One question I get a lot: where did the Bible’s chapters and verses came from. Here’s a quick answer taken from my textbook on the NT (The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings, Oxford University Press; 7th ed., 2020. Since the answer is so brief, I’ll attach another couple of paragraphs drawn from a nearby page in the book, dealing with another somewhat related and even more important (for many people) problem: when did scholars start to think that the differences in our manuscripts were a VERY big deal?
QUESTION:
About the numbers of the verses, who put them? Who divided the text in verses and chapters, and when?
RESPONSE: (from my book)
Given the fact that ancient manuscripts did not use punctuation, paragraph divisions, or even spaces to separate words, it will come as no surprise to learn that the chapter and verse divisions found in modern translations of the New Testament are not original (as if Paul, when writing Romans, would think to number his sentences and call them verses!). In order to facilitate the reading of these books—especially in public—scribes began to make chapter-like divisions as early as the fourth century. But the chapters in translations of the New Testament used today go back just to the beginning of the thirteenth century, when a lecturer at the University of Paris, named Stephen Langton, introduced major divisions into the Latin Bible.
Verse divisions were not to come along for another three centuries. In 1551, a Parisian printer named Robert Stephanus published a Greek and Latin edition of the New Testament in which each chapter was divided into separate verses. These are the verse divisions still in use today. They first appeared in an English translation in the 1560 Geneva Version.
An interesting anecdote: Stephanus’s son indicated that his father made these verse divisions while “on horseback” (i.e., on a journey) from Paris to Lyons. Presumably he meant that his father took the text along with him and worked on it at night during his layovers at inns along the way. Some wry observers have noticed, though, that in places our verse divisions make little sense (sometimes they occur right in the middle of a sentence), and have suggested that Stephanus literally worked “on horseback,” so that whenever his steed hit a pothole, it caused an inadvertent slip of the pen.
AND ANOTHER THING: WHEN SCHOLARS REALIZED THE MANUSCRIPTS DIDN’T FULLY AGREE
Here now is a second big issue that most people simply would have no clue about: when did experts on the Bible begin to recognize the enormity of the problem of the variations in our surviving manuscripts? And is it really that big of a problem? Again, from the same book:
Throughout the Middle Ages, scribes did not realize just how different the manuscripts they were copying were from one another. It was not until 1707 that scholars began to realize the enormity of the problem. That was the year that an Oxford scholar named John Mill (no relation to the Victorian John Stuart Mill) published an edition of the New Testament that included a list of places where there were variant readings in the manuscripts. Mill had examined about one hundred Greek manuscripts, as well as early versions of the New Testament (i.e., translations into other ancient languages) and the quotations of the New Testament in the writings of the Church Fathers. Based on his thirty years of study, Mill cited some thirty thousand places where there were differences among the manuscripts. This struck most of the reading public as an enormous and frightening number: How could the New Testament be trusted if we weren’t sure of what it said in so many places? Mill’s enemies claimed that he was trying to compromise the integrity of Scripture. His advocates pointed out that he hadn’t invented these thirty thousand variations; he had simply noticed they existed. And in fact many more than these existed: Mill’s list included only those variants that he thought were significant, not all the ones that he actually found.
Today we have nearly fifty-seven times as many manuscripts as Mill had. The differences that we now know number in the hundreds of thousands. It’s important to realize that the vast majority of these differences are completely unimportant and immaterial; many of them cannot even be reflected in an English translation. But it is also important to know that some of these differences are extremely important, affecting how significant passages—or even entire books—are interpreted. Obviously knowing the original text in these places is important: you can’t very well say what the New Testament means if you don’t know what it says! Unfortunately, there are dozens of passages whose original wording scholars debate, and for some passages where we will probably never know.
Are there any instances in which choice of chapter and verse breaks made a difference in the meaning of the text?
Sure. People seem ot to realize that Mark 9:1 is right after Mark 8:38, or that 1 Thess 4:18 is followed directly by what happens at the beginning of 1 Thess 5, for example.
wow, fascinating.
I started taking my favourite stories and parts of the bible and making copies for me without the chapter and verse numbers in them. I first did it with Ecclesiastes… my favourite read in the bible. I realized that in doing so, I could read and be more invested in the flow of the story instead of getting hung up on the verse divisions. It might be my way back into reading the bible again with some enjoyment. When Eugene Peterson came out with the Message… he first limited the verse markers to sections… but later publications found the traditional verses individually labeled again. I wonder if people liked his translation, but were lost without the verse markers. Go figure. How enjoyable would most novels be with verse markers? Not very. It was Rob Bell that said Genesis 1&2 is a poem… so I took out the verse marker numbers in those chapters… and it is a poem. It’s a lot of work to do that… but worth it if I can find my way back to enjoying the Bible again.
