Sunday, February 9, 2013
BACK TO BASICS – 2014
February Theme – the Bible – SUPPLEMENT
Can We Rely on Our Bibles Today?
IT has been argued that since we do not have the autographs
(originals) and that what we have is a copy of a copy of a copy that it
is probably corrupted and therefore unreliable.
This argument is used by critics of scripture who want to reject
its validity or who want to only accept portions of it.
While it is true that we don’t have the originals, and what we
have is the product of generations of copies, is the conclusion
accurate. I think not!
It is my conviction that what we have today is just as much the
word of God as what was originally said and that we need to take His
message “word for word.” In
this lesson, I want to talk a little about how Bible translation works.
IT is important that we understand this so that 1) We can answer
critics and 2) We can have confidence in the Bible ourselves.
NOTE: About 3 years ago, I presented an 8 lesson series on how
we got our Bibles. It is
available at our web site:
http://roseavenue.org/Study-Materials/Sermon-Outlines/HowWeGotOurBible/BibleIndex.html
Some of today’s material will be taken from these lessons.
Because of time constraints, this lesson is only a fundamental
and brief discussion of this subject.
a.
Canon- The
word “canon” is from the Greek word, “Kanōn” which meant a reed.
The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Revised notes
that from this word “came the idea of a measuring rod, later a rule or
norm of faith, and eventually a catalogue or list.”
In other words, it came to mean the standard.
When we speak of the
Canon of the Bible, we mean “the collection of religious writings
divinely inspired and hence authoritative.” (ibid)
More simply, the Canon is those books that have been determined
to be the WORD OF GOD!
b.
The Bible consists of 66
books. 39 Old Testament and
27 New Testament. There are
some who question whether or not these books are the complete canon.
Some believe there are other books that ought to be included,
while others might question the authority of those that we do use.
Let us take a brief look at this.
I believe we have the Bible God intended for us to have – it is
the complete revelation of God for us today.
c.
The Old Testament – there are some strong points to verify it because of the New Testament
and Jewish documentation.
Consider the following:
i.
Jewish documentation.
Centuries prior to the coming of Christ, Jewish history records
the Canon they accepted. In
content, it is consistent with our Old Testament (though in a different
order).
An interesting quote about the inspiration of the Old Testament
identifies how the Jews went about determining what belonged in the
Canon. They took very
seriously the word of God and would have gone to great lengths to verify
that which belonged and reject that which did NOT belong.
“The books accepted by the Jewish community originated over a period of
approximately one thousand years. The first question regarding a
writing’s acceptance was whether the book was written by a prophet of
God. Generally the book would have statements such as, “thus says the
Lord,” or “the word of the Lord came.” Second, miraculous signs or
accuracy of fulfillment served as confirmation of a prophet’s message.
Third, the book had to be internally consistent with the revelation of
God found in the teachings of other canonical books, especially what God
gave through Moses.”[1]
ii.
The New Testament lends
great validity to the inspiration of the Old Testament.
1.
The frequency with which
the Old Testament is quoted in the New Testament as a source of
authority. The Old Testament is quoted more than 250 times in the New
Testament with it being alluded to more than 1000 times.
Much of this attributing it directly as the word of God.
For example: In Matthew 21:42
Jesus said, “Have you not read in the scriptures…”
1 Cor. 14:21 says, ““In the law it is written: “With men of other
tongues and other lips I will speak to this people; And yet, for all
that, they will not hear Me,” says the Lord.” NOTE: What is
significant about this verse is that Paul is quoting from Isaiah
28:11-12. He refers to it as
“the law” thus indicating that more than the 5 books of Moses (Gen –
Deut.) being the law of God.
2.
Fulfilled prophecies in
the New Testament lend validity to the God authorship of the Old
Testament. (Validating the NT thus validates the OT, AND visa-versa).
3.
Consider
Luke 24:44, “Then He
said to them, “These are the words which I spoke to you while I was
still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in
the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms concerning Me.””
