New Testament Evidences (Wallace W. Wartick, 1975 College)Bible Study Textbook

8/12/2019 New Testament Evidences (Wallace W. Wartick, 1975 College)Bible Study Textbook

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Ne w Testament Evidences


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The Bible Study Textbook SeriesNEW TESTAMENTNewTestament&Hisior The Gospel of Matthew The Gos el of MarkV W .Warttck&W. F l e d In Four Volumes By B . 4 Johnsonand Don DeWelt1 I -The Intertestam ntP&i&ndTheGospe?s ~ Harold Fowler

The Gospel of LukeByT.R. AppleburyRomans RealizedBy Don DeWelt

The Gospel of JohnBy Paul T. ButlerStudies In CorinthiansBy T.R. Applebury

Acts Made ActualBy Don DeWeltGuidance From GalatiansBy Don Earl Boatman

The Glorious Church(Ephesians)By Wilbur FieldsHelps From Hebrews

By Wayne Armstrong

Philippians - Colossians Thinking ThroughBy Wilbur FieldsPhilemon ThessaloniansBy Wilbur Fields

Micah. Nahum - Habakkuk - Ze haniahHaggai -Zechariah -.Mala&By Clinton GillDOCTK N E

he Eternal Spiriturvey ourseTwoBo k o our 01 mes ByDonDeWe,tBv?.t.FrawXr#In Christian Doctrine In The Bible Two VolumesBy C.C. Crawford


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NEW TESTAMENTEVIDENCESWallace W. Wartick


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Copyright 1975College Press


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DEDICAT1ONTo Seth Wilsonwho first taughtm e to loveevidences


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CONTENTSPrefaceIntroductionThe Reason for This BookI. THE NATURE OF FAITHII, THE NATURE OF EVIDENCE

A. Subjective Evidence8, Objective Evidence

Chapter 1Integrity of the N e w Testament TextThe Meaning of IntegrityI. THE NEED FOR TEXTUAL CRITICISM

A. How the Problem AroseB. Variations in the New Testament TextC. How the Variations Came To BeD. ntentional Variations

SummaryII. RESTORING THE TEXT

A. Materials Used in Restoration of the TextB. Ancient VersionsC. Patristic Q uotations

SummaryChart: Materials and SourcesChart: Manuscript Families (Greenlee)

xixiiixiii

1

1 2

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V. ALLEGED INTERNAL CO NTRAD ICTION SA, The Synoptics and JohnB, H isto rica l Agreements in the GospelsC, H isto rical Agreements between Acts and/or the Epistles

SummaryChart: Chart of Herods

-m

Chapter 4Inspiration of the N e w TestamentI. INSPIRATION: AN INDUCTIVE STUDY

A. The Old Testament Vie w of ItselfB, N e w Testament Vie w of the Old TestamentC. N e w Testament Vie w of ItselfD. Terms

I I . INSPIRATION A N D THE BIBLEA. Effects of InspirationB. inerrancy and InfallibilityC. PlenaryD. TextSummary

Chart: Resurrection (Facts an d Faith)Chart: Pillars chart

Chapter 5The Bible and MiraclesThe Basis for DiscussionI. THE NEED FOR THE DISCUSSION

A. Bible AccountsB. Bible ClaimsC. M od ern Thought

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113

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X

I I . BIBLE MIRACLESA. NamesB. PurposeA . ProofB. Significance

I l l . THE RESURRECTION MIRACLE

Appendix IMANUSCRIPTSA. Descriptions

B. Textual FamiliesC. Textual Critics

Glossary

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PREFACE

Almost 100 years ago J.W. McGarvey wrote a book entit ledEvidences of Christianity. In that book he treated the N ew Testamenttext as to evidences for it, its genuineness, credibi lity and insp ira tion .To the adherents of the Restoration Movem ent, his book has playedan important part i n the acceptance of the B ible as the w or d of G od i nmans language. In the present writers life, it cer tainly has played animportant part in the faith he now holds.However, as with all things human, tim e brought about the needfor changes. Over the years many have thought about revisingMcCarveys book to b ring it up-to-date in some areas i n whic h ne wfacts and/or evidence have been found since McGarveys day. At thesuggestion of D on DeW elt, editor of Co llege Press, th e present write rhas that responsibility.We make no apology for saying that the heart of this book i sMcGarveys book. His basic ou tline and presentation are conta inedin this book. We have not necessarily attempted to use his verywords, though h i s thoughts are very often used. I t i s too dif f icult forthis writer to write as McGarvey wrote - hus we have simplyutil ized his basic thought as a general rule.We have added some material which was not available in Mr.McGarveys day, and also rearranged some of the m aterial wh ich hehad in the body of his text. A bibliography w it h some annotation i sgiven for further study in the various areas. Other summations andmaterial, along with charts, are found after the main text.

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xi i NE W TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

We believe, however, that McCarveys basic mode of presentationwas and i s the best for the student who wishes to consider theevidence for the group of documents kn ow n as the N ew Testament.H e we ll argued that a person shou ld begin such a study by,

first, establish the text from w hic h any subsequent wo rk i s to bethen, establish the fact of authorship, if such i s possible,then, consider the cred ibility of the writer, i n whatever facts arethen, and on ly then, argue about the writers inspiration, and

Thus, we present his book in revised form w it h the hope that it wi l lp lay a li ke part i n the lives of future believers as it has i n the past.W.W. Wartick, January 1975

done or conclusions drawn,

stated,what that may mean.


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I NTRODUCTI

The Reason for, this BookChristianity i s a system of faith, a fa ith that i s based upon the factthat Jesus of Nazareth i s the Christ of God . That equa tion (that Jesus stheChrist) i s based up on testimony, espec ially w ritten testimony. Thebasic written testimony about Jesus i s contained in a (new) will,commonly known as the New Testament.Christianity is, then, a religion based upo n the evidence c onta inedin a book, composed o fth e O ld and N e w Testaments. There are othe rlines of evidence for the existence of Jesus and w h o H e was -b ut the ,

Bible, and especially the New Testament, i s the principal one. The 'separate and com bined books present the pro position that Jesus o fNazareth was deity that came to earth, took u po n himself the fo rm ofman (John 1 : l- 1 8 ; Phil. 2:5-11) w ithout ceasing to be Go d (Ma tt.9: l f f ;John10:30; 14:8-10; ITim. 1:12-17;3:15-16;Heb. 1:1-4).Heclaims to be the Savior of each and every person w h o w il l accept Hisperson and claims.Hence, the impo rtance of the book(s) that testify about Him But,what about them ?Are they believable? Trustworthy? R eliable?Thesequestions help form the reason for a book on the evidence(s) for "thebook." The presenta t ion w i l l cons ider spe c i f i ca l l y the N e wTestament and on ly generally the Old Testament. (But see the chartsat the end of Ch. 4.)

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1. The Nature of FaithChristianity i s a faith system as stated above. It i s a faith wh ichproduces commitment f rom each adherent. This commitmentcertainly means everything to the believer. It promises h im both lifehere and hereafter (see John 10: O; 1 1 25,26; 14:1 f). The believer i spromised that his every need will be supplied here in this life,whether the need is,physical, em otio na l or spiritual, and also in thenext life (see Ma tt. 6:33, 34; I Cor. 10:12, 13; I Thess. 5:23; Jude v.Many other things the believer is promised - ut these aresufficient to show that the inq uiry in to the evidence upon wh ich onebelieves i s mighty important. In fact, the believer may approach thestudy of the evidences with such determination that his faith w il l notbe based upo n a false founda tion that he m ay neglect the contraryevidence, if such there be, or he may have faith, in his faith.G od has provided plenty of evidence for th e believers faith. This

book will attempt to present some of that evidence. However,regardless of ho w mu ch evidence w e have, Christianity w il l alwaysbe a system of faith. This simply means that we w il l always walk byfaith, no t by sight (see Rom. 8:24-25; II Cor. 5:7 ; Heb. 1l:l-12:2).That is, Christianity involves risk, because faith is, pure and simple,trust. The degree of trust demanded may be greater for som e thingsthan others, but trust i s the central facet in Christianity and, thus,qu ite necessary.As Montgomery well states, page 73,Absolute certainty lies on lyin the realm of pu re logic and mathematics, where, b y definition, oneencounters n o matters of fact at all (Where s Hi s t o r y Going.) SinceChristianity does not l ie in either of the realms that Montgomerymentions, the Christian will inevitably and always have to live byfaith, th ou gh the faith i s well substantiated by the various facts uponw h ic h the Christian system i s built (see the Faith and Facts chart onpage 115 as an example of the facts of the faith).

24-25).

