This text was published in The Stream (September 13, 2022) and is republished with permission.
Can we belief the authenticity of the New Testomony scriptures? Belief is foundational within the acceptance of scripture. There’s an attention-grabbing lesson to be taught from a really trendy system of belief: cash. Even Bitcoin, consider it or not.
An Change of Belief
We’ll begin with old school acquainted cash. Why is a twenty greenback invoice price $20? It’s only a small sheet of paper, in any case. The reply is belief. We belief the piece of paper has worth as a result of its price is backed by america authorities.
We additionally belief that Walmart will give us $20 price of Doritos if we give them a twenty greenback invoice. The cashier may have a look at us humorous, however there’s an change of belief no matter that.
The cryptocurrency Bitcoin doesn’t have any authorities backing it, however individuals nonetheless use it to purchase and promote. They wouldn’t do this except that they had good cause to belief it. Right here’s the place we discover the attention-grabbing parallel with the New Testomony Scriptures. Bitcoin and the Bible each set up belief in related methods.
A Bit About Bitcoin
Bitcoin remains to be new, so I’ll clarify the way it works. It’s a digital type of foreign money. Belief in Bitcoin worth is maintained via laptop software program known as blockchain. Think about numerous brief encrypted laptop program blocks linked collectively. Since numerous hyperlinks are linked collectively, the lengthy program is named a sequence — a blockchain.
You entry your Bitcoin via a password that opens up your account and yours solely. Watch out with that password! Californian Stefan Thomas forgot his, and it price him $220 million {dollars}.
So why ought to we belief Bitcoin? Why can’t some hacker are available and add a number of hyperlinks saying they personal the coin once they don’t? The reply is the Bitcoin ledger. Many customers preserve copies of the entire hyperlinks within the blockchain in a single ledger. They proceed to replace this ledger as increasingly Bitcoins are created and traded.
The variety of copies being saved of that ledger is tough to estimate, however some estimate it’s in the tens to hundreds of thousands. Each up-to-date copy is identical at any cut-off date.
Right here’s the place the belief is available in. Nobody particular person could make an unauthorized change within the Bitcoin blockchain with out each ledger proprietor figuring out about it. Those that keep ledgers personal Bitcoin. They’ve an curiosity in guarding Bitcoin’s popularity.
Patrolling the Ledger — A Hanging Parallel
Bitcoin might be trusted as a result of there are literally thousands of devoted Bitcoin homeowners patrolling the ledger to ensure its integrity. The piggybank is properly guarded. As a result of it may be trusted, even within the absence of any central controlling authority, blockchains have been utilized in a myriad of different functions together with smart contracts, non-fungible tokens and peer-to-peer transactions.
It’s very modern, and it’s additionally very technical, so what does it need to do with the authenticity of scripture? It turns on the market’s a hanging parallel between the historic document of scripture and the blockchain ledger. There exists an (unencrypted) blockchain of historic proof for scripture that establishes its integrity and is subsequent to not possible to hack. Wikipedia provides a very good abstract:
The New Testomony has been preserved in additional manuscripts than every other historical work of literature, with over 5,800 full or fragmented Greek manuscripts catalogued, 10,000 Latin manuscripts and 9,300 manuscripts in varied different historical languages together with Syriac, Slavic, Gothic, Ethiopic, Coptic and Armenian. The dates of those manuscripts vary from c. 125 … to the introduction of printing in Germany within the fifteenth century.
This massive variety of historic paperwork corresponds to a blockchain ledger. Its hundreds and hundreds of hyperlinks can lead us to belief within the authenticity of scripture, as a result of identical to Bitcoin’s blockchain, new fragments couldn’t be simply added, and none may very well be altered or eliminated. It will by no means have made it previous of the scrutiny of historians and others guarding the integrity of those information.
The Integrity of New Testomony Content material
Minor variations within the document are of little consequence. The overwhelming majority are on the order of variations in spelling. Others get ironed out by biblical students who like arguing about such issues.
Other differences are noted in most Bibles so everyone can see them. Many Bible translations, for example, have a footnote in the latter part of Mark 16 stating that it’s not found in all ancient manuscripts. Overall, though, there is a remarkably high consistency of scripture content in the historical record.
The result is that we have a solid record of the life and teachings of the Savior, Jesus Christ, and His early followers. The integrity of New Testament content is untarnished. The message comes through with crystal clarity. It’s not the only way we know Scripture is trustworthy, but it’s an important one.
Blockchain can be trusted due to widespread ledger duplication and watchful eyes. The authenticity and accuracy of scripture can likewise be trusted because of widespread manuscript duplication and watchful eyes.
