That the "Best Book of All" has come down to us we know. Copies of the English Bible have been multiplied enormously, and there are few sights more familiar to our eyes. It has been read and taught for centuries in our Churches, schools, and homes; and its modes of expression have left their indelible mark upon our language. The knowledge of it has produced and fostered all that is good and worthy in our national character and life. It has for generations brought peace to troubled hearts, light to dark ones, comfort to the mourning, and hope to the longing. No one would venture now to deny its wonderful effect and manifold blessings; and yet there are many who have but scanty knowledge of how God preserved and sent it to us and of the human agents whom He employed in the work. They have either never studied the matter at all, or else they have allowed the lessons of early days to evaporate from their minds. The aim of this series is to put the main facts of our Bible's story before our readers; or, in other words, to tell briefly how the Best Book of All has come down to us.

The Art of Writing Is Very Ancient⤒🔗

It has now been found that long before the days of Moses men knew how to give permanent form to the utterance of their thoughts. The oldest material upon which they wrote was probably clay; while soft it would easily receive impressions, and when dried in the sun it would permanently retain them. Many of these clay slabs and cylinders have been discovered in recent years, and their inscriptions have been deciphered by modern scholars. (Though the subject does not come within the scope of this little work, we may mention, in passing, that several of these ancient documents have confirmed the his­torical accuracy of the Old Testament in a remarkable manner.) The British Museum has been en­riched with a number of these literary treasures.

Another material upon which ancient writings were inscribed was stone. Instances of such writ­ings from the earlier parts of Scripture history will readily occur to us. Allusion may be made here to the "Rosetta Stone," which was discovered in the ruins of a fort near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile, and is now in the British Museum. The inscription is in three languages: Hieroglyphics, or the sacred writing; Demotic, or the common Egyptian; and Greek. Scholars, of course, could read the Greek and by means of it they deciphered the Hieroglyphics, so that this stone became the key to the understanding of these "sacred writings." It is a most interesting specimen of ancient writing on stone, but beyond that it has nothing to do with the Holy Scriptures.

Yet another material, which must have been frequently used by the old Egyptians, was made from the Papyrus plant. This was a plant or reed which grew upon the banks of the Nile. Its slender stem was cut into thin slices, and it contained a kind of natural gum, which, when moistened, was used to fasten the slices together; and by that means a fairly good and substantial paper was formed. Needless to say, this was the origin of our word paper.

But it is likely that the material of which the Jews made most use in preserving and handing down their sacred Scriptures, was parchment or dried skin. Skins carefully prepared and sewn together would form splendid sheets upon which long records could be written, and these could be rolled on poles and so rendered quite compact and portable. For references to these rolls we may look to Psa. xl. 7 (R.V.) and to St. Luke 4:17 (R.V. marg.). Many of them have been preserved from olden times, and the rolls which are still employed in the synagogue services, by their outward form and inner contents serve to connect the customs of the past with the hope of the future.

Old Testament and Hebrew Manuscripts←⤒🔗

From the materials on which the writings were inscribed we naturally proceed to speak of these writings themselves. It is well known that the Bible is divided into two main divisions, the Old Testament (or Covenant), and the New. Of these the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, (Exceptions to this general rule are Dan. 2:4-7:28; Ezra 4:8-6:18; and Jer. 10:11; which were written in Ar­amaic, commonly called Chaldee) by various in­spired writers who lived between the time of Moses and of Ezra. The style of writing, though not the language itself, was changed after the Babylonian captivity. For the old Hebrew characters the Jewish scribes substituted what are called the square ones, such as may be seen in our printed Hebrew Bibles today. We know that these square characters were in use in our Lord's time, for he spoke of a "jot" (or yod) the smallest letter of the Alphabet, and of a "tittle," the ornament of a letter (see Matt. v. 18).

The Jewish Scriptures now are divided into three parts: Torah (the law), Nebiyim (the prophets), and Kethubim (the writings), and it is interesting to remember that our Lord Himself alluded to this three-fold division as existing in His day (Luke 24:44.)

