Quick Apology: Sinai Bible vs KJV
Last week I published an article outlining my response to an abortion meme posted on Facebook by a friend. Today I would like to do something similar. Below is a meme which I also saw on Facebook during Advent:
Once again, I would like to share a modified version of the response I posted in reply as I know some readers find it helpful to see how different Christians respond to stuff like this.
My Response
There are really quite a lot of incorrect and misleading statements in this meme. Let’s just take each of the statements in turn…
STATEMENT #1: “THE OLDEST VERSION OF BIBLE IN THE WORLD IS THE SINAI BIBLE, HOUSED IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM”
Problem #1: Oldest?
I’m assuming that what they call “THE SINAI BIBLE” is what is known in the academic community as Codex Sinaiticus. If so, then it’s a rather bold statement to call this “THE OLDEST VERSION OF THE BIBLE”. There’s a good chance that Codex Vaticanus is a good thirty years older, demonstrated by its more archaic style and the absence of the Eusebian Canon tables.
Problem #2: Bible?
It would be easy to conclude from this meme that Sinaiticus is the oldest Biblical manuscript we have…but it isn’t. Rather, Sinaiticus is one of the oldest collections which contains all the Biblical books in a single volume. We have older manuscripts for each of the individual books. Sinaiticus just happens to have them all together, along with other non-canonical works.
Problem #3: Location
The Codex is in the British Library, not the British Museum. They’re not the same thing.
STATEMENT #2: “THERE ARE OVER 14,800 DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THIS BIBLE AND THE STANDARD KING JAMES VERSION”
Problem #4: Languages
The major problem with this meme is that it is asking us to compare a 4th Century work written in Greek to an English translation published in the 17th Century. How’s that meant to work?!
Problem #5: The Standards
In fact, why are these two works selected as the standards in the first place? For example, the various problems with the KJV translation are well-known to textual criticism scholars. The issues are a bit too dull to go into here (unless you like that sort of thing), so I’ll simply make that point that the KJV isn’t exactly the zenith of Bible translations so I’m uncertain why that translation is held up as the standard.
Problem #6: The “Differences”
In textual criticism, any deviation whatsoever between two documents counts as a “difference”. This would include spelling mistakes, duplicated words, jumbled word order etc. Why would the author of this meme think that a scribal error suddenly undermines the validity of the Bible?
In fact, if I really wanted to get picky, I could point out that there’s a scribal error in this meme! I believe that they meant to say “THE OLDEST VERSION OF THE BIBLE…” Should I doubt the veracity of this meme purely based upon the inability of its authors to proof-check their work?
STATEMENT #3: “JUST HOW MUCH PROOF DO YOU NEED THAT THE “WORD OF GOD” IS NOTHING BUT THE WORDS OF MEN?”
Problem #7: Manuscript Traditions
Let’s say for sake of argument that the differences mentioned in the meme were, in fact, really important. Let’s even go so far as to say that these differences changed the meaning of the text…what exactly would that prove?
Even if Sinaiticus was irrefutably shown to be riddled with errors, it wouldn’t show the Bible to be unreliable. The most you could conclude was that Codex Sinaiticus is an unreliable manuscript.
We have many more manuscripts in addition to Sinaiticus. In fact, we have a full manuscript tradition. As has been often pointed out, the Bible is the best-attested document of antiquity. In fact, it’s because of the volume of manuscripts found across the Roman Empire that we can see exactly where scribal errors have been introduced.
Those are the seven problems with this meme. I suppose we can’t blame it too much, it is a meme after all, but it is extremely misleading. It compares apples and oranges and completely disregards the well-established science of manuscript studies.
You mention that KJV is not the best version of comparison.. I am curious as to your opinion what version is the better?
Will
It’s less about the KJV and more about the manuscript tradition. Since the compilation of the KJV, older manuscripts have been found which have an important role to play in terms of textual criticism.
Just because the manuscript is older does NOT make it better. It was full of corrections. It was missing many scriptures from the gospels and had over 3000 differences from the Codex Vaticanus, not to mention it contains non-Biblical books. Watch “A Lamp in the Dark” and “Tares among the Wheat” and you will see solid proof of why it is a flawed document and definitely not the best manuscript to base Bible translations on.
Not necessarily, no. However, having earlier manuscripts does bring us to ancestors further back in that particular manuscript tradition.
I’m not sure what “it” is in this sentence. Sinaiticus? Corrections aren’t a bad thing. They give us textual critical data.
Do you mean verses?
Okay, but again this isn’t a problem – it’s data for textual criticism. Vaticanus isn’t being set up as the standard.
What’s the problem with that? Books like Barnabas and Hermas were very popular in the Early Church.
I’ll take a look.
For the record I’m seeing comments talking about non biblical books. That’s the problem right there. People think the Bible is just biblical book. That is incorrect. It is a compilation of letter papyruses scrolls, books , and even now coming to find out tablets of ancient time far predating what we call biblical times. So respectfully, people need to do research instead of just following one source of information and not even looking into that source’s source because the Bible itself is not the source of the information it contains it’s the end results of multiple sourced information.
Love and light everyone.
What non-biblical books?
That seems like a very strange assertion.
Can you give some examples? Specifically, what tablets?
