LESSON FIVE

THE RELIABILITY AND AUTHORITY OF THE BIBLE

Discussions about faith will always lead to questions about the Bible.
The Bible is the foundation for what we believe and lays down the truths
that we rely upon as Christians. For us, it is the key resource for settling
questions, the final authority when we can't agree. However, for
unbelievers, the Bible is not a very significant book. They may respect
it, but certainly will not accept its authority. Some of these unbelievers
refer to the bible as;

 Just another book, like the Quran or the Book of Mormon

 Unreliable document that was changed over time
 A book full of stories that were invented by men - usually with
very selfish motives. It is full of errors, and contradictions and
certainly not relevant to humanity today

We cannot bring up biblical arguments as long as the other person does

not believe in the authority of the Bible. It is therefore critical to show

 The uniqueness of the Bible

 What distinguishes it from other books?
 How reliable is the document we have in our hands today?
 Is the Bible really from God? What evidence do we have for that?
 How should we interpret what we read in the Bible?
 For all these questions there are internal and external answers.
 Internal answers are those that we find in the Bible itself
 External answers are those answers based on external evidence.
 Internal evidence will be sufficient only for those who already
accept the Bible as the Word of God.
 We should be aware, however, that all the evidence in the world
cannot convince those who don't want to believe (Luke 16:29-31).
On the other hand, the word of God does not return empty (Isaiah
55:11), so it is our task to provide both the word and the evidence
gently and lovingly and let God do the rest.
 In our biblical hermeneutics class, we have established that
understanding the Bible is based on two main axioms. An axiom in
geometry is a statement accepted as true for the sake of argument.
In logic, an axiom is a statement that does not need proof to
substantiate its validity. The two axioms are: the Bible is a
human book and the Bible is a divine book.

 It is self-evident that the Bible is a book. Just like other books it is

written in languages spoken by people to communicate ideas from
the writers to the readers. Also, the Bible is both a human book and
a divine book. Its divine origin makes it unique among all books.
Now when we say the Bible is both a human and divine book we
need explanations.

1. The Bible is a Human Book

Each biblical writing—that is, each word, sentence, and book—was
recorded in a written language and followed normal, grammatical
meanings, including figurative language. What this means is that God
did not communicate his Word in languages that needed some kind of
decoding to understand its message. The original readers did not need
any magical means to decipher the meanings of the messages since
they were written in their languages or languages they were familiar
with.
We may summarize it this way:
a. Each biblical writing was written by someone to specific hearers
or readers in a specific historical and geographical situation for
a specific purpose.
b. The Bible is affected and influenced by the cultural environment
from which each human writer wrote.
c. Each biblical writing was accepted or understood in the light of
its context.
d. Each biblical writing took on the nature of a specific literary
form.
e. Each biblical writing was understood by its initial readers
following the basic principles of logic and communication.
2. The Bible is a Divine Book
 The Bible is both a divine revelation and an inspired Word of
God.
 Revelation is the communication of truth which would not
otherwise be known. It is the Holy Spirit’s disclosure of divine
truth.
 Inspiration is the act whereby God puts the revealed truths into
infallible written form. It is the process whereby the revealed
information is presented accurately in written language. It is the
Spirit’s superintending process of recording His revelation.
 When we speak of inspiration from the Bible, we do not mean
that the writers were inspired but the words themselves were
inspired, that is, they were God-breathed. In some sense, it may
be said that God infused his life into the words of the Bible so
that they are His words. This can be said of no other book!
Seeing the Bible as a divine book we may draw the following
conclusions.
a. The Bible, being a divine book, is inerrant. This means that the
Scriptures are without error in their original writings.
b. The Bible, being a divine book, is authoritative. This means that
we can confidently live by the Bible because its authority to deal
with matters originates from God.
c. The Bible, being a divine book, has unity. Though recorded by
approximately 40 human authors, the Bible remains the work of
God. It does not contradict itself.
d. Passages that seem to have discrepancies need to be interpreted in
the light of the harmony of the Scriptures.
e. The Bible, being a divine book, has mystery. This means that the
Bible contains many things hard to understand. The Bible contains
mystery in at least three areas:
i. prophecy (predictions of future events, which no human by
himself could predict apart from divine revelation) – HOW
CAN MOSES RECORD THE BEGINNING OF THE
WORLD?
 ii. The Bible records miracles that cannot be explained by
human means (HOW CAN HUMAN BEING LIVE IN THE
STOMACK OF A FISH FOR THREE DAYS?)
iii. Some doctrines of the Bible are difficult for the finite mind to
comprehend. For example - how can God exist as three
persons in one essence? how could Christ rise from the dead?
how can God dwell in human beings?

