Published: Nov 5, 2025written by Eben De Jager, PhD New Testament

Christianity had about 2.4 billion adherents in 2023, almost half a billion more than Islam. Christianity is the largest religion in the world by a significant margin. Most Christians recognize the Bible as the authoritative rule for faith and practice. Yet not many know the origins and processes their central sacred text went through to take the form it has today. This article considers five stages of development that shaped the Bible into its current form. We start by considering oral traditions and end with the multitude of translations available today.

Oral Tradition

The Great Isaiah Scroll, the best preserved of the biblical scrolls found at Qumran. Source: The Israel Museum, Jerusalem

If we use the Masoretic text and Jewish tradition as a guide to establish a timeline, approximately 2,500 years passed between the events of Genesis 1 and the time Moses authored the Book of Genesis. Since the Bible does not specify its sources, it is safe to assume that the events Moses describes in Genesis were part of the oral tradition of the Israelites.

Oral traditions were common in the ancient Near East, as in many parts of the world where the ability to read and write was limited. Scholars have found that these traditions transmitted the culture and beliefs of people groups with remarkable accuracy over many centuries. Tribal leaders and priests would relate their cultural heritage to the younger generation in vivid stories describing events and people of prior generations, and the next generation would retell them and add new accounts of the heroes and villains of their youth.

Tribal leaders used these stories and adapted them to address the needs and contexts of the contemporary audience. The flexibility of the narratives does not mean the content is unreliable. Jan Vansina, a subject matter expert on oral tradition, believes oral tradition can preserve core elements with remarkable accuracy, especially in a religious context.

Adam and Eve, by Albrecht Dürer, 1504. Source: The Met, New York

Oral traditions often incorporated techniques that made it easier to remember content. These techniques included poetic parallelism, repetition, and mnemonic devices, many of which are evident in the rhythmic structure of the original Hebrew manuscripts of Genesis and Psalms, among others.

Archaeological evidence shows increased written records in Israel around the 10th century BCE, which aligns with the early Israelite monarchy. Scholars often date the Torah and older Old Testament books to this time, rather than subscribing to the earlier authorship by Moses, because of factors like this. Still, they agree that the Old Testament, particularly the pre-monarchal parts, is an oral tradition codified much later. The Hebrew people retold their oral traditions for generations, and once recorded in writing, they became the Tanak, which Christians know as the Old Testament.

The Emergence of Written Texts

Some jars of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The transition from oral tradition to written texts marked a pivotal moment in the development of the Bible. Around the 8th century BCE, scribes in Jerusalem, Samaria, and other metropolitan centers in Israel started recording the oral narratives into a written account of events. A standardized, single volume to serve as a religious text was never their intention, nor would it become a reality during that age. They merely documented the narratives that have existed in oral form for generations.

Scholars, scribes, and theologians of the day could edit and shape the narratives they recorded on papyrus, leather scrolls, or parchment, using plant-based dyes or charcoal for ink. It was a slow, laborious, and expensive process that saw the valuable manuscripts stored in the Temple or similar sacred places for careful preservation.

The process began with the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,* Numbers*, and Deuteronomy), which many scholars believe the scribes compiled from four sources to produce the Pentateuch we know today. The Documentary Hypothesis, or JEPD theory, posits that the Torah shows evidence of a Jahwist (J), Elohist (E), Priestly (P), and Deuteronomist (D) source that influenced the text of the Torah to different degrees.

King Josiah, 17th century, Church in Ahus, Sweden. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The discovery of the “Book of the Law” (likely Deuteronomy) during King Josiah’s reign indicates limited access to the sacred texts held in the Temple. Its discovery sparked many reforms in Judah, showing the growing authority of written texts during that era.

The exilic period saw significant scribal activity as a nation in captivity sought to preserve its identity and cultural heritage. It maintained continuity and the hope that the prophesied return to their native land would materialize. Many scholars believe scribes did much editing during this period. Ezra, a scribe trained in the Law of Moses, contributed to this process while he played a significant role in re-establishing the Jewish people in their native land.

