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History of the Bible:
How The Bible Came To Us
By Wesley Ringer
Introduction on the Bible
Why should we have some understanding
of how the Bible came to us?
Young children often think that milk
comes in cartons from the grocery store.
As they grow up they learn that milk
comes from cows on the farm. Likewise
many Christians have become so used
to having Bibles that they have bought
at a book store that they have almost
no knowledge of where the present English
translations of the Bible came from.
Understanding how the Bible came to
us gives us a confident foundation for
our faith in the reliability the Bible.
Evidence presented in a criminal case
must be shown to have been protected
by a proper chain of custody from being
tampered with.
We will be able to answer to critics
when they claim that the New Testament
contains 200,000 errors.
We will have some understanding of why
the newer translations such as the NIV
and NASV differ from the King James
Versions at various points.
Important terms to remember:
Autographs: The original texts
were written either by the author's
own hand or by a scribe under their
personal supervision.
Manuscripts: Until Gutenberg
first printed the Latin Bible in 1456,
all Bibles were hand copied onto papyrus,
parchment, and paper.
Translations: When the Bible
is translated into a different language
it is usually translated from the original
Hebrew and Greek. However some translations
in the past were derived from an earlier
translation. For example the first English
translation by John Wycliffe in 1380
was prepared from the Latin Vulgate.
The following is a time line for
the writings of the various books of
the Old and New Testaments and important
translations made from them.
Old Testament
The following are brief snap shots
of the beginning and ending of the Old
Testament and the reasons for the first
two translations of the Old Testament
from Hebrew into Aramaic and Greek
- 1875 B.C. Abraham was called
by God to the land of Canaan.
- 1450 B.C. The exodus of the
Children of Israel from Egypt.
Autographs
- 1450-1400 B.C. The traditional
date for Moses' writing of Genesis-Deuteronomy
written in Hebrew.
- 586 B.C. Jerusalem was destroyed
by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar.
The Jews were taken into captivity
to Babylon. They remained in Babylon
under the Medo-Persian Empire and
there began to speak Aramaic.
- 555-545 B.C. The Book of Daniel
Chapters. 2:4 to 7:28 were written
in Aramaic.
- 425 B.C. Malachi, the last book
of the Old Testament, was written
in Hebrew.
- 400 B.C. Ezra Chapters. 4:8
to 6:18; and 7:12-26 were written
in Aramaic.
Manuscripts
The following is a list of the oldest
Hebrew manuscripts of the Old Testament
that are still in existence.
The Dead Sea Scrolls: date from
200 B.C. - 70 A.D. and contain the entire
book of Isaiah and portions of every
other Old Testament book but Esther.
Geniza Fragments: portions
the Old Testament in Hebrew and Aramaic,
discovered in 1947 in an old synagogue
in Cairo, Egypt, which date from about
400 A.D.
Ben Asher Manuscripts: five
or six generations of this family made
copies of the Old Testament using the
Masoretic Hebrew text, from 700-950
A.D. The following are examples of the
Hebrew Masoretic text-type.
Aleppo Codex: contains the
complete Old Testament and is dated
around 950 A.D. Unfortunately over one
quarter of this Codex was destroyed
in anti-Jewish riots in 1947.
Codex Leningradensis: The
complete Old Testament in Hebrew copied
by the last member of the Ben Asher
family in A.D. 1008.
Translations
The Old Testament was translated
very early into Aramaic
and Greek.
(Note from Jim Staley-I would disagree
on this point as new information has
proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that
the Greek was translated from the Aramaic.)
400 B.C. The Old Testament
began to be translated into Aramaic.
This translation is called the Aramaic
Targums. This translation helped the
Jewish people, who began to speak Aramaic
from the time of their captivity in
Babylon, to understand the Old Testament
in the language that they commonly spoke.
In the first century Palestine of Jesus'
day, Aramaic was still the commonly
spoken language. For example maranatha:
"Our Lord has come," 1 Corinthians 16:22
is an example of an Aramaic word that
is used in the New Testament.