THE UNIQUENESS OF THE BIBLE

By uniqueness, we mean what distinguishes the Bible from any other
piece of literature, from any other religious book, from any other
historical document.

 UNIQUE IN ITS CONTINUITY

o Written over 1500 years by more than 40 authors with very
different background
o Written in very different places ranging from the desert
(Moses) to a palace
o Written in very different situations (war, peace, persecution)

 UNIQUE IN ITS CIRCULATION

o More than one billion copies sold world-wide
o Still more than 10 million copies are sold every year
(compare this to ANY other bestseller)

 UNIQUE IN ITS TRANSLATION

o More than 2200 languages and ``dialects'' (reaches more than
90% of the world population)
o First translations were already made in 250BC (Septuaginta:
translates Hebrew Old Testament into Greek)

 UNIQUE IN ITS SURVIVAL

o It survived time:
 There are more manuscript copies of the Bible than of all the
other historical documents combined. The variations between
these documents are extremely small, despite time
differences of hundreds of years.

o It survived persecution:
There had been many attempts to destroy scripture or to
stomp out Christianity (recall Nero as the best-known,
Diocletian in 302). None of them succeeded.

o It survived criticism:
People have tried over and over again to refute the Bible, to
label it as an invention by men, to question authorship and
dating, to prove it historically wrong, etc.

All ``evidence'' against the Bible has failed so far (was

disproved by later findings) ... and more people are believing
in it as the authoritative Word of God than ever before.

 UNIQUE IN ITS TEACHINGS

o Prophecy:
Many recorded prophecies took place exactly as predicted,
some are still open, and none failed.
Example: Christ's birth
 Timing: Daniel 9,
 City: Micah 5:2 - But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah,
though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet
out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be
ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of
old, from everlasting.
 Circumstances: Isaiah 7:14 - Therefore the Lord
himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall
 conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name
Immanuel.

Other books claim divine inspiration, yet none give predictive

prophecy. (God himself gives that challenge: Deuteronomy 18:22)

Deut. 18:22 "When a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if

the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which
the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it
presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.

o RECORDED HISTORY:
The calling of one person (Abraham) from its beginning until
the time of captivity. No other book is as complete

No other book had such an impact 2000 years after the last chapter was
written. We hardly know any other that even survived that long, let
alone is still being used.

### The Bible is unique, and no other book can compare

WHY THESE 66 BOOKS - NO MORE, NO LESS? WHO

DECIDED AND WHY?

It is important to notice that the church did not determine what should be
in the Bible (as many claim, alleging to a desire to establish power) but
tried to discover this. God, as we believe, wrote the books, so he made
sure that we could recognize his authority in the writings. The church
did recognize the authority in all the books we have in the Bible today
but not in other books.

THE CANON:
The canon means a rod for measuring.
Towards the close of the Old Testament times, it was realised that so
many sacred books have been written, it became necessary to make a
final selection to decide which of the books were considered inspired of
God. Thus, a group of the most learned and pious Jewish leaders were
selected possibly under the direction of the great and highly renowned
scribe Ezra.
Ezra is believed to be the person more than any person who was
responsible for collecting and arranging all the O.T. books into an order
which is almost the same as today’s O. T. canon.

A set standard to measure the worthiness of each book considered as

inspired.
Each book had to have certain characteristics, which made it acceptable
as an inspired book.

