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animal skin, usually sheep, but sometimes deer or cow. Animals considered unclean by Jews were never
used to make scrolls.

The Pentateuch on a scroll was called the “Torah.” An entire Torah scroll, if completely unraveled is
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over 150 feet long! As most sheep are only about two or three feet long, it took an entire flock of
sheep to make one Torah scroll. The scroll was broken into leaves (about one sheep long (2-3 ft)) and
sewn together to form the scroll. If a scribe made the slightest mistake in copying, such as allowing two
letters of a word to touch, they destroyed that entire panel and the panel before it, because it touched
the panel with the mistake! This demonstrates the level of faithfulness to accuracy applied to the
preservation of God’s Word throughout the first couple thousand years of Biblical transmission. All
scrolls that were damaged or began to show wear were copied, then destroyed to show reverence to
God’s Word.

English and Hebrew are similar in that both languages are “picture languages.” Their words form a clear
picture in your mind.
By 500 BC, the 39 books that make up the OT were completed and were preserved on scrolls. Between
400 BC and 30 AD, the books of the Apocrypha were completed, but were recorded in Greek rather than
Hebrew. By 100 AD, all the books of the New Testament were completed.

How did we get the Bible?

16 pu.edu/library/specialcollections/books/torahscrolls/#:~:text=The%20text%20is%20written%20in%20264%20col
umns%2C%2042%20rows%20per,is%20approximately%2019½%20inches%20tall.

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