got a call saying he was with the legal department but did not say with what company of any kind  where they have three allegations on me and  where my license was used said to call ack to have the matter taken care of an "good luck"

caller threatens with actions against someone I know...doesn't identify themselves.  The person I know has no clue what they are talking about .... has got to be a scam.

To all of you who have either received calls from this place or might, this is what is going on. This "attorney's office" buys old debts from companies and tries to retrieve money but the problem with them is they do so illegally and on debts in which have already been paid. What transpires is right around the time you get ready to pay that old debt or, when they have been notified that you have paid it, at least two other companies "jump on the band wagon" about the same debt and try to get you to pay them so that they can collect money from the original creditor for being able to get the account paid. If you EVER pay anyone off keep your receipts FOREVER....even if it is more than ten years old, just to protect yourself. I was contacted by three different companies on the same debt that I had already paid off but instead of ignoring it, I contacted the Better Business Bureau, my State Attorney's office, my local Attorney's Bar and the Federal Trade Commissioner. By contacting all of these companies I in turn found out that they ARE NOT a Law Firm but a collections office that "claims" to be a Law Firm. I searched the number on the net, got the "official names" and filed all of that, Long story short they left me alone.

Mr Joe Rizzo claims that i owe them money and they are trying to collect.They have hararred me at my job,even attempting to get me fired. Please help bring these people down.

Two weeks ago  my brother in law received a call from Mr. CARR on his answering  machine saying that I had  until the end of the business day to contact him or my case was going to court...I call him back and he said they were gonna file fraud charges on me for a payday loan back in 08..I did default on this loan because they kept taking money out that they shouldn't have...Like a fool I let them take $400 out of the $1125 that I owe on a $300 dollar loan the rest is due to penalties???  After they scared the heck out of me I called back a week later to ask for their website and this obnoxious guy asked me "whats your website and whats your mothers maiden name??? needless to say I was pissed and he hung up....I traced the number on the account that took the money out of my account. It is registered with a cricket phone in NEW YORK!!! Will be cancelling my check card TODAY!!!!! if anyone has any info please let me know.... I feel like driving up there and kicking someones A*S....It is a total scam

Please file a complaint with the BBB.  File it with the New York office because that is where they are from.  If you look on the BBB site, you will find that these jokers already have complaints filed against them.  Good luck to you.

Today at work I get out of a meeting and come back to my desk with a voicemail waiting from a "Miss James" at Smith & Associates. She told me like many others on this forum that I have THREE separate allegations against me for CHECK FRAUD!!! So, I call them back and give a man (cannot recall his name) my reason for calling and the case #. He makes a point to say over and over "we are not a collections agency, we are not going to threaten you". I said "Good because I don't do well with threats". He laughs and starts rattling off all this info about a payday loan I took out back in 2008. I did take out a few and paid off most of them. I recently filed for bankruptcy and put the remaining debt I could not pay in my bankruptcy. I know I included ALL of them. Anyway, he also says my email address and that my bank released all my info to them (Thanks again NATIONAL CITY, you suck!) which is now a closed account. Anyway, I asked the company name of the loaner, and he says "Cash For you" I asked him to spell it because I wasn't sure if "for" was really a "4" and he just repeated it louder. A***ole. He tells me the loan was for $400 and I agreed to pay back $610. I went through ALL of my paperwork and have NEVER taken out a loan this large or from a company called  Cash For You. I asked him if the company named had changed and he said no it's CASH FOR YOU and yelled it back in my ear. I mention that I will need to find my documentation in my emails for this supposed loan and that I would be calling my lawyer to discuss. He then started with the threats telling me if I don't call back by end of business that they are filing a suit tomorrow against me. I said "knock yourself out because YOU'RE the fraudulent party here NOT ME!" and he then hung up on me before I could ask his name again.

I will be reporting them not only to the FTC but also BBB. These scammers really need to be stopped already. I have to wonder HOW they got my info? One thing I thought of is that perhaps one of the loan places that were included in my bankruptcy SOLD my information in a sad last attempt to collect. OR sold it to some company who just pretends to be a creditor and make calls/threats such as Smith & Assoc. Either way this HAS to stop!

Just received a phone call from a person by the name of Joe from this company.  He indicated to me that if I don't call him back by 4:30 p.m. today, he was going to fax paperwork to my employer indicating to them that I have committed fraud by giving his company invalid credit card information in order to pay a debt. The card was closed, by me, after I found out that the company was quite possibly scamming me because of their inconsistencies and from my research which showed that their mailing address is a mailbox in a UPS Store in Cheektawaga, NY.  Because of this, there was no way, I was going to be sending them any money.  I have never heard of any attorney who has a mailbox at a UPS store.  They can have a mailbox at the P.O. but they also have a physical street address.  This company does not.  Now, this call today, states that at 4:30 p.m. they are going to be faxing this information to my employer.  However, it won't do them any good because I have not worked in three years due to being disabled.  Can they fax this information to Social Security and will I lose my benefits because of these people?

This is exactly word for word what happened to me except the part about the cars was wrong but the part about the debit card being canceled was exactly word for word what happened to me.  Do not give these people any money.  Their business location is a mail box at a UPS Store so what does that tell you?  I have never heard of attorneys having a mail box at a UPS Store.

I too, have been dealing with these people.  Do not give them any of your money.  My investigation found that they are not listed anywhere on the internet other than this site.  There is no debt collection company listed in Cheektawaga, NY where they are calling from.  Their address is a P.O. Box that is set up in a UPS Store.  If they were attorneys like they claim they are, they would have an actual street address not just a P.O. Box in a UPS Store.  Also, check out the complaint that was filed with the BBB against these people and you will see what you are dealing with.

Did they send the paper work to your HR dept

These PRICKS have got to be stopped.  NOW!  I just emailed Krohn & Moss, explaining the situation.  They are beyond the parameters of the law and FDCPA.

I received a call from Mike Knowles from Smith & Associates.  He said there is a case against me and they would contact my employer.  It scared the crap out of me because I did take out a payday loan 2 years ago and have defaulted on it.  I live paycheck to paycheck, I'm a single woman working 2 jobs trying to make ends meet & I fell into the trap of payday loans.  I have no problem setting up a reasonable payment plan with them but he told me I owed $755 (which I think the loan was for $400 originally) & I had to pay $264 over the next 3 pay periods. which I have no idea where I was going to pull that from.  Stupid me I gave him my debit card information, he told me he was recording our conversation.  I got off the phone & started researching the company & couldn't find anything & then I found this website.  I immediately canceled my debit card.  He called me today saying the card I gave him was "invalid".  I called him back & told him that my card was closed.  He proceeded to tell me that no it wasn't & that he'll look it up because they have access to all the information police have access to & he started calling me a liar & he said your 2001 Dogde Ram will be repossesed and I was like "I don't have and never had a car like that"  then he said "oh I'm sorry your 2001 camero"  I said "I don't & never had a car like that either" and he started yelling at me & said I was recorded and that I had to get him the money today & I said "please send me something in writing" he continued to yell at me and say they were going to court & wouldn't answer me when I asked him a question...then he finally said good luck and hung up on me.  I scared the crap out of me!

