Historical Veracity: The Bible vs. Other Ancient Manuscripts

[LegionnaireX]

I was debating a well informed Christian apologist the other day. He asserted that the bible has more bibliographic support than any other ancient works, including Tacitus' Annals and other histories. He stated that the Bible ought to be given historical weight because there are far more manuscripts in existence for the Gospels and they are closer to the time period discussed than the earliest known copy of the Annals.

Much of what he said was correct. There is a several hundred year gap in between the earlist extant copy of Tacitus' Annals and the period in which the original was written. For many biblical books, there are copies still in existence that are 100 or 200 years younger than the original would have been. Having read books by Bart Ehrman detailing the copying process and the inherint human error in biblical manuscripts, I cannot help but apply the same logic to other ancient works that are relied upon for an understanding of the ancient world.

This brings up the question, if Tacitus' Annals and other works could have been altered or embellished to varying degrees from the original, what do we really know about the ancient past? How have historians been able to corraborate the word of historians like Herodotus or Tacitus. I am aware of the doctrine of using multiple sources and archeological evidence when available to come closest to the historical truth. Maybe some of the more educated academics on this site could help me out with this. Interestingly, an apologist would probably say that the different gospels serve as corraborating sources because they were written by separate authors.

How would one refute or combat the apologetic claims made? And more importantly, through what methods did scholarship come to trust certain historical works (such as Tacitus) and cast doubt on the historical accuracy of others (The Gospels).

[Helm]

Well there were an awful lot of gospels written they just picked 4 that bore the most resemblance to each other. Though I'm sure they were all based on someone, difficult to say who exactly Jesus was in purely historical terms there wasn't a great deal written about him at the time of his life.

[The Million Dollar Prons]

Well there were an awful lot of gospels written they just picked 4 that bore the most resemblance to each other. Though I'm sure they were all based on someone, difficult to say who exactly Jesus was in purely historical terms there wasn't a great deal written about him at the time of his life.

Please, if you aren't informed on a subject please don't post about it and spread misinformation.

[LegionnaireX]

Maybe there were thousands of undead magically wandered around Jerusalem at the death of Jesus, maybe whole world did magically darken at his passing, maybe the red sea magically parted and magically killed the egyptians. If we accept these claims as fact then we have to accept other mythological stories, like excalibur, achilles, Oedipus etc. It's a slippery slope.

I understand this. I am not saying that one should believe all ancient myths because biblical manuscripts exist, but somewhat the opposite. The late Carl Sagan said extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and the third and fourth hand anecdotal evidence in the bible is not sufficient to diefy Christ or prove God's existence to a scientific mind.

My point is, given the above, while Tacitus, Herodotus, Caesar, Pliny the Younger or any other ancient writer or historian may not have been making extraordinary claims, their writings, in effect, amount to a bunch of hearsay from often uncited original sources. In addition, it is true that many of our earliest manuscripts of historians such as Tacitus are several hundred years younger than the originals which have been lost. How do we know they have not been greatly altered, interpolated etc, if we don't have the original copies? Much the same argument is put forward by Ehrman to cast doubt on biblical veracity.

My question is this: given that written sources are a huge part of understanding history, how do historians verify the claims made in such works? How do we know anything for certain about our past if our main sources are copies of copies of copies of books written by people with definate biases? Or is the answer that we don't know for sure, and can only approximate?

Well there were an awful lot of gospels written they just picked 4 that bore the most resemblance to each other. Though I'm sure they were all based on someone, difficult to say who exactly Jesus was in purely historical terms there wasn't a great deal written about him at the time of his life.

Not exactly true. The four gospels chosen for the Canon were thefirst four gospels written and generally had a bigger following than the rest, although many others were widely read. They also don't share that much in common necessarily. The synoptic texts (mathew, mark, luke) have the most in common with a very Jewish orientation, with John being markedly different, seeemingly written with a much more developed theology for a gentile, Hellenistic audience.

