PART I
Divine Inspiration
Our English Bible consists of the Old Testament (OT) with 39 books (corresponding to 24 books in the Hebrew Bible) and the New Testament (NT) with 27 books, for a total of 66 canonical books. The word “canon” means authoritative sacred writings, and thus excludes the Apocrypha. The Old Testament was written primarily in Hebrew, whereas the New Testament was written in koine (common) Greek. The original manuscripts (autographs) perished with usage long ago. However all conservative Christians believe that the Bible in its original autographs was divinely inspired – “God-breathed” – therefore every word is a word of God (Mt 4:4; Lk 4:4).
This is called plenary (complete) verbal (word by word) inspiration. Because the Bible is the inspired Word of God, it is inerrant, and therefore infallible. Thus for conservative Christians the Bible is the only infallible and final authority in all matters of faith and practice. It is therefore imperative that the English translation (or any other translation) be a faithful word-for-word reproduction of the original autographs, even though all we have are copies of copies of manuscripts since the original autographs were written. We should be able to confidently assert “This is the Word of God in English!”, but with rival translations showing very significant differences, there is no such confidence today, except among the few who use the KJB exclusively.
Providential Preservation through Multiple Manuscripts
The issue then becomes one of preservation – did God preserve His inerrant Word through the ages, and was this through a multitude of manuscripts? And the answer is a resounding “Yes” (Mt. 5:18; Lk. 16:17). Faithful copying of manuscripts ensured that the bulk of those extant would be almost identical to the original.
The provision then which the Divine Author of Scripture is found to have made for the preservation in its integrity of His written Word, is of a peculiarly varied and highly complex description. First, by causing that a vast multiplication of copies should be required all down the ages – beginning at the earliest period, and continuing in an ever-increasing ratio until the actual invention of printing – He provided the most effectual security imaginable against fraud. True that millions of copies so produced have long since perished; but it is nevertheless a plain fact that there survive of the Gospels alone upwards of one thousand copies to the present day... (The Revision Revised, pp. 8,9).
The Isaiah scroll which Christ read in the synagogue of Nazareth (c. 30 A.D.) was no different from the one written by Isaiah in 723 B.C., and was also no different from the one found with the Dead Sea Scrolls (100 B.C.), or the one which was printed in the Masoretic Text of 1,000 A.D. The same is true for New Testament manuscripts. Hebrew and Christian scribes played a major role in faithfully transmitting the true text. God’s Word is eternal and never changes (1 Peter 1:24,25; Isaiah 40:7,8) and therefore it has been faithfully transmitted through the ages. This is known as “providential preservation”.
Proper collation or comparison would still be necessary and legitimate. Dean Burgon (an authority in this field) provided seven criteria by which the correct reading of any Scripture may be established. He called them “The Seven Notes of Truth” consisting of (1) antiquity, (2) number, (3) variety, (4) weight, (5) continuity, (6) context, and (7) internal evidence (The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, 1896, pp. 40-67). They are discussed in detail in that book. This would have been the true methodology of textual criticism (also known as “Lower Criticism”) had believing Bible scholars prevailed. You will note that the age of a manuscript is only one criterion by which its value should be determined. Yet, it became the sole criterion because of a few unbelieving scholars, and this led to “The Great Bible Version Deception”.
The Masoretic Text of the Old Testament
The Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament) has been preserved in four codices (major manuscripts) – The Aleppo Codex (930 A.D., almost complete), Codex Cairensis (895 A.D., prophets), The Leningrad Codex (1008 A.D., complete), and the Tanakh at Qumran (the complete Hebrew Bible found with the Dead Sea Scrolls, 3rd century B.C.). While copies of ancient Hebrew Bibles are not numerous (about 1,500), they faithfully represent the true Hebrew Bible because of the meticulous care with which Hebrew scribes (the latest being the Masoretes) copied their sacred Scriptures. All these contain the Traditional or Masoretic Hebrew Text of the Tanakh.
After the invention of printing this text was printed in part or in whole between 1477 and 1607, and all these texts were available to the translators of the Authorized Version as well as to the Reformers. It is only the later editions of the Hebrew Bible, such as Rudolph Kittel’s Biblia Hebraica (BHK 1906-1913) with its footnotes recording possible “corrections” to the Hebrew text, which have impacted and corrupted modern Bible versions. The alterations are based on the Samaritan Pentateuch, and early Bible translations such as the Septuagint, Vulgate and Peshitta (most of which have been corrupted). Others are merely conjectural emendations (mere guesswork). The New American Standard Version (NASV) clearly rejected the Masoretic Text by stating “In the present translation the latest edition of Rudolph Kittel’s BIBLIA HEBRAICA has been employed together with the most recent light from lexicography, cognate languages, and the Dead Sea Scrolls”. On the surface this appears to be sound. In fact, it is the exact opposite.