What ever happened?

The other part I found funny was that he said I had 3 pay day loans at first but then it was one.  What was that about?  He said there were 3 and now there is just the one?

I got a message from a man named Mike Knolles from Smith & Associates.  He said that I had a case against me and that there were 3 pay day loans against me.  He also said that I had a court date on Wednesday from 9:30am to 10:15am.  

So, I called.  He repeated all the above and continually told me they are not threatening me.  However he could not tell me anything about the company.  He said I had gotten a $400 loan from Cash for You, which wasn't true, and I owed $755.00.  I questioned him and questioned him on where they were located, where was my documentation that I owed this.  I found it funny he said I had a court date but then said they would now pursue the courts but on his message he told me I already had a court date.  He really couldn't give me a clear answer and then when I continued to question him on it, he said that's fine you've made your choice, we will be faxing garnishment paperwork to your HR department.  I said I don't know why you can't send me something in writing that I owe this.  He said he could send me a letter.  I gave him my new email address at work, but I haven't seen anything come through yet.  I'm very hesitant to take this serious.  I did have pay day loans but I have to my knowledge paid them all.  If I knew for sure who this was and had some documentation, I might be more willing to take it seriously.  He knew more about me than he did the company, so it makes me a bit sketchy to just pay it.  I loved how he continued to say he wasn't threatening me and needed me to state that on record.  It was bizarre really....

Received a call from them at my sister in laws home where they left a message.  I promptly called back this morning and spoke with a Ms. Whitaker.  I asked her what it was in reference to and why they had called my sister in law.  She explained that I had taken out a payday loan in 2008 and I had defaulted.  I have never taken out a payday loan and explained to her as such.  She stated that she had an affidavit from my bank saying that the funds had been deposited and that she knew I had gotten the money. She rattled off an email that I haven't used in years and proceeded to tell me that they were going to serve me.  I asked that a verification of debt be sent to me and she said that they didn't have the time for that.  She said that I could pay today or they would sue.  The more questions I asked, the nastier she became before she just hung up on me.  I have no idea who they hell these people are, but be very careful.  I will be calling the FTC and letting them know about this.  You can reach the FTC at 877-382-4357, select 2.  They must be stopped.

I received a call from Mr. Carr...who transferred me to some other idiot, who said "They weren't trying to threaten me"...but they have some sort of case pending against me.  I asked what it was for, and he kept saying "do you want to settle this or not?" and I kept asking what it was for...finally I told him to F** Off and he said I would be "Sorry" and then referred to an old email address I had...anyway, he called back again, and said I now have 1 hour to call him back and settle this or he's filing suit...it's a scam, don't give them any money or information.

My husband got a phone call at 7:30am saying that we had taken out a payday loan in January 2008 from Eagle Finance and defaulted on it. The lady had his driver license number, our two friend?s names, and bank account information. She told me they had 3 cases pending against him and they were going to file charges. The amount of the loan was for $300.00 plus $169.79 in interest, but the company had not tacked on the past two years worth of interest yet so I could pay the $469.79 in full and the case would be closed.
At first I was so scared and taken off guard I started to give her my visa card number to clear the debit. I then decided I should verify who I was paying. I asked if they had a web site, ?no, we are a law firm?. My response was even ?lawyers have web sites?. I asked for her physical address and the city they were in. I also asked her to send a letter showing we owed this amount and who they were via email. She told me her secretary was ?out of the office with the lawyers?, but when she returned she would have her do it. I asked if she could send me something; that I really wanted to take care of this today. She told me she was really busy and could not. I told her I wanted to verify who the company was and then I would pay the balance in full. She said ?whatever, if you call you call otherwise good luck?.
I could not locate the address she gave me via the internet, the company?s name is not listed in the city, and Eagle Finance, the company who ?we received the money from? states on their web site that ?they provide a service to help consumes locate lenders online and is not a lender?.
My husband and I had payday loans at one point and we worked really hard to pay them off and get out of debit.
I believe this to be a scam. Please be careful.

I just received the same thing, it stated to my mom that she was listed as a reference and he needed me or my legal represenative to contact him immediately. He gave her a reference number for me as well, his name was "Mr Gambino"

My family is receiving the same phone calls and I had a voicemail today with the exact same comments from Mr. Carr! Don't have a clue who they are and what type of meeting they could be having about cases against me, which "Mr. Carr" state three of them and also tomorrow at 11 AM. Until I see something certified, I will not be responding!!! My family and friends will not give out any information about me without knowing who they are or what it is about. Once I find out who they are and what they are searching for I will update my comments.

Just got the the same type call at work, no number shows up on caller ID but this is the number they left to return the call at.  Told me I had three items pending against me and they are getting ready to serve me papers at my place of employment.  Not sure who they are or what it's about.  They left me a case number also.  Claim to be Jennifer from Smith and Associates.  I've never heard of them before.

Received a phone call from "Mr. Carr @ Smith & Associates" regarding "Ron Sylvester" and that my husband's name was listed as a possible contact for this "vocational acquisition" case and it was imperative that 'someone' call back as there was going to be an in-office Friday @ 11:00 a.m. Eastern time.  What was weird is that there was NO listing on my caller ID for this call.  I did not call back and my husband will not either.  He gave a case claim # as well (#37248) and referred to it a couple of times.  Bizarre.

Received the exact same message on my home voicemaill.  I called it back and found out that it was "Smith & Associates".  They are out of a place called Cheektawaga, NY.  I'm not sure who these people are if they are a legitimate debt collector or not.  Be very wary.  Talk to an attorney to advise you before sending them any money.

