I've read many topics on Religion and see that many people post Bible verses as a source.

My question is, how credible is the Bible?

One could argue that it isn't credible due to the massive amounts of translations that it went through, with a probably mis-translation somewhere along the way,
or one could argue that it is very credible because it was the divine words of God passed down to humans.

Are there any other answers besides those?

what you really mean is "how credible are religious texts."

cred·i·ble /ˈkrɛdəbəl/ Pronunciation[kred-uh-buhl] P
–adjective
1. capable of being believed; believable: a credible statement.
2. worthy of belief or confidence

Credibility is relative to a persons belief, if you ask a scientist they might say "It's impossible to walk on water", yet a religious believer would say "you're wrong, the religious text says so and this was written by god or by (INSER HERE) who was doing the work of god.

Yea, people act like that because the Bible says it was written by God it must be true... If I made a book about how people's lives should be lived, and I claim the words were divinely spoken to me by my dog in heaven who has achieved ultimate wisdom, would you believe it? (I'm sure somebody would though ). The point is, there is no proof but opinions supporting the Bible. Personally, that's not enough justification for me to live my life by a book.

Yes sorry, that was too specific.

The Bible wasn't written by God,but rather written by Man whose inspiration to write the Scriptures come from God.
Personally, Given that so many wrote it,and been translated so many times over probably 1500 yrs or so,I don't give it much credence.And the fact some chapters were left out is a worry,as to why.Did they conflict with what was already written?Who knows for sure.If you think it's credible,thats Fine.Other than the 10 Commandments,nothing else interests me.

I do agree DSTM, about the interest of the 10 commandments. To me, the 10 commandments are probably the best laws ever written.

I don't get this solaris32. You say you don't believe the bible but you think the 10 commandments are probably the best laws ever written. How can you possibly think this - especially seeing as though the first three or four laws concern the worship of god?

You may not know this but there are in fact fourteen (or maybe fifteen) imperative statements in Exodus and that there is no universal agreement on how to reduce these to ten laws. What I mean by this is that the 10 commandments are slightly different depending on whether you are Jewish, Orthodox, Roman Catholic or Protestant.

Take a look at this

MANUSCRIPT EVIDENCE FOR THE BIBLE

TEXTUAL CRITICISM OF THE BIBLE


Seafox14

"One could argue that it isn't credible due to the massive amounts of translations that it went through, with a probably mis-translation somewhere along the way,
or one could argue that it is very credible because it was the divine words of God passed down to humans."

In general this summarises two possible and widely held positions, but there are many others that can, and have been taken that form a continuum of possible stances. For example, the status of the OT may certainly be different from that of the NT.
Whether the Bible is creditable or not ultimately depends upon the individual's choice of the criteria of truth, and whether all statements found in the Bible equally satisfy those criteria; approaching the discussion from an historical perspective can lead to conclusions different than those from a theological perspective.

Regards,
John

One could also argue that any document which contradicts itself time and time again also loses any claim to credibility.

http://www.evilbible.com/Biblical%20Contradictions.htm

Could these contradictions be because of all the translations? Maybe so or maybe not but in any case contradict itself the Bible does.

If these contradictions are from the translations then the Bible is no longer as God intended it to be and as such is no longer the word of God. If it has not been bungled in translation, then it is the word of God and please explain all the contradictions inherent in it.



The above link comes from this heathenish (pagan, atheist etc...) website: http://www.evilbible.com/

Rebuttal website for above heathenish website: http://www.therefinersfire.org/evil_bible.htm

I do not really see this as a insurmountable problem for christians. It was recognised as far back as Origen of Alexandria (185AD–254AD) that one may take an allegorical interpretation of scripture. I understand that many religious historians consider that literal interpretation of the bible only became popular after the protestant reformation.

Excellent point. If you ever have a chance to read "The Battle for God" by Karen Armstrong, she does a good job of illustrating the pitfalls of literal interpretation of the bible. Her main focus is religous fundamentalism.

Ah yes. Well if you take those commandments pertaining to the worship of God and change the meaning slightly, it works. Such as "thou shalt have no other gods before me" you can change to mean something like get out and experience the world and don't be obsessed with one thing. Because what that commandment means is that if you would rather watch football than go to church etc, football has become your "God". So if you get rid of the God part, that commandment means don't do the same thing over and over or your life will not have been lived to its fullest. Get out and do other stuff and don't just watch football all day long etc.

2nd one says to not make an idol and worship it. This could mean to not make one thing your entire life, such as money or another worldly pleasure. Don't limit yourself to one thing and use/worship it.

3rd is to not use God's name in vain. Simply don't cuss as it doesn't help with your manners.

4th is honor the sabbath and keep it holy. Can mean to show up to work and don't blow it off. Same with any other things you have to do.

The problem of translation aside, there is also the problem of how the Canon of scripture was created and the creation of a critical edition(s) of the text itself.

