What Is The Bible?
The Bible is not a single book, but rather a collection of books and letters (or epistles) that have been brought together over several hundred years to form 1 complete work that we now know as the Bible.
Furthermore this collection of books or letters are different depending on whether you are reading the ‘Protestant’ Bible which has a total of 66 books that make up the Old and New Testaments, or indeed the Roman Catholic version which has a total of 73 books.
Why is the Protestant Bible 7 books Shorter Than The Roman Catholic Version:
This is a long and rather complicated story, however, suffice it to say that Martin Luther considered the 7 disputed books ‘non-canonical’ in nature and more legend and fantasy than the Word of God.
What books are excluded from the Protestant Bible:
It should be clear that the New Testament in both versions of the Bible include the same books, It is the Old testament where the differences appear.
- Books removed from the Protestant Bible are Tobit
- Judith
- Wisdom (also called the Wisdom of Solomon)
- Sirach (also called Ecclesiasticus)
- Baruch
- 1 Maccabees
- 2 Maccabees
What Is The Difference Between Old and New Testaments?
The Old Testament is the scripture followed by Israel and comprises of 39 books (Protestant) or 46 books (Roman Catholic). It was written sometime between 1200 and 165 BC in the Hebrew and Aramaic languages
The Old Testament is all about God’s dealing with his chosen people the Jews, and the Law given to Moses on mount Sinai – the Ten commandments. The ‘law’ was a system of rules (commandments) feasts and sacrifices offered unto God in order for the people to become acceptable to Him.
The Old Testament or ‘Covenant’ was designed to show the people just how far they were away from a Holy God.
The New Testament accounts for 27 books and Epistles. Written in ‘Koine’ Greek between 50 and 100 AD. It is all about Grace and the sacrificial offering of Jesus Christ that makes the individual fully acceptable before a Holy God. Where the Old demands continual blood sacrifice to offer temporary forgiveness of sins, the New offers permanent forgiveness of sins through the sacrifice of Jesus once and for all.
What Are The Books of The New Testament?
- Matthew, Mark Luke & John (canonical gospels)
- The Acts of the Apostles
- 14 Epistles of Paul – Romans, 1st nd 2nd Corinthians, Galations, Ephesians, Philipians, Collosians, Thesalonians 1 & 2, Timothy 1 & 2, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews.
- 7 Individual letters – James, Peter 1 & 2, John 1,2 & 3, Jude
- Book of Revelations
For an complete yet brief overview of the New Testament Bible itself, or indeed a complete summary of the 1st and 2nd letters to the Corinthian church, then please check out this New Testament Summary available in the Amazon store on This Link or click on the image above to view the kindle or hard-copy version.