Every "chapter" of the bible is titled with a different person's name. Is this who wrote the section?

Question

i.e. Matthew, Mark, Luke etc..

Answer 1

My degree was in Ancient History and Classical Civilization. I studied Ancient Greek for three years and I've read most of the New Testament in the original Greek. Furthermore, the history of early Christianity has been a major interest of mine and would have been my "niche" going into grad school if I hadn't taken a higher-paying job with the state government.

OK, the short answer: Mostly NO, those names are most likely not the people who wrote those "sections". The LUKE gospel is an exception.

There are four "gospels" in the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John). These are the four narratives about the life and teachings of Jesus that the early orthodox church selected as the most accurate and most representative of what was known to be "true" about Jesus (according to their beliefs about Jesus). The problem was that most of Jesus' disciples were illiterate. Jesus himself was clearly literate in Aramaic and Hebrew, and maybe even some Greek -- but he was executed and did not write anything down himself (he did not believe this was necessary since the "Kingdom of God was near" and the final judgment was coming).

There were originally many other gospels by other authors that did not make it into the canonical official "Bible". How do we know this? Because archaeologists find them all the time. You can get on the internet, go to a library, or a museum and actually read and see these old scrolls. One of the most famous is the "Gospel of Thomas".

ALL GOSPELS were originally ANONYMOUS and were simply titled something to the effect of: "The Good News of Jesus Christ". "Gospel" is an Old English word for "Good News".

The early church authorities had their best scholars do some detective work to determine who wrote the different gospels. By looking carefully at clues in the text, and by investigating where each gospel was most likely written, they tried to trace the gospel back to an author.

When the church authorities agreed on an author, they began to put "according to ..." on their gospel copies. So, the gospel they thought that John the Disciple wrote became the "Gospel According to John".

The problem is, the gospels are mostly compilations of material written by many different writers. Each gospel was completed by one compiler who gave the gospel a unique tone, rhythm, focus, pace, and word choice.

The earliest gospel is probably MARK and may have been written in Rome. LUKE is the only gospel that most scholars think was actually written by a guy named Luke, who was an associate of St. Paul. MATTHEW was almost certainly written by a someone who spoke mostly Aramaic and was still very "Jewish" ("Semitic") in word choice and philosophy. JOHN was most likely written a generation after the other three, by someone who was very skilled in the Greek language.

Yes, St. Paul was supremely literate and wrote very beautiful passages in Greek. He was not a disciple of Jesus, however: Paul never met Jesus while Jesus was living on earth as a man. Paul claims to have met the resurrected Jesus on the road to Damascus (in modern-day Syria).

BTW, the "Gospel of John" and the "Revelation to John" were written by two very different "Johns". John ("Yehonan" in Aramaic) was a very common name back then. Also, the style of the Greek is strikingly different in these two books of the Bible. John the Gospeller is very educated and has a fluent and lecturing style. John the Revelator is clearly not educated and his Greek is awkward and very plain.

I'll end by saying that knowing exactly who wrote these gospels does not really tell us whether we should believe what the documents say. After all, we know exactly who wrote "Mein Kampf", but that doesn't make me believe what the book says.

Answer 2

It was quite common for ancient writers to attribute their works to a well known member of the Christian community. In some instances, the name of the book does correlate with the author, however, in many others it does not. Mathew, Mark & Luke are generally assumed to be the authors of their work (though this cannot be proven). The Gospel of John is assumed to be written by a member of a Johannine community, and attributed to John the Apostle. The Book of Acts refers to the "Acts of the Apostles" and was written by Luke. The Letters of Paul, (Romans, Hebrews, etc) were letters written to specific communities and were titled as such (The Letter to the Romans). Paul is assumed to be the author of most of these epistles, however most scholars agree that he did not write them all. The Letters of James, Peter, John and Jude are attributed the Apostles of the same name, however, Peter, John , and Jude were likely written by other individuals and credited to the respective disciple. The Letter of James is still disputed. The Book of Revelations is traditionally credited to the Apostle John, but again most scholars agree that this was not the case, and it is titled "revelations" because it is a dream or "revelation" of John. However, in most cases the books were probably written by close followers of the people to whom they are credited, and it can be generally assumed that the theology that is present in the book would line up with the theology of the person for which the book is titled. Books in the Old Testament have a different history, but almost all were credited to a person, and not actually written by that individual.

Answer 3

Yes, you are right. The title of each book in the Bible, if the title is a person's name, refers to that book's author.

Some books that do not have a person's name for the title (Ephesians, Galatians, Thessalonians, etc.) are actually letters written by Paul to the churches in those cities.

Still others are documentation of history (Acts, Exodus, Kings 1 & 2) or collections of poetry, laws, or important Judaic ideas (Psalms, Leviticus, Proverbs).

It is understood, though (by all who follow the Word), that God is the real Author behind all the books of the Bible. God Himself wrote, in stone, the Ten Commandments for Moses. However, God also used men as scribes for other messages onto animal skins, parchment, or other material such as paper.

