The Historical Reliability of the New Testament

[TheRealJoeFish]

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And then there are the faked letters of Paul.  Why would anyone think a text written by someone fraudulently pretending to be someone else was sacred?

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Just out of curiosity, which letters do you believe are "faked letters of Paul"?

This whole article on the Authorship of the New Testament is enlightening, but pasted below is the specific section on the Letters of Paul:


"Paul's Letters

By far the largest section of the New Testament is made of the Epistles that are attributed to Paul of Tarsus. Paul lived between 5 and 67 CE, so the dating of his authentic works is generally fairly easy. His influence on the theology, rituals, and cultural beliefs of what is to become "Christianity" in its popular form is far more significant than the (supposed) words of Jesus himself. There are fourteen letters (Epistles) attributed to Paul. Of these, seven are generally undisputed as authentic.

    Romans
    Galatians
    1 Thessalonians
    1 Corinthians
    2 Corinthians
    Philippians
    Philemon

Three of the letters are ones that are debated by scholars as to their authenticity. In several cases, it is argued he wrote part of them, but that they were later highly edited and supplemented.

    Ephesians
    Colossians and
    2 Thessalonians

It is generally accepted by scholars that 4 are not his work

    First Timothy
    Second Timothy
    Titus
    Hebrews (see below)"

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I guess my follow-up question is this:

Do you agree that some books of the bible have multiple authors? If so, what goes into your Manuscript "M" - just the first author's work, or the additions, or just some of them, or what? And who's to say?

[Longhorn]

Oh boy... is this what convinces you? This is what makes your bible special? REALLY?

It has nothing to do with the validity of the largely or rather entirely unsupported supernatural claims made and nothing to do with forming a good argument for god's existence.

[abaris]

The purpose of these first posts is to establish one fact: we are working with an accurate text.

Accurate of what exactly?

We have a fairy tale, complete with the walking dead and splatter elements at the end.

So I could write a string of swear words and it would be an accurate text. Does it prove something? No. Same goes for the new testament.

[Minimalist]

Like I said...in one form or another, this shit has been done before.


http://atheistforums.org/thread-10260-po...#pid213719

[Randy Carson]

I guess my follow-up question is this:

Do you agree that some books of the bible have multiple authors? If so, what goes into your Manuscript "M" - just the first author's work, or the additions, or just some of them, or what? And who's to say?

Jenny-

Thanks for the link...I'll take a look.

Yes, some books have multiple authors, and yes, some of the authors are less certain than others. As for "who's to say", why, only one, infallible Church had that authority, of course!

But forgive me if I ask that we defer this discussion until later. As you probably know, I will be "swarmed" by AF regulars eager to take their best shots at the new guy, so I want to try to keep the discussion focused very tightly in this thread. 

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Oh boy... is this what convinces you? This is what makes your bible special? REALLY?

It has nothing to do with the validity of the largely or rather entirely unsupported supernatural claims made and nothing to do with forming a good argument for god's existence.

Didja notice the outline numbering? I.A.0....I.A.1., etc?

We're just getting started. 

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The purpose of these first posts is to establish one fact: we are working with an accurate text.

Accurate of what exactly?

We have a fairy tale, complete with the walking dead and splatter elements at the end.

So I could write a string of swear words and it would be an accurate text. Does it prove something? No. Same goes for the new testament.

Either the text that you can read today is an accurate translation of what the original author wrote or it isn't.

So, yes or no? 

Oh, and some "why" would be nice if you have anything. 

[robvalue]

What's the point of all this?

The only claims that matter in the bible are the supernatural ones, and they are impossible to validate. Especially so with just a textual account. The rest of it is of no consequence. Without these, it's just an inaccurate history/story book.

Apologies if you're not actually trying to prove Christianity is true.

[TheRealJoeFish]

Either the text that you can read today is an accurate translation of what the original author wrote or it isn't.

Can you have two different english translations of the bible that are still both "accurate?"  What if they're somewhat or wholly inconsistent?

[Longhorn]

Didja notice the outline numbering? I.A.0....I.A.1., etc?

We're just getting started. 

Uh-huh, lovely

I sense an unjustified leap in your reasoning in the nearest future...

[Simon Moon]

Either the text that you can read today is an accurate translation of what the original author wrote or it isn't.

So, yes or no? 

Oh, and some "why" would be nice if you have anything. 

It is not so easy. There are parts that are accurate to the original, and parts that aren't.

For example, the oldest and most reliable copies of Mark end at verse 16:8. 16:9 - 20 are almost assuredly a later addition by apologists. So, we have at least one example of the current Bible that is not accurate to the original. 

But why should we care? An accurate copy or translation of the original only means that we have a accurate copy or translation of a fictional, mythological text. Textual accounts of supernatural events are not valid forms of evidence. 

[robvalue]

Nope. You can jump as many little hurdles as you like on the way, but that one is always going to be there! It's really high, that hurdle. It's infinite metres tall. Which is why people tend to go around it...