I Object!
"The bible can't be trusted..." "...you don't have the original copies.""...it has been translated so many times it has changed.""...it has been corrupted.""...people added stuff to it.""...people left stuff out of it."
These are examples of the objections to the accuracy of biblical transmission. But do any of those objecting have a case?
Caveat
This is a difficult and very complex topic. It is also one that many Christians are completely unknowledgeable of. I was unaware of it until well into adulthood. Even as a preacher's kid, I simply believed that the bible was the bible from the beginning and hadn't been taught differently. I was told God preserved His word, but I wasn't ever told how His word was preserved. Importantly, I certainly hadn't been subjected to any of the skeptics' objections of which some are rather staggering for those who are unprepared.
In a world steadily moving away from tolerance of Christianity, the bible is often dismissed as an ancient book or myths and nonsense that has been repeatedly changed and corrupted over time by powerful men seeking to become more powerful and controlling through those changes.
If someone overheard you say something about Jesus or God, and interjected "Your so-called holy book is nothing more than a bunch of ancient myths and nonsense. You don't even have the original writings. Your bible has been changed so many times you don't even know what they really said. " would you be able to rationally explain why you believe it has been preserved with high accuracy, or would you have nothing but anger and insubstantial retorts to offer in response?
I believe that at least a basic understanding of this topic is beneficial to Christians not simply to refute criticism of the bible, but to have a stronger foundation of why it and its message have in fact endured time. One should also have solid reasoning why they believe something when pressed. Not having a solid foundation of what you believe does neither you nor the person engaging you any good.
So with mild apologies this will be a long and somewhat difficult post, but I pray it is a beneficial one to you. I have divided the sections into smaller headings in hopes to make leaving it and returning easier for reading.
While a bit heady, I've also tried to present the topic as best as I understand it while also trying to keep it relatable and understandable for you as the reader. This post isn't an exhaustive discourse hence the title inclusion of "Introduction". Many text sources are not specifically mentioned in the chain of events.
With that, let's get started!
Copy That!
Interestingly, the bible was the very first book ever printed on a printing press. Prior to the Gutenberg printing press development in 1440, Old and New Testament texts were handwritten reproductions by copyists and scribes. These works are called manuscripts meaning "written by hand" (Latin etymology: manu = hand, scriptus = writing). This was a tedious method requiring reverence, careful attentiveness, and dedication for copying the holy word of God.
During the centuries upon centuries prior to the birth of Jesus, scribes and scholars carefully copied their sacred texts known collectively as the Tenakh. There was even a specific stipulation commanded by God when He allowed Israel to have a king, that when the king took the throne, he was to copy the texts himself in the presence of the Levites and then read it all the days of his life. [Deuteronomy 17:14-20]
Long before the birth of Christ, the Hebrew scriptures had been accepted by the Jews as holy and authoritative texts. Although ordered differently and sometimes combined or divided differently, it is what we Christians refer to as the Old Testament.
Just a few hundred years before the birth of Christ, Jewish scholars were gathered in Alexandria, Egypt in order to translate the Old Testament scriptures from Hebrew into Greek as Greek was then the global language. This produced what is known as the Greek Septuagint, so called due to the reported number of seventy-two scholars active in the translation (Latin etymology: septuaginta = seventy).
God preserved His word throughout these periods including through the reigns of rebellious and sinful kings, the conquering and disbursement of Israel by the Assyrians in 722 BC, the conquering and captivity of Judah by the Babylonians in 586 BC, the Roman defeat of the Jewish rebellion in 70 AD, and the Roman decimation and disbursement of the Jews after the Bar Kokhba rebellion in 135 AD. Such an example is when the high priest rediscovered the word of God hidden within the temple during King Josiah's reign around 600 BC after Judah had lived under evil and idolatrous kings for years.
By the time of the 6th century AD, Jewish scribes known as the Masoretes copied the Old Testament texts with extremely stringent rules and observances. The Masoretic texts that were discovered only dated to around 900 AD. These were the oldest surviving copies of the Old Testament books known for around a thousand years.
When the final codification of each section was complete, the Masoretes not only counted and noted down the total number of verses, words, and letters in the text but further indicated which verse, which word, and which letter marked the centre of the text. In this way any future emendation could be detected. The rigorous care given the Masoretic text in its preparation is credited for the remarkable consistency found in Old Testament Hebrew texts since that time.
