59 Fun Facts About New Testament

How many books make up the New Testament?

The New Testament contains 27 books; the Protestant Old Testament adds 39, giving the familiar total of 66 for the whole Bible.

In what language was the New Testament originally written?

Greek, specifically the everyday Koine Greek of the eastern Roman world, is the language of every New Testament book, as the oldest papyrus fragments show.

Which Gospel do most scholars believe was written first?

Mark is placed first by most scholars ('Markan priority'): it is the shortest Gospel, and almost all of its material reappears, often word for word, in the two other Synoptic Gospels.

The Gospel of Luke and which other book are widely thought to be a two-volume work by the same author?

Acts of the Apostles opens by addressing the same Theophilus as Luke's Gospel; together the two volumes make up more than a quarter of the New Testament.

Which Gospel builds Jesus' ministry around seven 'signs', ending with the raising of Lazarus?

John's Gospel builds its first half around a series of miracles it calls 'signs', from water turned into wine at a wedding to the raising of Lazarus at Bethany.

Which archangel tells Mary she will bear a son, in the scene called the Annunciation?

Gabriel, the same angel who had announced a son to the elderly Zechariah, greets Mary in Luke 1; the Annunciation appears only in Luke's Gospel.

Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, is described in Luke as what relation to Mary?

Luke 1:36 calls Elizabeth her relative (syngenis), a word that does not specify the degree of kinship; the traditional 'cousin' is a later gloss.

According to the first Gospel, King Herod ordered the killing of all boys in Bethlehem up to what age?

The first Gospel (2:16) says Herod killed every boy in Bethlehem 'two years old and under', the age he reckoned from when the Magi said the star had appeared.

Which ruler had John the Baptist beheaded after John condemned his marriage to Herodias?

Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and Perea, ordered the beheading; Josephus places the execution at the fortress of Machaerus, east of the Dead Sea.

In John's Gospel, Jesus turned water into wine at a wedding in which town?

Cana in Galilee is where the fourth Gospel places the first sign: when the wine ran out, the water in six stone jars kept for Jewish purification became wine.

Which Sea of Galilee village was the base of much of Jesus' ministry and Peter's home?

Capernaum, on the north shore of the lake, is where the Gospels place the fisherman's house and the synagogue where Jesus taught; a fifth-century octagonal church was later built over the house.

The Feeding of the 5,000 is the only miracle apart from the resurrection that appears in how many Gospels?

All four Gospels record the Feeding of the 5,000, the only miracle before the resurrection that every evangelist includes; the fourth Gospel adds that a boy supplied the loaves and fish.

At the Transfiguration, Jesus is seen talking with which two Old Testament figures?

Moses and Elijah, often read as standing for the Law and the Prophets, appear with Jesus on the mountain in all three Synoptic accounts, witnessed by three disciples.

Zacchaeus, the tax collector of Jericho, climbed what to see Jesus over the crowd?

A sycamore tree, the sycamore-fig of Luke 19:4, gave the short tax collector his view; afterwards he promised half his goods to the poor and to repay anyone he had cheated.

How many days had Lazarus been dead when Jesus raised him?

Four days: the Gospel says Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days when Jesus arrived at Bethany, and Martha warned of the smell.

In the parable of the Good Samaritan, which two people pass the wounded man first?

A priest and a Levite each see the man and pass by on the other side before the Samaritan stops; Jesus tells it in Luke 10 to answer 'Who is my neighbour?'

In the parable of the Prodigal Son, what job is the younger son reduced to before he returns home?

Tending pigs, unclean animals to a Jewish audience, is the low point: Luke 15 says he was so hungry he longed to eat the pods the pigs ate.

The Samaritan woman whom Jesus meets at Jacob's Well had had how many husbands?

Five husbands: at Sychar Jesus tells her she has had five, and that the man she lives with is not her husband; Eastern tradition names her Photine.

The Sermon on the Mount opens with which set of sayings?

The Beatitudes, the 'Blessed are...' sayings, open the sermon in chapter 5 of the first Gospel, which arranges Jesus' teaching into a series of long discourses.

Nicodemus, who visited Jesus by night, was told a person must be what to see the kingdom of God?

'Born again', a phrase that can also mean 'born from above', is Jesus' answer in chapter 3 of the fourth Gospel; Nicodemus later helps Joseph of Arimathea bury Jesus.

