almost all forms of Christian worship. In addition to some language derived from the New Testament in the liturgy itself (e.g., the Trisagion may be based on Apocalypse 4:8, and the beginning of the "Hymn of Praise" draws upon Luke 2:14), the reading of extended passages from the New Testament is a practice common to almost all Christian worship, liturgical or not. These readings are most often part of an established lectionary (i.e., selected texts to be read at church services on specific days), and (together with an Old Testament reading and a Psalm) include a non-gospel reading from the New Testament and culminate with a Gospel reading. No readings from the Apocalypse of John, however, are included in the standard lectionary of the Eastern Orthodox churches.

Central to the Christian liturgy is the celebration of the Eucharist or "Holy Communion". The Words of Institution that begin this rite are drawn directly from 1 Corinthians 11:23-26. In addition, the communal recitation of the Lord's Prayer (in the form found in the Gospel of Matthew 6:9-13) is also a standard feature of Christian worship.

In the arts

Most of the influence of the New Testament upon the arts has come from the Gospels and the Apocalypse of John.^{[citation needed]} Literary expansion of the narratives of Jesus' birth found in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke began already in the second century and the portrayal of the Nativity has continued in various art forms to this day. The earliest Christian art would often depict scenes from the New Testament such as the raising of Lazarus, the baptism of Jesus or the motif of the "Good Shepherd". Biblical paraphrases and poetic renditions of stories from the life of Christ (e.g., the Heliand) became popular in the middle ages, as did the portrayal of the arrest, trial and execution of Jesus in Passion plays. Indeed, the Passion became a central theme in Christian art and music. The ministry and Passion of Jesus, as portrayed in one or more of the New Testament Gospels, has also been a theme in film, almost since the inception of the medium (e.g., "La Passion", France, 1903).

See also

• Biblical criticism
• List of Gospels
• New Testament view on Jesus' life
• Gospel harmony
• Epistle
• Apocalypse
• Non-canonical books referenced in the New Testament
• Textual variants in the New Testament
• Novum Testamentum Graece
• Early Christianity
• Antisemitism in the New Testament

