The invention of writing provided a reliable way to transfer religious practices from one generation to the next. Just about every religion now has some kind of collection of writings considered to be holy, held in high esteem or to be authoritative.
For us Christians, it is the Bible except there is not just one Bible. Different people with different levels of power have had different opinions about which texts to include in the Bible.
Somehow, many of the Bible versions we have today have more or less the same content anyway. Since about the 4th century, various councils, also called synods, of religious leaders have added and removed texts depending on what they considered important to know about God. More recently, as Christianity spread throughout the world disputes over interpretation in different languages also became a factor. As the church became more and more fractured, the number of versions increased. With the printing press it became easy to publish any version you preferred. I counted more than 50 versions in the English language alone.
As Christians we are mostly concerned with the 27 "books" we know as the New Testament because they tell us about the life of a man named Jesus who is the source of our particular interpretation of God. Jesus never wrote anything down himself. Everything we know about him and his message comes from people who either knew him or at least knew of him.
Jesus was a Jew. Even though he was a revolutionary, the Christian writers made it a point to portray him as someone who was well versed in the ancient Hebrew scriptures. For our convenience they are included in the Bible as roughly the first 39 "books" collectively known as the Old Testament. What I think they were trying to say is that Jesus was not going to start a new religion. He simply re-interpreted the old one. He paints for us a completely new picture of God, a God of mercy, a God who loves us, a God who wants us to take him seriously.
Most of the Bibles you will find will have some kind of introduction explaining how that particular version came to be and why. What is this particular group of Bible editors trying to teach us about Jesus?
Some scholars have spent a lifetime studying the Bible and published what they have learned. Every denomination has a list of books they think will tell the truth about Jesus. Some of it is scientific fact, but much of it is simply opinion; in some cases even outright lies. It is for us to know the difference. Reading all of them should help you construct a nuanced picture of Jesus and his relationship with God.