The oldest known Hebrew manuscript only dates back to the 8^th century, but we have reason to believe that the rather late manuscripts from which our printed text has been made, are faithful copies of much older ones. For example, appeal can be made to the Samaritan Pentateuch. This must have been preserved independently by the people of Samaria, for the Jews had "no dealings with the Sa­maritans," and the Samaritans hated and avoided the Jews. Yet the Jewish copy of the "Law" agrees substantially with the Samaritan, showing that they must both have come from one original, and been carefully preserved in their different courses down the centuries. Again there are ancient translations which can be examined and which give a fair idea of the text from which they were made. They go to prove that this text must have been, in the main, the same as that which we now possess. And besides all this, there is the well-known fact that the Jews had an almost superstitious regard for the exact letter of Holy Scripture, and their scribes were most scrupulously careful in making copies. If there happened to be a letter written in a different size from the others in the text before them, they did not allow themselves to correct it – they copied it strictly, small or large, just as it was. To prevent the possibility of mistake they counted every word and every letter in every word and made a note of the numbers at the end of each book. This devotion to rigid exactitude might be called slavish, but by the providence of God it served to maintain the integrity of the text for the generations to come.

The Septuagint←⤒🔗

The Old Testament was translated from Hebrew into Greek about 200 years before Christ. This translation is called the Septuagint, (Septuaginta is Latin for seventy) from the tradition that seventy men were employed upon it. It seems to have been made, in the first instance, for the benefit of the Greek-speaking Jews who lived at Alexandria. However, it had a much larger circulation; and reaching beyond the limits of the chosen nation to many of the Gentiles outside, it raised the expectation of a mighty Deliverer, who would appear in the land of Israel. So the Spirit of God used it to prepare the way of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is also of interest to note that it must have been constantly read by the apostles, and that most of the quotations in the New Testament are in its very words.

New Testament and Greek Manuscripts←⤒🔗

Coming down now to the first century of the Christian era, we see in it the beginning and the completion of the New Testament. Not long after our Lord's ascension the first Gospel record was published, and before the sands of the century had run out, the last writing was added by the inspired apostle St. John. The New Testament was originally written in Greek, (There is some reason to suppose that St. Matthew's Gospel first appeared in Aramaic; both came out at the same time.) and when it was finished there was a complete Greek Bible, the Septuagint translation of the Old, and the orig­inal of the New.

This, then, will be a convenient place to mention some of the oldest existing manuscripts of the Greek Bible.

One is kept in the Vatican Library at Rome and is called Codex Vaticanus. Scholars have told the difficulties which they have had in studying this manuscript, and making extracts from it, as it is so jealously guarded by the Pope and his librarians. If the Popes had taken as much trouble to preserve the pure teaching of the Bible we would have no quarrel with them; but there is little good in fencing the fountain if they do not drink from its waters.

Another Greek manuscript of about the same age and value was discovered by the celebrated German scholar, Dr. Tischendorf, in the year 1844. In his search for old treasures he visited the Monastery of St. Catherine on Mount Sinai, and when there he saw a basket of waste paper with which the monks were going to light their fire. He dived into this basket and drew out some parchment leaves of a very old Greek Bible. Upon enquiry he found that there were many similar leaves in the Monastery and he tried to get possession of them. The monks were too ignorant to have any idea of the real im­portance of this rare treasure, but when they saw that the European scholar wanted it, they suspected that they had money's worth and they were so stiff and cunning that the doctor could not conclude the bargain with them. However, to make a long story short, he obtained the influence and help of the Emperor of Russia and managed to secure the whole copy. Some leaves are now in the Court Library at Leipsig; but the greater part was deposited in the Royal Library of St. Petersburg (now named Leningrad). This manuscript is called Codex Sinaiticus. In 1934 this was purchased by public subscription in this country, and is now lodged safely in the British Museum.

A third Greek manuscript nearly equal in age and importance to the other two, may be seen in the Brit­ish Museum. It was sent as a present to King Charles I, by Cyril Lucar, the Greek patriarch of Alexandria, and hence it is called Codex Alexandrines.

These copies belong to the 4^th and the early days of the 5^th centuries. They are written in uncial, that is, capital letters. There is no separation between the words, and there are many abbreviations, two letters with a stroke above them often serving to indicate a whole word. Besides these three principal ones, there are many other old manuscripts, and students can find a large field for their energies in deciphering and comparing them together. But it is enough for the greater number of people, who cannot study them, to know that they are all in substantial agreement.