250 B.C. The Old Testament
was translated into Greek. This translation
is know as the Septuagint. It is sometimes
designated "LXX" (which is Roman
numeral for "70") because it was believed
that 70 to 72 translators worked to
translate the Hebrew Old Testament in
Greek. The Septuagint
was often used by New Testament writers
when they quoted from the Old Testament.
The LXX was translation of the
Old Testament that was used by the early
Church.
1. The following is a list of the oldest
Greek LXX translations of the Old Testament
that are still in existence.
Chester Beatty Papyri:
Contains nine Old Testament Books
in the Greek Septuagint and dates between
100-400 A.D.
Codex Vaticanus and Codex
Sinaiticus each contain almost the
entire Old Testament of the Greek Septuagint
and they both date around 350 A.D.
The New Testament
Autographs
45- 95 A.D. The New Testament was
written in Greek. The Pauline Epistles,
the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Luke,
and the book of Acts are all dated from
45-63 A.D. The Gospel of John and the
Revelation may have been written as
late as 95 A.D.
Manuscripts
There are over 5,600 early Greek Manuscripts
of the New Testament that are still
in existence. The oldest manuscripts
were written on papyrus and the later
manuscripts were written on leather
called parchment.
- 125 A.D. The New Testament manuscript
which dates most closely to the
original autograph was copied around
125 A.D, within 35 years of the
original. It is designated "p 52"
and contains a small portion of
John 18. (The "p" stands for papyrus.)
- 200 A.D. Bodmer p 66 a papyrus
manuscript which contains a large
part of the Gospel of John.
- 200 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical
papyrus p 46 contains the Pauline
Epistles and Hebrews.
- 225 A.D. Bodmer Papyrus p 75
contains the Gospels of Luke and
John.
- 250-300 A.D. Chester Beatty
Biblical papyrus p 45 contains portions
of the four Gospels and Acts.
- 350 A.D. Codex Sinaiticus contains
the entire New Testament and almost
the entire Old Testament in Greek.
It was discovered by a German scholar
Tisendorf in 1856 at an Orthodox
monastery at Mt. Sinai.
- 350 A.D. Codex Vaticanus: {B}
is an almost complete New Testament.
It was cataloged as being in the
Vatican Library since 1475.
Translations
Early translations of the New Testament
can give important insight into the
underlying Greek manuscripts from which
they were translated from.
- 180 A.D. Early translations
of the New Testament from Greek
into Latin, Syriac, and Coptic versions
began about 180 A.D.
- 195 A.D. The name of the first
translation of the Old and New Testaments
into Latin was termed Old Latin,
both Testaments having been translated
from the Greek. Parts of the Old
Latin were found in quotes by the
church father Tertullian, who lived
around 160-220 A.D. in north Africa
and wrote treatises on theology.
- 300 A.D. The Old Syriac was
a translation of the New Testament
from the Greek into Syriac.
- 300 A.D. The Coptic Versions:
Coptic was spoken in four dialects
in Egypt. The Bible was translated
into each of these four dialects.
- 380 A.D. The Latin Vulgate was
translated by St. Jerome. He translated
into Latin the Old Testament from
the Hebrew and the New Testament
from Greek. The Latin Vulgate became
the Bible of the Western Church
until the Protestant Reformation
in the 1500's. It continues to be
the authoritative translation of
the Roman Catholic Church to this
day. The Protestant Reformation
saw an increase in translations
of the Bible into the common languages
of the people. Other early translations
of the Bible were in Armenian, Georgian,
and Ethiopic, Slavic, and Gothic.
- 1380 A.D. The first English
translation of the Bible was by
John Wycliffe. He translated the
Bible into English from the Latin
Vulgate. This was a translation
from a translation and not a translation
from the original Hebrew and Greek.
Wycliffe was forced to translate
from the Latin Vulgate because he
did not know Hebrew or Greek.
The Advent of Printing
Printing greatly aided the transmission
of the biblical texts.
- 1456 A.D. Gutenberg produced
the first printed Bible in Latin.
Printing revolutionized the way
books were made. From now on books
could be published in great numbers
and at a lower cost.