The name Gethsemane, the garden where Jesus was arrested, comes from Aramaic words meaning what?

Oil press: Gethsemane comes from the Aramaic gat shemanim, an olive-oil press, fitting a garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives where Jesus often went with the disciples.

Which disciple cut off the ear of Malchus, the high priest's servant, during the arrest of Jesus?

Peter is named as the swordsman only in the fourth Gospel (18:10), which is also the only one to name the servant Malchus; Luke adds that Jesus healed the ear.

For how many pieces of silver did Judas Iscariot betray Jesus?

Thirty pieces of silver, the price the chief priests paid (26:15); the first Gospel adds that Judas threw the money back and the priests bought the potter's field with it.

Which prisoner did the crowd ask Pilate to release instead of Jesus?

Barabbas, described as a rebel and murderer held for an uprising, was released by Pilate at the crowd's demand; every Gospel tells the episode.

Who was compelled by the Romans to carry the cross of Jesus?

Simon of Cyrene, a passer-by coming in from the country, was pressed into carrying the cross; one Gospel names his sons Alexander and Rufus, and Cyrene lay in modern Libya.

The crucifixion site Golgotha is translated in the Gospels as 'the place of' what?

'The place of a skull' is how the Gospels gloss Golgotha, from Aramaic gulgulta; the Latin calvaria, 'skull', gives the name Calvary.

Which woman is honoured as the 'Apostle to the Apostles' for first witnessing the resurrection?

Mary Magdalene is the first to see the risen Jesus in the fourth Gospel and is sent to tell the disciples, hence the title; the church later dropped the medieval conflation of her with the sinner of Luke 7.

Which of the two disciples who walk with the risen Jesus to Emmaus is named?

Cleopas is named in Luke 24:18; his companion is never named, and the pair recognise Jesus only when he breaks bread at supper.

The Great Commission, Jesus telling followers to make disciples of all nations, closes which Gospel?

Matthew ends with it (28:16-20): on a mountain in Galilee Jesus tells the eleven to make disciples of all nations, baptising them, and promises to be with them always.

After Judas' death, the apostles chose his replacement by what method?

Casting lots: after praying for God to show which of the two he had chosen, the apostles drew lots and 'the lot fell on Matthias' rather than Joseph called Barsabbas.

Which chapter of the book after the Gospels describes the Holy Spirit descending at Pentecost?

Chapter 2: the Spirit comes as a rushing wind and tongues of fire on the day of Pentecost, the Jewish festival Shavuot held fifty days after Passover, and the apostles speak in many languages.

Who is traditionally regarded as the first Christian martyr, stoned to death in Acts 7?

Stephen, one of the men chosen in chapter 6 to oversee the daily distribution to widows, was stoned after his speech before the Sanhedrin; the young Saul approved of the killing.

Which couple in Acts 5 drop dead after lying about the price of land they sold?

Ananias and Sapphira kept back part of the price while claiming to give it all; each died on the spot when confronted, and great fear came on the church.

The Ethiopian official baptised by Philip was reading which book of Scripture in his chariot?

Isaiah: he was reading the passage 'like a sheep led to the slaughter' (Isaiah 53) when Philip joined the chariot and explained it as being about Jesus.

Saul of Tarsus was on his way to which city when he was struck blind by a light and heard the voice of Jesus?

A disciple named Ananias was sent to the house of Judas on the Street Called Straight to restore his sight.

According to Acts, what was Paul's trade?

It is how he came to work alongside Aquila and Priscilla in Corinth, and he had studied under the great teacher Gamaliel in Jerusalem.

The Roman centurion Cornelius, often called the first Gentile convert, was stationed in which city?

Caesarea, the Roman provincial capital on the coast, is where the centurion of the Italian Cohort lived; the apostle came from Joppa after his vision of a sheet of animals.

Lydia, regarded as the first documented Christian convert in Europe, was a dealer in what?

Purple cloth: chapter 16 calls her 'a seller of purple' from Thyatira, a city known for its dye trade; Paul met her at a riverside prayer place outside Philippi.

In which city were the followers of Jesus first called Christians?

Antioch in Syria, where Barnabas and Saul taught for a year; the city became a chief centre of early Christianity and the base for Paul's missionary journeys.

What did the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 decide about Gentile converts?

