Why are there different versions of the old and new testament?

Question

For example, in the book of Genisis, I believe that Chapter 2 says that God created Man and Woman AT THE SAME TIME, yet the next chapter it claims that he made woman from the rib of man. In the four first gospels of the new testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all describe stories of Jesus, yet they are all different renditions. Why?

Answer 1

There are different quote "versions," due to the fact that there are different writers. If you rear-ended somebody at a stoplight, you might say, "The person came to a complete stop for no apparent reason, and I back-ended them."
They on the other hand might say "I was in the act of slowing down for a red-light when I was rear-ended by some mad, manic driver!"
And eyewitnesses might even say otherwise. However, it was one event, and it really happened (and someone's insurance premium is going up). :-)~

The gospels are unique in that it isn't just one writer plagiarizing from another--it is three eyewitnesses and an investigator recording key events in the life of Jesus. [Those people being Matthew, Peter (who had Mark write for him), and John....and of course Luke, who was not an eyewitness, but gathered information from eyewitnesses (he was like an investigator of sorts)]

So why are there differing versions? Different eyewitnesses may have perceived different things, but either way, none of it changes the miracles that Jesus did. One witness may have told Luke one thing, and the disciples may have seen another thing.

For example, Matthew 8:5-8 says:
When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him,
"Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly."
And he said to him, "I will come and heal him."
But the centurion replied, "Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed.

To make a long story short, the centurion gets home and finds out the servant was healed at the very moment Jesus claimed the servant healed.

Now, in Luke 7:4-7 we read this:
When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant.
And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, saying, "He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue."
And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, "Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.
Therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed.

And again, in this account, the servant is healed. In both accounts the centurion shows great faith, and in both accounts the servant is healed. The only difference is whether the centurion himself came out to talk to Jesus. Did he come out, or did he send Jewish elders and then the servants of the centurion met them on the road. It seems plausible that Matthew simply said the centurion "came forward and appealed to him" simply because the centurion was the one who was appealing, just through the mouth of other people. It wasn't the Jews or the servants who really wanted the servant healed; it was the centurion. He wanted the servant healed, and he sent the people to talk to Jesus. Either way the message is clear that he had faith and his servant was healed.

These Biblical "contradictions" are trivial matters in light of the amazing inerrant nature of the Bible. In a book with thousands upon thousands of lines of text, there are no matters of faith or doctrine that are contradictory. To haggle over matters such as this is silly at the very least :-)

Answer 2

The difference in Genesis is that the story in ch 2 is a summary of humanities creation, ch 3 gives the details. The difference in the Gospels is best explained like this, my father is a retired police officer, a homicide detective in fact, one of the things he told me was that a number of eyewitnesses led to a variety of stories. All were true, just from a different perspective.

Answer 3

for the old testament it's because they stole that from the Jews and they cut allot of things out and changed it too make their own little book.

for the new, it's because they didn't write the book until Jesus had already died, and they were writing it by memory, and as you know memory can be a difficult thing.