THE OT CANAN
1. Had to be true to the facts of the times and history.
2. Had to have internal consistency - should be consistent within itself
no contrary statement.
3. It Had to show that its teachings honoured God and were true to all
moral concepts of righteousness.
4. Had to have a trustworthy author, so far as could be discerned. The
test of the Book itself was even more important than its author.
5. Had to bear the marks of divine origin, such as its author’s claim to be
from God.
6. Its teachings about the nature and person of God, if any, should be
true.
7. True miracles, if any.
8. Its truthfulness, purity and must honour God.
When the book passed all these standards, it was believed to be inspired.
The book, adjudged to be inspired, was then included in the canon. By
rule, 39 books were selected to form the OT canon.
THE NT CANON
The Canon of the NT was very similar to that of the OT on its rule and
standard for acceptance as inspired. This includes:
 Authorship
 Local church acceptance
 Recognition by church Fathers (Direct disciples of the Apostles)
 Subject Matter: What is the book about? Is it doctrinally sound?
 Personal edification. Is the book able to edify? Is it able to impact
life to people?
The New Testament canon was recognized as early as AD 367, the Old
Testament no later than 150BC. For instance, Jesus recognized the law,
the prophets, and the writings as such (Luke 24:44, 11:51) (so he
recognized the already existing canon) and many specific passages as
well.

Q: WHAT ABOUT ESTHER AND THE SONG OF SONGS?

Esther: although the mention of God was (deliberately?) omitted, one

can see God's hand in the story described. God is in control and directs
seemingly insignificant coincidences to protect his people. One of the
best sources for recognizing God's actions in what we experience - it is
not necessary to point that out explicitly.

Song of Songs: One of the greatest descriptions of love, which is God's

greatest gift to marital life. There is nothing impure about love, passion,
and desire. The fact that people have devalued love to something selfish
only makes ``the original'' more valuable.

Some people are offended by verse 4:2 - it's too explicit for them and the
book was on ``the index'' (mature readers only) for quite some time. But
there is nothing offensive to that passage.
Q: WHAT ABOUT THE APOCRYPHA?
Reasons to exclude a book are inaccuracies (historical,
geographical), doctrines that are inconsistent with the other scriptures,
lack of divine characteristics (prophecy, teaching, expression of relation
to God), and focus on legends and folklore.

The Apocrypha (hidden/concealed books) enjoyed only local and

temporary recognition but were excluded very early because they didn't
meet all the acceptance criteria.

1. Esdras (150BC)
too much legendary material with no religious value
2. Esdras (100BC)
7 apocalyptic visions, very confusing instead of edifying.
Tobit (early 2nd century)
pharisaic material, wrong doctrine (``almsgiving atones for sin''),
picked up by the catholic church in the Middle Ages
Judith (middle 2nd century)
a novel of little religious value
Additions to Esther (100BC)
adding the lacking reference to God to the book (prayers).
Questionable letters supposedly written by Artaxerxes.
These passages are clearly later additions, trying to fix a ``deficiency''
that made the inclusion of the book of Esther in the canon questionable
to some people (who don't understand Esther). Not found in early
manuscripts of Esther
Wisdom of Solomon (AD 40)
many noble sentiments but authorship more than questionable
Sirach / Ecclesiasticus (180BC)
Wisdom literature, similar to Proverbs. Useful, but not of the same
power.
Baruch (AD 100):
claims to be written by a scribe of Jeremiah but contains material
that indicates a past disaster, probably the destruction of
 Jerusalem AD 70. Analysis of style and content points to a date
AD 100, not 580BC.
Additions to Daniel
(story of Susanna, Bel and the Dragon) legendary material of little
religious value. Song of the Hebrew Children borrows from Psalm
148.
Neither of these is found in reliable manuscripts of Daniel.
1./2. Maccabees (1st century BC)
a valuable historical book but of little religious value.

- Philo, Josephus, and all of the early Church fathers did not recognize
the Apocrypha.
- Jesus quoted from almost all of the scripture but not from the
Apocrypha.
- All protestant Churches reject the Apocrypha as canonical scripture
- Even the Catholic church did not include the Apocrypha in the canon
until 1546 and it is suspected that including them was solely motivated
by counter-Reformation efforts.

HISTORICAL RELIABILITY OF THE BIBLE – NT

To test for the historical reliability of the Scriptures, the Bible should
also go through the rigorous tests (or the criteria) used for all historical
documents. Citing from C. Sanders, McDowell proposes three basic
principles for such tests, i) the bibliographical test, ii) the internal
evidence test, and iii) the external evidence test.1

A. THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL TEST FOR THE RELIABILITY OF

THE NT
The bibliographical test is an examination of the textual transmission
by which documents reach us. It answers the question of how reliable
are the copies we have regarding the number of manuscripts (MSS)
and the time interval between the original and the existing copies
because the very original copies are not available.