I I The Nature o f EvidenceW he n w e me ntion evidences, however, the question m ight we llbe asked, wh at k ind of evidences? Evidences for w hom ? Subjectiveevidenc e? Ob ject ive evidence? Both?A . SUBJECTIVE EVIDENCE. For some people, their philosophy wou ld


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INTRODUCTION xv

not perm it them to accept any evidence bu t subjective evidence. Forinstance, the existential philosophy, accepted, w i l l cause a person toreject some or all of the evidences presented in this book. Theevidences presented might w ell be used to pro duce an experience,bu t i t w o u ld be t he expe r ience t h a t was imp o r tan t andauthenticating, not the evidence, That t he existential philosophy haspervaded the think ing in the wor ld of re ligion ha rdly needs to be said.Kar l Bar th s theo logy re f lec ted some o f th is th ink ing (seeMontgomerys, Where Is History Going?, chapter 5). For him, thewo rd of G od was only the word of G od when it was meaningful tohim, t h e listener. Stated differently, the B ible contained the w ordof God b ut was not the word of God. Others have gone further thanhe i n this direction.Since the above i s so, many authors have written conc erning thenature of the New Testament (and of Gods w or d as a who le) , as to itsinerrancy or infallibility (eg., Young, Thy Word is Truth; Beegle,Scripture, Tradition and Infallib ility; Warfield, The Insp iration andAuthority of the Bible). Both of tliese words relate to the idea ofinspiration directly, and then to the areas of integrity, credibility andauthenticity. Men have argued pro and con about these subjects.Doubtless, t he discussion w il l go o n - th e reason being that whatone person considers proof positive the other person does not -a ndthis i s because each person has a distinct idea of what constitutesevidence. This i s not saying that every person i s different from everyother person, but it i s saying that there are distinctly differentpositions held about the nature of evidence, or what i s actuallynecessary to produce the Christian experience.To reiterate, subjective evidence may be the cr iter ion for the beliefa person has. Yet the nature of subjective evidence i s varied, Whatwould be an authenticating experience for one person would notnecessarily be so for another, though both held that the only validcriterion was subjective evidence. Some people would demand acontinued or repeated verification.In ad di tion to these facts, there i s disagreement on h ow one wo u lddecide which experience validated ones belief, since there i s thedistinct possibility of false experiences as well as true ones.

It seems to the present writer that Christian ity does not stand or fallfrom ones experience, regardless o f what that experience n ig h t be.In fact, ones conversion to Christianity does not constitute a va lid


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xvi NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

crite ridh for the conclusion that Christianity is true. (The conc lusion aperson draws abou t the meaning of an experience he has had maynot be the correct conclusion, or at least be acceptable to anyoneelse. We can hardly argue that a person has or has not had anexperience. However, we may well argue what this experiencemeant.) On e of the reasons for this statement i s the fact that onesfaithin anything will change that person. Restated, faith invariablyproduces change (and commitment). Every religion in the worlddemands some kin d of faith of its adherents -and that fai th produceschange (that i s a pa rt of the na ture of faith: to produce change). Eventhose peop le w h o reject any and/or all religion do so on the basis oftheir belief that religion i s not needed in their life, and that beliefproduces the change (result or effect) seen in that persons life.We are n ot arguing that Christianity does not produce change - itdoes, and often a dramatic change, bu t other things w i l l do the same(note Andersons preface, pp. 7-1 1). Thus we do no t consider that asubjective experience i s any criterion for one to use as regard ing theva lidation o f Christianity, and especially in relationship to the NewTestament books which are presently under discussion.One of the present day problems (as pointed out by Schaeffer,Escape From Reason, Pinnock, chapter 2 , Set Forth Your Case; andMontgomery, The Suicide of Modern Theology) i s that manyAmericans, imbibing the existential philosophy, have gone tooriental religions, o r mystic experiences in general. Christianity i s notsuch a religion. Hence, we turn to the other kind of evidence tovalidate ones faith: Objective. Let it clearly be understood that theargument i s not whether Christianity i s a re ligion invo lving onesemotions; but rather what kind of evidence God has provided tomake faith in Jesus of Nazareth possible. Ne ither should the readerconclude that the person who accepts (believes) that Jesus i s theChrist w il l not have an experience - h e w il l. Finally, we are notasserting that the co mbin ed experience of many Christians i s not ofsome value t i s . But God did not, as this write r v iews it, m ake thetruth or falsity of the Christian message stand or fall on subjectiveevidence, of whatever nature or quantity, but rather on objectiveevidence of a verifiable nature.

B. OBJECTIVE EVIDENCE. Objec tive evidence, in the sense wh ichwe are using it, is evidence that i s apart from ones self. Theillustration for Christianity i s : an empty tomb on Sunday morning

t


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INTRODUCTION xvi i

some 2,000 years ago. The people came expecting to f ind the deadbody of Jesus of Nazareth in a tomb. The body was no t there bu tgone. That was a part of the objective evidence for the resurrection. Arelated fact to the empty tomb was, as the records show (Matt. 28,Mk. 16, Lk 24, Jn. 20, 21, I Jn. 1:1-4, etc.) that these same people,and others like them, saw Jesus of Nazareth alive, i n bodi ly fo rm .That constituted objective evidence. The empty tomb and theresurrected body were not subjective experiences of any kind, butrather objective and apart from the individuals who perceived theempty tom b and the resurrected body. As a matter of fact, Chris tianityprimarily stands or fa l l s upon the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth(consider the chart 'onpage 115) . There are other evidences for thetruthfulness of Christianity, bu t this i s a sample of ob jective evidence.One may accept or reject the fact of the empty to m b as he chooses.The fact of the empty tomb and the resurrected body remains thesame.

This particular po int of evidence tha t God has pro vide d has beenconvincing for the present writer; convincing enough that he hasbelieved that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ of God, what Heclaimed to be, and has been accepted as so. However, the readermay well ask, what i s the evidence for the empty tomb and theresurrected body?-That i s the issue over wh ich peop le divide. Theevidence that causes one to believe the tom b i s empty may not be theevidence that causes another to believe that it was empty -w h ic hbrings up the issue about objective evidence: What constitutesevidence that compels faith for one person does not constituteevidence that compels faith in another. Since this i s so, somediscussion w il l be pertinent regarding this point.

If this i s thought strange, consider the com m on differences amongjudges in courtrooms as to what constitutes acceptable evidence. Asthis i s be ing written, the courts of the land, inclu din g the SupremeCourt, are cons idering the evidence for or against President N ixon'sinvolvement in the W atergate affair. The Ho use o f Representativesand the Senate are considering the evidence pro and con. I t hard lyneeds to be said that what i s com pelling evidence for one person i scertainly no t for another.Such i s the case with the evidence for the N ew Testament be ingwhat i t claims and for Jesus being the Christ, which i s the centralproposition of the New Testament. The life o f Jesus has illustrations


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xvii i NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

alon g these general lines, as does the rest of the Bible. Consider thefo llow ing incidents in the B ible.. 1. In he days of Noah, the only apparent believers in he evidenceNoa h presented for a destructive flood, to destroy the earth as i t thenwas (see II Peter 3), were his wife, three sons and their wives.2 . In the days o f Abraham, wh en the tw o angels came to Lot inSodom and instructed Lot and his family to leave the city, theevidence presented was no t enough to convince anyone bu t Lot, hisw if e and tw o daughters. Even his w ife looked back, to her ultima tedestruction (see Luke 17:32) .3. Again, du ring Abrahams lifetime, all the things that God d id forh im sti ll d id not keep him from doubting G od and attempting to havea son through Hagar.

4. Joseph, sold in to Egypt, was there because his brothers d id notbelieve that his dreams were of a revelatory nature. They w ere notnecessarily unbe lieving men, bu t they did not accept the evidencethat Joseph accepted. H e drew the conclusion that G od was in itthough his brothers had not thought they w ere acting in behalf of God(Gen. 4 5 : l - 8 ) .5 . In spite of a ll the obvious miracles w h ich were done i n Egyptand in spite of the fact that his ow n magicians drew the conclusionthat G od was greater than they (Ex.8:19) , Pharaoh did no tso believe..6. At Kadesh-Barnea (Nu. 13, 14) the majority of the Israelitesrebe lled against a ll the evidence they had seen as they had done atMt. Sinai, Ex. 32, and rejected all the evidence they had receivedfrom Go d. O n ly Joshua and Caleb believed the evidence.The story i s the same many times throughout the O ld Testament, Iti s no t materially different w hen we com e to the N ew Testament.7. Nicodemus co u ld see that the things wh ich Jesus d id wereample evidence for the presence of God in His l ife, In. 3: l f f , butmany others did no t draw that con clus ion (see Jn. 5 : l - 4 7 ) .

8. In spite of al l the miracles wh ich Jesus had done, most of thepeople who were fed did not believe that Jesus was greater thanMoses or that H e cou ld give them eternal life (see John 6).

9. The b li nd m an had plenty of evidence for his faith, John 9:lff,bu t i t did no t convinc e some Jewish leaders.man walking out of a tomb did not convince somei t did others, as In. 1 : I f f shows.as ample evidence to convince a Roman Centurion

. .


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INTRODUCTION x ix

that Jesus was righteous and the Son o f G o d (M att. 27:54; Lk. 23:47),but many others were not so convinced.These are samples of what we have ha d in m in d by the pre cedingcomments. Ob viously, the position or state of m ind of some peop lewas such that no evidence would convince them, but for others,different kinds of evidence to display the probabilities of thetruthfulness of the evidence were requ ired, illustrative of this fact i sthe reaction of the disciples at the resurrection o f Jesus. The tw o meno n the way to,Emmaus did not believe the womans story but had t obe shown (Lk. 24). The ten disciples were no different than Thomas:They a l l had to see to believe (and sometimes the (seeing did no t atfirst become a validating experience as i s shown by Lk. 24:36).So i t is yet today. A person 1) needs to carefully consider theevidence presented, pro and con, for the proposition that Jesus ofNazareth i s the Christ of God, but that person 2) must as carefullyconsider his presuppositions about the nature of the evidence herequires, etc. The one is certainly as important as the o ther.We then consider this idea: H o w did G od make us (as seen in theBible record) to think or consider?That is, what does He expect of usas His creatures?In cons iderationof the Bible and i t s description of Gods dealingswith man, Go d never asked anyone to believe i n H i m withou tevidence sufficient to produce such a faith. Review the cases citedabove from either the Old or New Testaments: Faith was notexpected in anyone without sufficient warning and/or reason tobelieve. Adam and Eve had been told , , / Noah preached , , ,,Abraham heard personally . . ., he Jews had been told . . .,etc. AsJesus said in John 15:22, If I had not co m e and spoken to them, theywould not have sinned, but now (that I have come and spoken tothem) they have noexcuse for their sin. Paul po ints ou t in Rom.1 :18ff. the me n had no reasons, only excuses, for rejecting God, H enotes in H eb . 3:4 that every house i s bu ilt b y someone (thus manreasons cause and effect) but the bu ilde r o f a ll things i s Go d (andthus man has no good reason not to conclude Cod i s the cause of theeffects he sees in the wo rld about him ).To reason any other way (that God requires faith w ithou t evidence,or punishes unjustly) i s to make God worse than men, w h o judge o nthe basis of ones accountability. Such i s exactly one o f the pointsPaul makes in Rom. 3:l-8.