Notes

1. ^ See the standard New Testament introductions listed below under "Further reading": Goodspeed, Kümmel, Duling and Perrin, Koester, Conzelmann and Lindemann, Brown, and Ehrman.
2. ^ See, e.g., Clabeaux, J. J.: A Lost Edition of the Letters of Paul: A Reassessment of the Text of the Pauline Corpus Attested by Marcion. Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series 21; Washington, D.C.: Catholic Biblical Association, 1989
3. ^ On the traditional ascriptions and anonymous authorship, see the standard New Testament introductions listed below under "Further reading": Goodspeed, Kümmel, Duling and Perrin, Koester, Conzelmann and Lindemann, Brown, and Ehrman.
4. ^ See Fitzmyer, Joseph A.: The Gospel according to Luke, 2 volumes. Anchor Bible Commentary; New York: Doubleday, 1981 and 1985, vol. 1, pp. 35-53.
5. ^ Luke 1:3 and Acts 1:1
6. ^ See especially Roetzel, Calvin J.: The Letters of Paul: Conversations in Context, fifth edition. Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox, 2009.
7. ^ Attridge, Harold W.: Hebrews. Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1989, pp. 1-6.
8. ^ Eusebius Church History Book VI Ch 25 v14
9. ^ Fornberg, Tord: An Early Church in a Pluralistic Society: A Study of 2 Peter. Coniectanea biblica, New Testament Series 9; Lund: Gleerup, 1977.
10. ^ For a detailed study of the Apocalypse of John, see Aune, David E.: Revelation, 3 volumes. Word Biblical Commentary; Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1997-1998.
11. ^ The Gospels are in this order in many Old Latin manuscripts, as well as in the Greek manuscripts Codex Bezae and Codex Washingtonianus.
12. ^ http://www.bibelcenter.de/bibel/lu1545/; see also http://www.bible-researcher.com/links10.html; see also Antilegomena
13. ^ Koester, Helmut: Introduction to the New Testament. Philadelphia, 1982, volume 2, p. 172.
14. ^ Davies, W. D. and Allison, Dale C.: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on The Gospel according to Saint Matthew, 3 volumes. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988-1997, see volume 1, pp. 33-58.
15. ^ Brown, An Introduction, p. 610.
16. ^ See Marshall, I. Howard: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Pastoral Epistles. International Critical Commentary; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999, pp. 58 and 79. Notable exceptions to this majority position are Jeremias, Joachim: Die Briefe an Timotheus und Titus. Das NT Deutsch; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1934, 8th edition 1963, and Spicq, Ceslas: Les Epîtres Pastorales. Études bibliques; Paris: Gabalda, 1948, 4th edition 1969. See too MacDonald, Dennis: The Legend and the Apostle. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1983, especially chapters 3 and 4.
17. ^ Papias of Hierapolis (c. 130) gives the earliest tradition of Mark's Apostolic connection: "This also the presbyter said: Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor followed him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connected account of the Lord's discourses, so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrote some things as he remembered them. For he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the thing which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely" (cited by Eusebius of Caesarea, Church History, 3.39.21ff.).
18. ^ Irenaeus wrote about A.D. 180, "Luke, the attendant of Paul, recorded in a book the Gospel which Paul had declared" (cited by Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica, 5.8.3ff.).
19. ^ Paul N. Anderson, John, Jesus, and History: Critical Appraisals of Critical Views, Volume 1, Symposium series, no. 44, Society of Biblical Literature Pub, 2007 p.77
20. ^ Brown, Raymond E. (1997). An Introduction to the New Testament. New York: Anchor Bible. ISBN 0-385-24767-2. pp.363-364
21. ^ Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity. 260.
22. ^ Robinson, John A. T.: Redating the New Testament. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976.
23. ^ [1]
24. ^ [2] See too book 4, chapters 1, 2, and 14. However, his meaning in chapter 22 is less clear, and in chapters 9 and 40 he uses the term to mean "new covenant".
25. ^ "ANF07. Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries: Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily | Christian Classics Ethereal Library". Ccel.org. http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-07/anf07-07.htm#P1533_624437. Retrieved 2008-12-29.
26. ^ See Gamble, Harry Y.: The New Testament Canon: Its Making and Meaning. Guides to Biblical Scholarship; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985.
27. ^ McDonald, Lee M.: The Formation of the Christian Biblical Canon. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1995, p. 116
28. ^ Metzger, Bruce M.: The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987, p. 246. ISBN 0-19-826954-4, writes, "Finally on 8 April 1546, by a vote of 24 to 15, with 16 abstensions, the Council issued a decree (De Canonicis Scripturis) in which, for the first time in the history of the church, the question of the contents of the Bible was made an absolute article of faith and confirmed by an anathema."}}
29. ^ Eusebius,Church History, (III xxv 5)
30. ^ McDonald & Sanders, page 277
31. ^ The Book of Revelation wasn't added till the 419 Synod of Carthage according to McDonald and Sanders: The Canon Debate, Appendix D-2, page 595, note 19.
32. ^ For the initial dating of P52, see Roberts, C. H. (Ed.): An Unpublished Fragment of the Fourth Gospel in the John Rylands Library. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1935, and Bell, H. Idris and Skeat, T. C.: Fragments of an Unknown Gospel and Other Early Christian Papyri. London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1935. Though see now Nongbri, Brent: "The Use and Abuse of P52: Papyrological Pitfalls in the Dating of the Fourth Gospel." Harvard Theological Review 98 (2005) 23-52 and Martinez, David G.: "The Papyri and Early Christianity," in Bagnall, Roger S. (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, pp. 590-623.
33. ^ See Metzger, Bruce M.: Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, second edition. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgeselschaft, 1994; and Metzger, Bruce M. and Ehrman, Bart D.: The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, fourth edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
34. ^ See Metzger, Bruce M. and Ehrman, Bart D.: The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, fourth edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
35. ^ See, e.g., Stendahl, Krister: The School of St. Matthew and Its Use of the Old Testament. Uppsala and Lund, 1954; Marcus, Joel: The Way of the Lord: Christological Exegesis of the Old Testament in the Gospel of Mark. Edinburgh, 1993; Smith, D. Moody: "The Use of the Old Testament in the New," in The Use of the Old Testament in the New and Other Essays: Studies in Honor of William Franklin Stinespring. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1972, pp. 3-65; Juel, Donald: Messianic Exegesis: Christological Interpretation of the Old Testament in Early Christianity. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988; and Barr, James: Old and New in Interpretation: A Study of the Two Testaments. London: SCM, 1966.
36. ^ Vööbus, Arthur: Early Versions of the New Testament. Stockholm, 1954, pp. 1-128, 211-240.
37. ^ Metzger, Bruce M.: The Early Versions of the New Testament. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977, pp. 3-98.
38. ^ Vööbus, Arthur: Early Versions of the New Testament. Stockholm, 1954, pp. 216-229.
39. ^ Vööbus, Arthur: Early Versions of the New Testament. Stockholm, 1954, pp. 229-237, and Metzger, Bruce M.: The Early Versions of the New Testament. Oxford, 1977, pp. 99-152.
40. ^ On the Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic, Arabic, and Gothic, see Arthur Vööbus, Early Versions of the New Testament (Stockholm, 1954), pp. 133-210, 243-309.
41. ^ Ware, Kallistos (Timothy). "Holy Tradition: The Source of the Orthodox Faith", from The Orthodox Church
42. ^ The Thirty-Nine Articles
43. ^ The Chicago Statement of Biblical Inerrancy
44. ^ "Homosexual ordination vote widens gap between Presbyterian factions,"ReligionToday, 2001-JUN-20
45. ^ "The Holy Bible", The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Further reading

