Evidence for God from Science

This may be old/no news for many of you, but I find it important to share that there are one or two passages found in most Bibles that are clearly not in the oldest, most-reliable manuscripts of Scripture. I see them quoted over and over to make points, but they should not be. In fact, as they incur such reasonable doubts from qualified and sincere Christian scholars, I think they should be removed altogether. I’m amazed that so many aren’t aware that these passages are widely considered suspect by a great many conservative theologians and scholars, or that there are foot-noted warnings about them in many widely used Bible versions.

The most obvious, and perhaps most surprising one - the passage concerning the woman caught in adultery - is widely quoted by lay people and pastors alike, but yet it is not in the oldest manuscripts and is widely thought by a great many conservative scholars to be an unscriptural addition (John 7:53 – 8:11). If you look in the foot notes of most Bibles you’ll see a warning about them, much like those in my ESV Study Bible, which says: “There is considerable doubt that this story is part of John’s original Gospel, for it is absent from ALL of the oldest manuscripts … Therefore it should not be considered as part of Scripture and should not be used as the basis for building any point of doctrine …” A believer in the inerrancy of the originals, renowned Greek scholar and Dallas Theological Seminary professor Daniel B. Wallace says, “The only problem with this story is that scholars have known for MORE THAN A CENTURY that it’s not authentic.” (Lee Strobels, “The Case for the Real Jesus,” p. 90).

Mark 16: 9-20 is another. ESV notes: “Some of the earliest manuscripts do not include 16:9-20 … SHOULD BE READ WITH CAUTION.” Many a dead snake-handling Christian might have lived longer if they’d only known of this. Wallace says, “… the whole last twelve verses of Mark – were not part of the original Gospel but were added at a later date and are not considered authentic.”

It's not that the above necessarily have changed any doctrinal teachings, but that they were VERY likely ADDED.

I want to make it clear that I DO believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, that God's Holy Word to mankind, as ORIGINALLY recorded, is true in its ENTIRETY. However, although what we have today has been shown by scholars to overwhelmingly be a faithful copying of the original "autographs," there are nonetheless copies which are not ENTIRELY, 100%, letter-for letter, word-for-word perfect, and which have slight mistakes and occasionally disagree with each other. Although no originals autographs remain, that does not mean that we don’t have a way of knowing ALL that is important/doctrinal and were minute, inconsequential, understandable/identifiable/correctable mistakes are. God has provided us with the ability and knowledge, through textual criticism techniques and the enormous number of ancient NT manuscripts across the world, for scholars to be able to confirm with great confidence that the vast majority of the discrepancies are word misspellings, word order mistakes, and minor issues like that. God also has protected and provided us with such a huge number of old NT manuscripts that it is relatively easy to see where and when passages like those above were added, and what was not in the oldest – and thus most-reliable – manuscripts (especially when such a large diversity of older manuscripts are compared to each other).

Renowned theologian Norman Geisler, in a short paper on his website (http://www.normgeisler.com/articles/Bib ... cyOfNT.htm) says that the "NT has about 5,700 manuscripts, which provides hundreds, in some cases even thousands, of confirmations, of EVERY LINE in the NT." Further, he quotes NT Greek scholar A. T. Robertson who said the real concern is with about a "thousandth part of the entire text," and observes that, "... the reconstructed text of the New Testament is 99.9% free from real concern."

Geisler even quotes agnostic NT scholar and critic Bart Ehrman ( a favorite of atheists/agnostics), who admits that: "In fact, most of the changes found in early Christian manuscripts have nothing to do with theology or ideology. Far and away the most changes are the result of mistakes pure and simple-slips of the pen, accidental omissions, inadvertent additions, misspelled words, blunders of one sort of another" ("Misquoting Jesus," P. 55).

So God used imperfect people to write down scripture - inerrantly so in the ORIGINALS, yet allowed extremely minor, theologically unimportant "mistakes" (like misspellings, etc.) to be in the copies. He gave us an unprecedented number of old NT manuscripts to compare to see exactly where there are discrepancies, so as to provide us with a very high confidence level as to precisely what was in the PERFECT originals. I believe these minor discrepancies actually ADD to Scripture's authenticity, as if all of our copies were pristine and perfectly identical, accusations that they had all been fully harmonized by the same long ago original editor(s) might be leveled at it.