(Credit: Brittanica.com article "Masoretic Text")
Then in 1947, the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in Qumran, Israel by Bedouin shepherds. It is believed that Qumran was an ancient Jewish settlement of a sect of Essenes, religious separatists, dating prior to and through the time of Christ. In the many caves of Qumran were discovered clay pots containing over fifteen thousand scrolls and scroll fragments. The content of the scrolls at Qumran ran a gambit of topics, but notably contained in many of the containers were almost all of the books from the Old Testament.
Dating of the scrolls at Qumran placed their writing around 300 to 100 BC. Comparison between the scrolls of biblical books at Qumran with the biblical books of the Masoretic texts revealed to scholars an astonishing level of accuracy in textual preservation despite nearly a thousand years between the two sources.
After Christ's resurrection when the gospels and epistles (letters) that make up the New Testament were written, the churches furiously copied the texts for themselves before sending them on to the next church. Then copies were made of copies for preservation and for continuing to send them out around the world over the next millennia.
But how are manuscript texts checked and verified?
Time To Exercise!
The methodology of testing manuscripts is called textual criticism. Textual criticism employs a number of highly developed methods for testing a textual source to determine its accuracy, age, authenticity, authorship, regional origin, etc. Sometimes it requires the identification and textual comparisons.
These interactivity samples I provide are admittedly over-simplified so as not to tax you while still demonstrating a couple of methods used in recreating text meticulously, analytically, logically, and faithfully.
Activity #1:
Imagine that you are heading up an archaeology team. Your team has collected various manuscript fragments at a site that dates to being over nine-hundred years old. Each fragment contains only a small portion of the full text. Sorted and studied, the team assembles fragments together by identifying various phrases and word pattern recognition.
Your team's task is to reassemble the message contained in the fragments.
[Check your answer here]
If you did the exercise, and checked your answer, then you found that one of the fragment pieces contains errors. Based on the greater number of fragments that are in agreement, you can determine which fragment is in disagreement. Even if you had no surviving copies of the complete message from which to reference, you can still determine which fragment to omit from the reassembly of the text. One error is an incorrect word, although closely similar to the correct one, that could be used legitimately but is overwhelmingly outnumbered by the correct word in the other fragments. Another error is a grammatical inaccuracy using an incorrect word, although correctly spelled, that's misuse is evident through familiarity and knowledge of the language of the text.
Activity #2:
Over time, your archaeological team has gathered and assembled many hundreds of copies of a particular message. But after assembling all the texts, you discover that there are inconsistencies in them! In fact, there are more inconsistencies in the variants of the message than there are words of the message itself! Each variation of the message is known as a "family" of the text.
Your team does not have a copy of the original message, so your task is to recreate the original from within all of the inaccurate copies of the twenty-four families of text that you do have.
- Paul bought a new car. I don't think he needed it though. But he got a bargain.
- Paul bought a sporty new car (a Mazda). I don't think he needed it, but he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. But he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. I don't think he needed it though. But he got a good deal. (It is a sporty Mazda.)
- I don’t think he needed it, but Paul bought a new car though. And he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a sporty new Mazda. I don't think he needed it though. But he got a good deal.
- Paul has bought a new car. I don’t think he need it. But he got a very good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. (I don't think he needed it though). But he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. I don’t think he needed it, but he got a good deal.
- Paula bought a new cart. I don’t think we needed it though, but he got a good meal.
- Paula bought a new car. I don’t think she needled it though. But she got a good deal.
- Paula bought a new car. I don’t think he needed it though. But she got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. I don’t think she needed it though. But we got a good deal.
- Paul sought a pew cart. I won’t think Paul needed it though. But he got a good ordeal.
- Paul bought a car new. I don’t think he needed it. But he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a car new. I don’t think we needed it though. But he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. He didn't need it I don’t think, but we got a good deal.
- Paul bought an new car. I don’t think he needed it though. But he got a good deal.
- Paul sought a pew car. I won’t think he nerded it though. But he got a good deal.
- Saul bought a new cat. I don’t think he needed it though, but she got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new car. I don’t think Paul needed it though. But he got a good deal.
