Ancient Sources Compared to New Testament copies

Author	Book	Date Written	Earliest Copies	Time Gap	Numbers of early copies
Homer	Iliad	800 BC	c. 400 BC	c. 400 years	643
Herodotus	History	480-425 BC	c.AD900	c. 1,350 yrs.	8
Thucydides	History	460-400 BC	c. AD 900	c. 1,300 yrs.	8
Plato	Surviving works	400 BC	c. AD 900	c. 1,300 yrs.	7
Demosthenes	Surviving works	300 BC	c. AD 1100	c. 1,400 yrs.	200
Julius Caesar	Gallic Wars	c. 54 BC (lived 100-44 BC)	c. AD 900	c. 1,000 yrs.	10
Livy	History of Rome	?-AD17 (lived 59BC-AD 17)	4^th century (partial) 10^th century	c.400 yrs c 1,000	1 partial 19 copies
Tacitus	Annals	c. AD 100	c. AD 1100	c. 1,000 yrs.	20
Pliny the Younger	Natural History	c. AD 100	C, AD 850	c. 750 yrs.	7
New Testament	27 books	AD 50-70 (some scholars date Revelation as late as AD100)	c.114 fragments c. 200 books c. 250 New Testament (most) c. 325 New Testament (complete)	10 – 50 yrs. 70-100 years 100-150 yrs. 200-225 yrs.	5366

Early Patristic Quotations from the New Testament
(from their surviving works)

Writer	Gospel	Acts of Apostles	Pauline Epistles	Catholic Epistles	Revelation	Total
Justin Martyr	268	10	43	6	3 (266 allusions)	330
Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyon	1,038	194	499	23	65	1,819
Clement of Alexandria	1,017	44	1,127	207	11	2,406
Origen	9,231	349	7,778	399	165	17,922
Tertullian	3,822	502	2,609	120	205	7,258
Hippolytus	734	42	387	27	188	1,378
Eusebius	3,258	211	1,592	88	27	5,176
Totals	19,368	1,352	14,035	870	664	36,289

Charts inspired from Evidence That Demands a Verdict, page 55

· Papias: Now Matthew made an ordered arrangement of the oracles in the Hebrew language, and each one translated it as he was able.

· Irenaeus wrote of Papias: ...a hearer of John and a companion of Polycarp.

"(Polycarp) had familiar intercourse with John and with others who had seen the Lord."

of the Apostle Matthew: "Matthew also among the Hebrews published a written gospel in their own dialect, when Peter and Paul were preaching in Rome and founding the Church there."(c. 180AD)

· Irenaeus wrote of himself: that he ...had the preaching of the Apostles still echoing in his ears and their doctrine in front of his eyes.

· Polycarp wrote: "of the apostles who preached to us.."

· Eusebius wrote 4^th century of Pantaenus (teacher of Clement of Alexandria) circa 150-215, (He) went to India, and the tradition is that he there found his arrival anticipated by some who were acquainted with the gospel according to Matthew; for Bartholomew, one of the Apostles, had preached to them and left them the writing of Matthew in Hebrew letters, and this writing was preserved until the time mentioned.

· St. Jerome finished the official Latin Vulgate 407AD. He testified that when he translated Matthew he worked with an ancient copy of Matthew's Gospel written in Hebrew.