And so God has miraculously protected and preserved ALL theology and doctrine that is important and has given us centuries of vast manuscript copies, vast scholarship and textual analysis techniques to be able to know which words were original and which was not. Our all-powerful God’s ability to preserve Scripture has no limitations in its human copyists – as He miraculously made provisions to overcome all such limitations. That He’s given us the ability to detect and be able to correct the minute, inconsequential human errors that He DID allow, it’s as if He’s saying to the naysayers: “So you see all of this miraculous protection of my Word, the fulfillment of so many prophecies within it, have the tiny specks of imperfection clearly identified and corrected, and YET you fail to see the enormity of my Word’s power, truth, confirmations, and amazing, miraculous preservation? You’re just looking for puny, inexcusable reasons to reject Me!” And so as God is in total control of ALL things and ALL beings, it would appear that He allowed these inconsequential “errors” into the copies ON PURPOSE, and as a test. And so if God could create our magnificent universe, of such extraordinary detail, order and precision, does it make any sense that He COULDN'Tprotect His word AS HE SAW FIT?!!! Does a Creator of such an unfathomable level of detail not find His Word IMPORTANT to protect? As Jesus came to fulfill ALL Scripture – and then DIED a horrific death as part of fulfilling it. So I’d say He took His protection of His Word quite seriously, but did so, not as a MAN would do it, but as He would.

Lot’s of great examinations of these issues in Lee Strobel’s “The Case for the Real Jesus”: http://www.amazon.com/Case-Real-Jesus-J ... Real+Jesus

Don't forget the "adultera periscope" in the GOJ.
The passages about the adulteress are universally acknowledged to NOT have been in the original and added on later.
It is viewed as either an addition from a different/parallel tradition or that perhaps it was part of another copy of the GOJ and when the two were made into one,it was retained because of its theological importance.
Or perhaps it was in the original but in a different part of the GOJ and when the Gospel was edited into its final format, the location was changed.
Different opinions about it abound but ALL agree that it isn't there in the oldest copies AND that it is indeed part of the GOJ.
ex:
According to a Samuel P. Tregelles in 1854:

Though I am fully satisfied that this narration is not a genuine part of St. John's Gospel, and though I regard the endeavors to make the evidence appear satisfactory to be such as would involve all Holy Scripture in a mist of uncertainty, I see no reason for doubting that it contains a true narration. There is nothing unworthy of the acting of the Lord Jesus detailed in this history. And thus I accept the narrative as true, although its form and phraseology are wholly uncertain, and although I do not believe it to be a divine record. No doubt, that there were many narrations current in the early church of some of the many unrecorded actions of our Lord, and the only wonder is that more have not been transmitted to us. This, from the variety of its forms, seems to have been handed down through more than one channel. Perhaps some one added it at the end of John's Gospel [one of the places it is found in some manuscripts—PJR], as one of the "many things which Jesus did which are not written in this book," and others afterwards placed it where it seemed to them to belong.

Bruce Metzger:

...the case against its being of Johannine authorship appears to be conclusive.
At the same time the account has all the earmarks of historical veracity. It is obviously a piece of oral tradition which circulated in certain parts of the Western church and which was subsequently incorporated into various manuscripts at various places.

Raymond E. Brown:

However, a good case can be argued that the story had its origins in the East and is truly ancient (see Schilling, art. cit.). ... From the standpoint of internal criticism, the story is quite plausible and quite like some of the other gospel stories of attempts to trap Jesus (Luke xx 20, 27). There is nothing in the story itself or its language that would forbid us to think of it as an early story concerning Jesus. Becker argues strongly for this thesis.

Of course, none of these things are new and have been discussed and answered by biblical scholars for some time.
Here is an interesting read:
http://christopherbutler.wordpress.com/ ... e-metzger/

What the critics of these fail to reveal is that......

"The passage is quoted by Irenaeus and Hippolytus in the second or third century." Hippolytus in the years from 170-236 A.D. had these passages in his works. (3) Also Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons in 180 A.D., had these verses in his writings. He was a student of Polycarp (Bishop of Smyrna, Revelation 2). Polycarp was martyred in 156 A.D., he had been a Christian for 86 years, and was a disciple of John the Apostle.