^ http://www.ethiopianorthodox.org/english/canonical/books.html
^ Philip R. Davies, "Memories of ancient Israel", p.7
^ Halpern, B. the First Historians: The Hebrew Bible. Harper & Row, 1988, quoted in Smith, Mark S.The early history of God: Yahweh and the other deities in ancient Israel. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.; 2nd ed., 2002. ISBN 978-0802839725, p.14
^ Businessweek on The Bible: "The Bible (2.5 billion copies sold)" (18 July 2005)
^ Ash, Russell (2001). Top 10 of Everything 2002. Dorling Kindersley. ISBN 0789480433, 9780789480439.  
^ a b Harper, Douglas. "bible". Online Etymology Dictionary. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=bible.  
^ "The Catholic Encyclopedia". Newadvent.org. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02543a.htm. Retrieved 2010-04-23.  
^ Biblion, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, at Perseus.
^ a b c d e Stagg, Frank. New Testament Theology. Nashville: Broadman, 1962. ISBN 0-8054-1613-7.
^ "From Hebrew Bible to Christian Bible" by Mark Hamilton on PBS's site From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians.
^ Dictionary.com etymology of the word "Bible".
^ "Bible Study, Bible Facts". http://www.csbbc.net/bible.html. Retrieved 2007-11-05.  
^ Accuracy of Torah Text.
^ a b Sir Godfrey Driver. "Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible." Web: 30 Nov 2009
^ Evans, Christopher. King's College London. Quoted in Wright, N.T. "New Testament Scholarship and Christian Discipleship." 5 Jun 2008. Web: 27 Feb 2010 N.T. Wright on NT Scholarship and Christian Discipleship
^ a b Wright, N.T. The Last Word: Scripture and the Authority of God?Getting Beyond the Bible Wars. HarperCollins, 2005. ISBN 0060872616 / 9780060872618
^ A Summary of the Bible by Lewis, CS: Believer's Web.
^ Philo of Alexandria, De vita Moysis 3.23.
^ Josephus, Contra Apion 1.8.
^ "Basis for belief of Inspiration Biblegateway". Biblegateway.com. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2 ... :25;&version=50. Retrieved 2010-04-23.  
^ Norman L. Geisler, William E. Nix. A General Introduction to the Bible. Moody Publishers, 1986, p.86. ISBN 0-8024-2916-5
^ For example, see Leroy Zuck, Roy B. Zuck. Basic Bible Interpretation. Chariot Victor Pub, 1991,p.68. ISBN 0-89693-819-0
^ Roy B. Zuck, Donald Campbell. Basic Bible Interpretation. Victor, 2002. ISBN 0-7814-3877-2
^ Norman L. Geisler. Inerrancy. Zondervan, 1980, p.294. ISBN 0-310-39281-0
^ International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) (PDF). The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. http://www.churchcouncil.org/ccpdfdocs/01_Biblical_Inerrancy_A&D.pdf.  
^ Luke 11:51, Luke 24:44
^ Catholic Encyclopedia: 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."
^ Paula Fredriksen, Augustine and the Jews, ISBN 978-0-385-50270-2 (2008), pp. 67-68, 391.
^ Wycliffe Bible Translators, Inc. (WBT) Translation Statistics. August 14, 2009: Wycliffe.org
^ Vision2025.org
^ Richard Elliott Friedman, "Who Wrote the Bible?," HarperSanFrancisco, 1997 (2nd edition).
^ Joel Rosenberg, 1984 "The Bible: Biblical Narrative" in Barry Holtz, ed Back to the Sources New York: Summit Books p. 36; Nahum Sarna, 1986 Understanding Genesis New York:Schocken Books pp. xxi-xxiii.
^ Wellhausen adopted the idea of a post-Exilic date for P from Eduard Reuss.
^ Although the bulk of all four documents date from before 587 BC, the strand of D known as Dtr2 dates from the following Exilic period.
^ Finkelstein, Israel; Neil Silberman. The Bible Unearthed.  
^ Dever, William. Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come from?.  
^ Kurinsky, Samuel (August 2008). "Nomadic Jews, Never". Hebrew History Foundation. http://www.hebrewhistory.info/factpapers/fp014_nomadic.htm.  
^ Did Noah really build an ark?, BBC.
References and further reading
Anderson, Bernhard W. Understanding the Old Testament. ISBN 0-13-948399-3.
Asimov, Isaac. Asimov's Guide to the Bible. New York, NY: Avenel Books, 1981. ISBN 0-517-34582-X.
Berlin, Adele, Marc Zvi Brettler and Michael Fishbane. The Jewish Study Bible. Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-19-529751-2.
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2001). The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-2338-1.  
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (August 2002). "Review: "The Bible Unearthed": A Rejoinder". Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 327: 63?73. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1357859?seq=1  
Herzog, Ze'ev (October 29, 1999). Deconstructing the walls of Jericho. Ha'aretz. http://mideastfacts.org/facts/index.php?optio ... id=32&Itemid=34  
Dever, William G. (March/April 2007). "Losing Faith: Who Did and Who Didn?t, How Scholarship Affects Scholars". Biblical Archaeology Review 33 (2): 54. http://creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/other/5106losingfaith.pdf  
Dever, William G. Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did they Come from? Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2003. ISBN 0-8028-0975-8.
Ehrman, Bart D. Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005. ISBN 0-06-073817-0.
Geisler, Norman (editor). Inerrancy. Sponsored by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. Zondervan Publishing House, 1980, ISBN 0-310-39281-0.
Head, Tom. The Absolute Beginner's Guide to the Bible. Indianapolis, IN: Que Publishing, 2005. ISBN 0-7897-3419-2
Hoffman, Joel M. In the Beginning. New York University Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8147-3690-4
Lienhard, Joseph T. The Bible, The Church, and Authority. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1995.
Lindsell, Harold. The Battle for the Bible. Zondervan Publishing House, 1978. ISBN 0-310-27681-0
Masalha, Nur, The Bible and Zionism: Invented Traditions, Archaeology and Post-Colonialism in Palestine-Israel. London, Zed Books, 2007.
McDonald, Lee M. and Sanders, James A., eds. The Canon Debate. Hendrickson Publishers (January 1, 2002). 662p. ISBN 1565635175 ISBN 978-1565635173
Miller, John W. The Origins of the Bible: Rethinking Canon History Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1994. ISBN 0-8091-3522-1.
Riches, John. The Bible: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-19-285343-0
Siku. The Manga Bible: From Genesis to Revelation. Galilee Trade (January 15, 2008). 224p. ISBN 0385524315 ISBN 978-0385524315
Taylor, Hawley O. "Mathematics and Prophecy." Modern Science and Christian Faith. Wheaton: Van Kampen, 1948, pp. 175?83.
The Brick Testament, Thebricktestament.com
Wycliffe Bible Encyclopedia, s.vv. "Book of Ezekiel," p. 580 and "prophecy," p. 1410. Chicago: Moody Bible Press, 1986.



