Early manuscript evidence as well internal inconsistencies indicate that the Bible manuscripts of the early Christians were edited and revised by the church. The Church Testament actually preserves a wide array of conflicting doctrines and ideological outlooks, and the differences between the gospels is pronounced. The evidence indicates that the purpose of the revisions was an attempt to harmonize the gospel accounts and lessen the conflicts in doctrine found on the pages of the Church Testament, or for the purpose of emphasizing ‘similarities' between gospel accounts, and down playing the marked differences, by ‘sharing' parables between manuscripts.

      Some of the tens of thousands of variant readings of copies of the church manuscripts are the result of the work of copyists who were not particularly concerned with precision, often paraphrasing or making small errors (manuscripts were copied by hand before the invention of the printing press). Other variants are due to poor translation. But there still remain a number of revisions and variants that were deliberately included in the manuscripts for the purpose of either harmonizing the inconsistent doctrinal positions of gospels and letters or harmonizing the church documents with the developments that took place in Christian theology over the first few centuries of the existence of the church.

      Not all the revisions of the church manuscripts can simply be blamed on copyist error. As perfectly good example of this is found in the opening line of the gospel of Mark. The line reads, ‘The beginning of the gospel of Joshua Messiah, the son of God. The phrase ‘the son of God' is not found in the earliest manuscripts. It is hard to imagine a scribe becoming so exhausted after copying the very first line of Mark's gospel that an inadvertent error, a notorious slip of the copyists pen took place, and the phrase ‘the son of God' was omitted. Furthermore, the phrase ‘the Son of God' is so central to Christian theology is impossible to imagine it being omitted from earlier manuscripts. It is obvious in this case that the phrase was added later, by the church, in order to harmonize Mark's gospel with developments in later Christology, as well as to bring terminology in Mark's gospel into ‘harmony' with that employed with other gospel narratives. (Mark was heavily influenced by apocalyptic imagery in the book of Daniel, as his explicit reference to Daniel's gospel in his ‘mini-apocalypse' indicates. Throughout the gospel Mark uses Daniel's term ‘the son of humanity' to refer to Joshua. The phrase ‘the son of God' was a later harmonization by the church.)

      The gospel of Mark, in its earliest form, ends with the discovery of the empty tomb in chapter sixteen. The remainder of the conclusion was added later by the church. Several variant endings of Mark's gospel are found in different early manuscripts and the current version is simply the version that ultimately found acceptance. Once again it is impossible to imagine early scribes becoming tired out and simply deciding to skip the ending of Mark's gospel, or to imagine a tired, error prone scribe ‘accidently' forgetting to copy the end of Mark's gospel. The fact that variant proposed endings of the gospel are known to exist demonstrates that the early church was dissatisfied with Mark's sudden conclusion, and decided to add references to Joshua appearing here and there to strengthen the allusion to the resurrection that was found in the original manuscript.

      We can only see the tail end of the process of editing and revision of the church manuscripts, and the best evidence we have comes from the fourth century when, finally, the work on the manuscripts was stopped, they became ‘canonical' and soon enough became ‘infallible, divine, and inerrant' making further work impossible (from this time forward any work on ‘harmonizing' the material with the needs of church doctrine would be confined to the efforts of translators. The originals hardened into stone, and were no longer subject to any extensive editing or revision after this time.)

      A good fourth century example of editing of the manuscripts to bring them into line with church dogma is the addition of the famous passage to the letter of John which endorses the third and fourth century concept of ‘the Holy Trinity'. (Before this time, at the doctrinal convention at Nice in the third century, the church had what could be called a dogma of ‘the Holy two' (the ‘holy spirit' only attaining full godhood in a trinity formulation about a century later). The phrase added to the gospel of John to afford manuscript ‘evidence' of the trinity doctrine reads, ‘and we have these three witnesses in heaven, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' A similar trinity formulation is found appended to the end of Matthew's gospel. ‘Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' When you consider that the church is known to have edited the letter of John to add a reference to trinity dogma, and when you consider the long centuries and conventions and heated debates the church engaged in before finally developing the doctrine of the trinity and adopting it formally in the fourth century, you can understand how the addition of such trinitarian terminology at the end of Matthew's gospel is another example of revision (if such strong statements in support of the trinity were actually original it leads one to wonder why the church took so long to decide the issue. The fact that it is well known that the church revised John's letter to provide scriptural evidence to support the trinity doctrine also suggests that Matthew's gospel was revised in a similar manner. The process is circular. Trinity doctrine is added to scripture, and then scripture is quoted to support trinity dogma.)

