If you can't join them... BEAT them!!!

  So I had another debate with Dr. Sarfati.  It is funny how you interact with someone you admire.  I have posted a couple times on the group "Jesus is the lamb".  Everytime Dr. Sarfati would respond to my post it was critical.  So I had the desire to post an article that was good but completely in line with what he taught and I even cited His ministry as a source.  Yet after a few weeks no response and then later he went back to critical remarks. Sometimes you are going to across people that you really want to please.  Yet they are just not going to be pleased by you.  So then he posted this article which I knew was in opposition to me. So I realized that if i could not simply gain his approval I could conquer his opposition and win respect.  Ultimately I was counciled by a friend in the group to remember that I should be content with The Lord's approval and not worry about if others(even christians) accept or reject me.
Meanwhile, I believe that the Bible version debate will be the theological and even apologetic debate of the 21st century.  As a New age culture picks and probes at the internal integrity of the christian religion we must be ready with an answer.  I think me and Dr. Sarfati had a classic arguement which is why I had to post this facebook debate. 




Jonathan David Sarfati


“What is overlooked in the approach that assumes that the earlier manuscripts were corrupted and produced by heretics is the fact that virtually all Gospels manuscripts harmonize. That is, in parallel passages between two or more Gospels, virtually all manuscripts, from time to time, change the wording in one Gospel so that it duplicates the wording in another. Would heretics do this? It represents rather a high view of scripture—or, as Paul said in another context, zeal that is not according to knowledge. Further, the great majority of these harmonizations are either found in isolated manuscripts or in later manuscripts. This tells us that the tendencies of the earliest scribes was to harmonize, but because such harmonizations are done sporadically and in isolation they are easily detected. And later scribes produced their copies in great quantities in a heavily concentrated area, resulting in a more systematic harmonization—again, something that is easily detected.”

Five More Myths about Bible Translations and the Transmission of the Text
danielbwallace.com
      Matt Singleton I find it interested how you excluded the beginning of this section: "Myth 3: Heretics have severely corrupted the text.



This myth is usually promoted by King James Only folks who assume that the manuscripts that came from Egypt were terribly corrupted. A more sophisticated approach seeks to demonstrate this in passage after passage. For example, would orthodox scribes begin the quotation of Isaiah 40.3 and Malachi 3.1 in Mark 1.2 with “As it is written in Isaiah the prophet”? The alternative reading, found in the majority of manuscripts, reads “As it is written in the prophets.” But the earliest, most widespread reading is “in Isaiah the prophet.” It looks as though the later scribes were troubled by this attribution and they ‘corrected’ it to be more generic so as to include Malachi." So in other words, the later manuscripts have corrected the old errors of the original manuscript. So the short text grew into a more complete text.

December 31, 2012 at 2:06pm · Like..
Matt SIngleton What does that sound like? Something small and simple changing to more complex over long periods of time? evolution? perhaps because the manuscript text critics were also text critics of dating authorship. representing textual evolution. You will also find this evolution going back the evolution of religion which goes back to the evolution of man/anthropology.

December 31, 2012 at 2:11pm · Like..
Matt SIngleton I want to pay careful attention to this section "Scholars have for a long time recognized that the Gospel writers shape their narratives, including the sayings of Jesus. A comparison of the Synoptics reveals this on almost every page. Matthew quotes Jesus differently than Mark does who quotes Jesus differently than Luke does. And John’s Jesus speaks significantly differentyly than the Synoptic Jesus does. Just consider the key theme of Jesus’ ministry in the Synoptics: ‘the kingdom of God’ (or, in Matthew’s rendering, often ‘the kingdom of heaven’). Yet this phrase occurs only twice in John, being replaced usually by ‘eternal life.’ (“Kingdom of God” occurs 53 times in the Gospels, only two of which are in John; “kingdom of heaven” occurs 32 times, all in Matthew. “Eternal life” occurs 8 times in the Synoptics, and more than twice as often in John.) The ancient historians were far more concerned to get the gist of what a speaker said than they were to record his exact words. And if Jesus taught mostly, or even occasionally, in Aramaic, since the Gospels are in Greek the words by definition are not exact." Why do we have to assume differents quotes are all the exact same quotes from different words? Why do we even have to assume that these men are making up stories off of their memory without the divine intervention of the Holy Spirit? I believe that the gospel writers are intelligent and with the revelation and inspiration of the Holy Spirit they are in errant. the words of God were penned by God in heaven psalm 119:89 "For ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven."

