Three Reasons to Believe in the Reliability of Scripture

LoewsBy: Deanna Huff, PhD Candidate | December 18, 2022 Written by 40 authors, over 1500 years, on 3 different continents and in 3 different languages, the Bible is a fascinating document. A story about God and his people. It is full of love, tragedy, restoration, and hope. But is it just another story alongside the Epic of Gilgamesh or the Iliad? Is Jesus historical? Are the Gospels of the Bible…

Match of the Century: Lydia vs. Licona…maybe?

“LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

A controversy has been brewing over the past several years over interpreting the Gospels and how to defend their basic historic reliability. This match of the century is sure to interest those concerned with biblical accuracy, scriptural interpretation, and New…

Biblical Archaeology: A Guide to Internet Archaeology

Have you ever come across (or bent sent a link via email or facebook) about a giant skeleton discovery that confirms the size of Goliath? I have. Many times.  They have all been internet hoaxes (like the picture below).

Over at Epic Archaeology Ted Wright has written an excellent article titled “A Quick Guide to Internet Archaeology” in which he provides some principles “and a plea to Christians…

Biblical Archaeology: Clay Seal of King Josiah’s aide found

2 Kings 23:11 – “He [Josiah] removed from the entrance to the temple of the LORD the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun. They were in the court near the room of an official named Nathan-Melek. Josiah then burned the chariots dedicated to the sun.” (NIV)

A clay seal of King Josiah’s aid mentioned in the above passage was found recently found.  Accordingto the Daily Mail, “The…

Apologetic Resource: Impact 360 [NEW Video]

Impact 360 has been releasing some fantastically produced videos. Here is one of their newest ones:

  Impact 360 has been running some great videos as well as their camps, residency programs, and training.

Speakers who frequent Impact 360 include: Jonathan Morrow, Sean McDowell, J. Warner Wallace, Brett Kunkle, Alisha Childers, Jay…

Fulfilled prophecy

there are hundreds of manuscripts of the OT written way before Christ was born that prophesy hundreds of things about Christs life.

dead sea scrolls

Archaeological discoveries

Bible is so accurate that archaeologists use it to find new things.

Nelson Glueck: profound archaeologist who said that no finds have ever contradicted the Bible

Pontius Pilate: Italian archaeologists discovered the validity of this person and his rank and power...giving power to send Christ to the cross.

Caiaphis: 1990- construction workers accidentally found a burial cave with an inscription of Joseph Caiaphis.

King David: 1993- 3000 year old inscription found (written by enemies): "king of Israel. King of the house of David"

Consistency

a. The bible addresses life's most controversial questions (creation, God, our purpose)

b. 66 different documents all consistent

c. 40 different authors with different educational backgrounds and occupations and written over a span of 1500 years in 3 different continents.

d. 3 different languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek

External Verification

Flavius Josephus (1st century historian): verified many figures in the bible

over 39 external sources that validate historical figures in the bible

Scientific Accuracy

the sun: bible says that the sun is on a circuit through space (ps. 19:6)

the shape of the earth. (is. 40:22, pr. 8:27 job 26:10) "sphere". Way before Aristotle suggested that the earth might be a sphere.

the suspension of the earth. (job 26:7) Job says that God rests the earth on nothing!

the stars. Before telescopes, astronomers thought they could number the stars but the bible said it was impossible to count them. (jer. 33:22)

F.A.C.E.S (1-5)

Manuscript Evidence

hand written copy of a document before the printing press

more than 25000 partial and complete manuscripts of the NT alone

hundreds of OT manuscripts

this verifies that the bible we read today is the same bible from thousands of years ago.

compared to the number of manuscripts of other "accepted" documents the bible has many times more.

the accuracy of each manuscript is extremely high (over 95% accuracy)

The willingness of the disciples to suffer