Authors of the Bible

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This list of authors of the Bible gives both the traditional and modern scholarly views on the authorship of the individual books. The books of the Old Testament are listed according to their order in the Jewish Tanakh. The introductory sections expand on the table.

Moses is traditionally credited with the five books of the Torah (the five books from Genesis to Deuteronomy), while King David, King Solomon, and various prophets are the traditional authors of the later books.[1] The overwhelming majority of modern scholars believe that every book of the Tanakh is an edited compilation of many sources, with some material dating from as early as c 950 BCE (and a few fragments even earlier), but with the formative creative period centering around the reign of the biblical king Josiah in the late 7th century BCE and subsequently in the exilic and post-exilic periods of the 6th and 5th centuries BCE.[1]

In the New Testament, the four gospels have all been connected to apostles. Matthew and John were Apostles themselves while Mark and Luke were associates of Peter and Paul, respectively.[1] Thirteen epistles are traditionally attributed to Paul, while other epistles are attributed to various figures or to no one at all, as in the case of Hebrews.[1] Revelation was ascribed to John the Elder.[1] Most contemporary scholars consider Mark, Matthew, and John to have been written by anonymous Christians who were not eye witnesses to Jesus' life.[1] Some, but not all, of Paul's epistles are considered genuine.[1] Other attributions, such as 1 and 2 Peter, have not been supported by critical scholarship.[1] On the other hand, the very late dates once suggested for the gospels have been largely discredited,[2] and scholars consider the evangelists to have lived in the first century and to have recorded some genuine historical events and perhaps authentic sayings of Jesus.[3]

Contents

[edit] Old Testament/Hebrew Bible

The Jewish bible (called the Hebrew bible by many scholars because it is written mostly in that language) differs from the Christian Old Testament notably in the order in which the various books within it are presented. The main principle behind the order of books in the Hebrew bible is authorship, and it is that order which is followed in this section.

[edit] Torah/Pentateuch

The first five books of the bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, are known by Jews as the Torah ("laws", or more accurately "instruction"). They were translated into Greek in the last few centuries before Christ, and are thus also known by their Greek title, the Pentateuch. The traditional belief that Moses was the author of the Torah has long been rejected by biblical scholars, but there is no single consensus among secular biblical scholars as to just who wrote the Torah and when. The most generally accepted theory, the documentary hypothesis, identifies four discrete components of the text, written and edited from c 950 BCE to c 400 BCE.[1] According to this hypothesis, the J (or Yawhist) document was written in Judah c 950 BCE, the E (or Elohist) document was written c 850 BCE in Israel (or Ephraim), and these two may have been edited together (into JE) c 750 BCE.[1] The D (or Deuteronomist) document is usually dated to c 650.[1] Finally, priests living during or after the Babylonian exile reworked JE and D, as well as providing more material, culminating in the Torah, c 400 BCE.[1] While most scholars ascribe to some version of the documentary hypothesis, they disagree of which particular passages belong to which tradition, and some question whether the separate traditions correspond to actual written documents.[1] Some hold that these various strands derive instead from oral religions about cult and religious life of Israel.[1] (By "cult," Bible scholars mean the formal system of veneration of a god and the related holy objects or places.)[1] Others[who?] point to major problems with this idea, and suggest instead that the Pentateuch grew by a process of slow accretion of material over the centuries; and others again, while accepting the problems with the documentary approach, believe that the Torah contains one basic document which was supplemented over the centuries by other writers with their own distinctive viewpoints and objectives.[citation needed]

[edit] Prophets

The next group of books after the Torah/Pentateuch in the Hebrew bible is called the Prophets. This section is divided into two subsections, Former Prophets and Latter Prophets.[1] Despite the name, the Former Prophets - Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings - are history books, telling the story of the Israelite people from the conquest of Canaan to the fall of Jerusalem, and stressing a religious interpretation of historical and military events.[1] They are included in the Prophets because their author was traditionally believed to have been the prophet Samuel, supplemented by other prophets for the period covering events after Samuel's death. Prophets concludes with Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel (the Major Prophets), followed by the twelve Minor Prophets (all the remaining prophetic books except Daniel).