- 1514 A.D. The Greek New Testament
was printed for the first time by
Erasmus. He based his Greek New
Testament from only five Greek manuscripts,
the oldest of which dated only as
for back as the twelfth century.
With minor revisions, Erasmus' Greek
New Testament came to be know as
the Textus Receptus or the "received
texts."
- 1522 A. D. Polyglot Bible was
published. The Old Testament was
in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin
and the New Testament in Latin and
Greek. Erasmus used the Polyglot
to revise later editions of his
New Testament. Tyndale made use
of the Polyglot in his translation
on the Old Testament into English
which he did not complete because
he was martyred in 1534.
- 1611 A.D. The King James Version
into English from the original Hebrew
and Greek. The King James translators
of the New Testament used the Textus
Receptus as the basis for their
translations.
- 1968 A.D. The United Bible Societies
4th Edition of the Greek New Testament.
This Greek New Testament made use
of the oldest Greek manuscripts
which date from 175 A.D. This was
the Greek New Testament text from
which the NASV and the NIV were
translated.
- 1971 A.D. The New American Standard
Version (NASV) was published. It
makes use of the wealth of much
older Hebrew and Greek manuscripts
now available that weren't available
at the time of the translation of
the KJV. Its wording and sentence
structure closely follow the Greek
in more of a word for word style.
- 1983 A.D. The New International
Version (NIV) was published. It
also made use of the oldest manuscript
evidence. It is more of a "thought-for-thought"
translation and reads more easily
than the NASV.
As an example of the contrast between
word-for-word and thought-for-thought
translations, notice below the translation
of the Greek word "hagios-holy"
NASV Hebrews 9:25. "...the high
priest enters the holy place year by
year with blood not his own."
NIV Hebrews 9:25. "...the
high priest enters the Most Holy Place
every year with blood that is not his
own."
The NIV supplies "understood" information
about the Day of Atonement, namely that
the high priest's duties took place
in the compartment of the temple known
specifically as the Most Holy Place.
Note that the NASV simply says "holy
place" reflecting the more literal translation
of "hagios."
The Integrity of the Manuscript
Evidence
As with any ancient book transmitted
through a number of handwritten manuscripts,
the question naturally arises as to
how confident can we be that we have
anything resembling the autograph. Let
us now look at what evidences we have
for the integrity of the New Testament
manuscripts.
Let us look at the number of manuscripts
and how close they date to the autographs
of the Bible as compared with other
ancient writings of similar age.
Tacitus, the Roman historian, wrote
his Annals of Imperial Rome in about
A.D. 116. Only one manuscript of his
work remains. It was copied about 850
A.D.
Josephus, a Jewish historian, wrote
The Jewish War shortly after 70 A.D.
There are nine manuscripts in Greek
which date from 1000-1200 A.D. and one
Latin translation from around 400 A.D.
Homer's Iliad was written around
800 B.C. It was as important to ancient
Greeks as the Bible was to the Hebrews.
There are over 650 manuscripts remaining
but they date from 200 to 300 A.D. which
is over a thousand years after the Iliad
was written.
The Old Testament autographs were
written 1450 - 400 B. C.
The Dead Sea Scrolls date between 200
B.C. to 70 A. D and date within 300
years from when the last book of the
Old Testament was written.
Two almost complete Greek LXX translations
of the Old Testament date about 350
A. D.
The oldest complete Hebrew Old Testament
dates about 950 A. D.
Genesis-Deuteronomy were written
over 1200 years before the Dead Sea
Scrolls.
Codex Vaticanus is an almost
complete Greek translation of the Old
Testament dating around 350 A.D. The
Aleppo Codex is the oldest complete
Old Testament manuscript in Hebrew and
was copied around 950 A.D. The Dead
Sea Scrolls date from within 200-300
years from the last book of the Old
Testament. However since the five books
of Moses were written about 1450- 1400
B.C. the Dead Sea Scrolls still come
almost 1200 years after the first books
of the Old Testament were written.
The New Testament autographs were written
between 45-95 A. D.
There are 5,664 Greek manuscripts
some dating as early as 125 A. D. and
an complete New Testament that dates
from 350 A. D.
