Origin of the New Testament

A question that often arises during discussions about the authority of the Bible is; "Where did we get the Bible?" this is especially asked about the New Testament. The typical insinuation is that the NT is a late-date compilation of many texts that had been floating around among the early Christians. Further, it is said that the Roman Catholics forced the currently accepted texts of the NT. Some Roman Catholics even boast that if it wasn't for the Roman Catholic Church there would be no New Testament. Detractors chime in & claim that therefore the current structure of the NT is completely artificial & does not represent what the original Christians accepted as the NT.

This dispute would seem to put Christians, especially non-Roman Catholic Christians in quite a precarious situation. Protestant Christians especially would seem to be dependant on the Roman Catholic Church for their source of faith -- indeed, Roman Catholics often make such a claim.

But is the NT really a late-date compilation? The historical Roman Catholic version puts the final, official canon of the NT with the Tridentine Council between 1545-1563AD, which would be quite a late date indeed.

However, there is clear evidence that not only the "Tetramorph" (the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, & John) but also most of the currently accepted texts of the NT were accepted & in wide use long before the Council of Trent or any such Church Council.

What follows is a table I have constructed from various sources that shows the approximate date of "canons", "catalogues" -- lists of NT texts accepted by differring groups of early Christians. You will see that there was a consistent acceptance of our present "Homologoumena" -- authoritative NT texts. I aslo include a list of resource links that I highly encourage the reader to follow & examine each.