The Old Testament. Have Christians written a fair portion of it themselves?

[Twilight Hue]

As I understand it, 24 books are in the Hebrew Bible used in Judaism.

There are 39 books in the Old Testament as part of the Holy Bible used in
Christendom.

Are 15 of the Old Testament books actually written by Christians themselves and passing it along and credited as being Jewish in origin?

If so, I think a fair number of Christians and respective denominations should stop deceiving people into thinking that the Old Testament is completely Jewish in origin.

If in disagreement with that assessment, where did the extra Old Testament books come from?

 

[Sanzbir]

From what I understand the Christian Old Testament and the Tanakh are made up of the same books, just in a different order.

I think what you are referring to is the Deuterocanonical Books, which are used in some Christian Bibles but the vast majority of Christian Bibles do not include this.

Even the Deuterocanonical Books were not "written by Christians themselves", but came from a book called the Septaguint, which was a Greek translation of the Tanakh plus the Apocrypha (the extra books) that some Jews including Jesus and his disciples used at the time of Christianity's rise.

Basically the extra books came from Greek-language speaking Jews.

 

[Skwim]

As I understand it, 24 books are in the Hebrew Bible used in Judaism.

There are 39 books in the Old Testament as part of the Holy Bible used in
Christendom.

Are 15 of the Old Testament books actually written by Christians themselves and passing it along and credited as being Jewish in origin?

If so, I think a fair number of Christians and respective denominations should stop deceiving people into thinking that the Old Testament is completely Jewish in origin.

If in disagreement with that assessment, where did the extra Old Testament books come from?

'The Christian Bible consists of all the Jewish Hebrew texts but they are arranged in a different manner so it makes a total of 39 books which are together known as the ‘old testament’."
source​

 

[Lyndon]

They were all written by Jews before the time of Christ, so no, they obviously weren't written by Christians. But they weren't all written in Hebrew, some were written in Aramaic, none were written in Greek as far as I know.

 

[Twilight Hue]

'The Christian Bible consists of all the Jewish Hebrew texts but they are arranged in a different manner so it makes a total of 39 books which are together known as the ‘old testament’."
source​

So essentially the Christian versions mix the Judaic writings up with the Torah at the beginning , then it mixes around the prophets and writings leaving Jesus as an open-end prophet yet to be fulfilled by his return, whereas Judaism says there has been no Messiah as of yet.

 

[Twilight Hue]

They were all written by Jews before the time of Christ, so no, they obviously weren't written by Christians. But they weren't all written in Hebrew, some were written in Aramaic, none were written in Greek as far as I know.

I thought it was the Greeks that had categorized it differently.

 

[Twilight Hue]

So basically what's being said is that the Old Testament is not a Christian work, but rather a redacted version of the Judaic scriptures.

 

[Sanzbir]

I thought it was the Greeks that had categorized it differently.

Not the Greeks, Greek-speaking Jews.

So basically what's being said is that the Old Testament is not a Christian work, but rather a redacted version of the Judaic scriptures.

"Redacted"?? No. A Greek translation that changed the order of the books, since the Greek-speaking Jews seemed to prefer an order to the book based on chronological occurrences, whereas the original book is organized by category, and added in some other books (that Christians largely later removed since they wanted their Old Testament to be more similar to the Tanakh then the Septaguint).

 

[Skwim]

So basically what's being said is that the Old Testament is not a Christian work, but rather a redacted version of the Judaic scriptures.

Yup, Just look what Christians did with one of my favorite verses, Isaiah 45:7. In the Tanakh it reads:

ז יוֹצֵר אוֹר וּבוֹרֵא חֹשֶׁךְ, עֹשֶׂה שָׁלוֹם וּבוֹרֵא רָע; אֲנִי יְהוָה, עֹשֶׂה כָל-אֵלֶּה. {פ} 7
I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil; I am the LORD, that doeth all these things.​

But depending on which Bible one reads, god says:

I make peace, and create evil or

troubles
doom
woe
calamity
disaster(s)
hard times
bad times
discords



.​

 

[Nakosis]

As I understand it, 24 books are in the Hebrew Bible used in Judaism.

There are 39 books in the Old Testament as part of the Holy Bible used in
Christendom.

Are 15 of the Old Testament books actually written by Christians themselves and passing it along and credited as being Jewish in origin?