If you have ever translated, for example, something written in more or less modern French prose into English, you have literally thousands of books---whole libraries--- magazines, and dictionaries to consult, and you can ask several Frenchmen for help. How do you not only translate word-for-word and still capture the tone and nuance of the original author?
Then consider on the other hand (for example) translating the NT Koine Greek into modern English. One has one or two dictionaries or lexicons, and the examples to consult barely fill a small alcove in a library. And these examples of usage and word-definitions are derived from the chance survival of contemporary texts.
Confining myself to the NT, we have only contemporary reports not only of Jesus's life but also his words (Jesus himself as far as we know wrote absolutely nothing), so we are dependent on differing perspectives about his life, and the memory of his disciples about his words. I will not mention the problem of the writings of St. Paul who never even heard Jesus. And even within the compass of two generations after the death of his discliples, there was argument about what his teaching meant, and about which books of the Bible were doctrinally authentic.

Cheers,
John

Ive heard this argued before, and it holds no weight. His encounter on the road to Damascus, he clearly heard the voice of Jesus.

Then the age old argument says....the stories of his conversion conflict in the book of Acts...blah blah blah. bzzz...sorry, they don't conflict at all. The men with Paul heard the noise but didn't understand the voice. I'm not sure if that's the argument you would use, but that's the one this age-old, beat to death, poor argument has used.

One may, of course, accept St. Paul's account of his conversion at face value, just as one may accept the angelic origin of John's revelation. However, there is not universal agreement, even among the various Christian sects about such acceptance. For many, the role of Pauline theology presents some difficulties, as it seemingly did, for example, among the earliest of Christians when they considered whether the message of Christ was meant for Jews only, or for both Jews and Gentiles (as Paul believed).

In any discussion about the credibility of the Bible, moreover, one important point to consider is whether one can accept an account that is self-validating, or whether self-validation is even an essential and necessary element of faith. One might accept Pauline theology even if one did not believe that he actually spoke with Jesus.
Cheers,
John

Yep, I believe Paul.

I think its rather obvious by Jesus' teaching that there is neither jew nor gentile in the Kingdom...in fact....I think there might be a Scripture that says it.

It doesn't take an enormous amount of intellect and countless straining hours pouring over all information available to realize certain truths of the Bible. Most can be cleared up simply by viewing the words of Jesus. Its also quite apparent that the struggle was within the disciple's hearts, and not out of the mouth of Jesus.

(And before you say, the Scripture pertaining to neither jew nor gentile was written by Paul, there are words from Jesus that validate that Scripture.) And yes, I use Scripture to validate Scripture, (You might say I like circles. )

One can accept Pauline teaching either on its own foundation, or on the foundation of Jesus's teachings, or on both. And of course one can not accept it. There is more than one basis for giving credence to it or not.
And while I think you and I can agree on Paul's important place in Christianity, this is not necessarily shared by others who do, in fact, see it as problematical.
Cheers,
John

Well, lets start with people that see it as problematical...who are they, and what do they find problematical about it?

Are Paul's teachings outside the realm and influence of his Rabbi's: Jesus? I don't find that they are.

I understand there are those that "don't accept it"...but I ask, do those not accepting the teaching of Paul only reject Paul, or do they reject all teachings of the Bible? (I am referring specifically to the people you are referring to as "this is not necessarily shared by others who do see it as problematical"

While I respect Paul as a fellow believer, and a brother in Christ...I don't think he is as important as some try to establish him to be. He is but one of many examples of the kind of profound thought and love for others that can flow from one's heart whom accepts and worships Jesus. On the other hand, his conversion is a great testimony of how Jesus can reshape the heart, and renew the mind. A stepping from darkness into light, if you will. I think if you were to ask "believers", you would find that many of us have had similar experiences of being engaged by Jesus, the Creator, which also bear witness with Paul's story.

People can sit around and try for ages to debunk the credibility of the Bible, and more specifically the credibility of the divinity of Jesus Christ, but their attempts will always be unsuccessful. The reason? Because Jesus is perfect, and He is the Word. Bold statement? Yes.

Why am I answering all of my questions? I don't know.

I would just like to say that many of the contradictions in the Bible are from two different people and two different points of view. Just wanted to get that on the floor that the Bible doesn't contradict itself, people in the Bible contradict each other.

Then what parts are you supposed to believe in? If the entire Bible is the divined word of God, then why are there many key people contradicting each other?

Sorry, I didn't fully explain. MOST of those contradictions on that website are people talking AGAINST God as in... part of the story, but didn't write one of the books... Like the bad guy in a book or something.