1
Josh McDowell, The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict: Evidence I & II, (Nashville: Thomson Nelson
Publishers, 1999), 33; or Josh McDowell, A Ready Defense, (Nashville: Thomson Nelson Publishers, 1993), 43.
 a) The Number of Manuscripts and Their Closeness to the
Original
How many MSS of the NT are available and what is the time
interval between them and the original writings are the questions to
be answered.

There is ample evidence to show that many of the NT MSS are in

existence today compared with other accepted ancient world
literatures. There are also proofs to demonstrate that the NT MSS
are closer to their original copies than that of these ancient kinds of
literature.

b) Other Bibliographical Tests

Other bibliographical examinations2 as provided by McDowell are,
i) Accuracy of Manuscripts Supported by Various Versions –
where various versions or translations of the NT’s early
versions, which are so near to the time of the originals, are
compared with the existing copies (e.g., the Syriac and Latin
versions of the NT which dates around A.D. 150).
ii) Accuracy of Manuscripts Supported by Lectionaries – which
forms the second largest group of NT Greek MSS that were
used by the early church. Its value is, however, said to be only
secondary due to the fact that it excludes Revelation and parts of
Acts. It has been given other important roles recently like
establishing the true text of the NT and its use in influencing the
understanding of specific passages (e.g., Jn. 7:53-8:11; Mk.
16:9-20).

iii) Accuracy of Manuscripts Supported by Early Church

Fathers – which helps to confirm the twenty-seven books of the
NT and contains extensive quotes from the various NT books
that, scholars think they could have been used to write the entire
NT if the MSS were not available. Their use has, however,
received cautions, such as, quotes are sometimes used without
2
McDowell, The New Evidence, 41-45.
 verbal accuracy and the observation that some copyists were
prone to mistakes or to international alteration. See Fig. – 2.

B. INTERNAL EVIDENCE TEST FOR THE RELIABILITY OF

THE NT
While the bibliographical test determines only that, the text available
now is what was originally recorded; the internal evidence helps in
establishing the credibility of the written document and to what
extent. What is important here is the truthfulness of the author and or
the witness. This ability to tell the truth is also linked with the
nearness of the writer or witness both geographically and
chronologically to events recorded. McDowell indicates three ways
by which this could be done i) the rule of the benefit of doubt, ii) the
freeness of the document from known contradictions, and iii) whether
the writers used primary sources.3

a) Benefit of the Doubt

Here Aristotle’s dictum of “the benefit of the doubt [which] is to
be given to the document itself, [and] not arrogantly by the critic to
himself,” is employed. Thus, one is not to assume fraud or error
unless there are actual causes in the document to warrant that (e.g.,
contradictions or known factual inaccuracies).

b) Freeness of the Document from Known Contradiction

This establishes that there are no known contradictions in the NT
though some portions of the Scriptures at times seem to suggest
otherwise. The following principles for understanding apparent
contradictions in the Bible have been proposed:
a. The unexplained is not necessarily unexplainable.
b. Fallible interpretations do not mean fallible revelation.
c. Understand the context of the passage.
d. Interpret difficult passages in the light of clear ones.
e. Don’t base teaching on obscure passages.
f. The Bible is a human book with human characteristics.
3
McDowell, The New Evidence, 45-52.
 g. Just because a report is incomplete does not mean it is false.
h. New Testament citations of the Old Testament need not
always be exact.
i. The Bible does not necessarily approve of all its records
j. The Bible used non-technical, everyday language.
k. The Bible may use round numbers as well as exact numbers.
l. Note when the Bible uses different literature devices.
m. An error in a copy does not equate to an error in the original.
n. General statements don’t necessarily mean universal
promises.
o. Later revelation supersedes previous revelation.

c) Whether the Writer Used Primary Sources

This test relates the writer’s nearness geographically and
chronologically to the events recorded. The NT confirms that the
authors wrote as eyewitness or from first-hand information (Lk.
1:1-3; 2 Pt. 1:16; 1 Jn. 1:1-3; Ac. 2:23; Jn. 19:32; Lk. 3:1; Ac.
26:24-26). Again, the writers wrote in the lifetime of the
eyewitnesses of the events so none of them could twist the records.
It has been proven by scholars that none of the books were written
after about A.D. 80.

