By Hank Hanegraaff

A new generation of popular communicators is disseminating the notion that manuscript copies buttressing the Bible are rife with error. Dr. Bart Ehrman, popular author and Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, tells ever-burgeoning audiences, “There are more differences among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament.” When reason prevails over such rhetoric, a completely different perspective emerges. By God’s grace, the acronym C-O-P-I-E-S turns out to be a perfect way to remember the sequential line of reasoning demonstrating that extant manuscript copies faithfully preserve the words of the original text.

COPYIST PRACTICES. Old Testament scribal luminaries ranging from Ezra to the Masorites set an unimaginable standard of excellence in their copyist practices. As sophers they literally tallied the words and letters to make certain that nothing was amiss. No letter could be inscribed without looking back at the original and verbalizing the text. As part of the Jewish sopherim, these scribes had such an exalted view of the Old Testament text that they perceived the missing of a mere tittle—a microscopic appendage at the end of a Hebrew letter—to be an affront to the holiness of their Creator. New Testament counterparts, likewise, engaged in their craft with care. The contention that careless, capricious copyists created cartloads of contaminated copies simply does not correspond to reality.

ORAL CULTURE. It is often contended that biblical accounts ranging from the exodus of the Jews to the extraordinary miracles of Jesus were not only recorded long after the fact but also recklessly embellished. This, however, is hardly the case. Why? Because the biblical accounts were not only recorded early—by eyewitnesses—but they were recorded in an oral culture in which people practiced the principles of memory. As such, they left us a cultivated oral tradition communicated in memorable prose. In sharp contrast to the present, past generations chose oral transmission as the principal means by which to pass along historical truths. This, of course, does not imply the ancients did not employ written records. Instead, it is to put the emphasis on the right syllable: manuscript repositories augmented mental recall, not vice versa.

PAPYRUS AND PARCHMENT. The original writings of the prophets and apostles are forever immortalized in a supernaturally preserved corpus of biblical manuscripts, some made of papyrus; others, of parchment. Cumulatively, the sheer volume of manuscripts undergirding sacred Scripture dwarfs that of any other work of classical history. Consider, for example, Homer’s Iliad. While its manuscript numbers are singularly impressive—1,757 copies—this pales in comparison to the almost 6,000 Greek manuscript fragments undergirding the New Testament. In the words of distinguished Greek scholar F. F. Bruce, “There is no body of ancient literature in the world that enjoys such a wealth of textual attestation as the New Testament.” Not only is there a relatively short time interval between the earliest extant papyrus and parchment copies and their autographs (original writings), but there is less than a generation between the autographs and the events they chronicle. The quantity and quality of papyrus and parchment manuscripts assure us that the message and intent of the original autographs have been passed on to the present generation without compromise.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. The eyewitness testimony of its authors is

surpassingly powerful internal evidence to the absolute and irrevocable trustworthiness of Scripture. As Peter reminded his hearers, “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:16). Luke, likewise, said that he gathered eyewitness testimony and “carefully investigated everything” (Luke 1:3). Internal evidence points to the reality that far from being inventors of internally inconsistent stories about Jesus, the gospel writers were inspired to faithfully narrate the core set of facts by which they had been radically transformed. While it is conceivable that they would have faced torture, vilification, and even cruel deaths for what they fervently believed to be true, it is inconceivable that they would have been willing to die for cleverly invented stories that they knew to be lies.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. Internal evidence is sufficient to establish

the biblical manuscripts as authentic, reliable, and complementary. External evidence, however, provides remarkable corroborating confirmation. From early external evidence provided by such credible historians as Tacitus (the greatest first-century historian of the ancient Roman Empire) as well as Suetonius (well known for gathering historical data from eyewitnesses and citing historical accounts without prejudice or partiality), it is possible to piece together highlights of Christ and New Testament Christianity wholly apart from the internal evidence. It is amazing to think that even such historians as the Jewish Josephus—an eyewitness to many of the details found in the New Testament—would provide ancient and authoritative attestation to the authenticity of the sacred text, but such is precisely the case.

SCIENCE OF TEXTUAL CRITICISM. Imagine writing a monograph on neo-terrorism and then asking five of your closest friends to produce handwritten copies of it. Suppose each of your friends asked five of their closest friends to produce copies of their copies. Of one thing you can be sure: your friends will make mistakes and so will their friends! Indeed, by the fifth generation, four thousand flawed manuscript copies of the neo- terrorism piece would exist somewhere on the planet. Moreover, imagine that during the copying process, your original monograph was discarded due to wear and tear or even destroyed. Would all have been lost? Of course not! Your five copyist friends all made mistakes, but it is unlikely that they all made the same mistakes. And that would be true of their friends and their friends’ friends. Not only so, but most of the mistakes would be obvious—such as misspelled words or missed conjunctions. As such, no essential aspect of your treatise on terrorism would be tainted and even nonessential copyist errors could be resolved through what is known as the science of textual criticism. What is true of your monograph is true of the biblical manuscripts: the original writings are no longer available, but we can be certain that the copies accurately reflect the intent of the original writers. The beauty from a biblical perspective is that the wealth of biblical manuscripts empowers textual critics to credibly ferret out copyist errors and allow the autographa to emerge unscathed.

Like a Rock of Gibraltar embedded in a sea of manuscript copies, the Bible is yet and forever will be an immovable bulwark fueling our faith and shattering the waves of skepticism and doubt.

In part adapted from Has God Spoken?

“Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.”

Matthew 24:35 NKJV

COPYIST PRACTICES
ORAL CULTURE
PAPYRUS AND PARCHMENT INTERNAL EVIDENCE
EXTERNAL EVIDENCE
SCIENCE OF TEXTUAL CRITICISM

For further study, see Hank Hanegraaff, Has God Spoken? Memorable Proofs of the Bible’s Divine Inspiration (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2011).

 

***Note the preceding text is adapted from The Complete Bible Answer Book: Collector’s Edition: Revised and Expanded (2024). To receive for your partnering gift please click here. ***