How do we know the Bible we have now is the same as the original writings?

Question

I mean, like the gospels, how do we know that there were no mistakes or alterations made from the original gospels? And please don't say anything about divine inspiration or divine guidance, cause that's a pretty weak argument to an atheist, or someone of another religion. There were no printing presses in those days, so how could we be sure that the writings were not changed, maybe by accident, human error, etc? Cause the Jehovah's Witness' bible is quite different from mainstream bibles, so how can we be sure that there was no deviation?

I just want to thank those who gave their answers; this being the first time i posted a question

Answer 1

This so-called "question" seems to be primarily intended as an insult against "New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures", which is distributed by Jehovah's Witnesses. There are more than 130 million copies of this modern-language bible in print, in dozens of languages.
http://watchtower.org/languages.htm

The entire text of NWT is freely available at the official website of Jehovah's Witnesses, and a personal printed copy can be requested at no charge:
http://watchtower.org/bible/
https://watch002.securesites.net/contact/submit.htm
http://watchtower.org/how_to_contact_us.htm


If the questioner had a specific example of some verse or phrase which he felt had been poorly translated by NWT, it would have been far more useful to simply mention the particular passage.


Jehovah's Witnesses certainly like NWT, but they are happy to use any translation which an interested person may prefer, and in fact Jehovah's Witnesses themselves distribute other translations besides NWT. Jehovah's Witnesses attach no particular infallibility or inspiration to NWT.

Since the same manuscripts used by the NWT translators are still widely available for study, and since there are dozens of alternate translations for comparison, anyone who chooses to use NWT does so informedly.

It seems that the vast majority of the criticism against the New World Translation is actually as a proxy for blind hatred against Jehovah's Witnesses. The hatred must be "blind" since secular experts of biblical Hebrew and Greek have consistently refused to condemn any particular verse or phrase as an unacceptable translation. Instead, it is religionists with preconceived theologies who bigotedly insist upon particular wordings, since these are necessary to prop up the shakey tenets of their false worship.

(2 Timothy 4:3-5) For there will be a period of time when they will not put up with the healthful teaching, but, in accord with their own desires, they will accumulate teachers for themselves to have their ears tickled; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, whereas they will be turned aside to false stories. You, though, keep your senses in all things, suffer evil, do the work of an evangelizer, fully accomplish your ministry.

It seems signficant that the relatively small religion of Jehovah's Witnesses are the ones best known for their worldwide preaching work. Yet Jesus commanded that ALL who would call themselves "Christian" perform this public work:

(Matthew 28:19,20) Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, teaching them to observe all the things I have commanded you. And, look! I am with you all the days until the conclusion of the system of things.

Learn more:
http://watchtower.org/library/pr/article_04.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/na/
http://watchtower.org/e/20020915/article_01.htm
http://www.watchtower.org/e/20050715/article_02.htm

Answer 2

By the time of Jesus, the Jews have been utilizing the Septuagint, a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. When the Jews made up our minds to return to utilizing Hebrew, they simply took the ones books that have been written in that language, and dumped the later ones that have been written in Aramaic. So, such a lot Bibles include the equal OT books that the Jews recognize as Scripture. No "Christian" alterations in any respect; each Christians and Jews makes use of the equal constituents to supply the state-of-the-art models. Some Bible nonetheless comprise those further Aramaic books. This is referred to as the Apocrypha, or Deutero-Canonical books. The Torah is handiest the primary five books, sometimes called the Pentateuch. There also are the writings of the Law, and Prophets, and Wisdom as good, and the Psalms. LONG tale brief: the OT in such a lot Christian Bibles is the equal as what the Jews use. More or much less.

Answer 3

At the time the Christian Bible was being formed, a Greek translation of Jewish Scripture, the Septuagint, was in common use and Christians adopted it as the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. However, around 100 A.D., Jewish rabbis revised their Scripture and established an official canon of Judaism which excluded some portions of the Greek Septuagint. The material excluded was a group of 15 late Jewish books, written during the period 170 B.C. to 70 A.D., that were not found in Hebrew versions of the Jewish Scripture. Christians did not follow the revisions of Judaism and continued to use the text of the Septuagint.

