2 - The New Testament

Summary

For Christians, the Bible consists of two quite separate but interlocking Testaments, the Old and the New. The New Testament, the second part of the Christian Church's canon, marks the beginning of the separation of Christianity and Judaism.

Written primarily in Koine Greek (with occasional Latin and Aramaic expressions) and dating from the mid-first to the early second century ce, the New Testament addresses both Jews and Gentiles. The designation ‘New Testament’ can also be translated ‘new covenant’, which derives in part from Jeremiah 31:31–34. Jeremiah anticipated a ‘new covenant’, distinct from the covenant at Sinai that the Children of Israel often failed to follow. In the Old Testament the term ‘covenant’ (berit) is usually understood as a sacred agreement and expresses the sovereign power of God, who promises in a solemn oath to fulfil his word to his people Israel, who have only to be faithful and obey. In the New Testament the concept is reinterpreted through the experiences of the early Christian community and represents a new phase in the covenant-story of Israel.

The translation from Hebrew into Greek provided a major challenge for the first Christians and had an impact on Christian interpretation of and in the New Testament. See, for example, the cry of dereliction that the Gospels record that Jesus recited in Aramaic on the cross, ‘My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?’ (Mark 15:34; Ps. 22:1).