[Himster]

My point is, given the above, while Tacitus, Herodotus, Caesar, Pliny the Younger or any other ancient writer or historian may not have been making extraordinary claims, their writings, in effect, amount to a bunch of hearsay from often uncited original sources. In addition, it is true that many of our earliest manuscripts of historians such as Tacitus are several hundred years younger than the originals which have been lost. How do we know they have not been greatly altered, interpolated etc, if we don't have the original copies? Much the same argument is put forward by Ehrman to cast doubt on biblical veracity.

Ah, I see.

My question is this: given that written sources are a huge part of understanding history, how do historians verify the claims made in such works? How do we know anything for certain about our past if our main sources are copies of copies of copies of books written by people with definate biases? Or is the answer that we don't know for sure, and can only approximate?

Unverified historical accounts are just that: unverified historical accounts. There's not much to debate. But the bible isn't just a historical secondary source, it is also (and primarily) a theological work, in this regard it can be considered a primary source, but obviously claiming it to be a primary source because it in itself claims to be a primary source is absurd, but then again if you consider the definition of "dictionary" to be in a dictionary is self refuting, that doesn't mean a definition of "dictionary" doesn't exist.

[AdamWeishaupt]

Exactly.

[Mikesmith08]

A very interesting point and a question which I've wanted answered myself for a long time. What are the reasons why the Bible is so mistrusted, of course the claims are considered more illogical than Tacitus claims in the Annals for instance but none the less disregarding most of the ignorant accusations levelled against the Bible why is it held in such low regard as a historical document?

[Himster]

Maybe there were thousands of undead magically wandered around Jerusalem at the death of Jesus, maybe whole world did magically darken at his passing, maybe the red sea magically parted and magically killed the egyptians. If we accept these claims as fact then we have to accept other mythological stories, like excalibur, achilles, Oedipus etc. It's a slippery slope.

[hellas1]

Maybe there were thousands of undead magically wandered around Jerusalem at the death of Jesus, maybe whole world did magically darken at his passing, maybe the red sea magically parted and magically killed the egyptians. If we accept these claims as fact then we have to accept other mythological stories, like excalibur, achilles, Oedipus etc. It's a slippery slope.

I would say this:
Research before you believe and realize that we are dealing with ancient things here, not Mickey D's fast food joints!

Germain to the topic at hand now.....
Archaeology is a wonderful tool!

Cross referencing extra-biblical sources is a good thing to do.
Finding archaeological discoveries which confirm biblical stories/people are even better.

When one talks about Excalibur, Achilles, Oedipus or any so called myth, one needs to careFULLY examine the entire storyline/description/whatever that revolves around a person, place, thing.

Ex. I saw a special on T.V. which talked about Excalibur being a sword drawn out of the rock.
Sounds kinda weird...As I continued watching the T.V. special, it explained that in the bronze or iron age, whichever, the mold used to make swords was made up of stone and that pouring metal into the case and then removing the newly fashioned sword hilt fit the "Drawing Excalibur out of a rock" bit.

What I'm saying is: Research before you judge. It's not like I believe in My Little Pony as being real!

Completely imaginary things are just that but when you speak of particular people/sociological or cultural things/events/etc. there is now ALWAYS a way to research and come to logical, albeit sometimes partial, conclusions about so called "unconfirmable" things like Noah's flood, Darkness covering the earth during Jesus's crucifixion, etc.

Regarding why Catholics and Orthodox have different bibles:
Historical research will show you that the Catholic Vulgate was a translation by Jerome of the Greek Septuagint.

The Septuagint was quoted by the New Testament writers many times btw.

Of course, in the New Testament we see Paul for example quoting an Old Testament verse which doesn't match with the Septuagint.
In that time period, Jewish scribes/scholars would create/use loose translations of a verse, these were called Targums.

Research man, it costs $$ and time and TRUST me, I spent both.

Let's think about this shite really hard...
hellas1.5

[Himster]

What I'm saying is: Research before you judge. It's not like I believe in My Little Pony as being real!