- Saul bought a new cat. I don’t think we needed it through. But he got a good deal.
- Paul bought a new cat. He don’t think he needed it though. But we got a good meal.
- Mr. Smith bought a car. I don't think he needed it, but he got a fair price.
If you did the exercise, you saw that there were misspellings, incorrect words, additional notations added, varying sentence structures, differing word arrangements, synonymous words, and so forth. There were even different identifications for the individual the message was about. Some were misspellings, some were formal identification, and some were possibly an alternate name.
You can accurately recreate the original message by weeding out all of the inconsistencies.
[The correct answer is below - but don't cheat!]
👉 Paul bought a new car. I don't think he needed it though. But he got a good deal.
Ain't Got Time
Dating the period in which manuscripts were written is also a major consideration. There are a number of ways for determining how, when, and where manuscripts were written. Such methods include testing the physical nature of the manuscript by investigating the scribal technology used: the medium type and creation process as well as the ink type and creation process. Analysis through chemical and radiometric testing can also reveal a period of origin. Other methods study the internal nature of the writing by investigating the language, dialect, naming conventions, vocabulary, syntax, punctuation, idioms, and lettering styles used which can reveal regional and cultural origin.
Language evolves over time. Consider how English has changed since when Beowulf was written around 900 AD, to the 1390s when "Canterbury Tales" was written, to the 1590s when "A Midsummer Night's Dream" was written, to the 1960s when "To Kill a Mockingbird" was written. Or, just consider how language has been hijacked and changed in just the last decade in our society.
By applying these various methods, dating of the manuscript creation and dating of the textual content can be determined. Not surprisingly, the two dating results may not necessarily correspond with one another. The dating of the material on which the text is written may be younger than the dating of the text itself due to it being copied from a manuscript decades or centuries older. It would be like if you recreated a letter written by one of your grandparents when they were a young adult. The chemical content of the paper and ink your grandparent used would date older than the paper and ink you use today, but the written text itself would be identical.
When considering the passage of time between the date of the original authorship and the date of the earliest surviving manuscript, New Testament manuscripts have a narrow gap of time passage ranging only within decades. Other books from antiquity date many centuries between the original and the earliest surviving copy. For instance, Homer's Iliad, was originally written around 800 BC, but the oldest surviving manuscripts of the epic tale date to around 300 BC for fragments and around 900 AD for a complete manuscript.
By The Numbers!
Now that you have a basic understanding of textual criticism, let's look at another very important consideration.
Sources of biblical manuscripts are almost an embarrassingly huge amount of resource wealth There are over twenty thousand manuscript sources for the Old Testament books. For the New Testament books, there are approximately six thousand Greek manuscript sources, over ten thousand manuscript sources in Latin, and over nine thousand manuscript resources in other languages.
In addition to the biblical manuscripts, the New Testament itself, except for a handful of verses, could be recreated simply from its quotes repeated in the handwritten letters from the early church fathers.
When considering other books dating from antiquity, the next highest count of authentic manuscripts is Homer's Iliad which has a current count of just under eighteen hundred manuscripts. The next numerous after Homer's work have just a few hundred manuscripts, and the numbers go down from there.
Too Much Of A Good Thing?
Just a quick note on this objection. Some people will look at the great number of biblical translations (such as King James, English Standard, New International, etc) and the great number of Christian denominations and argue that there can't be any truth to it because even Christians don't agree on these things.
Some will object to the reliability of the bible because there are so many different translations of the bible. As one Christian teacher I heard respond to that objection said, "But you know what? They all say the same thing." It would be like asking ten different people for directions to a specific location. They would say the same thing but most likely use different words, and you'd make it to your destination by following any one of them or a combination of any of them.
Others will object to Christianity because there are many different denominations and they disagree with one another (often) over what the bible says. That's sadly true, to a point, but it has no bearing on what truth is. Many denominations divide over issues and non-essential beliefs that shouldn't divide a church. The foundation of Christianity isn't the non-essential doctrines but the essential ones.
For instance, if you believe that Jesus is a created being and not a divine Person of the triune yet singular Godhead, that is grounds for division. (See the note below under: CULTure)
Jimmy First!
