IN THIS ISSUE...

The American Family

Evidences: Documentation of the Bible

Transmission of Translations from Original Greek to Modern Text (Chart)

In our country today, the concept of "family" is vague and uncertain. While some still hold to the scriptural definition, or at least something akin to it, others have very different ideas. In the most extreme cases, folks believe it is all right to physically abuse or even to kill their own flesh and blood. Of course, the vast majority of us can see immediately that this is wrong. However, there are innumerable other ideas which are socially acceptable, yet fall far short of the scriptural pattern. The acceptance of these ideas has had disastrous results.

For example, many households contain only one parent. While in some cases this occurs through no fault of the remaining parent - for instance, when the spouse has died - in other cases, it is the result of the parents' own decisions. This situation is not good for the children. Consider the following excerpt from a recent column in the Providence Journal:

"Nearly 75 percent of children without fathers spend part of their childhood in poverty. They are more than twice as likely as children from two-parent families to be held back in school and more than four times as likely to be expelled or suspended. They are likelier to die in infancy. Likelier to need treatment for psychiatric problems. Likelier to be injured in an accident, to score poorly on I.Q. tests, to abuse drugs, to become criminals, to commit suicide.

"Above all, children born and raised out of wedlock are far more likely to get pregnant as teenagers and have children out of wedlock themselves - and thus to begin the cycle anew."

The people living this lifestyle lose their sense of personal responsibility, dignity, and self-worth. (We are discussing here situations wherein children are intentionally or recklessly conceived out of wedlock.) They develop the attitude that the government ought to provide them their basic needs. On the other hand, those who work to support themselves, and thereby provide for the poor through paying taxes, begin to resent those who receive the help. Thus we have different segments of society hating and resenting each other. Moreover, those who work begin to feel that the government owes them something, as well. They begin to look for more and more services and hand-outs from the government, driven by the selfish attitude that they ought to get some "return" on their "investment". The end result is a nation degraded by citizens who complain that they are not being given what they "deserve". Rather than going out and working and saving and sacrificing to earn what we want to have, as our parents and grandparents did, modern Americans wait for a handout or a big win at the lottery. Even as we live the most luxurious lives known to man, we wallow in self-pity because we don't have everything we want. This is not how God wants us to live; He loves us, and wants much better for us.

The single-parent arrangement is not the only one that leads to trouble: not by a long shot. Another example is the household wherein both parents are career professionals. Rather than being content to live a simple lifestyle, both parents are working full-time jobs outside of the home in order to gain more and more material wealth, or at least to maintain a more luxurious lifestyle than they otherwise could. So, rather than seeing a father who sacrifices to provide for his family, or a mother who sacrifices to nurture her children, the children instead see two parents who are in continual pursuit of material comfort and worldly pleasure. Is it any wonder if such children grow to be selfish and materialistic? Again, rather than coming home to a mother who teaches and guides him, the teenager comes home to the television, which shows him all manner of fornication and violence - in the most glamorous light. Or, since there is no one home to know where he is, he just stays out and involves himself in violence and fornication - and intoxicants.

These are by no means the only problems which modern American families make for themselves. The list goes on and on. However, as has been said before, this paper is not intended to change society, but to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. The above examples are offered as illustrations, to show what happens when we do not follow God's pattern for the family. As with all of God's instructions, He designed the family with our best interests at heart. When we follow His ways, we not only have heaven to look forward to, we also live better lives here. This is clearly seen when we consider the impact the modern American version of "family" has had upon our children.

It is often said that children have no respect these days. And this is a valid observation. They show no respect for their teachers. They show no respect for their parents. They show no respect for each other, or even for themselves. When they cross the street, they do not move quickly, so as to get out of the way: they saunter slowly, not caring whether anyone is waiting. When they enter a building, they don't look to see if there is someone behind them, so as to hold the door. When you greet them with a friendly smile, they look at you sullenly, and may or may not say anything. They curse and swear loudly in public, not even caring whether they might be offending someone. They exhibit a flagrant disregard for all authority, as well as for any sense of decency. Consider this report from the Providence Journal:

"BURLINGTON, VT. (AP) - A gay high school student who has been suspended several times for wearing a dress, makeup and a wig to class says he has no plans to change his wardrobe."