8,000 to 10,000 Latin Vulgate manuscripts.
8,000 manuscripts in Ethiopic, Coptic,
Slavic, Syriac, and Armenian.
In addition, the complete New Testament
could be reproduced form the quotes
that were made from it by the early
church fathers in their letters and
sermons.
ISSUES CONCERNING THE AUTHORSHIP
AND DATING OF THE NEW TESTAMENT BOOKS
Skeptics and liberal Christian scholars
both seek to date the New Testament
books as late first century or early
second century writings. They contend
that these books were not written by
eyewitnesses but rather by from second
or third hand sources. This allowed
for the development of what they view
as myths concerning Jesus. For example,
they would deny that Jesus actually
foretold the destruction of Jerusalem.
Rather they would contend that later
Christian writers "put these words into
his mouth."
Many of the New Testament books claim
to be written by eyewitnesses.
The Gospel of John claims to be written
by the disciple of the Lord. Recent
archeological research has confirmed
both the existence of the Pool of Bethesda
and that it had five porticoes as described
in John 5:2. This correct reference
to an incidental detail lends credibility
to the claim that the Gospel of John
was written by John who as an eyewitness
knew Jerusalem before it was destroyed
in 70 A. D.
Paul signed his epistles with his
own hand. He was writing to churches
who knew him. These churches were able
to authenticate that these epistles
had come from his hands (Galatians 6:11).
Clement an associate of Paul's wrote
to the Corinthian Church in 97 A. D.
urging them to heed the epistle that
Paul had sent them.
B. The following facts strongly suggest
that both the Gospel of Luke and the
Book of Acts were written prior to 65
A.D. This lends credibility to the author's
(Luke) claim to be an eyewitness to
Paul's missionary journeys. This would
date Mark prior to 65 A.D. and the Pauline
epistles between 49-63 A.D.
Acts records the beginning history
of the church with persecutions and
martyrdoms being mentioned repeatedly.
Three men; Peter, Paul, and James the
brother of Jesus all play leading roles
throughout the book. They were all martyred
by 67 A.D., but their martyrdoms are
not recorded in Acts.
The church in Jerusalem played a
central role in the Book of Acts, but
the destruction of the city in 70 A.D.
was not mentioned. The Jewish historian
Josephus cited the siege and destruction
of Jerusalem as befalling the Jews because
of their unjust killing of James the
brother of Jesus.
The Book of Acts ends with Paul in
Rome under house arrest in 62 A.D. In
64 A.D., Nero blamed and persecuted
the Christians for the fire the burned
down the city of Rome.
Paul himself was martyred by 65 A.D.
in Rome. Again, neither the terrible
persecution of the Christians in Rome
nor Paul's martyrdom are mentioned.
Conclusion: These books,
Luke-Acts, were written while Luke was
an eyewitness to many of the events,
and had opportunity to research portions
that he was not an eyewitness to.
THE CHURCH FATHERS BEAR WITNESS
TO EVEN EARLIER NEW TESTAMENT MANUSCRIPTS
The earliest manuscripts we have
of major portions of the New Testament
are p 45, p 46, p66, and p 75, and they
date from 175-250 A. D. The early church
fathers (97-180 A.D.) bear witness to
even earlier New Testament manuscripts
by quoting from all but one of the New
Testament books. They are also in the
position to authenticate those books,
written by the apostles or their close
associates, from later books such as
the gospel of Thomas that claimed to
have been written by the apostles, but
were not.
Clement (30-100 A.D.) wrote an epistle
to the Corinthian Church around 97 A.D.
He reminded them to heed the epistle
that Paul had written to them years
before. Recall that Clement had labored
with Paul (Philippians 4:3). He quoted
from the following New Testament books:
Luke, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Ephesians,
Titus, 1 and 2 Peter, Hebrews, and James.
The apostolic fathers Ignatius (30-107
A.D.), Polycarp (65-155 A.D.), and Papias
(70-155 A.D.) cite verses from every
New Testament book except 2 and 3 John.
They thereby authenticated nearly the
entire New Testament. Both Ignatius
and Polycarp were disciples of the apostle
John.