I’m interested in the thought that the Bible was ‘inspired’ by God. What is your response on this? What does ‘inspiration’ mean in this sense? Are we to assume that what has been written down are the exact words directly from God to man and through his pen wrote verbatim what God said?
It completely depends on what you mean by “inspired.” Some think God dictated it, others that he gave authors the ideas, others that he somehow made sure they didn’t mess it up when they described their thoughts, others that there were is used by God to communicate, so that it’s more inspiring than inspirec, and… other things.
Can you kindly clarify what you were trying to say? Spellcheck?
Sorry — I’m mot sure what you’re asking.
The second half of what you said is not clear due to spellchecker. I don’t want to assume what you said.
“… others that there were is used by God to communicate, so that it’s more inspiring than inspirec…”
should read
others that their words were used by God to communicate, so that it’s more inspiring than inspired
The first version is how the original author articulated his message. The second version is how the scribe (ie. me) tried to clarify the message for an uncomprehending audience (ie. Cherylmlyle). Perhaps Cherylmlyle got a bit too lazy there in their hammock … ?
1. Has anyone ever suggested to the editors of the NRSV that they produce a version without modern chapter and verse divisions? Perhaps as a print on demand?
2. You’ve expressed understandable reluctance to tackle a complete NT translation but how about a standalone of say, Mark? (Like you Mark is my favorite gospel. I can handle thick multi-volume commentaries and fat NT translations at my desk well enough but it would really be nice to have a portable edition of Mark produced by a critical scholar not squeamish about controversial passages.) Tempted?
Publishers wouldn’t do it, but I guess if it’s print on demand they could. But there’d be no way for you to refer someone else to the part you’re reading effectively.
And nope — no interest in taking on a translation. It wouldn’t differ much from others already out there.
What was the logic used for deciding the chapter breaks? It often seems to me that the breaks make no sense, though I don’t have any good examples at hand.
It was a decision made by the first one who did it (discussed in the blog), and he probably did it just according to what made sense to him…
Back when I was a kid, the first edition of the Bible I read at any length was the Today’s English Version. It included the usual chapter and verse divisions, of course, but it also added its own sections and section headings. The usual section was around a chapter long, but the editors felt perfectly free to define a section that crossed from the end of one chapter to the beginning of the next.
I actually found those sections pretty useful, and they often made more sense to me than the traditional chapter breaks.
> But there’d be no way for you to refer someone else to the part you’re reading effectively.
Just give the position in bytes. The text version of the KJV is something like 4,300,000 bytes long, and a position could be specified as, e.g., 2,396,420. Not sexy, but effective.
Ah, I thought you meant on paper.
The biggest benefit of the current system is that it’s consistent across translations. If for example I want to talk to someone about a bible passage in German, it will have the exact same chapter and verse numbers as the English passage. Telling someone the byte number would only work for a specific translation in a specific language. I’d rather have an arbitrary, but universal system than a bunch of competing systems, even if they individually make more sense.
The last verse of Matthew chapter 19, Matthew 19:30 “But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first” actually links in with the parable at the start of chapter 20, “Workers in the Vineyard”, which ends with the line “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
Mark has the verse “But many who are first will be last, and the last first” but not the corresponding parable and Luke has neither this verse nor the parable, moving straight from the rich young ruler to Jesus predicting his death for the third time.
Rather than Matthew inventing a whole new parable to go along with Mark’s single verse, which Luke coincidentally happens to remove, isn’t it more likely the the verse and parable of Matthew were the original version, with Luke removing both and Mark keeping just the verse?
Especially seeing as the verse on its own is out of place in the Markan context. Mark 10:29-31
Doesn’t seem more likely to me, no. We have lots of instances of people who have heard one-liners making up a story to go with it to provide context.
If Mark is writing first then Matthew and Luke would have to be said to have had radically different responses to the verse “But many who are first will be last, and the last first”
Luke will see it as out of place and remove it, Matthew will see it and decide to create a whole new parable to along with it.
If Matthew is writing first, Luke and Mark both see the parable of the workers in the vineyard and decide to remove it. But unlike Luke, Mark forgets to also remove the verse “But many who are first will be last, and the last first”. Possibly because it was linked to early chapter/scroll page in Matthew?
Hi Bart,
There are only “few” serious variances in the NT Manuscripts. However, I haven’t seen any article (in the public domain) that gives a sense of quantification for these “few”. Can you provide some insights about this? How many serious variances in the NT Manuscripts that is still in the “list of debate”?
For example, the “adulterous narrative” (John 8:1) was a serious variance, but it is no longer in the “list of debate” as most Scholars concluded that it is an addition. Therefore, many revised bibles don’t have it. So I am asking about the variances that are still in the “list of debate” between Scholars.
I am not asking for an exact count, just a sense of quantification: are they within about 10 serious variances in each Gospel, or within 50, etc.
