Has the bible been altered throughout time?

Question

enlighten me.

i'm not just talking about translation, i'm talking about straight up changing and taking things out, putting things in

obviously i was too vague with my questioning, since half of you are talking to me like i have half a brain. i'm not just now questioning my faith, this isn't something new to me, i was looking to see if anyone knew of any actual accounts of the altercation. such as the church taking out parts that they didn't agree with.

Answer 1

The clear answer is no, with a however.....

The Bible is not a book. It is a collection of written histories, biographies, prohecies and communications. Each Book of The BIble was written separately and independently from the rest (except for the 1st 5). They only became part of the Bible when the Catholic Church decided that they were divinely inspired, and thus merited inclusion in a standardized Word of God. There were literally thousands of writings that could have been included, but were rejected as not being God's Word. There is still controversy as to who, why, how this was done, and whether the Church used only the books that supported their version of Christianity. However a great discussion that may be, it does not answer your question.

When the dead sea scrolls were discovered, they were very ancient original documents of quite a bit of the Old Testament. We know therefore that the OT is the same as originally written. Does this mean that every single solitary word is exactly like the original writer put it down? No, but it does mean that it hasn't been altered, edited or revised as to content.

The New Testament, we know again as being accurate because there are many original copies of some of the Books still in existence. That is, actual documents from the 1st thru the 5th centuries...many spread around among European Catholic Churches...others in The Vatican.

Now, as I said before there is opinion among anti-Catholics and Mormons particularly that the Church deliberately altered some of the Books to suit their purpose. There is no evidence to this...and because of the surviving 'copies' the burden of proof clearly resides on The Bible being today as written.

The Bible was copied by hand, and when a page was done, the numeric letter value of words was added both across and vertically, and compared to the numeric value of the original page, much like the check digit used today in date transfers over the internet. Anyway, if the page did not match, the whole page was discarded, and started anew. This was done by the Holiest of the Jews and early Christian Monks, and to suggest now, that before there was a BIble, these men altered The Word, is silly. These were the most respected of men that did this..could they have made some human error, of course (and there may be a couple of these in The Bible, usually where numbers/counts of people don't agree).

No one can argue reasonably that The Bible has been changed since the 5th Century (except for the Protestants removing some Books, The Apocrypha, that they believed are not divinely inspired). These Books were removed, not changed, edited or altered.

So, while there may be somevery small possibility that The BIble has changed, in the great dustbin of history between 200 BC and about 300 AD, there is no real proof that it has. Just speculation mostly by an Anti-Catholic, Anti-Christian crowd.

Answer 2

Just saying something is so don't make it true. (Ipse dixit ring a bell for any of you?)
There's no evidence to support the claim that the Bible has been altered, save for through translation, which has always been spoken out against by those who can read the original languages of the various manuscripts.
There is evidence, however, that the transmission has been remarkably faithful. One example is the Isaiah Scroll found at Qumran, which was 1,000 years older than any previously known manuscript and contained only one additional word (light - changing "and he shall see life" to "and he shall see the light of life" in Isaiah 53:11).
Are there variations in some of the manuscripts? Yes. Does it necessarily follow that this means we have an unreliable text today? No - no more than we have an unreliable text of Homer's Odyssey or any number of other ancient writings.
For the majority of scholars(yes - I know there are exceptions), the reliability of the transmission isn't whats debated - but whether there's any validity to the claims made within and about the text, when it was written - who it was written by - and all that jazz.

Answer 3

The Bible has not been altered just simply translated into many different languages. From there even the English language has gone through a lot of changes from when it first began to now. There have been new versions that have come out. The new versions still tell the same message but in a manner that people of today can comprehend. A simple example would be between the King James Bible and the New International Version Bible. King James is an older English Bible that used many words and forms of words that we don't use today. So when they made the NIV Bible they formatted the wordage so people of today can understand what's being said. However the message itself has not changed. For example the KJ Bible used the word "hath" where the NIV Bible uses "has". The words mean the same just written in different forms according to their modern times.

Answer 4

No. There are nearly 30,000 ancient manuscripts from all over the world. The total variance between them all is about 1- 1/2% of the text. Almost all of the differences are variant spellings of names and places. No Jewish or Christian doctrine is affected by the variants. Bible students know what all the variants are and where they are. There is nothing hidden or lost.
The 66 books we have in the Bible today are accurate. There are a few translations that are not correct (like the NWT), and some that the editors took too much liberty with (TNIV).
However most modern translations are accurate-NKJ, NASB, HCSB, NIV, NEV, CEV, NLT, and more.

Answer 5

The doctrine, theology, history and ethics of Scripture has remained constant. There have been scribal errors, but nothing of consequence.