So God had a reason for every Word that was penned down. 2 peter1:20 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

December 31, 2012 at 2:21pm · Like..
Jonathan David Sarfati None of the above shows that the late Byzantine manuscripts are better. About the harmonization, a while ago I responded to someone who brought up:



“Therefore we have the Scriptures today, the "more sure word", and I would also conclude that God's word does not contradict itself, yet the Codex Sinaiticus does in various places including Mark 1:2-3 where it quotes from Malachi and Isaiah, yet attributes it all to Isaiah which is a contradiction.”



My response:



You mean Mark 1:2–4 which says:

"2 It is written in Isaiah the prophet: "I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way" —

3 "a voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’"

4 And so John came, baptizing in the desert region and preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins."



The first quotation (v. 2) comes from Malachi 3:1, as you note, and only the second quotation is from Isaiah 40:3. But this is no error, given the Jewish citation methods. The Jews often kept all the Prophets on a single scroll, and so would often cite the most prominent of the prophets. It it more likely that later gentile scribes failed to realize this, and "corrected" the text to "As it is written in the prophets". But there is no error in following the citation conventions of the day rather than 21st-century practices, as various biblioskeptics unreasonably demand.



Another example is in Matthew 27:9–10:



"9 Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: "They took the thirty silver coins, the price set on him by the people of Israel,

10 and they used them to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me."



Here, most of this was from Zechariah 11:12–13, and only a small allusion to Jeremiah 18:1–4 and 19:1–3, and the field mentioned in Jeremiah 32:6-9. Once more, some scribes tried to "correct" this, but far fewer manuscripts have this "correction" than the previous one. Hence the majority text has exactly the same type of supposed "error" that you criticize.

January 1 at 4:27pm · Like..
Matt SIngleton The Byzantine text is superior to the alexandrine text because it identifies with what the scriptures say about themselves.

Scriptures says that the church of the living God is the pillar and ground of truth 1timothy 3:15 and the scriptures are preserved for the assurance of salvation of that true church. 1 Peter 1:23-25

The Byzantine copiest out number the alexandrines almost 100/1.

And they were living at a time where they could evaluate the alexandrines manuscripts as well as manuscripts that we could never see.



"the prophets" is a common biblical phrase and classification of biblical writers. Matthew 11:13



The passage you site in Matthew 27:9-10

Sites Jeremiah as opposed to Isaiah. In the MacArthur study bible study notes on this text it says "Jeremiah came first in the order of prophetic books, so the prophets were sometimes collectively referred to by his name." however that would disqualify the explanation of the alexandrine text of mark 1:2, after all Isaiah would not be the head of the scroll.

Also it maybe that the references to Zechariah were simply illustrative, while the fulfillment of prophecy is literally accomplished in Jeremiah.



And let's get rid of the deceptive notion that the alexandrine texts are somehow the originals. They contradict themselves on 3,000 occaisions vaticanus vrs. Sinaiticus.



And even James white admits that there are thousands of manuscripts which were burned and have simply aged because of use.

But which manuscript has God's people used most?

January 1 at 9:17pm via mobile · Like..
Jonathan David Sarfati Arguments from circumstance mean nothing. Probably hardly any Bible was used for longer than the Vulgate. The above sounds like something a roman Catholic would say, since it is tradition-centred not Bible-centred.



