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January 3, 2026 |
| Is The Bible Trustworthy? | ||
Critics of the Bible attack it in many areas in an attempt to show that it is not trustworthy. This study looks at only three of those attacks.
One kind of attack is to show that something the Bible says about existence is false. We'll counter that by showing something the Bible said was true before mankind could know it was true.
Another king is to attack the Greek manuscripts of the Bible. They see differences in them that they use to claim the Bible isn't trustworthy.
The other kind of attack is to show that something the Bible says about history is false. We'll counter that by showing that the Bible's version of history is the only one that makes sense.
After the first few chapters of the Book of Job, we find Job complaining that God is unfair to him. He thinks he should have some way to appeal his case and argue it before God. God asks, "Who are you to say I am wrong? Specifically, God responds:
Who makes [Arcturus], Orion, and the Pleiades, and the constellations of the south. (Job 9:9)
God's point, which isn't our point, is that I have done things way beyond you, Job. This is one example from a list God provides of things he has done.
To our point, we find the question: How are constellations identified and named? Restating that, wasn't Job written long before the constellations we know were identified? Aren't those identifications a cultural thing that would be different in every culture?
Later in Job, the topic comes back to constellations.
Can you tie up the chains of the Pleiades, or untie the cords of Orion? 32 Can you bring out a constellation in its season, and guide [Arcturus] with her satellites? (Job 38:31-32)
The names "Orion" and "Pleiades" come from Greek mythology. Orion is first mentioned by Homer, a Greek author who lived about 1,000 years after Job. What is a character from Greek mythology doing in Job's nighttime sky?
What is this?
It is normal for our vision to connect lines through the dots. Instead of seeing dots, we see a box. It's the same as seeing figures in the shapes of clouds. So it is entirely natural that mankind would see groups of stars as things they knew.
Many constellations were identified long before Job. The main constellations were identified so long ago that we have no idea who did it or when. Maybe it was Adam. He was given the job of naming things.
Believers and unbelievers agree that the Sumerians were among the first people who ever existed. We know the names of some of their kings from Sumerian writings. The Bible also has the same names. The Bible goes beyond the Sumerians by saying they were the descendants of Noah through Ham.
The Sumerians knew some of the constellations. One figure was a hunter, another group was sisters, and they knew others. These identifications were passed on to other people as they spread out. When the Greeks came along, they retained the basic figure of a hunter and created a back story for him, calling him Orion. Similarly a back-story was created for the sisters, calling them the Pleiades. Other cultures retained the figure, but gave it different names and stories.
For us, we inherited the figures and names from Greek mythology and incorporated the Greek names into English.
But sometimes the constellations are different between cultures. Not all of our current constellations were identified anciently, so later, someone identified a constellation of stars and gave a name to it. We see that in Job.
Who makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the constellations of the south. (Job 9:9)
No one knows what this part of the verse is talking about. So, it translated differently even among English translations. Some say "chambers of the south," "the [vast starry] spaces of the south," "the clusters of stars in the south," and "the circuit to the south."
Can you tie up the chains of the Pleiades, or untie the cords of Orion? 32 Can you bring out a constellation in its season, and guide [Arcturus] with her satellites? (Job 38:31-32)
God sees the Pleides (Seven Sisters) as being chained together and asks Job if he is able to chain them together, presumably as God did. But there is a problem with that. There is nothing to be seen between those stars that would give a person reason to think they were chained together. There is more to what God is saying than figurative chains. They are chained together.
"The Seven Sisters is an open star cluster in the constellation of Taurus, a group of hundreds of stars formed from the same cosmic cloud. They are bound to one another by mutual gravitational attraction."
God sees Orion's belt as being untied. Again, though, there is nothing to be seen in the stars that would make a person think they were untied. There is more to what God is saying.
"Orion's belt is formed by two stars (Alnilam, and Mintaka) and one star cluster (Alnitak). These stars are heading in different directions."
God sees Arcturus as having "satellites." Again, there is nothing in the night sky that is close to Arcturus that would make a person think they were "satellites," whatever that means. There is more to what God is saying.