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xx NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCESW e then con clude that God does not expect anyone to believe in a

vacuum:but rather that H e has so created us that we com e to faith byhearing, Rom. 10 :17 . We resist squarely those who teach that mancannot come to faith un ti l he i s born again (see for example, HowDependable i s the Bible, pg. 182). This i s exactly in antithesis to thewhole Bible teaching. It i s also a false doctrine made somewhatnotable by Augustine, refined and taught by john Calvin and hisspiritual heirs. If such were actually the case, there wou ld be no poin tin w rit ing books about evidences (to produc e faith), and certainly noneed to preach for conviction, since God a lone decides and does thecon vict ing (w ith faith as the automatic effect)IWe d o no t so agree. Hence, w e present th e follow ing pages on thebasis that anyone so desirous can consider the evidence and com e tofaith. Christianity i s an histo rica l religion, depending up on factsadequate to cause faith. The honest person ca n hardly do other thanconsider them. The w illi ng person can do aught but accept them, asC.S. Lewis so w ell states in Surp risedb yjoy, pp . 177 -178. May thosew h o read further in the present wo rk be so inclin ed and persuadedWe express appreciation for the permission granted to use materialfrom the fo llo w in g books and from the respective publishers:Am erican Bible Society, N ew York, N e w York, The Creek Ne wTestament, 1966, for the material used in Append ix I taken from theirIntroduction.Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, M ich igan , Revelation and theBible,Carl F . N. Henry, Ed., 1958 , fo r thequo te f rompages140-141.

Ha rpe r and Row, Scranton, Pennsylvania, Our Bib le and theAncien t M anuscripts, Frederic Kenyon, 1958, for the m aterial frompage 55.Moody Press, Chicago, Ill inois, A General lntroduction to theBible, Nor m an L. Geisler and W il liam E. Nix, 1968, for their chartsused from pages 193, 357, 392.N e w York Bible Society International, N e w York, N ew York, N e wlnte rnatio na l Version, 1973, for permission to use the quotes from theN e w Testament in chapter four.Oxford University Press, Oxford, England, Roman Society andRoman Law i n the N e w Testament, A.N. Sherw in-White, 1963, forthe quote from page 187.Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, Nutley, New


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INTRODUCTION xxiJersey, Inspiration an d Au tho rity of the Bible, Benjamin B , Warfield,1948, for t h e quote from pages 173-174.Appreciat ion is also expressed to David Mehrens and JamesSherrod who helped with some of the charts; and to Mrs. JudithWeeks Savoy and Mrs. Carla Scott for the patience in helpingpro du ce the manuscript for the printer, M ay G od bless all of these fortheir efforts.


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CHAPTER 1INTEGRITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT

The Meaning of Integr i tyIntegrity has the idea of trustworthiness, in co rr u pt ib i l i t y orwholeness. The integrity of a book has been preserved whe n it hasbeen transmitted w itho ut a change tha t wo u ld affect i ts meaning. Ifw e stated that our N e w Testament text had integrity, it w ou ld meanthat the present Greek text, from which we get our Englishtranslations, would yield the same meaning as the autographs,writte n by ,the apostles or the various authors.Textual criticism i s the science that deals wi th this particula r area

of Bible study. The textual critic attempts to restore the orig inal te xtfrom the materials which he has at hand, such as manuscripts,versions or quotations (see the chart "Materials and Sources Fro mWhich We Get Our New Testament").I. The Need for Textual Cr i t ic ism

If we had the autographs, written by the apostles or the otherauthors, there w ou ld be no need for textual crit icism . The p rob lem is:we do not possess, as nearly as we know, any of the autographs.Perhaps they are not in existence or, if they are, they have no t beenbrought to our attention.Though the fact i s true as stated above a bout the autographs, w epossess many copies o f the autographs, i n one form or another, as w e1


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2 NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCESshall presently see. The work oft he textual crit ic is then,to bridge thegap between the autographs and the Greek text of our day, so that wemay k n o w that our English translations are representative of wha tG o d wanted us to know.A . HOW THE PROBLEM AROSE

1. THE AUTOGRAPHS ARE LOST. The question m ight be asked, whydid G o d a llow the autographs to be lost? In fact, it has often beenasked and discussed. The answer to the question i s basica lly the sameevery t ime : w e do not know why God allo wed the autographs to belost. There are reasons why it m igh t be an imp robab ility that theycou ld have been saved except by div ine care. For instance,

a. They were probably written on papyrus, w hic h i s hard topreserve, since it is muc h li ke ou r paper. (Greenlee statesthat a ll manuscripts we possess w hic h are earlier than thefourth century are on papyrus, page 26.)Perhaps the writers did not know that they w ou ld need tobe preserved for 2,000 years or so.Perhaps the fact i s that we can w it h considerable assurancerecover the original text from the materials which wepossess - hus the autographs would not need to bepreserved.2. THE COPIES OF THE AUTOGRAPHS DIFFER. As the textual criticbegins his work of recovering the orig inal text, he w il l immediately

discover, though he has many means of res toring the text, thevarioussources differ am on g themselves. The question w il l be asked, w hy dothey diffe r? The answer is: because those w h o cop ied them did notcopy accurately.Without doubt, various congregations wanted copies of theGospels and the other New Testament books when they learned oftheir existence and value. But if th e copy was made, it had to be madeby hand. Unt il the invention of printing abo ut 1450, every copy ofanything had to be made by hand. I t i s diff icult, if no t impossible, toco py extensively witho ut making errors.The pr intin g press for all p ractical purposes brought an end to themaking of errors i n copies. When Johannes Gutenberg invented thepr int ing press w ith its ab ility to reproduce many copies all alike, hebrought into existence the means to reproduce accurately anyautograph. W h ile w e are thankful for such progress, we need to span

b.c.


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INTEGRITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT 3

the distance between the inven tion and the w ritin g of the autographs,approximately 1400 years,B . VARIATIONS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT

1. THE AMOUNT OF VARIATION, Consider ing the whole NewTestament text and the various copies that w e have, it is estimatedthat there are some 150,000 to 200,000 variations among the variousmanuscripts, A t first reading, this seems a tremendous amount ofdifferences. Further, every additional copy we find adds to thenumber of mistakes, since few if any copies are made without anerror in them (we shall discuss the nature of h o w errors are madebelow). It is also true to say that every addit ional copy we f indprovides additional material for correcting mistakes and thus aid ingin the restoration of the original text,In consideration of the total number of "errors", w e surely want toask: 1) h o w the errors are counted as w ell as 2) wha t the errors are. Asan illustration of how the errors are counted, if the first copy of theautograph contained one error and the c opy had six copies made ofit, each copy c on tain ing the origin al error, there w ou ld be sevenerrors counted. As a matter of fact, most of the total men tioned abovei s composed of just such errors,

a. M any of the errors consist in various ways of spelling words(Jerusalem s spelled different ways, just to men tion one).b. Some errors inv olv e the insertion or om ission of words notessential to the sense.c. The use of synonyms is often noted.d . The transposition of words - hese and others constitutethe great majo rity of the variations previously noted.Hence, the am ount of variation i s large -the variation that affectsmeaning i s very small. It w il l be we ll to quote the statement by F.J.A.

Hort from "The Introdu ction to the Creek N ew Testament" byWestcott and Hor t. The statement of Dr. I-lort i s made w ith referenceto the integrity of the N ew Testament text. H e writes as follows:"With regard to the bulk of the wo rds of the N e w Testament, as of most otherancient writings, there is no variation, or other ground of doubt, and thereforeno roo m for textual criticism; and here, therefore, an edito r is on ly a transcriber.The same may be said in truth wit h respect to those vatious readings wh ic lihave never been received, and in ail prob ability never wil l be received, intoany printed text. The Ipropoition of words virtually accepted on all hands as


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4 NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCESraised above doubt is very great, not less, on a rough computation, thanseven-eighths of the whole. The remaining eighth, therefore, formed in greatpart by changes of order and other trivialities, constitutes the whole area ofcriticism . . .Setting aside differences in orthography, the words i n our op in io nstil l subject to doub t only make up about one-sixtieth of the Ne w Testament. Inthis second estimate, the proportion of comparatively trivial variations isbeyond m easure larger than in the former, so that the amount of what can in anysense be called substantial variation is but a small fraction of the wholeresiduary variation, and can hardly form more than a thousandth part of theentire text.

