"DID YOU KNOW?" will be a summer series where we review issues of the Bible and the Christian faith of special interest. If you have a suggestion/question that you'd like addressed in a "DID YOU KNOW?" segment, please e-mail the coaches.
What are some interesting statistics about the Bible?
The Bible is a
long book (or rather collection of books) and has been around for a long time, so scholars have had plenty of time to crunch the numbers.
- About 50 Bibles are sold every minute.
- There are 66 books in the Bible, 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament.
- The 66 books of the Bible is divided into 1,189 chapters consisting of 31,173 verses.
- The Old Testament has 929 chapters, the New Testament 260.
- The longest line in the Bible is Esther 8:9 - 89 words, 425 letters.
- The longest word in the Bible is Maher-shalal-hash-baz: Isaiah 8:1.
- The shortest verse in the NIV Bible is John 11:35: "Jesus wept."
- The longest book chapter in the Bible is Psalm 119, the shortest is Psalm 117.
- There are 594 chapters before Psalm 118 and 594 chapters after it.
- Psalm 118 verse 8 is in the center of the Bible: "It is better to trust in the Lord than put confidence in man."
- Obadiah, with 21 verses consisting of 602 words, is the shortest book in the Old Testament, and the third shortest in the Bible.
- II John has the fewest number of verses of any book in the Bible - it is the shortest book in the Bible.
- III John has the fewest number of words of any book in the Bible.
- Job is the oldest book written in the Bible - it was written by an unknown Israelite around 1500 BC.
DID YOU KNOW: *More* Biblical Stats