Fact 1
The Bible is the method the Supernatural Being (the God of the Bible) who created everything has chosen to communicate with the pinnacle of His creation: mankind. How do we know? We know because the Bible says so: 2 Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is breathed out by God…” So when Moses wrote about the creation in the first few chapters of Genesis, his mind was being guided by God. And when Isaiah wrote about Cyrus being king of Persia approximately 150 years before Cyrus was born (Isaiah 45:1-3) and when he wrote about the coming Messiah (chapter 53); His linage, incarnation (coming in human form) and His death in amazing detail some 700 years be-fore Jesus was born, his mind was being guided by God.
Fact 2
The word Bible was first applied to the Hebrew scripture in the 2nd Century A.D.
Fact 3
The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic; The New Testament in Greek.
Fact 4
The Bible is unique in all literature. About 40 writers, ranging from kings, farmers, prophets and fishermen, to a tax collector, a doctor, a Rabbi, a cupbearer, a military General, and others, wrote it over a period of 1,600 years. It was written on three continents (Asia, Africa and Europe) and in three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek) — but it is one coherent story from start to finish with salvation through faith in Jesus Christ as its theme.
Fact 5
The full cannon of scripture was not finally put together until AD 367 when the Bishop of Alexandria, Athanasius, set out the 27 books of the New Testament in their present form in his Easter letter in an effort to protect his flock from the heretical writings circulating at the time. Even though the writings (letters and books) were held up as inspired scripture and circulated among the churches at the time of the apostles. His compilation was confirmed by the councils at Hippo in 393 and at Carthage in 397.
Fact 6
The present chapter divisions of the Bible were most likely devised by Stephen Langton (died 1228), a professor in Paris who later became Archbishop of Canterbury. He placed them into a Vulgate edition of the Bible.
The Old Testament was divided into verses by Rabbi Nathan in 1488 and the New Testament by Robert Stephanus who placed them in a Greek New Testament in 1551 and he published them in an edition of the Latin Vulgate in 1555 which was the first Bible to have the present chapters and divisions. The first English Bible with these divisions was the Geneva Bible of 1560.
Fact 7
The Bible consists of 66 books; 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament. It has 1,189 chapters; 929 in the OT and 260 in the NT. Its chapters are divided into 31,173 verses; 23,214 in the OT and 7,959 in the NT. The shortest chapter in the Bible is Psalm 117 and the long-est chapter is Psalm 119.
Fact 8
The Bible is the first and undisputed best-seller of all time and no other book is likely to take its place. Best estimates put the total number of Bibles printed to be in excess of 4 billion.
Fact 9
The Bible was the first book to be printed by Johannes Gutenberg after he invented the movable type printing press. This was carried out in Mainz, Germany in the 1450’s. Only 21 complete copies survive. The one shown here is held in the New York public Library.
Fact 10
The Bible has been translated into in excess of 2,000 language groups which cover over 90% of the world’s population.
Fact 11
An arithmetic sequence gives the life spans of the patriarchs in their correct order and all are on the linage to the Messiah.
Patriarch Life Span Arithmetic Sequence Biblical Reference
Abraham 175 years 7 x 5² Genesis 25:7
Isaac 180 years 5 x 6² Genesis 35:28
Jacob (Israel) 147 years 3 x 7² Genesis 47:28
Fact 12
William Shakespeare’s name in the Bible.
In the 1500’s in England, Latin was the language of religion and all business was conducted in French. English was only spoken by the peasant class. However, two literary masterpieces promoted the English language significantly: they were the writings of William Shakespeare and the King James Bible. They are connected in another way as well. When the King James Bible was published in 1611, William Shakespeare was 46 years old and psalm 46 has his name encoded in it: the 46th word of psalm 46 is shake and the 46th word from the end of the chapter is spear. The same is true for the current King James Bible which was written in 1769.
