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BIBLE ACCURACY:
Bible "errors" exaggerated by the unscrupulous
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SERIES—Part 3
As mentioned in
part 2 of this series,
far too many people today, when it comes to their only valid spiritual map from earth to heaven, are only too eager to flippantly
lay aside this priceless Guide for fear of a rare misspelled word.
But the Bible—just as with anything highly successful in life—obviously has many opponents (often religiously motivated),
some of whom aren't particularly
bothered by an unscrupulous approach to Biblical discussion.
It is this concept we hope to examine in this final part of our series.
For the introduction to the series, please click here.
For part 1, please click here.
For part 2, please click here.
Misunderstanding #3: Failure to remove prejudice and pre-conceived motives from truth searching
To find truth, one's own motives must not be allowed to cloud rational judgment and honest logic; nor should religious
traditions or pre-conceived opinions be allowed to influence one's quest for truth. And while some allegations of Biblical
errors emanate from honest, misinformed individuals, others show the unfortunate signs of theological motivation.
Muslims are a prime example. Because Muslims actually claim to accept the entire Bible as truth, they find themselves
perched in a precarious position: Either they must make a valid historical case that Bible manuscripts have been massively
altered—or they must abandon Islam (an immediate grounds for execution in Muslim countries).
Why?
Because the Bible clearly attests its completeness—in other words, it claims to be the final revelation from God.
No other revelations will follow it.
This doesn't leave much room for the Koran (or any other such-like "revelation from God")
since the Koran came rather late to the party—500 years late, in fact (incidentally, this also applies to the Book of Mormon,
which came almost 2000 years later, and the Catholic "apocryphal books," which were not selected by early Christians but by the
Roman Catholic church centuries after the fact).
And just as bad for Muslims is the Bible's repeated identification of Jesus
as the promised Messiah. Since the Koran does not recognize Jesus as the Messiah, the Koran glaringly contradicts the very
Bible it claims to authorize. (13)
Thus, many modern Muslims have "bought in" to baseless charges of gross Biblical inaccuracy. Muslims claim the original
Biblical books were 100% accurate, but the manuscripts were tampered with by unscrupulous Greeks who purposely altered the
Bible to make it appear that Jesus was the Messiah—and to make folks doubt the Koran.
They further assert that the only part of
the Bible which perhaps can be trusted are those portions which do not disagree with the Koran, a book they believe is infallible.
Muslims contend that all manuscripts of the Koran are infallible since Allah, they insist, guided the copying process to
ensure 100% accuracy. This creates yet another logical difficulty for Muslims, who now must explain how those who copied the
Koran were guided by Allah to prevent human error—but those who copied the Bible (which they also believe came from Allah)
were not guided by Allah but instead plagued with a severe case of "blunderitis."
Furthermore, to get every manuscript to
match, early Muslims destroyed every conflicting copy of the Koran, such that today no Muslim can be certain the Koran is
even similar to that which Muhammad originally wrote. Did Allah guide only the hands of certain copyists?
Obviously, while we certainly respect our Muslim friends, such Islamic charges are plainly devoid of credible evidence.
Conclusion
The rumors of massive Biblical inaccuracies and contradictions—which still actively circulate in some circles
today—may well represent the largest snow job since the latest Mt Everest blizzard.
Yet the Bible continues to be the number one best seller year after year after year—much to the vexation of
the thinly veiled, theologically motivated, logically vacant campaigns against its integrity.
Attacks upon the Bible, instead of thwarting its popularity, have resulted in closer examination into the Book
which has again emerged unscathed and stronger and more popular than ever from the baseless attacks and groundless conspiracy theories.
We close with the timely words of Frederic Kenyon:
"...no fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith rests upon a disputed reading...", and, "...the general result
of [24,000 New Testament manuscript] discoveries strengthen the proof of the authenticity of the Scriptures,
and our conviction that we have in our hands, in substantial integrity, the veritable Word of God." (14)
ARTICLE REFERENCES:
(1) Josh McDowell, Evidence That Demands a Verdict, p 18.
(2) McDowell, p 16.
(3) McDowell, p 20.