C. EXTERNAL EVIDENCE TEST FOR THE RELIABILITY OF

THE NT
This third test proves whether other historical documents confirm or
deny the internal evidence of the documents – are there other sources
that substantiate the accuracy, reliability, and authenticity of the
literature under review? (cf. Dt. 19:15; Mtt. 18:16; 2 Cor. 13:1; 1
Tim. 5:19).

a) Evidence of Early Christian Writers Outside the Bible

Writings from the following have been cited: Eusebius, Papias,
Irenaeus, Clement of Rome, Elgin Mayer, Ignatius, Polycarp, and
Tatian.
 Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 53-54 for details.
 b) Early non-Christian Confirmation of the NT
Tacitus, Suetonius, Josephus, Thailus, Pliny the Younger, Emperor
Trajan, the Talmud, Lucian, Mara Bar-Serapion, The Gospel of
Truth and the Acts of Pontius Pilate have been cited as examples of
non-Christian writers that supports the NT writings.
 Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 54-61 for details.

c) Archaeological Evidence of the NT

It is said that the evidence from archaeological findings to support
the Bible are so huge that whole books are not large enough to
contain them. For the NT, the following have been listed: support
of archaeology for the Gospel of Luke, earlier records of
Christianity, the pavement, the pools of Bethesda, archaeological
support for the Gospel of John, the Nazareth decree, Yohanan – a
crucifixion victim, the Pilate inscription, the Erastus inscription,
and NT coins. The table below summarizes some of the historical
and archaeological evidences for the reliability of the New
Testament.
 Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 61-68 for details.

HISTORICAL RELIABILITY OF THE BIBLE – OT

This section is about the reliability of the Old Testament. While some of
the means used in testing the reliability of the NT are applicable here,
much of the evidence used, however, is different. The following three
major ways for testing the reliability of the OT are employed i) textual
transmission, ii) evidences uncovered through archaeology, and iii)
evidence from the NT.

A. TEXTUAL TRANSMISSION
Unlike the NT, there is no abundance of close manuscript authority
for the OT. The closest Hebrew MS to the originals (or oldest
Hebrew MS) was dated around AD 900 before the discovery of the
Dead Sea Scroll. Thus, the time gap between this oldest Hebrew MS
and the completion of the OT (c. 400 BC), is 1,300 years. However,
the Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered from 1947 are dated, approximately,
between 200 BC and AD 68. Much of the evidence under textual
transmission is therefore related to the accuracy of the copying
process down through history.

a) The Accuracy of the Copying Process

This process examines the path from the original writings (which
do not exist) to the extant copies. It answers the question, is the
OT text, as it exists now, when compared with the original
documents, the same? Do they represent what their original
authors wrote and intended to say? Or, has the OT message
somehow been lost in the centuries-long shuffle of copying and re-
copying the biblical manuscripts? Studies have, nonetheless,
proved that the accuracy of the Hebrew copyist of the OT is
astonishing when compared with that of other similar literature of
antiquity.
 Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 69-71 for details.

With regard to the number of MSS, though that of the OT is

nowhere near the number of MSS for the NT, several hundreds
have been discovered.
 Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 71-73 for details.

b) The Talmudist (AD 100 – 500)

Although there were several groups of scholars in the Jewish
community who were tasked with the standardisation and
preservation of the Scriptures, the following two, the Talmudists
and the Masoretes are discussed since they are the most common
and important.

The Talmud (instruction, teaching) was a body of Hebrew civil and

canonical law based on the Torah. It represented the opinions and
 decisions of Jewish teachers. It is made up of the Mishnah4 (oral
law) and Gemara5 (comments on the Mishnah).
 Read more on the Mishnah and the Gemara from McDowell,
The New Evidence, 87.

c) The Masoretes (AD 500-950)

The Masoretes (from masora – ‘tradition’) were Jewish scholars
who gave the final form to the Old Testament. They were called
Masoretics because they preserved in writing the oral tradition
(masorah) the correct vowels and accents, and the number of
occurrences of rare words of unusual spellings. These scholars
(the Masoretes), thus, accepted the laborious job of editing the text
and standardising it. The text which the Massoretes concluded
with is called the “Masoretic” text, which is the standard Hebrew
text today.

