|There is no question that books have been edited, stripped out, and added over the centuries. As far as the gospels and much of the new testament are concerned, this is incorrect. We get the Jesus narrative from the gospels, and we have really early copies of the gospels, dating back to as early as 125 AD, which, in the case of the Gospel of John is only 30-40 years after the first publication. Considering that it was the old world, pre-printing press, this isn't irregular or uncommon. Also, understand that these writings weren't disposable or thrown around the way we throw books around today. These writings were venerated and cherished. Orthodoxy also holds that tradition is just as valid as the written word. In this case, tradition verifies the text. The Western mind boggles at this, because it has no exposure to (and thus no respect for) any kind of tradition. Anyway, here's a chart with dates: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dating_the_Bible#The_New_Testam...