The word "canon" etymologically means cane or reed. In early Christianity "canon" referred to a list of books approved for public reading. Books not on the list were referred to as "apocryphal" ? meaning they were for private reading only. Under Latin usage from the fourth century on, canon came to stand for a closed and authoritative list in the sense of rule or norm.[9]

Hebrew Bible
Main article: Development of the Jewish Bible canon
The New Testament refers to the threefold division of the Hebrew Scriptures: the law, the prophets, and the writings. Luke 24:44 refers to the "law of Moses" (Pentateuch), the "prophets" which include certain historical books in addition to the books now called "prophets," and the psalms (the "writings" designated by its most prominent collection). The Hebrew Bible probably was canonized in these three stages: the law canonized before the Exile, the prophets by the time of the Syrian persecution of the Jews, and the writings shortly after AD 70 (the fall of Jerusalem). About that time, early Christian writings began being accepted by Christians as "scripture." These events, taken together, may have caused the Jews to close their "canon." They listed their own recognized Scriptures and also excluded both Christian and Jewish writings considered by them to be "apocryphal." In this canon the thirty-nine books found in the Old Testament of today's Christian Bibles were grouped together as twenty-two books, equaling the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. This canon of Jewish scripture is attested to by Philo, Josephus, the New Testament,[26] and the Talmud.[9]Scholars intrigued by the hypothesis that Moses had not written the Pentateuch considered other authors. Independent but nearly simultaneous proposals by H. B. Witter, Jean Astruc, and Johann Gottfried Eichhorn separated the Pentateuch into two original documentary components, both dating from after the time of Moses. Others hypothesized the presence of two additional sources. The four documents were given working titles: J (Jahwist/Yahwist), E (Elohist), P (Priestly), and D (Deuteronomist). Each was discernible by its own characteristic language, and each, when read in isolation, presented a unified, coherent narrative.

Subsequent scholars, notably Eduard Reuss, Karl Heinrich Graf and Wilhelm Vatke, turned their attention to the order in which the documents had been composed (which they deduced from internal clues) and placed them in the context of a theory of the development of ancient Israelite religion, suggesting that much of the Laws and the narrative of the Pentateuch were unknown to the Israelites in the time of Moses. These were synthesized by Julius Wellhausen (1844?1918), who suggested a historical framework for the composition of the documents and their redaction (combination) into the final document known as the Pentateuch. This hypothesis was challenged by William Henry Green in his The Mosaic Origins of the Pentateuchal Codes (available online). Nonetheless, according to contemporary Torah scholar Richard Elliott Friedman, Wellhausen's model of the documentary hypothesis continues to dominate the field of biblical scholarship: "To this day, if you want to disagree, you disagree with Wellhausen. If you want to pose a new model, you compare its merits with those of Wellhausen's model."[31]

The documentary hypothesis is important in the field of biblical studies not only because it claims that the Torah was written by different people at different times?generally long after the events it describes?[32] but it also proposed what was at the time a radically new way of reading the Bible. Many proponents of the documentary hypothesis view the Bible more as a body of literature than a work of history, believing that the historical value of the text lies not in its account of the events that it describes, but in what critics can infer about the times in which the authors lived (as critics may read Hamlet to learn about seventeenth-century England, but will not read it to learn about seventh-century Denmark).

Modern developments
The critical analysis of authorship now encompasses every book of the Bible. In some cases the traditional view on authorship has been overturned; in others, additional support, at least in part, has been found.

The development of the hypothesis has not stopped with Wellhausen. Wellhausen's hypothesis, for example, proposed that the four documents were composed in the order J-E-D-P, with P, containing the bulk of the Jewish law, dating from the post-Exilic Second Temple period (i.e., after 515 BC);[33] but the contemporary view is that P is earlier than D, and that all four books date from the First Temple period (i.e., prior to 587 BC).[34] The documentary hypothesis has more recently been refined by later scholars such as Martin Noth (who in 1943 provided evidence that Deuteronomy plus the following six books make a unified history from the hand of a single editor), Harold Bloom, Frank Moore Cross and Richard Elliot Friedman.

The documentary hypothesis, at least in the four-document version advanced by Wellhausen, has been controversial since its formulation. The direction of this criticism is to question the existence of separate, identifiable documents, positing instead that the biblical text is made up of almost innumerable strands so interwoven as to be hardly untangleable?the J document, in particular, has been subjected to such intense dissection that it seems in danger of disappearing.

Although biblical archaeology has confirmed the existence of many people, places, and events mentioned in the Bible, many critical scholars have argued that the Bible be read not as an accurate historical document, but rather as a work of literature and theology that often draws on historical events?as well as upon non-Hebrew mythology?as primary source material (see The Bible and history). For these scholars, the Bible reveals much about the lives and times of its authors and compilers.

Archaeological and historical research
Main articles: Biblical archaeology school and The Bible and history
Biblical archaeology is the archaeology that relates to, and sheds light upon, the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. It is used to help determine the lifestyle and practices of people living in biblical times.

There are a wide range of interpretations of the existing Biblical archaeology. One broad division includes Biblical maximalism that generally take the view that most of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible is essentially based on history although presented through the religious viewpoint of its time. It is considered the opposite of biblical minimalism which is strictly secular and does not allow any consideration of the Bible as documentary evidence or as a framework of history.

One example of the dispute involves biblical accounts of Israelite bondage in Egypt, wandering in the desert, and conquest the Land of Israel in a military campaign, the accounts of the land being passed on to the 12 tribes of Israel, and David's and Solomon's conquests, and other key elements described in the biblical narratives as occurring in the 10th century BC or before. So far, there is a lack of archaeological evidence to independently support this, which has led some archaeologists, such as Israel Finkelstein, Neil Silberman,[35] and William G. Dever[36] to believe that these events never happened, and that the ancestors of the Hebrews and the Jews are either nomads who had become sedentary, or people from the plains of Canaan, who fled to the highlands to escape the control of the cities. Others disagree sharply.[37]

Another example involves the story of Noah's Ark. Biblical literalists support a theory of a worldwide flood as described in the story and are looking for archaeological evidence in the region of the mountains of Ararat in north-east Turkey where Genesis says Noah's Ark came to rest. Mainstream scientists (and many Christians and Jews) discount a literal interpretation of the Ark story, on the basis of geology and other sciences.[38]

According to recent theories, linguistic as well as archaeological, the global structure of the texts in the Hebrew Bible were compiled during the reign of King Josiah in the 7th century BC. Even though the components are derived from more ancient writings, the final form of the books is believed to have been set somewhere between the 1st century BC and the 4th century AD.



The New Testament writers assumed the inspiration of the Old Testament, probably earliest stated in 2 Timothy 3:16, "all Scripture is inspired of God."[9]

Old and New Testaments
Main articles: Development of the Old Testament canon and Development of the New Testament canon
The Old Testament canon entered into Christian use in the Greek Septuagint translations and original books, and their differing lists of texts. In addition to the Septuagint, Christianity subsequently added various writings that would become the New Testament. Somewhat different lists of accepted works continued to develop in antiquity. In the fourth century a series of synods produced a list of texts equal to the 39-to-46-book canon of the Old Testament and to the 27-book canon of the New Testament that would be subsequently used to today, most notably the Synod of Hippo in AD 393. Also c. 400, Jerome produced a definitive Latin edition of the Bible (see Vulgate), the canon of which, at the insistence of the Pope, was in accord with the earlier Synods. With the benefit of hindsight it can be said that this process effectively set the New Testament canon, although there are examples of other canonical lists in use after this time. A definitive list did not come from an Ecumenical Council until the Council of Trent (1545?63).[27]

During the Protestant Reformation, certain reformers proposed different canonical lists to those currently in use. Though not without debate, see Antilegomena, the list of New Testament books would come to remain the same; however, the Old Testament texts present in the Septuagint, but not included in the Jewish canon, fell out of favor. In time they would come to be removed from most Protestant canons. Hence, in a Catholic context these texts are referred to as deuterocanonical books, whereas in a Protestant context they are referred to as Apocrypha, the label applied to all texts excluded from the biblical canon which were in the Septuagint. It should also be noted, that Catholics and Protestants both describe certain other books, such as the Acts of Peter, as apocryphal.