"About 100 students cut class Friday to protest the suspensions, including boys wearing pink lipstick and girls wearing white button-down shirts with ties."

The attitudes and behavior of our nation's children have become so reprehensible that people are actually buying into the notion that "it takes a village" to raise a child! Why are children this way? It is because they are not being taught the fundamentals of decency in the home. These fundamentals cannot be taught by a few simple verbal lessons. They must be taught by example, by patient listening and teaching, by consistent correction. They must be taught by someone who practices them, and who spends sufficient time with the child to instil them in him: someone like godly parents. It doesn't take more than two people to raise children into fine adults if those two people are doing their job. The current state of American children is a direct result of the current state of the American family. The farther we get from the scriptural pattern, the more severe the consequences we will suffer. And all of this only serves to highlight the wisdom and the love of God in establishing His pattern for the family. The tragedy is, so many would rather serve the gods of comfort, convenience, social acceptability, and/or material wealth, than the true and living God. To these people, I will let the words of Joshua speak for me:

And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. (Joshua 24:15)

There are many today who are under the impression that the Bibles we have today are not true to the original documents. Moreover, there are some who still think that the various books of the Bible were not written when the books themselves claim to have been written. Some folks think that the Gospels, for instance, were not eyewitness accounts as they claim to be, but are rather mythical accounts written much later in order to establish the Christians' doctrine. In pursuing this type of question, we are not trying to establish whether the Bible is inspired, but whether it is authentic: whether the text is true to the original, and whether the original books were written when they claim to have been. In this article, we will look at some of the evidence which can help us to answer this type of question.

In order to understand the evidence for the Bible, it is necessary to have a little background. First, we know that the Bible is a collection of books written over a span of some centuries by approximately 40 different authors. These books are divided into two main sections, which we call the Old and New Testaments. There is a span of hundreds of years between the writing of the last Old Testament book, and the first New Testament book. The scholars who study the questions surrounding the Bible's authenticity apply to it the very same tests they apply to all ancient documents (although they tend to apply them a little more rigorously to a book which claims to be inspired by God.) These tests cover a variety of subjects, including both internal and external evidence. Internal evidence is what can be determined by looking within the pages of the books themselves: we have looked at some of this in past issuesSee footnote 1. External evidence includes archaeological and scientific evidenceSee footnote 2, historical and cultural evidenceSee footnote 3, and manuscript evidence. A manuscript is a document written by hand. For our current purposes, a manuscript is a document written before the advent of the printing press (ca. 1450 AD). Because of the circumstances of the writing of the Bible, the study of the manuscript evidence is generally divided into two separate areas, one for each Testament. In the interest of space, we will look at some of the evidence for the New Testament only.

First, it is interesting to note that the earliest manuscripts of the New Testament still in existence date much closer to the time of authorship than is the case with other ancient books. The earliest manuscripts of Herodotus' writings, for example, date approximately 1300 years after his death; and this is not unusual in ancient books. By contrast, there is a fragment of the Gospel of John in the John Rylands University Library in Manchester, England, which is dated ca. 125 AD. Since scholars generally agree that John wrote his Gospel at a later date (between 60-90 AD) than the other three Gospel writers, this fragment is especially significant. Moreover, there is a fragment of the Gospel of Matthew found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, dating from before 68 AD: less than 35 years after Jesus' death! In addition to these, there are manuscripts containing the Gospel of John, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and most of the Epistles of Paul, dated ca. 200 AD. There are manuscripts of all four Gospels, as well as other New Testament books, from the 200's AD. And in the British Library's manuscript room is the manuscript called Sinaiticus, which is dated ca. 350 AD, and which contains the entire New Testament. In short, the manuscript evidence points to the conclusion that the New Testament was written when it claims to have been written: between ca. 50 - 100 AD.