Divine Inspiration
Our English Bible consists of the Old Testament (OT) with 39 books (corresponding to 24 books in the Hebrew Bible) and the New Testament (NT) with 27 books, for a total of 66 canonical books. The word “canon” means authoritative sacred writings, and thus excludes the Apocrypha. The Old Testament was written primarily in Hebrew, whereas the New Testament was written in koine (common) Greek. The original manuscripts (autographs) perished with usage long ago. However all conservative Christians believe that the Bible in its original autographs was divinely inspired – “God-breathed” – therefore every word is a word of God (Mt 4:4; Lk 4:4).
This is called plenary (complete) verbal (word by word) inspiration. Because the Bible is the inspired Word of God, it is inerrant, and therefore infallible. Thus for conservative Christians the Bible is the only infallible and final authority in all matters of faith and practice. It is therefore imperative that the English translation (or any other translation) be a faithful word-for-word reproduction of the original autographs, even though all we have are copies of copies of manuscripts since the original autographs were written. We should be able to confidently assert “This is the Word of God in English!”, but with rival translations showing very significant differences, there is no such confidence today, except among the few who use the KJB exclusively.
Providential Preservation through Multiple Manuscripts
The issue then becomes one of preservation – did God preserve His inerrant Word through the ages, and was this through a multitude of manuscripts? And the answer is a resounding “Yes” (Mt. 5:18; Lk. 16:17). Faithful copying of manuscripts ensured that the bulk of those extant would be almost identical to the original.
The provision then which the Divine Author of Scripture is found to have made for the preservation in its integrity of His written Word, is of a peculiarly varied and highly complex description. First, by causing that a vast multiplication of copies should be required all down the ages – beginning at the earliest period, and continuing in an ever-increasing ratio until the actual invention of printing – He provided the most effectual security imaginable against fraud. True that millions of copies so produced have long since perished; but it is nevertheless a plain fact that there survive of the Gospels alone upwards of one thousand copies to the present day... (The Revision Revised, pp. 8,9).
The Isaiah scroll which Christ read in the synagogue of Nazareth (c. 30 A.D.) was no different from the one written by Isaiah in 723 B.C., and was also no different from the one found with the Dead Sea Scrolls (100 B.C.), or the one which was printed in the Masoretic Text of 1,000 A.D. The same is true for New Testament manuscripts. Hebrew and Christian scribes played a major role in faithfully transmitting the true text. God’s Word is eternal and never changes (1 Peter 1:24,25; Isaiah 40:7,8) and therefore it has been faithfully transmitted through the ages. This is known as “providential preservation”.
Proper collation or comparison would still be necessary and legitimate. Dean Burgon (an authority in this field) provided seven criteria by which the correct reading of any Scripture may be established. He called them “The Seven Notes of Truth” consisting of (1) antiquity, (2) number, (3) variety, (4) weight, (5) continuity, (6) context, and (7) internal evidence (The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, 1896, pp. 40-67). They are discussed in detail in that book. This would have been the true methodology of textual criticism (also known as “Lower Criticism”) had believing Bible scholars prevailed. You will note that the age of a manuscript is only one criterion by which its value should be determined. Yet, it became the sole criterion because of a few unbelieving scholars, and this led to “The Great Bible Version Deception”.
The Masoretic Text of the Old Testament
The Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament) has been preserved in four codices (major manuscripts) – The Aleppo Codex (930 A.D., almost complete), Codex Cairensis (895 A.D., prophets), The Leningrad Codex (1008 A.D., complete), and the Tanakh at Qumran (the complete Hebrew Bible found with the Dead Sea Scrolls, 3rd century B.C.). While copies of ancient Hebrew Bibles are not numerous (about 1,500), they faithfully represent the true Hebrew Bible because of the meticulous care with which Hebrew scribes (the latest being the Masoretes) copied their sacred Scriptures. All these contain the Traditional or Masoretic Hebrew Text of the Tanakh.
After the invention of printing this text was printed in part or in whole between 1477 and 1607, and all these texts were available to the translators of the Authorized Version as well as to the Reformers. It is only the later editions of the Hebrew Bible, such as Rudolph Kittel’s Biblia Hebraica (BHK 1906-1913) with its footnotes recording possible “corrections” to the Hebrew text, which have impacted and corrupted modern Bible versions. The alterations are based on the Samaritan Pentateuch, and early Bible translations such as the Septuagint, Vulgate and Peshitta (most of which have been corrupted). Others are merely conjectural emendations (mere guesswork). The New American Standard Version (NASV) clearly rejected the Masoretic Text by stating “In the present translation the latest edition of Rudolph Kittel’s BIBLIA HEBRAICA has been employed together with the most recent light from lexicography, cognate languages, and the Dead Sea Scrolls”. On the surface this appears to be sound. In fact, it is the exact opposite.