Question:

I was wondering if you had any information regarding the following topic “Has the Bible been changed.”   I would guess, through cross referencing all the manuscripts over the past centuries, we would be able to identify what has been changed within the text.   Do you have any sources of info/studies for this? I would like to understand more about the bible integrity.  Also – are there any strong arguements to suggest, the bible has been changed? I would like to know both sides to the arugement, if you have any information.   Many thanks.

Answer:

There is a  LOT of material on this question at the web site.   I suggest you begin there.  First of all, if you go to the Questions and Answers section and look under the section titled Reliability of the Bible you will find dozens of articles on this topic.   I believe that the first Q & A you will come to on the front page is also on the question of supposed changes in the Bible.   Also, if you go to the Power Point section you will find a few sets of notes and power points on the topic.    One is titled Biblical Reliability, Inspiration and Inerrancy, another is “Judas, Another Gospel?”    Another is titled  Biblical Inspiration, Manuscripts and Versions.   There is also one titled “How We Got the Bible.”    Also, there is one on the Da Vinci Code which deals with this topic.    If you go to the ARS store, there is an entire section, with nine audios, titled Biblical Reliability and Manuscripts.   What happened at the Council of Nicaea is a good lesson the topic, as this deals directly with your question.   Also, the class titled APLA 6; Inspiration, Inerrancy and How We Got the Bible would be helpful.

If you are really interested in this, we have an entire course on the topic available in our Christian Apologetics Certificate Program.   You will find a button on our front page with information about that.   If you are interested in taking our apologetics courses, please just contact us and we can get you started.

Lastly, I have a book with a pretty detailed chapter on the question of supposed biblical “changes.”   It is titled “Reasons for Belief.”

So, as you can see, we have many dozens of hours of material on this topic.   Bottom line, a relatively small number of changes have been made to the text of the Old and the New Testament.  The vast majority are completely inconsequential.  There are a small number of manuscript changes which are significant, but none of these are significant to the theology and teaching of the Bible.  Even in these cases, scholars are fairly confident of what the original was from referring to the thousands of manuscripts we have available.   Those who claim that major consequential changes have been made to the New Testament are simply not correct if we look at the big picture, in view of all the evidence we have available.

John Oakes