(4) The Papyrus reeds (which grew from 3 - 10 ft tall) were sliced and arranged lengthwise and crosswise, water applied,
pressed, dried, rubbed smooth, and then rolled up in sections usually of 5 x 9" to about 9 x 15" and lengths of about 20
to 30 ft. Authors would typically write in columns as narrow as 3". By the 4th century AD, papyrus was replaced by
parchment (dried animal skins) due to its greater durability, although papyrus remained in wide-spread use until the 8th or 9th century.
(5) Apparently 9 men penned (on papyrus) the 27 books of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, James,
Peter, Jude, and the unidentified author of Hebrews, possibly Barnabas). Every author was either an apostle or a
direct associate of an apostle, and divinely inspired—and all were universally accepted by early Christians
(which is why their writings were copied and considered so valuable). Of these 9 men, 4 were among the original
12 apostles of Christ (Matthew, John, Peter, and Jude). Paul (also considered by early Christians to be an apostle
of Christ), Mark (also called John Mark, who had accompanied Paul on part of his first mission campaign), Luke
(a physician / historian who also accompanied Paul on portions of his mission campaigns), James (the brother of
Jesus, not an apostle), and the author of Hebrews—round out the remaining authors. The Catholic Bible contains
several additional books sandwiched between the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New
Testament which were added into the Bible 1500 years later and thus are not accepted by many as legitimate inclusions.
(6) Colossians 4:16; 1 Thessalonians 5:27; 1 Peter 1:1; James 1:1; 2 Thessalonians 3:14; 1 Timothy 1:20-21;
2 Timothy 1:13—Several letters were not written to individual churches, meaning they were circulated to many
congregations. For example, Peter addressed his 2 letters to numerous congregations spread across Roman
provinces—Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia to be exact. James wrote his epistle to "the
12 dispersed tribes of Israel"—in other words, to Jewish Christians who had been scattered across the
Roman empire due to persecution. There is only one logical way Christians could read these books addressed
to them: by circulating the original, or obtaining copies of copies. It is also very possible the originals
were copied initially several times and distributed in original form.
(7) All other writings fell by the wayside as a set of 27 books began to settle in as the complete New Testament.
Other inspired, redundant books (such as Paul's letter to the Laodicean church, not extant) also fell off due
apparently to its redundancy of teaching to other existing books.
(8) Colossians 3:9; John 8:44; John 10:1; 1 John 2:21; Revelation 21:8.
(9) Deuteronomy 4:2; 1 Corinthians 4:6; Revelation 22:18-19.
(10) Neil R. Lightfoot, How We Got the Bible, p 92. Of course, the first Christians were Jews, and Jewish
scribes were famous for the extreme and painstaking measures they took to avoid scribal slips of addition,
modification, or omission. Jewish Biblical copyists were so accurate that some have actually suggested their
hand-written copies were more accurate than those produced on modern printing presses. Why? Because Hebrew
scribes literally counted every verse, word, and even every letter in each book. They even went to the
absurd extreme of counting the number of times each letter was used in each book. They calculated middle
verses, middle words, etc, etc—to the point of the ridiculous. Every count reportedly had to total
correctly in each new manuscripts or the entire document was destroyed. By contrast, even modern
printing presses occasionally fail to copy a letter, chop off the top or bottom of a page, leave
out a page, or due to poor printing render part of the text difficult to read. This was not the case
with Jewish scribes. Every manuscript copy was examined and re-examined with a fine-tooth comb.
Therefore it is logical to conclude that the first Christians—who were entirely Jews, and who
considered the Bible's message the greatest treasure on earth—labored for the same squeaky-clean
accuracy as their scribal predecessors.
(11) F. F. Bruce, The Books and the Parchments, p 178.
(12) McDowell, p 44.
(13) 2 Timothy 3:16-17; Revelation 22:18-19; Deuteronomy 4:2; 1 Corinthians 4:6; John 8:24; Matthew 16:13-18.
(14) Frederic G. Kenyon, Handbook to the Textual Criticism of the New Testament, p 23, and, The Story of the Bible, p 113.
Additional recommended reading:
How to interpret the Bible accurately: 12 critical tips
If modernists re-wrote the Bible, how big would it be?
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