Every Bible in every language is a copy of a copy, and the differences are documented. Twelve questions across three levels on manuscripts, editions and translations — every answer explained.
Open “Bible Trivia: Manuscripts and Translations” on its own page — if the module does not load.
Every question, with the answer and the reason
The interactive module above runs in a sandbox of its own, which means its text is not part of this page. So here is the whole thing in full: all 12 questions, the options as they appear, the answer, and why that answer and not the one beside it. Nothing is held back to make you play first.
Easy
These turn on something stated outright in the text. If you have read the book, you have met the answer.
What are the Dead Sea Scrolls?
- Ancient Jewish manuscripts found near the Dead Sea — correct
- Medieval Hebrew Bibles from Cairo
- Greek translations made in Alexandria
- Letters of the early church
Answer: Ancient Jewish manuscripts found near the Dead Sea
Manuscripts found from 1947 onwards in caves near Qumran and other sites. They pushed the earliest Hebrew biblical manuscripts back by roughly a thousand years.
The Septuagint is a translation of the Hebrew scriptures into which language?
- Latin
- Syriac
- Aramaic
- Greek — correct
Answer: Greek
Greek, made in Egypt from the third century BCE onwards. It is the version most New Testament writers quote, which is why their citations sometimes differ from the Hebrew text in modern Bibles.
What is the Vulgate?
- The Greek text of the New Testament
- Jerome's Latin translation of the Bible — correct
- An Aramaic paraphrase of the Torah
- The oldest complete Hebrew Bible
Answer: Jerome's Latin translation of the Bible
Jerome's Latin Bible, produced from the late fourth century. It was the standard Bible of western Christianity for more than a thousand years, which is why so many later disputes are really disputes about Latin.
Roughly when was the King James Version first published?
- 1525
- 1769
- 1611 — correct
- 1382
Answer: 1611
1611. The 1769 revision is what most modern printings actually reproduce, which is why quotations attributed to 'the 1611' usually are not.
Medium
These need a detail held in place — a name, a sequence, a number that only means something next to another number.
What is a codex, as opposed to a scroll?
- A translation with commentary
- A scroll written on both sides
- A book with leaves bound at one edge — correct
- A collection of letters
Answer: A book with leaves bound at one edge
A bound book. Early Christians adopted the codex much earlier and more thoroughly than the surrounding culture did, and that preference is itself a piece of historical evidence.
Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus are manuscripts of roughly which century?
- Second
- Fourth — correct
- Seventh
- Tenth
Answer: Fourth
The fourth century. They are the earliest near-complete Greek Bibles and are central to modern critical editions of the New Testament.
What is P46?
- A Qumran cave number
- An early papyrus codex of Pauline letters — correct
- A Latin manuscript family
- A Syriac gospel harmony
Answer: An early papyrus codex of Pauline letters
A papyrus codex of the Pauline letters, usually dated to around 200 CE. It is the earliest substantial witness to most of Paul's letters — and it does not contain the Pastoral Epistles, though the codex is damaged at the end.
Which book does Jude quote by name as prophecy, though it is outside the biblical canon?
- The Wisdom of Solomon
- Jubilees
- The Testament of Levi
- 1 Enoch — correct
Answer: 1 Enoch
1 Enoch, in verses 14–15, introduced with a formula of prophecy. Aramaic fragments of 1 Enoch were found at Qumran, and the complete text survives in Ge'ez. Jude's own canonical status was questioned in antiquity partly on this ground.
Hard
These turn on what the evidence actually supports, which is not always what the story is remembered as saying.
The Comma Johanneum is an addition to which passage?
- John 8:1–11
- Mark 16:9–20
- Luke 22:43–44
- 1 John 5:7–8 — correct
Answer: 1 John 5:7–8
1 John 5:7–8. The trinitarian formula found in older English Bibles is absent from every Greek manuscript before the fourteenth century. It entered the printed Greek text through Erasmus's third edition, after a manuscript containing it was produced — one now generally thought to have been made to order.
What does the term 'textual apparatus' refer to in a critical edition?
- The record of variant readings and the manuscripts supporting them — correct
- The index of proper names
- The system of chapter and verse numbers
- The translator's preface
Answer: The record of variant readings and the manuscripts supporting them
The notes recording where manuscripts disagree and which witnesses support each reading. Without it, a reader cannot tell which words are firmly attested and which are an editor's judgement — which is why this site treats the edition as part of a citation, not a convenience.
Which discovery is the reason the Great Isaiah Scroll matters for textual criticism?
- It is written in Greek
- It contains a commentary on every verse
- It preserves chapter divisions
- It is a nearly complete copy about a thousand years older than the previous oldest Hebrew Isaiah — correct
Answer: It is a nearly complete copy about a thousand years older than the previous oldest Hebrew Isaiah
It is a near-complete Hebrew Isaiah from the last centuries BCE, roughly a millennium older than the medieval manuscripts that had been the basis of the text. Its overall agreement with them, and its specific differences, are both informative.
In manuscript studies, what is a 'pesher'?
- A running commentary applying a text to the interpreter's own community — correct
- A scribal correction mark
- A list of variant spellings
- A liturgical instruction
Answer: A running commentary applying a text to the interpreter's own community
A commentary genre found at Qumran, most famously on Habakkuk, that reads a prophetic text as referring to the commentators' present. It is direct evidence of how prophetic texts were being applied in the first century BCE.
What this quiz draws on
Books in play: 1 John, 2 Peter, Isaiah, Jude. Each of those leads to what the book contains, who has been proposed as its author, and how it is dated.
Themes: Authorship, Manuscripts.
Answers here are drawn from the biblical text and, where an external record bears on the question, from the artefact or publication that carries it. How this site reads a text and how this site is written set out the rules, so you can check the reasoning rather than take the answer on trust.