The reference made by Jesus demonstrated familiarity with the Hebrew
Canon. The Hebrew canon
consisted of 24 (these are the same 39 books we have but several were
combined into one) books in 3 divisions.
The divisions were called:
a.
The Torah (Gen – Deut),
b.
The Nevi’im which consisted of 8
books (Joshua, Judges, Samuel {combines 1 & 2), Kings (combines 1 & 2),
Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and “The Twelve” (Our minor prophets).
c.
The Kethuvim or writings
which consisted of 11 books including Psalms, Job, Proverbs, The 5 rolls
(Meginoth) –Ruth, Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Lamentations & Esther;
and the Historical books – Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah (combined) and
Chronicles (combines 1 & 2).
NOTICE that it was these
3 sections Jesus made reference to as fulfilled prophecy concerning Him.
iii.
What about the
Apocrypha? Perhaps you have
heard of the Apocrypha. It
is a group of books recorded mostly after the time of Malachi (which
seemed to indicate that God’s writings would end until the time of the
coming of Elijah (John the Baptist).
Just a couple of thoughts about this:
a.
There was not universal
acceptance of these books as part of the Jewish Bible and actually they
were rejected as uninspired.
b.
In the New Testament,
all 3 portions of the Hebrew Canon are quoted liberally.
But not once is the Apocrypha cited.
c.
Actually, the Apocrypha
was not even recognized as Canon by Catholicism until 1546 at the
Council of Trent.
d.
The New Testament
– more challenging,
i.
As with the OT, there
are other books that some think are inspired or were excluded whatever
reason. Movies such as the
DaVinci Code and others make reference to books that were supposedly
left out.
ii.
It was not until 367 AD
that the canon we have was officially published.
It was in a letter written to Athanasius.
However, understand that the majority of the books were decided
early in the 2nd century (with the exception of about 7
books).
iii.
The criteria for
accepting books at Canon.
1.
IT is worthy of note
that the canon was not chosen, but rather it was “discovered.”
They didn’t just vote on whether or not to accept something.
There were standards through which they were able to recognize,
accept, affirm and confirm it.
2.
Did it have the quality
of inspiration?
In other words, did it demonstrate “the fingerprint of God”?
IT claimed inspiration, continuity of flow.
3.
Was the author an
apostle or have apostolic authority?
Either an apostle or those who had direct interactions with the
apostles.
4.
Does the doctrine agree
with the canon of truth or “the rule of faith”? Its teachings
could not contradict what the Bible taught.
(One reason many of the so-called pseudo-gospels are rejected is
because they contain stories that contradict the 4 gospels of the NT).
This would also reject the Qur’an and the Book of Mormon, etc.
5.
Did the work receive
wide circulation and acceptance?
More than local
acceptance. In other words,
the books were known to have been circulated. (Col 4:16, Rev. 1:4, Gal.
1:1-2, 1 Pet. 1:1, etc.)
6.
When was it written?
If a book was not penned in the 1st century (apostles
and their contemporaries)
7.
With such strict
criteria, many works were rejected and with cause.
iv.
What about the 7 books
that were questioned. First,
let it be noted that all NT books were recorded as inspired many years
or centuries prior to the first complete list we now have.
IT is just that they were not all mentioned.
The 7 books that were questioned were not rejected, they simply
required greater investigation and this for good reasons.
These books include:
1.
Hebrews – questioned
because the author was not named.
2.
James – because at first
it seemed to contradict the epistles of Paul concerning faith and grace.
But with further discussion it was determined that there is no
contradiction (and there is NOT!)
3.
2 Peter because it was a
different style than 1st Peter and similar to Jude.
But being written later, the tone was different.
4.
2 & 3 John because of
their personal nature and brevity.
But teachings very consistent with 1 John (not disputed).
5.
Jude – because of a
quote by Enoch (vs. 14).
This was actually dismissed rather early as inconsequential (not being
recorded doesn’t mean he didn’t say it).
6.
