One of the most important questions asked by non-Christians as they look into
Christianity is whether or not the Bible is trustworthy. Can the Bible be trusted. If it has been corrupted, then we cannot trust
what is attributed to Jesus' words and deeds. So, is the Bible reliable or
not?
Yes, the Bible was reliable. The original writings
of the Bible have been lost. But before they were lost, they were copied.
These copies were incredibly accurate, very meticulous, and very precise. The
people who copied them were extremely dedicated to God and their copying
tasks. They took great care when copying the original manuscripts. This
copying method is so exact, and so precise, that the New Testament alone is
considered to be 99.5% textually pure. This means that of the 6000 Greek
copies (the New Testament was written in Greek), and the additional 21,000
copies in other languages, there is only one half of 1% variation. Of
this very slight number, the great majority of the variants are easily
corrected by comparing them to other copies that don't have the
"typos" or by simply reading the context. You should know
that copying mistakes occur in such ways as word repetition, spelling, or a
single word omission due to the copyist missing something when moving his
eyes from one line to another. The variants are very minor.
Nothing affects doctrinal truth and the words and deeds of Christ are
superbly reliably transmitted to us.
The science of studying ancient literature and its
accuracy of transmission to is called historicity. The Bible is so exceedingly
accurate in its transmission from the originals to the present copies, that
if you compare it to any other ancient writing, the Bible is light years
ahead in terms of number of manuscripts and accuracy. If the Bible were
to be discredited as being unreliable, then it would be necessary to discard
the writings of Homer, Plato, and Aristotle as also unreliable since they are
far far less well preserved than the Bible.
The Bible was written by those who were inspired to
God. When we look at the New Testament we realize that it was written by
those who either knew Jesus personally, or were under the direction of those
who did. They wrote what they saw. They wrote about the resurrection of
Christ. They recorded His miracles and His sayings. It comes down to
whether or not you believe what it says about Christ. Do you?
For more information on the Bible and its reliability, please go to www.carm.org/bible.htm.