Welcome to First Century Bible
This is a new Bible translation in English, still in the earliest stages of preparation, and presented here as an ongoing project. It is based primarily upon the Greek and Slavonic Bibles of eastern tradition. The Old Testament is therefore derived from the most ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures, begun in the third century BC, and known as the Septuagint; and this is accompanied by the traditional Byzantine New Testament.
Although early Christianity began as a sect of Judaism, it very quickly spread throughout the Mediterranean Greek speaking world. It was therefore quite natural that the early Christians should adopt the Greek scriptures as their Bible, to which were added, over the course of time, the books of the New Testament. The Septuagint was received as the inspired word of God and became an integral part of Christian tradition. It is the version that was known to the New Testament writers, and to all the early Fathers of the first few Christian centuries. To the churches of the Orthodox east its use continues unchanged, but in the post-Reformation west, although it is extremely well known to the world of professional scholarship, it is now virtually unknown to the ordinary Bible reader. As a basis for modern Bible translation it has no place, being of academic interest only, and since the Reformation has been supplanted by the Hebrew Masoretic text of Rabbinical Judaism.
But the Septuagint has a richness and beauty of its own. Its real value is that it is translated from a much earlier, pre-Masoretic Hebrew text to which it is now virtually the only complete witness. The Hebrew scriptures were subject to a substantial revision at the end of the first century, when the Hebrew canon was first formally recognised, and the text established from which the Masoretic is directly descended. All earlier versions and copies were systematically destroyed, apart from a few fragments that survived by being hidden among the Dead Sea Scrolls. The Septuagint was effectively disowned by the Rabbis who sought to purge their scriptures from all Christian associations. Ironically, this became a reason for its rejection by the Reformers, the Masoretic thus becoming the textus receptus for nearly all English versions ever since.
It should be understood that in the first century there was no fixed canon, nor were all the scriptures contained in a single volume. Each local church would acquire its own collection of scriptures which were considered to be inspired and authoritative, and the term 'Septuagint' broadly includes all those that were available in Greek, including some which are now regarded in the west as apocryphal. The canons of both Old and New Testaments developed with many local variations over the course of several centuries. The present objective is simply to produce an English Bible that will be more fully representative, and to make available to the ordinary reader, the scriptures that were known and received by the early Church. All the books of the Septuagint were highly regarded and widely used, and they are accepted here, with no debate as to their canonicity or otherwise, but simply as an authentic and valid part of Christian history and tradition.
Thank you for your interest. All comments and feedback will be welcome.