According to F. F. Bruce, they “were well disciplined and treated

the text with the greatest imaginable reverence, and devised a
complicated system of safeguards against scribal slips.

d) Witness of the Dead Sea Scrolls

The Dead Sea Scrolls, said to be one of the most important
discoveries in biblical history, constitutes the collection of Hebrew
and Aramaic manuscripts, discovered in a series of caves in
Jordan, at the north-western end of the Dead Sea in the area of
Khirbet Qumran. The discovery covers a period between 1947 and
1956. The initial discovery in 1947 was by a Bedouin 6 shepherd
boy, Muhammad, who was searching for his lost goat. They were
originally written on leather or papyrus in various states of
4
The Mishnah (repetition, explanation, teaching) which contained the oral law was regarded the Second Law after
the Torah by the Jews.
5
The Gemara (to complete, accomplish, learn), was written in Aramaic and was basically a commentary on the
Mishnah.
6
Bedouins (Arabic, Badawi, “dwellers in the desert”) are nomadic Arabs inhabiting the deserts of the Middle East
and northern Africa. They are virtually Muslims.
 preservation. They have been attributed to members of a
previously unknown Jewish brotherhood.

Palaeographic evidence, supported by archaeological evidence,

indicates that most of the documents were written at various dates
between approximately 200 BC and AD 68. Among other things,
the scrolls included two of the oldest-known Hebrew copies (or
MSS) of the Book of Isaiah, dated 125 BC almost wholly intact;
and fragments of every book in the Old Testament except that of
Esther. A huge significance of this discovery is the closeness in
details of the information in the book of Isaiah and the then oldest
MS of Isaiah, dated around AD 900, over a thousand years
interval. This is an evidence of the kind of accuracy the copyist of
the Scriptures demonstrated in their work and hence confirms the
reliability of our extant Hebrew MS.

B. EVIDENCES THROUGH ARCHAEOLOGY

a) The next test for the reliability of the Old Testament is the
archaeological evidence. What is at stake here is whether the
historical events recounted in the OT actually happened as they are
told.

The task here is the reconstruction of the biblical events as they are
recorded in the Bible and attempting to identify them with known
historical events from the ancient Near East. By these
comparisons of the OT with ancient history, it makes it possible to
measure how close the biblical writers’ accounts were to the
modern historians’ understanding of what “actually happened.”

Two areas are of importance, namely, i) hard evidence (made up of

artifacts of previous societies that testify directly to biblical
events), and ii) documentary evidence (consisting of extra biblical
texts – written documents – that confirm the OT history directly or
indirectly).
 Archaeology is of prime importance in trying to fix both secular
and biblical historical events and after many years of serious
digging, the pieces supplied by biblical archaeologists fit so well
with the picture supplied by the biblical narratives.

 Read more on the Archaeological Evidence of the OT from

McDowell, The New Evidence, 91-115.

The table provided summarizes some of the historical and

archaeological evidences for the reliability of the Old Testament.
It gives evidence for how reliable the Bible texts really are.

b) Despite all these proves, some modern archaeologists have raised

negative attacks on the reliability of the Bible. E.g., (1) they
presume that the stories are fiction and (2) though they recognise
the archaeological discoveries, doubts are raised on the
conclusions drawn by earlier archaeologists.

C. NEW TESTAMENT CONFIRMATION OF THE OT

With the establishment of the historically reliability of the NT it can
also be used as a source to authenticate the OT’s historical reliability.
The NT records make this clearer when one considers its numerous
OT references both by Jesus and the various authors. In fact Jesus
held that the Torah was from Moses (Mk. 7:10; 10:3-5; 12:26; Lk.
5:14; 16:29-31; 24:27, 44; Jn. 7:19, 23; 5:45-47) as well as the NT
writers (Mk. 12:19; Lk. 2:22; 20:28; Jn. 1:17, 45; 8:5; 9:29; Acts
3:22; 6:14; 13:39; 15:1, 21; 26:22; 28:23; 1 Cor. 9:9; 2 Cor. 3:15;
Heb. 9:19; Rev. 15:3).

After these examinations of evidences, one can certainly agree with

McDowell that, “I can hold in my hand the Bible (both Old and New
Testament together) and conclude I have the reliable Word of God).7

7
McDowell, The New Evidence, 116.
Read McDowell, The New Evidence, 115-116 fo