There are five manuscripts which were the main source of our present New Testament. Material from more recent discoveries has been included in later additions- The first is the Vatican Codex. It was made in the middle of the 4th century, possibly one of fifty five ordered by the Emperor Constantine after his conversion to Christianity in 323 A.D. It is now placed in the Vatican and is said to be a most beautiful work.

The second is the Sinai Codex. In 1844 Tischendorf visited the St. Catherine monastery at Mount Sinai and found some 43 leaves of an Old Testament manuscript in a waste basket. Nine years later he returned and obtained another fragment. After a further six years he returned again under the patronage of the Emperor of Russia. In a room occupied by the Great Steward of the monastery he recognised the rest of the Old Testament and the whole of the New Testament. After another ten years and a lot of dealing and money the text ended up in the Imperial Library at St. Petersburg. The British Museum purchased it from Russia for 100,000 British Pounds,

The third Codex, the Alexandria Codex was made in Egypt toward the end of the 5th century and presented to the Patriarch of Alexandria in 1098. This document was offered to James 1 of England who died before receiving it. So it was received by Charles 1, in 1628. The British Museum was founded in 1753 and the manuscript was deposited there.

The fourth manuscript is the Codex Bezae. It was made at the end of the 5th or the beginning of the 6th century. It came from St. Irenaeus monastery in Lyons in 1562 through Calvin's friend Theodore Beza. He presented it to the University of Cambridge in 1581. The left hand page contains Greek and the right hand page Latin in single columns. Many passages, especially in Luke and Acts differ greatly from other Greek manuscripts. This is our first indication that alterations have been made to the original texts.

The fifth manuscript is the Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus now deposited in the National Library in Paris. It was made in the 5th century in Egypt. Perhaps vellum was scarce at that time. The original Greek of the New Testament was erased and some sermons were written on it in the 12th century. Fortunately, with the use of chemicals, it was possible to restore the original writing in most places. I have to thank a little book, "The Thrilling Voices of the Past" by T.C. Innes, for this information. No date of publication or copyright is on the book.

The shame is that the world had to wait so long before records were available. We are forced to use manuscripts like the above which date from the fourth century A-D. The original documents are lost and we have to use very old transcriptions which were to be further subjected to translations of translations. Errors were bound to have occurred. It would be impossible to avoid this happening.

In studying the New Testament we must look at the difficulty of original manuscripts- We should also remember that there were no copyright laws in those times to protect authors and their works. Anyone who had inherited or otherwise acquired a manuscript was at liberty to delete or add anything he wished to the work of the original author. There were no mechanical means of reproducing manuscripts. Scribes would copy manuscripts by hand, many times over, thereby laying them open to easy alterations and errors by a copier who may have wished to change the screed. Perhaps he would try to update the text in conformity with current beliefs. In fact changes were made to the ancient texts.

Philological scholars (those who make a special study of languages) assure us that many, perhaps most, of the hooks of the Bible have been subject to alterations by persons who have wanted to include their own ideas. This also applies to the Old Testament which has had changes made to the original texts. There are many footnotes in the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible which refer to other ancient manuscripts with a different reading or alterations. This to my mind confirms the opinion of the philological experts that the Bible texts have often been tampered with.

There are 27 books in the New Testament of which half are written by the apostle Paul. The earliest of all the Christian writings are the 13 or possibly 14 epistles written to various churches which had been established by Paul. They are believed to be written about 55 to 65 A.D. I believe that Paul's epistles have been less subject to alterations than the Gospels or Acts. They can be checked against the stories in the book of Acts and Paul's other epistles.

Jesus left no written record of his teaching. We are totally dependent on what was passed on by word of mouth and relayed through his disciples to the early followers of Jesus. He and all his disciples were orthodox, devout Jews who regularly attended the synagogues. The Jews who believed in Jesus continued to observe the Mosaic laws and attended the synagogues. They did not forsake Judaism for the Christian religion.

The present day understanding of Jesus is that his teachings are good ethics. He showed compassion to the needy, poor, sick and to children. He went about doing good. He taught that people should repent and live a sincere and righteous life keeping the ten commandments and ordinances of Moses. That is a life built on ethical principles in conformity to a moral code.