Myths About How We Got The Bible
We live in a day when the Bible is pushed aside by many people in our culture. Even by many who call themselves Christian. It is no longer the source of morals, of doctrine, of principles for living. One reason is because of the critics who dismiss it, saying it is not from God, but just a human document. Here are a few of the myths about it, and responses to the critics.
Some say the writings of the Bible were put together at the Council of Nicaea in 325AD or that Emperor Constantine hand-picked what to include. This theory was used in the book and movie The Da Vinci Code. The fact is, there was no such vote at the Council of Nicaea, and Constantine never decreed what books belonged in the Bible. He was the first Roman emperor to accept Christianity, true. But early Christians relied on Jewish precedent to determine Old Testament books and relied on apostolic authority for New Testament books. In other words, New Testament books had to be written by either an apostle or by one of their apprentices. The only deviation from this was the apocryphal books included by Catholics, but even they don’t give them the same weight of authenticity.
A second myth is that copying the Bible in the early years was so difficult that the original message has long been lost, and we can’t be confident of what we have today. It’s true we no longer have the originals, but this is true for virtually all literary works of antiquity. But to say the original message is lost is without merit. The reason is because the biblical text was copied so many times with care and attention, that comparing the huge number of copies throughout history allows us to verify if the text has continued consistent from the original. What few differences the scholars note have no significance in setting doctrinal beliefs from Jesus or the apostles. This makes the Bible unique and provides more confidence of its accuracy than any other book from the past.
Another myth is that translating the Bible into other languages messes with proper interpretation. Once more, translation does offer its challenges, but rarely do we see any doctrine challenged because of the slight differences in wording from one translation to another. Even in the 4th century with Jerome, he was debating the merits of a word-for-word approach versus a sense-for-sense one, as he did Latin revisions. The biggest danger here is with paraphrased Bibles, which are not translations, but rather one person’s rewording of the text. When using them, it is wise to also use a translation and compare. A good word-for-word translation is the ESV, a good sense-for-sense translation is the NIV.
A final myth for this article is that the Catholic church completely outlawed Bible translations, desiring only to use their Latin version. The truth is, even the Catholic church (who did for many years maintain Latin as their official language) translated the Bible into English in 1609, two years before the King James Bible was published. This has been an area of struggle, John Wycliffe’s desire to put the Bible into local vernacular got him into trouble, as well as William Tyndale later. A high motive of the Protestant movement was to allow the common people access to God’s Word on their own.
The good news is that truth is better than fiction, and although the Bible has had many hurdles to overcome through the years, it can be verified more than any other book as true to the original writings. Because so many have tried to destroy it during this history, it would seem God has providentially guided it and protected it for our benefit. Please don’t take it for granted.
Some say the writings of the Bible were put together at the Council of Nicaea in 325AD or that Emperor Constantine hand-picked what to include. This theory was used in the book and movie The Da Vinci Code. The fact is, there was no such vote at the Council of Nicaea, and Constantine never decreed what books belonged in the Bible. He was the first Roman emperor to accept Christianity, true. But early Christians relied on Jewish precedent to determine Old Testament books and relied on apostolic authority for New Testament books. In other words, New Testament books had to be written by either an apostle or by one of their apprentices. The only deviation from this was the apocryphal books included by Catholics, but even they don’t give them the same weight of authenticity.
A second myth is that copying the Bible in the early years was so difficult that the original message has long been lost, and we can’t be confident of what we have today. It’s true we no longer have the originals, but this is true for virtually all literary works of antiquity. But to say the original message is lost is without merit. The reason is because the biblical text was copied so many times with care and attention, that comparing the huge number of copies throughout history allows us to verify if the text has continued consistent from the original. What few differences the scholars note have no significance in setting doctrinal beliefs from Jesus or the apostles. This makes the Bible unique and provides more confidence of its accuracy than any other book from the past.
Another myth is that translating the Bible into other languages messes with proper interpretation. Once more, translation does offer its challenges, but rarely do we see any doctrine challenged because of the slight differences in wording from one translation to another. Even in the 4th century with Jerome, he was debating the merits of a word-for-word approach versus a sense-for-sense one, as he did Latin revisions. The biggest danger here is with paraphrased Bibles, which are not translations, but rather one person’s rewording of the text. When using them, it is wise to also use a translation and compare. A good word-for-word translation is the ESV, a good sense-for-sense translation is the NIV.
A final myth for this article is that the Catholic church completely outlawed Bible translations, desiring only to use their Latin version. The truth is, even the Catholic church (who did for many years maintain Latin as their official language) translated the Bible into English in 1609, two years before the King James Bible was published. This has been an area of struggle, John Wycliffe’s desire to put the Bible into local vernacular got him into trouble, as well as William Tyndale later. A high motive of the Protestant movement was to allow the common people access to God’s Word on their own.
The good news is that truth is better than fiction, and although the Bible has had many hurdles to overcome through the years, it can be verified more than any other book as true to the original writings. Because so many have tried to destroy it during this history, it would seem God has providentially guided it and protected it for our benefit. Please don’t take it for granted.