Thus, the Protestant Old Testament of today has a 39-book canon?the number varies from that of the books in the Tanakh (though not in content) because of a different method of division?while the Roman Catholic Church recognizes 46 books as part of the canonical Old Testament. The Orthodox Churches, in addition to the Catholic canon, recognise 3 Maccabees, 1 Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151. Some include 2 Esdras. The Anglican Church also recognises a longer canon. The term "Hebrew Scriptures" is often used as being synonymous with the Protestant Old Testament, since the surviving scriptures in Hebrew include only those books, while Catholics and Orthodox include additional texts that have not survived in Hebrew. Both Catholics and Protestants have the same 27-book New Testament Canon.

Qumran Bible
The Bible used at Qumran excluded Esther but included Tobit. Otherwise, it seems to have been basically the same as the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament, albeit with many textual variants.

Ethiopian Orthodox canon
The Canon of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is wider than for most other Christian groups. The Ethiopian Old Testament Canon includes the books found in the Septuagint accepted by other Orthodox Christians, in addition to Enoch and Jubilees which are ancient Jewish books that only survived in Ge'ez but are quoted in the New Testament (citation required), also Greek Ezra First and the Apocalypse of Ezra, 3 books of Meqabyan, and Psalm 151 at the end of the Psalter. The three books of Meqabyan are not be confused with the books of Maccabees. The order of the other books is somewhat different from other groups', as well. The Old Testament follows the Septuagint order for the Minor Prophets rather than the Jewish order.

Marcionite Bible
Marcion, an early Christian heretic, and his followers, had a Bible that excluded the Old Testament. It consisted of an edited Gospel of Luke (excluding what Marcion considered Jewish additions), and the Epistles of Paul (excluding Titus, the two epistles to Timothy, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and passages rejected as Jewish additions).[28]

Bible versions and translations
Further information: Bible translations and Bible translations by language

A Bible handwritten in Latin, on display in Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. This Bible was transcribed in Belgium in 1407 for reading aloud in a monastery.Bible versions are discussed below, while Bible translations can be found on a separate page.

The original texts of the Tanakh were in Hebrew, although some portions were in Aramaic. In addition to the authoritative Masoretic Text, Jews still refer to the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, and the Targum Onkelos, an Aramaic version of the Bible. There are several different ancient versions of the Tanakh in Hebrew, mostly differing by spelling, and the traditional Jewish version is based on the version known as Aleppo Codex. Even in this version by itself, there are words which are traditionally read differently from written (sometimes one word is written and another is read), because the oral tradition is considered more fundamental than the written one, and presumably mistakes had been made in copying the text over the generations.

The primary biblical text for early Christians was the Septuagint or (LXX). In addition, they translated the Hebrew Bible into several other languages. Translations were made into Syriac, Coptic, Ge'ez and Latin, among other languages. The Latin translations were historically the most important for the Church in the West, while the Greek-speaking East continued to use the Septuagint translations of the Old Testament and had no need to translate the New Testament.

The earliest Latin translation was the Old Latin text, or Vetus Latina, which, from internal evidence, seems to have been made by several authors over a period of time. It was based on the Septuagint, and thus included books not in the Hebrew Bible.

Pope Damasus I assembled the first list of books of the Bible at the Council of Rome in AD 382. He commissioned Saint Jerome to produce a reliable and consistent text by translating the original Greek and Hebrew texts into Latin. This translation became known as the Latin Vulgate Bible and in 1546 at the Council of Trent was declared by the Church to be the only authentic and official Bible in the Latin Rite.

Especially since the Protestant Reformation, Bible translations for many languages have been made. The Bible has seen a notably large number of English language translations.

The worldwide status of Bible translation (2008):[29] Number Statistic
6,909 Number of languages spoken in the world today
200,000,000 Number of people who speak the 2,393 languages where translation projects have not yet begun
1,998 Number of translation programs currently in progress for languages without adequate Scripture
Nearly 80% world?s remaining Bible translation needs that are located in the three areas of greatest need
1,168 Number of language communities which have access to the New Testament in their heart language
438 Number of language communities which have access to the entire (Protestant Canon) Bible in the language they understand best
6,500,000,000 Population of the world
2,479 Number of Bible translations available

The work of Bible translation continues, including by Christian organisations such as Wycliffe Bible Translators, New Tribes Mission and the Bible Societies. Of the world's 6,900 languages, 2,400 have some or all of the Bible, 1,600 (spoken by more than a billion people) have translation underway, and some 2,500 (spoken by 270 million people) are judged as needing translation to begin.[30]

Biblical criticism
Main articles: Biblical criticism and Criticism of the Bible
Biblical criticism refers to the investigation of the Bible as a text, and addresses questions such as authorship, dates of composition, and authorial intention. It is not the same as criticism of the Bible, which is an assertion against the Bible being a source of information or ethical guidance.

Higher criticism
Main articles: Higher criticism and Lower criticism
The traditional view of the Mosaic authorship of the Torah came under sporadic criticism from medieval scholars including Isaac ibn Yashush, Abraham ibn Ezra, Bonfils of Damascus and bishop Tostatus of Avila[citation needed], who pointed to passages such as the description of the death of Moses in Deuteronomy as evidence that some portions, at least, could not have been written by Moses.

