| The Making of the New Testament, AD 40-150 | |
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long as the first disciples, who had known Jesus personally, were still alive,
they could tell other people all about him, but stories about him soon began to
be written down as well. Some stories and sayings may first have circulated in
Aramaic, the language that Jesus and his earliest followers spoke. However, the
Gospels as we now have them were written in Greek, which had become the common
language of the Roman world, especially at the eastern end of the Mediterranean
region. As the Christian message first began to spread, Paul and other apostles also wrote letters in Greek to their friends in the Christian churches. These letters were regarded with great respect, and were copied and passed around to other churches and Christian groups. Gradually a collection of highly-revered writings appeared, and by the end of the second century this collection had taken almost the same form as the New Testament we use today. By the fourth century, the Old and the New Testaments were being used together by Christians, as their own, distinctive holy books. | |
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The Making of the Old Testament The First Translations, mid-3rd century BC The Making of the New Testament, AD 40-150 Translating the Bible into Latin, AD 383-410 The Earliest English Translations, AD 735 The First English Bible, AD 1383 The First Printed Bible, AD 1456 Luther and the German Bible, AD 1522-34 The First Printed New Testament in English, AD 1525 The First Complete Printed Bible in English, AD 1535 |