The statement just quoted was made ca. 1881 after the tw o menhad spent some thi rty years intensively studying the textual problemsof the New Testament. Westcott and Hort had only about 1500manuscripts from which to work, not including some consideredtoday to be among the best we have.j Much more recen t l y , a f t e r cons ide rab l y mo re ev idenceconcern ing the N ew Testament has been found, Sir FredericKenyon (who spent his lifetime in the same general field), wrote,

The Christian can take the wh ole Bible in his hand and say witho utfear or hesitation that he holds in i t the true W ord of God, handeddown w i t hou t essen t i a l loss f rom genera t ion to genera t ionthroughout the centuries, page 55, Our Bible . . . Within the lastdecade, u tili zi ng over one hundred years of intensive c rit ical studies,the American Bible Society published a Greek New Testament,setting forth the best N e w Testament text possible today. It can beused by the student or translator w ith confidence that he has, for a llpra ctica l purposes, the accurate representation of what G od had theapostles and other writers pen for us some 2,000 years ago.Our present da y Greek text i s witho ut d oub t almost 100 percentlike the original autograph(s). We actually have a New Testamenttext which i s over 99 percent trustworthy and whole. Furthermore,w e actua lly k n o w the various words and/or verses that make up theone percent ofd ou btfu l text. Wikgren and Ir w in state thaton ly4 00 orso variants affect thesense in any great degree, and o nly about 50 areof real significa nce (pg. 222). Thus, we may w it h assurance read ourN e w Testament, whether in Greek or a translation from Greek (likeEnglish) and feel that we are reading what God had written some2,000 years ago. There is certainly no book w ritten at or about thetim e of the B ible that has as good or greater evidence for its integrityas does the Bible. Both the kind of evidence and the amount ofevidence helps to make that conclusion true. (The k ind of evidence


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such as the various manuscripts, quotations, etc., and the amou nt o fevidence w il l be discussed below .)2 . TH E N E W TE S TA ME N T C OMP A R E D TO OTHER TEXTS. I nconsideration of the statements above, perhaps the student wouldlike to consider the manuscripts from which w e get other anc ientworks and the various facts about those manuscripts which arepara llel to those facts about our N ew Testament text. W e have beforestated tha t the New Testament i s about 99 percent uncorrupted,

leaving only one percent of textual corruption. Giesler and N ix po in tout, pages 366-367, that the lliad i s somewhat comp arable to theNew Testament, both as to extant manuscripts and length ofcomposition. In comparison to the N e w Testament, the / / i d has atleast five percent corruption. We have, ac cording to Giesler and N ix(w ho quote M etzger), some 643 manuscripts of the Iliad. Comparethat total w ith the totals for the New Testament1 Yet no one questionsthe general integrity of the I l iad. The com pan ion text to the Iliad, theOdyssey, w hich was written probably in the eighth century B.C., haspapyri attesting to i t s text dating from about the third century B.C., a500 year gap. Compare that to the fact that w e have pap yri of theN ew Testament text dating to the years A.D. 100 to 150. Tacitus, aRoman historian of ca. 56 to ca. 120, wro te a Greek anthology andhis Annals. We have one m anuscript each of these tw o works, an dthey are copies far removed from the autographs. Other writers such

'as Euripides, Cicero, Ovid and Virgil, while they wrote much, weon ly have manuscripts of a l l their works whic h w o u ld num ber i n thehundreds. The works of Virgil, for instance, are obtained frommanuscripts that are at least three centuries later than the originals.In spite of these facts, which can be multiplied at length about theancient writers and their works, modern scholarship accepts asgenerally trustworthy such ancient classics as we have m en tione d.It i s worth mentioning in this regard that w e ac tua lly possess someautographs w h ich are more ancient than the N e w Testament text, orat least as old as the New Testament texts. Many libraries in theancient wo rld have been unearthed such as at U r or M ari. We havewritings from the Qumran community. The Lachish letters andAmarna letters, the Moa bite Stone, the Rosetta Stone an d others likethese give evidence that we possess the originals of some workscomparable in time to the N ew Testament. Hence, the preservationof some ancient autographs, more ancient than the N e w Testament


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6 NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

autographs, i s a fact. However, these are the exceptions rather thanthe ru le, The integrity of our N ew Testament text i s as good as almostany ancient writing, and much better than most.C . H O W THE VARIATlONS CAME TO BE

It does not seem that the New Testament Christians wereacceptable, by and large, nor their works, until about the year A.D.300. W he n w e read that the early chu rch was often persecuted for itsfaith, we can understand that some copies of their books (i.e., theN e w Testament) were made under great stress. The person do ing thecopy m ight be doing it in the late night hours, w ith poo r l ight and in ahurry. It i s also true to state that the N ew Testament writings were notcons idered a mcng the literature o f the first three centuries -hence, they were not copied in scriptoriums or by people w h o wereaccom plished in such activ ity. Then, as we shall suggest, som e of thevariations arose because those who made copies attempted toc w re c t them. Sometimes the correction was an effort to restore wh atwas thought to be the correct reading in a given place, or theco rrection was made to substantiate a certain teaching or doctrine.Let us n o w consider in some deta il ho w the variations came to be.

1. ACCIDENTAL VARIATIONS. There are a number o f different waysthat accidental variations came to be. Perhaps the greater amount ofvariations in our manuscripts are because of accidental changes.a. Mom en tary Inattention. If you have everTtried to copy anythingexac tly and have tried to do i t over an extended pe riod of time, youwill kn ow from experience that it is very easy to lose your a ttention,even if only for a moment. Such loss of attention produces manydi ffe rent kinds of variations, such as repea ting words or letters,substituting words, transposing words and various other errors. Theperson copy ing may even become so absorbed in the subject of thetext wh ich he i s copying, that it diverts his attention from the words tothe subject matter. If this happens, he may paraphrase what he i scopying or otherwise change it in some way. Some of the otherproblems of the text we shall m ention are rather interwoven withmom enta ry inattention.b. W ritin g from Dic tation . Probably most of the early manuscriptswere not copied in a scriptorium, though many later manuscriptswere. Some of the early manuscripts may have been copied by oneperson wh ile another person read the text to him . In either case, the


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problems of unclear pronunciation and inaccurate hea ring doubtlessproduced some variations in the text. M any words sound the samebut are spelled differently. (Such words are called homophones,)Consider our English words to, too and two as examples. If the personreading did no t correctly read the text, then the person cop ying co u ldnot correctly copy the text, Sometimes the persons copy ing were no tas attentive or as competent as they m ight be. There are exam ples i nmanuscripts wh ich show that scribes i n a scriptorium wro te notes toone another w hile the copying was g oing on, A ll these things makefor variations in the text,c. Change of Pronunciation. Any liv ing language changes -a n dthis includes the spelling of words. Asth e centuries passed, the Greeklanguage changed, and so did those who spoke it. Sometimes,doubtless, peo ple were copying the Greek text w h o did not kno w theGreek language. All of these combined for variations of differentkinds. As an illustration, if you have learned a foreign language (suchas Spanish o r French), try out your pro nunc iation o n a native speakerof the language. You w il l probably discover that pron unc iation o f thesame word or words differs.d. Memory Lapse. If you attempted to copy the whole NewTestament b y hand, you w ou ld become wearied at the task - ndyou m ight try to carry more words in your me mo ry wh ich you areattempting to copy, so that you w ould no t have to look back to theexemplar so often. If you d id that, you w o u ld doubtless discover thatyour memory played tricks on you. You migh t paraphrase the text,forget a par ticle or other l ike word, or use a synonym. You mighteven co nflate the text by bring ing a fam iliar text from another book.This wo u ld especially be so in the Gospels where there are numerousparallel passages.e. The Nature of the Exemplar. The exemplar (the copy fromwhich yo u are working) w ou ld not necessarily aid you in accuratecopying, It may have been written by someone who had poorhandwriting . It may have been corrected as many manuscripts were,either by the corrector (the SLopOwmjs) of the scriptorium, or bysomeone else. It may no t be easy to read because of age or the factthat it i s a palimpsest or other problems.The m anuscript whic h you are cop ying w il l not necessarily aid youin th? co py ing process. Punctuation, spe lling and other aids to theaccurate reading of t h e tex t were very scarce in the ear ly


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manuscripts, and so for the first 800 years or more of the Christianera. Sometimes the paragraph breaks were indicated by spaces or byan enlarged letter or by useof a new line, bu t not always and certainlyno t i n the same way in every manuscript. Apparently all manuscriptsfor the first eight centuries were cop ied in the uncia l script. Cursivemanuscripts did not begin to appear un til about the m iddle of thenin th century (see Greenlee's Figure4). An uncia l manuscript lookedas follows:IPAULMYSELFENTREATYOUBYTHEMEEKNESSANDGENTLENESSOFCHRISTIWHOAMHUMBLEWHENFACETOFACEWITHYOUBUTBOLDTOYOU H E N I A M A WAYIBEGOFYOUTHATWHENlAMPRESENTlMAYNOTHAVETOSHOWBOLDNESSWlTHSUCHCONFlDENCEASlCOUNTONSHOWlN C A G A I NSTSOMEWHOSUSPECTUSOFACTlNGlNWORLDLYFASHlONFORTHOUGHWELlVEl N THE WORLDWEARENOTCARRYlNCONAWORLDLYWARORTHEWEAPONSOFOURWARFAREARENOTWORLDLYBUTHAVEDlVlNEPOWERTODESTROYSTRONGHOLDSWEDESTROYARGUMENTSANDEVERYPROU DOBSTACLEOFTHEKNOWLED G E O F C O D A NDTAKEEVERYTHOUGHTCAPTIVETOOBEYCHRISTSuch i s the nature of the manuscript you might be copying. If youattempt to co py the above quotation exactly, see i f you can do it rightthe firsttim e. Consider the facttha t you are probab ly usin ga qu ill penand something l ik e our ink w hich i s no t easy to erase. If you d ictate itto someone else to copy, you w i ll soon discover the problems that lietherein.