In the 17th century Thomas Hobbes collected the current evidence and became the first scholar[citation needed] to conclude outright that Moses could not have written the bulk of the Torah. Shortly afterwards the philosopher Baruch Spinoza published a unified critical analysis, arguing that the problematic passages were not isolated cases that could be explained away one by one, but pervasive throughout the five books, concluding that it was "clearer than the sun at noon that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses...." Despite determined

^ http://www.ethiopianorthodox.org/english/canonical/books.html
^ Philip R. Davies, "Memories of ancient Israel", p.7
^ Halpern, B. the First Historians: The Hebrew Bible. Harper & Row, 1988, quoted in Smith, Mark S.The early history of God: Yahweh and the other deities in ancient Israel. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.; 2nd ed., 2002. ISBN 978-0802839725, p.14
^ Businessweek on The Bible: "The Bible (2.5 billion copies sold)" (18 July 2005)
^ Ash, Russell (2001). Top 10 of Everything 2002. Dorling Kindersley. ISBN 0789480433, 9780789480439.  
^ a b Harper, Douglas. "bible". Online Etymology Dictionary. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=bible.  
^ "The Catholic Encyclopedia". Newadvent.org. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02543a.htm. Retrieved 2010-04-23.  
^ Biblion, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, at Perseus.
^ a b c d e Stagg, Frank. New Testament Theology. Nashville: Broadman, 1962. ISBN 0-8054-1613-7.
^ "From Hebrew Bible to Christian Bible" by Mark Hamilton on PBS's site From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians.
^ Dictionary.com etymology of the word "Bible".
^ "Bible Study, Bible Facts". http://www.csbbc.net/bible.html. Retrieved 2007-11-05.  
^ Accuracy of Torah Text.
^ a b Sir Godfrey Driver. "Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible." Web: 30 Nov 2009
^ Evans, Christopher. King's College London. Quoted in Wright, N.T. "New Testament Scholarship and Christian Discipleship." 5 Jun 2008. Web: 27 Feb 2010 N.T. Wright on NT Scholarship and Christian Discipleship
^ a b Wright, N.T. The Last Word: Scripture and the Authority of God?Getting Beyond the Bible Wars. HarperCollins, 2005. ISBN 0060872616 / 9780060872618
^ A Summary of the Bible by Lewis, CS: Believer's Web.
^ Philo of Alexandria, De vita Moysis 3.23.
^ Josephus, Contra Apion 1.8.
^ "Basis for belief of Inspiration Biblegateway". Biblegateway.com. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2 ... :25;&version=50. Retrieved 2010-04-23.  
^ Norman L. Geisler, William E. Nix. A General Introduction to the Bible. Moody Publishers, 1986, p.86. ISBN 0-8024-2916-5
^ For example, see Leroy Zuck, Roy B. Zuck. Basic Bible Interpretation. Chariot Victor Pub, 1991,p.68. ISBN 0-89693-819-0
^ Roy B. Zuck, Donald Campbell. Basic Bible Interpretation. Victor, 2002. ISBN 0-7814-3877-2
^ Norman L. Geisler. Inerrancy. Zondervan, 1980, p.294. ISBN 0-310-39281-0
^ International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (1978) (PDF). The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. http://www.churchcouncil.org/ccpdfdocs/01_Biblical_Inerrancy_A&D.pdf.  
^ Luke 11:51, Luke 24:44
^ Catholic Encyclopedia: 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."
^ Paula Fredriksen, Augustine and the Jews, ISBN 978-0-385-50270-2 (2008), pp. 67-68, 391.
^ Wycliffe Bible Translators, Inc. (WBT) Translation Statistics. August 14, 2009: Wycliffe.org
^ Vision2025.org
^ Richard Elliott Friedman, "Who Wrote the Bible?," HarperSanFrancisco, 1997 (2nd edition).
^ Joel Rosenberg, 1984 "The Bible: Biblical Narrative" in Barry Holtz, ed Back to the Sources New York: Summit Books p. 36; Nahum Sarna, 1986 Understanding Genesis New York:Schocken Books pp. xxi-xxiii.
^ Wellhausen adopted the idea of a post-Exilic date for P from Eduard Reuss.
^ Although the bulk of all four documents date from before 587 BC, the strand of D known as Dtr2 dates from the following Exilic period.
^ Finkelstein, Israel; Neil Silberman. The Bible Unearthed.  
^ Dever, William. Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come from?.  
^ Kurinsky, Samuel (August 2008). "Nomadic Jews, Never". Hebrew History Foundation. http://www.hebrewhistory.info/factpapers/fp014_nomadic.htm.  
^ Did Noah really build an ark?, BBC.
References and further reading
Anderson, Bernhard W. Understanding the Old Testament. ISBN 0-13-948399-3.
Asimov, Isaac. Asimov's Guide to the Bible. New York, NY: Avenel Books, 1981. ISBN 0-517-34582-X.
Berlin, Adele, Marc Zvi Brettler and Michael Fishbane. The Jewish Study Bible. Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-19-529751-2.
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2001). The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-2338-1.  
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (August 2002). "Review: "The Bible Unearthed": A Rejoinder". Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 327: 63?73. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1357859?seq=1  
Herzog, Ze'ev (October 29, 1999). Deconstructing the walls of Jericho. Ha'aretz. http://mideastfacts.org/facts/index.php?optio ... id=32&Itemid=34  
Dever, William G. (March/April 2007). "Losing Faith: Who Did and Who Didn?t, How Scholarship Affects Scholars". Biblical Archaeology Review 33 (2): 54. http://creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/other/5106losingfaith.pdf  
Dever, William G. Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did they Come from? Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2003. ISBN 0-8028-0975-8.
Ehrman, Bart D. Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005. ISBN 0-06-073817-0.
Geisler, Norman (editor). Inerrancy. Sponsored by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. Zondervan Publishing House, 1980, ISBN 0-310-39281-0.
Head, Tom. The Absolute Beginner's Guide to the Bible. Indianapolis, IN: Que Publishing, 2005. ISBN 0-7897-3419-2
Hoffman, Joel M. In the Beginning. New York University Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8147-3690-4
Lienhard, Joseph T. The Bible, The Church, and Authority. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1995.
Lindsell, Harold. The Battle for the Bible. Zondervan Publishing House, 1978. ISBN 0-310-27681-0
Masalha, Nur, The Bible and Zionism: Invented Traditions, Archaeology and Post-Colonialism in Palestine-Israel. London, Zed Books, 2007.
McDonald, Lee M. and Sanders, James A., eds. The Canon Debate. Hendrickson Publishers (January 1, 2002). 662p. ISBN 1565635175 ISBN 978-1565635173
Miller, John W. The Origins of the Bible: Rethinking Canon History Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1994. ISBN 0-8091-3522-1.
Riches, John. The Bible: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-19-285343-0
Siku. The Manga Bible: From Genesis to Revelation. Galilee Trade (January 15, 2008). 224p. ISBN 0385524315 ISBN 978-0385524315
Taylor, Hawley O. "Mathematics and Prophecy." Modern Science and Christian Faith. Wheaton: Van Kampen, 1948, pp. 175?83.
The Brick Testament, Thebricktestament.com
Wycliffe Bible Encyclopedia, s.vv. "Book of Ezekiel," p. 580 and "prophecy," p. 1410. Chicago: Moody Bible Press, 1986.



