The Bible is Full of Errors and Unreliable!

No doubt you’ve heard this said before. We live in a world of unbelievers, and even some Christians believe the Bible is full of errors. I read a very good defense written by Norman L. Geyser in his book titled Reasons for Belief. As Christians we need to be ready to defend our faith and our Bible. Let me summarize what he said about so-called errors in the New Testament (NT). It’s very interesting!

First we need to say that if the New Testament is unreliable, then our beliefs about Jesus—his birth, life, death, and resurrection, have no basis in fact. Atheists and agnostics charge that the NT copies differ in so many places that there are too many too count. The fact is these statements are not true. Geisler contends that o understand how errors are counted we should consider that, for example, there is more than one way to spell the name Ann. Let’s say someone used that name in an original manuscript. The time passed and the next scribe hand-copied the text [there were no printing presses]. This scribe spells the name Anne. Then as time goes by, suppose 3,000 copies get made based on that change. Do we say there is one error or 3,000 errors (page 100)?

What we need to keep in mind is that of the several “types” of errors they do not affect our beliefs. Geisler gives a few examples (page 101):

1. Spelling, grammar, or punctuation that got changed or updated.
2. Out of date phrases or words divided differently.
3. A letter or word that was omitted or copied twice. Similar letters that were confused. Did Solomon’s stables hold 4,000 or 12,000 horses (see 1 Kings 4:26; 2 Chronicles 9:25)?
4. Some texts refer to the “Lord Jesus Christ,” others the “Lord Jesus.”
5. Some texts refer to “the twelve,” others “the twelve disciples.”

Geisler writes, “As it happens, the first edition of Bart Ehrman’s book (Misquoting Jesus), which reportedly was 100,000 copies, contained at least sixteen errors. If we applied the same method to determine the number of errors,, we’d have to say Misquoting Jesus contained 1.6 million mistakes, even though not one “error” affected his intended message” (page 101) Tis true. My books have spelling, grammar, or punctuation errors, yet the message is still clear.

Okay, this is the point. Not one supposed error impacts the meaning of the text or accuracy of a doctrine. No Christian belief has been altered because of these errors. According to Geisler, we can accurately reconstruct beyond question more than 99% of the original text. While some other texts are very accurate, the NT is the most accurate text we do have from the ancient world (page 103). Think about this: if we can’t trust the Bible, then we can’t trust other ancient documents and accounts.