If so, I think a fair number of Christians and respective denominations should stop deceiving people into thinking that the Old Testament is completely Jewish in origin.

If in disagreement with that assessment, where did the extra Old Testament books come from?

Until the 4th Century CE there are only fragments which date back to 150 BCE. There some verification to the DSS. I don't know what's around prior to that for verification.

Over the years the Bible continued to change, albeit slightly. Several versions were in circulation before the text was canonized in what we call the Masoretic Text. However, it seems likely that by the time of the Second Temple, 6TH century BCE – 1ST century CE, much of the Torah existed in very much the form we know today.
Who wrote the Torah?

 

[Augustus]

Not the Greeks, Greek-speaking Jews.

That probably makes them Greeks/Hellenes. This predates modern concepts of nation states as a source of identity.

You didn't have to be from Greece to be Greek or from Italy to be Roman, or (later) from Arabia to be an Arab.

 

[Enoch07]

Yup, Just look what Christians did with one of my favorite verses, Isaiah 45:7. In the Tanakh it reads:

ז יוֹצֵר אוֹר וּבוֹרֵא חֹשֶׁךְ, עֹשֶׂה שָׁלוֹם וּבוֹרֵא רָע; אֲנִי יְהוָה, עֹשֶׂה כָל-אֵלֶּה. {פ} 7
I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil; I am the LORD, that doeth all these things.​

But depending on which Bible one reads, god says:

I make peace, and create evil or

troubles
doom
woe
calamity
disaster(s)
hard times
bad times
discords
​

​

This is why any Christian who is serious about understanding the bible should only use the KJV. It is not perfect mind you. But the KJV really is the best to use for English readers. It is the closest to the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic writings. With a Strongs Exhaustive Concordance translations are much easier. That's why scholars (who post here a lot) that use other versions of the Bible constantly get so much wrong. Your example of Isaiah 45:7 is a great examplr, here it is from the KJV.

Isaiah 45:7 King James Version (KJV)

7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.

Any serious student of the Bible will not settle for the inferior new translations. Because they are so twisted, they are pointless to use.

 

[Sanzbir]

That probably makes them Greeks/Hellenes. This predates modern concepts of nation states as a source of identity.

You didn't have to be from Greece to be Greek or from Italy to be Roman, or (later) from Arabia to be an Arab.

Typically Jews during the Hellenic occupation still identified as Jews though, despite language shifts.

Otherwise we'd say something like "Jesus was not a Jew, he was Aramaic."

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

As I understand it, 24 books are in the Hebrew Bible used in Judaism.

The number "24" is a function of what is considered a "book."

BTW, some might consider it intellectually disingenuous to rush into polemic while being so ill-informed particularly when the information is so readily available. See, for example, here.

 

[Augustus]

Typically Jews during the Hellenic occupation still identified as Jews though, despite language shifts.

Otherwise we'd say something like "Jesus was not a Jew, he was Aramaic."

That's just a language though, not a cultural identity.

Hellenistic Jews were part of the Greek diaspora and were culturally both Greek and Jewish. They seem to have been considered a distinct group within Judaism based on this.

 

[Twilight Hue]

The number "24" is a function of what is considered a "book."

BTW, some might consider it intellectually disingenuous to rush into polemic while being so ill-informed particularly when the information is so readily available. See, for example, here.

I got the info from Torah.org.

 

[Sanzbir]

Hellenistic Jews were part of the Greek diaspora and were culturally both Greek and Jewish. They seem to have been considered a distinct group within Judaism based on this.

So then... on what grounds did you object to my label of "Greek-speaking Jews"??

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I got the info from Torah.org.

You just didn't understand it.

 

[Augustus]

So then... on what grounds did you object to my label of "Greek-speaking Jews"??

I didn't object to that label, it's perfectly correct.

Not the Greeks,

I just slightly disagreed with this bit. Greek speaking Jews were probably still Greeks.

 

[pearl]

They were all written by Jews before the time of Christ, so no, they obviously weren't written by Christians. But they weren't all written in Hebrew, some were written in Aramaic, none were written in Greek as far as I know.

I think it was at the council of Jamnia that it was decided to accept only those books written in Hebrew were accepted, not those from the Septuagint interpretation.