But the dates of the various manuscripts are not the only important factor. The sheer quantity of them is nothing short of impressive. The earliest New Testament manuscripts were written on papyrus, which is relatively fragile and subject to decay, not unlike paper. If you have seen a newspaper clipping from as recently as the 1960's, you will see it shows signs of deterioration after only 30 years. With this in mind, it is a wonder that any of the early papyrus manuscripts of the New Testament have survived a span of 1500 years or more. In fact, there are over 80 such manuscripts. And these are only the beginning. In the fourth century AD, parchment replaced papyrus as the primary medium for copies of the Bible. There are nearly 3000 parchment manuscripts of the Greek New Testament dating from the fourth century through the fifteenth century, when the printing press took over. By contrast, we only have one manuscript copy of the

Annals of Tacitus, who lived ca. 55 - 120 AD: the very same era as the New Testament writings.

So far in our discussion, we have looked only at the manuscripts of the New Testament in Greek, which is the language in which it was originally written. In addition to the Greek, there are also a large quantity of manuscripts which are versions, or translations into other languages. The mere fact that the New Testament was translated at all is impressive when one considers that it was very unusual to translate a book in ancient times. And the New Testament was not translated only once, nor was it long after the writing that translations began to appear. The Bible was translated independently into both Latin and Syriac somewhere between 100 - 150 AD. It was translated into Coptic (an Egyptian dialect) in the 200's, Armenian and Gothic in the 300's, Georgian in the 400's, etc. In all, there are over 5000 manuscripts of the New Testament still in existence. With such a huge number of manuscripts, it is inevitable that variations would arise among them. The question which remains, then, is the extent and significance of these variations. In order to answer this question, we will first consider some more facts regarding the versions.

Each of the translations, of course, began a new tradition. For example, when making copies of the Bible in Armenian, the copyist would not generally have access to the Greek manuscript from which the original translation was made. So, he would have to copy directly from the Armenian translation itself. And likewise in making later revisions of the translation: the revisers would have to go by the existing Armenian, along with whatever Greek editions they had available to them; but they would not have access to the manuscript from which the translation was originally made. And this is so with each of the languages into which the Bible was translated. Thus, when looking at the accompanying chart, keep in mind that each of the vertical lines represents a separate line of transmittal. In determining the accuracy of the text, then, the modern scholars can compare copies of the New Testament in a number of different languages, representing different cultures and different religious points of view.

When we consider the great differences between the various cultures represented by the ancient translations, and the large number of variant doctrines existing in the religions of those cultures, we would expect there to be tremendous differences in the Biblical texts. But that is not the case. On the contrary, even with the enormous number of manuscripts, and the diversity of languages, approximately 85% of the New Testament text is not even questioned: in other words, there is no disagreement between the manuscripts for this portion of the text. As to the 15% for which variant readings exist among the manuscripts, most of the variant readings are easily recognized as false, simply because of the overwhelming manuscript evidence against them. As for the tiny portion that remains, most of the variant readings which are not easily dismissed as unauthentic, are so insignificant that they do not substantially change the meaning of the passages in which they occurSee footnote 4. In fact, the renowned Bible scholar F.J.A. Hort estimates that the "substantial" variations (those which affect the meaning of the passage) affect only about one one-thousandth of the textSee footnote 5. And, even in those few instances wherein the sense of the passage is affected by the variant reading, the actual teaching of scripture remains unchallenged.

In conclusion, we may note that the manuscript evidence for the New Testament is truly overwhelming. If we approach the subject objectively, we must admit that all of the manuscript evidence points to the genuineness and authenticity of the books. They were written when they claim to have been written, and by whom they claim to have been written. Moreover, the text we have today is true to the original documents. Any claim, then, that "the Bible has been changed", or that "the Gospels were written generations after the fact", is demonstrably false. Consequently, any argument or doctrine built upon such a claim necessarily falls apart. Whenever we pick up a literal translation of the Bible, we have in our hands a substantially accurate rendition of some authentic - and very important - ancient documents.