The word "canon" etymologically means cane or reed. In early Christianity "canon" referred to a list of books approved for public reading. Books not on the list were referred to as "apocryphal" ? meaning they were for private reading only. Under Latin usage from the fourth century on, canon came to stand for a closed and authoritative list in the sense of rule or norm.[9]

Hebrew Bible
Main article: Development of the Jewish Bible canon
The New Testament refers to the threefold division of the Hebrew Scriptures: the law, the prophets, and the writings. Luke 24:44 refers to the "law of Moses" (Pentateuch), the "prophets" which include certain historical books in addition to the books now called "prophets," and the psalms (the "writings" designated by its most prominent collection). The Hebrew Bible probably was canonized in these three stages: the law canonized before the Exile, the prophets by the time of the Syrian persecution of the Jews, and the writings shortly after AD 70 (the fall of Jerusalem). About that time, early Christian writings began being accepted by Christians as "scripture." These events, taken together, may have caused the Jews to close their "canon." They listed their own recognized Scriptures and also excluded both Christian and Jewish writings considered by them to be "apocryphal." In this canon the thirty-nine books found in the Old Testament of today's Christian Bibles were grouped together as twenty-two books, equaling the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. This canon of Jewish scripture is attested to by Philo, Josephus, the New Testament,[26] and the Talmud.[9]Scholars intrigued by the hypothesis that Moses had not written the Pentateuch considered other authors. Independent but nearly simultaneous proposals by H. B. Witter, Jean Astruc, and Johann Gottfried Eichhorn separated the Pentateuch into two original documentary components, both dating from after the time of Moses. Others hypothesized the presence of two additional sources. The four documents were given working titles: J (Jahwist/Yahwist), E (Elohist), P (Priestly), and D (Deuteronomist). Each was discernible by its own characteristic language, and each, when read in isolation, presented a unified, coherent narrative.

Subsequent scholars, notably Eduard Reuss, Karl Heinrich Graf and Wilhelm Vatke, turned their attention to the order in which the documents had been composed (which they deduced from internal clues) and placed them in the context of a theory of the development of ancient Israelite religion, suggesting that much of the Laws and the narrative of the Pentateuch were unknown to the Israelites in the time of Moses. These were synthesized by Julius Wellhausen (1844?1918), who suggested a historical framework for the composition of the documents and their redaction (combination) into the final document known as the Pentateuch. This hypothesis was challenged by William Henry Green in his The Mosaic Origins of the Pentateuchal Codes (available online). Nonetheless, according to contemporary Torah scholar Richard Elliott Friedman, Wellhausen's model of the documentary hypothesis continues to dominate the field of biblical scholarship: "To this day, if you want to disagree, you disagree with Wellhausen. If you want to pose a new model, you compare its merits with those of Wellhausen's model."[31]

The documentary hypothesis is important in the field of biblical studies not only because it claims that the Torah was written by different people at different times?generally long after the events it describes?[32] but it also proposed what was at the time a radically new way of reading the Bible. Many proponents of the documentary hypothesis view the Bible more as a body of literature than a work of history, believing that the historical value of the text lies not in its account of the events that it describes, but in what critics can infer about the times in which the authors lived (as critics may read Hamlet to learn about seventeenth-century England, but will not read it to learn about seventh-century Denmark).

Modern developments
The critical analysis of authorship now encompasses every book of the Bible. In some cases the traditional view on authorship has been overturned; in others, additional support, at least in part, has been found.

The development of the hypothesis has not stopped with Wellhausen. Wellhausen's hypothesis, for example, proposed that the four documents were composed in the order J-E-D-P, with P, containing the bulk of the Jewish law, dating from the post-Exilic Second Temple period (i.e., after 515 BC);[33] but the contemporary view is that P is earlier than D, and that all four books date from the First Temple period (i.e., prior to 587 BC).[34] The documentary hypothesis has more recently been refined by later scholars such as Martin Noth (who in 1943 provided evidence that Deuteronomy plus the following six books make a unified history from the hand of a single editor), Harold Bloom, Frank Moore Cross and Richard Elliot Friedman.

The documentary hypothesis, at least in the four-document version advanced by Wellhausen, has been controversial since its formulation. The direction of this criticism is to question the existence of separate, identifiable documents, positing instead that the biblical text is made up of almost innumerable strands so interwoven as to be hardly untangleable?the J document, in particular, has been subjected to such intense dissection that it seems in danger of disappearing.

Although biblical archaeology has confirmed the existence of many people, places, and events mentioned in the Bible, many critical scholars have argued that the Bible be read not as an accurate historical document, but rather as a work of literature and theology that often draws on historical events?as well as upon non-Hebrew mythology?as primary source material (see The Bible and history). For these scholars, the Bible reveals much about the lives and times of its authors and compilers.

Archaeological and historical research
Main articles: Biblical archaeology school and The Bible and history
Biblical archaeology is the archaeology that relates to, and sheds light upon, the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. It is used to help determine the lifestyle and practices of people living in biblical times.

There are a wide range of interpretations of the existing Biblical archaeology. One broad division includes Biblical maximalism that generally take the view that most of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible is essentially based on history although presented through the religious viewpoint of its time. It is considered the opposite of biblical minimalism which is strictly secular and does not allow any consideration of the Bible as documentary evidence or as a framework of history.

One example of the dispute involves biblical accounts of Israelite bondage in Egypt, wandering in the desert, and conquest the Land of Israel in a military campaign, the accounts of the land being passed on to the 12 tribes of Israel, and David's and Solomon's conquests, and other key elements described in the biblical narratives as occurring in the 10th century BC or before. So far, there is a lack of archaeological evidence to independently support this, which has led some archaeologists, such as Israel Finkelstein, Neil Silberman,[35] and William G. Dever[36] to believe that these events never happened, and that the ancestors of the Hebrews and the Jews are either nomads who had become sedentary, or people from the plains of Canaan, who fled to the highlands to escape the control of the cities. Others disagree sharply.[37]

Another example involves the story of Noah's Ark. Biblical literalists support a theory of a worldwide flood as described in the story and are looking for archaeological evidence in the region of the mountains of Ararat in north-east Turkey where Genesis says Noah's Ark came to rest. Mainstream scientists (and many Christians and Jews) discount a literal interpretation of the Ark story, on the basis of geology and other sciences.[38]

According to recent theories, linguistic as well as archaeological, the global structure of the texts in the Hebrew Bible were compiled during the reign of King Josiah in the 7th century BC. Even though the components are derived from more ancient writings, the final form of the books is believed to have been set somewhere between the 1st century BC and the 4th century AD.



