Customer Reviews

How the Bible Came to Be

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John Barton spent 15 years studying the making of the Bible. This brief booklet (less than 100 pages) presents his findings. He first gives a short synopsis of each of the 66 books of the Bible, and then dives into probable authorship and dating. From there, he discusses how the books were selected and collected into scripture, including an interesting discussion of what was considered "scripture." Finally, he explains how the two canons (Old Testament and New) were derived.

Barton is not going to tell you Paul wrote Hebrews or that Moses wrote the Torah. His purpose is not to present traditional, conservative teachings, but to bring you up to date on current Bible scholarship, and he writes in a manner that non-technical readers can comprehend. There is no unified understanding between scholars, and some of Barton's views are his own, yet all in all I think he does a great job of introducing the formation of the Bible.

In my opinion, the book's greatest value is for conservative Christians! If you don't want to spend weeks learning about biblical scholarship, but need to be aware of the thinking and conclusions of critical scholarship, this is a perfect overview. Two hours will give you the basics.

"Throughout the book Barton states the consensus opinion of most scholars, only subtly inserting some of his specific theories and not mentioning many of his most interesting proposals." David Carr, M. Th. Sc.



Prelude to a review:
In the preface to his milestone classic, The canon of scripture, FF Bruce wrote, "..., that the process of canonization is indicated by the traditional threefold division of books in the Hebrew Bible - has been underlined in two important works of recent date: R. Beckwith's "the Old testament canon of the New Testament Church, and John Barton's 'Oracles of God'."
After you read 'How the Bible came to be', you will be initiated to examine Bruce's gem.
One year earlier, Barton wrote "People of the book," about the authority of the Bible in Christianity, in which was treated by lay readers to a lucid discussion of the role that the Bible has played and continues to play..., in the words of Dr. Robert Wilson of Yale Divinity.

Brief Lucid Introduction:
Before establishing a list of the sixty six books that belong to the Old and New testaments, he briefly surveyed the books themselves, writing the texts, collecting them, and considering them as scripture. Then he proceeds to discuss their dates and authorship, stressing how complex the process was. He then presents his own views on the main divisions, as groups or collections of writings like the Pentateuch, the Prophets, the Gospels and Pauline Epistles, the first new testament collection of writings. He elaborates on authorship, citation, date of authorship, and consistency with other scriptural texts. He concludes with his observations of the process of Bible formation.
Although the word Canon, or standard was first mensioned by St. Athanasius in his pascal letter of 367, yet its use for the Hebrew Bible which took stages in time was only declared as the book which render the hands unclean, in Jamnia.

Expert evaluation:
I very much agree with Dr. Carr's book review that,"Barton's book does a beautiful job of achieving its chief aim: providing an accessible and up- to-date survey of the formation of the Bible. Far too few Biblical scholars write with such balance, clarity and sensitivity to non-academic readers."

The Canon of Scripture, The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church: And Its Background in Early Judaism

I received the book very quickly from the seller and in great condition. The book itself was used for a New Testament College Class so it was required reading material. The whole class felt that the book was a little dry reading however, none of us are experts and the professor felt that the book offered great insight.

I was very pleased with the timely arrival which made the overall experience a good one.