Those usually charged with this shameful crime of changing the Bible are Jews and Christians. Could this have been possible?
The Jews are well known for their zeal in preserving their sacred Scriptures. They know the exact number of words and letters it contains. Those scribes responsible for the copying of the ancient Hebrew text showed amazing reverence and deep respect for the Scriptures. If they made even a small mistake whilst copying, that whole section was disposed of. When they came to the name of God in the text, they would go and wash themselves before continuing. Such is their respect for their Holy Book.
We must also ask the question, "Why would the Jews wish to change the text of Scripture so that Jesus the Son of Mary is continually revealed as God's Messiah - an idea to which they became totally opposed?" That would make no sense whatsoever.
Well what about the Christians? Once again there is no evidence. The documents of the New Testament were written by Christ's Apostles or close companions of the Apostles. They were moved by God's Spirit to record Holy Scripture. They were eyewitnesses of the events of which they wrote. They watched Christ and knew him intimately. They loved him and were willing to die for what they heard Christ say and saw him do. Their writings come to us in an unbroken line of testimony. Their books from the very first have always been regarded as reliable Holy Scripture coming from God Himself.
Within a very short time Christianity and hundreds of copies of the Bible had spread over a wide area. There were translations of the Christian Scriptures into several languages distributed very early on. Because there were so many copies, written in different languages, in so many places, in the poss...
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...ost confidence that the Gospels that we have today is the same Gospels that were originally written.
Works Cited
(1) McDowell, Josh. The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict (Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1999), p. 55.
(2) Veteran, http://www.forerunner.com/discussion.
(3) Ibid.
{4} Strobel, p. 132.
(5) The renowned Jewish archaeologist, Nelson Glueck, wrote: "It may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever controverted a biblical reference." cited by McDowell, Josh. The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict (Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1999), p. 61.
{6} Geisler, Norman L. Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998).
(7) Patrick Zukeran. Archaeology and the New Testament.
{8} Zacharias, Ravi. Can Man Live Without God? (Word Publishing, 1994), p. 162.
(9) Robert Jones
(10) William Lane Craig “Reasonable Faith”
^ a b c d e f g h i John Arthur Thomas Robinson (1919-1983). "Redating the New Testament". Westminster Press, 1976. 369 halaman. ISBN 10: 1-57910-527-0; ISBN 13: 978-1-57910-527-3
"NOVA | The Bible's Buried Secrets | PBS." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 27 Sept. 2011.
Although the New Testament is the main source of information regarding Jesus’ life, Jews often disregard it as a reliable source of information. It was not written until two to three generations after Jesus, hence it cannot be considered a primary source. Also, from a Jewish perspective, the aim of the Gospels is not to give an accurate account of Jesus’ life and teachings; the Gospels served as missionary documents containing accounts recorded by biased evangelists. They reflect the aims of the church rather than actual facts, and their writers were more concerned with the advancement of Christianity than the transmission of factual historical information. For these reasons, it is impossible to separate the historical Jesus from the divine Christ presented in the Gospels, and Judaism regards the Gospels as unreliable and irrational.
Although, not as much information is found on the Elephantine papyri and the “stele” of Menephtah, they still display the bonds between the history of Egypt and biblical scriptures.
The study of textual criticism is important when talking about any historical manuscript or text. In particular, when talking about something with as much impact and influence as the bible, textual criticism is a necessary part of scholarship. Brad Ehrman does an excellent job in explaining the basics of textual criticism and how it can be used to determine the accuracy of biblical texts and manuscripts. His book, Misquoting Jesus, serves as a primer to the study of historical biblical manuscripts. As Ehrman states in his introduction, the thesis explained in the text is that biblical manuscripts have been changed throughout history, both intentionally and non-intentionally, and that those changes were affected by the attitudes and beliefs of the scribes.
