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Jehovah's Witnesses believe that the Bible is made up of "66 smaller books". God used about "40 faithful men" to write them. According to them, the first five books were written by Moses about 3,500 years ago; the last book was written by the apostle John over 1,900 years ago. God communicated with the Bible writers by means of the holy spirit. They wrote down the thoughts of God, not their own thoughts. So "Jehovah" is the author of the Bible, according to Jehovah's Witnesses.

  1. Who were the 40 faithful men?
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    As an answer asserts, this is not peculiar to Jehovah's Witnesses. – Narnian Jul 22 '13 at 11:56
  • I have re-tagged this. – fгedsbend Aug 2 '13 at 20:21
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    @fredsbend not sure that's a good idea, if the OP wants answers about JW, then you can say "the answer is not specific to Jehovah's Witnesses" in the answer, otherwise you're changing the question to match the answer. – Peter Turner♦ Aug 2 '13 at 20:25
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    OK, I agree with the retag, but not the edits, that looked like an odd sort of bandaid to the context here. I've reverted the original edit and reapplied the tagging. I think that's the right solution. Anon if you disagree feel free to edit again. – wax eagle Aug 2 '13 at 23:47
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    @Anonymous if this question isn't really specific to the JW, would you mind if we removed that entirely (and just said anyone who accepts the 66 book Bible)? – curiousdannii♦ Sep 5 '14 at 4:01
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The 40-author count is not unique to Jehovah's Witnesses, so I'll provide the names of the forty commonly-accepted authors. Note that the authorship of some books (Hebrews, for example) is debated, so the number and names vary slightly depending on which scholars you ask.

  1. Moses
  2. Joshua
  3. Samuel
  4. Ezra
  5. Jeremiah
  6. Nehemiah
  7. Mordecai
  8. Job
  9. Sons of Korah
  10. Asaph
  11. Heman
  12. Ethan
  13. Hezekiah
  14. David
  15. Solomon
  16. Agur
  17. Lemuel
  18. Isaiah
  19. Ezekiel
  20. Daniel
  21. Hosea
  22. Joel
  23. Amos
  24. Obadiah
  25. Jonah
  26. Micah
  27. Nahum
  28. Habakkuk
  29. Zephaniah
  30. Haggai
  31. Zechariah
  32. Malachi
  33. Matthew
  34. John
  35. Mark
  36. Luke
  37. Paul
  38. James
  39. Peter
  40. Jude

See When was the Bible written and who wrote it? for a matchup of names to books, along with approximate dates of authorship.

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  • So, which one is the hypothetical woman? If I remember correctly, some scholars maintain that some parts of the Bible are likely to be written by a woman or women. It might be one of the canonical gospels. Is this the traditional, conservative account of all the authors? Genesis is accepted as a traditional Jewish narrative, merged from disparate and conflicting sources. Which one of those authors compiled Genesis into a single book? – Double U Jul 18 '13 at 13:17
  • @Anonymous: one idea I have heard is that Priscilla wrote Hebrews, but I don't think there is much evidence for it. – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE Aug 3 '13 at 9:18
  • @Anonymous: found it. – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE Aug 5 '13 at 19:19

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