Two points I should have mentioned:
1. The codex was found AFTER the construction of the KJV and comes from a different manuscript family (hence more differences)
2. The KJV has certain know problems, particularly with regards to the Book of Revelation. For example, when Desiderius Erasmus was assembling his printed Greek text (on which the KJV is largely based), his copy of Revelation was missing the last page. Due to printing deadlines, he instead translated the chapter from the Latin Vulgate himself! This led to mistakes which remain to this day. For example, in Revelation 22:19 the KJV and NKJV both speak of the “book of life”, whereas it should say “tree”.
I’d like to do some posts on KJV-onlyism at some point and I’ll go into this stuff in a little more depth.
He is correct when he say Sinauticus is one of the oldest bible, but I don’t agree in KJV.😆
Thang it so which bible is best translated so I could read. Fill free to respond please.
I can’t quite work out question question you’re asking. Which is the best Bible translation? That depends on what standard one uses. The KJV is a fine translation, but personally I use the RSV-CE.
NIV
What makes you think the NIV is the best translation?
The Masoretic Texts (Hebrew) and Textus Receptus (Greek) are the preserved manuscripts from which the KJV was translated. As good a translation as the KJV is, it often fails to expound the deeper meaning of words which can present a theme in one word e.g (Owlam) in Hebrew means ‘the vanishing point on the horizon’. English translators rendered it ‘forever’ Which of course does not specify an end. The vanishing point is a specific location. Yet in reaching it obviously changes. Blueletterbible.org has free in-depth word Etymology, giving greater understanding to the original words used to record the biblical accounts and testimonies.
I think I’d push back on this a bit – the word has semantic range and although a vanishing point is a specific point, that doesn’t mean “forever” is an inappropriate translation. What English word would you suggest be used instead?
You’re wrong, pilgrim….the KJV IS the zenith, and the greatest fruit of the reformation, as well.
Wrong on what points?
I actually find it strange that any Protestant would think a translation of the Bible would be the greatest fruit of the Reformation since, if the Protestant position is correct, it should be the restoration of the true Gospel.
Do you think the KJV is flawless? Revelation 16:5 in the KJV reads “Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be”. No extant Greek manuscript says “…and shalt be”. Beza inserted a conjectural emendation.
The old testament is the Jewish Tora, i.e. Judeo Christian. The Tora is the oldest manuscript and there have been no errors when rewriting additional toras for Jewish Synagogues etc…
Of course the old testament pertains to the laws of Moses and is a law/works based text which has been done away with by the blood of Christ Jesus, his self-sacrifice in order for our sins to be forgiven. thntestament is a grace-faith based text. Works are rewarded are punished
Hi David, welcome to Restless Pilgrim!
It depends, depending on who is using the word and in which period – “Torah” has wide semantic range, sometimes referring sometimes to the books of Moses, sometimes referring to the a larger corpus.
Once again, it depends what you mean – there certainly have been scribal errors and the Septuagint and Masoretic texts do differ.
Quran
Hey Joseph, welcome to Restless Pilgrim. You just wrote “Quran”. What about the Qur’an?
i know not what this writter who wrote this article tries to mean. Just blah blah you wrote without no reasoning fact nor proof. Wait. Did you mean you are the only christian. Or the most truthful christian?. Hmm. Dont you think that the so called christian priest, whom they are your elder pastors whom now they have tired of hidding the true are now bringing things into light. These priest are saying there are more than 100s of discrepancies in the same bliblical text. Wait dont you see it yourself? For i do see it, hence my asking. So even if this contradiction exist in this same bible so called sacred text and you confirming that this text of king james is the authentic text. Then why itself which is king james, containing more than 100s of contradiction. See if you did reason things out systematically and objectically to out to find out the true and make use of it and also posting it as an article to benefit readers and mankind it will be better and very grate work done.
To what you posted, the bible itself is flooded with contraditon which confirm by many scholars of the bible and unorder arrangement by mens hand. Then how can you confirm this today bible with the other oldest bible found, Which is hidden not to reveal the true about this already believed man made bible of today.
You see? Why it is hidden from the eyes of the world have you ever ask yourselve that?. Then why you making an assumption which you had no knowledge of.? Have you ever read that hidden bible? then why are you making a proof when you have nor had no knowledge in that.
Just tried to bring out the mistake of this bible of today… 1. You are going fool… You should be thinking that if bible is bible, then it is God words and God words shouldn’t contain mistake of any sort. 2. It is from this old scripture that this today bible is known because on that old bible is what they use to write the today bible. Then why should diffrences apearing in this both both. Think!!!
Hey Zakari, welcome to Restless Pilgrim. Not all of your comment was understandable (I’m guessing English isn’t your primary language), but I’ll do my best to respond.
What statement do you think is unsubstantiated?
I don’t understand what you’re suggesting here. To which of my statements are you referring?
Are you referring to mistakes in copying?
Can you please give me an example of these discrepancies?
Once again, you say there are contradictions. Could you please give an example?
Also, you appear to suggest that the codex was “hidden”? That is not the case. In fact, the entire thing is available online.
Once again, you’re asserting that there are mistakes, but not giving an example of such a mistake.