(1) Reliability of the Bible
1. The Bible is 98 percent textually pure. Through all the copies 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.
4. Some of the supporting manuscripts of the NT are:
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

Answer 6

Jesus is the Word of God, please do not consider the bible in the same way. The bible proof texts usually quoted to say that the bible is the word of God are quoted out of context and do not say that at all.
The bible, in company with every other ancient book has been subject to change, sometimes deliberate change to suit the agenda of those handling it in ancient times.
Fortunately, it is possible to recover from many attempts to alter the text, because we can find and establish what it said originally using old manuscripts and biblical quotations made by real historic people in their writings.
The bible has already had a lot of work done on it to discover the original text, but that does not mean it is perfect.
If you like a challenge, it is possible to study one or more of the ancient biblical languages; Hebrew, Syriac/Aramaic, Latin, Greek or Coptic and work on the bible text yourself. There is loads of work that needs doing, especially on the New Testament. This work is very interesting and thought provoking. If it interests you, there are some examples on my website.

Answer 7

Well, read this:

"I think every follower of Jesus faces questions like this at some point. You believe what some have called 'The Zealous Monk Theory'...the idea that somewhere centuries ago, some over-zealous Catholic monks decided to deceive the world by manipulating and twisting the Bible to say what they wanted it to say. Therefore (the theory says), you can't trust the Bible we have today. Thankfully, this "theory" has absolutely no basis in fact or truth.

In all honesty, the Scriptures we have today are the best attempt of scores of honest people to 'translate' not 'interpret' the Bible. That said, the original Greek actually holds the key to what the Bible actually literally says. So, if you want, you can bypass all those translations entirely, and go back to the original manuscripts (which we have ancient copies of) and study the Bible in the Greek. I, like many good students of the Bible, have done this using study tools, and have found that the modern translations, for the most part, say exactly what the early manuscripts say. You can do it too, if you wish, and completely bypass the zealous monks you fear!! =)

So, it's not 'The Zealous Monk Theory' at at all...it's the 'Zealous Monk Myth.'

Consider this also: The Bible has 66 books and 40 authors. It was written over a period of 1500 years by men from all walks of life. Nehemiah was a cupbearer. David was a shepherd boy. Joshua was a military commander. Peter was a fisherman. It was written in three different languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek). And yet, inspite of all these complex factors, the Bible has a moral and thematic unity. It is about ONE THING...Jesus Christ. Who could author a book, writing a story over 1500 years? Only God.

Consider this...I recently wrote a letter to a friend with a Bic pen. Should I have signed the letter "Bic" because I wrote the letter with a Bic pen? Of course not! I signed the letter 'Derek' because I wrote it. The Bic pen was just an instrument! In the same way, God used men as an instrument to write the Bible. We don't give the credit to them any more than we would the Bic pen. God used those men as instruments in His hand!

Consider this also...the Bible has been attacked in every generation. French skeptic Voltaire actually said, "It took 12 men to establish Christianity, but I will show the world that it will take one man to destroy it!" Today, Voltaire is dead, and his house is being used by Wycliffe Bible Translators! Nations have plotted in vain to destroy God's Word! God will not allow it, for 'His word endures forever.'

All that to say...have faith that the Bible is the Word of God, and can change your life when you believe it!"

Answer 8

Before there was a bible, early Christians wrote their own versions of the gospel. Some are canonical - some are not.

Some newer versions made the list, while some older versions were considered wildly errant by the church. The same is true of some old testament books.

It doesn't say a whole lot about the validity of the texts (in my opinion) but it does let us know that crackpots have been around for quite a while.

Answer 9

what's particularly thrilling is that when archaelogists began to do digs interior the Holy land, they stumbled on previous manuscripts, such through fact the lifeless Sea Scrolls (in 1947) and on interpreting them stumbled on that aside from a acceptance spelling exchange or 2, the classic manuscripts are what we've in our Bible as we communicate. a number of what replaced into stumbled on are incomplete books of the Bible. some, which incorporate Deuteronomy and Isaiah have been stumbled on only approximately in tact to the letter. there has been a verse or 2 further over centuries - some achieved by using zealous translators, others mistakenly picked up from marginal notes by using the subsequent copyist. yet those "blunders" have been for the main placed by using evaluating greater contemporary manuscripts and historic manuscripts. The Bible does no longer have as many differences as some would such as you to have self belief. and picture approximately this. Is there any reason to no longer think of that the God who led to the writing down of scripture would desire to no longer additionally in his capability and information shelter adequate evidence interior the form of historic manuscripts so as that this form of blunders would and would desire to be corrected? A study of the interior historic evidence that the Bible supplies is yet another form of evidence. Daniel financial disaster 8 is an occasion. evaluate that with any severe college international historic previous e book.

Answer 10

"thall shalt not suffer a poisoner to live"
was changed to...
"thall shalt not suffer a witch to live"

In the old days, a which was commonly known as a person who could use herbal remedies, like willow bark and stuff like that. As it was not totally understood and the nature of allergic reactions (tomatoes were thought poisonous for a long time) the word 'poisoner' was used for someone who could or would use such things at all. Two translations later, the word 'witch' was used.