It should be sincere and unbiased research, that's all that counts.

Completely imaginary things are just that but when you speak of particular people/sociological or cultural things/events/etc. there is now ALWAYS a way to research and come to logical, albeit sometimes partial, conclusions about so called "unconfirmable" things like Noah's flood, Darkness covering the earth during Jesus's crucifixion, etc.

Noah's flood is confirmable.
"waters prevail until all the high mountains are covered fifteen cubits deep." It's physically impossible for that amount of water to have ever existed on earth: Research before you judge.

[hellas1]

It should be sincere and unbiased research, that's all that counts.

Noah's flood is confirmable.
"waters prevail until all the high mountains are covered fifteen cubits deep." It's physically impossible for that amount of water to have ever existed on earth: Research before you judge.

What? What are you actually saying?

It is NOT physically impossible for that amount of water to have ever existed on earth.
WHO told you that it wasn't? Evidence for what you stated please.

Do you think that given the Biblical account of the lifespan of people back then, that people didn't inhabit a large portion of the planet Earth? Were they stupid or something?
Furthermore, Genesis says that in the days of Peleg the earth was divided. That doesn't mean "Good versus evil" man. Ask a Jewish Rabbi about that.......

Lastly, MANY cultures speak of a great flood with 8 people surviving which exactly matches the Hebrew Genesis account but not the Gilgamesh Epic narrative of the flood story with Utnapishtim.

Food for thought.
hellas1.5

[AdamWeishaupt]

Correct:
-> George Smith (1872)

[Tankbuster]

Do you think that given the Biblical account of the lifespan of people back then, that people didn't inhabit a large portion of the planet Earth? Were they stupid or something?

No, the Biblical account is just wrong.

[Himster]

What? What are you actually saying?

It is NOT physically impossible for that amount of water to have ever existed on earth.
WHO told you that it wasn't? Evidence for what you stated please.

Are you joking?
There isn't enough water.
The overall amount of water on our planet has remained the same for two billion years.
The earth's total amount of water has a volume of about 344 million cubic miles.
· 315 million cubic miles is seawater.
· 9 million cubic miles is groundwater in aquifers.
· 7 million cubic miles is frozen in polar ice caps.
· 53,000 cubic miles of water pass through the planet's lakes and streams.
· 4,000 cubic miles of water is atmospheric moisture.
· 3,400 cubic miles of water are locked within the bodies of living things.

So, here are the calculations:

First, Everest:

V = 4/3×pi×r3
= 4/3×pi×6387.248 km3
= 1.09151×1012 km3
Now, the Earth at sea level:

V = 4/3×pi×r3
= 4/3×pi×6378.4 km3
= 1.08698×1012 km3
The difference between these two figures is the amount of water needed to just
cover the Earth: 4.525×109 Or, to put into a more sensible number,
4,525,000,000,000 cubic kilometres. This is one helluva lot of water.

For those who think it might come from the polar ice caps, please don't forget
that water is more dense than ice, and thus that the volume of ice present in
those ice caps would have to be more than the volume of water necessary.

Some interesting physical effects of all that water, too. How much weight do you
think that is? Well, water at STP weighs in at 1 gram/cubic centimetre (by
definition), so:

4.525×109 km3 of water,
×109 (cubic meters in a cubic kilometer),
×106 (cubic centimetres in a cubic meter),
×1 g/cm3 (denisty of water),
×10-3 (kilograms),
(turn the crank)
equals 4.525×1021 kg
Ever wonder what the effects of that much weight would be? Well, many times in
the near past (i.e., the Pleistocene), continental ice sheets covered many of
the northern states and most all of Canada. For the sake of argument, let's say
the area covered by the Wisconsinian advance (the latest and greatest) was
10,000,000,000 (ten million) km2, by an average thickness of 1 km of ice
(a good estimate... it was thicker in some areas [the zones of accumulation]
and much thinner elsewhere [at the ablating edges]).

Now, 1.00×107 km2 times 1 km thickness equals 1.00×107 km3 of ice.

