Islam - The Summit of Religious Evolution — Page 25
25 John, Luke and Mark, form the core of the New Testament and are regarded as Canonical. Strange as it may sound, they deal only with the last two or three years of Jesus’ life and devote what might seem an excessive detail in the week immediately preceding his alleged death. 14 They were written decades after his departure from Judea by people whom he may never have met. Although books were written by Jesus' main disciples and, according to Church records, were commonly used in the early Church, these books were not included in the current New Testament. Surprisingly, obscure authors’ book form the main text of the New Testament. It becomes rather obvious that the books written much later and by less qualified authors have been given more credibility. Manuscripts of some books written by the apostles, namely Thomas, Barnabas, Hermas etc. have since been discovered. These books do not support the current Christian teachings regarding Jesus’ crucifixion. This was most probably created through later interpolations in the original version of the New Testament. Again, no original manuscripts of any books in the New Testament exist and hence the absolute authenticity of the New Testament can never be established. 13 The Bible itself accepts the fact that its text has been significantly altered over time. That acknowledgement is contained in the preface of the various Bibles in different words, which are reproduced in Appendices III, IV, V; excerpts from three versions are reproduced below (emphasis added by the author). The Revised Standard Version (RSV) published by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of the Christ in the United States, edited by John Stirling and published in 1901 states: 15 The Revised Standard Version of the Bible is an authorized revision of the American Standard Version published in 1901, which was the revision of the King James Version published in 1611. The first English version of the Scriptures made by direct translation from the original Hebrew and Greek, and the first to be printed, was the work of William Tyndale. He met bitter opposition. He was accused of willfully perverting the meaning of the Scriptures, and his New Testaments were ordered to be burned as 'untrue translations. He was finally betrayed into the hands of his enemies, and in October 1536, was publicly executed and burned at the stake. Yet Tyndale's work became the foundation of subsequent English versions, notably those of Coverdale, 1535; Thomas Matthew (probably a pseudonym for John Rogers), 1537; the Great Bible, 1539; the Geneva Bible, 1560; and the Bishops's Bible, 1568. In 1582 a translation of the New Testament, made from the Latin Vulgate by Roman Catholic scholars, was published at Rheims. The translators who made the King James version took into account all of these preceding versions; and comparison shows that it owes something to each of them. It kept felicitous phrases and apt expressions from whatever source, which had stood the test of public usage. It owed most, especially in the New Testament, to Tyndale. The King James version had to compete with the Geneva Bible in popular usage; but in the end it prevailed; and for more than two and a half centuries no other authorized translation of the Bible into English was made. The King James Version became the "Authorized Version" of the English-speaking peoples.