Revelation – because of
its apocalyptic nature.
However, the bigger question dealt with its interpretation rather than
its inspiration.
e.
Thoughts:
2 Tim. 2:16,17 tells us that scriptures inspired of God are
profitable and able to make us complete..
Jude 3 tells us we have “the faith, once for all delivered.”
2 Peter 1:3-4 tells us
His divine power has give to us “all things that pertain to life and
godliness.”
IF we do not have all that God
intended for us to have, how can we rely on anything within its pages?
a.
The other question we
want to briefly address is the Bible we have today.
Since what we have is the result of copies does that mean error
has been written into it? Is
it accurate today? I am
convinced that what we have IS the word of God and must be accepted word
for word. Why?
Because of the process that resulted in our texts.
Consider the following:
b.
The process of
determining the accuracy of a text is called “textual criticism.”
It involves examining various manuscripts to determine the
character (dating, accuracy, etc.) and authenticity of a work.
c.
With the translation of
the New Testament, what we have today is NOT the result of linear
transmission (a straight line of copies – much like “the telephone game”
where one mistake affects everyone after that) but a rich collection of
manuscripts to work with. A
manuscript is a hand written document.
Scholars and translators will examine the various documents which
include:
- Fragments (portions of a
document) – the are some of the oldest documents including P52 which is
believed to have been written around 110-125 AD and contains a few
verses in John 18 (31-34, 37-38),
- Uncials (mss with all Greek
Capital letters which date from the 3rd to the 8th
centuries) – about 300 of these including the complete Codex Sinaticus
(ca. 340 AD – the earliest complete New Testament in Greek) and Codex
Alexandrinus (ca. 450 AD);
- Miniscules (mss from the 9th
century and beyond which contain both capital and small case Greek
letters) of which we have about 2795, plus another 1900+ lectionaries
(books written that contain specific scriptures to be read by the
church).
- In addition to this, we have
about 19,000 manuscripts of various dates in other ancient languages
(including Syrian, Coptic, Latin and Aramaic).
- Together, it is estimated that there are more than 24,000 manuscripts.
d.
While there are
differences in the various documents (called variants), through
examining the various texts they can reach an accurate conclusion.
And most of these variants are insignificant (spelling errors,
transposing words (i.e. Jesus Christ vs. Christ Jesus), omitting a word
or a line of text, etc.)
This can easily be identified by comparing texts, especially when you
have as many as we have.
e.
By comparing these
documents they can comprise a text that is believed to be 99.5% accurate
(true to the original) which will be used to translate a Bible (into
English or some other language).
There is much more to be said about this, but this is a brief
summary.
f.
As a case in point,
consider the Dead Sea Scrolls. While dealing with the translation of
the Old Testament which was somewhat different, it gives a good example
of accuracy in translation.
Discovered in the 1940s by a boy throwing rocks into caves in Qumran
when he heard something break.
It was a clay picture containing leather scrolls.
When they were found they contained substantial portions of the
Old Testament including complete copies of Isaiah and Gen-Deut., Psalms,
etc. and fragments which come from every book of the Old Testament
except Esther, and other works (including some apocryphal books and
commentaries, and numerous other works).
These manuscripts date to around 100 BC by the Essenes.
What is remarkable is that when a comparison was done with one of
the Isaiah scrolls found there and earlier manuscripts the variants were
minimal. As an example,
Isaiah 53 was examined which has 166 words in it.
In that chapter there were discovered 17 differences of which 10
were matters of spelling, 4 were stylistic changes and 3 were letters
that comprised a word in vs. 11 (“light”) which was added to what it was
compared with.[1][2]
In essence, the errors were overwhelmingly what we would call
today, “typos”. IT verified
the accuracy of the text of the Old Testament and the methods used to
preserve it.
When you
consider these thoughts, we have every reason to believe that the Bible
we have IS the Word of God.
It was written and preserved so that we might have an understanding of
His will for us. Whether or
not we accept it is another story.