Textual Criticism: Do History, Learn From History, Repeat History

In the chapters "Texts of the New Testament" and "The Quest for Origins," Ehrman describes how in the past some scholars and scribes had worked hard to get back to the original New Testament. Daniel Whitby, writing in 1710, argued that in a circulating reading of the NT, there is no problem because no core doctrine or direction for Christian discourse was in question(1). 

Then, the astounding Richard Bentley, the Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, pointed out the Protestant faith wasn't attacked by Roman Catholics (who say the church has authority shown apart from the Bible)(2). He also pointed out that the more manuscripts, inevitably the more variants -- and inevitably the greater probability of getting back to the original! Goodness, that sounds just like Josh and Sean McDowell's, "Yet one needs to realize that the large number of variants is a direct result of the extremely large number of New Testament manuscripts that we have." (3)

Johann J. Wettstein presented a thesis on March 17, 1713, where he claimed that variants don't alter the main message. The reason that all variant readings will just create tension among minor, rather than major, things, is because God preserved His word for us(4).

Wallace said, "Let me repeat the basic thesis that has been argued since 1707: No cardinal or essential doctrine is altered by any textual variant that has plausibility of going back to the original. The evidence for that has not changed to this day." (5)

He also said, along with other scholars, "The short answer to the question of what theological truths are at stake in these variants is--none." (6)

This day in age is like a repeat of the past, just modernized. It's ironic: history repeated itself, because we learned from history. With the evidence we in the modern day can discover and catalog, we are doomed to be certain of the original NT. 

Brooke Foss Westcott and Fenton John Anthony Hort published in 1881 The New Testament in the Original Greek. Because it is so influential, and "remarkably similar to the one still widely used by scholars today," he won't allow his graduate students to not learn it, and learn it well(7). This made me think of what I cited from Hugh Ross in my post on Biblical inerrancy: the greater skepticism is in a generation, the more evidence God will give. God made sure to supply us with much more and early NT manuscripts than any other ancient book, to answer those who would seek out arguments to take down the Bible. More than a century and a half earlier, someone produced a manuscript based on somewhere around 100 Greek copies(8). Today, the evidence is so much better (57 times as much, Ehrman stressed[9]).

Citations:

1. Bart D. Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why (HarperCollins: New York, NY. 2005), 85-86.

2. Ibid., 86-87.

3. Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, More Than a Carpenter (Tyndale: 2009), 76.

4. Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus, 112.

5. Lee Strobel, In Defense of Jesus: Investigating Attacks on the Identity of Christ (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, MI. 2007), 94.

6. J. Ed Komoszewski, M. James Sawyer, Daniel B. Wallace, Reinventing Jesus, 104. Cited in McDowell, More Than a Carpenter, 77.

7. Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus, 122-23.

8. Ibid., 84.

9. Ibid., 88.