Justin Martyr, (110-165 A.D.), cited
verses from the following 13 books of
the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke,
John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Galatians,
2 Thessalonians, Hebrews, 1 and 2 Peter,
and Revelation.
Irenaeus, (120-202 A.D.), wrote a five
volume work Against Heresies in which,
He quoted from every book of the New
Testament but 3 John. He quoted from
the New Testament books over 1,200 times.
HOW WAS THE NEW TESTAMENT CANON
DETERMINED?
The Early church had three criteria
for determining what books were to be
included or excluded from the Canon
of the New Testament.
First, the books must have
apostolic authority-- that is, they
must have been written either by the
apostles themselves, who were eyewitnesses
to what they wrote about, or by associates
of the apostles.
Second, there was the criterion
of conformity to what was called the
"rule of faith." In other words, was
the document congruent with the basic
Christian tradition that the church
recognized as normative.
Third, there was the criterion
of whether a document had enjoyed continuous
acceptance and usage by the church at
large.
The gospel of Thomas is not included
in the Canon of the New Testament for
the following reasons.
The gospel of Thomas fails the test
of Apostolic authority. None of the
early church fathers from Clement to
Irenaeus ever quoted from the gospel
of Thomas. This indicates that they
either did not know of it or that they
rejected it as spurious. In either case,
the early church fathers fail to support
the gospel of Thomas' claim to have
been written by the apostle. It was
believed to by written around 140 A.D.
There is no evidence to support its
purported claim to be written by the
Apostle Thomas himself.
The gospel of Thomas fails to conform
to the rule of faith. It purports to
contain 114 "secret sayings" of Jesus.
Some of these are very similar to the
sayings of Jesus recorded in the Four
Gospels. For example the gospel of Thomas
quotes Jesus as saying, "A city built
on a high hill cannot be hidden." This
reads the same as Matthew's Gospel except
that high is added. But Thomas claims
that Jesus said, "Split wood; I am there.
Lift up a stone, and you will find me
there." That concept is pantheistic.
Thomas ends with the following saying
that denies women salvation unless they
are some how changed into being a man.
"Let Mary go away from us, because women
are not worthy of life." Jesus is quoted
as saying, "Lo, I shall lead her in
order to make her male, so that she
too may become a living spirit, resembling
you males. For every woman who makes
herself male will enter into the kingdom
of heaven."
The gospel of Thomas fails the test
of continuous usage and acceptance.
The lack of manuscript evidence plus
the failure of the early church fathers
to quote from it or recognize it shows
that it was not used or accepted in
the early Church. Only two manuscripts
are known of this "gospel." Until 1945
only a single fifth-century copy translation
in Coptic had been found. Then in 1945
a Greek manuscript of the Gospel of
Thomas was found at Nag Hammadi in Egypt.
This compares very poorly to the thousands
of manuscripts that authenticate the
Four Gospels.
Textual Criticism: What Is It And
Why It Is Necessary
Important terms:
"Lower" Textual Criticism: the practice
of studying the manuscripts of the Bible
with the goal of reproducing the original
text of the Bible from this vast wealth
of manuscripts. This is a necessary
task because there exists minor variations
among the biblical manuscripts. So,
unless one manuscript is arbitrarily
chosen as a standard by which to judge
all others, then one must employ textual
criticism to compare all manuscripts
to derive the reading which would most
closely reflect the autographs.
"Higher" criticism: "The Jesus Seminar"
is a group of liberal Christian higher
critics who vote on which of the sayings
of Christ they believe to have actually
been spoken by Him. This is an example
of "higher" criticism. It is highly
subjective and is colored by the view
points of various "higher" critics.
Textual Variants: Since all Greek
manuscripts of the New Testament prior
to Erasmus' first printed Greek New
Testament were copied by hand scribal
errors or variants could have crept
into the texts.. When these Greek New
Testament manuscripts are compared with
each other we find evidence of scribal
errors and places where the different
manuscripts differ with one another.
