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GOHEAVY.COM Debates Forum
Re: yet you'll believe a 2000 yr old book
Posted By: ken wheeler (71.138.213.159)
In Response To: Re: yet you'll believe a 2000 yr old book (rick knicely)
Date: Friday, March 14, 2008, @ 7:17 p.m.
the main problem with that comparison is that part of the fun of the experiment in grade school was changing the story. That was not the case with the transmission of the Bible. The ancient eastern society of biblical times was an oral transmission based society. Passing along traditions and history (i.e. telling the story) from generation to generation was part of their culture. We westerners can't possibly relate because we experience nothing like it or even remotely similar. One of the greatest examples of care of transmission of text is found with the Massorettes. They were a people committed to the accurate transmission of the Old Testament text. One of the methods they used was letter counting. Every letter was counted within a text. After a copy was made, the letters were counted in the copy. If one letter was off by one count...300 instead of 299 for example...the document was burned and they started over. They would calculate the middle letter of a text, if it was not the same with a copy, the copy was burned. One of the greatest discoveries in our century was that of the Dead Sea scrolls found in the tombs around Qumran near the Dead Sea. The Essenes had buried scrolls in clay jars and the dry dessert air preserved these scrolls. The Isaiah scroll is dated from about 100BC. When compared to the Massoretic scroll dated about 900AD there were virtually no differences in the text except for a few minor words changes that did not affect the meaning of the text. That is a one thousand year separation between copies with no significant differences.
The accuracy of transmission of the New Testament is attested by the number of copies and the time between those copies and the originals. We don't have the autographs (originals) but the evidence indicating that we have what the original authors wrote is much greater than any dozen works of comparable classical history combined. For example, no secular historian will discount the works of Tacitus, without whom we would have virtually no history of the Roman Empire. Yet we only have 16 copies of his original 30 Histories and Annuls within the confines of two manuscript copies dated about 1000 AD. Tacitus wrote about 100-120 AD making our extant copies 1100 years removed from the originals of which we have none. Only prejudice would dis-allow the same consideration for the New Testament of which we have thousands of manuscript copies ranging in dates of 120 to 1400 years from original to copy. This is better than any ancient work, yet the New Testament must continue to weather the storms of prejudice. Remember, all that is being discussed here is transmission of text, not content of text. So whether or not you believe the message, historical evidences indicate that what we have in our Bibles was accurately preserved. The real question is whether a person's preconceived prejudices will keep them from considering the evidence. If a person chooses to not believe, so be it, but the evidence is there to be considered. It is often asked in powerlifting "how bad do you want it?". I would ask the same of anyone, how badly do you want to consider the evidence? kw
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