Theology & Worldview

Can the Bible Be Trusted?

Every single book of the Bible points to Jesus in some way. Though the Bible is often accused of being full of errors, in reality it is remarkably consistent with itself. This is truly astounding. After all, the Bible was originally written in three languages and in three continents over 1,500 years by about 40 different authors and contains different literary genres. Many of the authors could not have known each other. And yet, they all agreed on the one true God and chronicled His redemptive story.

The abundance of ancient texts of the New Testament in existence provide a great way to test the consistency of the documents and assess how well they must copy the originals. Josh McDowell reports that there are “more than twenty thousand copies of the New Testament in existence…” (74). These texts, remarkably, contain essentially the same words that are in Bibles today. However, according to critic Bart Ehrman, these ancient copies of the New Testament contain about 300,000 to 400,000 variants. While that number is extremely high, McDowell notes that because so many manuscripts exist, there is a higher chance of variants. Unconcernedly, about 75% of differences in the texts are spelling differences and many of the other variants are synonyms (McDowell 76). Less than one percent of viable variants change the meaning of verses, but none challenge any Biblical theology (Barnett). Even Ehrman concedes that “the essential Christian beliefs are not affected by textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament.” (252) Additionally, the earliest existing copies of the New Testament books are dated from about A.D. 125 to 300, very shortly after the events of Jesus’ life and very early church history (van Minnen). Jesus died sometime between A.D. 26 and 36, so the New Testament’s words were already essentially the same as they are in the Bible today approximately 95 to 170 years after Jesus’ death (Bookman). Of course, these dates are of the copies in existence, since the originals are lost. The large quantities of consistent copies indicate early and unchanged originals.

The ramifications of the early dates of the New Testament are immense. They were written so soon after the events took place, myths had no time to develop. Also, eyewitness to the events written about in the New Testament were still alive. The New Testament authors “could not afford to risk inaccuracies…” (Bruce, qtd. in McDowell 82). In fact, the disciples themselves appealed to other eyewitnesses. For example, “Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know – this Jesus, you crucified…” (English Standard Version; Acts 2:22-23, emphasis added). Another example is Acts 26:24-26.

One of the most compelling reasons to trust the Old Testament is fulfilled prophesy. Many religious texts have prophesy, but the difference with the Old Testament is that there are numerous examples of fulfilled prophesies. Ezekiel, writing from around 593 B.C. to 571 B.C. and Amos, writing around 775-750 B.C., both prophesied destruction to the city of Tyre (Amos 1:9-10; Ezek. 26).  Ezekiel included the details that the city of Tyre would be made into “a bare rock” and a place to spread fishing nets (Ezek.26:3-5, 7) and that Nebuchadnezzar and “many nations” would come against Tyre and the “stones and timber and soil” would be cast into the “waters” (Ezek.26:3-5, 7, 12). Amos, along with Jeremiah (who wrote from around 626 to 586 B.C.), prophesied an end to the Philistines and one of their cities, Ashkelon (Amos 1:8; Jer. 47:4, 7). Jeremiah foretold that Tyre would not come to Ashkelon’s aid (Jer. 47:7). Zephaniah, who wrote from around 640 to 609 B.C., concurred that “Ashkelon shall become a desolation…” but said that the “seacoast” would become Judah’s property (Zeph. 2:4, 7). One fulfilment is complete non-existence of any Philistines today. As for Ashkelon, it was destroyed, but now belongs Israel (Davis, qtd. in McDowell 67). Ancient sources say that Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Tyre from 586–573 B.C.  (“Ithobaal III;” “What Happened To Tyre?”). Later, in 332 B.C., Alexander the Great conquered Tyre (Whipps). Alexander used the ruins of the mainland part of Tyre to build makeshift bridge to the island part of Tyre.  (Mustermann). He “scraped… Tyre clean when he made the causeway out to the island and left a ‘bare rock.’” (McDowell, 62) Even recently, people have used the place where Tyre was to dry fishing nets (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary qtd. in “Was the prophecy against Tyre in Ezekiel 26 fulfilled?”). As for other examples, Isaiah foretold specific details about Jesus’ death over seven hundred years before Jesus actually died (Isa.53, Matt.27:14, Rom.5:9). In the first book of the Bible, God promises some land that is now in the Middle East would belong to Abraham’s offspring. Though the Jewish people have often been persecuted and scattered, today, the Promised Land belongs to Israel.

The textual accuracy and fulfilled prophesies make a compelling case for the reliability of the Bible. Perhaps the most controversial book ever written, the Bible deserves credit for overwhelming accuracy.

Works Cited

Barnett, Tim. “Textual Variants: It’s the Nature, Not the Number, That Matters.” Stand to Reason, May 2016, https://www.str.org/w/textual-variants-it-s-the-nature-not-the-number-that-matters.

Bookman, Doug. Qtd. in “When Did Jesus Die? The Year, Day & Time.” Christianity.com, Apr. 2010, https://www.christianity.com/jesus/death-and-resurrection/the-crucifixion/on-what-day-did-jesus-die.html.

Ehrman, Bart D. Misquoting Jesus. HarperOne, 2005.

“Ithobaal III.” Wikipedia, March 2021, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithobaal_III.

McDowell, Josh and Sean McDowell. More Than a Carpenter. Tyndale, 2009.

McDowell, Josh. A Ready Defense. Bill Wilson, Here’s Life Publishers, Inc., 1990.

Mustermann, Erik. “How Alexander the Great Literally Changed the Geography at Tyre.” War History Online, Jul. 2018, https://www.warhistoryonline.com/war-articles/alexander-the-great-tyre.html.

The Bible. English Standard Version, Crossway, 2011.

van Minnen, Peter. “Dating the Oldest New Testament Manuscripts.” Duke University Libraries, Dec. 1995, https://library.duke.edu/papyrus/texts/manuscripts.html.

“Was the prophecy against Tyre in Ezekiel 26 fulfilled?” Belief Map, https://beliefmap.org/prophecy-fulfilled/tyre.

“What Happened To Tyre?” Bible Reading Archeology, Sep. 2017, https://biblereadingarcheology.com/2017/09/13/what-happened-to-tyre/comment-page-1/.

Whipps, Heather. “Mystery Solved: How Alexander the Great Defeated Tyre.” Live Science, May 2007, https://www.livescience.com/1523-mystery-solved-alexander-great-defeated-tyre.html.

Image Credit: Tanner Mardis on Unsplash.com

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