TEXTUAL VARIANTS AND THE INTEGRITY
OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT
Many scholars have spent a lifetime
of study of the textual variants. The
following is the conclusion of the importance
of these variants as they relate to
the integrity of the New Testament text.
There are over 200,000 variants in
the New Testament alone. How do these
variants effect our confidence that
the New Testament has been faithfully
handed down to us?
These 200,000 variants are not as large
as they seem. Remember that every misspelled
word of an omission of a single word
in any of the 5,600 manuscript would
count as a variant.
Johann Bengel 1687-1752 was very
disturbed by the 30,000 variants that
had recently been noted in Mill's edition
of the Greek Testament. After extended
study he came to the conclusion that
the variant readings were fewer in number
than might have been expected and that
they did not shake any article of Christian
doctrine.
Westcott and Hort, in the 1870's,
state that the New Testament text remains
over 98.3 percent pure no matter whether
one uses the Textus Receptus or their
own Greek text which was largely based
on Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.
James White, on p. 40 of his book
The King James Only Controversy states:
"The reality is that the amount of variation
between the two most extremely different
manuscripts of the New Testament would
not fundamentally altar the message
of the Scriptures! I make this statement
(1) fully aware of the wide range of
textual variants in the New Testament,
and (2) painfully aware of the strong
attacks upon those who have made similar
statements in the past."
Scholars Norman Geisler and William
Nix conclude, "The New Testament, then,
has not only survived in more manuscripts
that any other book from antiquity,
but it has survived in a purer form
than any other great book-a form that
is 99.5 percent pure."
When textual critics look at all
5,600 Greek New Testament manuscripts
they find that they can group these
manuscripts into text-types or families
with other similar manuscripts. There
are four text-types.
Figure 1. Age differences between Alexandrian
and Byzantine manuscripts.
The Alexandrian text-type, found
in most papyri and in Codex Sinaiticus
and Codex Vaticanus all of which date
prior to 350 A.D.
The Western text-type, found both
in Greek manuscripts and in translations
into other languages, especially Latin.
The Byzantine text-type, found in
the vast majority of later Greek manuscripts.
Over 90 percent of all 5,600 Greek New
Testament manuscripts are of the Byzantine
text-type. The Byzantine text-type is
"fuller" or "longer" than other text-types,
and this is taken as evidence of a later
origin. The reason that we have so many
manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type
is because the Byzantine Empire remained
Greek speaking and Orthodox Christian
until Islamic Turks overran its capital
Constantinople in 1456. Constantinople
is now called Istanbul and is the capital
of modem day Turkey.
The Caesaarean text-type, disputed by
some, found in p 45 and a few other
manuscripts.
WHY DOES THE KJV DIFFER FROM THE
NIV?
The reason the King James version
differ from the NASV and the NIV in
a number of readings is because it is
translated from a different text-type
than they are.
The King James Version was translated
from Erasmus' printed Greek New Testament
which made use of only five Greek manuscripts
the oldest of which dated to the 1,100
A.D. These manuscripts were examples
of the Byzantine text-type.
The NASV and the NIV make use of
the United Bible Societies 4th Edition
1968 of the New Testament. This edition
of the Greek New Testament relies more
heavily on the Alexandrian text-type
while making use of all 5,664 Greek
manuscripts. The reasons that the NASV
and NIV find the Alexandrian text-type
more reliable are the following:
This text-type uses manuscripts date
from 175-350 A.D. which includes most
of the papyri, Codex Sinaiticus and
Codex Vaticanus.
The church fathers from 97-350 A.D.
used this text-type when they quoted
the New Testament.
The early translations of the New
Testament used the Alexandrian text-type.
EXAMPLES THAT SHOW WHY THE KJV DIFFERS
FROM THE NIV AND NASV IN CERTAIN VERSES
In the following examples the King
James Version differs from the NIV,
and NASV. because it bases it's translation
on the Byzantine text-type and the NIV
and NASV base theirs on the Alexandrian
text-type.
KJV 1 John 5:7-8 "For there are three
that bear record in heaven, the Father,
the Word, and Holy Ghost: and these
three are one. And there are three that
bear witness in earth, the spirit, and
the water, and the blood; and these
three agree in one."