This isn’t actually correct. The codex comes from a different manuscript family and text type from the one used in the construction of the King James Version.
Reason. The one thing the scripture says we should NOT rely on, our OWN understanding and that is in all of the written rest I don’t care what language you translate it from. Reason is why Nazi Germany Reasoned Jews could be round up and wiped out, thanks to the Jesuits, and the Rome Catholic Churches backing by the way. If you are keeping Jesus as your front and center, and have the Holy Spirit, you don’t need anything else anyways, you have the teacher, and God has written His Law upon your Heart, it’s up to you than, to notice, listen, and obey.
What fruits produced does one make reasoning for themselves the mysteries of God instead of relying heart mind soul and all strength upon Jesus shed Blood?
Do you reason that his blood is the fulfillment and the price paid? Or do you trust, in faith, in the blood, even against your own reason?
If that were taken literalistically, you couldn’t rely on Scripture since you need to engage your own understanding to identify which books are Scripture and then how to interpret it!
Evidence please. I have a deep suspicion that you’re saying this because of an attitude you’ve imbibed rather than any primary sources you’ve read.
Yet that’s not the attitude of Scripture or the Early Church…
The university, the hospital, the great achievements of Christendom?
I don’t think you realize how much you shoot yourself in the foot with this question. To ask this question is to reason…
i would respond but someone with more knowledge than me in this matter already has… and he actually did his research and stated facts instead of assertions http://rense.com/general66/hide.htm
Sorry, but the article is not much better than the meme. Here there is a considerable lack of source citation…just lots of assertions. Rather than offering a thorough rebuttal of the article (which would take far too long since almost every statement would need to be challenged), here’s a selection of logic, assertions and unsubstantiated historical “facts”…
As I ask in my post, how exactly does one compare “differences” between a Greek manuscript and an English translation?
Who are these people?! There is a tiny, tiny, TINY portion of Christians in the United States who would make an assertion similar to this.
I’m extrmely confused as to the meaning of this passage. Is he suggesting that the KJV translated the Old Testament from Greek Texts? No, it was translated from the Hebrew. Is it asserting that the New Testament was originally written in Hebrew? With the possible exception of Matthew’s Gospel, it was written in Greek in the First Century.
This statement is not qualified or justified. How are there five removals? Even if we assume that Matthew’s Gospel was written in Aramaic, that’s Aramaic -> Greek -> English. What are the other two removals meant to be?
Source? Citation? I can’t find anything about this guy!
Source? Citation? What is this “Ancient church evidence”? Also, apparently nobody told Bishop Ignatius of Antioch that there wasn’t an official god in Christianity…
“…through the majesty of the Most High Father, and Jesus Christ, His only-begotten Son; …according to the love of Jesus Christ our God… [I wish] abundance of happiness unblameably, in Jesus Christ our God…For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with the Father, is all the more revealed [in His glory]…” – Letter to the Romans (AD 107)
…
I could go on and on, but suffice it to say, this is not scholarship. Real scholarship cites sources.
// There is a tiny, tiny, TINY portion of Christians in the United States who would make an assertion similar to this.//
Bald assertion (quote: “I could go on and on, but suffice it to say, this is not scholarship. Real scholarship cites sources.”), and there is far more to this world than the USA. Many Americans do not appear to understand this.You cannot extrapolate your unsubstantiated assertion regarding Christians in the USA to the rest of the world. There are far more Christians outside the US than within.
I didn’t back up my assertion because it seemed self-evident. But if you think there are large bodies of Christians who are King-James Only Christians, please identify them.
Given that the Catholic and Orthodox Churches don’t use the KJV, the KJV-only group must necessarily be in the minority in Christianity as a whole. Further, since you only tend to find the KJV-only mindset inside Evangelical or Baptist groups, it means it’s even only a subset of Protestantism.
I mentioned the United States because this is where the predominant KJV-only folks reside: Dave Hunt, Gail Riplinger, Peter Ruckman… Also, given the United States is an entire continent of English-speakers, what other countries did you have in mind?
So, are the 14,800 differences true? If that’s so, then it is a fact, then, that the texts in the Bible are continuously changing overtime and can be subjected to changes or inaccuracies? Many will, then, doubt the abilities of God? Isn’t that a reflection that the texts are just purely man-made and not inspired by some holy entity?
Hey Jason, welcome to Restless Pilgrim!
Did you read the article? In it it’s explained why such a comparison between a 4th Century Greek manuscript and a Protestant 17th Century English translation is meaningless. Have you ever tried to compare two documents in different languages? What would even count as a “difference”?
To your point, of course manuscripts can be subject to mistakes. They are copied by human authors who might have skipped their morning cup of tea or coffee. Try having a chain of ten people hand-copy a page of hand-written text you and you’ll see all kinds of errors creep in: misspellings, repetitions, duplications, word-order mixups…
However, I don’t see why scribal errors would cause someone to doubt God’s ability or think the text is man-made. Did God ever promise that every scribe would copy every text perfectly? Does a spelling mistake in a 7th Century manuscript indicate that the work is not God-breathed? Does a slight change of word-order in the Greek (which is indistinguishable in an English translation) somehow show that the original is not inspired? If a scribe were copying a text and about to make a mistake, what should happen? Should an angel fly down and snatch the pen before the mistake is made? Should the paper spontaneously combust or the scribe drop dead? 😉 Is that what you’d expect for a text inspired by some holy entity?