Even though Irenaeus did not leave us a complete manuscript of the Bible, he does quote much of it in his own commentary, which does include the Mark 16: 9-20 passage. It would seem strange for him to quote this part along with other Scripture unless he knew it was truly part of Scripture. Also, being a disciple of John the Beloved, he must have known what was considered Scripture and what was not!

It is absolutely fallacious to reason that age alone can verify or negate authenticity. It just seems that many believers hear the phrase "oldest manuscripts" and then just roll over.

http://fpgm.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/pericope.pdf
http://www.scionofzion.com/john_7_53_8_11.htm

According to Augustine (c. 400), it was this moralistic objection to the pericope de adultera which was responsible for its omission in some of the New Testament manuscripts known to him. "Certain persons of little faith," he wrote, "or rather enemies of the true faith, fearing, I suppose, lest their wives should be given impunity in sinning, removed from their manuscripts the Lord's act of forgiveness toward the adulteress, as if He who had said 'sin no more' had granted permission to sin."

It seems that those opposed to the verses present their case, but at the expense of walking around a mountain of evidence that supports the verses.

Paul, thanks for the links!

Clearly, the passages I mentioned are highly problematic. We just don't KNOW, as they are missing in the oldest manuscripts and at least APPEAR to be later additions. I think the REAL reason they are still in Bibles, is, as Wallace says, people would absolutely "freak" if they were taken out. The adultery story just sounds SO Jesus like and brilliant in His supposed response. And I think some might worry that it would call into question the rest of Scripture's validity as being God's Holy Word.

I do agree with what Metzger said about the adultera periscope passage, that it COULD be TRUE, but as from a different stream or oral tradition, yet that wasn't originally in John, but that was perhaps added there later. But again, that's monkeying around with Scripture, so why would someone do that if they were dedicated to the truth and accuracy of Scripture? No place to put it? You don't just tack on God's word anywhere you please, but it appears, at least in these cases, that someone did.

I also agree that the age of the older manuscripts without these passages do not PROVE these passages weren't in the originals, but that this is an important aspect of the evidences. All I'm saying is that when so many conservative, immensely respected, inerrancy believing Bible scholars and respected Bible versions caution us that a passage is suspect, then we should keep it out of Scriptural commentary or using it as a basis for teaching Scriptural truths. You just don't quote something as Scripture unless you KNOW it to be so. Not even if you think it is PROBABLY true or because you THINK that it MIGHT BE so. It's just unwise and unnecessary to work and comment from human SPECULATION about what is Scriptural. Neither passage really changes anything - except perhaps the bits about swallowing poison or handling poisonous snakes. Small memberships is such churches practicing these (and getting smaller all the time ), I'll tell you that.

It's just surprising that more people aren't aware of the issues surrounding these two passages.

Wait...thee story of the adulterous woman receiving forgiveness is not in the original manuscripts by authors of the New Testament? The story was inserted into the gospel of John from what someone else wrote?

Wait...the story of the adulterous woman receiving forgiveness is not in the original manuscripts by authors of the New Testament? The story was inserted into the gospel of John from what someone else wrote?

No, it is not in the OLDEST known/available manuscripts. There are no known ORIGINAL manuscripts in existence, they are all long gone - or so it would appear.

Eureka wrote:Wait...thee story of the adulterous woman receiving forgiveness is not in the original manuscripts by authors of the New Testament? The story was inserted into the gospel of John from what someone else wrote?

No.
Like Philpi said, it is NOT in the oldest manuscripts WE have. It may will have been in THE original one and removed at one time and then put back.
See the link I posted.
Fact is that, once IN, it was accepted by all as something that belongs there.

Fact is that, once IN, it was accepted by all as something that belongs there.

If that were totally true, then why all the Bibles with brackets around those verses in question? Why all the footnotes to use caution, as they may not be true Scripture? These teams of scholars that put together translations like the NASB, NIV, ESV, have been amongst some of the most well-respected evangelical scholars in the world. I can guarantee you that they did not make these warnings on a whim or that the passages in question weren't very carefully analyzed. Fact is, they just weren't SURE, and so they did what is wise in such situations: Warn not to consider such passages as Scripture and to take/make no theological understandings from them. Neither of those passages I have mentioned are just a verse or two. They are rather significant in length. How did they ever just disappear and then suddenly reappear, across many copies and relatively far beyond the oldest manuscripts?