There are no two Byzantine manuscripts that are identical. Nor are any of them identical to the so-called Textus Receptus.



On the issue of prophet citations, here is something from our site—http://creation.com/claimed-bible-errors:



Also, Noel Weeks, PhD in ancient history and languages at Brandeis University under Cyrus Gordon, showed how this actually supported the reliability of Scripture. In an interview in Australian Presbyterian by CMI-supporter Rev. Peter Hastie, he was asked, “Can we say that the Bible is true even though it is imprecise with some of its statements? For example, Matthew attributes a quote from Zechariah to Jeremiah in Matthew 27:9. Isn’t this an instance of imprecision?” Dr Weeks replied:



Let me tell you a story about when I was doing my PhD at Brandeis University in Boston. Brandeis is a leading Jewish university. I remember sitting in a lecture by a very fine Jewish scholar, Nahum Sarna, who was talking about the canon of the Old Testament as it was understood in early Judaism. One of the topics he touched on was the order of the books. He said, “Well, you know that there was a period in which Jeremiah was regarded as the first book of the prophets.” Of course, nobody in the class knew that. Anyway, he continued, “One proof is that you have a quote from Zechariah quoted as being from Jeremiah because in the Jewish way of labelling things you call a book by its first few words, and you call a collection of books by the first book in that collection. Thus one of the evidences that we have of Jeremiah being the first book of the prophets in the first century is the New Testament.” I was sitting there thinking, “This Jewish audience doesn’t understand why that’s an important question, because this particular text has been held up as proof that there are errors in the New Testament. All it says is that the New Testament is a Jewish document. It is speaking in the language that Jews would speak and understand.”

Claimed Bible errors

creation.com

A correspondent claims there are errors in the Bible, but all of the alleged  

Matt SIngleton If your position is bible centered then argue from scripture. I showed you where the bible gives detail to it's preservation. Am I right? If so your argument against the text is not according to God's Will, if not, then you should tell my why the scriptures say something else.

Why would denying the superiority of the Catholic bible be catholic? Codex vaticanus is under the control of the Roman catholic church. And until his recent death cardinal Carlo martini committee for the Nestlé/Alund text.



Why does it matter if the Byzantine manuscripts are identical? When are you going to hold the alexandrine manuscripts to any level of accountability?



The Byzantine differs in spelling while the alexandrine differs in canons.

Differences of spelling only show us that there where so many different copyists to destroy the idea of conspiracy.

But when people claim the gospel of mark is the first gospel and yet claim that it does not have an account of the resurrection; you can spin it however you like. But reality bears the fruits of apostates like Bart Ehrman.



As long as you think that there is not a single inspired book on planet earth you will have to compromise with scripture. At which point you will have to give up on key points of your apologetic and eventually, theology.

January 1 at 11:34pm via mobile · Like..
Jonathan David Sarfati Just come out with it: are you KJV-only?

January 2 at 1:35am · Like..
Matt SIngleton I am a preservationist. I believe that God has preserved his word perfectly for us in the Hebrew masoretic text and the Greek textus receptus.

I believe that the authorized version nicknamed Kjv is the standard English translation of the Bible.

I recommend the Kjv. Though translations are not perfectly inspired. But derive there authority from the Greek and Hebrew.

January 2 at 1:42am via mobile · Like..
Matt SIngleton Put it like this, if you saw me talking to James white and Peter Ruckman.

James white would say I am king James only. But Peter Ruckman would call me a liberal TR man.

January 2 at 1:47am via mobile · Like..
Matt SIngleton But my position is essentially the same as Westminster, Charles spurgeon, d.a.Waite, Henry Morris, Frank Logsdon and Edward hills

January 2 at 1:53am via mobile · Like..
Jonathan David Sarfati One can be a preservationist, but this doens't entail that God preserved the Biblical manuscripts they way you think. The KJVO way is untenable because it would follow that no Bible existed before the Romanist Erasmus performed his textual criticisms on a few Greek manuscripts. None of these MSS is identical to the so-called Textus Receptus, so where was the "preservation"?

