Integrity of the New Testament.—We have set out to prove that the religion of the Bible is from God. We found in the last chapter that the New Testament was written by its reputed authors. We now ask, Has it preserved its integrity? If we can ascertain that it has, we shall have made a good start toward proving the divinity of the
*A few words relative to the time of beginning the Sabbath are here demanded. 1. The reckoning of the first week of time necessarily determines that of all succeeding weeks. The first division of the first day was night; and each day of the first week began with evening; the evening and the morning, an expression equivalent to the night and the day, constituted the twenty-four hours. Gen. i. Hence, the first Sabbath began and ended with evening. 2. That the night is in the Scriptures reckoned a part of the day of twenty-four hours, is proved by many texts. Ex. xii, 41, 42; 1 Sam. xxvi, 7, 8; Luke ii, 8–11; Mark xiv, 30; Luke xxii, 34, and many other testimonies. 3. The 2300 days, symbolizing 2300 years, are each constituted like the days of the first week of time. Dan. viii, 14. The margin, which gives the literal Hebrew, calls each of those days an “evening morning.” 4. The statute defining the great day of atonement is absolutely decisive that the day begins with evening, and that the night is a part of the day. Lev. xxiii, 32. “It shall be unto you a Sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even; from even unto even shall ye celebrate your Sabbath.” 5. That evening is at sunset is abundantly proved by the following scriptures: Deut. xvi, 6; Lev. xxii, 6, 7; Deut. xxiii, 11; xxiv, 13, 15; Josh. viii, 29; x, 26, 27; Judges xiv, 18; 2 Sam. iii, 35; 2 Chron. xviii, 34; Matt. viii, 16; Mark i, 32; Luke iv, 40. But does not Neh. xiii, 19, conflict with this testimony, and indicate that the Sabbath did not begin until after dark? I think not. The text does not say, “When it began to be dark at Jerusalem before the Sabbath,” but it says, “When the gates of Jerusalem began to be dark.” If it be remembered that the gates of Jerusalem were placed under wide and high walls, it will not be found difficult to harmonize this text with the many here adduced, which prove that the day begins with sunset.
Christian religion; but if we cannot, the labor of the preceding chapters is lost. For, though we prove the need of a revelation, and the apostolic origin of the New Testament, we have nothing of which to boast, if it be true that it has been corrupted in some succeeding century, so that we are not now in possession of the ideas designed to be conveyed by its original writers.
We are aware that in proving the integrity of this book, we are going beyond what should be required of a defender of Christianity, but we wish not to “leave a stone unturned.” Opposers should show what errors have crept into the New Testament, and where. This they do not pretend to do. The most that they can say is that “the Bible has passed through so many hands that we cannot be certain that it is now what it was when it came from the hands of its authors.”
While there is no evidence that the New Testament has gone through any material change since it was written, the answer to such an assertion is complete. It is perfectly impossible that the New Testament should have been so corrupted as to destroy its original import, or that it should have gone through any material alteration, either in or since the days of the apostles. The argument that the New Testament has passed through so many different hands is rather an argument in favor of its integrity than against it. If it had not been in different hands as soon as written, it might possibly have been altered. I have shown that the custom of publicly reading the scriptures obtained in the early church, and that the epistles were read in the apostolic churches as well as “the other scriptures.” Col. iv, 16.
Not only so, but the epistles of “our beloved brother Paul” were classed among “the other scriptures” in the days of the apostles. See 2 Pet. iii, 16. Christians prized them highly. As soon as they were written they were copied. Christians earnestly sought for and multiplied copies of them, carried them into distant countries, and esteemed them more sacred than the rich worldling does his deed to his large farm. Why should they not? The gospels and epistles were public documents, containing the history of their Master, together with sundry commandments and ordinances, in obedience to which men were daily “mortifying the deeds of the body” [Rom. viii, 13]; enduring the scoffs, sneers, and buffetings of their neighbors [1 Cor. iv, 11]; suffering trouble as evildoers [2 Tim. ii, 9; 1 Pet. iii, 16]; having their property confiscated [Heb. x, 34]; and endangering their lives. 2 Cor. i, 9.