I wonder if we will ever really know the answer to the credibility issue. Because man has a tendency to twist words to suit himself, and cover up the truth. I can say that the dead sea scrolls are pretty close to the bibles OT, I don't like the fact that some writings didn't make it into the bible. I think some major religions made up there own rules. I think the contradictions in the Bible are minor compared to the pig picture. I think I would believe in the teachings of Jesus, over paul, or John. I don't think that Jesus is god, but I think he was closer to god than anyone else. The disciples didn't really understand everything Jesus taught. And Pual waffled back and forth on subjects like ," should priests get married" and what the 10 comandments should be. (I read deuteronomy and there's more than 10 comandments) I've asked myself many times, do I believe in evolution, or inteligent design. Right now I'm leaning towards intelegent design. Because right now, evolution makes less sence, with more contradiction. and as smart as evolutionists are, there not smart enough to explain the theory to us dumba$$es. (That would be me) and if it don't make sence, it ain't true.

The truth is that believers will believe the word of their holy scriptures, even if there is a few discrepencies.
The second truth is from a scientific stand point most religous texts aren't credible as they hold not alot of proven scientific facts, but maybe a few amusing bedtime stories.
But seeing from the above its completely obvious that this is more of a topic of religion, sense and relativity.

Many religions are fairly vague and thus can claim they are legitiment because the shoe fits if you will, but you can see the shoe may fit but it's not the correct color, ect. Meaning that the text states something fairly vague, thus it will be interpreted differently by each person, even if it is supposedly the end all exact words of god.

When you really step back and think about it, whose to say that a few writers didn't get together and make up a bunch of stories, then link them to one omnipotent character, tell people about it, the people wanted to believe in such a figure and thus a religion was born?

Now I know someone is bound to say "so you think the universe created itself, and people, ect.", now leaving out my thoughts and beliefs I'm going to pose a different side; If you can fathom a God that existed, he just was, then how can you not fathom a universe that just was?

Whether something is contradictory in the bible depends on a lot of things, not the least of which is your hermeneutic interpretation of various passages of scripture. If you take the bias which that site obvious has, which is that the bible is a big crock, you can take an interpretation of a passage and pit it against another interpretation of another passage and say "Aha! These passages contradict each other and the whole bible is therefore silly!" And of course there are many different interpretations of scripture, the second coming of Christ alone has three major interpretations, all of them different, and each of them having different scriptures to back up their position. Most churches, however, have a cohesive way that they individually interpret scripture, and within their particular interpretation there aren't necessarily contradictions. That's primarily why there are different denominations, while the creeds of the different denominations may differ, within each of them there is usually a uniformity of comprehensive theology.

Well, I certainly hope that Christians accept the Word of God as infallible...otherwise, there really isn't much of a point in being Christian. There are no discrepancies or contradictions in the Bible. These proposed contradictions have been beat to death for hundreds of years, and have never held up. The Bible has always held up under the most intense of scrutiny.

They aren't amusing bedtime stories as some might try to have us believe...they are in fact a way for us to get to know the heart of God, and how to seek and love Him, and love people more. There is simply no greater purpose.

Matthew 22:36-40 (New King James Version)
New King James Version (NKJV)

36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”
37 Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

Well, I guess this depends on what you mean by infallible. The Roman Catholic Church, which is by far the largest christian church, holds the view that the bible is error free only in the things that god intended to reveal, with any inconsistencies being deemed to be allegory or figurative.

Im not catholic, and don't feel that way. I don't look to catholocism as an answer for anything pertaining to Christianity. But that's just me.

Beyond that, my hoping that Christians believe it is infallible has nothing to do with the definition of infallible, or what the catholic church thinks.

Well I too believe that it is infailiable. At my church we've done Bible studies on the credibility of the Bible and no matter what the contradiction that was brought up none of them proved to be a contradiction.

-Steve

Most Christians will agree that scripture is inerrant in that it is "God-breathed", but they also accept that man is fallible and there are some translations that are more fallible than others. You need only look at something like the KJV to see that every translation of the bible is not literally infallible. Look in the KJV version of Proverbs 21:4, "An high look, and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked, is sin." Here the incorrect homonym has been used, "niyr" (neer); or "nir" (neer), can mean freshly plowed land, but it more commonly means a lamp. "Even the light of the wicked is sin" is a much more effectual verse than "even the gardening of the wicked is sin".

There is also passage 19:24 in the KJV "A slothful man hideth his hand in his bosom, and will not so much as bring it to his mouth again." The word "Bosom" can also be translated "dish", which would make more sense that a lazy person would not raise his had to feed himself from a dish rather than a man will stick his hand in his chest and not take it up to his mouth (???).

The KJV is overall a good translation, and it did the best it could with the biblical texts that were available at the time (textus receptus), but there have since been older, more reliable texts that have been better translated.

Something you will have to take into consideration is how the words were commonly used in that time period and where the translation was made. That could explain for the use of words that otherwise make no sence.