What is the evidence that God preserved Scripture in the TR, which differs from the Majority Text in 1,800 places?



The Westminster divines were too early for the textual debate. Spurgeon preached a sermon called "And we are: A Jewel from the revised Version", based completely on the superiority of the Alexandrian text in 1 John 3:1. I know much more than Henry Morris did about this issue; his writings on textual matters were very weak (James White showed where Dr Morris erred on both factual and logical grounds http://vintage.aomin.org/A%20Response%20to%20a%20Brother%20in%20Christ.html). I have rebutted Waite's slanderous attacks on the NIV, again showing that he is loose with facts and guilty of double standards.



The Geneva Bible is a much better translation of the same texts that the KJV translators used.

Alpha and Omega Ministries, The Christian Apologetics Ministry of James R. White

vintage.aomin.org

Christian Apologetics, Theology, Information on Mormonism, Roman Catholicism, J...ehovah's Witnesses, etc. A reformed ministry dedicated to sharing the Gospel of God's grace!See More.January 2 at 2:14am · Edited · Like..Matt SIngleton Your first premise is contradictory, you say that the idea of original manuscript remaining intact means it disappeared???

You are not omniscient.

You did not live in every century. You are assuming your own uniformitarianism idea of the text.

Their were many copies that existed in those centuries that you don't have access to.


Why does the "majority text" matter?

One minute it is utterly ignored when it prefers the traditional reading. But it only seems to matter to disagree with the TR.

Well, let's acknowledge the truth.

10% is not the majority!!

Von soden's critical text is only based on about 500 of the 5000 Greek manuscripts. That means he can choose the text which will disagree most with the TR. and that has been the on-going mission of textual criticism.



Of the Westminster were too early for the textual debate, perhaps they were too early for sola scriptura debate. Perhaps they were too early for the justification debate as well!

Who were they to stand up against Rome?

All they claimed was that they had absolute authority from scripture. But if they did not then the premise of the reformation falls apart.



James white constantly errs on factual grounds. He is still selling the myth about Erasmus and the wet manuscript which was dispelled by Bruce metzger.

Or this constant obsession with Erasmus and 6-7 manuscripts ignoring the work of stephanus and Beza when Beza possessed 19 manuscripts.

Also ignoring how the reformers were aware of textual issues sense the KJV translators compared 15 ancient translations on top of their work with the Greek text.



Spurgeon Preached on mark 16:16

Morris was smart enough to know about the evolutionary presuppositions of the text critics.

Defending the NIV is equivalent to defending neo-orthodoxy. If God inspired the words of scripture then the words need to be translated.



www.wayoflife.org

Way of Life Literature

www.wayoflife.org

THE APPLE STORE: A WINDOW INTO THE NEW AGE (Friday Church News Notes, December 2...8, 2012, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - I love Apple equipment, but on recent visits to Apple stores in two different countries, I realized that these are true windows into the New Age. Indeed, the...See More.January 2 at 8:10am via mobile · Like · Remove Preview..

Jonathan David Sarfati The same could be said about KJVOs who go on about their text agreeing with the "majority" of the manuscripts. But suddenly, when their reading is finds no support in the majority, it no longer matters. The fact remains: your view of textual preservation is untenable, because no manuscript looks like what you claim the "preserved" text is.

January 3 at 6:54pm · Like..

Matt SIngleton No the preservationist view is completely rational.

God inspired the bible without error

God preserved the Bible for believers

God provided a perfect text for believers.



What is irrational is.

God inspired the bible without error

God could not preserve his word with out error

God's people stop believing in Christ alone for salvation.

But the church was intact as a genocidal idol worship empire.

Suddenly people believed the bible correctly and thwarted the "church" with a bible filled with errors. Which the popes could correct at any time with their superior manuscript.