      There are numerous examples from the fourth century of revisions and additions to the gospel manuscripts designed to bring the accounts into greater harmony. If a passage or phrase was found in one gospel account and not another, then suddenly, in fourth century manuscripts the additional phrase would appear in the manuscripts. Many examples of such harmonization consist of the addition of a few words here and there, a phrase here and there. Other additions were more significant, such as the addition to Matthew's gospel of Luke's deist parable comparing a person's ability to discern the future weather based on the signs in the sky to their ability to discern the ‘signs of the times.' This parable was not originally found in Matthew's gospel. Furthermore, in its original form in Luke's gospel, the parable was employed as an argument for deism (‘so then why don't you decide for yourselves what is right?'). This ideological individualism has no place in the ‘master-slave' ideology of Matthew's gospel, and the concluding deist statement was not moved to Matthew's account, but is found only in Luke. The portion of the parable that was harmonized into Matthew's gospel follows:

"He answered them, "When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather; for the sky is red.' And in the morning, ‘It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.' You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times." (Matthew Chapter 16 verse 2)

The mysterious 16th Chapter of Romans

      There is evidence for tens of thousands of variants in the New Testament manuscripts, including many minor adjustments (harmonizations) designed to bring gospel narratives into harmony (often the addition of a couple of words found in one version and not another). There are also more significant additions, such as the ending appended onto the gospel of Mark, or the introduction of the Trinity formulation to scriptures (in this case to introduce harmony between scripture and evolving church dogmas). As in the case of the gospel of Mark, an ending has been appended onto the book of Romans, which, along with the clarifications and expansions included in the rest of the manuscript, indicate that the book of Romans was edited.

      In the earliest manuscripts of the Book of Romans the 16th chapter is not included. In manuscripts that follow the the 16th chapter of Romans is included, but as the 15th chapter, with the 15th chapter following and thus becoming the 16th chapter. In the final form, as the manuscript has come down to us today, the 16th chapter is found at the end of the book of Romans.

      It would appear that the 16th chapter of Romans was a fragment and that a decision was made to preserve this fragment by appending it onto the manuscript of Romans. It was obvious that the fragment would have to be appended to the end of the manuscript because it is in the form of a logical conclusion. The last few verses read:

" {The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.} Now to him that is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which hath been kept in silence through times eternal, but now is manifested, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, is made known unto all the nations unto obedience of faith: to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory for ever. Amen." (Romans Chapter 16 verse 24)

      Note that verse 24 (in curly brackets) is another example of a verse not found in earlier versions of the manuscript, an example of a verse added to a chapter which itself is a later interpolation. The reasons for the movement of chapter 16 can be understood when we understand that the end of chapter 15 is also a logical conclusion to the book. The book could either end logically with chapter 15 or chapter 16, and there was obviously difference of opinion as to where to insert chapter 16 into the manuscript. Chapter 15 ends as follows:

"Now I beseech you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me; that I may be delivered from them that are disobedient in Judaea, and that my ministration which I have for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints; that I may come unto you in joy through the will of God, and together with you find rest. Now the God of peace be with you all. Amen." (Romans Chapter 15 verse 30)

      Eventually the fragment settled as the end of the book of Romans and now forms the 16thchapter. This chapter preserves some valuable information about the early history of the church. In form it consists of a long list of ‘greetings' and it is the identity of those sending the greetings that proves to be interesting. (The 16th chapter of Romans would later prove to be so problematic for church theologians that Jerome would be forced to mistranslate portions of it when preparing his Latin Vulgate.)