2. NOMENCLATURE. There are a number of words that areassociated w ith various kinds of errors. The fo llo w in g list will help inthis regard and will be involved in one or mo re of the items citedabove or that follow. These are often involved in what i s oftendesignated as errors of the hand or eye, or errors of the mind.a. Haplography i s the word wh ich means single writing. Itmeans a failure to w rite a letter or wo rd whic h should be

repeated. For instance, a sentence w ith t w o "thats", theone fo llow ing the other or a word w ith tw o "t's'' or l f s ' f i nit, such as ditto or lilly, written as dit0 or lily.b. Dittography i s the opposite of the above word. It means todu plica te a letter or w ord. For instance, in Acts 19:34, thecry o f the m ob about Artemis is given tw ice in Codex 6.c. Hom oeote leu ton means a similar ending. Many phrases orsentences end the same way. It i s very easy to skip a line


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wh en copying and pick up t lie wrong ending or the w rongseries of letters, For instance, tlie omission of the phrase in IJo hn 2:23, "He who confesses the Son has the Fatheralso,'' prob ab ly was omitted because of the repetit ion ofl ike phrases,d. ltacism has to do with the fact that various letters soundalike. Theva riation between o and win C rxopivand ~ I X W ~ Vin Romans 5 : l pro ba bly arose because o and w soundedalike. Many other let ters or combinat ions of let terssounded alike, such as E and QL O andw,q,Eb,oL,uL,L, q and7). Not on ly d id the preceding letters make problems forreading and copying as far as pronunciation went, theyalso made problems in the fact that they changed wordsinto different words or different forms of the word. Anotheri llustrat ion w ould be the fact that the personal pronounsw hi ch mean "we" or "you", though spelled differently~ ~ F L E L Snd u p a s ) sounded a like.e. Abbreviation, Several words canie to be abbreviated (seeCreenlee, page 30for a l ist). Som etimes the first and lastletters of the w ord were used, or the end was droppe d off ora syn ibo l was used , o r o therw ise the word wasabbreviated. This made for proh lenis i n copying, since theabbreviation might not be well done and hard to read, orthe copyist might misunderstand the abbreviation a5 beingfor another word,

D, INTENTIONAL VARIATIONSMany texts we re changed because the one co py ing them wa ntedto change them . However, it i s f a i r to say tha t in al l p rob ab il ity niostof the intentiona l changes were made for good reasons. Doubtless,some were made in a self-serving wa y, but niost were otherwise.Considering the fact tha t the scribe m ight have only one exem plarfrom which to copy, he might be prone to make certain changes inthe text he was making, depending upon h i s theology or otherinformation ava ilable to hi i l , Consider then the fo llow ing suggestion

as to why changes might have been tiiade intentionally:1. DOC TRINA L CHANGES, Many of the early Church Fathers, such

as Irenaeus, Tertullian and Origen mention that people classed as"heretics" we re m aking changes in the N ew Testament to suppo rt


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their pa rticu lar views. This apparently was the basis for the work ofM arcio n abo ut A. D. 140. For instance, if a scribe decid ed to change atext because of doctr ina l considerat ions, he would probablystrengthen the text if the text before him did not say all that hewanted. Some add itions such as and fasting i n M ark 8:29, theexpression and the Holy Spirit in Luke 1 3 were probably added tostrengthen the statements. The text con ce rn ing the He avenlyWitnesses in John 5:7,8 i s an illustration of an inten tional variationin support of a doctrine. Contrariwise, the deletion of certain thingsor a change in the wo rd or words might have been made to tonedow n wha t the text said. The change of C o d to Son in John1 :18 w o u ld be an illustration o f this. The change from Cod toLord in Acts 20:28 was probably made for the same reason. Theomission of the phrase neither the Son in Matt. 24:36, whichseemed to be inconsistent w ith the divin ity o f Jesus, thus was om ittedby some scribes. Some ancient manuscripts give the name ofBarabbas, who was the substitute for Jesus, as Jesus Barabbas.Doubtless, early scribes would not like the idea of the name Jesusbeing applied to Barabbas, so it i s eliminated in most of themanuscripts, th ough it may we ll have been his nam e (since Jesus orJoshua was not an uncom mo n name i n N e w Testament times).

2. CONFLATION OF TEXTS. Suppose that yo u have tw o exemplarsbefore you which read differently in a given passage. What wouldyou do?You have several choices: 1) Use the text o f on e as opposedto the other; 2) Leave both out for fear of putting in the w rong one;3) Conflate the readings, thus incorporating both of the variationsin to the text. This way w ould assure you o f hav ing he righ t reading, ifyo u conside r either that one or the other was the correct reading. Or,4) You co uld p u t one in the text and the other on e i n the margin ofyour text. Probably some or a ll of these methods were used by scribesco py ing texts. For instance, in the text of Acts 6:8, the description ofPhilip varies am ong the manuscripts w ith some reading fu ll of graceand power, some full of faith and power and some full of graceand faith and pow er. If you were faced wit h exemplars which readas the above, w hic h text wo uld you make a part of your text?

3. FULNESS OF EXPRESSION. Many variations in the manuscriptsarise from the scribe bringing a parallel thought or word into thegiven text which he i s copying. For instance the words to


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INTEGRITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT 11repentance i n Matt. 9:13 or Mk.2:7 were proba bly written there bya scribe w ho remembered them from Lk, 5:32. The three accounts ofPauls conversion in Acts 9, 22, 26 are often found fth is way, w ithphrases being brought from one account to the other account.Sometimes if the scribe were copy ing a text of the N e w Testamentwhich was quo ting an Old Testament text, he wo u ld supplement theN ew Testament version with a longer or different version o f theOld Testament text. Many scribes apparently tried to ha rm on ize thetwo accounts of the prayer of Jesus in Matthew G and Luke 11,Doubt less , e f fo r ts a t harmoniz ing passages were many. Acharacteristic o f the text designated as Byzantine i s that it i s fu l l aswell as being smooth. It i s the textual family which characterizesmost of the later manuscripts and the type text fro m w h ich the K ingJames Version was translated.

4. GRA MMATIC AL CORRECTIONS. Sometimes the scribe attemptedto correct the grammar of the exemplar before him, especially inthe book o f Revelation, but in every bo ok to some extent. Remem ber- ourteen centuries passed in the transmission of the NewTestament text before p rinting caused the copy ing by hand to cease.As before stated, language changes with use. Greek was notexcluded from change. Thus, the scribe m ig h tw an t to change the textbecause the Greek language which h e spoke was n ot the same as thetext from whic h he was copying. Sometimes the scribe attempted tocorrect a supposed grammatical mistake in the text before him . Suchmight have been the change in Rom. 4:11 where the same forms o fthe Greek word m p h r o p j are interchanged, each one giving acertain sense to the passage.

5. MANUSCRIPT CORRECTIONS. M an y manuscripts have marginalnotes. If a scribe were uncertain about the nature of the marginalgloss, he might incorporate it into his text th ink ing the previous scribehad mistakenly left it out. But not a l l were to be so cop ied. The textabout the troub ling of the water in Joh n 5:3b -4 probably got into thetext in such fashion, as well as the text of Acts 8:37. Such inclusioninto the text i s called interpolation. Sometimes the manuscriptwhich a scribe was copying would have textual difficulties aboutwhich he knew. H e might copy the tex t as i t stood but designate thefact that the text which he copied was in error in some way. Thusmany manuscripts testify to the p roblem passage o f M ar k 1G:9-20 aswell as the passage of John 7:53-8: 11,

~


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SummaryIn summarizing the above comments, the follow ing observationscan be made:The present extant Greek m anuscripts o ft h e Ne w Testament testifythere are ma ny var iat ions i n the text . How ever, the extantmanuscripts also provide the means for correcting those supposedmistakes.Variations came about in many ways. Some were accidentally

done, others intentiona lly done. In co rrecting the various mistakes,we have to consider how the mistake arose.Though there are a number of texts invo lve d in the problem, therei s no t even one Bib le doctrine that i s affected by such variations. N oBible doctrine is based upon one single text -thus, the variations d ono t affect wh at G od wants us to do or to kn ow .Considering the various ways a text co u ld be changed, whetheracc iden tally or purposely, it is l ittle short of miraculous that we haveso m uch assurance conce rning the present state of the Greek text ofthe New Testament,I I Restoring t he Text

H o w sha ll we restore the integrity to the N e w Testament text?Thisquestion i s answered in the follow ing discussion, w hich concernsthematerials wh ich w e use in the wo rk as we ll as labors o f those w hohave work ed in the area of textual crit icism of the N e w Testament.The charts at the end of this chapter w il l be help fu l in a study of thispa rticula r area, as w el l as the info rm atio n in the index o f persons atthe back of the book .A . MATERIALS USED IN RESTORATION OF THE TEXT

As the chart at the end o f the chapter shows, there are three basicsources, outs ide o f the text itself, w hich are used to restore the text.These are manuscripts ( in Greek), versions and quotations. As far asthe text o f the various manuscripts, the textual critic considers bothwh at the author wo u ld have written (called intrinsic probability) andwh a t t he sc ribe m ig h t have w r i t ten ( ca l l ed t r ansc r i p ti ona lpro ba bility). We shall discuss some of the various people wh o havehelped play a part in the restoration of the text.1 . GREEK MANUSCRIPTS. We shall give a description of someGreek m anuscripts i n an appendix. The student may wa nt to peruse


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those discussions for additiona l help regarding the manuscripts. Seethe collateral reading list also.Greek manuscripts come to us in various forms, W e list thefollowing tabulation to show this information:Papyri 81Uncials 266Min uscu es 2,754Lectionaries 2,135Ostraca 2 5

Total 5,261We would mention that the above statistics are gleaned fromMetzgers The Text of the New Testament, pages 3 1-33, as hequotes Kurt Aland who i s the person presently in charge ofnumbering Greek manuscripts.The above sources form a major part of the material used inascer\aining the correct text. They are the direc t witnesses to theautographs of our N ew Testament. In a ddition to the above sources,Metzger mentions (page 33)that a num ber of talismans (good luc kcharms) have been found dating from the fourth to the thirteenthcenturies written on vellum, papyri, ostraca and wo od . Apparen tlysome Christians wore such. Four of those which have beencatalogued (that is, numbered) con tain the Lords Prayer, and othershave different verses from the Old and New Testaments.2. PAPYRI. Papyri are the earliest witnesses to the N e w Testamenttext which we have. The fragment designated P5* which containsjohn 18:31 -33, 37-38 i s dated between A.D . 1 0 0 o 150 . It i s writtenon both sides, which shows that though papyri were normally inrolls, some were in codex form, (M an y of the papyri of the NewTestament are in codex form.) Most w h ic h w e possess are in the earlycenturies (as before stated), between the second and fourth. Almosta l l of them have been collated since the tim e of Westcott and Hort.Many papyri give obvious testimony to the fact that the NewTestament was copied early and i n various places by differentpeople, Interestingly enough, the papyri give evidence, along withthe Churc li Fathers, that the Byzantine text (w h ic h i s the text used bythe King James ranslators, etc., Iktiown as the Textus Receptus) i s alater form of t he text, since t he papyri d o not show, as a rule, evid enceof the Byzantine type text un til they are later than the fourth cen tury.