There is a push among some Christians to adhere only to the King James bible. Unfortunately, many King James Only advocates are very dogmatic about it and openly claim the modern translations are corrupt - even to the point some will claim they are heretical. Sadly, these advocates often come across as condescending, condemning, and divisive.
Recall earlier our discussion of the multiple family of texts? Near the base of the tree-trunk of biblical text families, there is a split. King James Version (KJV) and New King James Version (NKJV) translations are derived from one family of texts, and the modern translations, such as New International Version (NIV) and New American Standard Bible (NASB), are derived from the other family.
A few points the KJV advocates make are:
- The King James family of manuscripts originates from the region where Jerusalem and the Holy Land are.
- The King James family of manuscripts is more numerous than the manuscripts the modern translations are based on.
- The manuscripts that the modern translations are translated from were lost for fifteen hundred years.
- The modern translations omit verses and sometimes entire passages.
Let's take a look at it.
1) Location, Location, Location
The family of manuscripts the King James is derived from is called the Byzantine family from which the manuscripts came from all around the region of the Mediterranean where Christianity originated around Jerusalem and the Holy Land. The family of manuscripts the more modern translations are derived from is called the Alexandrian family which was discovered in a region of Egypt.
Remember, the Israelites were captured and dispersed by the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Romans made distant travel more readily available. Remember from earlier that Jews were in Egypt translating the Hebrew texts into Greek centuries before Christ. There were Jews all around the known world by the time of Christ, and Christians all around the known world within decades after Christ's resurrection.
However, location of itself is not a necessitated factor of truth or perfection.
2) Copy Cats
The Old Testament texts were originally written in Hebrew from the time of Moses approximately 1440 BC until 400 BC when prophet Malachi lived. As noted earlier, the Septuagint was translated from the Hebrew into Greek which was the era's global language. The New Testament was originally written in Greek with portions written in Aramaic.
With the Roman conquests, Latin eventually became the global lingua franca, so in the 300s AD, the bible was translated into Latin. When Constantine legalized Christianity in 313 AD, intrigue entered the scene among political and church officials. After the Western Roman Empire fell in the mid to late 400s, Europe was cast into the Dark Ages by 500 AD. During this period, the vast majority of Europeans were illiterate and counted on the church leadership to read them the Scriptures. By 600 AD, Latin became the only authorized language for biblical translation, and the bible "belonged" to the literate, wealthy, and powerful political-religious leadership.
As it was also around the 600s AD that Latin was falling out of being a global language. People desired a bible in their own native languages that they could understand themselves. "The Church" opposed that notion citing that the masses were intellectually and spiritually incompetent to read and correctly discern the holy text.
Over the following centuries, men like John Wycliffe, Jan Hus, William Tyndale, Martin Luther, and others worked secretly and under persecution to translate the bible into native languages for the people to read for themselves. Such persecutions even led to torturous execution for Tyndale.
Translating scriptures into languages other than Latin really took off during the Reformation period. The first complete English bible was the Coverdale Bible (1535). It was followed by The Great Bible (1539), the Geneva Bible (1599), the Bishop's Bible (1568), and then the King James Bible (1611). Many of these were based solely on previous English translations while others relied on both previous editions and original Hebrew, Greek, and Latin manuscripts available to them at that time.
The King James bible, through several revisions and printing corrections, remained the dominant and essentially the sole English translation until the 1900s.
3) Numbers
When the King James version of the bible was commissioned in the 1600s, there were relatively few original manuscripts from which to translate. For that period though, it was a wealth of manuscripts. However, there has been an explosion of discoveries of biblical manuscripts, including the 1947 discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and non-biblical manuscripts which increased knowledge of the Hebrew and Greek languages as used in antiquity.
The copying methods of the New Testament texts were not quite as stringent as those that had been employed to copy the Old Testament manuscripts. The push to publish New Testaments with the newly developed printing press often became a race between scholars. The fifteenth century theologian, Erasmus, worked feverishly to publish a New Testament translation ahead of other scholars. After several publications of his work, with corrections along the way, he published what is now referred to as the Textus Receptus (Latin etymology: "received text").
Since Erasmus' time, texts that predated the Textus Receptus have been discovered. Scholars studied the various "families" as a whole in attempts to preserve the most accurate wording to the original manuscripts. This resulted in what is referred to as the Critical Text.