"One of the brightest stars in the night sky. While Arcturus certainly appeared in antiquity to be a single star, in 1971 astronomers discovered there were 52 additional stars connected directionally with Arcturus. One of the largest suns in the universe (25 times the sun's diameter, 100 times brighter), Arcturus, is a runaway whose speed is 257 miles per second. Our sun is traveling only 12 ½ miles per second. This high velocity places Arcturus in a very small class of stars that apparently are a law unto themselves, Arcturus is a runaway."
In Job's time, no one knew that Arcturus had "satellites" and that they, and Arcturus, were travelling so fast. God asks Job if he can guide them.
What we have seen here is God providing information to Job that Job could not have known. Only in recent times has it become possible to know these things. The Bible is trustworthy.
There are many Greek manuscripts. Some are complete Bibles. Some are only one or a few books. Some are a section from one book. Of these there are many differences between them. These differences are an attack point for those who want to dismiss the Bible.
The Bible manuscripts were copied by hand, often by the light of only candles. We know that people make mistakes, and these are the kinds of errors introduced by a copyist.
There were other people who acted as editors, taking it upon themselves to intentionally make changes. They were usually trying to make the text clearer. But some were trying to "correct" things they didn't agree with or introduce ideas they wanted to see in the Bible. We see these kinds of differences between manuscripts.
In all of these, there is no significant change that would affect doctrine. Much worse things were done in translations from Greek into other languages.
We'll look at a change that was made that resulted in an erroneous statement in the Bible.
Then that which was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: "And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of the one whose price had been set by the sons of Israel." (Matthew 27:9)
This is factually in error. The quote in the verse is from Zechariah, not Jeremiah.
A factual error in the Bible would be a great disgrace for Christianity. It would strike at the idea that the scriptures are inerrant because they are the words of God given to man. Therefore commentators have tried to rationalize this in various ways.
What happened? There are a small number of manuscripts that say only "the prophet," and do not name him. Somewhere, someone decided to clarify the text by adding the prophet's name, but got it wrong. For whatever reason, his manuscript was used as the source for copies more than other manuscripts, so the vast majority have this error. Usually, when the correct text is in a minority of manuscripts this indicates the change was made very early, when there were not many manuscripts available.
Next, we'll look at a problem where a New Testament verse quotes an Old Testament verse, but incorrectly.
This is how the NIV translation renders the verse from the New Testament.
This is why it says: "When he ascended on high, he took many captives and gave gifts to his people." (Ephesians 4:8 NIV)
This is the NIV translation of the Old Testament verse that is quoted in the New Testament.
When you ascended on high, you took many captives; you received gifts from people (Psalms 68:18 NIV)
Did Jesus give gifts or receive gifts?
Now we'll look at the Old Testament verse as rendered in Young's Literal Translation. That translation was done a long time ago and has the sound of the KJV. It tries to render the Greek as literally (exactly) as possible.
Thou hast ascended on high, Thou hast taken captive captivity, Thou hast taken gifts for men (Psalms 68:18 YLT)
With "captivity captive," it says something completely different.
What's happening here? For people who understand that everyone in the Old Testament who dies goes to Sheol and not to Heaven or Hell, there needs to be a way to get that to line up with the modern idea that everyone goes to Heaven or Hell, which they like, but is wrong. The verses Psalms 68:18 and Ephesians 4:8 have become the focus of that attack, which I won't detail here.
The Old Testament verse is obscure enough that it can be twisted, so it gets the treatment as does the New Testament verse, in both the Greek and English translations.
Next we'll look at some words that were changed.
The verse here is Matthew 23:25. The word that changed is the last word of the verse. I tell you that because we'll be looking at the Greek. I don't know Greek, but I can still see the difference.
We are comparing this verse as it appears in two Greek manuscripts.
Οὐαὶ ὑμῖν, γραμματεῖς καὶ Φαρισαῖοι ὑποκριταί, ὅτι καθαρίζετε τὸ ἔξωθεν τοῦ ποτηρίου καὶ τῆς παροψίδος, ἔσωθεν δὲ γέμουσιν ἐξ ἁρπαγῆς καὶ ἀκρασίας. (Westcott and Hort / {NA28 variants})
Οὐαὶ ὑμῖν, γραμματεῖς καὶ Φαρισαῖοι, ὑποκριταί, ὅτι καθαρίζετε τὸ ἔξωθεν τοῦ ποτηρίου καὶ τῆς παροψίδος, ἔσωθεν δὲ γέμουσιν ἐξ ἁρπαγῆς καὶ ἀδικίας. (RP Byzantine Majority Text 2005)
The verse ends with "but within are full of plunder and …" The last word is commonly translated as laziness or injustice, which are completely different words.