In the 1940s, German Old Testament scholar Martin Noth identified a Deuteronomistic History, comprising Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings, with Deuteronomy as its preamble.[4] Noth proposed that these books had been written as a unitary work, sometime around the year 600 BC, at the court of king Josiah of Judah, with the intention of providing a rationale for Josiah's plan to reconquer the northern kingdom of Israel. Modern scholars accept this description of these books composing a unified work from the hands the deuteronomist writers.[1] The authors of the Former Prophets are anonymous,[1] although Richard Elliott Friedman makes the case that it may have been Baruch, the scribe of the prophet Jeremiah).[citation needed]

The other books are traditionally ascribed to the various prophets whose names they bear - Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and so on. Modern scholars consider it probably that real individuals lie behind the books, although Isaiah includes substantial material from the anonymous "Second Isaiah" and "Third Isaiah," writing two hundred or more years after the historical Isaiah.[1]

[edit] Writings

The final section of the Hebrew bible, taking in all the remaining books, is the "Writings" (Kethuvim).[1] This division is the least unified part of the Bible, representing a wide variety of post-Exilic views, including wisdom literature, poetry, and festival scrolls.[1] The traditional authorship of many is reflected in the titles: Ezra, Nehemiah, Daniel, etc. The unnamed books are ascribed to various famous figures: King David is the traditional author of Psalms; Solomon of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs; Moses of the Book of Job; and Lamentations to Jeremiah.[1] Modern biblical scholars hold all these books to be fairly late compositions by anonymous and pseudonymous authors, although Nehemiah incorporates Nehemiah's memoirs.[1]

[edit] New Testament

The New Testament is divided into the Gospels/Acts, the Epistles, and the Apocalypse (Book of Revelation).

[edit] Gospels/Acts

According to tradition, the Gospels were written by the four named authors and in the order in which they appear in the New Testament - Matthew by the Apostle Matthew, Mark by a disciple of the Apostle Peter in Rome, Luke by Luke the companion of Paul, and John by John the Evangelist, traditionally identified with the Apostle John. Luke is also identified by tradition as the author of the Acts, as a continuation of the Gospel of Luke.

Scholarly opinion is evenly divided between those who accept and those who reject the traditional authorship of Luke/Acts.[5] For Mark, Matthew and John there is far greater agreement that the traditional ascriptions are incorrect, and that the authors of these works are in fact unknown.[1] Scholars are in broad agreement that Mark is the earliest gospel, and that Matthew and Luke rely on it for their narrative.[6] All four Gospels are usually dated to a period after 70 AD,[1] although a minority of conservative scholars continue to argue for earlier dates.[citation needed]

[edit] Epistles and Revelation

Each of the books of the New Testament is traditionally ascribed to a named author. The majority of modern scholars believe some of these ascriptions to be genuine, some disputed, and some pseudepigraphical.[1]

Thirteen of the Epistles are ascribed by tradition to the Apostle Paul. Modern scholars believe that about half of them are false attributions, introduced by later authors to lend authority to their own views.[7] The following list identifies the traditional Pauline Epistles according to whether they are accepted as genuine, false, or uncertain (the Epistles are listed in the order in which they appear in the New Testament):

Hebrews was regarded as Pauline by some early traditions, but this was questioned even in ancient times and is rejected by all modern/liberal scholars.[8] The true author is unknown.

The remaining epistles are traditionally ascribed to the persons whose names appear in their titles - three epistles of John the Evangelist, (the author of Revelation), two of the Apostle Peter, and one each of James the Just, the brother of Jesus, and one of "Jude the brother of James" (presumably a kinsman of Jesus[1]). The tradition ascribing the Epistle of James to James, the "brother" or near kinsman of Jesus, is relatively late.[1]

The authorship of the Johannine works in general (the three Epistles plus the Gospel of John and Revelation) is still disputed, but the general opinion among scholars is that there are clear similarities between the First Epistle of John and the Gospel of John, so that a common author is plausible; the Second and Third Epistles probably come from within a circle of followers of the author of the First Epistle and the Gospel, but are not by that author himself: the hypothetical author of the Second and Third Epistles is often called John the Presbyter by scholars to distinguish him from the Evangelist.[9] Revelation is believed to be by a third author, who introduces himself simply as "John" - this third author is referred to by modern scholars as John of Patmos.[10]

The First is generally regarded as pseudonymous and the same conclusion is virtually unanimous for Second Epistle of Peter.[1] The Greek of both letters is too polished to have come from a Galilean fisherman, and they both show familiarity with the Jewish scriptures only in their Greek translation. Nor are the two epistles from the same author: the second epistle relies on the Epistle of Jude and makes reference to multiple Pauline epistles, and the theology seems to belong to a 2nd century time-frame.[11]

Modern scholars regard the Epistle of James as anonymous, probably dating to 80-100 AD.[1] Jude is ascribed to an anonymous author writing c 125, perhaps in Rome.[1]

[edit] Table

[edit] Old Testament

(This table follows the canon of the Roman Catholic Church - the mainline Jewish, Protestant and Orthodox canons differ significantly, both in the books regarded as biblical and in the order in which they are presented)