The passage at the end of Mark would seem especially suspect, as it's instructions would seem to put God to foolish tests (per Luke 4:12), and much of what it says will happen we do NOT see in "those who believe in my name." (a rather inclusive group): "these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands fon the sick, and they will recover."

PaulSacramento wrote:Fact is that, once IN, it was accepted by all as something that belongs there.

I agree with PaulSacramento here. If it is in the Bible, God put it there. If you want to start excluding everything that is a later insertion, you'll also have to eliminate:

Isa 2:9b
Isa 2:10
Isa 2:22
Isa 40:7
Isa 48:22

...and this is just a short list of scribal additions to the Isaiah Scroll of the Dead Sea Scrolls. You may want to pick up The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible, The Oldest Known Bible Translated into English for the First Time, (Harper SanFrancisco, 1999)

On second thought, if you are serious about your original idea here, you may as well just throw out the Bible you have as you can't be sure of anything. Hey! you'll share the same idea as the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Muslims!

FL

I agree with PaulSacramento here. If it is in the Bible, God put it there.

That's a big IF!

I would agree that, at least to some degree, later additions aren't necessarily unScriptural. However, the verses mentioned are suspect for a lot more than just that one reason. Very key is the fact that the verses we're discussing we just don't KNOW the real deal about them. You just shouldn't have something in the midst of Scripture that is so highly suspect by the team of scholars that put it together in the first place that it feels led to also puts footnotes there saying it's likely not truly Scripture. That is very troubling.

But most importantly, I don't think any preaching or teaching should use these passages precisely because they are uncertain, and as they are unnecessary - they don't really change the slightest doctrinal view. And we have considerable evidence that the ending in Mark has false teachings that have resulted in many deaths and foolish acts. That is why this passage bothers me much more - is both authentically suspect and has proven fatal to many who have embraced its teachings.

On second thought, if you are serious about your original idea here, you may as well just throw out the Bible you have as you can't be sure of anything. Hey! you'll share the same idea as the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Muslims!

I find this to be a very disingenuous, antagonizing statement, as I believe in the inerrancy of the originals, believe we can discern within a tiny, inconsequential few lines of what those actually included, and I basically share the same concerns the teams that inserted the cautions do. So are you suggesting that all of those Godly men who put these Bibles (NIV, NASB, ESV) together have much in common with cultists? Really? I'm not trying to be argumentive, but I find that to be a really dumb, wise-guy type of statement! There's an enormous difference between being appropriately cautious and discerning over doctrine, listening to what those inerrancy-believing evangelical scholars qualified to shed light on it have to say, and of jumping on the liberal, "low view," slippery slope of arbitrarily, willy nilly picking and choosing which parts of God's Word you believe are true and which are not - which leads to disaster and unbelief.

Philip wrote:That's a big IF!

Would you prefer, ''Since it is in our Bible, God put it there''?

As for the snake story, there will always be those who do not understand the context and go on to do stupid things. Handling snakes, mouthing gibberish (''Tongues'') and unbiblical personal revelations are some of the stupidity that pass as ''Christian''. These events are of a fiendish nature and are not from God.

Philip wrote:[the suspect passages] don't really change the slightest doctrinal view.

Since they don't ''change the slightest doctrinal view'' and they part of the Bible, I really think you are stirring up a tempest in a teapot.

Philip wrote:So are you suggesting that all of those Godly men who put these Bibles (NIV, NASB, ESV) together have much in common with cultists?

No. I'm suggesting that you are being overly cautious for no good reason, especially since you said that the suspect passages don't really change the slightest doctrinal view.
So, I'm suggesting that you are expressing a concern that is of a similar nature to that of KJV Onlyists. And, taken to extremes, you would have to throw out your Bible because you can't really be sure of the provenance of what's in it.

FL

Philip wrote:

Fact is that, once IN, it was accepted by all as something that belongs there.

