Let's examine, in some detail, the available evidence that validates the inspiration of the text in our New Testament.

The integrity of the Old Testament text was established via the transmission of the Masorite text and confirmed by the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The accuracy of the Old Testament text is largely the result of the meticulous care the rabbinical scholars took during the transmission process.

The fidelity of the New Testament text, however, rests on an altogether different foundation--the mass amount of manuscript evidence. Counting just the Greek copies, the New Testament text is preserved in some 5,366 partial and complete manuscript portions that were hand-copied during the period that lasted from the second through the fifteenth century. Following are definitions of some terms pertinent to this discussion:

1. Autographs-Books written in the author's own handwriting. Much of the early writing was done on papyrus, which is quite fragile. Consequently, none of the autographs survived. In other words, there are no autograph copies from Matthew, Luke, John, or Paul.
   
   
2. Manuscripts-Hand-written literary compositions, in contrast to print copies. Obviously, most available New Testament copies are manuscripts. The abundance of these copies makes possible the completely accurate reconstruction of the original. There is no known manuscript that contains the entire Bible, aka a pandect. There are different types of manuscripts
   
   
3. Uncials-The earliest and most important group of manuscripts were written in uncials, capital letters formed in a curved or rounded shape. (About 300 of these are extant.) This type of writing flourished from the third to the seventh century A.D.
   
   
4. Minuscules (Cursives)-Dated between the ninth and fifteenth centuries. Written in a smaller, running style, these manuscripts form the largest number (over 5,000) of manuscripts available today. The number of manuscripts, not all of them complete, is well above 5,000--more than any other book, of any kind, in any age.
   
   
5. Lectionaries-Final testimony (which has been generally undervalued) of the New Testament text are numerous lectionaries, or church-service books, containing selected readings. A great majority of the lectionary readings consisted of passages taken from the gospels.

How important are the dates of these manuscripts? Are the oldest the most valuable? The three oldest vellum manuscripts are complete, or near-complete, copies of the New Testament.

Codex Vaticanius {B} The Vatican Manuscript: Is perhaps the oldest (325-350) uncial on parchment or vellum. It is acknowledged to contain the finest, earliest, and most important copies of the New Testament text. This manuscript, of the entire Bible, was probably written during the fourth century. Textual scholars were unaware of its existence until 1475, when it was catalogued in the Vatican Library, where it still resides. For the next 400 years, the scholars were not permitted to study it. In 1889-90, a complete photographic copy was made, and in 1904, an additional New Testament copy was made. This manuscript includes most of the Septuagint (LXX) version of the Old Testament and most of the Greek New Testament. Only recently has it been made available for extensive scholarly research. Missing from it are some of the beginning and ending of the book of Psalms.

Codex Sinaiticus (Sinaitic Manuscript, Codex Aleph (First letter in the Hebrew alphabet): The manuscript is so-named because the great text critic Constantine Tischendorf discovered it in 1844, at St. Catherine's Monastery on Mt. Sinai. During his first visit (in 1844), he discovered, in a basket of scraps used by the monks to start fires, 43 leaves of vellum, containing portions (1 Chronicles, Jeremiah, Nehemiah, and Esther) of the Septuagint version. Due to the excitement he exhibited over finding these documents, he was not permitted to take them. They remained lost for 15 years. In 1859, under authority from Czar Alexander II, he returned. Again, he was about to return empty-handed, when a monastery steward showed him an almost-complete copy of the Scriptures, as well as other books. This manuscript, the now-famous Codex Sinaiticus, contained all of the New Testament, save Mark 16:9-20 and John 7:53-8:11. In 1933, Russia, more interested in money than archeology or preservation of truth, sold the documents to the British Museum for $500,000. The Codex Sinaiticus now occupies a special place in that museum.

Codex Alexandrianus (A) (The Alexandrian Manuscript): A well-preserved fifth-century manuscript that probably originated with the scribes of Alexandria, Egypt. This manuscript contains both Testaments, but it is flawed in several different ways.

• Twenty-three leaves were dropped from the book of Matthew, two from John, and three from 2 Corinthians.
• Further, it was not as good a quality as the other two.

It was given to the king of England, but too late (1627) to be used in the King James Version of the Bible.