Book Author according to
traditional thought		 Author according to
modern thought
Genesis Moses: A few eary authors, notably Josephus and Philo, believed that Moses wrote the entire Torah, including the account of his own death; later Talmudic scholars felt it more likely that this section at least was written by another. The problem of Genesis, to which Moses was not an eye-witness, also gave rise to alternative theories, expressed in the Oral Torah and the midrashim. Documentary hypothesis: Various unnamed editors combining originally complete and independent documents;[12] OR Supplementary hypothesis: Various anonymous authors making additions (supplements) to a base text; OR Fragmentary hypothesis: Single unknown author drawing on multiple documentary and oral sources.
Exodus
Leviticus
Numbers
Deuteronomy
Joshua Joshua with a portion by Phinehas or Eleazar Deuteronomist using material from the Yahwist and Elohist
Judges Samuel Deuteronomist
Ruth Samuel A later author, writing after the time of David
1 Samuel Samuel, Gad, and Nathan Deuteronomist or a combination of a Jerusalem source, republican source, the court history of David, the sanctuaries source, the monarchial source, and the material of various editors who combined these sources
2 Samuel
1 Kings Jeremiah[13] Deuteronomist
2 Kings
1 Chronicles Ezra The Chronicler, writing between 450 and 435 BC, after the Babylonian captivity
2 Chronicles
Ezra Ezra The Chronicler, writing between 450 and 435 BC, after the Babylonian captivity
Nehemiah Nehemiah using some material by Ezra The Chronicler, writing between 450 and 435 BC, after the Babylonian captivity
Tobit A writer in the second century BC
Judith Eliakim (Joakim), the high priest of the story
Esther The Great Assembly using material from Mordecai An unknown author writing between 460 and 331 BC
1 Maccabees A devout Jew from the Holy Land. An unknown Jewish author, writing around 100 BC
2 Maccabees Based on the writing of Jason of Cyrene An unknown author, writing in the second or first century BC
3 Maccabees An Alexandrian Jew writing in Greek in the first century BC or first century AD
4 Maccabees Josephus An Alexandrian Jew writing in the first century BC or first century AD
Job Moses A writer in the 4th century BC.
Psalms Mainly David and also Asaph,[citation needed] sons of Korah, Moses, Heman the Ezrahite, Ethan the Ezrahite and Solomon Various authors recording oral tradition. Portions from 1000BC to 200BC.
Proverbs Solomon, Agur son of Jakeh, Lemuel and other wise men An editor compiling from various sources well after the time of Solomon
Ecclesiastes Solomon A Hebrew poet of the third or second centuries BC using the life of Solomon as a vista for the Hebrews' pursuit of Wisdom. An unknown author in Hellenistic period from two older oral sources (Eccl1:1-6:9 which claims to be Solomon, Eccl6:10-12:8 with the theme of non-knowing)
Song of Solomon Solomon
Wisdom Solomon An Alexandrian Jew writing during the Jewish Hellenistic period
Sirach Jesus the son of Sirach of Jerusalem
Isaiah Isaiah Three main authors and an extensive editing process. Is1-39 "Historical Isaiah" with multiple layers of editing. Is40-55 Exilic & Is56-66 post-exilic.
Jeremiah Jeremiah Baruch ben Neriah.[14] Chapters 1-6 and 10-23 seem to derive from Jeremiah himself, as dictated to Baruch.[1]
Lamentations Jeremiah Disputed and perhaps based on the older Mesopotamian genre of the "city lament", of which the Lament for Ur is among the oldest and best-known
Letter of Jeremiah Jeremiah A Hellenistic Jew living in Alexandria
Baruch Baruch ben Neriah An author writing during or shortly after the period of the Maccabees
Ezekiel Ezekiel Disputed, with varying degrees of attribution to Ezekiel
Daniel Daniel An editor in the fourth century to mid-second century BC
Hosea Hosea
Joel Joel
Amos Amos
Obadiah Obadiah
Jonah Jonah Possibly a post-exilic (after 530 BC) editor recording oral traditions passed down from the eighth century BC
Micah Micah The first three chapters by Micah and the remainder by a later writer
Nahum Nahum
Habakkuk Habakkuk
Zephaniah Zephaniah Disputed; possibly a writer after the time period indicated by the text
Haggai Haggai
Zechariah Zechariah Zechariah (chapters 1-8); the later remaining designated Deutero-Zechariah, were possibly written by disciples of Zechariah
Malachi Malachi or Ezra Possibly the author of Deutero-Zechariah

