Sheshbazzar

None bearing any weight on doctrinal issues?
Really? Consider this, my previous affiliation as a believer was with a congregation that was (and yet is) adamant in its position that the Biblical "Feast Days" are to be kept, and can back up that claim with copious Scriptural citations.
With that doctrinal position in mind let's consider and compare texts of Acts 18:21 King James Version;

"But bade them farewell, saying, I must by all means keep this Feast that cometh in Jerusalem: but I will return again unto you, if God will. And he sailed from Ephesus. "

with what is supposedly the same verse in The New International Version;

"But as he left, he promised, “I will come back if it is God's will.” Then he set sail from Ephesus."

Notice something lacking? If you were a life-long devout keeper of Yahweh's Feast Days, you most certainly would. TWELVE ! words gone missing in one single verse!
(same twelve words difference in the Greek too, as between the Stepens' Textus Receptus and the Westcott-Hort version)

Words comprising of;
1. Paul's personal statement of his urgency to be present at that Feast.
2. A New Testament reference that The Feast(s) were still being observed at that time, and suggestive that there would be more important matters that Paul needed attend to at that PARTICULAR time.
3. The "Feast" and "Jerusalem" holding places in the one text, easily found and referenced for hundreds of years, while being utterly obscured in the other.

OK, so in line with this thread, Which ONE of these pure verses is the ONE that is "99.5 % textually pure?"

You might be inclined to say that it doesn't make any significant doctrinal difference, (to you.) However, the point here IS that to them to whom it DOES make a difference, it makes a very significant doctrinal difference, one that is manifest in both belief and in conduct.

Sheshonq

And as usual, you ignore the fact that your precise question has been answered - not once, but twice. And not just by me, but at least three other people responded to you with the same rebuttal that I mentioned.

That's because classics haven't become a causus belli, a reason to lock people up, or the targets of partisan tinkering.

Your response has been rebutted, Roger. The only question is how long until you stop avoiding the rebuttal.

Iasion

Greetings,

This is not true at all.

Let's look at some of variations found in the NT -


Mark 16:9-20
The Resurrection Appearances

Most of the earliest witnesses have G.Mark ending at 16:8 - with the empty tomb scene, but no resurrection appearances etc.

G.Mark ends at 16:8 in the very important early MSS Vaticanus and Sinaiticus, and also in others such as : Latin Codex Bobiensis, the Sinaitic Syriac manuscript, and the two oldest Georgian translations and many Armenian manuscripts.

In later versions however, there are several DIFFERENT endings to G.Mark after 16:8 -
* the longer ending (16:9-20 in many Bibles)
* the shorter ending (also found in some study bibles)
* another minor variant of a few verses

In other words -
there are at least FOUR different ways that different G.Mark MSS end.


Origen and Clement of Alexandria (early 3rd C.) and Victor of Antioch quote and discuss G.Mark WITHOUT mentioning the appendix. Eusebius (early 4th C.) mentions that most MSS do not have the appendix. Jerome also specifically notes the passage can not be found in most Greek MSS of his time (4th C.) This means Eusebius and Jerome KNEW of the appendix, but noted that it was NOT part of the Bible at that time.

This is clear and present evidence that the post-resurrection stories were NOT original, but added later, around the 4th-5th century or so.

This helps to explain why the stories in G.Luke and G.Matthew and G.John are so wildly different - they did not have G.Mark to follow, so each made-up a different story. (Scholars agree G.Luke and G.Matt were largely copied from G.Mark.)


Luke 3:22
The words of God at the Baptism

Early MSS and quotes have the same as the Psalm :
"...and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou are my son, this day have I begotten thee"

But later versions have changed it to :
"...and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved son; in thee I am well pleased"

Here we see Christian scribes have CHANGED the very words of God, or the alleged words of God. And we know the reason - it supports the view called Adoptionism - later called a heresy.

In other words, Christian writers had no compunction about changing the supposed words of God himself, at a crucial time in the story.


1 John 5:7
The Trinity

"For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. "

This passage is not found in ANY early Greek MSS, and was therefore not included in the original Textus Receptus of Erasmus in the 16th Century.
Erasmus said "I will not include the Comma unless I see a Greek MSS which includes it".
Sure enough, a newly written Greek MSS suddenly "appeared" with this passage, so Erasmus ADDED it to the 2nd edition.


Matthew 6:13
The Lord's Prayer

Early and important MSS (Aleph, B, D, Z, 205, 547) as well as some fathers (Tertullian, Origen, and Cyprian) have :
"And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil"

Other MSS have :
"And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen"

And a few MSS have another version :
"And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, of the father, the son, and the holy spirit for ever. Amen"

A few MSS exclude the words "the power" or "the glory" or "the kingdom".