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1 4 NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

Thus the evidential value o f the papyri i s basically for the type textwhich was produced by Westcott and Hort in 1881 and i srepresented today in Greek texts like Nestles and that of theAm erican Bib le Society. They also give evidence that the principlesused by the textual critics (see below) are sound.The papyri vary in their contents. Some con tain various parts ofbooks or co mple te books, such as Luke or John or sections of theepistles by Paul, etc . The papyri, like the uncia l manuscripts, werewritten in u ncia l letters.O ne interesting facet of the papyri i s that they bear witness to thefact that the N e w Testament was written i n the language of the streetor the marketplace. Recent discoveries in Egypt of papyri (whichwere bu ried in the sand) conta ining letters, documents, etc. from allwalks o f li fe give evidence to the fact that the New Testament was i nthe language of the people. The student can consul t Adol fDeissmanns Light From the Ancient East for plenty o f evidence thatthe papyri give for the above conclusion. Certainly the style ofwriting, such as syntax and expressions i n the N e w Testament textthat seem peculiar when compared to Classical Greek, were all inco m m on use in the first century. Giesler and N ix w ell conclude thatthe papyri give evidence of the fact that the New Testament waswritte n in the first century (see page 292).Some of the m ore important papyri are as listed be low . The studentcan consult the complete list in the back for further information.

PP2P8P2PP 2 4P33P45P 4 6P4P 5 2P66P72P75

Th ird CenturyFourth CenturyFourth CenturyLate Thi rd C enturyFourth CenturyFourth CenturyFourth CenturyTh ird CenturyCa. 200Third CenturySecond CenturyCa. 200Th ird CenturyCa. 200

Matt. 1 :1-9,12,13,14-20Luke 1 :74-80, 5:3-8, 5:30-6:4Heb. 1 :I-2Phil. 3:9-4:lRev. 5:5-8, 6:s-8John 8:14-22Sections of the Gospels & ActsSections of Pauls epistlesParts of RevelationJohn 18:31-33, 37-38Some of Joh nSome of JudeSections of Luke and John

Acts 4131-37, 5:2-9, 6: l-6, 8-15


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3, UNCIALS. Uncial manuscripts are those which have the"printed" style of han dw riting rather than the cursive style. Thepapyri were written in uncial handwrit ing, but are normally notincluded in the designation uncial manuscripts, since they aredesignated by the type of wr i t ing mater ia l (papyrus) . Uncia lmanuscripts date from the fourth to the n inth centuries. M an y of theuncials are very simple in appearance, especially the earlier ones.Some are in rather decorative handw riting, though o thers are no t so.Only one of the uncials (the Sinaitic) contains a l l of the NewTestament, thou gh others perhaps orig ina lly d id (such as A, B, C, c) .The uncials give testimony to t he various text types (see the app endixwhich concerns the manuscripts). Generally speaking, the mostimpo rtant w itnesses to the tex t ofth e N e w Testament are consideredto be the uncial manuscripts. This is so because they co ntain all o ralmost all o f the N e w Testament, and are m uc h earlier than the nextclass of manuscripts, the minuscules.

A few of the uncials, their date and contents, can be listed. Themore complete list can be referenced in the appendix.Fourth CenturyFifth CenturyFourth CenturyFifth CenturySixth CenturyN inth CenturyN inth CenturyNinth CenturyA.D. 949Fifth CenturyN inth CenturySixth Century

Com plete N e w TestamentMo st of the N ew TestamentM os t of the N e w TestamentM ost of the N ew Testament, M os t of Gospels & Acts

Pauline EpistlesMost of ActsGospelsGospelsGospelsGospelsMat thew and Mark4. MINUSCULES. The m inu scu le m an us cr ip ts d ate f ro mapproximately the ninth to the fifteenth centuries. Though they arenot as early as the un cia l manuscripts, thus perhaps not generally asimportant, yet they possess evidence tha t i s imp ortan t to the recoveryof the text. Generally speaking, they co nta in the later text type know nas Byzantine though o ther text types are witnessed by the minusculesalso. They are also important because many of them are perhaps


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1 6 NEW TESTAMENT EVIDENCES

copies of good early texts. Man y of the m inuscules indicate that theyare copies of the same exemplar. For instance, family 1 includesmanuscripts 1 , 118, 131 and 209 and seems to be related to thecodex 038. Family 13 includes manuscripts 13, 69, 124, 230, 346,543, 788, 826, 828, 983, 1689, 1709. Other manuscripts beartestimony to lik e relationships. Thus whe n the textual c ritic begins toevaluate the worth of the minuscule, he must consider both theprobable date of the com position and also the possibility that it s butone of a fam ily. I f i t is bu t one o f a family, then the testimony of thefamily i s considered rather than the testimony of each individualmanuscript in the family.The follo w ing minuscules give evidence for sections of the NewTestament as fol lows:

1132833616981157565579

1071142417392053

Tw elfth Century A ll but RevelationThirteen th Century GospelsEleventh Century GospelsN in th Century A ll but RevelationLate Fifteenth Century Entire New TestamentFifteenth Century Entire N ew TestamentA.D. 1044 Acts & Pauls EpistlesTw elfth Century GospelsN in th Century GospelsThirteenth Century GospelsTw elfth Century GospelsLate N inth CenturyTenth CenturyThirteenth Century Revelation

Entire New TestamentActs & Pauls Epistles

(Greenlee estimates that approxim ately ni ne-tenths o f the Greekmanuscripts w hi ch are kno wn are from the minuscu le period, page29.)5 . LECTIONARIES. As a class, lectionaries are grouped with theminuscules, since they have the same general dat ing. Thelectionaries we re readingsfor ind ividu al days or for public reading inworship services. Most of the lectionaries have readings from theGospels w it h some readings taken from Acts and/or the Epistles. Likethe minuscules, they are the text type Byzantine as a who le thoughsome of the earlier ones show other textual affinities. The lectionaries


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date from about the fifth through the seventeenth centuries, Thecharacter of the lectionaries i s of interest since they bear witness tothe various textual changes do w n through the cen turies or they giveevidence o f having been copied in certain areas where certainreadings predominated.6. OSTRACA. Ostraca are actually pieces of po ttery that were usedas a writ ing material. They are also kn own as potsherds. l f t h e personwri t ing did not possess any other writing material, these were

sometimes used for that purpose. Metzger notes, page 33,that abo ut25 have been ca talogued. These 25 contain port ions of six differentNew Testament books.This completes the l i s t of principle sources of G reek manuscripts,with the exception of good luck cliarms mentioned above. Thesesources form the first and most importan t witness to our Greek text.They prob ably contain the original N e w Testament, w or d for w or d.We may w ith careful study and use of add ition al m aterials use thesesources to ascertain what God had written through the apostles or theII

I other writers.5. ANCIENT VERSlONS

Il

New Testaments in languages other than the original Greek areva luab le as a means to he lp restore the integrity o f th e text. There area considerable number of versions of the N ew Testament w hi ch areavailable to us to so use. We w il l give a description of these versionsin the appendix concerning Ancient Versions. Suffice i t to say thatthey are helpful in the following ways:

a. They give witness to the sta teo fthe text at a cer tain p oin t i nti me.b. They give evidence concerning the spread of the Gospeland the need of, and the value of, a translation of the Ne wTestament,c. They show in some detail the acceptance or rejection ofthe New Testament canon as we have it.d. The early dates of some of the translations show that theN ew Testament was obviously in existence at that po int intime. This i s he lpful because the Greek manuscripts fromthe time of w ritin g to about the year A.D. 350, though inexistence, are rather scarce and incomplete.


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e. The versions are valuable in that they he lp bridge the gapbetw een the years around A. D. 350 (the approximate datesof our oldest Greek manuscripts and B) and the tim e ofwriting, which probably ends at around A.D. 95. Forinstance, the Old Latin version and the Old Syriac aredated ca. 150, thus mov ing the evidence for our N ewTestament back 200 years fromf. They bear testimony to the different types of text in thevarious loca lities, such as at Rome, Antioch, Carthage, etc.These are the major reasons w h y the versions are valuable for theefforts to restore the text. Certainly their witness, bo th as to time oftranslation arid place of translation, i s important.There are problems w ith the versions that need to be recognized bythe textual critic w h o uses them. They are in that respect somewhatlik e the Greek manuscripts, that is , they have prob lems that must besolved about the m as well. Some of the items to consider about theversion(s) would be as follows:

and 8.

a. We do no t have the o r ig ina l au tographs , and themanuscripts are corrupted which were made from theautographs.The fact must be recognized that some of them were madewith a doctrinal bias, or were copied from an exemplarw it h a doctr inal bias.It i s to be remembered that we cannot date the versionsexactly, nor can we pinpoint always the place andcircumstances of the translation.d. The version might have been made by someone w ho didno t kno w Greek, or kno w it well. I t i s also possible he knewGreek we l l but did not kno w the language into which hewas translating well.e. No two languages are alike. Thus, some features of theGreek language cannot be conveyed i n another language.