When early Christians were sharing their manuscripts, the copying was unrestricted. As a result, the text went all across the empire, from Syria, through Africa into Gaul (France) and Britain. As a result, the Gospels are the most well-attested documents of ancient history. Thanks to this, it allows us to do textual critical studies to identify scribal errors. Adjusting the example given above, if you gave your hand-written text to ten people and each then passed on their own copy to ten more people, for ten generation, you could gather up the manuscripts, identify the families of manuscripts and very clearly identify the scribal errors. This is what textual critical studies allows us to do, which is why we can have great confidence in the transmission of the Bible.
Hope this helps 🙂
I would like to add that if one would read the Bible and studied it one would come to the conclusion that it would be virtually impossible for all those books to come together and all point to the same thing. It’s worth mentioning that the 66 books by 40 plus authors were never written with the intention to come together and make one book.
I agree with your main point, but I would argue that there are 73 books, rather than 66 (which actually makes your case even stronger).
You are a complete Moron to think the differences are not important. Common sense would tell you if you want the most authentic version you would use the oldest version. KJV( 1611 A.D.) or Sinai version 380 AD. Anything different in the KJV was added at a later time. Point Blank, end of story. Religion is worst than being hooked on crack. You cant even detox when faced with the truth. SAD..All of the GoDs are man made. ALL OF them, Any culture.
Hey captainyak, welcome to Restless Pilgrim.
I’m afraid you haven’t really interacted with my article at all. Perhaps you could address the seven problems I identity?
You said “We have older manuscripts for each of the individual books.” That would be likely but what are they called? Where are they and what are the differnces between them and the Codex Sinaiticus? This is surely the BIGGEST ommission in your critique. Library or Museum … no change in whats important. Translation errors you say? Well we could argue that for EVERY version of the Bible. Jesus didnt speak Greek, or Latin he spoke Aramaic. Your “point” 7 is also a weak argument in that even the earliest manuscripts are like 300 years after the death of Jesus and ALL have translation issues and comprehension issues and ithe problem of being passed down through man who is known to be corrupted and unreliable in his memory of events particularly in a chain hand me down. It is said that it is inspiraion from God himself well I admit in spiritual mediation I can tune into a higher energy in spirit ation however one must ask if God meant for us to have the WORD in physical form why didnt it manifest when Jesus was alive and Jesus give it to us directly? Why was it written in such an ambigious fashion with many contradictions? Maybe the Word is a SOUND vibration? Maybe straight is the path and narrow is the gate means to rise your own spiritual energy up your spine and out through the top of your head (crown chakra)? These things you shall do AND MORE! Seriously the corruption of men in power writing HISstory has a lot to answer for. There are many ways to interpret the “word of God” or is that man?
Hey Stephen, welcome to Restless Pilgrim!
They are scattered around museums, libraries, universities and private collections. They are usually given some catalogue designation. For example, those on papyrus typically begin with a P.
If the meme can’t get this basic fact right, would you say it is more or less likely to get more nuanced facts right?
This meme concerns the textual transition of the New Testament. The originals were written in Greek (with the possible exception of Matthew). This meme attempts to count the textual differences between a Greek text with an English translation…which is ridiculous.
You’re confusing complete copies of the New Testament with individual books or substantial parts of books.
On what do you base the statement that they “ALL have translation issues and comprehension issues”?
You assessment of both memory and textual transmission doesn’t do justice to the field of critical studies. The very fact that we can see chains of transmission allows us to see that how good the copying could be.
We also see the amazing integrity of textual transmission when we compare the documents from the recently-found Dead Sea Scrolls to other textual traditions.
You’re assuming a twenty-first century, document-centric mindset. Jesus didn’t come to deliver a book, He came to teach, found a Church and offer His life for the world. The book is simply a record of those events.
Can you give me an example of an ambiguity? Or a contradiction?
Documents produced by lawyers attempt to remove all ambiguity. Even though they’re pretty incomprehensible to us laymen, even they can be challenged in court for ambiguity and loopholes. Are you looking for a document which is both easily comprehensible and completely unambiguous? I think you’re placing an unreasonable burden on human language.
Well, your interpretation lacks any evidence. Did First Century Jews talk about spiritual energy going up your spine and interacting with charkas? If not, then it’s unlikely that your interpretation is valid.
“if this meme cant get the facts right”…well if NO ONE can get the translations right, what is your base for “fact”? the only “facts” i have known to be presented revolving around this book are more questionable and mistranslated words from the same book! the only fact is that its a man made lie used by the powers that be for control.
Who is claiming that it’s not possible to do an accurate translation of a text from one language to another?
There are additions to the text that were not there.. 100’s of passages that do seem very ego driven. As if someone added passages they wanted added.
https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/bible-versions-and-translations/absent-from-codex-sinaiticus-oldest-new-testament/
I’m Catholic, I want this to be untrue, but wanting something to be untrue doesn’t mean it’s ok to leave out the facts that 100’s of new parts of scripture seem to be created after 400 ad meaning… people added them, not the saints.
