Discover the origins of the Bible
What is the Bible?

What is the Bible?

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Table of contents:

The origins of the Bible

Etymology and constitution of the Bible

The Old Testament

The New Testament

Scripture and translations of the Bible

The Bible for Jews and Muslims

The Bible for Jews: The Hebrew Bible

The Bible for Muslims

The Bible: a book that still marks our civilisation

Genesis and the creation of the world

Noah's Ark

The Bible in our language

Reading the Bible today

The textual interpretation of the Bible: creationism

The Catholic Church and the interpretation of the Bible

The Bible is the holy book of Christians and Jews. It is a collection of fundamental texts written between the 8th century BC and the 2nd century AD. Depending on the religious orientation, the Bible is not read in the same translations or texts are added or removed.

The Bible remains an important book for everyone. In this article we will look at the origins of the Bible, how it was written and its various versions, and how it is interpreted by believers.

The origins of the Bible

Etymology and constitution of the Bible

The word Bible comes from the Greek "ta biblia" meaning books. The Christian Bible consists of 73 books.

For Christians, the Bible is divided into two distinct parts.

The Old Testament

The Old Testament contains 46 books written before the birth of Jesus Christ: it tells about the life of the people of Israel and their relationship with God. It is a collection of different writings assembled during a period beginning in the 8th century BC.

The term 'Old Testament' is a typically Christian way of calling the Bible, because for Jews there is no New Testament. The first mention of this term dates back to the third century BC. However, the Christian use of the term Old Testament derives from St. Paul's use of the term in a letter to the Corinthians.

Jews call the part of the Bible they have in common with Christians the Torah.

Torah means the Law or teaching or doctrine. The Torah is more commonly called the Pentateuch by Christians. It contains the first five books of the Bible that are said to have been revealed to Moses before God dictated the Ten Commandments to him.

The New Testament

The New Testament, containing 27 books, was written after the birth of Jesus Christ. It tells the good news of Jesus as the son of God and bears witness to the effect of this good news in the lives of the early Christian communities. It contains

- the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John

- the Acts of the Apostles

- the epistles of the various witnesses to the life of the first Christian communities

- the Apocalypse.

Scripture and Bible translations

The different books of the Bible were written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.

These thousands of pages were written over the course of a thousand years. Dozens of authors have been involved. The Bible has been translated into hundreds of languages. It has been constantly retranslated for over 2000 years.

This makes it a mobile and nomadic Bible: every religion, Jews and Christians and then Protestants, have rewritten and retranslated it. These different writings could raise the question of interpretation. This is why most denominations have settled on a version and translation that suits their worship. Among Catholics, the Jerusalem Bible or the TOB (Ecumenical Bible Translation) are the commonly used versions.

Each book of the Bible is divided into chapters and verses.

The Bible for Jews and Muslims

In different ways, the Bible is a reference for the three monotheistic religions of our western world.

The Bible for Jews: The Hebrew Bible

Jews use a part of the Bible common with Christians, which they call the Torah: the first five books of the Bible. Besides the Torah (the Law or for Christians the Pentateuch), the Hebrew Bible also contains the Nevi'im (the Prophets) and the Ketuvim (the other writings or hagiographers).

This Hebrew Bible is called the Tanakh, and in addition to the five books of the Torah or Pentateuch, it contains eight books for the Nevi'im and eleven books for the Ketuvim.

The Bible mainly tells the story of God's chosen people, i.e. the story of the Jewish people. The Hebrew Bible owes its name to the fact that it was written mainly in Hebrew. However, some of the books of this Bible were originally written in Aramaic.

File:Open Torah and pointer.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

The Bible for Muslims

Islam does not consider the Bible to be a holy book, but in its Koran, written in the eighth century AD, there are many references to the Bible. There is Abraham, who is very important to Islam, and the mention of many prophets.

Although it has a different place in each of the religions, we can say that the Bible is a common reference for the three monotheistic religions of our western world. It is sometimes referred to as 'religions of the book'.

The Bible: a book that still marks our civilisation

The Bible is not only a religious book. It is also a real reference in the world of art: painting, sculpture, literature, seventh art and religious music. Finally, it truly permeates our history, our culture and our language. We will take a few simple examples here.

Genesis and the creation of the world

The first book of the Bible is Genesis. It tells how in seven days God created the universe, the earth and mankind. Finally it tells the story of the Jews up to the Exodus. This book alone has a profound effect on our world. Even today, the story of Adam and Eve, the intervention of the serpent, the apple that was bitten, are all references used in the imagery of our everyday language.

Noah's Ark

In the Bible, Noah's Ark is a boat built on God's orders to save Noah, his family and all the animals in creation from the flood. No one is unaware of the story of Noah's ark; many plays, stories and films have told its story. Noah's Ark is probably one of the most familiar passages in the Bible to our children, as there are even toys made by large international companies that represent Noah's Ark.

The Bible in our language

There are many verbal references and expressions that refer to the Bible:

- An unequal battle can be compared to that of David against Goliath,

- To designate a period of catastrophe, we can speak of the seven plagues of Egypt,

- To evoke a difficult period, we could speak of a path to the cross.

These observations allow us to understand that even a person who has not been educated in religion will necessarily have cultural references to the Bible.

Reading the Bible today

The textual interpretation of the Bible: creationism

The Bible's account of the creation of the world up to the present day is for some people, for some groups, to be taken literally. For example, orthodox Jewish groups and some Christian movements believe that the world is only 6,000 years old, as can be calculated from the Bible. These people also believe that the world was created in seven days as described in Genesis.

Since the 19th century, and especially since the theory of evolution described in Darwin's Origin of Species, the world has gradually realised that it is impossible to read the Bible literally.

Faced with the evidence, groups of people who believe that the Bible should be taken as a reference for world history find themselves isolated. This movement is called creationism.

The Catholic Church and the interpretation of the Bible

Today, the Catholic Church, led by its successive popes, notably John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, does not reject the writings of the Bible.

However, these popes made it clear that the Bible, and especially Genesis, cannot be read literally.

They considered that the Church cannot contradict the theory of evolution. The notion of a planet Earth created in a different way from the one described in Genesis is not incompatible with the notion of creation by God. As Benedict XVI quotes, the theory of evolution does not contradict the fact that "each of us is the fruit of a thought of God".

In other words, the position of the Catholic Church and Christian churches in general is to interpret the message of the Bible, and more specifically the New Testament, as a message of love, a guide for human beings created by God.

We will end with another quote from Pope Francis: "Unfortunately, in many Christian families, no one feels able - as is prescribed in the Torah - to make the Word of God known to children in all its beauty, with all its spiritual force," he regrets. He goes further, pointing to the cultural heritage that the Bible has passed on to our civilisation: "Christianity makes you heirs to an incomparable cultural heritage that you must appropriate. Be passionate about this history which is yours.

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