The New Testament was written in Hebrew, not Greek!
Question:
You seem to teach that the original New Testament was originally written in Greek. I hate to differ with you. Nowhere is that fact proven. I believe that Luke may have written his manuscript in Greek, since he was of Syrian descent and also perhaps the books of Acts, but as far as the other manuscripts of the Apostles, I have no doubt that they were written in Hebrew. The Apostles were Hebrew -- born and raised Hebrew. None of them were from families of wealth, so they were taught the language of their families and most likely were unable to attend a school to learn another language. Even when Yahshua appeared unto Paul on the road to Damascus, Paul admits that Yahshua spoke to him in Hebrew.
Also, Yahshua told his disciples to go and find the lost sheep of the House of Israel and teach them the Good News. He didn't tell his disciples to go to the Gentiles of the nations around them. As a matter of fact, Yahshua told his disciples, when he sent them out to teach the good news, to avoid the cities of Samaria [Gentiles] and go only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.
It seems as our ministers today believe that all of a sudden, Yahweh became a Gentile God and all of a sudden, Yahweh has made a Covenant with the Gentiles. This can not be further from the truth. The only nation that Yahweh has ever made a covenant with is the people of Israel, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacobs [whose name was changed by Yahweh to the name Israel]. Yahweh even warned his people not to adopt the ways of the Gentiles [Canaanite, Amorites, Perushites and so forth] that were living in the land that Yahweh was about to give to the people of Israel.
I believe that the King James Bible has made many grave errors when they translated the Bible. Of course, this was not exclusively their fault. The Greek manuscripts were firstly translated wrong and I blame Rome and Constantine for these errors. If you study the history of the early church, you will learn that Rome, and this includes Constantine, and especially Him, for trying to cause a complete separation of the so-called Gentile Christians from anything that resembled Judaism. The early Roman church was even blatant enough to burn many of the early Hebrew manuscripts and kept only those that had been translated into Greek. The true early believers were persecuted and martyred if they worshiped with any resemblance to the Jewish roots of Christianity. Constantine even had the early name of the True Believers changed. The first and second century true believers were known as THE WAY OF HOLINESS and Constantine forbid this name to be used and it was during his reign that the word Christians and Christianity replaced the true name of the early believers in Yahshua Messiah.
The problem is that the distortion of the truth has followed down through the centuries today, and the same lies that Constantine and the Roman Church began back in 325 A.D. are the same lies that are still being taught today.
No, the original manuscripts were not written in Greek. For goodness sake; James was the first bishop of Jerusalem. Why in the world would James write to the true believers in Jerusalem in Greek? And besides, the Apostles, including Paul, went and taught in the synagogues the message of the Good News of Yahweh's Government and of Yahshua Messiah.
Paul also stated that he was a Hebrew of the Hebrews and a Pharisee of the Pharisee and that he was taught at the feet of Gamaliel. In other words, he emphasized that he was a Hebrew through and through and that he did not adopt the Hellenistic beliefs, as many religions want us to believe that Paul taught in Greek.
Answer:
Poor Constantine. He gets blamed for so many things that he never did.
So, let's begin analyzing your claims. You claim that the New Testament, with the exceptions of possibly Luke and Acts were written in Hebrew. You claim there is no evidence that the New Testament was written in Greek. First, we have well over 5,300 Greek manuscripts and 13,000 fragments of the New Testament. There are another 8,000 manuscripts in Syriac, Armenian, Ethiopic, Coptic, Gothic, Slavic, Sahidic, and Georgian. What is notably lacking are Hebrew manuscripts of the New Testament. Yet if Hebrew was the original language a reasonable person would expect numerous copies. Thus you based your argument not on evidence but on a hypothesis of missing evidence -- so thoroughly missing that even references to its existence are missing.
Second, when a manuscript is translated from one language to another, it becomes apparent that it is translated. Even the best translations leave subtle clues that the work is not in the original language. That is because every language has different word selections, grammar rules, and idioms. The one thing scholars consistently agree is that all the books of the New Testament show indications of being originally written in Koine Greek. There are a few who argue that perhaps Matthew and Hebrews were originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic, but every argument has been defeated because of the smoothness of the Greek text. Even the translations found in other languages indicate that they were translated from Greek texts and not any other language.
