Big Ideas · Prologue
Ancient religions didn't need scriptures
Most ancient religions centered on sacrifice and ritual, not sacred books. Priests might consult manuals, but a holy text was rarely at the heart of worship.
The holy book was an invention, not a given.
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As Bart Ehrman notes, Christianity and Islam became 'religions of the book' only because the Hebrew Bible came first. That makes the Bible's existence a historical riddle: no small kingdom or empire produced anything like it.
Source: Why the Bible Began, pp. xv–xvi
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