They contained the promises which moved them to serve God, and for the sake of which they suffered such things. They were daily read in families, expounded in their religious assemblies, quoted by writers, attacked by enemies, misconstrued by heretics and “grievous wolves,” and scrutinized by true Christians, lest heretics, in order to escape their denunciations, should alter the sacred text. In a short time their sound goes into all the earth. Rom. x, 18. Copies are scattered far and near. They are translated into different languages before the close of the first century. Commentaries are written on them; catalogues of the authentic books are carefully made and circulated in order to prevent forgeries. Thus universal notoriety is given to all the books of the New Testament, almost as soon as they were written.
Now we ask, How, under the circumstances, could the Scriptures be corrupted without detection and exposure? Is it possible that Christians would allow opposers to alter their public documents, which they esteemed more dear than life? Or, suppose Christians should undertake to corrupt their own sacred scriptures, would not opposers, who were not wanting in disposition or ability, have exposed their fraud? At least, would they not have preferred such a charge if they could have found ground upon which to predicate it?
Had one copy of the New Testament been corrupted, a discrepancy between that and others would have exposed the mistake at once. Hence60if one copy was altered, all were, otherwise some unaltered copies would have reached us, or at least would have been noticed and quoted in ecclesiastical history. If a change was universally made, it must have been done by Christians, heretics, or hostile opposers.
Is it credible to suppose that enemies unnoticed by Christians could have corrupted all the copies of scripture in the world, when they were so constantly read and revered and affectionately protected, when the enemies had not, and could not get, one-hundredth part of the copies in their possession?
Could any of the various sects of heretics have made the change, when, in addition to being watched by Christians, they were all eagerly watching each other, anxious to sustain a charge upon which to put others down and build themselves up. Supposing true Christians could have desired an alteration in their Scriptures, could they have accomplished such a task? Heretics on the one hand, and open enemies on the other, were all wide awake and watchful, with the Scriptures in their hands, ready to grasp the least pretext against the defenders of the Christian faith.
He that believes that such a change could have been made without detection, believes in a greater miracle than any recorded in the Bible, and that not only without evidence, but against all evidence. David Hume thought that no testimony could prove a miracle, but if infidels prove that the Scriptures have been corrupted, they prove a miracle without testimony.
Let those who think it an easy matter to change public documents without detection undertake it. Let some southern politician change the Declaration of Independence, or some northern man try his hand at corrupting the Constitution of the United States, and see how far he will proceed without detection. Even if it were possible for the corruption to creep into every copy extant, thousands would detect it as soon as their eye would light upon it. Yet its chance to pass unnoticed would be infinitely greater than that of the New Testament.
Just think of making a material alteration in a book translated into different languages, and transported almost “from sea to sea, and from the rivers to the end of the earth”—into Britain, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Turkey, etc.: committed to memory by thousands, and quoted by authors of the first three centuries, so that all of the New Testament except from six to twenty-six verses can be gathered from their writings.
No wonder that St. Augustine, after thoroughly canvassing the subject, came to the conclusion that “The integrity of the books of any one history, however eminent, cannot be so completely kept as that of the canonical Scriptures, translated into so many languages, and kept by the people of every age; and yet, some there have been who have forged writings in the names of the apostles. In vain indeed, because that Scripture has been so esteemed, so celebrated, so known.” Lard., Vol. ii, p. 594.
Reasoning with an opposer the same writer says, “If any one should charge you with having interpolated some texts alleged by you, would you not immediately answer that it is impossible for you to do such a thing in books read by all Christians? And that if any such attempt had been made by you, it would have been presently discovered and defeated by comparing the ancient copies? Well then, for the same reason that the Scriptures cannot be corrupted by you, neither could they be corrupted by any other people.” Id. p. 228.
The agreement among existing manuscripts of the New Testament is an additional proof that they have not been corrupted. Upon this point Mr. Patterson says, “The genuineness of the New Testament which we now possess is abundantly proved by the comparison of over two thousand manuscripts from all parts of the world; scrutinized during a period of nearly a hundred years by the most critical scholars, so accurately that the variations of such things as would in English correspond to the crossing of a t, or the dotting of an i, have been carefully enumerated; yet the result of the whole of this searching scrutiny has been merely the suggesting of thirteen, or as later critics say, nine unimportant alterations in the received text, of the seven thousand nine hundred and fifty-nine verses of the New Testament. This is a fact utterly unexampled in the history of manuscripts.”