Now, remember earlier that we noted that it would take 4.525×109 km3 of
water for the Flood? Well, looking at the Wisconsinian glaciation, all that ice
(which is frozen water, remember?) would be precisely 0.222% [...do the math]
(that's zero decimal two hundred twenty two thousandths) percent of the water
needed for the flood.

Well, the Wisconsinian glacial stade ended about 25,000 YBP (years before present),
as compared for the approximately supposedly 4,000 YBP flood event.

Due to these late Pleistocene glaciations (some 21,000 years preceding the supposed
flood), the mass of the ice has actually depressed the crust of the Earth. That
crust, now that the ice is gone, is slowly rising (called glacial rebound); and
this rebound can be measured, in places (like northern Wisconsin), in centimetres-
per-year. Sea level was also lowered some tens of meters due to the very finite
amount of water in the Earth's hydrosphere being locked up in glacial ice sheets
(geologists call this glacioeustacy).

Now, glacial rebound can only be measured, obviously, in glaciated terranes, i.e.,
the Sahara is not rebounding as it was not glaciated during the Pleistocene. This
lack of rebound is noted by laser ranged interferometery and satellite geodesy [so
there], as well as by geomorphology. Glacial striae on bedrock, eskers, tills,
moraines, rouche moutenees, drumlins, kame and kettle topography, fjords, deranged
fluvial drainage and erratic blocks all betray a glacier's passage. Needless to say,
these geomorphological expressions are not found everywhere on Earth (for instance,
like the Sahara). Therefore, although extensive, the glaciers were a local (not
global) is scale. Yet, at only 0.222% the size of the supposed flood, they have had
a PROFOUND and EASILY recognisable and measurable effects on the lands.

Yet, the supposed flood of Noah, supposedly global in extent, supposedly much more
recent, and supposedly orders of magnitude larger in scale; has exactly zero
measurable effects and zero evidence for it's occurrence.

Golly, Wally. I wonder why that may be...?

Further, Mount Everest extends through 2/3 of the Earth's atmosphere. Since two
forms of matter can't occupy the same space, we have an additional problem with the
atmosphere. Its current boundary marks the point at which gasses of the atmosphere
can escape the Earth's gravitational field. Even allowing for partial dissolving of
the atmosphere into our huge ocean, we'd lose the vast majority of our atmosphere
as it is raised some 5.155 km higher by the rising flood waters; and it boils off
into space.

Yet, we still have a quite thick and nicely breathable atmosphere. In fact, ice
cores from Antarctica (as well as deep-sea sediment cores) which can be
geochemically tested for paleoatmospheric constituents and relative gas ratios; and
these records extend well back into the Pleistocene, far more than the supposed
4,000 YBP flood event. Strange that this major loss of atmosphere, atmospheric
fractionation (lighter gasses - oxygen, nitrogen, fluorine, neon, etc. - would
have boiled off first in the flood-water rising scenario, enriching what remained
with heavier gasses - argon, krypton, xenon, radon, etc.), and massive
extinctions from such global upheavals are totally unevidenced in these cores.

Even further, let us take a realistic and dispassionate look at the other claims
relating to global flooding and other such biblical nonsense.

Particularly, in order to flood the Earth to the Genesis requisite depth of 10
cubits (~15' or 5 m.) above the summit of Mt. Ararat (16,900' or 5,151 m AMSL), it
would obviously require a water depth of 16,915' (5,155.7 m), or over three miles
above mean sea level. In order to accomplish this little task, it would require
the previously noted additional 4.525×109 km3 of water to flood the Earth to this
depth. The Earth's present hydrosphere (the sum total of all waters in, on and
above the Earth) totals only 1.37×109 km3. Where would this additional
4.525×109 km3 of water come from? It cannot come from water vapour (i.e., clouds)
because the atmospheric pressure would be 840 times greater than standard pressure
of the atmosphere today. Further, the latent heat released when the vapour
condenses into liquid water would be enough to raise the temperature of the
Earth's atmosphere to approximately 3,570 C (6,460 F).