There was a time when only the four gospels were taken as truth, I’d like to see what we see about these scriptures in older texts find the originals and stick with those as everything else is literally man. Including everything about Paul, while I love his faith, if he gave us his story today we would ignore him and put him in a loony bin. Reality matters. Especially if we are uncovering problems with man adding things to the texts that God did not divine.
We don’t use the same texts at all that the first Christians did. As a matter of fact the most popular used books are gone completely. Then we paired everything down at Nicea and then again the protestants did the same, so to say it’s not infallible at this point means you have to believe man isn’t fallible and that would just be a fools errand.
Yes, but what sort of additions? The sort of thing you see are scribal errors, a growth in piety expanding “the Lord Jesus” to “the Lord Jesus Christ”. These and other features are well-known to critical scholars.
What do you mean by “ego driven”? What doctrine do you think these changes invent?
This is what the field of Critical Studies focuses upon. It’s worth remembering that a skeptical scholar such as Bart Erhman admits that these changes don’t radically change the meaning of the text.
Jesus promised to be with His Church. He didn’t say that he was stop every scribe from making a mistake or an invalid correction.
This whole field of study is not new! These questions were asked in the early church when comparing manuscripts. I’d also add that simply because a manuscript is old, doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s going to be more accurate than a later manuscript.
Do you deny the existence of the supernatural? Why does an incarnate God teaching, healing, dying and rising seem so much more believable to you than a man who claimed to have met this incarnate God on the road to Damascus?
Which books are you thinking of here?
The Gnostic Gospels are written too late and were never used by the Christians.
There were other books which, while considered orthodox, were not included in the canon due to the lack of apostolicity. Examples of these were the Shepherd of Hermas, the Didache, 1 Clement, the epistles of Ignatius… These texts are used today in the study of Patristics.
This is a popular urban myth (thanks Dan Brown!). Nicea had nothing to do with the canon of Scripture. It was responding to the Arian heresy which asserted that, while the Son is divine, He was not eternal. It did not establish the canon.
There is so much wrong with what you said in this thread. Every time you answer a reply you dig yourself further and further into a hole. You “God incarnate” comment is the BIGGEST issue Christianity created for it’s self. It’s also the BIGGEST contradiction the NT has.
Hey Zamiel, welcome to Restless Pilgrim. Unfortunately, you don’t point out why you think this post is wrong, only that you have some kind of issue with the Incarnation.
Everything you said…take your pick
I said “…you don’t point out why you think this post is wrong”. Telling me that you think everything is wrong is not the same as telling me why you think everything is wrong.
Please pick one of the points in the article and explain why it’s wrong.
I’m curious as to your thoughts on Young’s Literal Translation? I’d like to know your opinion. I do think this is a good article and I agree, much has been taken out of context or without historical consideration as is the case ad nauseam across the board with biblical text. I find that comparing earlier texts and synoptics of different versions produces some remarkable results. Ultimately, I think people forget the New Testament wasn’t written until YEARS after Jesus’ death. It’s like playing the telephone game. A lot can get garbled in translation.
Hey June, welcome to Restless Pilgrim!
I haven’t had any real contact with it. However, I think the goal isn’t realistic. When translating from one language to another, you’re going to make choices in translation based on the lens you look through. I wouldn’t compare the writing of the Gospels to the telephone game, however. They were written within the lifetime of the Apostles with eyewitness sources and from years of consistent preaching concerning Christ’s life, death and resurrection.
What older manuscripts do we need to read instead of the KJV ? Could you give me some examples and maybe how to get the copies ? I have no clue.
It depends upon what you’re looking for. I’m guessing you don’t read Greek, so looking at the early manuscripts won’t mean much to you.
If you’re just looking to do Bible study in English, the KJV is a pretty good translation in most respects and it’ll serve you well (although if you’re Catholic, I’d recommend the RSV-CE). Modern Bible translations (NIV, ESV etc.) will make use of more recent manuscript finds.
If you’re looking to understand the whole area of textual transmission, textual criticism, and the KJV, then I’d recommend The King James Only Controversy by Reformed Baptist, Dr. James White.
Is that what you were looking for?
Thank you, I wish I could read Greek or Hebrew or Aramaic so I could hear it out of the horses mouth even though I know that would really be God but oh well thank you very much.
What would you say is better then the KJV ? I’m actually curios, it’s all about perspective and how would I get it
The RSV-CE. Latest scholarship and includes the books Luther tried to remove at the Reformation. If you want a study version, the New Testament is available here and is fantastic.
Religion faces a slippery slope on the road to extinction. Good riddance to bad rubbish. All in all, religion is cancer.
Is there anything in the article with which you disagree?
//Problem #1: Oldest?
I’m assuming that what they call “THE SINAI BIBLE” is what is known in the academic community as Codex Sinaiticus. If so, then it’s a rather bold statement to call this “THE OLDEST VERSION OF THE BIBLE”. There’s a good chance that Codex Vaticanus is a good thirty years older, demonstrated by its more archaic style and the absence of the Eusebian Canon tables.//
“There’s a good chance”? So it’s NOT a fact that Codex Vaticanus IS the oldest; merely “a good chance”. No a reason to rebut the claims in the meme, as the MAIN point is the number of differences between that and the KJV. Rebuttal dismissed. (Also, most sources DO give Codex Siniaticus as THE oldest version anyway!)