Among all Greek manuscripts, there are 7 different words used here.
What's happening here? The original word had many meanings, and the intended meaning in this verse isn't clear. Some people changed the word to one that they thought was clearer.
Next we'll look at a verse that has a bunch of different changes. It is James 2:18 and we'll be comparing two mauscripts again.
I've highlighted the text as shown to show what kind of change was made.
Changed word
Added word
Moved word
ἀλλ' ἐρεῖ τις Σὺ πίστιν ἔχεις κἀγὼ ἔργα ἔχω. δεῖξον μοι τὴν
πίστιν σου χωρὶς τῶν ἔργων, κἀγώ σοι δείξω ἐκ τῶν ἔργων
μου τὴν πίστιν. (Westcott and Hort / {NA28 variants})
Ἀλλ’ ἐρεῖ τις, Σὺ πίστιν ἔχεις, κἀγὼ ἔργα ἔχω· δεῖξόν μοι τὴν
πίστιν σου ἐκ τῶν ἔργων σου, κἀγὼ δείξω σοι ἐκ τῶν ἔργων
μου τὴν πίστιν μου. (RP Byzantine Majority Text 2005)
Are these changes, additions, and movements of words significant? Maybe they don't really make a difference in the meaning of the verse.
To answer this, we are going to look at the English translation of the Greek above. I used Google Translate to do that.
But you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith without works, then I will show you faith from my works.
But you have faith, and I have works; show me your faith by your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.
Those verses make distinctly different points. Both are true, I suppose, but only one of them was intended by the author.
What's going on here? This isn't a theologically important difference. So it's hard to ascribe a motivation to these changes other than that someone was trying to clarify the text, but he had a very different idea of what the author was trying to say. There is no scoundrel at work here.
Next we'll look at two verses that are unrelated in their message, but are related in what was done to them. I mentioned them earlier, but now we'll look at them in detail.
I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet (Revelation 1:10)
Therefore when you come together it is not to eat the Lord's Supper (1 Corinthians 11:20)
The phrases "Lord's Day" and "Lord's Supper" were not in use during the time of the apostles. We know this because:
Someone made these changes to the Greek manuscripts and only made them once each. There are no Greek manuscripts that say it differently. Because this change was not made early, when there were few manuscripts to change, the person who made the change had to have made it by decree to all copyists. Only the Roman church had that kind of power.
In the 300s AD, the Roman church was moving the date for Passover, and its wave sheaf offering. Ultimately the wave sheaf offering (the day of Jesus' resurrection) landed on a Sunday. At the same time, they were transferring the observance of the Sabbath to Sunday.
To justify these changes, it seems an order was given to change the Greek manuscripts in this small way. By using "Lord's", they attached Jesus' title to their change, making their changed day sound glorious.
Using Jesus' death this way was not the last time. Other people have done the same thing since. The idea behind it is that Jesus' death is so monumental that other things must have changed as well. The Church of God (Seventh Day) did that to justify the changes they were making to the Sabbath they had previously kept.
Yes, there are many differences between the Bible manuscripts, and some of those changes were made with bad intent.
Most of the changes were unintentional, the kinds of changes that a human makes when copying a document by hand. The intentional changes were mostly attempting to clarify the text. They shouldn't have happened anyway.
The intentional changes that were made with evil intent were small changes. Christians simply would not have accepted big changes to God's word. A complete Bible was terribly expensive then. Would you have paid a pile of money for a Bible that was significantly modified from God's original word?
While these intentional changes are not doctrinally significant, they are there to support significant doctrinal changes. A person who is unaware of the change can read the passage without being misled.
Especially in our time it is easy to spot these changes by comparing manuscripts, even when a major effort was made to cover their tracks as the Roman church did. The Bible was not corrupted by the changes that were made.