Someone, who shall properly remain anonymous, suggested that all the water needed
to flood the Earth existed as liquid water surrounding the globe (i.e., a "vapour
canopy"). This, of course, is staggeringly stupid. What is keeping that much water
from falling to the Earth? There is a little property called gravity that would
cause it to fall.

Let's look into that from a physical standpoint. To flood the Earth, we have
already seen that it would require 4.525×109 km3 of water with a mass of
4.525×1021 kg. When this amount of water is floating about the Earth's
surface, it stored an enormous amount of potential energy, which is converted to
kinetic energy when it falls, which, in turn, is converted to heat upon impact
with the Earth. The amount of heat released is immense:

Potential energy: E=MgH, where
M = mass of water,
g = gravitational constant and,
H = height of water above surface.
Now, going with the Genesis version of the Noachian Deluge as lasting 40 days and
nights, the amount of mass falling to Earth each day is 4.525×1021 kg/40 24-hr.
periods. This equals 1.10675×1020 kilograms daily. Using H as 10 miles (16,000
meters), the energy released each day is 1.73584×1025 joules. The amount of energy
the Earth would have to radiate per m2/sec is energy divided by surface area of the
Earth times number of seconds in one day. That is:

e = 1.735384×1025/(4×3.14159×((63862)×86,400))
e = 391,935.0958 j/m2/s
Currently, the Earth radiates energy at the rate of approximately 215 joules/m2/sec
and the average temperature is 280 K. Using the Stefan-Boltzman 4th-Power Law to
calculate the increase in temperature:

E (increase)/E (normal) = T (increase)/T4 (normal)

E (normal) = 215
E (increase) = 391,935.0958
T (normal) = 280.

Turn the crank, and T (increase) equals 1,800 K.
The temperature would thusly rise 1,800 K, or 1,526.84 C (that's 2,780.33 F...
lead melts at 880 F...). It would be highly unlikely that anything short of fused
quartz would survive such an onslaught. Also, the water level would have to rise
at an average rate of 5.5 inches/min; and in 13 minutes would be in excess of six
feet deep.

Finally, at 1800 K water would not exist as liquid.

It is quite clear that a Biblical Flood is and was quite impossible. Only fools
and those shackled by dogma would insist otherwise."

Interesting, no?

Do you think that given the Biblical account of the lifespan of people back then.

That's another debunked claim. The bible claims humans to live up to 900 years, it's so absurd and plain silly, it's not even worth mentioning, an embarrasing belief to be sure.

that people didn't inhabit a large portion of the planet Earth? Were they stupid or something?

Yes, people did inhabit every continent, except australia and antarctica, infact not long before 4400bc agriculture began in large scale, the human population rapidly increased nd continued to increase, despite the alleged glabal flood.

The last bottle-neck of human population was 70,000 years ago, where the population was roughly 15,000. That reduction in population was caused by a volcano in modern day Indonesia, it's called the Toba catastrophy.

The flood is so blatantly false, if mankind was reduced to a group of 8 a mere 4400 years ago there wouldn't be enough time to have the biological diversity we have, try taking a skin graph from any random human and you'll see what I mean. To illustrate, cheetahs were bottlenecked around 7000 years ago to breeding group of around 8 and even now they can all recieve skin graphs from one another, their genetic diversity is far less than ours.

Furthermore, Genesis says that in the days of Peleg the earth was divided. That doesn't mean "Good versus evil" man. Ask a Jewish Rabbi about that.......

Lastly, MANY cultures speak of a great flood with 8 people surviving which exactly matches the Hebrew Genesis account but not the Gilgamesh Epic narrative of the flood story with Utnapishtim

.

So what, many more cultures have accounts of unicorn creatures exactly matching , most cultures from history is that seriously the best "evidence" you have? Lots of people think so therefore it must be true. Soo brah, reality is not subject to democracy.