The Manuscript of Ephraem: At various times, it became very difficult to obtain writing materials. In order to continue writing, the scribes took old parchments, scraped them clean, and then wrote on them again. This kind of manuscript is called a palimpsest. The Codex Ephraem (Codex C) is a palimpsest manuscript. The top layer of writing is a twelfth-century work of Ephraem of Syria, but underneath, the second layer is a fifth-century copy of the Scriptures. It contains both the Old and New Testaments. It now resides in the National Library of Paris. Because of its advanced age, it is a good witness for the New Testament.

The Codex Bezae (Codex D): In 1581, Theodore Beze gave this manuscript to Cambridge University. It is still there, and is the earliest known copy in two languages-Greek and Latin.

Another subject that begs to be discussed concerns "textual variations." In attempting to discredit the Bible's validity, its enemies point to the fact that the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament contain an estimated 250,000 to 300,000 variants. How should Christians respond to this information? Is it enough to shake our confidence in the reliability and inspiration of the Bible text? Is this a large number of mistakes? Sadly, just looking at the numbers conveys a false impression. The large number of variants results from counting all the variants in ALL the more-than-5,000 manuscripts. For example, if the same word is misspelled in all 5,000 manuscripts, it counts as 5,000 mistakes. The larger the number of manuscripts, the larger the number of variants. A person who allows such statistics to undermine his confidence in the authenticity of the manuscripts must be either unlearned or a skeptic. Of course, the question that must be asked and answered is: are there significant variations?

Trivial variations of no significant consequence--Often, these are nothing more major than changing the word "the" to "a." Of course, misspelling also comes into play. Over the years, the spelling of some Greek words has changed. Or a variation may result from changes in the order of a few words. For example, the phrase "Jesus Christ the Lord" may be changed to "the Lord Jesus Christ." These variations do not, in any significant way, alter the inspiration or meaning of the text.

Substantial variations that do not affect the text--Some variations involve only one or two words, while others involve whole verses. However, these variations, which appear to be substantial, do not affect our present text. The story of the adulterous woman in John 7:53-8:11 is one example. Many manuscripts omit these verses, and although this is a substantial omission, it does not affect our present-day text. There is simply not enough evidence to warrant seriously questioning the New Testament's reliability.

Substantial variations that do have some bearing on the text--For example, some versions omit the last verses of Mark's Gospel (Mark 16:9-20). The Mark 16 problem is unique. While the evidence for 1 John 5:7 and John 7:53-8:11 points in one direction, the evidence for Mark 16 points in both directions. The Vatican and Sinaitic manuscripts do not contain Mark 16:9-20, but a host of others (Alexandrian, Ephraem, Code Bezae, etc.) do. The problem is significant; but whatever the correct viewpoint, it is important to realize that the passage's basic truthfulness is not in dispute. The main events of the passage are recorded elsewhere. And if proponents who advocate rejecting these verses are correct, it has no effect on any doctrine or teaching of Christ. Keep one thing in mind. Even if those who do not like this passage because of what it says concerning baptism are correct, they still have to contend with such passages as 1 Peter 3:21.

In reviewing the testimony in favor of the New Testament texts, consider one vital point. The fact that our present Bible agrees with the original documents is unrelated to whether or not the original documents were inspired. That is an altogether different subject. Remember, the New Testament documents have been in existence for more than 1900 years. For 15 of the 19 centuries, they were copied by hand. In spite of this, there are only between 12 and 20 significant variations in the entire New Testament; and none of them has any bearing on an important doctrinal matter. On the other hand, William Shakespeare's wrote less than 400 years ago (and after the invention of the printing press). Yet, in every one of Shakespeare's 37 plays, there are probably a hundred readings still in dispute, a large number of which materially affect the meaning of the passages in which they occur!

"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 general integrity of the books of the NT may be regarded as finally established." (The Bible & Archaeology, by Sir Frederic Kenyon)

The real question to consider is whether any of those "textual variations" change the meaning of the New Testament's doctrinal teaching. The answer of course is "no." Surely, after more than 2,000 years, if the New Testament (and, for that matter, the Old Testament) had some blatant contradiction, someone would have been able to produce it. This is a valid and reliable text-period!