Old Testament
The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, with the exception of a few parts, namely, Ezra 4:7 to 6:18, 7:12-16, and Daniel 2:5 to 7: 28, which were in Aramaic. Hebrew, the language of the children of Israel down to the fifth century B.C., was displaced by Aramaic as the spoken tongue after the return of the Israelites from exile, and it remained only as the language of literature. Thereafter it became the practice, when the Scriptures were read in public assemblies, to include also a translation into Aramaic. Thus in Nehemiah 8:8 we read, "So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading." This was probably the beginning of the Targums, or paraphrases in Aramaic.
Our Authorized and Revised Versions of the Old Testament are translations mainly from the Hebrew. The "Revisers' Preface to the Old Testament" contains much that is both interesting and instructive to Bible students, for example, "The Revisers have thought it most prudent to adopt the Massoretic (that is the Received Hebrew) Text as the basis of their work, and to depart from it, as the Authorized Translators had done, only in exceptional cases."
The Massoretes were a group of scholars responsible for the accuracy of the Old Testament text from about 400 a.d, to 1000 A.D. Before their time the Hebrew writings had been recorded by means of consonants only; they added the vowels and accents in accordance with the traditional readings (that is, the Talmud) and made marginal notes. From this text our Hebrew printed Bible is derived.
The actual documents which are the sources of our text date from about the fourteenth century A.D. There are, however, now available a few earlier Hebrew manuscripts going back before 1000 A.D., which have been discovered since the Received text was compiled. Briefly summarized, some of the reasons why we possess no very ancient Hebrew manuscripts of the Old Testament are as follows:
1. From 800 B.C. down to the Christian era the little country of the Hebrews was subject to invasion and occupation from time to time. Large numbers of people were deported and many thousands migrated to Egypt and other lands. The Jewish temple was destroyed with all that it contained. Later the continued persecution of both Jew and Christian was accompanied by the burning of their sacred literature.
2. Very few copies of Old Testament books existed outside the synagogues, with the result that in times of conflict, when the destruction of the synagogue occurred, the documents were lost.
3. The material (papyrus or skins) on which the writings were recorded was incapable of withstanding the climate of Palestine: humidity caused rapid decay of the papyrus, and the winding and unwinding of the rolls, which were often twenty to thirty feet long, caused wear and tear.
4. Very strict rules were imposed on the synagogue copyists to prevent mistakes, with the result that all copies were presumed to be correct, and the most recent copies were preferred. Discarded manuscripts were kept in the synagogue lumber cupboard or "Gheniza." Periodically the cupboard was cleared and imperfect or redundant copies were destroyed.
In view of these reasons, which account for the disappearance of the more ancient documents, Christian Scientists feel intense gratitude for what has been preserved. They have learned, however, that Truth, being omnipresent and omnipotent, is not really dependent upon the preservation of ancient records.
It is of interest to know that the Hebrew text as we have it is regarded by the best scholars as substantially accurate. What errors there may be are trivial, and we should beware of exaggerating them or of assuming that they affect the truth of the record.
Our beloved Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, writes (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 179): "The Old and the New Testaments contain self-evident truths that cannot be lost, but being translations, the Scriptures are criticized. Some dangerous skepticism exists as to the verification of our Master's sayings. But Christians and Christian Scientists know that if the Old Testament and gospel narratives had never been written, the nature of Christianity, as depicted in the life of our Lord, and the truth in the Scriptures, are sufficient to authenticate Christ's Christianity as the perfect ideal."
Versions
In addition to the Hebrew manuscripts we have versions of the Old Testament, that is, translations into Greek, Latin, Syriac, and so on, made between 300 B.C. and 400 A.D., which are useful for reference where there is doubt about the correct rendering. The most important of these are the Greek Codices of the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries A.D. In the third century B.C. the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament into Greek was commenced for the library of Alexandria. This was used as their "Old Covenant" by those Jews who had been dispersed abroad and had forgotten the Aramaic tongue, and later it served as "the Scriptures" for the early missionaries of the Christian church. Several later translations into Greek were made, and the Septuagint has suffered some revision. It is, however, the basis of the Codices to which reference is made below.
In the early Christian church it became necessary to provide translations for missionaries who had gone far afield in response to the Master's command, which was taken quite literally by many disciples, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature" (Mark 16:15). Among these were the Syriac versions, which would be for the peoples of Syria and Mesopotamia and possibly Palestine. The Peshitto or Common Syriac Version, dating from the fourth century, is still the official Bible of the Indian Church. Another important translation was made from Greek into Latin; and later another Latin version, the Vulgate of Jerome, was made direct from the Hebrew about 400 A.D. This is still the accepted Bible of the Roman Catholic church.
New Testament
The language used by Jesus and his disciples was Aramaic, and the earliest records of his words were probably written in that dialect. Later they were translated or rewritten in Greek, which is the original language of our text of the New Testament (with the possible exception of Matthew's Gospel). They would have been mainly on rolls of papyrus which, for reasons already mentioned, would not, under ordinary circumstances, endure very long. In addition, the persecutions of the early church were severe and continuous, and as late as 303 A.D. the Roman emperor Diocletian issued an edict ordering that the churches should be abolished and all Christian writings destroyed.
Soon after this date, however, the Roman emperor Constantine "embraced" Christianity, and the church was recognized by the state. It now became possible to use vellum—that is, well-prepared skins—instead of papyrus, and about the same time codices (books) replaced the rolls. It is not, therefore, surprising that the earliest manuscripts date from this period.
The Greek codices are divided into (a) Uncials, written in large capital letters and (b) Cursives, in freehand, and (c) Papyri. The oldest uncials date from 300 to 350 a.d, onwards and are known by symbols which are usually capital letters. A few of the most important are:(—Aleph) Codex Sinaiticus, discovered in 1844 in a monastery at Mount Sinai. This early fourth-century manuscript is one of the most valuable.
(A) Codex Alexandrinus, early fifth century, now in the British Museum in London. It shows evidence of some later editing. (B) Codex Vaticanus, early fourth century, perhaps the oldest and most valuable, is in the Vatican Library at Rome.
(C) Codex Ephraemi, a fifth-century palimpsest, rather badly mutilated; only parts have been deciphered.
(D) Codex Bezae, dating from the fifth century, contains only the Gospels and Acts in both Greek and Latin.
The codices, A, B, and C originally contained the whole Bible, but parts of each are missing or mutilated. The cursive manuscripts number several thousands, but are much later, dating from the ninth to the fourteenth centuries. Of the papyrus fragments a number date from the third century, and one at least is as early as the second century, containing five verses from John 18.
In the margins of some Bibles we find notes such as, "Many ancient authorities read," which refer to the different readings of such documents as those already mentioned. Sometimes the note is accompanied by the symbols which denote the manuscript.
It is true to say that there are no variations of text which affect any important doctrinal points or in any way invalidate the narrative. In substance, the text of the Bible stands firm, and this is especially true of the New Testament. An authority on ancient manuscripts has written: "The Christian can take the whole Bible in his hands and say without fear or hesitation that he holds in it the true Word of God, faithfully handed down from generation to generation throughout the centuries." Our beloved Leader gives as the first tenet of Christian Science (see Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 497), "As adherents of Truth, we take the inspired Word of the Bible as our sufficient guide to eternal Life."
