how would you rate the reliability of the process by which the New Testament was transmitted to us ? What are some reasons you find this process trustworthy or not?
Scan a copy of the New Testament and examine some of the notes in the margins that talk about variant readings. What are some examples you find? How does the presence of these notations affect your understanding of the passages?
3. Do the criteria for determining whether a document should be included in the New Testament seem reasonable? why or whynot?
Early church's decisions concerning whether a document should be included in the Bible?
2006-09-27 15:33:05 · 6 answers · asked by anstod88 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
There is a lot of info on the web about this. Interestingly, one of the best explanation I have seen is from a decoding Da Vinci site. Read here about the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Gnostic Gospels:
http://www.davinci-decoded.com/content/faqs.asp#2.
Also, Check this out: http://www.ibs.org/bibles/about/translation/index.php This one is a page and video about Bible translations.
2006-09-27 15:36:34 · answer #1 · answered by Makemeaspark 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
The Bible, as we have it today, is very reliable. God gave the job of preserving the Old Testament to the Jews, and he made sure they kept it close enough that his meaning was not lost.
The New Testament was preserved for us in another way, but still guided by God.
Though there are many places in the Bible that can be called into question, almost all of the serious ones can be rectified by a study of what the Bible says elsewhere on the subject.
As for the determination of which documents were included, God oversaw that process too. No organization was used to decide which documents were to be kept as holy; the people of God already kept them for hundreds of years before anyone put their stamp on the Bible.
2006-09-27 23:33:56 · answer #2 · answered by BC 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The Bible that we have today is the Word of God. It is reliable, and any supposed "contradictions" or "problems" can be solved by either futher, say, culteral investiagtion, or by going back to the original languages. A good book to read on this subject would be Josh McDowell's "A New Evidence That Demands A Verdict". It's a pretty lengthy book, but you can just read the parts that interest you, and it's a good resource to have around.
Here's a link; this will take you to Amazon; you can get the book new for $13, used for $11-something. If you don't want to follow the link, just go to Amazon and type in the title of the book or the author. Hope this helps, and God bless!
http://www.amazon.com/Evidence-Demands-Questions-Challenging-Christians/dp/0785243631/sr=8-1/qid=1159415413/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-6573015-7995865?ie=UTF8&s=books
2006-09-27 23:54:10 · answer #3 · answered by eefen 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I think the best way to put the bible to the test, specifically, the new testament, since you are speaking of it, is to get into study. Find a good bible teaching church, a good, in-depth bible study, pick up that bible, and dive in. Really read, really think about what you are reading, and then put into practice these things. And see what happens in your life.
People can talk about the bible, back and forth, pro and con, until they are all blue in the face. For me, the proof was a transformed life. I cannot, by speaking, convince anyone that the bible is what it claims to be: the word of God. For each person to make that choice for themselves is, in my opinion, the greatest discovery anyone could make.
2006-09-27 22:37:22 · answer #4 · answered by Esther 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Are you talking about the Helps in the center of the columns which help to clarify the scriptures by giving us more information about the subject? I think your questions are really good but I guess I would like to know more specifically what Bible you are using. I think God is powerful enough and wise enough to retain any information he thinks is pertinent in any translation a person might use and I am certain that he did not allow anything he wanted included to be omitted.
2006-09-27 22:59:09 · answer #5 · answered by Sparkle1 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Its not reliable at all if u want to call it as the words of God.
Based on the histories of Bible by theologians....
1.The KJV was not based on the earliest manuscripts found. When they make a revision based on earliest manuscripts, they found a lot of INSERTED VERSES in the bible and found thousands of errors in translations. It is not a small differences or error between KJV and revised version instead it shows that a lot of doctrine and diety of Jesus has been changed in KJV.
2.Bible is mainly based on translation and thousands of manuscripts with different or even unknown writer found in greek language and most of the manuscripts are dated hundred years after Jesus gone. Where is the original Gospel in hebrew?Why they dont published the original Gospel in hebrews?
3.Church says that only them can understand and teach Bible. Why cant anyone else can? Do u think that Jesus will speak words that human doesnt understand? No, definitely not. Jesus will not hide his command and place burden for human to understand. This process will make several people who has the authority upon bible mistranslated Jesus words in their own context!! How do u know they translated it correct?
3.Due to that, read ur gospel and pauls letter, list out what jesus said and list out what pauls teach. U will see a tremendous differences of teaching from both of them. Jesus command was very clear and direct, but who has make it complex
who doesnt understand Jesus words?
4. Gospels is written by Unknown writer, they simply named it as John, Mark, Mathew and Luke.
5. Gospels contains different stories. How can God tell us about different facts? Anyway, why there must be 4 Gospel? Logically Words God is 1!! and where is Gospel of Jesus? as Jesus always said he preach HIS OWN GOSPEL.
6.All the margins and footnote only proves that those who compiled the bible has no idea whether they got the right verses or manuscripts. Which simplifies that they themselves is not 100% believe that it is 100% from God. How can Gods words from multiple readings? with differents ideas? Again Jesus preach his own Gospel, thus it should be 1 gospel!!!
7. By the way, since the translator or compiler of Bible basically used greek sources of thousands manuscripts found, u can see that almost 70% of New Testament is Paul's letter. If u count 1 Gospel about Jesu, its only about 5% of the New Testament. U can asked whose religion is Christian originated from, who made Christians belief?
8.If Jesus was meant to bring the Kingdom of the world, its suppose to be Jesus 100% of his teaching contain in the bible. Like i told u, list the teaching of Jesus and Paul's compare to Christians doctrine. Who do u actually obey?
9.For most of theologians, based on manuscripts, Jesus is just human and only God messenger. The worst part is some said that Jesus never existed.
10.But if u truly read Bible, each words in it and compare it to the doctrine, u will found that Jesus never ever teach anything in the doctrine!! Its all Paul's own translation in Paul's own context!
11.they pick and chose the document they want.. do u think its reasoneable? what makes them think that they are correct?
Just see... how KJV which has been used for hundred of years and which was believed the most correct version ever made before was found to consist of more than 50 000 errors?? and because of that, they produced the new revised version. Again u can asked urself, if KJV compiler believed they made no mistakes, how come there are thousands mistakes in there? So, they dont know that they are correct but assuming they are.
Is that reliable?
what i can say, based on histories of Bible.
2006-09-28 00:41:45 · answer #6 · answered by sweetzy 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