//Problem #2: Bible?
It would be easy to conclude from this meme that Sinaiticus is the oldest Biblical manuscript we have…but it isn’t. Rather, Sinaiticus is one of the oldest collections which contains all the Biblical books in a single volume. We have older manuscripts for each of the individual books. Sinaiticus just happens to have them all together, along with other non-canonical works.//
Again, this is beside the point. It is the fact that it is the oldest COLLECTION that makes it relevant to the comparison with the KJV. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Problem #3: Location
The Codex is in the British Library, not the British Museum. They’re not the same thing.//
The location of the book is ENTIRELY irrelevant to the actual point being made. This is sheer desperation to try to get as high a number of negatives as possible but it fails on two levels; not only is it irrelevant, but it is not entirely true. The Codex Siniaticus WAS in the British Museum (on loan https://www.independent.co.uk/…/worlds-oldest-bible…), although it is correct that it normally resides in the British Library. Please explain how the location affects the claims made in the meme. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Problem #4: Languages
The major problem with this meme is that it is asking us to compare a 4th Century work written in Greek to an English translation published in the 17th Century. How’s that meant to work?!//
Differences are differences. Some of them will be due to bad translation, but many will also be due to the use of different sources. The point remains that there are 14,800 differences. The language is irrelevant. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Problem #5: The Standards
In fact, why are these two works selected as the standards in the first place? For example, the various problems with the KJV translation are well-known to textual criticism scholars. The issues are a bit too dull to go into here (unless you like that sort of thing), so I’ll simply make that point that the KJV isn’t exactly the zenith of Bible translations so I’m uncertain why that translation is held up as the standard.//
Because one IS the oldest complete version available and the other is one of the most popular versions available. Many Christians even believe the KJV to be “the authentic” bible, so it is an excellent choice for the comparison. This is another desperate attempt to undermine the validity of the claim, but doesn’t alter the FACT that there are 14,800 differences between the two versions. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Problem #6: The “Differences”
In textual criticism, any deviation whatsoever between two documents counts as a “difference”. This would include spelling mistakes, duplicated words, jumbled word order etc. Why would the author of this meme think that a scribal error suddenly undermines the validity of the Bible?//
Yes, the vast majority of the differences will be insignificant on their own, but it’s not simply a case of “a scribal error”; it’s almost 14,800 of them. THAT is significant! THAT is the point. When you have such a massive number of differences, it calls into question the validity of the entire document; not on the basis of each individual error, of course, but on the basis of that massive number. And it’s NOT just a case of “scribal errors”; it is know that there are many omissions and insertions. Scribes took out what did not fit in with the prevailing dogma and added sections that “improved” the message. No-one knows what the originals actually said. THAT is the point of the meme. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Problem #7: Manuscript Traditions
Let’s say for sake of argument that the differences mentioned in the meme were, in fact, really important. Let’s even go so far as to say that these differences changed the meaning of the text…what exactly would that prove?
Even if Sinaiticus was irrefutably shown to be riddled with errors, it wouldn’t show the Bible to be unreliable. The most you could conclude was that Codex Sinaiticus is an unreliable manuscript.//
No, because the CS is the oldest version, it would be assumed to be the most “reliable”, but other, older manuscripts are also different. Again, no-one knows what was actually written in the original documents, so it is not possible to claim the bible to be reliable, as you cannot rely on something that you don’t really know. If the differences “change the meaning of the text”, of course it becomes unreliable. It is remarkably foolish to claim otherwise! Rebuttal dismissed.
//We have many more manuscripts in addition to Sinaiticus. In fact, we have a full manuscript tradition. As has been often pointed out, the Bible is the best-attested document of antiquity. In fact, it’s because of the volume of manuscripts found across the Roman Empire that we can see exactly where scribal errors have been introduced.//
No, you cannot see where all scribal errors have been introduced. There are NO original documents from which to draw the comparison! Even the very oldest manuscripts are several thousand generation copies, so there are many thousands of potential errors (and omissions and insertions) that we can never know about. Rebuttal dismissed.
//Those are the seven problems with this meme. I suppose we can’t blame it too much, it is a meme after all, but it is extremely misleading. It compares apples and oranges and completely disregards the well-established science of manuscript studies.//
Wrong. Every single “problem” can be addressed, as above. It compares two different versions of the same document. That’s NOT “comparing apples with oranges”; it’s comparing Pink Lady with the original apple species after hundreds of years of mutations.
The entire attempt to undermine the meme is based on flawed logic and bad arguments.
Hey Dene, welcome to Restless Pilgrim and thank you for your comprehensive response. Here are my thoughts…
The meme made an assertion which is either incorrect or disputed. I’m not sure what survey you’ve performed in order to say that “most sources” claim Sinaiticus is the oldest. Regardless, the meme could have bypassed the problem by simply saying it was “One of the oldest…”
Once again, the point was that the meme was misleading. Sinaiticus does not contain our oldest manuscripts. The idea of a collected bound codex of the Christian canon was a later development in Christian history.