While the above problems are to be considered in the use ofversions, they are sti l l the second best au thor ity for the restoration ofour Creek text. Accordingly, we can be thankful for them and usethe m w ise ly. Versions and their approx imate dates that are of use intextual crit icism include the fol lowin g:

b.

c .


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1. SYRIAC VERSIONS. There are five different versions in Syriac ofour N ew Testament,The Old SyriacPeshi taPhi oxenianHarclean A,D. 616 (Seventh Century)Palestinian-Syriac Fifth Century

M idd le Second CenturyMiddle Fifth CenturyA.D. 508 (Sixth Century)

It i s easy to see that the New Testament Christians who lived inSyria wo uld qu ick ly want a version of their o w n language, when o neconsiders the part that Antioc h of Syria playe d i n N e w Testamenttimes. No te Acts 6:5,11:2 6,13 : 1 f, etc. It may be we ll to state that theSyriac language was probably the spoken language in Palestine,which we know as Aramaic, though there are dialec tica l differencesbetween the Syriac spoken in Palestine and that spoken in An tioch,We d id no t mention the fact that Tatians Diatessaron (a harmonyof the four Gospels), w hich was produced about A.D . 170, may havebeen orig ina lly w ritten in Syriac. Some suggest that i t was writte n inGreek and then translated into Syriac. In either case, this i s also anearly witness to the importance of and presence of the four Gospelsbeing placed into another language other than Greek at a very earlydate.

2. COPTIC VERSIONS. Christianity soon spread to Egypt andsurrounding areas as evidenced by the acco un t in Acts 8. Obviouslythe New Testament in the various languages was also soon anecessity. Thus, in Egypt at least two importan t versions came in toexistence dur ing the th ird century.

The Cop tic language was the latest fo rm of w rit in g used in Egypt. Itwas comprised of the Greek letters with the addition of sevencharacters taken from the Demotic script, an older script used inEgY Pt.There were several dialects in Egypt w h ic h used the C optic script.The tw o important ones were the Boharic and the Sahidic and threeless important ones ( for textual cr i t ic ism work) classif ied byCreenlee, page 51, as Achmimic, Sub-Achmimic and Fayumic.These dialects, a l l of wh ich had the B ible translated into them, aredated as follows:


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Boharic Th ird CenturySahidicAchmimic, Sub-Achmimic, Beginning of the Third CenturyFayumic Fourth or Fifth Centuries3 . LATIN VERSIONS. Latin was the official language of the RomanEmpire although Greek was the com mon ly used language. Hence, it

is quite understandable that the New Testament was very earlytranslated in to Latin. Because Latin was spoken so widely throughoutthe Empire, and after the th ird century Greek began to be less w ide lyused, there were several Latin versions (d iffe rin gf rom one another insome ways) and a great mass of Latin manuscripts circulating. It hasbeen estimated that there are over 8,000 manuscripts of the LatinVulgate alone, no t to mention the manuscripts of the other types ofLatin texts.Like Syriac and Coptic versions, the Latin versions give evidence ofthe widespread nature of Christianity and the importance attached tohaving the N e w Testament in the official language of the RomanEmpire. Though there i s some disagreement over the number ofdifferent Latin versions there are, it i s generally agreed that there wereat least three different Latin versions (classified under the headingOld Latin) w it h th e Latin Vulgate by Jerome replacing them, at leastgenerally speaking. Hence, we list the following different versionsand their approximate dates.The Old LatinLatin Vulgate A.D. 382M idd le Second Century

4. OTHER VERSIONS. Many peoples wanted the Bible andespecially the N e w Testament, i n their o w n languages. W e listseveral versions that are helpful in textual criticism.Ara bic Version Eighth Cen turyArm en ian Version Early Fifth CenturyEth iopic Version Fourth CenturyGeorgian VersionG oth ic Version Fourth CenturyNestorian VersionSlavonic Version N inth Century

Midd le of the Fifth CenturyM idd le o f the Fifth Century

There are m any other versions o ft h e Bible w hic h were made in theearly centuries w hic h, though of no t so m uc h use to the textual c ritic


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INTEGRITY OF TI-IE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT 21

as others, do testify to the spread of Christianity and the character o fthe New Testament, both as to text and accepted books, then inexistence.C. PA TRlSTK QUOTATIONS

These various men w h o quoted the N e w Testament are impo rtantto our study because they, like the manuscripts and versions, giveevidence, through their quotations, commentaries and references, tothe text of the Bible, both Old and New Testaments. As has oftenbeen po inted out, these men quoted e xtensively the N e w Testament.It has been suggested that the N ew Testament co uld b e repro ducedfrom their quotations alone.The quotations are important for the following reasons:

1, They help determine the state of the text at a given po int intime.

2, They also show wh at the text i s at a particula r place, suchas Rome, Lyons, Alexandria, etc.3. They very often p rovide info rmation about textual matters(especially Origen and Jerome in this area), because the ywere aware of variants among the extant exemplarsavailable to them.4. As the chain chart at the end of Ch. 2 shows, the pa tristicquotations actually span the rem aining years between theversions and the actual writing of the New Testamentautographs.

~

i~

I

The quotations by these men have, Iike the Greek manuscripts an dversions, suffered i n the ravages of t ime. A l i s t of problems related tothem w o ul d include the fol lowing:III 1. other men.

2 . Some are found only in late manuscr ipts, centur iesremoved from the autographs.3 . Scribes have sometimes changed wha t they said, or wh atthey quoted, or have miscopied.4. At times, the men quoted loosely, or by memory, and/or5. If the person quo ted the same text more than once, as wasthe case at times, he might not quo te id en tica lly w it h thepreceding time.

Some of their writings are preserved on ly in the works o f

I inaccurately.


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However, in spite of such divergent problems, th e c h u rc h Fathersplay an im portant part in he search of the actual N ew Testament ext.Some of the more important Church Fathers will be described inthe collateral reading as well as other men who figured in thetransmission of the Bible. Perhaps i t w il l be he lpful here to give a listof some important men in the early centuries. Includ ed in the list w il lbe various works whose authors are unknown, but which containreferences to a text or texts in the N ew Testament.First Century to A.D. 100Epistle of Clement to the CorinthiansPseudo-bar nabasSecond Century, A.D. 100 to 200Basil ides MarcionCelsus MelitoCerenthius MontanusClement of Alexandria M uratorian FragmentClementine Ho m i es PapiasDionysius PolycarpEpistle of Barnabas PtolemaeusEpistle of lgnatiusEpistle of PolycarpHegesippus Tati anlrenaeus Teaching of Twelve (didache)Justin Ma rtyr TheophilusLetter to Diog netus ValentinusTh ird Century, A.D. 200 to 300Cyprian MethodiusDion ysius Alexandrinus OrigenGregory Thaumaturgus Paul of SamosataHippolytus Tertull ianFourth Century, A .D .-300 to 400Ambrose of M i lanAph raates Gregory o f NyssaAthanasius HilaryAugustine JeromeBasil of Caesarea John Chrysostom

Second Epistle of Clement(Philippians) Shepherd of Hermas

Gregory of Nazianzus


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INTEGRITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXT 2 3Cyri l of Jerusalem LactantiusEpiplianius LuciferEphraem Prisci I ianEusebius Theodore of MopsuestiaEuthalius Tycon i us

These sources, and others l ike them, form the th ird malor witnessto the text of the N e w Testament. Th ough these quotations aresometimes fragmentary, loose, mixed or doubtful, yet the vastamount and variety, as the following chart shows, give substantialboost to the text of our New Testament.

EARLY PATRISTIC QUOTATIONS OF THE NEW TESTAMENTWriter Gospels

Justin Marty r 26 8lrenaeus 1,038Clement Alex. 1 017Origen 9,231Tertul l ian 3,822Eusebius 3,258Hippolytus 734

Acts

1019444

3 4 95 0 2

4221 1

PaulineEpistles

4 34 9 9

1,1277,7782,609

3 8 71,592

General Revela-Epistles t ion Totals

6 3, 3301266 a l lus ions)23 65 1,819

2 0 7 1 1 2,406399 165 17,922120 205 7 ,258

27 188 1,37888 27 5 ,176

Grand Totals 19,368 1,352 14,035 87 0 66 4 36,289(Courtesy Moody Press. From the book,AGeneral introduction to the Bib/e.by Geislerand Nix)Summary

It i s worth repeating: no book of ancient times has anythingcomparable for the restoration of the text as does the N e w Testament.God has ric hly provided ample evidence for His revelation in wordsto man.The integrity o f the New Testament text i s made more sure by eachof these groups of witnesses: 1) the Greek manuscripts, 5,000 plus;2) over 9,000 manuscripts in other languages; and 3) the 36,000 pluspatristic quotations. We can confidently use our text of today,know ing that it i s more than adequately substantiated through the


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various witnesses. We can even know which section of text i s i nsome doubt. M ore than that, we cou ld e l iminate every doubtful textand lose no doc trine or teaching of consequence to the believer.W ith this study thus completed, we take u p the inqu iry as to theauthorship of the individual books of the N e w Testament, w hi ch i sthe subject of Ch. 2, Genuineness.COLLATERAL READINGrevised edition, 1953.Publishing Co., 1974 .Eerdmans Publish ing Co., 196 4.chs. 17, 18, 20, 21, 23-27, Moody Press, 1968.chs. 1-6, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., second edition, 1953.Adams, A.W., 1958 .LTD., revised editio n, 1 949 .