If that were totally true, then why all the Bibles with brackets around those verses in question? Why all the footnotes to use caution, as they may not be true Scripture? These teams of scholars that put together translations like the NASB, NIV, ESV, have been amongst some of the most well-respected evangelical scholars in the world. I can guarantee you that they did not make these warnings on a whim or that the passages in question weren't very carefully analyzed. Fact is, they just weren't SURE, and so they did what is wise in such situations: Warn not to consider such passages as Scripture and to take/make no theological understandings from them. Neither of those passages I have mentioned are just a verse or two. They are rather significant in length. How did they ever just disappear and then suddenly reappear, across many copies and relatively far beyond the oldest manuscripts?

The passage at the end of Mark would seem especially suspect, as it's instructions would seem to put God to foolish tests (per Luke 4:12), and much of what it says will happen we do NOT see in "those who believe in my name." (a rather inclusive group): "these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands fon the sick, and they will recover."

There is nothing wrong with informing the reader the history of verse that are not in the oldest manuscripts or that have been found to be "modified" in some other bibles/manuscripts.
Remember that there is MORE than ONE canon and more than one denomination and as we know, MANY translations.

That's a big IF!

I would agree that, at least to some degree, later additions aren't necessarily unScriptural. However, the verses mentioned are suspect for a lot more than just that one reason. Very key is the fact that the verses we're discussing we just don't KNOW the real deal about them. You just shouldn't have something in the midst of Scripture that is so highly suspect by the team of scholars that put it together in the first place that it feels led to also puts footnotes there saying it's likely not truly Scripture. That is very troubling.

But most importantly, I don't think any preaching or teaching should use these passages precisely because they are uncertain, and as they are unnecessary - they don't really change the slightest doctrinal view. And we have considerable evidence that the ending in Mark has false teachings that have resulted in many deaths and foolish acts. That is why this passage bothers me much more - is both authentically suspect and has proven fatal to many who have embraced its teachings.

We need to remember that the bible is not always used the same way by believers, and for researchers and scholars or just avid readers of the bible that want to know all about it, it is crucial to show ALL passages that over the centuries have been viewed as worthy of being in the bible and to know the history of those deemed controversial, or later additions and why.

Lets take into account the Periscope de Adultera, if you look at the passages does it look like something OUT of context with what Jesus preached? would have said?, No, it is very much in character with Jesus's preaching, even more so within the context of the GOJ.
We do NOT know why it was not present in the oldest manuscript, it MAY have been in the original and removed by some scribe that taught it to "forgiving" on an adulteress, or it may have come from a different copy of the GOJ that was "made into one" master copy, we simply do NOT know, but we.they DO KNOW that it does NOT go against the orthodox teachings of Christ.

Lets take into account the Periscope de Adultera, if you look at the passages does it look like something OUT of context with what Jesus preached? would have said?, No, it is very much in character with Jesus's preaching, even more so within the context of the GOJ.
We do NOT know why it was not present in the oldest manuscript, it MAY have been in the original and removed by some scribe that taught it to "forgiving" on an adulteress, or it may have come from a different copy of the GOJ that was "made into one" master copy, we simply do NOT know, but we.they DO KNOW that it does NOT go against the orthodox teachings of Christ.

I would well agree that the Periscope de Adultera passage absolutely sounds exactly what one would expect Jesus might say. In fact, I was rather shocked when I learned that it was considered suspect by many qualified to render such an opinion. The passage at the end of Mark seems contradictory and even dangerous if applied. Plus its assertions are not what we have observed to be true.

If you think about it, God could have preserved His Word in some perfect pristine way that even all COPIES were IDENTICAL, no misspellings, word order mistakes, etc. - with all being precisely the same. But He didn't do that, as apparently He did not think that necessary. In fact, it might make it more suspect, that someone had systematically harmonized them. Even if someone added a MEANINGLESS passage, it has not changed the truth they tried to attach it to (nothing will do that!). Also, I would imagine that, historically, most who might have attempted to add to or change Scripture would have had evil motives to DISTORT what was already there - in an attempt to mislead or contradict what true Scripture says. This is why the other so-called "lost" books are rather easy to identify.

Truly, I didn't mean to stir up anything, but to stimulate an important discussion about some passages most Christians are unaware of the debate over them - as a discussion amongst brothers. And I'm sure these teams that put these Bible's together prayed long and diligently over whatever cautionary comments they might make about them. These are no simple, knee-jerk reactions. And I don't think for a minute that IF they are not Scriptural, that they in any way reflect upon the integrity of the rest of Scripture. I take a very high view of God's Word.