The Lord's Prayer is one of the more variant parts of the NT.

Now,
this prayer was supposedly taught by Jesus himself.
But
early Christians could not even agree what the prayer said !



Mark 1:1
Jesus Christ [Son of God]

Early MSS do not have "son of God".


John 9:35
Son of Man/God

Early MSS have :
"Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, Do you believe in the Son of man?"

Later versions have :
"Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God?"



Acts 8:37
JC is the Son of God

"And Phillip said, if thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God"

This passage is missing from all the early MSS.

In other words, the MSS show a consistent pattern of "Son of Man" being changed into "Son of God".



Mark 1:2
As written in [Isaiah]

The early MSS have :
"As it is written in Isaiah the prophet..."

But most later versions have :
"As it is written in the prophets..."

Probably because the quote is NOT really from Isaiah (its composited from Isaiah, Malachai, and Exodus) - the eariest MSS were wrong, so later versions fixed this error by using just "prophets".

Here we see later scribes fixing up an earlier mistake.



Colossians 1:14
Redemption by blood


All early MSS have the shorter :
"in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins"

But later copies have added "through his blood" :
"In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins"

This is an important proof-text for the doctrine of redemption by Chist's blood - but its a later addition.



So what does this show ?

1. The NT was often changed during its history.

2. The changes included some of the most important parts of Christian doctrine :
* the resurrection
* the alleged words of GOD at the Jordan!
* the Lord's Prayer
* the Trinity
etc.

3. The reason the NT was changed was often arguments over doctrine - i.e. different Christian sects fiddled the books to support their sect.


Iasion

andrewcriddle

There are some actual figures in The Text of the New Testament by Kurt and Barbara Aland pps 25-30, including a table of the number of differences between critical editions listed by NT Book on p 30.

This gives roughly 3,700 places where the text of the NT is disputed, (a little lower than my earlier estimate - I was extrapolating from the Gospels to the whole NT), with the 7947 verses of the NT including 4999 verses without dispute and 2948 verses with at least one disputed word or phrase.


Andrew Criddle

Johnny Skeptic

Copies of the New York Times are 100% accurate representations of the originals. So what?

gdeering

Just for sake of clarity, considering the large number of "disputed" verses, how many are "non-trivial."


Gregg

JoeWallack

JW:
I'm still waiting for remez to define "N.T." but he has apparently gone wherever the hell Jesus has been for the last two thousand years. Posturing that the issue of accurate Transmission of the NT is comparable to most ancient documents is [Understatement]Misleading[/Understatement] as no one ever wrote an original NT and other ancient documents were not significantly edited with major themes changed and than included with the original. A proper analysis of the likely accuracy of Transmission here needs to be looked at on an Individual work basis.

The original Gospel with the basic Jesus story is "Mark" and it is generally agreed that 16:9-20 is Forged. Using 666 total lines for "Mark" this % would be about 2. More importantly, the Forgery here provides supposed evidence for the single most important Assertian in "Mark", that Jesus was Resurrected. This flies in the face of the central theme of "Mark" that Belief in Jesus is based on Faith and not Evidence.



Joseph

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

andrewcriddle

It is a bit difficult to say because it depends on your definition of trivial.

At one extreme at least half would have no effect in English translation, moving up we have issues such as whether or not in the reference to the man healed in Mark 7:35 it should read "And his ears were opened" or "And straightway his ears were opened" or whether the pasage in Mark 7:4 about "the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze" should read "the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze and beds"; beyond that we have questions such as whether Jesus in Luke 10 sent out seventy or seventy-two disciples; what are unusual are cases where the original is really in dispute and makes a real difference such as does John 1:18 read "only Son" or "only God" ? is "Father forgive them for they know not what they do" original in Luke 23:34 ? what was the original text of the Last Supper passage in Luke 22:19-20 ? I would estimate that there are about a hundred such passages, where the original text is really uncertain and really matters.

Andrew Criddle

ETA When I say the original text is really uncertain I mean there is no consensus among scholars; in most of these cases there is a clear majority in support of one of the readings.

arnoldo

Agreed, the gospel writer didn't have a "chapter/verse' mentality when they wrote the gospels, they also really didn't care if a particular OT writing was specifically mentioning Yeshua because the reality of His earthly existence transcended all of that ( I have a picture in mind of the question whether Yeshua is the Lord of the Sabbath). Anyway Vernard Eller puts it much more eloquently thusly:

I listed the amazon link (or via: amazon.co.uk) to Vernard Eller's book in this post: War and Peace: From Genesis to Revelations

Roger Pearse

True. It is desperately easy to be influenced by strawman-type ideas as to what the bible 'must' say or how it 'must' be composed, which are in fact imaginary, and which the early Christians did not believe.

All the best,

Roger Pearse