Introduction To The New Testament

          The second half of the Holy Bible is called the "New Testament", which literally means "new covenant" (Luke 22:20). The word covenant means an agreement made by one party,in which the other involved partycould accept or reject the agreement, but couldn't make any change in it. The Old Testament mainly describes God’s interaction with the Israelites, based on the covenant given through Moses on Mount Sinai, while the New Testament, describes God’s agreement with human beings through Jesus based on the new covenant (Exodus 24:1-8, Luke 22:14-20, II Corinthians 3:6-11). The old covenant revealed God’s holiness on the religious level of the Law and promised the coming of a saviour. The new covenant sees the holiness of God in His righteous son. In this way, the New Testament contains those articles which reveal the contents of the new covenant.

          ‘‘The New Testament” is the second part of the Holy Bible. The story of God's people that began with the Old Testament (Jewish Scriptures)continues in the twenty-seven books of the New Testament also. The English word "Testament" is derived from a Latin word meaning "will" or "agreement" (covenant), which was used to translate the Greek word “diathec”. The Old Testament speaks of the covenant that God made with the people of Israel. This covenant was mainly based on the Mosaic Law. Those who obeyed God and lived according to this law were called God's people.But about six hundred years before Jesus was born, The prophet Jeremiah proclaimed a "new covenant", which was based on an inner relationship with God (Jeremiah 31:31-34).  The Christian writers of the New Testament used the language of the "new covenant" to describe what God did through Jesus Christ (I Corinthians8:7-13, 9:15-17, 11:25, 12:24-27). The apostle Paul says that the new covenant is not based on the Law, but rather comes from the spirit of God and gives a new life. (II Corinthians 3:6-15, Galatians 3:10-14).

          The books of the "New Testament" were written during about 100 years following Jesus' time. Many of its books focus on Jesus of Nazareth;, Who was considered to be born to Jewish parents and who is believed to be “the chosen one”, or “the saviour” by the Christians  (Mark 8:29, 14:61, 62, Luke 2:11, John 20:30, 31, Acts 3:18-21). The Four Gospels, (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), talk about the life and teachings of Jesus and each one presents it from a different perspective. The book of Acts describes how the early apostles preached about Jesus and spread Jesus' message in the decades following Jesus. The epistles of the New Testament explain how Jesus' message was preached and interpreted in the early years of the early church. At this time, the good news about Jesus was being delivered to new lands. The epistles were also giving an indication of what the early Christians were facing. Revelation, the last book of the New Testament, ends with the hope of a future in which God will create a new heaven and a new earth.

          It is impossible to give a definite date of the writing of the books of the New Testament books. However, most scholars believe that some of the apostles of Paul are the oldest of the writings of the New Testament. The four Gospels and Acts of the apostles were actually written after them. Mark was probably the first gospel to be presented in writing. It is likely that it was written in shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 AD.

          Message of the New Testament is focused on  - (1) That person, ho gave Hhimself for the forgiveness of sins (Matthew26:28), and (2) Those people (church), who have received His salvation. So the main theme of the New Testament is salvation. The Gospels introduce the Saviour to us. A book called Acts, describes the Gospel of his salvation in a large land of the Mediterranean world in the first century. The epistles give a detailed account of the blessings of that salvation and the book of Revelation foresees the climax of salvation.

          Although Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, the books of the New Testament were written in the Greek language which was the language of the common people at that time. The writers of the New-Testament were also familiar with the Greek translation of the Jewish Scripture known as the Septuagint. Many of the Passages found in the New Testament have been directly quoted from the Greek translation (Septuagint), while the others of the  Hebrew-language Jewish Scriptures have been translated into Greek. The original New Testament manuscripts were decomposed or destroyed long ago, but  the manuscripts of these articles continued to be made for centuries.The oldest copy of the New Testament, which is completely in Greek, dates back to about the fourth century, and the oldest copy of a part of the book of the New Testament is of 125 AD. Along with this, the early translations of the New Testament in Coptic, Syriac and Latin languagesare also very valuable for the Bible scholars. It took almost 350 years for the list of twenty-seven books of the New Testament found in our Bible today to be approved. 

The books of the New Testament in chronological order

          There are 27 books written in a span of 50 years by eight or nine different authors in the New Testament. All these books are divided into four parts –  the first part consists of the 4“Gospels”which describe the life of Christ.Then there is one book “Acts”, which describes the history of the expansion of Christianity. Then there are 21 letters or “epistles”, which reveal the principles and development of the church as well as its problems, and finally in “Revelation” there is a vision of the second advent of the Lord Jesus Christ. The books of the New Testament, are not placed in the Bible in the order in which the events are recorded. The following list shows which book was written when -

          After these books were written, each book was not archived into the Canon or the collection of those twenty seven books which comprise the New testament. First books like the epistles of Paul and the Gospels were collected and archived by those churches or people to whom they were sent. Gradually, all twenty-seven books were collected and were formally accepted by the whole church. This process took almost 350 years. But finally, they were compiled and the Canon was certified by Carthage's General Assembly of Religions in 397 AD.

          Though none of the original copy of the writings of the New Testament exist today, although, but, complete or partial parts of more than 4, 500 Greek manuscripts along with more than 8000 Latin manuscripts and at least 1000 editions of translations from the original books are in existence. A careful and comparative study of these available copies has provided the world with an accurate and reliable the New Testament.