On the Christian Apologists Propaganda Techniques to Prove the Authenticity of the Bible

A fascinating technique employed by the Christian apologists is to overwhelm their audience with a barrage of nonsensical numbers that are totally unrelated to the problem of verification of the hypothesis that they are trying to maintain, that is the bible text is not corrupted. The reality is that these apologists are barking at a wrong tree. The issue of corruption of bible has nothing to do with the question of variations among different manuscripts.

For instance, to maintain the hypothesis that the biblical manuscripts are not corrupted, the apologists talk about 5824 Greek manuscripts, more than 10,000 Latin manuscripts, and between 5000 to 10,000 of manuscripts in other languages like Armenian, Syriac, Arabic, Georgians, Coptic and so on.  According to them this means there are between 20 to 25 thousands of biblical manuscripts. To further overwhelm their audiences, they then talk about numerous church fathers, pastors, bishops, dickens and so on that in their numerous letters, sermons, homilies , and so on, in which they have quoted various verses of the bible, and claim that the entire New Testament can be reconstructed from these documents.

They cleverly misrepresent the question of the corruption of the bible as a question related to variations of the text among various manuscripts, and they pretend that the question of the corruption of the text is related to some trivial differences in misspelling of some words that have no bearing on the doctrinal issues of Christianity. Again to prove their points, they resort to another barrage of irrelevant numbers. related to variation in wording, including word order, omission or addition of words, and spelling differences. They argue for instance that the Greek New Testament is made of approximately 140,000 words (some even provide the exact number of 138,162 words). They then offer an  estimate of the variations among manuscripts (about 400,000), and arguing that the vast majority of such differences cannot be translated at all, or that the number of variations is correlated to the number of manuscripts, and a vast majority of them are so insignificant that do not affect any doctrinal issues.

To continue with this diversionary tactic  of confusing the audience, they then talk about the dating of manuscripts and try to prove that these were written very close to the time of Christ. By this stage the audience has forgotten that at issue is not the corrupt manuscript, but the corrupt version of 27 books of the bible, including the four gospels that are written by anonymous Greek writers, under the pseudonyms of Mark, Luke, Mathew and John, that are so different from one another in reference to birth, teaching and the death of Jesus,

They do not mention that the Hebrew Bible has 24 books, a "canon," which was affirmed at the Councils of Jamnia in A.D. 90 and 118. The Protestant Old Testament  reordered these 24 books into 39 books. For instance, they divided the book of Samuel in the Hebrew Bible into ; Samuel I and II!

The Catholic Old Testament, on the other hand includes Tobit, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus (Sirach), Baruch (includes the Letters of Jeremiah), I and II Maccabees, and additions to Daniel and Esther. These books were included in the Septuagint, a Greek translation of a different Hebrew canon. Greek Orthodox bible includes 4 more books: ;I Esdras, ;III and IV Maccabees and Psalm 151.

During the period between the completion of the Old Testament and the first writings included in the New Testament (i.e. the period between 450 BC and 50 AD), many essays, psalms and historical accounts circulated throughout the synagogues and early churches. Some of these documents gradually came to be regarded by certain of the believers as actually inspired and deserving of a place in the canon.

 The first definite listing of the accepted books of the Bible  is usually dated  around 367 AD. However, a second set of booklets had been assembled through the years, and these were given the name Apocrypha ἀπόκρυφα (meaning “hidden”).  These all were written before the birth of Christ, and many early Christians regarded them as the word of God, and in some editions of the Bible they were interspersed among the Old Testament books.

When  Martin Luther,  translated the bible in 1534, he decided to extract  the apocryphal books from their usual places in the Old Testament, and  place them at the end of the Old Testament, since he was of the opinion that they  “are not held equal to the Sacred Scriptures and yet are useful and good for reading!”  Subsequently, many Protestant Bibles omitted them completely. However, in 1546 the Roman Catholic Council of Trent specifically listed the apocryphal books approved by the Roman Catholic Church as inspired and they are always included in Roman Catholic Bibles and are usually interspersed among the books of the Old Testament.

The Authorized King James Version called these books ‘Apocrypha’. It separated them, because the  2 Esdras 14:46 says:

 But keep the seventy last, that thou mayest deliver them only to such as be wise among the people: For in them is the spring of understanding, the fountain of wisdom, and the stream of knowledge.