Dozens? Many dozens? Not sure. Examples: Luke 3:22; Luke 22:19-20; Luke 22:43-44; John 1:18; Romans 5:1. It seems like you’re pretty interested in the matter. If you want to see a full discussion of a number of them, I’d suggest looking at my book The Orthodox Corruption of Scripoture.
Hello Dr. Ehrman,
We are told that Mary conceived Jesus as a virgin and she was not married at all during this. The question is why was Mary not put to death as this was the punishment for adultery. Some have said this was because she was engaged and not fully married, why is this biblically absent and how would this even be plausible in this judaic society?
It’s not clear that women who became pregnant out of wedlock were typically executed, even though the Law says they should be. The Law also says that children who are disobedient to their parents should be executed, but it never happened so far as we know. But no, being “betrothed” would not solve the problem, since she is not to have sex until after the wedding ceremony.
Dr. Ehrman,
1. What/when was the need to differentiate the sequence of books of OT from Hebrew Bible?
2. When and how the additional OT books of Catholic Church were deleted for present Protestant OT (39 books)
1. I’m not sure I understand your question? 2. The Protestants rejected the books not found in the Hebrew Bible itself (that is, the “apocrypha,” which could be found in the Greek from of the OT) from the very beginning. Their OT was only the books of the Hebrew.
Dr Ehrman,
The sequence and arrangement of books of Old Testament and Hebrew Bible is different.
Why is that? Why was it done?
Does the diffrtent arrangement of books present a different message?
Regards
In antiquity the Hebrew Bible was not published as a single book with many books in it, as today. The separate books were circulated on different scrolls — either containing a single book or a small collection of the books. And so in the ancient world there wasn’t a single order, because they weren’t gathered together in one large book (especailly since they were written on scrolls — a single scroll could not contain all the books). And so various orders were possible.
Dr Ehrman,
Is there any difference between Hebrew Bible and OT of Protestant Bible other than sequence?
regards,
No, the Protestant OT is a translation of the Hebrew.
In the ancient Greek manuscripts, why didn’t they space between words? It seems like the natural thing to do and I would think it would make reading them very difficult.
It’s amazing how many things seem natural to us that don’t seem natural to other times and places, and it’s hard to get our minds around it. (In the ncient world, why didn’t they eat at *tables*? With *chairs*?? What were they thinking). Spaces just didn’t occur to anyone — not just the Greeks. Hebrew is written that way too. Spaces are a modern invention. It might be worth looking up to see if they came into vogue with the invention of the printing press. I don’t know, but it would make some sense.
From time to time I’ve heard that Jesus’s parables often have surprise endings (a punch line?) that try to get hearers to view the world differently. It’s sometimes said that many, rather than being completely original to Jesus, were probably common stories at the time to which Jesus (or the gospel writers) gave a special twist.
Is that a standard view among critical NT scholars. If so, do the parables typically contain clues as to what the punch line is? Many of us have heard them so many times that there’s nothing surprising about them.
It’s a widely held view, yes. Sonme scholars push it to an exteme, though, to say if it doesn’t have a surprise ending, or an unusual message that makes one stop and thin, it’s not one that Jesus said — that’s not necessarily the case I should think.
I’ve sometimes thought that the most concrete and plausible notion of God is that of a universal mind in which we all participate through our own minds. I think that originated in Hinduism.
Is there any hint of that notion in the gospels or the historical Jesus? Or can it be found in Paul, eg, when he talks about taking on the mind of Christ and being part of Christ’s body?
Im not asking whether the NT writers were influenced by Hinduism but whether the NT contains ideas similar to what I think of as Hinduism.
No, that view would be foreign to the ancient Jews and Christians. You can find something like it, though, in Stoicism.
Would that view also be foreign to the Gnostics?
Sorry, I don’t know which comment of mine you’re asking about!
In response to Seeker’s comment. Did any of the Gnostics have the concept of God as universal mind?
Not in the way we would think of it today, no.
Professor Ehrman,
An unrelated question. I recently heard a preacher say that Ephesians 1:3-14 is the longest sentence in the Greek language in any known document. Can you comment on this claim? Thanks!
Hmmm… It’s a long sentence for sure. But, uh, I wonder how many other Greek books this preacher has read? It’d be interesting to know….
Bart,
Were the authors of the Gospels in *competition* with each other in a certain sense to write THE ONE
true Gospel that would be all someone needed – perhaps representing their particular flavor of the new movement?
They obviously never knew or intended that they would all be gathered together under one
cover in one *book*. What would the authors of these Gospels think of the concept of all 4 gathered together like that? I don’t think they would like it very much…
I hope that made at least some sense…if you have any insight on those questions TY !
SC
Luke seems to suggest that he was: see Luke 1:1-4 (he may well be referring to Mark, e.g.) My sense is that none of them would have been very keen about the idea that their account was supposed to be interpreted only in light of the account of someone else….