Isn't it funny though that only cultures that experience floods have flood myths, food for thought.

Now for the clincher: Genesis 6:15 in the Bible tells us Noah's Ark was at least 135 meters long (300 cubits), 22.5 meters wide (50 cubits), and 13.5 meters high (30 cubits). It could have been larger because several larger-sized cubits were used. But the 45-centimeter (18-inch).

Now, let's pretend that all these animals and people didn't need food and didn't deficate for at least a year (a preposterous assumtion, but it gets better). Let's also pretend that all plant life magically and simultaneouslay germinated and froze somehow. Now there are 16,000 species of ants, there are there are 37,500 species of spider, 9,000 species of bird, there are 2790 species of snake, there are 20,000 species of bee, there are 6,000 known species of earthworms (orms can actually drown), there are 5 species of rhino, 6 elephants, there are 800 kinds of cattle, there are 30 species of chipmunks, there are 60 known species of Lemur, 6 species of sloth, there are 85,000 known species of mollusk (some, but not all can live under water), there are 36 species of cats, there are 43 species of canids (dogs, wolves etc.), there are 30 species of mongoose, 3 species of zebra, 2/3species of horse, 30 species of bear, at least 6 species of giraffe, 4 specieas of gorilla, at least 260 current species of monkey.
Now, I've left out at least half a dozen species, there are at least 20 million species on earth, even if the ark was twice the size as described in genesis, you couldn't get a fraction of the required mating units, you couldn't even get all the species of insects into an ark, even if you stacked them.

The global flood myth was debunked many many many years ago, I blame the schools.

[Mortality]

Wasn't the Bible edited by the Catholic Church?

[Himster]

Wasn't the Bible edited by the Catholic Church?

Then why would the orthodox churches have basically the same thing, they're only slightly different translations.

[Col. Tartleton]

History is a pseudoscience.

[Veliky Kaiser Theos]

History is a pseudoscience.

No-one ever called history anything with the word science in it.

The Bible shouldn't be trusted as a source of history because of the "unusual" claims it makes.

Also, it was made with an agenda other than the recording of history, to convert people to Christianity.

[Tankbuster]

History is a pseudoscience.

You say that as though it's remotely relevant.

I understand this. I am not saying that one should believe all ancient myths because biblical manuscripts exist, but somewhat the opposite. The late Carl Sagan said extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and the third and fourth hand anecdotal evidence in the bible is not sufficient to diefy Christ or prove God's existence to a scientific mind.

That is a fair point. Apologists often try to obscure matters and construct logical arguments from what little evidence we have, but the fact remains that the evidence we have (a few non-eye-witness testimonies written decades after the fact) will simply never be enough to prove the extraordinary claims which they profess.

My question is this: given that written sources are a huge part of understanding history, how do historians verify the claims made in such works? How do we know anything for certain about our past if our main sources are copies of copies of copies of books written by people with definate biases? Or is the answer that we don't know for sure, and can only approximate?

Absolute certainty does not exist, so obviously, our judgements about distant time periods will never be absolutely certain as well.
However, we can work from the sources we have and study them with care; particularly trying to determine what biases they have, contrasting them with sources that have other biases, and going from there.

It's not an easy job but it's far from impossible.

[LegionnaireX]

Absolute certainty does not exist, so obviously, our judgements about distant time periods will never be absolutely certain as well.
However, we can work from the sources we have and study them with care; particularly trying to determine what biases they have, contrasting them with sources that have other biases, and going from there.

It's not an easy job but it's far from impossible.

But when you take the unreliability of eyewitness testimony into account, and allow for possible copying errors in the available manuscripts, how accurate is The Histories or The Annals? It is true that the Gospels were written decades after the fact from second and third-hand sources, but so is the material present in the works of Herodotus and Tacitus which have become essential to our understanding of western history. Tacitus was not a contemporary of the time frame of his works, and neither really was Herodotus, and they very rarely cite their own sources for their writings.

Given this, what can be said about the truth value of the seminal works of western history?