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Originally Posted by Sandram75  I learned from my senior year psychology teacher that he thought the Bible was the only book that has been around for 2000 years. Does anyone know if there are any other books that lasted this long? |
Actually, there are a lot of texts that are as old or older. Check out the
Internet Sacred Text Archive. It’s a great resource for the texts of religions and spiritualities alive and dead, as well as texts and literature from ancient cultures (and a few more modern texts as well).
But just off the top of my head:
The texts of Hinduism as someone already mentioned (and which is generally regarded as the oldest organized religion still practiced), the
Tipitaka of Buddhism, the Tao Te Ching of Taoism, the I Ching of many Chinese spiritualities, the Gathas of Zoroastrainism (which had a lot of influence on Judaism and Christianity). And this list is just religious texts that are still in use. There are a lot of strictly religious texts from “dead” religions as well as literature and stories from ancient civilizations. Gilgamesh, the Ancient Sumerian epic, is considered one of the oldest, if not the oldest stories ever written (third millennium BCE). The Iliad and Odyssey are still widely read today (and even turned into movies) and date from the seventh or eighth century BCE.
So yeah; your teacher was incorrect.
As a side note, the Bible read today isn’t even 2000 years old. But that’s a whole different discussion.