THE RELIABILITY OF THE BIBLE BY CHARLES F. STANLEY

The Reliability of the Bible

By Charles F. Stanley

Is the Bible the Word of God? If we want to be intellectually honest, we will study the evidence. Just as a jury weighs the facts and then decides on a verdict, we can investigate the historical evidence and determine if the Bible is reliable. 

You might know that most modern translations of the Bible are based on ancient manuscripts [documents written by hand] in the original languages, not on a translation of a translation, as people often believe. In a study of historical manuscripts, reliability is determined in part by: 1) the date they were written, 2) the origin, and 3) the condition of the manuscripts.

This is true in studying any historical document, whether biblical or not. During the first century, two important Romans wrote history. The first was Julius Caesar, who wrote during the first century, but his writing was not discovered until 900 years after it was written. We have only 10 copies of his work.

The other writer of Roman history—Tacitus—wrote The Annals about battles his father-in-law Agricola fought. We only have 20 copies, and they are dated about A.D. 900 or 950.

These works are quoted in other history books. No one doubts their authenticity, even though there are few copies and many years between the writings and their discovery.

How does the Bible compare to the writings of these two men? A one-volume copy of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John was found in 250 AD. Historians discovered a copy of Luke’s gospel in Egypt, just as it appears in our Bible; this find is dated 175 AD. A fragment of John dates back to 150 AD. Apparently, soon after the gospel events, people started distributing copies in Egypt, not just in Jerusalem. Scholars believe Jesus Christ died around A.D. 30, so there is a relatively short time span between His death and the oldest copies of the writings. 

By 350 AD, there were 5,000 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament. This is incredible evidence that the news needed to get out to the whole world. In light of testing the date, origin, and condition of the manuscripts, the New Testament is more reliable than ancient history.

Although we don’t have the originals of any of the ancient manuscripts, we do have copies. The earliest manuscripts we have were written on papyrus, which is made out of a water plant that grew in Egypt. Papyrus became brittle with age or rotted with dampness and soon wore out. We can see why copies were necessary. But this is true of all ancient documents. The earliest complete copy of Homer’s writings is dated 1300 AD.

Although the New Testament writers were often poor and relatively unknown, their writings were better cared for than the histories of the powerful, influential Roman Empire. The Romans were very interested in spreading their story throughout the world, but the followers of Christ had God Himself orchestrating the distribution of their manuscripts.

Because there were so many manuscripts, those working on the canon of Scripture (deciding what to include in our present-day Bibles) analyzed and compared the various manuscripts. There were some differences, but most of the discrepancies were minimal. Many were grammatical, such as a plural noun in one manuscript, but a singular noun in another. The substantial variations make up only 1/1000 of the New Testament. This is about a quarter page of the Greek text.

Let me give you an example in English of how most of the variations look. Suppose you receive a telegram that reads, “You inherited a million.” The next day, you receive another telegram that reads, “You have inherited a million dollar.” You probably would not complain that the s is missing on the word dollar. The next day, you get another telegram: “You’ve inherited a million dollars.” You probably would not say, “Okay, which is it: You or you’ve? Dollar or dollars?”

These are “variant texts” telegrams. But comparing one with another doesn’t make you doubt your good news. Suppose you had five thousand telegrams with only that little variation. You would probably believe you had inherited a million dollars! Those are exactly the types of minute variations in the biblical manuscripts. All those documents, spread throughout the world, copied over and over, still bear no significant discrepancies that affect the truth.

The New Testament gets an A+ when we apply the tests of the date, origin, and condition of the manuscripts. If we do not accept the biblical manuscripts, we need to throw out all of ancient history. The historical manuscripts so widely accepted do not pass the tests with flying colors, as do the biblical texts.

It stands to reason that God must love us—and His Word—so much that He watched over every writer and scribe to make sure that we would have the greatest love story ever told.

Adapted from Charles Stanley’s Handbook for Christian Living. 1996. pp. 187-191.

GRACE ABOUND IN CHRIST JESUS!!!