Originally, I compared why I believe what I believe to how Rene Descartes supported his views on God's existence and the truth of Christianity. I cut the later part out to make this post a bit easier to read. But if you have a chance and are interested, look up Descartes' three proofs for the existence of God. Really interesting! But anyhow... Here's the paper!
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Christianity is a religion with a rich and varied history. Though it once permeated Western culture, we have slowly drifted from its values. While the majority of the Western world now follows some sort of atheistic worldview, I still believe that God exists and that Christianity is the only real way to know Him.
The basis for my personal belief is the Bible and its historical reliability. If the Bible is true, and the Bible claims there is a God and supports Christianity, then by definition there would be a God and Christianity is true. Thus, as long as the Bible is true, my belief is not unfounded.
The first section of the Bible is the Old Testament, made up of sixty-six books. The last book in what is now called the Old Testament was written around 430 BC, and the Jewish people first recognized all the books in the Old Testament as canonical by AD 90 at the Synod of Jamnia.
Since the gap between these two dates is fairly significant, how do we know that the Old Testament has been transmitted correctly? There would be a lot of room for typographical errors, or even for additions or subtractions to be made from the text.
However, there have been groups of scribes dedicated to teaching and correctly transcribing the Old Testament since before 430 BC. These groups, known as soferim, specialized in Old Testament manuscripts and followed many rules that were incredibly strict.
In fact, we have so many different manuscripts of both the Old and New Testaments that it is easy to determine when verses were changed – such as a few verses from Deuteronomy in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The evidence is overwhelmingly clear that the Old Testament we have today is the same Old Testament it has been for thousands of years.
But the Old Testament is not where Christianity lives or dies – that would be the New Testament, a collection of twenty-seven books that describe the life of Jesus Christ and how Christ followers (Christians) should live. The arguments against the historical reliability of the New Testament are many and can be found easily.
But it is interesting to note that when the tests that are used to determine the reliability of ancient literature are applied to the New Testament, it passes with flying colors. The first five books of the New Testament – the four Gospels and the book of Acts – were all written within a century of the events they describe, and the earliest manuscript we have is from AD 130, just thirty years after the books were originally written.
The remainder of the New Testament is made up largely of epistles – letters written by leaders in the early church to different congregations across the civilized world. These epistles were circulated around to different churches and we have many manuscripts that are very close to when the originals would have been written.
While the New Testament easily passes the ancient literature test, so does the entire Bible – both the Old and New Testaments. This can most clearly be demonstrated by looking at Homer’s ancient work, The Iliad. The Iliad has 650 manuscripts, and through using these manuscripts, scholars have determined that 95% of The Iliad is accurate. While the other 5% we can’t be sure about with the manuscripts we currently have access to, it is still easy to see what the poem originally meant.
In contrast, the Bible has 5,000 Greek manuscripts and 9,000 additional manuscripts. Using these, scholars are only unsure about what 0.002% of the Bible means – which means that the meaning of the Bible is completely clear and the same as it was originally.
Overall, there is absolutely no argument that can reasonably be made that the Bible is not historically accurate. But how do I know it is true? If the Bible is a reliable document, then it is easy to build a case to show that it is true. Since the Bible has often been shown to be true in historical matters, I believe it can be trusted when it comes to spiritual matters.
However, if the Bible did not describe the Christianity that I believe in, proving the Bible’s truth would be pointless. So what do I believe in? I believe that God exists and that He is a three-in-one, a Trinity. I believe that because of the Fall, every human is sinful – every human disobeys God. God is holy and cannot tolerate sin. I need to live a perfect life in order to go to heaven, but I can’t do that. Jesus, the Son of God, came down to earth, lived a perfect life, and then died on the cross. When He died, He took the punishment for all of my sins on Himself. All of these truths can be easily supported by many verses in the Bible.
Because of the historical reliability and accuracy of the Bible, I believe that it is true. And because of what the Bible says, I believe that there is a God and Christianity is the only way we can know and interact with Him. This is how I support my personal beliefs, this is why I believe in God and am a Christian.
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And that's that! I hope you enjoyed, and maybe even learned something. Those facts about the Illiad compared to the Bible still blow my mind. XD Talk to you next week!
~ Anna
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