RE: The Question of the Greek New Testament
April 19, 2015 at 11:01 am
(This post was last modified: April 19, 2015 at 11:58 am by Jenny A.)
For the OP:
It is remotely possible, Jesus spoke some Greek. But as the Jews in Judea and around spoke mostly Aramaic, that's probably the language he preached in. But Jesus, and his disciples didn't write anything down.
Most of the books of the New Testament were written in Greek because although there was a small Jesus sect among the Jews, it ultimately didn't grow very large or live very long. Paul took the Jesus story to the gentiles, where he had rather more success (understatement). Greek was the most common language in the eastern part of the Roman empire and Paul spoke it. His letters don't read like books, because while they were probably intended to be copied and reread, they aren't books, they are letters to specific Gentile, Greek speaking churches, sometimes in answer to questions in letters addressed to Paul. But we don't have the letters from the congregations to Paul. He says surprisingly little about Jesus' life and teachings. He is all about the resurrection and the life to come. Like Jesus he appears to thought the end times would be within his generation. His letters reveal that early Christians were doctrinally divided on many theological issues including whether you had to first be a Jew in order to be a Christian. There's evidence that some of the letters attributed to Paul were written by others and may have been out-and-out fakes written by people with a theological axe to grind. Not that Paul didn't have his own theological axes to grind.
Almost a generation later, people, we don't know who, wrote down some of the oral traditions about the life and sayings of Jesus which had obviously grown and changed in the telling. By then Christianity was almost entirely a Gentile religion and as the authors were Gentile Christians, and they wrote in Greek. Only one of the Gospels appears to be addressed to primarily Jews rather than Gentiles. John is positively anti-Jewish.
Much much later the Gospels were given their common names: Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John.
Min is right that Ehrman, is an excellent source for the history of the NT.
It is remotely possible, Jesus spoke some Greek. But as the Jews in Judea and around spoke mostly Aramaic, that's probably the language he preached in. But Jesus, and his disciples didn't write anything down.
Most of the books of the New Testament were written in Greek because although there was a small Jesus sect among the Jews, it ultimately didn't grow very large or live very long. Paul took the Jesus story to the gentiles, where he had rather more success (understatement). Greek was the most common language in the eastern part of the Roman empire and Paul spoke it. His letters don't read like books, because while they were probably intended to be copied and reread, they aren't books, they are letters to specific Gentile, Greek speaking churches, sometimes in answer to questions in letters addressed to Paul. But we don't have the letters from the congregations to Paul. He says surprisingly little about Jesus' life and teachings. He is all about the resurrection and the life to come. Like Jesus he appears to thought the end times would be within his generation. His letters reveal that early Christians were doctrinally divided on many theological issues including whether you had to first be a Jew in order to be a Christian. There's evidence that some of the letters attributed to Paul were written by others and may have been out-and-out fakes written by people with a theological axe to grind. Not that Paul didn't have his own theological axes to grind.
Almost a generation later, people, we don't know who, wrote down some of the oral traditions about the life and sayings of Jesus which had obviously grown and changed in the telling. By then Christianity was almost entirely a Gentile religion and as the authors were Gentile Christians, and they wrote in Greek. Only one of the Gospels appears to be addressed to primarily Jews rather than Gentiles. John is positively anti-Jewish.
Much much later the Gospels were given their common names: Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John.
Min is right that Ehrman, is an excellent source for the history of the NT.
If there is a god, I want to believe that there is a god. If there is not a god, I want to believe that there is no god.
