About The Bible I

1.   The Bible. Christians believe this book to be the true Word of God. From the creation account of Genesis to the end-time visions of Revelation, from the story of Israel to Jesus' ministry, it is the source for what Christians believe and how they try to live.

2.   The word Bible comes from the Greek word biblia, which means "books," which comes from another word, biblos, meaning  papyrus, a material books were made from in ancient times.

3.   The ancient Greeks obtained their supplies of paper from the port of Byblos, in what is now Lebanon. Their word for book-biblion (the singular form of biblia)- was derived from the name of this port, and from this we get our English word Bible, meaning the Book of books.

4.   The word Bible is not in the Bible. The term came long after all the writings were completed and assembled.

5.   The Bible is the world's best-selling book as well as the world's most shoplifted book!

6.   The Bible is the most bought yet understood book. Nine out of ten Americans own a Bible, but fewer than half ever read it. Worldwide sales of the Bible are uncountable.

7.   Just how big is the Bible? Stack ten average-sized nonfiction books printed today. That pile will contain the same number of words that are found in one Bible-close to one million words not counting the number of words in features like footnotes, verse numbers, and concordances.

8.   The Bible looks like one book, but is actually an anthology, a collection of many smaller books. In an even broader sense, it is not just an anthology of shorter works but an entire library.

9.   Some Bible books are as short as half a page. One of the longest books-Jeremiah-is roughly the length of today's short novel. This makes the Bible's longest book one hundred times longer than its shortest book.

10.   Though the Bible as a whole is much longer than most any other book we'd like to read, its individual books are mostly shorter than any other book we consider reading.

11.   The Bible is an extraordinary gathering of many books of law, wisdom, poetry, philosophy, and history. The number of books in this portable library depends on which Bible you are holding. The Bible of a Jew is different from the Bible of a Roman Catholic, which in turn is different from the Bible of a Protestant.

12.   The Bible is both ancient and contemporary as it deals with the unchanging issues of human existence: life, death, joy, sorrow, achievement, and failure...Yet these issues are couched in the language and correspondence of ancient times.

13.   Testament was another word for "covenant"-meaning an agreement, contract, or pact. For Christians, the Old Testament represents the ancient covenant made between God and his people. In the New Testament, Christians believe in a new covenant with God made through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.