What resources do you use to verify what is written in the Bible is the truth?

Question

Or do you assume everything contained in the Bible is the truth?

Answer 1

Faith

Answer 2

I don't ASSUME anything. I know that the Bible is the truth. For anyone who does not believe in God or his son Jesus Christ, their eyes are shut to the Bible. So to really explain anything would be about useless if your heart is not open to God. I notice that Jon Jon mentioned that their are contradictions in the Bible but I would like for him to explain those contradictions. I notice that a lot of people are very quick to say that it is not the complete truth and yap yap yap but never provide anything specific. If the Bible is not the truth, then what is the big debate over? Why are so many people questioning and becoming offended by something that they don't even consider to be truthful? Could it be because they may be afraid that it is? I believe in the Bible because it is the word of God and has never failed me. I have known people to have said "Hey God I don't understand why this is the way it is" and they have opened the Bible and turned directly to a page that explains exactly what they were wondering about. Conincidence, you and others might say so. I have seen and heard of miracles that doctors could not explain. My grandmother and uncle prayed for an old woman who had brain cancer and her cancer mysteriously went away. Doctors could not explain it. Conicidence right? I watched members of a church I used to attend pray over a girl who had lost her hearing in one ear and aftewards her hearing returned. Coincidence. These are only a few reasons why I believe in God and the Bible. I have seen all of these miracles in christianity and chrisitanity follows the Bible. This is some of the reasons why I believe. The biggest reason I believe is because of the peace I have felt myself when I let God enter into my life. There is no greater feeling in the world. You cannot find the feeling with drugs, alcohol, sex or a relationship with another human being. It is the best feeling in the world to know that you are going to heaven when you die. It feels a lot better than walking around aimless and being self serving and always questioning and never finding answers. Just open your heart to God and his son Jesus Christ and then you will see why I find truth in the Bible. Until then, you will always question.

Answer 3

(1) Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the Bible is the only source of God's Word.

(2) The first Christians "were persevering in the doctrine of the apostles" (Acts 2:42; 2 Tim 1:14) long before the New Testament was written — and centuries before we knew with certainty which books were part of the New Testament.

(3) The Bible affirms that Christian teaching is "preached" (1 Pet. 1:25), that the Apostles' successors were to teach what they have "heard" (2 Tim. 2:2), and that Christian teaching is passed on both "by word of mouth [and] by letter" (2 Thess. 2:15; 1 Cor. 11:2).

(4) Not everything Christ did and said is recorded in Scripture (Jn. 21:25).

(5) New Testament authors availed themselves of sacred Tradition. For example, Acts 20:35 quotes a saying of Jesus that is not recorded in the Gospels.

(6) Scripture needs an authoritative interpreter (Acts 8:30-31; 2 Pet. 1:20-21, 3:15-16).

(7) Christ left His Church with divine authority to teach in His name (Mt. 16:13-20, 18:18; Lk. 10:16).

(8) The Church will last until the end of time, and the Holy Spirit protects the Church's teaching from corruption (Mt. 16:18, 28:19-20; Jn. 14:16).

(9) The Church — and not the Bible alone — is the "pillar and bulwark of the truth" (1 Tim. 3:15).

(10) The Bible refers to more sources of the Word of God than only Scripture. Jesus Himself is the Word (Jn. 1:1, 14), and in 1 Thess. 2:13, St. Paul's first epistle, he refers to "the Word of God which you heard from us." There St. Paul is clearly referring to oral apostolic teaching.

Answer 4

The Bible is the oldest book ever written, parts of it being composed some 3,500 years ago. It is many centuries older than any other book considered sacred. The first of the 66 books that it contains was written about a thousand years before Buddha and Confucius and some two thousand years before Muhammad.
The history recorded in the Bible goes back to the beginning of the human family and explains how we came to be here on earth. It even takes us back to the time before humans were created, giving us facts about the formation of the earth.
Other religious books, and nonreligious ones too, have only a few copies of their old manuscripts left in existence. About 11,000 handwritten copies of the Bible or parts of it exist in Hebrew and Greek, some of which date from close to the time of the original writing. These have survived even though the most concentrated onslaughts imaginable have been attempted against the Bible.
Also, the Bible is by far the most widely distributed book in history. About three billion Bibles or parts of it have been distributed in some two thousand languages. It is said that 98 percent of the human family have access to the Bible in their own language. No other book comes close to that circulation.
In addition, no other ancient book compares with the Bible in accuracy. Scientists, historians, archaeologists, geographers, language experts, and others continually verify Bible accounts.