Formation of the Hebrew Bible

A Bible handwritten in Latin, on display in Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Many more texts than the Old Testament books circulated during the post-exilic, second temple, and intertestamental periods. The Dead Sea Scrolls and apocryphal books attest that other works, which never became canon, were in circulation and valued for their contribution. They, however, never rose to the level of inspired works.

The writings of the Tanak, or Hebrew Bible, consisted of three parts: the Torah (Law), the Nevi’im (Prophets), and the Ketuvim (Writings). Determining which texts would meet the standard for inclusion as authoritative texts took from the 8th century BCE to the 2nd century CE to complete.

Some of the books included in the Tanak came from different traditions. They sometimes covered some of the same periods in Israelite history and provided unique details. Establishing a single authoritative set of books developed over time, and the Dead Sea Scrolls indicate how many religious texts were preserved and regarded as significant to the Qumran faith community. Before the Christian Era, the Tanak and other apocryphal books had already been translated into Greek, a translation called the Septuagint.

After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE, the process of determining which books would become part of the sacred texts of the Jewish religion gained momentum. Though not an official council, the Council of Jamnia (90 CE) discussed the Old Testament canon, focusing on some contentious books like Song of Songs. The canon of the Old Testament was largely accepted by the 2nd century CE.

The Development of the New Testament Canon

Demonstration of Guttenberg’s printing press at the Bible Lands Museum, Jerusalem. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The New Testament, central to Christianity, was authored in a distinct cultural context over a much shorter time than the Old Testament. The earliest book dates to about 50 CE and the latest to around 100 CE, though views on the dating differ significantly. The New Testament books saw a change of focus from Israel in the Gospels to a universal message of salvation.

The Pauline letters date to between 50 and 65 CE and address people from cities with unique contexts and challenges. The General Epistles range from 45 to 95 CE, depending on the author and scholarly view. The gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John date to between 50 and 100 CE. Some scholars believe editing occurred after 100 CE. In general, scholars date Revelation to around 95 CE.

Depending on the definition of a gospel, between 30 and 50 have been discovered. Church Fathers rejected many of these gospels as gnostic or false due to their content. Nonetheless, these gospels and other epistles and apocalypses circulated in early Christianity. Some gained traction in some areas of the world, while other regions rejected them or considered them less authoritative. Eventually, determining the New Testament Canon took more than 250 years after the date of the latest book it included.

The oldest known list containing the 27 books of the New Testament was the Easter Letter of Saint Athanasius in 367 CE. The Council of Hippo (393 CE) and the Council of Carthage (397 CE) agreed on the 27 books of the New Testament canon that align with what we have today. For much of Christian history, the Latin translation of the Bible, the Vulgate, was used in churches regardless of the native language of the area.

Bible Versions

Painting of the Council of Trent. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The East and West mostly agreed on the New Testament canon since the 4th century, and the Roman Catholic Church officially affirmed the canon at the Council of Trent (1546 CE). The Protestants accepted the 27 canonical books while rejecting the Catholic Deuterocanonical books. After the invention of the Gutenberg press in the 15th century, the production and distribution of Bibles increased dramatically. Many versions of the Bible appeared, with the Old and New Testament canons and a separate section that contained the apocryphal books. Various versions of the Bible also saw the light with textual variations based on the manuscripts used to translate them. These Bibles appeared in the native languages of local people, increasing access to the Bible narrative for common people.

Later, different approaches to translation resulted in literal, dynamic equivalent, and paraphrased Bibles becoming available to the public. The literal translations attempted to render the original language word-for-word, while the dynamic equivalent made concessions for easier reading. Paraphrase Bibles relay the basic idea of the original manuscript with little regard for rendering the words of the original with fidelity.

The history of the Bible is one of codifying oral tradition while filtering the manuscripts based on reliability and authority to establish the Old Testament canon and finding criteria to determine which of the manuscripts authored in the first century would constitute the New Testament Canon. With the progress made in printing technology, publishers produced a wide range of Bibles to satisfy the needs of Christians with varying commitments to the text of the ancient manuscripts.