The most basic concepts of sin and salvation are rooted in the first 15 chapters of Genesis. These contain the origin, the introduction of sin, the roles of man and woman, the destruction of that world, the salvation of a remnant, and the division of mankind by language and biology.
Because it contains these core values, many people who attack the Bible attack the Creation and Flood accounts. One attack is to show that there were other accounts of creation and the flood. Therefore the Bible's account is just one more of many. Therefore there is no reason to believe the Bible's story.
The oldest story that is different is the Sumerian creation and flood story. They are written in books called Eridu Genesis, Epic of Gilgamesh, and others. They have a problem though. While they are substantially similar, they differ from each other in significant details. This makes them appear to be snapshots of an evolving fictional account.
The Bible was written after the Sumerian stories. Therefore the claim is made that the Sumerians made them up to explain a forgotten history. Then those stories traveled to other people, and eventually became the basis for the Bible's account. Therefore the Bible's account is fictional because it is based on fiction.
The Sumerian stories have amazing similarities to the Bible's Creation and Flood stories. There are also surprising differences.
The Bible talks about the Sumerians and where they fit in from the perspectives of genealogy and timeline.
The sons of Ham were Cush, Mizraim, Put, and Canaan. 7 The sons of Cush were Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca; and the sons of Raamah were Sheba and Dedan. 8 Now Cush fathered Nimrod; he became a mighty one on the earth. 10 And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. 11 From that land he went to Assyria, and built Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah, 12 and Resen between Nineveh and Calah; that is the great city. (Genesis 10:6-8,10-12)
"Shinar" is the Hebrew name for Sumer. Sumer was a geographic area, and the people in Sumer were called Sumerians.
The name "Accad" is also spelled "Akkad." His people lived in an area that was named after him, and those people were called Acadians. This is long before the unrelated Acadians of Canada and the US.
Some of the people who came from Noah's son Shem lived among the Acadians.
The name "Nimrod" doesn't only appear in the Bible. It appears in Sumerian writings, and they recognize him as a mighty man who founded many cities. From the bible's timeline, he would have been born about 64 years after the flood.
Abraham isn't part of this story, but he is a good reference point. He was born about 300 years after the flood, in Ur of Sumer.
This map shows the geographic areas of Sumer and Akkad. They were in a fertile area between the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers, which feed into the Persian Gulf. This area is what we now know of as the southeast corner of Iraq.
We also see some cities that we know of from the Bible:
This area became part of the Assyrian Empire, which conquered most of Israel. When it collapsed, the Babylonian Empire sprang up. It was eventually conquered by the Medo-Persian Empire. So this area figures heavily in Biblical history.
I've also marked on the map an arrow showing the direction to the mountain that is currently called Mount Ararat. This is where many people think the Ark landed.
In the Sumerian account, there are similarities and differences. Here are a few.
The story of the flood appears in many of the Sumerian stories because it was a major feature of their history. Their parents or grandparents would have known Noah's sons, for whom the flood was a world-changing reality.
The Sumerians recognized that the number of people who lived before the flood far outnumbered the Sumerian people.
From the Sumerian account of the pre-flood events:
Most cultures have flood stories:
The story points mostly survive:
But some of the details are different:
These are exactly what you would expect with verbal transmission of a story. Once it is written, the story stops changing.
The world wants to see the flood story as a fabrication of man long ago. That way they can dismiss it and with it the creator God behind it. They say:
We say the flood was a fact:
Why is it that anthropologists are fascinated by the Sumerian Genesis story but use it to discredit the Bible's Genesis story? Shouldn't they also be fascinated by it?
Why is it that UFO scientists don't believe in angels, but they believe in life on other planets? Or they say we called those extra-terrestrial beings the name angels, but they are really just beings who are more advanced than us.
Why is it that the world hates Christians and Jews but loves every other religion?
Deep inside we all know the truth. Those who don't want it to be true work to push it away, and that pushing shows up as hypocrisies. But pushing away an unwanted truth is proof that the truth exists. If it didn't exist, you wouldn't need to push it away.
If you are looking for God, you see him everywhere. If you don't want to see God, you won't.
All attacks on the Bible come down to a single question – Is there a God? If you don't believe there is a God, then you don't believe the Bible is the word of God. Therefore there is no Bible fact you can tell someone to convert them.