Free More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell, Sean McDowell Page B

should not cast any doubt upon them whatsoever.” 18
    Sir Frederic Kenyon, former director and principal librarian at the British Museum and whose authority on ancient manuscripts is second to none, concludes:
The interval then between the dates of original composition and the earliest extant evidence becomes so small as to be in fact negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established. 19
    Others agree. Anglican bishop and New Testament historian Stephen Neill argues that “we have a far better and more reliable text of the New Testament than of any other ancient work whatever.” 20
    Craig Blomberg, former senior research fellow at Cambridge University in England and now professor of New Testament at Denver Seminary, explains that the texts of the New Testament “have been preserved in far greater number and with much more care than have any other ancient documents.” Blomberg concludes that “97–99% of the New Testament can be reconstructed beyond any reasonable doubt.” 21
    New Testament Greek scholar J. Harold Greenlee adds:
Since scholars accept as generally trustworthy the writings of the ancient classics even though the earliest manuscripts were written so long after the original writings and the number of extant manuscripts is in many instances so small, it is clear that the reliability of the text of the New Testament is likewise assured. 22
    The application of the bibliographical test to the New Testament assures us that it has more manuscript authority than any other piece of literature from antiquity. If we add to that authority the more than 130 years of intensive New Testament textual criticism, we can conclude that an authentic New Testament text has been established.
    What about Biblical Variants?
    In 2005, textual critic Bart Ehrman created a firestorm of controversy with the release of his best-selling book, Misquoting Jesus. His claim was simple: the biblical manuscripts have so many errors that we cannot recover the original text. Some of these mistakes were accidental, claims Ehrman, while others were intentional. Either way, the New Testament as we know it today cannot be trusted.
    A key point Ehrman raises is the 300,000 to 400,000 variants among New Testament manuscripts. A textual variant is any time the New Testament manuscripts have alternative wordings. Given that the Greek New Testament of today has roughly 138,000 words, the idea that there are two to three times as many variants as words is quite disturbing. Yet one needs to realize that the large number of variants is a direct result of the extremely large number of New Testament manuscripts that we have. There are no other works of antiquity that come close to the wealth of New Testament manuscripts available. The more manuscripts you possess, the more variants; the fewer the manuscripts, the fewer variants. But this is not the whole picture. When the variants are looked at more closely, a very different story emerges.
    By far the most significant category of variants is spelling differences. The name John, for example, may be spelled with one n or with two. Clearly, a variation of this sort in no way jeopardizes the meaning of the text. Spelling differences account for roughly 75 percent of all variants. 23 That’s between 225,000 and 300,000 of all the variants! Another large category of variants consists of the synonyms used across manuscripts. For instance, some manuscripts may refer to Jesus by his proper name, while others may say “Lord” or “he.” Such differences hardly call the meaning of the text into question.
    When all variations are considered, roughly one percent involve the meaning of the text. But even this fact can be overstated. For instance, there is disagreement about whether 1 John 1:4 should be