Reference work
The Text of the New Testament
Reference work on New Testament textual transmission.
- Author
- Bruce M. Metzger and Bart D. Ehrman
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press
- Tradition
- Textual criticism
Citation
Bruce M. Metzger and Bart D. Ehrman, The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, 4th ed., Oxford University Press, 2005.
Where this source is used
- Constantine changed the BibleThe four Gospels were received long before Constantine, and the records of Nicaea show no vote on the Bible's contents and no removal of books.
- The Bible is corruptedThe manuscripts differ in small ways, but the Gospel Christians held in Muhammad's day, which the Qur'an tells them to judge by, survives and can be read today.
- The Bible lost plain and precious truthsThe manuscripts show small, documented copying changes, not an early removal of doctrine, and the Bible already teaches what the Book of Mormon calls plain and precious.
- The New World Translation restores the truthJudged by its own standard of following the text, the New World Translation bends the verses about Jesus' identity in one direction, while much of it reads fairly.
- The reliability of the BibleVariants in the manuscripts are real and openly catalogued. They show a text copied many times in many places, which is why its earliest wording can be recovered.
- The reliability of the New TestamentPaul's letters preserve a summary of belief from within a few years of Jesus' death, the Gospels were written within living memory, and the text can be recovered with confidence.