There are but six manuscripts of the Comedies of Terence, and these have not been copied once for every thousand times the New Testament has been transcribed, yet there are thirty thousand variations found in these six manuscripts, or an average of five thousand for each, and many of them seriously affect the sense. The average number of variations in the manuscripts of the New Testament examined, is not quite thirty for each, including all the trivialities already noticed.
It is true that uninformed persons become alarmed when they hear infidels state that among the manuscripts collected by Griesbach, there were one hundred and fifty thousand various readings; but all cause for suspicion is allayed when we learn that there were nearly four hundred manuscripts from which these various readings were taken; not only so, but not one in a thousand makes any important variation of meaning. They consist almost entirely in mistakes of transcribers, such as the transposition or omission of letters, the changing of words in a sentence, or the use of certain words instead of others of a similar meaning. It is said that “the worst manuscript extant, if it were our only copy, would not change or pervert one single doctrine or precept.” I also have good authority to back me up, when I say that the difference in the manuscripts collated by Griesbach are no greater than the difference in the English Bibles printed in the last two hundred years. This being true, the worst manuscripts extant, neither obscure nor render doubtful a single doctrine or precept of the New Testament.
While the diversity of readings is not against the integrity of the New Testament, we believe that they are decidedly in its favor; for this difference is all-sufficient proof that our present manuscripts are copied from various manuscripts of ancient times, while the fact that the difference is so small, in our present copies, shows that the difference in the original manuscripts must have been inconsiderable. This shows that our present New Testament differs but little from the autographs of its original writers could they now be collected.
Another proof of the integrity of the New Testament is found in its agreement with the numerous quotations made from it in the writings of ancient Christians, and with ancient translations. I have before remarked that nearly all of the New Testament could be gathered from quotations made from it by writers of the first three centuries. These quotations agree precisely with the corresponding parts of our New Testament. For an abundance of evidence on this point, the reader is referred to Alexander’s Evidences, pp. 266–302.
We now possess in various languages, translations of the New Testament reaching as far back as the first century. I will only refer to one. The old Syriac version called “Peshito,” is considered to have been made before the close of the first century. In the second it was in general circulation. It is said that “it was never brought into contact with our copies of the New Testament, because not known in Europe until the sixteenth century; though handed down by a line of tradition perfectly independent of, and unknown to, that by which our Greek Testament was received, yet when the two come to be compared, the text of one was almost an exact version of the text of the other. The difference was altogether unimportant. So clearly and impressibly has divine providence attested the integrity of our beloved Scriptures.” M'Ilvaine, pp. 127–8.
Mr. Campbell briefly sums up the argument for the integrity of the New Testament in the following language:
“That the Scriptures of the New Testament are now read in language communicating substantially all the same ideas originally expressed in them, appears from the quotations found in the works of these first advocates of the Christian cause. To prevent the alteration or interpolation of these documents, the various sects which soon sprung up, afforded every sort of safeguard. Various sectaries arose under the influence of the Oriental philosophy, who rather engrafted Christianity upon their philosophy, than embraced Christianity as an entirely new system. The Platonic philosophy became the parent of many sects. The Platonists began to expound the Scriptures philosophically, and this led to many factions among the Christians. Each party soon got into the practice of quoting the Scriptures to prove its own tenets. The opposing party narrowly scrutinized these quotations. This prevented the corruption of the text. And thus by that government which from evil still educes good, the very heretics themselves which disturbed the peace and retarded the progress of Christianity, became the guardians of the integrity and purity of the text.”—Debate with Owen, p. 273.
How good the Lord is to give us such a bright evidence of the integrity of his word. We are now as undoubtedly in possession of genuine copies of the New Testament, as written by the contemporaries of Jesus Christ, as if we had the autographs of its writers. We shall next inquire into the truth of its narrative.