The New Testament writers assumed the inspiration of the Old Testament, probably earliest stated in 2 Timothy 3:16, "all Scripture is inspired of God."[9]

Old and New Testaments
Main articles: Development of the Old Testament canon and Development of the New Testament canon
The Old Testament canon entered into Christian use in the Greek Septuagint translations and original books, and their differing lists of texts. In addition to the Septuagint, Christianity subsequently added various writings that would become the New Testament. Somewhat different lists of accepted works continued to develop in antiquity. In the fourth century a series of synods produced a list of texts equal to the 39-to-46-book canon of the Old Testament and to the 27-book canon of the New Testament that would be subsequently used to today, most notably the Synod of Hippo in AD 393. Also c. 400, Jerome produced a definitive Latin edition of the Bible (see Vulgate), the canon of which, at the insistence of the Pope, was in accord with the earlier Synods. With the benefit of hindsight it can be said that this process effectively set the New Testament canon, although there are examples of other canonical lists in use after this time. A definitive list did not come from an Ecumenical Council until the Council of Trent (1545?63).[27]

During the Protestant Reformation, certain reformers proposed different canonical lists to those currently in use. Though not without debate, see Antilegomena, the list of New Testament books would come to remain the same; however, the Old Testament texts present in the Septuagint, but not included in the Jewish canon, fell out of favor. In time they would come to be removed from most Protestant canons. Hence, in a Catholic context these texts are referred to as deuterocanonical books, whereas in a Protestant context they are referred to as Apocrypha, the label applied to all texts excluded from the biblical canon which were in the Septuagint. It should also be noted, that Catholics and Protestants both describe certain other books, such as the Acts of Peter, as apocryphal.

Thus, the Protestant Old Testament of today has a 39-book canon?the number varies from that of the books in the Tanakh (though not in content) because of a different method of division?while the Roman Catholic Church recognizes 46 books as part of the canonical Old Testament. The Orthodox Churches, in addition to the Catholic canon, recognise 3 Maccabees, 1 Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151. Some include 2 Esdras. The Anglican Church also recognises a longer canon. The term "Hebrew Scriptures" is often used as being synonymous with the Protestant Old Testament, since the surviving scriptures in Hebrew include only those books, while Catholics and Orthodox include additional texts that have not survived in Hebrew. Both Catholics and Protestants have the same 27-book New Testament Canon.

Qumran Bible
The Bible used at Qumran excluded Esther but included Tobit. Otherwise, it seems to have been basically the same as the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament, albeit with many textual variants.

Ethiopian Orthodox canon
The Canon of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is wider than for most other Christian groups. The Ethiopian Old Testament Canon includes the books found in the Septuagint accepted by other Orthodox Christians, in addition to Enoch and Jubilees which are ancient Jewish books that only survived in Ge'ez but are quoted in the New Testament (citation required), also Greek Ezra First and the Apocalypse of Ezra, 3 books of Meqabyan, and Psalm 151 at the end of the Psalter. The three books of Meqabyan are not be confused with the books of Maccabees. The order of the other books is somewhat different from other groups', as well. The Old Testament follows the Septuagint order for the Minor Prophets rather than the Jewish order.

Marcionite Bible
Marcion, an early Christian heretic, and his followers, had a Bible that excluded the Old Testament. It consisted of an edited Gospel of Luke (excluding what Marcion considered Jewish additions), and the Epistles of Paul (excluding Titus, the two epistles to Timothy, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and passages rejected as Jewish additions).[28]

Bible versions and translations
Further information: Bible translations and Bible translations by language

A Bible handwritten in Latin, on display in Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. This Bible was transcribed in Belgium in 1407 for reading aloud in a monastery.Bible versions are discussed below, while Bible translations can be found on a separate page.

The original texts of the Tanakh were in Hebrew, although some portions were in Aramaic. In addition to the authoritative Masoretic Text, Jews still refer to the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, and the Targum Onkelos, an Aramaic version of the Bible. There are several different ancient versions of the Tanakh in Hebrew, mostly differing by spelling, and the traditional Jewish version is based on the version known as Aleppo Codex. Even in this version by itself, there are words which are traditionally read differently from written (sometimes one word is written and another is read), because the oral tradition is considered more fundamental than the written one, and presumably mistakes had been made in copying the text over the generations.

The primary biblical text for early Christians was the Septuagint or (LXX). In addition, they translated the Hebrew Bible into several other languages. Translations were made into Syriac, Coptic, Ge'ez and Latin, among other languages. The Latin translations were historically the most important for the Church in the West, while the Greek-speaking East continued to use the Septuagint translations of the Old Testament and had no need to translate the New Testament.

The earliest Latin translation was the Old Latin text, or Vetus Latina, which, from internal evidence, seems to have been made by several authors over a period of time. It was based on the Septuagint, and thus included books not in the Hebrew Bible.

Pope Damasus I assembled the first list of books of the Bible at the Council of Rome in AD 382. He commissioned Saint Jerome to produce a reliable and consistent text by translating the original Greek and Hebrew texts into Latin. This translation became known as the Latin Vulgate Bible and in 1546 at the Council of Trent was declared by the Church to be the only authentic and official Bible in the Latin Rite.

Especially since the Protestant Reformation, Bible translations for many languages have been made. The Bible has seen a notably large number of English language translations.

The worldwide status of Bible translation (2008):[29] Number Statistic
6,909 Number of languages spoken in the world today
200,000,000 Number of people who speak the 2,393 languages where translation projects have not yet begun
1,998 Number of translation programs currently in progress for languages without adequate Scripture
Nearly 80% world?s remaining Bible translation needs that are located in the three areas of greatest need
1,168 Number of language communities which have access to the New Testament in their heart language
438 Number of language communities which have access to the entire (Protestant Canon) Bible in the language they understand best
6,500,000,000 Population of the world
2,479 Number of Bible translations available

The work of Bible translation continues, including by Christian organisations such as Wycliffe Bible Translators, New Tribes Mission and the Bible Societies. Of the world's 6,900 languages, 2,400 have some or all of the Bible, 1,600 (spoken by more than a billion people) have translation underway, and some 2,500 (spoken by 270 million people) are judged as needing translation to begin.[30]

Biblical criticism
Main articles: Biblical criticism and Criticism of the Bible
Biblical criticism refers to the investigation of the Bible as a text, and addresses questions such as authorship, dates of composition, and authorial intention. It is not the same as criticism of the Bible, which is an assertion against the Bible being a source of information or ethical guidance.

Higher criticism
Main articles: Higher criticism and Lower criticism
The traditional view of the Mosaic authorship of the Torah came under sporadic criticism from medieval scholars including Isaac ibn Yashush, Abraham ibn Ezra, Bonfils of Damascus and bishop Tostatus of Avila[citation needed], who pointed to passages such as the description of the death of Moses in Deuteronomy as evidence that some portions, at least, could not have been written by Moses.

In the 17th century Thomas Hobbes collected the current evidence and became the first scholar[citation needed] to conclude outright that Moses could not have written the bulk of the Torah. Shortly afterwards the philosopher Baruch Spinoza published a unified critical analysis, arguing that the problematic passages were not isolated cases that could be explained away one by one, but pervasive throughout the five books, concluding that it was "clearer than the sun at noon that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses...." Despite determined