Once again, the meme said something which was either misleading or incorrect. The inability of the meme’s creator to get basic facts right calls into question their ability to accurately report more substantial details.
No, and this is the fundamental problem with this meme. Please explain to me how we can talk about “differences” between a 4th Century Greek text and a 17th Century translation? What even constitutes a “difference” when comparing text in two different languages?
This still makes the selections rather arbitrary. Popularity of a translation doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a good translation. As I pointed out, the KJV has a number of well-known issues. Not only that, the KJV-only crowd who regard it as “the authentic” Bible is a pretty tiny portion of Christianity, so why do they get to set the standard? If we care about popularity, why not choose, say, the Vulgate, which was the dominant version for most of Christian history?
Then I think you need to present some of these differences which you think are so significant. Can you give me an example of what “Scribes took out…[because it] did not fit in with the prevailing dogma”?
No, this is exactly what I meant about the meme being misleading. This codex is NOT “the oldest version”. It is one of the oldest collections we have. My assertion stands – even if Sinaiticus was irrefutably shown to be riddled with errors, it wouldn’t show the Bible to be unreliable. The most you could conclude was that Codex Sinaiticus is an unreliable manuscript.
This, together with your other assertions, rather demonstrates that you’ve never done textual critical studies. I doubt that you read Greek or have looked at any of these “differences” in detail.
Please explain how you realistically compare a 4th Century Greek codex and a 17th Century English book and please give some examples of these 14,800 differences where Scribes removed things so as to fit prevailing. dogma
Most of your responses do not affect the basic premise of the meme, and that is that there are huge differences between different versions of the bible AND the documents from which it is comprised.No, I don’t read Greek, but I don’t need to. I rely on the expertise of those who DO. Nor am I a historian so, again, I rely on the expertise of those who ARE. I suggest that you read “Misquoting Jesus” by Bart D. Ehrman, if you have not yet done so – he’s a professor in religious studies. He explains about all the errors, the omissions and the additions far better, and with far more credibility than I ever could. There are differences in ALL documents. No-one really knows what ANY of the original documents said.
The precise number is irrelevant to the point. There can be no claim to have “the unaltered word of god” in ANY document. The whole enterprise is shrouded in mystery and obfuscation. Your apologetics do not change that. You have no proof even of your god’s existence. You are merely guessing that the bible contains some truth, without there being any external corroboration of this.
If you recall, I pointed out that the very notion of a “difference” between a 4th Century Greek codex and a 17th Century English book is one which needs explanation. Yet, you haven’t even attempted to explain how that would work or what would constitute a difference.
Likewise, I asked you for some examples of these differences, particularly one which showed that “Scribes removed things so as to fit prevailing dogma”. Given your claim that there were 14,800 differences, I find it strange that you couldn’t think of a single one to put forward as an example…
So you don’t read Greek (there are intricacies of Greek grammar which are important concerning this subject), you aren’t a historian and have never done textual criticism. What this means is that you are simply taking on faith the perspective what certain scholars tell you.
I am very familiar with Dr. Ehrman’s work and I have listened to many of his debates. I even included a link to a video interview he had with an atheist where he denies the atheist’s claim that Jesus never existed.
I’m interested to know what books you have read which critique these kinds of views? Have you heard the opposing side?
THIS ARTICLE contains the same miss givings as the Bibles and teachings of today. Another desperate attempt to justify the indoctrination of a false, man made religion.
I’m not sure what “miss givings” you have in mind, but you’re welcome to point them out and I’ll see if I can address them.
i can simplify this for everyone. truth is universal. there are no variations or different interpretations of truth. it just is. it is understood in any language. we live, we die. that is truth. therefore it is a simple matter to conclude that the bible is not truth. my 4 year old has come to this understanding on his own. but grown men still cannot stop arguing it.
No Christian would deny any of these statements.
This is a non sequitur. On what basis do you say “therefore”?
aaaand i would think that when it comes to your eternity and salvation those simple scribal errors such as confusing tree for book would be of extreme importance to anyone with even a small amount of intelligence
To which scribal error are you referring? Surely the very fact that it can be identified as a scribal error means we can discern truth from error?
I think that, in this instance, “scribal error” is a misnomer. The situation described is a translation error. Scribal errors can only be identified by comparing with an older manuscript, if one exists. The fact that scribal errors CAN be identified from the few instances where an older document is available strongly indicates that there are likely many, many other scribal errors that can never be identified and, therefore, it is impossible to know what the original documents said. We do know that sections have been added and other sections removed long after the original author generated the script. Some are readily identified, again, using earlier documents for comparison, but there is no certain way of knowing what was added or subtracted in those earliest documents because there is no benchmark for comparison. In some cases, the writing style of the added passages is so different that it is obvious to the expert, but no-one will ever know what the originals actually contained.
This logic doesn’t hold. If we have a massive number of manuscripts, such that we can track individual schools, even individual scribes, that gives us immense confidence in the integrity of the message:
1. There is massive uniformity of the texts across the Roman Empire in multiple languages.
2. The differences we do find are very minor, many of which can’t even be expressed in English (Greek word order etc)!
If you think the current situation is bad, what would need to be different for you to have more confidence that the message was preserved?
Even the most skeptical scholars like Dr. Erman wouldn’t agree with this.