They need not be circumcised: James the Just gave the ruling, asking Gentile converts only to abstain from food offered to idols, blood, strangled meat and sexual immorality.

Paul's sermon on the Areopagus in Athens took as its starting point an altar dedicated to what?

An unknown god: Paul said he had found an altar inscribed 'To an unknown god' and proclaimed that god to them; the converts Dionysius the Areopagite and Damaris followed.

Eutychus, a young man in Troas, died after doing what during one of Paul's sermons?

Dozing off and falling from a window: as Paul talked past midnight in a lamp-lit upper room, Eutychus sank into sleep in the window and fell three storeys; Paul embraced him and he lived.

Paul and Silas were freed from prison in Philippi by what event?

An earthquake at midnight shook the prison's foundations, opening the doors and loosening every chain; the jailer, about to kill himself, was instead baptised with his household that night.

Which New Testament book is the shortest by word count?

2 John has fewer verses, but 3 John, a personal letter to a man named Gaius, has fewer words.

Paul's letter to Philemon asks him to welcome back which runaway slave as a brother?

Onesimus, whose name means 'useful'; Paul puns that he was once useless but now useful, and offers to repay anything the slave owes his master.

How many New Testament books have traditionally been attributed to Paul?

Fourteen: the thirteen letters bearing Paul's name plus Hebrews, which tradition also assigned to him although its authorship was disputed even in antiquity; modern scholars accept far fewer as certainly his.

On which island was John when he received the visions recorded in the Book of Revelation?

Patmos, a small Aegean island where the author says he was 'on account of the word of God'; its Cave of the Apocalypse and monastery became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1999.

The seven churches addressed at the start of Revelation were all located in what is now which country?

Turkey: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea all lay in the Roman province of Asia, in the west of modern Turkey.

The Four Horsemen of Revelation ride horses of which colours?

White, red, black and pale: the white horse's rider carries a bow, the red takes peace from the earth, the black holds scales, and the pale horse's rider is named Death.

Some early manuscripts give the number of the beast not as 666 but as what?

616: Papyrus 115 (third century) and Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus both read 616 rather than 666, and Irenaeus already knew of copies with that reading in the second century.

Which early church writer is the first known to call the Christian scriptures the 'New Testament'?

Tertullian, writing in Latin around 200, used 'Novum Testamentum' for the Christian writings in Against Praxeas; Irenaeus used the phrase of the covenant rather than of a book collection.

Which bishop's Easter letter of 367 first listed the 27 books of today's New Testament?

Athanasius of Alexandria, in his 39th Festal Letter of 367, listed exactly the books of the modern New Testament and called them 'canonized'; the Synod of Hippo in 393 approved the same list.

Who around AD 140 proposed a canon of only a modified Luke and ten Pauline letters?

Marcion, a wealthy shipowner from Sinope, rejected the Old Testament's God and kept only an edited Luke and ten Pauline letters; he was excommunicated in Rome around 144.

How many of Paul's letters are classed as 'undisputed', with near-consensus that he wrote them?

Seven: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians and Philemon; the other six letters bearing Paul's name lack the same consensus.

In the Latin West before the Vulgate, the Gospels were arranged in which order?

Matthew, John, Luke, Mark, the so-called Western order, puts the two apostles before the two companions of apostles; it appears in Codex Bezae and most Old Latin Gospel manuscripts.

What does the word 'catholic' mean when applied to the Catholic or General epistles?

Universal: the label, used by Eusebius in the fourth century, marks these letters as addressed to the church at large rather than to one named congregation, unlike Paul's letters to particular churches.

Which emperor commissioned Eusebius in 331 to produce fifty Bibles for Constantinople?

Constantine I: Eusebius records in his Life of Constantine that the emperor ordered fifty copies of the scriptures on fine parchment for the churches of his new capital, Constantinople.

Roughly how many Greek manuscripts preserve all or part of the New Testament?

More than 5,800 are catalogued, from papyrus scraps to complete codices; roughly 10,000 Latin manuscripts and some 9,300 in other ancient languages such as Syriac and Armenian add to the total.

Whose Bible placed Hebrews, James, Jude and Revelation last, reflecting his doubts about them?

Martin Luther, in his 1522 German New Testament, put those books at the end, unnumbered in the table of contents, and called James 'an epistle of straw' in his preface.