Third, quotations in the New Testament indicated that they were based on the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament -- with some modifications to correct the translation. The Septuagint is a Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament. If the New Testament were written in Hebrew, the quotes would indicate that they came from the Hebrew manuscripts.
Fourth, the Greek manuscripts are copies -- not translations. We can tell by analyzing the text. Different translations will show differences in wording, just as the New King James Version does not read precisely like the New American Standard Version or the New International Version. The Greek manuscripts show that they were copied, not translated. In order for this consistency to occur, they all had to have been copied from a single Greek source document.
Fifth, by claiming that only erroneous Greek manuscripts survived and that the things you just happen to disagree with are among the errors, shows the weakness and duplicity of your arguments. What you are claiming is that God was not able to preserve His words for future generations. In fact, you claim that God lost control of His book within decades of it being written. How odd! You trust the Old Testament as being accurately transmitted, but claim the New Testament by the same God was corrupted by man. But this argument also fails. If the text was corrupted, then we should see a variety of corruptions because multiple men would be involved and man never agrees on anything. But once again, the numerous texts that we have show consistency pointing back to a single source.
John Rylands Fragment. Showing front and back sides.
A source that long predates Constantine is also one of our oldest fragments: the John Rylands fragment of the book of John dates back to 100 A.D. That fragment contains part of a passage that does have Jesus' name -- in Greek, not Hebrew. Fragment P90, dated at 163 A.D. contains Jesus' name written in Greek. Fragment P4, dated about 200 A.D. also contains Jesus' name written in Greek.
Sixth, the audience of the New Testament was clearly not limited to Jews. Mark, Luke, and John all explain Jewish customs and traditions for the reader; thus, they were directed toward audiences that might not be familiar with Jewish traditions. Even Paul, at times, explained to those he wrote about his Jewish heritage. "For you have heard of my former conduct in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it. And I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my own nation, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers" (Galatians 1:13-14).
You note that Paul taught in synagogues, which is true, but you ignore the fact that when those Jews rejected him, he continued his teaching among the Gentiles. "And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded both Jews and Greeks. When Silas and Timothy had come from Macedonia, Paul was compelled by the Spirit, and testified to the Jews that Jesus is the Christ. But when they opposed him and blasphemed, he shook his garments and said to them, "Your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean. From now on I will go to the Gentiles."" (Acts 18:4-6). But that shouldn't be surprising. Jesus commissioned Paul to teach the Gentiles. "So I said, 'Who are You, Lord?' And He said, 'I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you. I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.'" (Acts 26:13-18). I know you have seen this passage because it is the one that mentions that Jesus spoke to Paul in Hebrew, yet you purposely ignored what Jesus said! At an earlier occasion Paul mentioned this same commission, "Depart, for I will send you far from here to the Gentiles" (Acts 22:21) which caused his Jewish audience to become upset. And later Paul state that leaders in Jerusalem knew about his work. "But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles), and when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that had been given to me, they gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised" (Galatians 2:7-9). Of course, Paul wrote in Greek! He was talking to Greek-speaking people.
Koine Greek was the common language throughout the Roman Empire, and even beyond. By writing in Koine Greek, God saw that his message reached a wide audience. The fact that the apostles were born Jews and knew the Hebrew language (and Aramaic) doesn't preclude them from communicating in Greek. Greek was the merchants' language. It was the common language of business when dealing with foreigners. Besides the apostles had the gift of tongues (languages) and could communicate in any language the Holy Spirit saw fit for them to use.
You make it sound as if Jesus limited himself to only Israel. Such was not true. He did spend time in Phoenicia and in Decapolis. But more important is what God said about Jesus' mission. "Indeed He says, 'It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also give You as a light to the Gentiles, that You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth'" (Isaiah 49:6). To save Israel was too small of a mission for the Messiah. Christ came to save the world. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). Yes, in one of their first practice runs, Jesus limited the disciples to only Israel (Matthew 10), but such a restriction did not remain. "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:19-20). Unlike you, I do not have blinders on to look at only a select set of verses.
In regards to the name Christian, "And when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. So it was that for a whole year they assembled with the church and taught a great many people. And the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch" (Acts 11:26). The name is far older than Constantine. The Greek word behind "called" is chrematizo, which means something uttered by an oracle or said by a prophet. In other words, the disciples were divinely called Christians first in Antioch.
