The New Testament Text Foundation of the Faith I. Introduction A. Let us now spend some time examining the New Testament text 1. Many today question this text 2. Plenty try to debunk Christianity by "debunking" God's Word 3. Misconceptions rule the day B. The Benefit of Verification 1. We have the benefit of having a foundation for our faith 2. through Jesus Christ a. We know Him by His Word b. 1 Corinthians 15:12-17 if the Word of God is not able to be believed, then our whole faith is in vain C. Let us explore the New Testament text 1. How did it develop? 2. How was it transmitted? 3. What arguments do people make against it? II. History of the Text: 30 CE - 350 CE A. 30 CE - 100 CE: Authorship 1. In this time period, the Apostles and others write the material known as the NT 2. Many Pauline letters probably the first written 3. 60s CE: Synoptic Gospels, Acts, "universal" letters save John's, written 4. By 70CE, all but John and perhaps Jude written 5. By 100 CE, NT fully written B. 100 CE - 250 CE: Leading to a canon 1. While there was no formal canon, all writings of this period consider the works above to be Scripture and inspired 2. Some individuals may consider other works inspired, some may consider a few of the NT books to be questionable, but among those considered "orthodox," general unanimity regarding the majority of the New Testament as inspired 3. As time goes on and more heresies develop, and heretics attempt to establish their own canons of Scripture, the need to fix what is authoritative perceived 4. Muratorian Canon, ca. 150 CE: fragmentary document presenting what one person considered to be inspired Scripture-- it has some apocryphal additions and does not mention a couple of letters, but the majority correlates to the NT 5. We have uncovered many papyrus fragments that include many parts of the New Testament from this period 6. The oldest piece is purportedly to be dated around 175 CE, and is part of the Gospel of John C. 250 CE - 400 CE: Fixing of canon 1. After suffering great persecution, Christianity is "recognized" by Constantine in 312 and persecutions cease 2. Council of Nicaea in 321, discussed more below, called to fix doctrinal positions on the Trinity 3. Athanasius, "bishop" of Alexandria, in 366 CE circulates a "festal letter" that includes the authoritative list of OT and NT books 4. This list codified by the Third Council of Carthage in 398 CE 5. Despite numerous arguments since, NT canon consistent since that period 6. This period also sees the great uncial codices, including Sinaiticus and Vaticanus (aleph and B), that we have today III. Transmission of the Text: 350 CE - Present A. 350 CE - ca. 800 CE 1. The text is continually copied, most often by monks 2. Many errors creep in during the copying 3. This is the period before the standardization of the Greek text; many different families of copies has developed and are propagated 4. In the later fourth century Jerome makes his translation of the NT into Latin- the Latin Vulgate, which is established as authoritative in the West B. 800 CE - 1450 CE 1. The Byzantine Empire and its reaches facilitated the Orthodox leaders to standardize the transmitted New Testament text in Greek 2. The rest of the history of the transmission to the point of the printing press in 1450 is the copying of the standardized text, also called the Byzantine text, and this is the text of which we have many thousands of copies today C. 1450 CE - Present 1. The invention of the printing press facilitated greater accuracy and greater distribution 2. One of the projects of the Renaissance was to reclaim the Greek text of the NT in the West 3. Desiderius Erasmus took up the call, and using a handful of Byzantine manuscripts, came out with a Greek New Testament in the 1516 that would eventually be called the Textus Receptus (TR) 4. This text was the basis for the KJV and stood, rightly or wrongly, for the better part of 350 years 5. In the nineteenth century, many desired to find ancient copies of the New Testament text, and many Europeans went out to the monasteries and other locations in the East and found many such manuscripts 6. The evidence from these texts indicated that the TR was based on poor manuscripts, and new and better eclectic texts have been produced 7. Nevertheless, the transmission of the New Testament was found to be remarkably good for the period of time covered and the number of copyists in between, and demonstrates the providence of God IV. Myths and Facts regarding the history of the Bible A. Myth: The Catholics corrupted it 1. Historically impossible a. the NT was not solely possessed by the Catholic church b. the Catholic version was in Latin anyway c. there are plenty of texts that come from all over the Mediterranean world and beyond, and they are all consistent 2. Likewise, why keep Matthew 1:25; 23:9? 3. Why not add some more verses to justify Catholicism? 