The family of the Byzantine (KJV family) of text has vastly more copies than the Alexandrian manuscripts. The difference is thousands of copies compared to hundreds. However, while majority numbers can at times lead to truth, of itself a majority is not a factor of truth.
This is where the "missing verses" controversy lies. The younger Byzantine manuscripts contain verses and passages that the older Alexandrian manuscripts don't contain.
That is a very over-simplified account. Textual Criticism is a decidedly complex field dealing with a large amount of reference material.
4) Hide And Seek
Even if the Alexandrian manuscripts were unknown for fifteen hundred years, the word of God as a whole was not hidden. The "missing verses" in question would remain a moot point, as pointed out next.
5) Material
The first thing to note is that the verses and passages in question do not affect any major doctrine. They neither change doctrines nor contradict doctrines.
The Byzantine family of manuscripts are several centuries younger than the Alexandrian manuscripts indicating the Alexandrian manuscripts are chronologically nearer to the original writings. Considering the "missing verses" are not in the older Byzantine manuscripts, it could be reasonably and equally proposed that those verses were added in later years rather than omitted.
Many of the modern Alexandrian family translations such as the New American Standard (NASB) and English Standard (ESV) will include those passages and have them bracketed and annotated to indicate that they are in the Byzantine family (ie: "other manuscripts").
6) Jimmy First?
I love the King James version. It is what I grew up with, but I rarely use it any longer.
It is beautifully written and poetic, but just as English has changed from the time of Beowulf to that of Shakespeare, so has English changed from 1611 to the 2000s. Many words used in the King James bible have completely dropped out of modern usage, and in some cases words have changed definitions. If you are not familiar and comfortable with Elizabethan English, the King James bible is often difficult to read.
In the 400+ years since the King James was introduced to the world, and its final revision in 1769, there have been not only the discoveries of more manuscripts to enrich the foundation on which translations are based, but also great increases of knowledge in linguistic scholarship of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin has been gained, and the discoveries provide expanded evidence of reliable transmission.
I now personally prefer a modern translation. My preference now is the New American Standard Bible (NASB) and then the English Standard Version (ESV) for their more literal word-for-word translation focus. I also appreciate inclusion of the Byzantine verses within brackets and included footnotes to explain why they are bracketed.
These newer translations provides the "best of both worlds". You benefit from both the updated scholarship and the bracketed inclusion of Byzantine verses.
CULTure
However, be aware! There are "bibles" in publication that have been manipulated for the pushing of religious cultish purposes. One infamous alteration is by a certain group's rendition in their bible of verse John 1:1.
That verse has been translated and read, as well as supported by other internal passages, for time immemorial is John 1:1:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god.
(Emphasis mine)
Oh, I Get It!
When I worked at Lifeway Christian Store, I was often asked what is the best bible translation. After performing my own research, learning about translation methods, reading various reviews, and listening to many scholars on the subject, I picked up on the best answer to give anyone 100% of the time.
The best bible translation is: the one you will read and use and not leave sitting on your shelf when you aren't just carrying it to church.
So, it is advisable to be familiar with the basics of bible translations and secure in knowing what you have is true, accurate, and doctrinally sound.
Peddle That Junk Somewhere Else
When someone tells you, "You can't believe the bible because it has been corrupted by people pushing an agenda", you don't have to be caught off-guard and unaware of how confident you can be that you have an incredibly accurate translation of the bible, preserved over thousands of years, in your hands.
If they bring up that Christians don't even agree about the bible and that is why there are so many denominations, don't be dismayed. Even as Christians, we are still currently in a fallen world. We will differ on opinions and preferences; we will still make mistakes; and we will still sin.
True Christians are locked in solidarity on the immutable essential Christian doctrines. The essential doctrines are what define what Christianity is. Deviance from those essentials within a denomination, or a church, or even an individual, introduces heresy and division is necessary to extract heresy. Legitimate Christian denominations and individual churches that divide are at most times unnecessarily divided over views of secondary doctrines, and at times even more senselessly divided over tertiary doctrines.
See my follow-up post on Counterfeits for more on the topic of essential doctrines and discerning them from counterfeits, and how to deal with secondary and tertiary doctrinal differences.
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