NIV 1 John 5:7 "For there are three
that testify: v. 8 the Spirit, the water
and the blood: and the three are in
agreement."
When Erasmus first printed the Greek
New Testament in 1514 it did not contain
the words "in heaven, the Father, the
Word, and Holy Ghost: and these three
are one. And there are three that bear
witness in earth," because they were
not found in any of the Greek manuscripts
that Erasmus looked at.
These words were not quoted by any
of the Greek church fathers. They most
certainly would have been used if the
Trinity in the 3rd and 4th centuries.
These words are not found in any
ancient versions of the New Testament.
These include Syriac, Coptic, Armenian,
Ethiopic, Arabic, Slavonic, nor in the
Old Latin in its early form.
These words begin to appear in marginal
notes in the Latin New Testament beginning
in the fifth century. From the sixth
century onward these words are found
more and more frequently.
Erasmus finally agreed to put these
words into new editions of his Greek
New Testament if his critic's could
find one Greek manuscript that contained
these words. It appears that his critics
manufactured manuscripts to include
these words.
These additional words are found
in only eight manuscripts as a variant
reading written in the margin. Seven
of these manuscripts date from the sixteenth
century and one is a tenth century manuscript.
Erasmus' New Testament became the
basis for the Greek New Testament, "Textus
Receptus", which the King James translators
used as the basis for their translation
of the New Testament into English.
Mark 16 verses 9-20 are found in
the King James Version. However, both
the NASV and the NIV note that these
verses are not found in the earliest
manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark (see
The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20).
Neither Codex Sinaiticus nor Codex
Vaticanus have Mark 16:9-20.
Mark 16:9-20 is also absent from
some Old Latin, Syriac, Armenian, and
Georgian manuscripts.
Clement of Alexandria and Origen
show no knowledge of the existence of
these verses.
4. The earliest church father to
note the longer ending of Mark 16:9-20
was Irenaeus, around 180 A. D.
Luke 2:14 reads:
KJV: "Glory to God in the highest and
on earth peace, good will toward men."
NIV: "Glory to God in the highest, and
on earth peace to men on whom his favor
rests."
The Greek text from which these two
versions are translated differ by only
one letter. The NIV is translated from
manuscripts that have an "s" on the
end of the Greek word for good will.
This reading is supported by the oldest
Alexandrine text-types.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The following is a list of books
that deal with the issue of how the
Bible came to us. I have listed them
from the easiest to most the complex.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ: A
Journalist's Personal Investigation
of the Evidence for Jesus. Grand Rapids:
Zondervan, 1998
White, James R. The King James Only
Controversy: Can You Trust the Modern
Translations? Minneapolis, Bethany House
Publishers, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. The Text of the New
Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption,
and Restoration. Oxford, Oxford University
Press, 1992
Aland, Kurt and Barbara. The Text of
The New Testament an Introduction to
the Critical Editions and to the Theory
and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism.
Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing Company,
1995
Wurthwein, Ernst. The Text of The Old
Testament: An Introduction to the Biblia
Hebraica. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. A Textual Commentary
of the Greek New Testament. Stuttgart,
United Bible Societies, 1995
Related Links:
Are the Biblical Documents Reliable?
(by Jimmy Williams from Probe Ministries)
Is Our Copy of the Bible a Reliable
Copy of the Original?
The New Testament Canon
(
PowerPoint Presentation, 3.5 MB) by
Hill Roberts (http://www.lordibelieve.org)
HISTORICAL CRITICISM
History is a closed continuum of cause
and effect. This first principle rejects
even the possibility of God’s supernatural
intervention in the affairs of mankind.
The Principle of analogy: if it is
possible now it was possible then. If
it is not possible now it was not possible
then. This second principle would reject
the possibility of any supernatural
miracle. Men dead for three days do
not now rise from the dead. Therefore,
Jesus Christ could not have risen from
the dead, nor could he have raised Lazarus
from the dead.
You decide what is logical and what
is not. This principle allows for the
much speculation. If it does not seem
logical to you that men can walk on
the water then Jesus did not walk on
the water.
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