Does The Bible Have Reliability?

Does The Bible Have Reliability?

To know Christianity is the truth, the Holy book(i.e. The Bible) must have reliability. On this page, we will refute arguments against its reliability.

The Authors of The Bible(Who Wrote The Bible?):

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The New Testament Manuscripts-

The Amount:

The Bible by far as some of the most reported manuscripts than almost any other document. We obviously can not know the exact figure of manuscripts as some own them privately or we may just find more like we did with the dead sea scrolls, but current estimates are usually around 20,000-28,000. In a counting by Josh and Sean McDowell there are 27336 known manuscripts including 10,000 of the Latin Vulgate, 5856 in Greek, 4000 in Slavic, 3325 in Armenian, 3000 in Coptic, 600 in Ethiopian, 350 in Syriac, 110 in other Latin manuscripts, 89 in Georgian, and 6 in Gothic.[1] Many sources on the internet have far higher counts, but these are the most reliable statics I could find. 

The Age: 

A common claim is that the newest manuscripts we have are from hundreds of years after Jesus, this is a bizarre claim which like most claims, has no evidence. Note: The Apostle John was believed to have died around 98AD out of old age.

Papyrus 90 is a Greek manuscript found in Egypt which dates to sometime in the 2nd century(101-200AD), the manuscript is very damaged, but from what we still have, we have a decent part of the Gospel of John. 

Papyrus 75, a Greek manuscript found in Egypt,  has even more than 90, 21(out of 24) chapters of Luke and 15(out of 21) chapters of John. It is dated anywhere between the late 2nd century(101-200AD) and early 3rd century(201-300AD).

Papyrus 104, written in Greek, contains a few verses from Matthew. It is very damaged aswell as small, but it is dated as very old. It is dated as around 100-150AD in some estimates, but some scholars date it more generally(i.e. any time in the 2nd century[101-200AD]). [3]

Papyrus 98, also in Greek, contains 2 of the 22 chapters of Revelations(or Apocalypse). It is dated as sometime between late first century(1-100) or early 2nd(101-200). [4]

Papyrus 66 contains 17 out of the 21 chapters of John(Some verses[of these 17 chapters] are to distorted to be read or ripped). It is said to be one of the most well-preserved manuscripts found. [5]

There are many more examples(Papyrus 32, 46, 52, 64, 67, 77, 103) but I wouldn't want to go even more overkill here.

Refuting Objections-

The 400,000 Variants:

A common claim to refute Bible's reliability is to claim there are 400,000 variants in manuscripts of the New Testament. However, this shouldn't be a surprising fact as we have thousands of manuscripts.  

It must also be noted that most of these variants(~90%) are simple spelling errors or synonym usage.  Bart Ehrman even notes in his book, "Misquoting Jesus" that essential beliefs of Christianity are not affected by these textual variants. [6] ~9% of this amount are also small details that are different which don't change the actual meaning of the text(different wordings). Then, ~1% are variants that change the text, but, as mentioned later, essential beliefs are not challenged. Most of this 10% of variants are from newer manuscripts, and even with these variants, we can debunk them by reading newer manuscripts. To show the insignificance of these variants, here are a few examples. 

Examples of the ~9%

Works Cited:

[1]McDowell, Josh and McDowell, Sean. Evidence That Demands a Verdict: Life-Changing Truth for a Skeptical World (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2017) Pg. 47-53

Aland, Kurt; Aland, Barbara (1995). The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Erroll F. Rhodes (trans.). Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. p. 101. 

[3]Jongkind, Dirk (January 13, 2015), "What is the Oldest Manuscript of the New Testament?", Evangelical Textual Criticism

[4]Philip Comfort & David Barrett, The Text of the Earliest New Testament Greek Manuscripts, Tyndale House 2001, p. 629.

[5] Victor Martin, Papyrus Bodmer II: Evangile de Jean chap. 1–14 (Cologny-Geneva: Bibliotheca Bodmeriana, 1956), 15-18. 

[6] Ehrman, B., 2005. Misquoting Jesus. New York City: HarperOne, p.252.

Translated by Gross Alexander. From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 13. Edited by Philip Schaff. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1889.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/230107.htm>.

Translated by James Donaldson. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 7. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1886.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/07158.htm>.