Protestant reformers in the 1500s decided to follow the official canon of Judaism for the Old Testament rather than the Septuagint, and the excluded material was placed in a separate section of the Bible called the Apocrypha. Protestant Bibles included the Apocrypha until the mid 1800s, but it was eventually dropped from most Protestant editions.

The Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches continue to base their Old Testament on the Septuagint. The result is that these versions of the the Bible have more Old Testament books than Protestant versions. Catholic Old Testaments include 1st and 2nd Maccabees, Baruch, Tobit, Judith, The Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), additions to Esther, and Susanna and Bel and the Dragon which are included in Daniel. Orthodox Old Testaments include these plus 1st and 2nd Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh, Psalm 151 and 3rd Maccabees.

The Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox New Testaments are identical.

Answer 4

What you're talking about is exegesis. There are some scrolls and older manuscripts. The best we can do is compare the earliest possible texts with the recently discovered scrolls, rechecking the Greek or Hebrew texts with the other editions.

Have you read the Stone Gospels, the Dead Sea Scroll research? Did you ever see a Jerusalem Bible? It has the comparative texts, and lists every point on which there is disagreement, with the differing versions and references for you to do your own research.

Answer 5

The oldest scrolls are from the 3rd century, but there is also the Dead Sea scrolls which has many comparative parts that can be used to confirm. This is one way they can prove that God's name was actively used in ancient Israel.

The witnesses may have their own Bible, but unlike other religions that use different other Bibles, beside the KJV, they have never experienced a split and their members, as a whole, have an overall good moral and ethical reputation. You may not like their teachings, but live closer to Christ than any other religion. Besides, that Bible was not published until the 50s. Before than they used the KJV.

Answer 6

Even the original Gospels were written long after the ascension of Jesus Christ. What is important are the spiritual truths revealed in the Holy Bible and any other Holy Writing. The physical and material truths and errors are meaningless.

www.bahai.org

Answer 7

we really do not know for certain ,,,,and because it is witnessing and written by man it is bound to have mans PERCEPTION of some of the things they saw and what was said .
i do believe there is truth in it but it has been so misinterpeted and altered that it is difficult to discern .
it is just like anything, someone gives a lecture to 100 people and most will have percieved it differently .
there also is evidence that some of the altercations around the year 300 AD by a ruler because of the many problems of controlling the masses that there are accounts of murder among the holy men and the bible being rewritten to account for the things we read that are difficult to interpet ........taken out of context Jesus and the disciples words more then likely have been altered to gain control and put the fear of heaven and hell in the common people .
i also have always wondered why Jesus who is supposedly the master teacher ,why there is so little really of his teachings ???why if for so many years he taught and held sermons there is really very little of what he said ?????we have to rely on his followers who after all were human men ????
it just makes one wonder is all ...............................so OF course there is deviation and i can not see how anyone would say there couldn't have been .

Answer 8

At a place called Qumran on the northern side of the dead sea in Israel , A Bedouin Shepherd found in one of the caves some ancient pottery. Archaeologists found some scrolls in some of the pots with ancient text which correspond word for word with what we know as ancient scriptures. The very fact , as you say , that there were no printing presses in those days , but still the same text remains with no mistakes , is proof in itself.
For more info' about this , search " The dead sea scrolls".

Answer 9

THere is a possibility that they may be alterations in the translations but it takes them up to 10 years just to finish one chapter because of the delicate writings and worn out paper. It take s a professional to do these jobs. The poeple who make copies of the Holy Bible check and re-check any mistakes or errors made. We can't be sure but our present Bible is a sacred Holy scripture and shouldn't be treated like a bunch of writings in a book.
:) :) :) :) :)

Answer 10

That's because we have most of the original writings.
When a congregation received a letter from one of the apostles, carefully made copies were made of it and sent to other congregations. If one of the originals was in what we have now, you wouldn't know it.

We have available something like 23,000 fragments, scrolls, parchments, letters, codexes from that era