save their nation under the Romans. The end of saving their nation justified their murder of Jesus, they argued. They said: “If we let him alone this way, they will all put faith in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”—John 11:45-48, NW.

This immoral slogan that puts expediency ahead of principle cannot work. Jesus said that it could not: “A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, neither can a rotten tree produce fine fruit.” Bad means do not bring good ends. Good means, good end; evil means, evil end. To purchase expediency at the expense of principle is the snare of the shortsighted. Only by clinging to divine principle can permanent good come.—Matt. 7:18, NW.

How We Got the Bible

The Bible was written so we could get the thoughts of God. We need God’s thoughts. The Son of God said that “every utterance coming forth through Jehovah’s mouth” is vital for life. How did we get the Life-giver’s thoughts in written form?

NO ORDINARY book is the Bible. It is unique. It is God’s Book. It contains his thoughts. It tells us what God’s purposes are and what he wants us to do. To learn the sublime thoughts of the Creator is necessary. Recognizing the imperative need for man to know the Life-giver’s thoughts, Christ Jesus said: “Man must live, not on bread alone, but on every utterance coming forth through Jehovah’s mouth.”—Matt. 4:4, NW.

The written utterances of God may be had in hundreds of languages today. In many countries the common people may read the Bible freely. But during the Middle Ages the common people could not read the Bible; it lay entombed in a dead language.

But God never caused the Bible to be written originally in a dead tongue. He wanted people to get his thoughts. So as not to be speaking into the air the Bible’s Author caused his thoughts to be written in the familiar language of the people.

The everyday language of God’s chosen nation of Israel was Hebrew. So the Bible’s Author used that tongue for the writing of the bulk of the so-called Old Testament, properly called the Hebrew Scriptures.

When did Bible writing begin? About the year 1513 B.C., shortly after the Israelites had been delivered from bondage in Egypt. Jehovah said to Moses: “Write this as a memorial in the book.” God himself had given to Moses “two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone written on by God’s finger.” These tablets contained the Ten Commandments. Moses incorporated these into the book of Exodus when he wrote the first five books of the Bible.—Ex. 17:14; 31:18, NW.

From then on the writing of the Bible continued. God used many men, men from all walks of life, such as Joshua a general, Samuel a judge, David a king, Daniel a prime minister, Ezra a scribe, Nehemiah a court official, Amos a herdsman and Jeremiah a prophet. These men wrote by the infinite wisdom and might of the Bible’s Originator. They confessed that the thoughts they wrote were not of their own origin. Said David: “The spirit of Jehovah it was that spoke by me, and his word was upon my tongue.”—2 Sam. 23:2, NW.

With the writing of the book of Malachi, some eleven centuries after Moses started the book of Genesis, the writing of the Hebrew Scriptures was finished.

More Bible writing was yet to be done, but in a different language. Christ Jesus came to earth. It was vital that the life and teachings of the Founder of Christianity be put down in writing. Thus the disciples and apostles of Christ wrote twenty-seven more books, from Matthew to Revelation. They wrote under the influence of God’s spirit. Thus the apostle of Christ could say: “All Scripture is inspired of God and beneficial for teaching, for reproving, for setting things straight, for disciplining in righteousness, that the man of God may be fully competent, completely equipped for every good work.”—2 Tim. 3:16, 17, NW.

In what language were these twenty-seven inspired books written? Not in Hebrew, for Hebrew had become a dead tongue. The koiné or common Greek had become an international language, the speech of the people. So common Greek was the language God used for the writing of the so-called “New Testament,” properly called the Christian Greek Scriptures.

How clear, then, that God wanted people to learn his thoughts! Psalm 119:105 (AS) tells us: “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and light unto my path.” The Bible is man’s guide. Many handwritten or manuscript copies of the Bible were made; these were distributed far and wide for the benefit of all Christians.

But time changes language. New languages are born. So Bible translation became necessary to preserve God’s thoughts. As early as the third and the fourth century B.C., the Greek-speaking Jews in Alexandria and Egypt could not read the Scriptures in Hebrew. So about the year 280 B.C. a group of some seventy men, according to a letter quoted by the historian Josephus, began the work of translating the Hebrew Scriptures into common Greek. This version, completed sometime during the first century B.C., was called the “Septuagint.” It is also known by the Roman numerals for seventy, LXX.

Copies of the Septuagint were in great demand, especially in the first century of the Christian era. No doubt the publishing houses of Alexandria found it difficult to supply the demand, even though publishing was organized on a large scale in the houses of the rabbis in the Jewish quarter. Here a chief scribe would read slowly from the Septuagint while a battery of five to ten scribes seated at desks wrote in concert. They used pens and ink and wrote swiftly. After being carefully proofread the papyrus strips were rolled up, packed and shipped to the entire Greek-speaking world. So far and wide did the Septuagint Bible go that the apostle Paul, on his missionary journeys, found many Gentiles who already knew the Scriptures.

THE BIBLE IN A DEAD LANGUAGE

As the centuries went by even Greek ceased to be an international language;