1. Bruce, F.F, The Books and the Parchments, chs. 14 -17, Fleming H. Revell Co.,2. Finegan, Jac k. Encountering New Testament Manuscripts, W m. B. Eerdmans3. Greenlee, J . Harold. lntroduc tion to N e w Testament Criticism, chs. 1-4, W m. B.4. Geisler, No rm an L. and Nix, Will iam E.A General lntroduction to the Bible,5. Kenyon, Frederic G. andbook to the Textual Criticis m of th eN ew Testament,6. - Our Bible and the Ancien t Manuscripts, chs. 1-3, 6-8, revised edition,7. - The Text o f the Greek Bible, chs. 1,3,4,7, Ge rald Duckw orth and Co.,8. Lightfoot, Ne il R. H o w We Got Our Bible, chs. 1-7, Baker Book House, 1963.9. Ma cGrego r, Geddes. The Bible i n the Making, ch. 4, J.B. LippincottCo., 1959.10. Me tzger, B ruce. The Text of the N e w Testament, Part I , chs. I, 11, Part 111, chs.

11. Price, Ira Maurice. The Ancestry of Ou r English Bible, chs. XI-XVI, Harper and12. Robertson, A.T.A n lntroduction to the Textual Critic ism of the N e w Testament,13. - Studies in the Text of the New Testament, chs. 1-2, 7-8, Restoration14. Souter, Alexander. The Text of the New Testament, chs. 1-7, 9, Gerald15. Wenham , J ohn W. Christ an d the Bible, ch. 7, lnterv arsity Press, 1972 .

V-VII, Oxford University Press, second edition, 1968.'Bros., third revised edition, Irwin, Wil l ia m A,, and Wikgren, A llen P., 1956.chs. 1-3, 5-1 2, Broadm an Press, 1 92 5.Reprint Series, College Press, 1969.Duckworth and Co., LTD., revised edition, C.S.C. Williams, 195 3.


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by Matt., Mark, Lute, John by Paul, Petar, James, Jude & JolinIN GREEK IN GREEK IN GREEK

Tliere writings clrculate separately and In groupsCOPIES ARE MA DEVARIATIONS BEGIN TO OCCUR

OTHER ANCIENTCHRISTIAN WRITINGSCommenteries, Sermons,atc., quoting the N. T.directly & Indirectly

1

ANCIENT VERSIONSN, 7. ranslated in to

FirstprintedGREEK

TESTAMENT1614 A. D.

3lbS

E X I S T I N G C O P I ES O F EXISTING COPIES OFANCIENT VERSIONSorks of more than 200 Over Q.OD0 copies in0 t least 14 languagesCHRISTIAN WRITERS IN GREEKMany 1,ODOs o f q~otat ions Over 6 OD0 copies

o f N T or parts of 11

RECONSTRUCTION O F ORIGINALGREEK, T EXTMost variations removed Any possible doub t of accuracyattaches t o specific passages.not t o t he whole N T , anddoer not affect any doctrine

All Slgnlf l c m t YBriatiOnScite dan d evaluated anyuncerteinty limited t o lessthan ona word out o f 1,OOD~ TWENTIETH CENTURYVERSIONS


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G O E P E W ACISP' P P' P' P' P PPa* (P ) P'*H B C L Q T ( W - L u k e 1 - H A B C P W 8 0 7 8John 8:12) 2 A E t 0% 059 086720 33 184 215 378 579 718850 892 1241 (1342 Mark)

Boh (S ah ) Boh ( S a h )Ath Cyr-Alex Or)

P' ( P O )

c 080 0182E 33 81 104 328 1175

2Ath Cyr-Alex Clem-Alex?01)

CAmOrJo EPlsrrss PAUL,EBREWS REVELATIONp'o pa2 p 2 p1 pL p 7 pia pll p' pup,, p,. p.0 pa,H A B C P r X A B C H I M A C PW8 058 0142 01% M P Psi 048 081 02W 0189088 022033 81 104 323328 8 33 81 104 328 81 59 94 241 2424' 1175 1739 424~ 175 1739 1WB 1175 18112298 1908 1841 185220402053 2344 2351Bob (Sah ) Boh ( S a h )Ath Cyr-AlexClem-Alex? ( O r )

(Courtesy of Moody Press, from A General introduction to the Bible, by Geisler andNix)

p,: pa,

8 e ( W - M a r k 5 f f . ) N 0 8 0Fam 1 Fam 13 28 585 7W8 7071 16043 G w Arm Pal-SyrEus Cyr-Jer (Or)P"D (W-Mark 1-S?) 0171

It , especially k e Sin-Sycur-syrTert Ir Clem-Alex C p( A% )A E F G H K M S U V(\V-Matt., Luke 8:12 f . ) Yr .I u nMort minuriden[ oth Later versionsLater Fathers

FITI?I? (Text type not determined in the remainder of the New Testament)Cyr-Jer?pas pa, p PD E OBB D E D E F G F?257 440 814 913 1108 12451518 1811 1739 2138 2298It Hark-Syr mg

88 181 915 9171838 1898 1912It Hark-Syr rng I t I t ?EPhIr Tert C p Aug

H L S P H K L S K L 04842 398 8293 429 469801920 2aKJMost minuscules Most otherminus- Mort other minus- Most other mi.cules nusculesGoth Later versions Goth Later ver- Goth Later vel- Goth Later vel.

li0U.S riom $ionsater FathersLater Fathers Later Fathers Lit er Fathers


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CHAPTER 2GENUINENESS OF THE

NEW TESTAMENT BOOKS

The Meaning of GenuinenessGenuineness has the idea of the true, the real, the actual. Withrespectto the books of the N ew Testament, genuineness refers to thepurported authors of their respective books. W e w ish to kn ow if theywere the p roducts o f the apostles and/or those wh o w ere associated

w ith the apostles, or if they were written by someone else. Sometimesthe w ord "authentic" i s used in this area because w e have in m in dthe idea that the books are trustworthy, and not counterfeit. As inChapter 1 we wished' to know if we had the original text, now wewant to know who wrote that text.1. The Reasons for the Discussion

If the books of the New Testament were written through meninspired by God, the Christian i s obliga ted to treat them as such (thatis, as books in wh ich G od speaks to us). How ever, if they were not,then we should treat them as we do a ll other literature wh ic h i s notinspired. Hence, the knowledge gained i n our discussion ab ou tgenuineness i s of abid ing importance to every C hristian.Throughout the centuries since the New Testament was written,the church at large has norm ally held to the posit ion that the books

27


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we re writte n as follows: Matthew, (by) the apostle Ma tthew; Mark,Jo hn Mark; Luke and Acts, the physician Luke; John, I , II, IllJohn andRevelation, the apostle John; Romans, I and I I Corinthians , Galatians,Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, I and I I Thessalonians, I and I ITimothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, the apostle Paul; James, byJames the apostle, or James the Lords brother; I and I I Peter, theapostle Peter; Jude, by Jude, the Lords brother. As the followingdiscussion will brin g out, there have been those who did not h old theabove views, bu t by and large, the above reflects the views o f thech urch in the early years and throughout the M idd le Ages, as to theauthors and their respective books .In the last tw o centuries, approximately, the end results ofScientism, Rationalism, etc., and/or various theological positionshave caused some to ,question the trad i t ional authorship(s).However, the evidence wh ich caused the early church to generallyun ite o n the various authors has no t changed. It i s the theologicalpresuppositions (of the last tw o centuries), wh ich have been and arebe ing he ld b y various theologians, wh ich have caused different mento hold positions other than the trad itiona l ones. (Included at the endo ft h is chapter w il l be a number of books the student can read whichwil l present the newer conc lusions and the reasons for them.)I I The Evidence for Genuineness

The evidence for genuineness must be presented from twoa.

perspectives:The evidence for the existence of the books at the timewhen they could have been written by the supposedauthors.b. The evidence to be considered for the supposed author.

Some of the available evidence will argue for one or the other ofthe preceding points, while some will argue for both of them (oragainst them as thexase may be). The evidence available i s fromseveral sources (reference the chart, on page 55), that from:a. ind ividua ls c. translationsb. canons d. councilsW e wi l l consider each of these various witnesses for genuinenessIn addition, each book will have testimony, pro and con, fromin the order presented.


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GENUINENESS OF TIiE NEW TESTAMENT BOOKS 29

sources external to itself (such as the above sources), and t ha ttestimony which comes from within it. We thus have external andinte rna l testimony for or against each book, W e shall considerexternal testimony, then internal testimony.111. External EvidenceA , INDIVIDUALS

As the chart will show, various individuals testify to the NewTestament books in different ways, Though theo nes w e w il l m en tionwere not united in their testimony, yet each of them testify to theexistence of the book if nothing else, We did not include variousauthors who wrote against Christianity, though some could havebeen mentioned who testify in various ways about the NewTestament books and their authorship. It i s pertinent to po int ou t thatwe do not have access to much of the material that was doubtlessavailable at an earlier date in history. For instance, Eusebiusmentions various sources of info rm ation w h ich he used that are no tno w available to us, and even some o f his work i s no t extant. Hence,were we closer to the years d uring wh ich the N e w Testament bookswere composed, we could cite other testimony than what we do,However, the testimony available to us i s thou gh t adequate to sustainour case wh i

Documents

New Testament Evidences (Wallace W. Wartick, 1975 College)Bible Study Textbook