[edit] New Testament

Book Author according to
traditional thought		 Author according to
modern thought
Matthew Matthew the Evangelist An anonymous author who borrowed from both Mark and a source called Q
Mark Mark the Evangelist Perhaps Mark (John Mark), follower of Peter.
Luke Luke the Evangelist An anonymous author who borrowed from both Mark and a source called Q
John John the Apostle or John the Evangelist An anonymous author with no direct connection to the historical Jesus Jn 21 finished after death of primary author by follower(s)
Acts Luke the Evangelist The author of Luke
Romans Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle
1 Corinthians
2 Corinthians
Galatians
Ephesians Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle or edited dictations from Paul
Philippians Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle
Colossians Paul the Apostle Disputed; perhaps Paul coauthoring with Timothy
1 Thessalonians Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle
2 Thessalonians Paul the Apostle An associate or disciple after his death, representing what they believed was his message[15]
1 Timothy Paul the Apostle Perhaps someone associated with Paul, writing at a later date
2 Timothy Paul the Apostle Perhaps someone associated with Paul, writing after his death
Titus Paul the Apostle Perhaps someone associated with Paul, writing after his death
Philemon Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle
Hebrews Paul the Apostle or possibly Luke the Evangelist, Clement of Rome or Barnabas An unknown author, but almost certainly not Paul[16]
James James the Just A writer in the late first or early second centuries, after the death of James the Just
1 Peter Peter An author, perhaps Silas, proficient with Greek writing
2 Peter Peter Certainly not Peter[17]
1 John John the Evangelist An unknown author with no direct connection to the historical Jesus Same as Gospel of John.
2 John John the Evangelist An unknown author with no direct connection to the historical Jesus Final Editor of Jn 21
3 John John the Evangelist An unknown author with no direct connection to the historical Jesus Final Editor of Jn 21
Jude Jude the Apostle or Jude, brother of Jesus A pseudonymous work written between the end of the first century and the first quarter of the 2nd century
Revelation of Christ to John John the Apostle or John the Elder[1] Perhaps John of Patmos

[edit] See also

Bible portal

[edit] References

  • Gledhill, Tom. The Message of the Song of Songs. InterVarsity Press: 1994.
  • Kidner, Derek. The Message of Ecclesiastes. InterVarsity Press: 1984.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al am an ao ap aq ar as at au Harris, Stephen L., Understanding the Bible. Palo Alto: Mayfield. 1985.
  2. ^ In the early 1900s, Adolf Harnack upheld very early dates for the gospels. "Harnack." Cross, F. L., ed. The Oxford dictionary of the Christian church. New York: Oxford University Press. 2005
  3. ^ Harris, Stephen L., Understanding the Bible. Palo Alto: Mayfield. 1985. "The Historical Jesus" p. 255-260
  4. ^ "Noth, Martin." Cross, F. L., ed. The Oxford dictionary of the Christian church. New York: Oxford University Press. 2005
  5. ^ Brown, Raymond E. (1997). Introduction to the New Testament. New York: Anchor Bible. pp. 267–8. ISBN 0-385-24767-2. 
  6. ^ Amy-Jill Levine, chapter 10, The Oxford History of the Biblical World, Oxford University Press, 2001. p.372-373
  7. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.286ff
  8. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.411
  9. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.177ff
  10. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.467ff
  11. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.456ff
  12. ^ From the Introduction to Richard Elliot Friedman's The Bible with Sources Revealed, 2003.
  13. ^ Who were the authors of the books of the Bible?
  14. ^ Miller, Stephen M., Huber, Robert V. (2004). The Bible: A History. Good Books. pp. page 33. ISBN 1561484148. 
  15. ^ Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford, p.385; Beverly Roberts Gaventa, First and Second Thessalonians, Westminster John Knox Press, 1998, p.93; Vincent M. Smiles, First Thessalonians, Philippians, Second Thessalonians, Colossians, Ephesians, Liturgical Press, 2005, p.53; Udo Schnelle, translated by M. Eugene Boring, The History and Theology of the New Testament Writings (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), pp. 315-325; M. Eugene Boring, Fred B. Craddock, The People's New Testament Commentary, Westminster John Knox Press, 2004 p652; Joseph Francis Kelly, An Introduction to the New Testament for Catholics, Liturgical Press, 2006 p.32
  16. ^ http://religion-online.org/showchapter.asp?title=531&C=563 Richard Heard, Introduction To The New Testament
  17. ^ Carson, D.A., and Douglas J. Moo. An Introduction to the New Testament, second edition. HarperCollins Canada; Zondervan: 2005. ISBN-10 0310238595, ISBN-13 978-0310238591. p.659.
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