      It would appear that women in the early church held high church offices, even the very highest in the church. For example, the opening series of greetings reads as follows:

"I commend unto you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant of the church that is at Cenchreae: that ye receive her in YAHWEH, worthily of the saints, and that ye assist her in whatsoever matter she may have need of you: for she herself also hath been a helper of many, and of mine own self. Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for my life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles: and salute the church that is in their house. Salute Epaenetus my beloved, who is the first-fruits of Asia unto Christ. Salute Mary, who bestowed much labor on you. Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen, and my fellow-prisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also have been in Christ before me. Salute Ampliatus my beloved in YAHWEH." (Romans Chapter 16 verse 1)

      Worthy of note here are all the names of women who were Paul's ‘co-workers' in the gospel, who were in charge of running churches from their homes, and of special note is the woman ‘Junias' whom is called ‘noteworthy among the apostles' and to whom deference is shown because she was ‘a Christian before me'. It is also interesting to note that the early church apparently had a different definition of the term ‘apostle' than that which is common today (typically taken to refer to the ‘twelve' who were assigned a special office, that of apostle). Junias, and Andronicus were both noteworthy ‘apostles' and this leads one to wonder just how the early churches went about defining the meaning of the term ‘apostle'. (It is known from the letter to the Corinthians, that the office of apostle was listed as the top office of the church, before even ‘prophet' or ‘miracle working healers', healers being at the very bottom of the list, strangely enough. So we can see that women held the highest of offices as they were designated in the early church.)

      By the time Jerome got around to translating the official Latin Vulgate, the editing days of the church had come to an end, and the canon was entering a new phase (that of being fixed in stone). Furthermore, there were a lot of manuscripts in circulation by this time, so that Jerome could not simply adjust the original manuscripts. Therefore, Jerome was forced to nullify these passages in translation, and the women mentioned became men. The reasons for his nullifications become obvious when you consider some of the other traditions which have also been preserved in the Church Testament. The conflicts that the introduction of this fragment into the book of Romans brought to the Church Testament make its preservation of particular interest, in that it records a totally separate strand of tradition in regards to the status of women in the early church. This could also explain why it is not found in some earlier manuscripts (it was removed because it promoted women even to apostolic offices. However this theory would not explain the movement of the fragment between the 15th and 16th chapters in various following manuscripts of Romans. It does not seem to have been original, but rather was a later fragment that was preserved by appending it to the manuscript of Romans, an explanation that seems more logical to me.)

      The 16th chapter of Romans provides us with valuable information about the status of women in at least one sect of the early church. It seems to be in general agreement with the position of equality outlined in the following passage taken from Paul's letter to the Galatians:

"For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ. There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one in Christ Jesus. And if ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise." (Galatians Chapter 3 verse 27)

      Galatians and Romans share terminology, language constructs and other features in the Greek that separate them from the other letters in the Church Testament, and they also are found to share the doctrine of equality. However other conflicting traditions are found in the epistles and it was these traditions that caused Jerome so much trouble. According to these traditions, not only were women forbidden to be apostles, they were even forbidden to so much as speak in church, which was considered downright shocking. They were to keep silent, and if they wanted to speak, or even if they had a question about something they heard in church, they could ask their husbands about it when they got home. They were also to stay home, do housework, and obtain ‘salvation' through childbearing, and there were to wear veils at all times (since it was considered scandalous for women not to wear their veils). Most of these harshly oppressive traditions have fallen by the way side, and are not observed in even the most conservative of fundamentalist denominations (with the exception of the doctrine that women are to stay home and keep house). But every one of these dogmas was in vogue during Jerome's time (hence the need to nullify the troublesome 16th chapter of Romans, lest any women should start getting ‘ideas' based on ‘the authority of scripture' itself, refuse to listen to ‘the church fathers' and begin to ask hard questions about their assigned roles in society, instead of meekly submitting to ‘God's Word.' That Jerome would actually have the nerve to mistranslate these passages is not surprising when you consider that before this time the church actually had the nerve to edit the manuscripts themselves. Moving on to the task of mistranslating the manuscripts was a small matter in comparison. The church has employed whatever techniques were available to them at the time, and mistranslation is still in vogue as the notorious examples found in the modern NIV translation demonstrate so well. The Spirit of Jerome lives on, and the same impulse that led to editing of the original documents (dogmatism) is still present in the church, as is proved by their willingness to deliberately mistranslate passages, even translating them in the exact opposite sense of the original meaning right to this very day.)

NOTE: my piece on the NIV will be posted shortly. this page is progress and the final version will be posted in the near future. By the way, for a perfect example from the NIV of verse translated OPPOSITE to original sense see Jeremiah chapter 7 from about verses 20 onwards. Compare a few translations. If we accept what Jeremiah said the Christian doctrine of atonement by 'the Levitical sacrifice of Christ' would be completely destroyed, thus the translators, recognizing this, nullified the verse.