4. The one addition clearly seen-- 1 John 5:7 in many texts, including the KJV, the "Comma Johannem" explicating the Trinity-- is clearly seen, not hidden at all, the dispute regarding it well-known, and clearly obvious by the fact that no legitimate Greek manuscript includes the addition! 5. The history does not bear out a "Catholic conspiracy" at all! B. Myth: The Bible was determined by the Council of Nicaea 1. First of all, the canon developed, not established a. There is a long list of early Christians familiar with the NT b. Patristic authors constantly cite the NT as authoritative long before Nicaea 2. The Council of Nicaea did not do as much as given credit for a. It declared Arianism heretical b. It established the Trinity as the official description of the mystery of the Godhead c. It did not make any declaration regarding what was Scripture and what wasn't 3. This myth entirely baseless C. Myth: The Catholics left scriptures out 1. Again, it was not as if the Roman Catholic church and the pope held sway-- such an institution was 600 years away! 2. The majority of those who were involved in the canonization were Greek! 3. While it is true that there were many spiritual books that were not included... 4. ...there were substantive and reasonable bases for not including them! 5. Objective criteria of dating and closeness to Apostles and inspiration were considered a. many Gnostic texts that were clearly heretical and after the Apostles not even considered b. many books not written by Apostles or those near them likewise not added c. many books purported to be written by Apostles but known to be later not added 6. Furthermore, these books have inferior quality in writing a. testament to the power of the Holy Spirit b. likewise, confirmation that knowledge has gone away (1 Corinthians 13:8-10) D. Myth: The NT was overtranslated 1. This myth is based on false assumptions about history a. after all, Latin used in medieval times b. therefore, many presume that the NT went from Greek to Latin to English 2. In reality, since the sixteenth century, most translations have been directly from Greek to English a. our Greek texts correspond very closely with codices made in 330 CE b. We cannot get much better than that! E. Myth: Copying errors make the Bible inaccurate 1. Yes, the Bible was copied over a period of 1350 years a. such was necessary-- there was no printing press yet! b. While those who did copy the Scriptures did the best they could... c. ...humans are fallible, and mistakes were made 2. Copy editors did exist, and did catch many mistakes in copying 3. While such errors exist, however, the different families of texts makes it improbable that many copy errors would not be discovered a. text families: groupings of texts from similar origins b. the texts we have spread out over 1,000 years over three continents in many different languages c. in whole New Testament, only 3 words cannot be determined precisely, and that because the disputes in question revolve around similar looking words that each fit the context and have equal authority in the manuscript evidence d. pretty good for a 2,000 year old document! F. Myth: the translations of the Bible make it not true to original 1. Translation is hard work, and there are always difficulties in translation 2. Every language has its particular idioms that do not translate well 3. Thanks to papyrus evidence, however, much is known about idioms of the first century CE 4. Since we have the Greek text to analyze, we can be confident that the English translations we have faithfully transmit God's word to us, and any differences between the two can be known and explained IV. Conclusion A. Can we have confidence in the New Testament we have today as the Word of God? Absolutely! 1. Many unquestioned texts of the ancient world survive in far fewer manuscripts 2. The historical works of Tacitus come to us in two main texts 3. The Iliad, the second best attested Greek work, in about 600 texts and fragments 4. By comparison, we have over 4500 texts and fragments of the NT! B. We have seen how the text developed and was transmitted over time, and that while some errors did creep into the text, on the whole they were unintentional and common scribal errors, easily explained and not adding to or detracting from the truths of God's Word C. Thousands upon thousands of copies over a period of 1200 years in many different languages and many different places all attest to the transmission of our New Testament from its origin D. If we cannot have confidence in the NT, we cannot have confidence in any piece of literature handed down over generations E. Let us recognize that we can have full trust in the New Testament as being the same today as when it was written, and that we can trust its message F. Invitation/songbook G. If you have not trusted in God's message, hopefully you see today that it is to be trusted, and that you need to repent of your ways and obey God H. Perhaps you are a Christian, and need encouragement to continue obeying God I. However we can help you today, let us do so now as we stand and sing