Does anyone know where the oldest copy or prehaps THE BIBLE is located?

Question

From what I've heard the actually copy is gone...

Answer 1

"The original documents it came from, many are gone."

ALL are long gone.

Answer 2

The oldest existing copies of the Bible is the Dead Sea scrolls, which contain pieces of several Old Testament books. They date to shortly before the time of Christ. But in the writings of David there are references to the "scrolls" so the Old Testament itself dates at least as far back as David. However Greek scholars in 250 BC were supposed to have made a Greek translation of the Old Testament, and this is called the Septuagint.

The oldest complete Bible is in the British Museum and it is the Codex Sinaiticus. It was written in Greek in uncial format, meaning all capital letters with no spaces between the letters. It is actually very easy to read once you know Greek because Greek is a pretty perfect language. The Codex Sinaiticus dates from about 340-360. It also includes the epistle of Barnabas, who was a friend of Paul. Today it is generally excluded because there are questions as to if it is genuine, and it is also fairly anti-Jewish because it makes claims that God's covenant is only with Christians and not with Jews. This differs from most Christian theology - "first the Jew, then the Gentile". That is why the covenant passed from Abraham to Issac to Moses to Christ and through Christ we Gentiles enter into covenant with God.

Anyway it also includes the Shepherd of Hermas which is more of an allegorical story rather than a gospel or epistle.

There is also the Codex Vaticanus, a Latin copy of the Bible dating to the early 4th century.

The oldest fragment of the New Testament is from John 18, and dates to anywhere between 90AD and 150AD but my Greek teacher leaned towards the first century. It is located in John Rylands University Library in Manchester. Regardless of the dating controversy, it is interesting because some "scholars" have said John's gospel was not written until the 300AD but here is one dating to at least 150 years before that even by the most liberal scholars.

Answer 3

I just saw the actual Book of Kells recently, which is not the original copy of the Bible but very very old and from a time when monks copied the Bible by hand and embellished very ornately, the texts.
The Dead Sea scrolls are among the original sources that were put down on any type of media. Prior to that, these stories were completely oral, which you can imagine, makes them subject to change over the years.
Not all of the Scrolls were included in what we know as the Bible, and the Council of Nicea further whittled down what was accepted and seen as advantageous to Constantine as he used the Bible to solidify his power. So what ended up as the Bible in Rome still isn't the complete story.

Answer 4

The problem is that the paper itself used for writing scriptures did not typically last that long. That's why scribes were hired to continue to copy older manuscripts so they could be preserved. Take a look at our current paper making methods. How many of these books will last for hundreds or thousands of years. Most printed materials cannot survive the ravages of time. That is why the original scrolls are difficult to preserve. Yes the Dead Sea Scrolls survived, but that is because they were place in airtight containers in a cave.

Answer 5

The Gutenberg Bible is one of the oldest forms and it was the first book ever printed on a printing press. Before that books from the bible were were written by hand or carved in stone. The Dead Sea Scrolls are a good example as some books from the bible were found in the scrolls.

The bible was not handed down from God complete in one piece. It was written over time by many different people. Each person wrote an "essay" of sorts and then a council of men sat down and decided which essays would be put into the "bible" and which ones would not.

Answer 6

If you're talking about the "original" printed Bible that were first PRINTED by the Gutenberg printing press, there are less than 50 of them existing today spread throughout the world. Libraries in Germany have the most copies, followed by the U.S. and the U.K. The Vatican has two copies.

But if you mean the actual, hand-written scrolls of the ancient scribes, then most of these scrolls would be in the deep [underground] vaults of The Vatican --since it was the Catholic Church that compiled the first version according to what was agreed upon in the Council of Nicaea, circa 325 AD.

The recent discovery of the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls found in Qumran are under the jurisdiction of the Israel Antiquities Authority, which scrolls have created great controversy among biblical scholars since they were found in 1947.

But I digress.

Peace be with you!

Answer 7

There's a couple of very ancient, original documents in the Vatican, along with the original 4th century Latin Vulgate Bible, which was the first produced.

The Dead Seas Scrolls provide substantial insight into the accuracy and truth of many of the old testament writings.

There's also lots of pre-4th century fragments of documents in existence, that quote portions of the same writings that would later be declared to be part of the authentic new testament scriptures.

In short, there's still plenty of good stuff out there ... so we can make reasonably sure that our present day translations stay pretty much in line with the originals ... if we really want them to.

Answer 8

I believe the original copy was in hebrew, but the very first copies were long gone. All the old ones we have were translations from greeks,etc.

Answer 9

Their is no such thing as "The Bible" because it was written over several centuries.

but some of the oldest copies we have include the famous dead sea scrolls among others.

Answer 10

The very first put together in a whole copy? Cathiloc Church has it.

The original documents it came from, many are gone.

Answer 11

The oldest are the dead sea scrolls and some others found in egypt. does it really matter?