We do, however, have to venture into precarious territory here and avoid committing ad hominem fallacies. Lamsa, who aligns with Nestorian views, asserted the idea of the New Testament being originally written in Aramaic. Therefore, scholars overwhelmingly believe the New Testament writers penned the latter half of the Bible in Greek. We know, from the language of the Aramaic used in these manuscripts, that certain dialects used in the Peshitta manuscript existed centuries after Jesus’ time. Those who assert this position believe that the New Testament writers didn’t write the manuscripts in Greek but rather Aramaic. First, and primary, those who use this version of the Bible as their primary text often adhere to something known as “ Aramaic Primacy.” The Peshitta ControversiesĪs mentioned above, this manuscript has drawn a number of controversies. We’ll dive into some of those controversies here, discuss the original language of the New Testament, and touch on why this matters to us today. This seems innocuous enough, but this manuscript has drawn a great deal of controversy. Peshitta is a “ collection of Aramaic manuscripts of the Bible.” Many Syriac churches will use this version of the Bible as their primary text. Now, what does this have to do with the title “Peshitta”? Back during the time of Jesus, the Jews would have spoken multiple languages from Hebrew, Aramaic, and the lingua franca at the time (most likely Greek). After all, maybe we learned a Greek word like logos and how it applied to John 1, or we saw someone get a Hebrew word from the Bible as a tattoo.īut many of us forget about a third language in which the writers penned Scripture: Aramaic.įor instance, we find portions of Ezra and Daniel containing Aramaic, the language of the common people. Most of us might venture answers such as Greek or Hebrew. Pop quiz, what were the original languages of Scripture?

Pdf copy of the peshitta