“The King James Bible was 400 years old in 2011, and it remains one of the most favored translation used today” (“At 400, King James Bible still No. 1”). “Some statistics from a newspaper said, that out of the people polled thirty-one percent said the King James language was beautiful, and twenty-three percent said it was easy to remember” (“At 400, King James Bible still No. 1”). When the King James Bible was published in 1611 there were many ways it could have been improved. The King James Bible has had a huge impact on the world of today. The King James Bible was published by scholars that King James I gathered from 1604 to 1611. King James did this in order to create a
Damrosch, David, and David L. Pike, eds. "The Gospel According to Luke." The Longman Anothology of World Literature. Compact ed. New York: Pearson, 2008. 822-33. Print.
Kevin Killeen and Peter J. Forshaw. "The Word and the World." Biblical Exegesis and Early Modern Science, 220-225.
The study of the Gospel of John can be viewed as distinct and separate from the study of any of the previous three synoptic gospels. The Fourth Gospel contains language and conceptions so distinct from the synoptics that scholars are often faced with the question of its historical origins. Originally, scholars believed the main source for the Gospel of John to be Jewish wisdom literature, Philo, the Hermetic books and the Mandaean writings, leading to the idea that John was the most Greek of the Gospels. However, with the discovery of the scrolls, scholars were now faced with source materials, remarkably similar to the concepts and language found in John, illuminating the literature as not only Jewish but Palestinian in origin. The discovery of the manuscripts opened up an entirely new interpretation of the gospel of John and a progressive understanding of its proper place within biblical scripture.
Harris, Stephen. Understanding The Bible. 6 ed. New York City: McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages, 2002. Print.
that the stories and writings in the Bible did not come solely from the minds of
Jesus, the central character of the New Testament, makes a prominent appearance in the Quran. His purpose in the New Testament differs considerably from that in the Quran as can be observed in the level of importance attributed to him in the two texts. While Jesus is the protagonist of the New Testament, the Quran makes no such observations. The Quran claims to undo the distortions (called tafrih in Arabic) that had crept into the Injil (the Gospels) and the Torah. It further claims to restore the monotheistic nature of the Abrahamic religion, and thus directly refutes the Biblical depiction of Jesus.
For centuries now Christians have claimed to possess the special revelation of an omnipotent, loving Deity who is sovereign over all of His creation. This special revelation is in written form and is what has come to be known as The Bible which consists of two books. The first book is the Hebrew Scriptures, written by prophets in a time that was before Christ, and the second book is the New Testament, which was written by Apostles and disciples of the risen Lord after His ascension. It is well documented that Christians in the context of the early first century were used to viewing a set of writings as being not only authoritative, but divinely inspired. The fact that there were certain books out in the public that were written by followers of Jesus and recognized as being just as authoritative as the Hebrew Scriptures was never under debate. The disagreement between some groups of Christians and Gnostics centered on which exact group of books were divinely inspired and which were not. The debate also took place over the way we can know for sure what God would have us include in a book of divinely inspired writings. This ultimately led to the formation of the Biblical canon in the next centuries. Some may ask, “Isn’t Jesus really the only thing that we can and should call God’s Word?” and “Isn’t the Bible just a man made collection of writings all centered on the same thing, Jesus Christ?” This paper summarizes some of the evidences for the Old and New Testament canon’s accuracy in choosing God breathed, authoritative writings and then reflects on the wide ranging
In the Jewish Concepts of Scripture, Benjamin D. Sommer talks about what Scriptures mean and how they are important to different Jewish people. Sommer begins his Introduction with asking the question “What is scripture for the Jews?”. He starts to answer this question by talking about the different writings that are generally accepted as scriptures. Jewish religion differs from that of the Catholics or Orthodox Christians or because they accept more writings as scripture than the Jews do. Generally there are 24 books that make up the readings the Jewish people recognize as scriptures. These book are broken down into three parts: Torah, Nevi’im, and the Ketuvim. Together these books make up the Tanakh (Jewish Bible). All Jewish people
The writings of historian Eusebius, and Iraneous, Bishop of Lyons, have confirmed the writings of the Apostle John. These men did their historical writing between 130 and 180 AD. They researched scrolls from the time of Christ. Archaeology also provides exterior evidence. Archaeologist Joseph Free states, "Archaeology has confirmed countless passages which have been rejected by critics as unhistorical and contradictory to known facts (McDowell 54)."