Oldest bible now online

Sorry if this is already covered in other thread(s) but I did look and found none.

"The world's oldest known Christian Bible goes online Monday -- but the 1,600-year-old text doesn't match the one you'll find in churches today."

link to CNN

"And some familiar -- very important -- passages are missing, including verses dealing with the resurrection of Jesus, they said."

"The Bible comes from the Monastery of St. Catherine in the Sinai desert"

"The manuscript contains the Christian Bible in Greek, including the oldest complete copy of the New Testament. (A copy held at the Vatican dates from about the same period.) Older copies of individual portions of the Christian Bible exist, but not as part of a complete text."

Now we just need honest people to tranlate the most original Bible found.

This, I feel, is a little misleading. Each Gospel has a resurrection narrative in it. The only doubt, in some people's minds, is the authenticity is Mark's resurrection story. Beyond that though, no one questions that the other three Gospel's had, originally, Jesus' resurrection.

Also, it's a little misleading to trump up the "extra" books. If anyone does a little investigation, they'd know that the early church, and many people today, viewed extra-biblical works as important and helpful. Apparently, this Sinai Codex had two of this New Testament era books. I bet that they're Barnabas' Epistle and The Shepherd of Hermas.

The Jews had the same view on several Old Testament era books as well. But they were never considered Scripture, just helpful. For example, 1 and 2 Maccabees.

ETA1: Yeah, my thought on the New Testament portion was correct:



ETA2: Regardless, I think this is cool. It will be interesting to compare what they have to manuscripts that are currently used. I bet that the consistency will be pretty close among them.

[edit on 7/6/2009 by octotom]

[edit on 7/6/2009 by octotom]

For me the interesting bits will be key places like Genesis, where different versions of the Bible - different translations have huge impacts on our way of thinking.

One example

Genesis 1:30

Darby translates as
and to every animal of the earth, and to every fowl of the heavens, and to everything that creepeth on the earth, in which is a living soul, every green herb for food. And it was so.

King James
And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

To me it is of importance what the oldest texts say and whether they are translated correctly.

And for all the Hard Core Biblie Bashers I'm sure it must be interesting to know how come the word of God is added to and in some places replaced by words or whole sentences.

I know it is interesting for me.

While I wholly support the thinking behind making a set of rules to help society work properly, I am equally against the notion of a benevolant, fair and just God that supposedly have created a huge number of rules and regulations punishable by death or worse.
(Leviticus springs to mind)

Of course we have the Christians who say that the Bible is Gods word and promptly states that parts of it is meant to be interpreted.
Other Christians claim that no interpretation is needed as everything IS the word of God.
Blatantly disregarding that key elements are attributed to the teachings of the disciples. In other words NOT the word of God but the word of someone who claims to know Gods will.

All in all

This is interesting. And as I mentioned what is most interesting are the corrections and not least what they were corrected from.


[edit on 6.7.2009 by HolgerTheDane]

Originally posted by octotom
***snip***
Apparently, this Sinai Codex had two of this New Testament era books. I bet that they're Barnabas' Epistle and The Shepherd of Hermas.

The Jews had the same view on several Old Testament era books as well. But they were never considered Scripture, just helpful. For example, 1 and 2 Maccabees.

ETA1: Yeah, my thought on the New Testament portion was correct:

The New Testament portion includes the Epistle of Barnabas and The Shepherd of Hermas.

Please visit the link provided for the complete story.

***snip***

And the fact that the two "helpful texts" were in fact part of this Bible in this particular Bibles New Testament doesn't imply that they were more than helpful texts? Perhaps in fact Scripture?

And the reason for including them in the old Bible and later removing them was?
Just wondering why Leviticus is still there. If ever I saw a part of the Bible clearly not used this must be it.

I do realize that we are munching words here. Bible as opposed to Codex.


EDIT:
Sorry about edits. I have Microsoft fingers today.
[edit on 6.7.2009 by HolgerTheDane]

[edit on 6.7.2009 by HolgerTheDane]