So that we now live based upon tradition which is superior to a more popular tradition because it is more in accord with the bible which the bigger tradition has held to the whole time.



The fact is that we hold to our canon because we believe the scripture which says that God would preserve His word for us are true. 1peter 1:23-25.

If God preserved the canon for us, then he could preserve the manuscript for us.

January 3 at 8:15pm via mobile · Like..Matt SIngleton I have read you arguing against evolution with aging methods that are not in line with evolution even though the result does not equate a young earth.

Such as the rate at which the ocean expels salt and the rate at which which the rate at which the moon orbits away from the earth.

Why are you using evidence that does not lead exactly to a 6,000-10,000 year old earth??

Because you new that evolution

Runs on a naturalistic system. So everything has to fit a naturalistic system or the premise of evolution and secular empiricism fails.

Young earth is based in the supernatural power of God.



I bring up that the majority of manuscripts agree with the TR over and against the alexandriane manuscripts.

Which means that the churches by and large rejected these manuscripts.

You say will they don't agree perfectly.

Just like the young earth position,

Revelation is the answer. The bible teaches that the word of God would be preserved among believers.

The textus receptus is the basis of most of the worlds bibles including the most reproduced book on earth.



Now besides the fact that many of Erasmus views moved toward an evangelical position.

The reformation NEVER based the bible on his work alone. Robert stephanus, and Theodore Beza and the elziver brothers and finally scrivener who based his work off of the textual decisions in the AV.



To claim that this is all the work of a catholic is A-historical.

January 3 at 9:50pm via mobile · Like..
Jonathan David Sarfati What are you talking about? Our reasoning for our age arguments is expressed in http://creation.com/age-of-the-earth



Yes, the KJVOs must indulge in historical revisionism to re-invent the Catholic Erasmus, an opponent of Luther and the Reformation, a...See More

Age of the earth

creation.com

Evidences for a young age of the earth and the cosmos.Yesterday at 11:20am · Like..  
Matt SIngleton Reading your age of the earth article you have vindicated my statement.

It's the same premise.

Science is not absolute, therefore it must bow it's knee to revelation.



The same logic of preservation.

Biblical criticism is a science which is not absolute, therefore it must bow it's knee to biblical criticism.



"to re-invent the catholic Erasmus, an opponent to Luther and the reformation"

This argument grows weaker and more embarrassing when you are encapable of giving a rebuttal after I have refuted the premise.



Erasmus never opposed Luther on any point other than free-will. And that is a subject which anabaptist, Luther's protege Melanchthon, and arminius opposed Luther and Calvin on in that day.

Besides the fact that Luther chose Erasmus work over and above the complutesuan polyglot; the Swiss anabaptist would have their sermons preached directly from Erasmus text, in order to deepen their convictions about anabaptist doctrine.

But you are still, yet again, refuted on this point. Because even if Erasmus was a raving papist, the reformers were not dependent solely on his work alone.

As Calvin's successor Theodore Beza had more greek manuscripts of his own than Erasmus. Not to mention the work of stephanus and the Elzivir brothers and others previously mentioned.



Still waiting on that...



Yet God preserved the word in the desert where Christians couldn't read it and have assurance of salvation, so that could be overcome by pagans claiming to be representatives of Christ.....sure.

But now we have a great authority which contradicts itself 3,000 times between 2 manuscripts and does not have the same OT or even NT canon that we have.

Based upon the authority of a "church father" who castrated himself denies that Son and Holy Spirit are of equal power to the Father, doesn't preach faith alone, argues for universal salvation even to the devil. Yep, sounds pretty orthodox!


Now with any facebook wall the debate didn't have an official end.  But after a week goes by I feel it is safe to it concluded. Also remember that as in any debate we are not as deep in our references as one would see in a research paper.

btw, I made a statement the otherday that Dr. Sarfati liked so there is hope ;)