For example, while the Bible was not written as a science textbook, it is in harmony with true science when it deals with scientific matters. But other ancient books regarded as sacred contain scientific myths, inaccuracies, and outright falsehoods. Note just four of the many examples of the Bible's scientific accuracy:

Answer 5

There are plenty of people who make a living these days trying to answer this question. For me, these truths about how man should live on this earth and live with each other is not limited to contents in the Bible. Those same truths are in the the Torah, the Koran and in just about every holy word written in support of all the various religions alive in the world.

They are all based on the single pure ideal......Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Such singular purity can only mean that it must be true. It matters little if the stories in the Bible are factually true or not. I suspect most are not, or are huge embellishments of ancient events, blown out of proportion through thousands of years of telling and retelling by those who came before us.

What matters is that the lessons to be learned are true and set the model for man to live with himself and with the rest of mankind.

The story is unimportant, the message is all that matters.

Answer 6

Where do I start? The septaguant perhaps, the actual prototext for the Bible. Why does the Bible, the most scrutinized book in the world, get a different standard than any book on history. We believe in many historical events based on the writings of one person. The Bible has many writers and several corroborating publications including loads of architectural corroboration. It's validity overcomes challenge better than any historical document from the same time period. Does that cover it?

Answer 7

Our English Scriptures must be compared with copies of the original Greek and Hebrew texts. Besides that, for those of us that don't speak those languages, there are other ways of verification. For example, history proves that Jesus existed. Creation proves there is a God. The Bible has survived countless attempts to destory it....that in itself should tell you something. But like any sort of religion, believing the Bible or being a Christian takes faith.

Answer 8

God wants us to praise Him with our "minds." Thus, ample evidence exists outside of the Bible for its truth.

Despite what you may see on this board, more and more atheists and those in scientific fields are accepting Christ. I believe science supports God, rather than denying Him.

Additionally, history and archeology supports the veracity of the Bible. I don't have my resource for archeology with me, but I can attest that most of the archeology in recent years that has connections with the Bible has provided evidence for its truth, not against. Things we haven't found provide evidence against, while our findings have mostly supported, though some has pointed to questions (neither supporting or denying).

As a historian (professional, not amateur), I see the Bible as a very accurate historical document. Many other documents, including the most accurate Jewish document of Christ's time, support the New Testament. Other ancient documents help to make the Old Testament stories believable.

Historically, archeologically and scientifically, there is support for the Bible's veracity.

Answer 9

If different people have a story which connects with time and has plausible evidence, you ought to believe that there is something about the Bible, that makes it a true book of Wisdom!

May you find the peace and wisdom of Christ to know the truth!

Answer 10

You need to receive the holy Ghost, which will lead you unto all truth. (John 16) Resources can be used to help understand the word of God, but you need the Spirit of God to give you the full revelation of His truth.

Answer 11

The irony is, if you believe in the Bible, it's only based on the Bible - and "faith," which is defined as absolute acceptance without criticism, examination, verification, or any other method of test. The Bible is supposed to be "inspired by God," and therefore to be an infallible textbook for every department of knowledge - which is how we arrive at lunacies like Young Earth.

I actually prefer it when people are more or less honest about this circular reasoning - "I believe in the Bible because it's the Word of God," etc - maybe they even quote a text to make their point! - as opposed to pretending that they've done external research to verify the scriptural texts. Because anybody who's done ANY legitimate research knows that the Bible is often just plain wrong on matters of fact, and wildly self-contradictory as to its moral and spiritual philosophy - as indeed one would expect from a compilation of writings by dozens of diverse authors across many centuries. And by the way, Bible Study doesn't count as "legitimate research."

I'm sorry, but when people say that the Bible is verified by archaeology, they're referring only to the fact that certain cities mentioned in the Bible actually existed in biblical times, etc. There is NO archaeological evidence even for such a monumental project as the First Temple of Solomon, and again none whatsoever for "Jesus." (Josephus doesn't count either, the "Jesus passage" being practically universally regarded as spurious.) And, of course, in matters of science, the crude ontology and cosmology of the Bible is absolutely bunk.