Religion and rituality

[Angrboda]

When does it state there should be no additions to the Bible? In Revelation? And yet the Gospel of John was written after the Book of Revelation... Realize that the Bible was compiled and put in order by men, not by God. Just because there's a warning about adding to the words of Revelation, and that just happens to be the at the end of the Bible, why the fuck would you interpret it that way? The prophets of that day sure didn't think it meant that.

How do you know when the Book of John was written. How do you know when the Book of Revelation was written, no originals so an exact dating is impossible at this time. What prophets and exactly what did they think?

This cuts both ways. If you don't know when Revelation and the other books were written, then you don't know when Revelation and its admonition about adding or subtracting was written.

For the sake of argument, not because it's plausible, ask what it would mean if Revelation were the first book of the New Testament written? If that were the case, all books except Revelation are heretical.

Since you can't demonstrate that a particular book or epistle was written before Revelation, you can't prove that any of them are consistent with the book of Revelation's admonition against additions or subtractions.


Anyway, this is rather moot, anyway, because the author of Revelations didn't specifically refer to "the bible," as the bible did not exist at that time. I must confess to being ignorant of Koine Greek, but even though it's not clear what the author is referring to in the text, because the bible didn't exist at the time Revelations was written, he most likely is referring to something else. (And no, it doesn't matter if God is the author of those words; the reference is still uncertain.)

The English word Bible is from the Latin biblia, from the same word in Medieval Latin and Late Latin and ultimately from Koine Greek τὰ βιβλία ta biblia "the books" (singular βιβλίον biblion).

Medieval Latin biblia is short for biblia sacra "holy book", while biblia in Greek and Late Latin is neuter plural (gen. bibliorum). It gradually came to be regarded as a feminine singular noun (biblia, gen. bibliae) in medieval Latin, and so the word was loaned as a singular into the vernaculars of Western Europe. Latin biblia sacra "holy books" translates Greek τὰ βιβλία τὰ ἅγια ta biblia ta hagia, "the holy books".

The word βιβλίον itself had the literal meaning of "paper" or "scroll" and came to be used as the ordinary word for "book". It is the diminutive of βύβλος bublos, "Egyptian papyrus", possibly so called from the name of the Phoenician sea port Byblos (also known as Gebal) from whence Egyptian papyrus was exported to Greece. The Greek ta biblia (lit. "little papyrus books") was "an expression Hellenistic Jews used to describe their sacred books (the Septuagint).

The word in the interlinear bible I'm looking at is βιβλίου, bibliou, and appears to be singular, likely referring to the book of Revelation itself. Maybe you or Drich can weigh in and explain the finer points of Koine Greek to those of us like myself who are ignorant of such things.