Publisher's Synopsis
The Bible is a collection of texts that are held sacred in Judaism, Islam and Christianity. There is no single Bible and many Bibles with varying contents exist. The Bible is widely considered to be the best selling book of all time, has estimated annual sales of 100 million copies, and has been a major influence on literature and history, especially in the West where the Gutenberg Bible was the first mass-printed book. Various religious traditions have produced different versions of the Bible with different selections of texts. For example the Catholic bible is different from the Protestant Bible and the Jews and Muslims hold certain texts of the Old Testament as part of their sacred books. Currently it is estimated that there are approximately 1000 different English versions of "The Bible" in print - all with different content. The purpose of this series of books on religion, mythology and theology is designed to illuminate the necessity to emphasize our common humanity and eliminate the battles and divisiveness that exist within the ongoing religious struggles.This book discusses the history and manner in which the generally accepted books (canon) of the various bibles were adopted over a thousand years ago and is designed to be a state of the art, superb academic reference work and provide an overview of the topic and give the reader a structured knowledge to familiarize yourself with the topic at the most affordable price possible.The accuracy and knowledge is of an international viewpoint as the edited articles represent the inputs of many knowledgeable individuals and some of the most current knowledge on the topic, based on the date of publication.
