The Manuscripts of the Bible T HIS is the story of the ancient copies of the Bible. Manuscript means "written by hand" and the word is used for the old copies, whether they have come down to us or not. In ancient times all books were written by hand, for printing was not used until about fourteen hundred and fifty years after Christ. Some people made a business of copying, and books could be bought at shops. But often if one wanted a book he must copy it himself. In Egypt a reed which grew in the water, called papyrus, was cut and pressed into a sort of paper; and the word "paper" comes from "papyrus." In most countries especially prepared leather, called parchment, was used. It would seem to us very thick and stiff and heavy, but it lasted better than the paper to-day. It was so costly that the books written on it were expensive. What did the old Bibles look like? Down to later than the days of Jesus they were rolls, not books with leaves. The writing was arranged on them in columns. As the reader read, he unrolled the book and rolled up what he had read. Usually the writing was on only one side, but sometimes it was on both; "written within and without" is the phrase in the Bible. Such a book was bulky. The whole Old Testament could not be written on one roll. The first five books of the Bible were written on one roll, and portions were read in the synagogue every Sabbath, but it made a large book. Usually each book was made on a separate roll. Now it happens in religion that people like to keep the same old customs. The Jews had become so accustomed to seeing these rolls of the books in the synagogue services that when books with leaves began to be used they still kept the roll-books for the Old Testaments to be read in the synagogues. That went on century after century, and even to-day the synagogues which keep the ancient customs have rolls of the Law from which the Scripture is read in the service. In the first Christian centuries the Greeks began to make books with leaves, like those of to-day. The Christians wrote their copies of the Bible in the new-fashioned way; so it comes about that in the Christian churches the custom of keeping the Bible on rolls never arose, and all the old copies of the New Testament or of the Old Testament, which come from the churches, are in the form of books very much like ours. The church Bibles were usually made with large leaves, like the big Bibles in the pulpits of some churches to-day. Such books could contain much more than the old rolls. Books containing the whole New Testament, or even the whole Bible, were not uncommon, though they had to be larger than the printed Bibles of to-day. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, except a few parts in Aramaic, a language the Jews spoke in the time of Jesus and for a few hundred years before. The New Testament was written in Greek, the language most of the early Christians spoke. The Christians also had a Greek translation of the Old Testament made by Jews in Alexandria before the time of Christ. So the manuscripts of the Jews are in Hebrew; those which come from the Christians are in Greek. Here is a line of Hebrew and a line of Greek as they were written in ancient times. ספרווכניכס לכניוס ZENBACIMÉATĤCOIKY THE GUTENBERG BIBLE The page here photographed belongs to Smith Used by courtesy of the college authorities THE earliest known book printed from movable type is the Latin Bible printed by Johann Gutenberg at Mainz, Germany, between 1452 and 1456. The type was made to imitate closely the black-letterwriting of the manuscripts of that day. Only about twenty copies of this Bible are known to be in existence. It is sometimes called the Mazarin Bible, a copy from the library of Cardinal Mazarin having first attracted attention. The page contains Exodus 32:25-33:14. |