Hasn’t the Bible been changed?

19 May 2009 in Topics

Many people think that because there are so many different versions of the Bible and that its been written in so many different languages that it has been changed, but evidence shows that it is very reliable.
1. The Bible is 98 percent textually pure. Through all the copying of the Biblical manuscripts of the entire Bible, only 1% has any question about it. Nothing in all of the ancient writings of the entire world approaches the accuracy of the biblical documents.
2. The 1 percent that is in question does not affect doctrine. The areas of interest are called variants and they consist mainly in variations of wording and spelling.
3. The NT has over 5000 supporting Greek manuscripts existing today with another 20,000 manuscripts in other languages. Some of the manuscript evidence dates to within 100 years of the original writing. There is less than a 1% textual variation in the NT manuscripts.

  1. Some of the supporting manuscripts of the NT are:
  2. 1. John Rylands MS written around 130 A.D., the oldest existing fragment of the gospel of John
    2. Bodmer Papyrus II (150-200 A.D.)
    3. Chester Beatty Papyri (200 A.D.), contains major portions of the NT
    4. Codex Vaticanus (325-350 A.D.), contains nearly all the Bible.
    5. Codex Sinaiticus (350 A.D.), contains almost all the NT and over half of the OT

The above information is obtained from carm.org

As to different versions, this is dependent on the manuscripts the version used. Some words in the manuscripts are hard to translate. The original languages the Bible was written in are richer then our language. Such as in the Greek language there are multipile forms of love, one form being stronger than another. One being a physical love, just wanting what you can get out of someone. Another is a mutual kind of love, as much love you give/take is the same as you receive/give. Another is a spiritual kind of love where you love the person unconditionally at the same high level regardless of what they do to you, good or bad. Each version goes over different variations in some of the words.  This is basically no difference at all.  Just a version trying to communicate to us the right word that we may understand what was originally written.
As to the Bible being translated in other languages, the versions in other languages were translated from the manuscripts. They were not translated from the new languages that were translated. The versions in other languages were translated from say the Greek manuscripts are the same. You can have many different languages using the same original and they will be the same, except for the differences in the translated languages, such as different words in English and Spanish.
19 May 2009 Topics

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