//Even the most skeptical scholars like Dr. Erman wouldn’t agree with this.//
“There are clear reasons for thinking that, in fact, the bible is not this kind of inerrant guide to our lives; among other things, as I’ve been pointing out, in many places we (as scholars or just regular readers) don’t even know what the original words of the bible actually were”..
This is an extract from the introduction to Dr. Ehrman’s excellent book, “Misquoting Jesus”.
So your claim was incorrect and I rest my case.
Erman’s statement “in many places we (as scholars or just regular readers) don’t even know what the original words of the bible actually were” is not the same claim as your claim that “scribal errors that can never be identified and, therefore, it is impossible to know what the original documents said”.
Erman has very particular passages in mind when he made his statement. It is not your own simplistic argument that the presence of some scribal variants invalidate entire documents.
…and even if Erman was making your argument, that’s simply an argument from authority, saying that because you’ve found a scholar who supports your position that it must therefore be true.
//and even if Erman was making your argument, that’s simply an argument from authority, saying that because you’ve found a scholar who supports your position that it must therefore be true.//
1) It’s not an “argument from authority”. An argument from authority fallacy is when you use a quote from someone who is an expert in a different field to the one under discussion. SO when you throw accusations of fallacious logic at someone, it’s a good idea to ensure that you fully understand the fallacy, otherwise YOU are guilty of the famous “fallacy fallacy”, as in this instance, as Ehrman (note the correct spelling) IS an authority and his views hold some weight.
2) I didn’t “find the scholar”; I used the example YOU provided.
And, in Ehrman’s own words “in MANY places” doesn’t specify how many places and, as we DON’T know what the originals said, we don’t know how valid the entire documents are, no matter how badly you wish to dispute this fact.
Whilst you may be correct to certain extent regarding the tracking of scribal errors in SOME documents, many early manuscripts are far from complete and it is impossible to determine what scribal errors there may be in the earliest documents, simply because there are no earlier documents available for comparison. So we DON’T know anything about what the original documents may have said because there is a huge gap between the originals and the earliest surviving manuscripts.
Re Bart Ehrman, it’s helpful to compare his work with other researchers. For instance, When Jesus Became God / the view he was deified by his followers, with
When God Became Jesus, Craig Evans, ed. / view that Jesus has always been God.
Thanks.
There’s some fun background at:
https://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/014838.html#014838
How you people continue defending something that is so clearly shrouded in mysterious corruption will always baffle me to the core. Lol.
If you looked into the study of textual criticism, it would no longer be mysterious. This is a well-established field.
1# You (author) are knit picking/cherry-pick, or clutching at straws. Both Vaticanus, and Sinaiticus are about the same age, the problem is we do not know the exact dating for them.
2# Of course, there are older manuscripts (MSS), but I find it hard to call a fragment an MSS.
3# a Library is where books are kept?
4# You cannot compare Sinaiticus to a King James version. The Sinaiticus is a copy of a copy a copy of a copy. The KJV is a copy of a copy a copy of a copy a copy of a copy a copy of a copy a copy of a copy a copy of a copy.
5# No scholar would use the KJV, it is full of known anomalies. Just because it has the word authorize does not make it perfect, no biblical MSS can attain that quality.
6# If we take all the known Greek MSS, there are between 300,000 and 400,000 anomalies. Yet, your seven (7) # comments, still leaves 14,800 anomalies, which I myself thought it was low.
7# Your verbatim: “We have many more manuscripts in addition to Sinaiticus. In fact, we have a full manuscript tradition. As has often been pointed out, the Bible is the best-attested document of antiquity. In fact, it’s because of the volume of manuscripts found across the Roman Empire that we can see exactly where scribal errors have been introduced.” This is false, and we can see this in the Greek biblical manuscripts, where no two MSS are identical. The problem is the early church, who took it upon itself to erase/alter/additions to suit its doctrine. Just like the Donation of Constantine which the church forged to gain the Papal States, and vast wealth. We do not have an extant biblical autograph (original manuscript (MS)), what we have are copies of copies.
Regards Jero Jones.
1. I don’t think you know what it means to cherry-pick. I’m pointing out that the very first assertion of the meme is most likely wrong.
2. You say “of course”, but the meme is misleading.
3. Once again, I’m pointing out that the meme makes a claim which is wrong. This should make you suspicious as to the meme creator’s care for truth.
4. All documents of antiquity are copies! That’s the nature of the medium. The point I was making here was that they’re in different languages.
5. Well, that’s demonstrably false.
6. You’re missing the entire point here. An “anomaly” can simply be a mispelling of a word, a word in a different order, a repeated line etc. How many of these “anomalies” affect doctrine?
7. Two documents cease to be identical if there’s a typo in one of them. That doesn’t mean that we can’t see that these two documents share a common source. You say “The problem is the early church, who took it upon itself to erase/alter/additions to suit its doctrine”. This is a MASSIVE claim you make without evidence. The Donation of Constantine is from probably 9th Century, looooooong after the canon of Scripture was settled. You say “We do not have an extant biblical autograph (original manuscript (MS)), what we have are copies of copies”, but as pointed out, that’s true for every document of antiquity because papyrus decays.