• Brown, Raymond E. (1997). An Introduction to the New Testament. Anchor Bible Reference Library; New York: Doubleday.
• Bultmann, Rudolf (1951–1955). Theology of the New Testament, English translation, 2 volumes. New York: Scribner.
• von Campenhausen, Hans (1972). The Formation of the Christian Bible, English translation. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
• Conzelmann, Hans and Lindemann, Andreas (1999). Interpreting the New Testament: An Introduction to the Principles and Methods of New Testament Exegesis, English translation. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson.
• Dormeyer, Detlev (1998). The New Testament among the Writings of Antiquity, English translation. Sheffield.
• Duling, Dennis C. and Perrin, Norman (1993). The New Testament: Proclamation and Parenesis, Myth and History, 3d edition. New York: Harcourt Brace.
• Ehrman, Bart D. (2007). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings, 4th edition. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Goodspeed, Edgar J. (1937). An Introduction to the New Testament. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Koester, Helmut (1995 and 2000). Introduction to the New Testament, 2d edition, 2 volumes. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
• Kümmel, Werner Georg (1996). Introduction to the New Testament, revised and enlarged English translation. Nashville: Abingdon Press.
• Mack, Burton L. (1995). Who Wrote the New Testament?. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco.
• Neill, Stephen and Wright, Tom (1988). The Interpretation of the New Testametnt, 1861-1986, new edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Schnelle, Udo (1998). The History and Theology of the New Testament Writings, English translation. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
• Zahn, Theodor (1910). Introduction to the New Testament, English translation, 3 volumes. Edinburgh: T&T Clark.

External links

General references

• New Testament Gateway Annotated guide to academic New Testament Web resources including not only other Web sites, but articles and course materials
• "Introduction to New Testament History and Literature" course materials "Open Yale course" taught at Yale University by Dale B. Martin
• New Testament Reading Room Extensive on-line New Testament resources (including reference works, commentaries, translations, atlases, language tools, and works on "New Testament theology"), Tyndale Seminary (evangelical)
• Biblicalstudies.org New Testament pages Bibliographies on the New Testament and its individual books
• Christianity.com Bible Study Tools For-profit, conservative religious site with links to translations, as well as to mostly out-dated and non-critical commentaries, concordances, and other reference works
• Pastoral articles on the New Testament for ministerial training Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary (WELS)
• The New Testament into a single file (Authorized King James Version, Oxford Standard Text, 1769)

Development and authorship

• The Gospels in the official canon, and some that were not included in the Bible
• New Testament Timeline
• Dating the New Testament A compilation of the dates ascribed by various scholars to the composition of the New Testament documents, accompanied by an odd statistical average of the dates

Greek

• New Testament Byzantine Greek Original Side by side with the English (King James) and Russian (Synodal) translation Commentary by the Greek Fathers - Icons from Mount Athos
• New Testament, Greek Polytonic Text according to Ecumenical Patriarchate (Greek)
• Greek New Testament text (searchable only; no downloads) with lexical aids

Categories: New Testament | Greek literature (post-classical) | Christian terms

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