Is Scripture reliable?
Do we know what Jesus actually said?
It has been suggested that, because the manuscripts we have of the New Testament are “copies of copies” that they would be unreliable as errors would have crept in.
In fact, we have a large number of early manuscripts found in different places which show that the text was very stable.
Also, the earliest complete manuscript of the whole New Testament, the Codex Siniaticus, dates back to 350AD so it is quite possible that the original autographs would still have been in existence at that time.
The earliest handwritten copy of a Gospel fragment is estimated to be between 100 and 150 AD which implies that the original was written in the 1st century which is within the living memory of the events described.
The authors were either eyewitnesses themselves (Matthew and John, according to tradition) or closely associated with eyewitnesses (Mark with Peter, and Luke with Paul and other early followers). Luke explicitly states his intention to provide an "orderly account" based on information from "eyewitnesses and ministers of the word" (Luke 1:1-4).
How does the evidence for the Gospels compare?
Compared with other ancient classical documents, the amount of material we have of the Gospels is immense. There may be about 20 early manuscripts of Homer compared with over 5000 early manuscripts of the Gospels or parts of them. In addition there are large numbers of early translations into various languages. Together, we have about 20000 versions. The evidence for the accuracy of what we have today is huge.
As well as that, even if all the Bibles were wiped out, it would be possible to reconstruct much of it from quotations in the writings of the Church Fathers.
The evidence is almost irrefutable and this in itself points to something very remarkable about Jesus who inspired the Gospels.
How big are the differences in the hand-written copies of the Gospels?
There are two passages which are in some manuscripts and not others. Mark 16:9-20 and John 7:57-8:11. Apart from those, and given the vast number of manuscripts we can use to compare, greater than 99% of the Gospels can be known beyond reasonable doubt.
Moreover, Bart Ehrman who is a well known critic of the Biblical text, says in the appendix to his book “Misquoting Jesus” that no variations which he has found has any bearing on doctrine or ethical teaching.
Jesus, the Gospels, and the “Telephone Game”
It has been suggested that errors were introduced in the passing on of the Gospels by word of mouth similar to the “telephone game” or “Chinese whispers”. However the Gospels were not transmitted like that through a chain of individuals. Rather transmission happened through networks of people where any error introduced by one person would be corrected by the versions transmitted by everyone else. The two situations are not analogous.
Real places and Real people in the Bible account of Jesus
With the exception of Matthew, the Gospels are generally believed to have been written outside the Land of Israel and yet the Gospel narrative is set in real places which would be well known to the people of the Land but not those outside. This is evidence that the text is based on the testimony of people who lived there and not made up later by others.
Likewise the names of the people in the Gospel accounts have a similar frequency to that found in non-biblical records. Since name popularity varies over time, anyone wanting to make up stories would be very unlikely to know what names were most popular at an earlier time and a different place. This implies that the writers had a reliable sources which included high quality information about the Land and its people.
The Gospels often accurately reflect the social, political, and religious customs of first-century Israel. Archaeological discoveries have corroborated various details mentioned in the Gospels, such as the existence of the Pool of Siloam, the town of Nazareth in the first century, and the title of Pontius Pilate.
There is evidence that the Gospels are derived from eyewitness testimony and that this can be seen from stories involving named minor characters as well as the the main witnesses in the Bible’s accounts of Jesus.
Nobody knows for sure who wrote the Gospels but despite some scholars’ belief that the attributed names were given to add kudos to the material when the authors were unknown, there are good arguments for accepting that their traditional attribution to Matthew, Mark, Luke (using material from Peter) and John are correct.
There are some who would say that the Gospel stories were made up in order to meet the theological needs of the people at that time. However, while there are certainly differences in detail between the Gospel accounts, there is no evidence that the historical facts had a spin put on them in an attempt to mislead.
The "Criterion of Embarrassment":
Some details in the Gospels, such as the disciples' misunderstandings, their desertion of Jesus, and the initial disbelief in the resurrection, could be seen as embarrassing for the early church. Their inclusion suggests a commitment to reporting events as they occurred, rather than embellishing them.