Concept
New Testament
Overview
The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events relating to first-century Christianity. The New Testament's background, the first division of the Christian Bible, has the name of Old Testament, which is based primarily upon the Hebrew Bible; together they are regarded as sacred (holy) scripture by Christians.
The New Testament is a collection of 27 Christian texts written in Koine Greek by various authors. It includes four gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, epistles attributed to Paul and other authors, and the Book of Revelation. The New Testament canon developed gradually over the first few centuries of Christianity through a complex process of debate, rejection of heretical texts, and recognition of writings deemed apostolic, culminating in the formalization of the 27-book canon by the late fourth century. It has been widely accepted across Christian traditions since Late Antiquity.
Literary analysis suggests many of its texts were written in the mid-to-late first century. There is no scholarly consensus on the date of composition of the latest New Testament text. The earliest surviving New Testament manuscripts date from the late second to early third centuries AD, with the possible exception of Papyrus 52.
The New Testament was transmitted through thousands of manuscripts in various languages and church quotations and contains variants. Textual criticism uses surviving manuscripts to reconstruct the earliest recoverable text and to trace the history of its transmission. It has varied reception among Christians today. It is regarded as inspired holy scripture by the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, evangelicals and many other Protestants. Catholics and Orthodox receive the New Testament together with sacred tradition as a source of divine revelation, whereas Protestants hold that doctrine is to be derived from scripture alone, without tradition. Evangelicals and some other Protestants believe the New Testament, as the written word of God, to be inerrant.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where New Testament is discussed.
The _prophetical_ book tells in figurative language what shall take place in the Church of Christ up to the time when there shall be new heavens and a new earth. CANONICAL BOOKS. The sixty-six books enumerated above are inspired, and are called the Canonical Books of the Old and New Testaments. The so-called Apocryphal Books, printed in some editions of the Bible, are not a part of the Bible: they are not inspired…
Martin Luther, An Explanation of Luther's Small Catechism
a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; names the idea
The New Testament The Writers of the New Testament lived all in lesse then an age after Christs Ascension, and had all of them seen our Saviour, or been his Disciples, except St. Paul, and St. Luke; and consequently whatsoever was written by them, is as ancient as the time of the Apostles. But the time wherein the Books of the New Testament were received, and acknowledged by the Church to be of their writing, is not…
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
names the idea; opens on it
The greatest benefit we owe to the New Testament is that it has revealed to us the immortality of the soul. It is in vain, therefore, that this fellow Warburton tried to cloud over this important truth, by continually representing in his legation of Moses that "the ancient Jews knew nothing of this necessary dogma, and that…
Voltaire, Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary
states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it; names the idea
But it should be noticed that, when Christian Ethics, as represented by the New Testament, are praised for this, two distinctions of the utmost importance, which they entirely neglect, are very commonly overlooked. In the first place the New Testament is largely occupied with continuing the tradition of the Hebrew prophets, by recommending such virtues as ‘justice’ and ‘mercy’ as against mere ritual observances…
G. E. Moore, Principia Ethica
states what it is; names the idea
But to this office the New Testament immediately adds the consolatory promise of grace through the Gospel, which must be believed, as Christ declares, Mark 1,15: Repent and believe the Gospel, i.e., become different and do otherwise, and believe My promise. And John, preceding Him, is called a preacher of repentance, however, for the remission of sins, i.e., John was to accuse all, and convict them of being sinners…
Martin Luther, The Smalcald Articles
states what it is; opens on it; names the idea
Philosophers who discussed New Testament
- R. H. Tawney
- Friedrich Schleiermacher
- Samuel Clarke
- Anthony Collins (philosopher)
- Ernest Renan
- Philip K. Dick
- David Bentley Hart
- Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite
- John Toland
- Renaissance
- Jews
- Voltaire
- Moses Mendelssohn
- Robert Boyle
- Beyond Good and Evil
- Apollonius of Tyana
- Epimenides
- Edmund Husserl
- Herman Dooyeweerd
- John Lucas (philosopher)
- The Age of Reason
- Richard Cumberland (philosopher)
- God Is Not Great
- Profiat Duran
Related ideas
- Erasmus
- Eusebius
- Eastern Orthodox Church
- Aristophanes
- Christian humanism
- Jesus
- Turkey
- Hellenistic Judaism
- First Epistle to the Corinthians
- Greek language
- Gnosticism
- Gospel of Luke
- Gospel of Matthew
- Gospel of John
- Gospel
- Hebrew language
- Gospel of Thomas
- Holy Land
- John of Salisbury
- Judaism
- Mount Athos
- Jerome
- Justin Martyr
- John Wycliffe
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Bioethics.