The whole Bible is one book made up of sixty-six smaller books.

The Old Testament tells us of the establishment of God's physical kingdom and of the covenant that applied to that physical kingdom. It explains who and why the physical people were chosen.

The New Testament explains the new covenant brought by Christ which had been promised by God in the Old Testament. It also explains the new spiritual kingdom and who, why and how these spiritual people are chosen.

The difference is the covenant between God and His family (or "bride of Christ", which is the spiritual kingdom added to the physical which makes up the complete kingdom of God).

The Bible, like a finely tailored glove, fits together in content, direction, and purpose, from cover to cover.

It was stitched together by men under the direction of God's power, or what we know as the Holy Ghost or Spirit.

Great question!

Answer 4

You are speaking of "books" of the Bible; chapters are not titled. Some books are named after the person who wrote them; i.e. Matthew, Mark, Luke. Some books, however are named for the subject of the book,i.e. Ruth, Judges, 1 and 2 Kings. The first five books, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,Numbers,Deutoronomy also are named for the contents of the books.

Answer 5

The individual books, bound in a single volume we call the Bible, are usually named for their contents rather than the author. The gospels and some Epistles (letters) are more an exception.

The first five books of the Old Testament are named for the opening words of the book.
Genesis....means "beginning"
Exodus....opens with the Jews leaving Egypt
Leviticus...deals with worship rules, the tribe of Levi's responsibility
Numbers...opens with the first census of Israel
Deuteronomy...contains the "words of Moses" and is a second (duet) presentation of what has happened to the Israelites.

Joshua...tells the story of Moses successor.
Obadiah, Malachi, etc. contain the history of those prophets, not the authorship....but you get the idea, I'm sure.

As a side note...the letters of Paul are arranged in the Bible, not by when they were written, but by their length.

Answer 6

Not always but in many cases that is the case. Usually most Bibles have an introduction to the chapter where they inform the reader who the accepted author or writer of the book is. Realize though that no matter who wrote the words that the inspiration is of God and also it is God who through His Holy Spirit dwelling with your inner human spirit reveals the Spiritual truth to your mind. He reveals what He wishes for you to learn to your mind that is. While the Bible is history, poetry, and also stories it reveals much truth about life from within the pages. Many times also, like with Corinthians or Galatians the name of the Church that the text was written to is placed upon the name of the book. The book of Romans is accepted to be written by Paul to the Christians that were at Rome. Each early Church many times just was a group of people that met in homes or a group of homes and the letters were circulated and passed around from one church home to another and were written to address a certain concern that either the writer had about that particular church or in response to a question that the people in that area had about what God's words about a certain topic was. Matthew-John tell about Christ and his life and deeds while on earth, Acts tells about the deeds and lives of the Apostles of Christ and their starting ministry, Romans and other epistles were what was written to various churches or peoples in a certain area in response to either a concern of the apostle or a question from the people. Revelation is all together different as it is prophecy and to prepare people for the coming age and the end times. Before the new testament also realize that people didn't have bibles or books but learned from the priest and teachers. It wasn't until much later in time, since Christ came, that our Bible was carefully and prayerfully assembled by scholors and devout men of God. I hope this helps a little.

Answer 7

chapter??? no, Book you mean,
yyyyeeeeaaaaahhhhh-NO.
Genesis was not written by a man named Genesis, it was by Moses, that was obvious. Joshua, might have been written by Joshua, but i don't know. Judges, that is a plurality, not one author, maybe it was written by one or two judges. Samuels, no clue, Kings, not a chance. Isaiah, either by him or a scribe. Jeremiah was done by Baruch i believe which was a scribe who followed Jeremiah. Same concept with Isaiah, and the rest of the prophets. Psalms was written primarily by David, but not solely, Job might have been written by Moses. Daniel, part fo that was written by Nebucadnezer, or however his name is spelt. The New testament, that i WON"T get into, there is what is believed, and then what can be proven. The fact that believers won't accept what can be proven, does NOT change the "facts." And when proofs show that it was not a particular person, "believers" don't care. They will STILL believe what they want to believe.

Answer 8

No, not all of them.
The old testement has a lot of names, and they pretty much tell who that book is about.
In the new testement, matthew, mark, luke, and john are written by those people, but the rest of the new testement is made up of a bunch of letters that were written by the early christian leaders. The name of the book tells who the letter is addressed to.
So the books of timothy are letters written to timothy.
The book of hebrews is the letter written to the hebrews.
The book of romans is the letter written to the romans.

Answer 9

They are the writers who, inspired by God, penned the words.

Matthew was one of the 12 disciples of Jesus. Mark was a young man who travelled with the disciples and with St. Paul later on. Luke was a physician who was focused on the miracles that Jesus did. John was another one of Jesus' disciples. Each of the four Gospels is the same story from a slightly different perspective.

Answer 10

Actually, no. When the Bible was written, Christians were the minority - the persecuted minority. Most of the books of the New Testament were written anonymously. And names were added later.