-Steve

Im not going to argue with you about that arcman...but I can say personally I don't get into the whole translation debate, because it doesn't concern me. What does concern me is that God's Word is infallible. Translations have their place.

How come most other religions, including religions with many gods, aren't under such scrutiny as the Bible? It doesn't seem fair that the ACLU is only chasing Christianity out of the country, while every day in the middle-east people pray to Mecca 5 times a day or something like that.

Are you saying that the more gods a religion has the more scrutiny it should be put under?

I think he is asking why is it Christianity is the only one being scrutinised to such a degree.

-Steve

But is it? Personally I have seen a LOT more scrutiny about Islam in the press in recent years (not without good reason in my opinion).

I don't know what shows or whatever you are watching Budapest, but I believe there is a much larger mainstream scrutiny of the Bible. I.E. specials on Discovery Channel, History Channel, ABC specials, etc.

In the "press" I have seen next to no scrutiny of the TEXTS of islam.

Yeah but do Christians have to become a radical terrorist group to stop scrutiny? Doesn't seem fair to me.


Yea how come Bible stories have to be scientifically analyzed and put on TV? Scientists in Islam countries don't do that.

It may be that God's word is infallible, but the issue seems to remain, what exactly is God's word? Even if we had the most reliable and perfect of original texts, we would still be faced with the problem of translation.
Even if, after reading the original text repeatedly, we can understand the general ideas, when we get to specific and important parts where the meaning can hinge on a single phrase, the problem becomes acute. For example, we lack a true understanding of its nuances because of our limited knowledge of how the original language was used and we must make a decision about the relative importance of that passage to whole.
My only real point here is that translations are very complex creatures, and must be understood as such. God's word may be infallible, but any translation is only a tentative approach to understanding it.
Regards,
John

I dont mind it myself Ryan3000, however, it would be nice if they had a person that actually believed in the divinity of Jesus Christ to give their opinion on the show, instead of always consulting the "Jesus Seminar"

The problem is, they are not interested at all in discovering the truths of the Word of God. Their minds are completely made up that the Bible is fantasy, and they base all of their interpretation of evidence upon that presupposition.

Exactly! They approach the Bible on TV like some random children's story in the sense of "is it possible"? They look at each Bible story in today's terms and even if it's possible, they say 'this COULD happen, but it's extremely unlikely'. Both Christians and scientists are narrow-minded about their beliefs, which really does not contribute to a good relationship.

I simply disagree John (being a pig-headed Christian), I believe the Holy Spirit will guide you into or teach you all truth. Translation is simply not a factor when it comes to knowing the heart and mind of God.

The Bible says in John 16:13 (NKJV)


Right Ryan...they keep rehashing the same age-old arguments that held no weight then, and hold no weight now. There is a reason why its impossible to find imperfections in a perfect Jesus.

Well...I don't watch any American TV, so I have no idea what they're showing on those channels.

It certainly isn't very helpful to the Christian side of the argument that there are a lot of different translations of the Bible and they all have something to say that is somewhat different.

Is it just me or is the Software and Hardware forum less busy lately?

I think there are very rare occasions when a translation has left something out that is important...but honestly, I don't see that it hurts Christianity to have so many translations. It has helped many people discover who Jesus is. Its hard to complain about that. I think I remember something also about the Bible being the most purchased and obtained text ever in history.

But can't we just make one plain english bible that everyone speaking english can understand? It seems like not many people would read the original text, or the old english version, or the 'thou thee and thy' instead of the 'you me and I' version.

Well, since the others are made, its hard to say, "we are choosing only one as the only appropriate English version."

I agree that many people will choose not to read "the originals." Ryan, if you feel perplexed by the translation situation, I urge you to take 5 or 6 of the translations, look at the differences between them. (A good place is to just start in the gospels.)

There are many problems with trying to make just "one plain English bible" For starters, there are different translation approaches such as dynamic equivalence, formal equivalence and paraphrastic translation. Also, there are theological issues that come into play. For example, the NIV bible is an expressly Protestant translation that was published in response to the belief that the RSV bible did not follow traditional evangelical theology. On top of this, there is not universal agreement as to what books actually make up the bible (hence the deuterocanonical books/apocrypha).

That is explicitly a catholic thing in my opinion.

Those "books" are not accepted by non-catholic mainstream Christianity, because basically there are doctrines taught within them that completely contradict the teachings of Jesus. I.E. purgatory, salvation not a gift, justified suicide (just to name a few.)


Universal agreement will never be something to "wait with baited breath" for...thats for sure. The bottom line though....none of it changes the Word, and the One that spoke the Word.

I think it is a mistake not to differentiate between catholics and protestants.

Not just a "Catholic" thing; I believe the Coptic Christians also have a different Canon.
I also seem to remember, and I may be wrong here, that the earliest Christians did quite well without a "Bible," which only seemed to be necessary around 100-200 A.D.
Cheers,
John