The Roman Catholic Bibles  does not call them Apocrypha. They call them deuterocanonical, which means that they belong to the second canon. The first list is of books first written in Hebrew. This second list is of books first written in Greek.

The 1538 Myles Coverdale Bible contained an Apocrypha that excluded Baruch and the Prayer of Manasseh. The 1560 Geneva Bible placed the Prayer of Manasseh after 2 Chronicles; the rest of the Apocrypha were placed in an inter-testamental section.

The Douay-Rheims Bible (1582–1609) placed the Prayer of Manasseh and 3 and 4 Esdras into an Appendix of the second volume of the Old Testament.

The apocrypha was a part of the KJV for 274 years until being removed in 1885 A.D

1 Esdras (Vulgate 3 Esdras)
2 Esdras (Vulgate 4 Esdras)
Tobit
Judith ("Judeth" in Geneva)
Rest of Esther (Vulgate Esther 10:4 – 16:24)
Wisdom
Ecclesiasticus (also known as Sirach)
Baruch and the Epistle of Jeremy ("Jeremiah" in Geneva) (all part of Vulgate Baruch)
Song of the Three Children (Vulgate Daniel 3:24–90)
Story of Susanna (Vulgate Daniel 13)
The Idol Bel and the Dragon (Vulgate Daniel 14)
Prayer of Manasses (Daniel)
1 Maccabees
2 Maccabees

The term "Pseudepigrapha" comes from Greek words meaning false writings (pseudo=false and epigraphe=to inscribe) and refers to works that attempt to create Scripture under false names. Both Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha were written–scholars believe–during the same general period of time, and it is not inconceivable to imagine the discovery of future texts that (along with the Qumran library and other assorted scrolls) might continue to inform our knowledge of the world from which they emerged.

• Apocalypse of Abraham
• Apocalypse of Moses
• Letter of Aristeas
• Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah
• Joseph and Aseneth
• Life of Adam and Eve
• Lives of the Prophets
• Ladder of Jacob
• Jannes and Jambres
• History of the Captivity in Babylon
• History of the Rechabites
• Eldad and Modad
• History of Joseph
• Odes of Solomon
• Prayer of Joseph
• Prayer of Jacob
• Vision of Ezra

The apologists do not like to talk about the books  that were burnt. In fact during the dark ages if anybody had these books, the Inquisition, which was an ecclesiastical court of the Roman Catholic Church, and its mission was the discovery and punishment of heresy would torture and kill them. Even today evangelical Christians are in absolute horror to talk about these books, which include:

• Gospel of Mary the Magdalene…
• Gospel of Philip
• Gospel of The Twin/Thomas
• Book of Enoch
• Secret Book of James
• Apocalypse of Paul
• Letter of Peter to Philip
• Apocalypse of Peter
• Gospel of Truth
• Gospel to the Egyptians

The quality of the writings included in the Pseudepigrapha varies greatly from one to the next. For example, the Didache includes many valuable historical elements from early Christianity, while the Gospel of Thomas has no connection to the biblical Thomas and was written by a Gnostic writer in Egypt.

The Apostle Paul had to deal with false writings or Pseudepigrapha even in his time. In 2 Thessalonians 2:2 we find him concerned about a "letter seeming to be from us." In other places, Paul would note, "I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. This is the sign of genuineness in every letter of mine; it is the way I write" (2 Thessalonians 3:17; also 1 Corinthians 16:21; Galatians 6:11; and Colossians 4:18).

The reason  some of the Pseudepigrapha  were removed or destroyed is because some powerful sects claimed that they presented  false or blasphemous doctrines.  In 1252, Pope Innocent IV officially authorized the creation of the horrifying Inquisition torture chambers. It also included anew perpetual imprisonment or death at the stake without the bishops consent. Acquittal of the accused was now virtually impossible. Thus, with a license granted by the pope himself, Inquisitors were free to explore the depths of horror and cruelty. Dressed as black-robed fiends with black cowls over their heads, Inquisitors could extract confessions from just about anyone. The Inquisition invented every conceivable devise to inflict pain by slowly dismembering and dislocating the body.

Many of the devices were inscribed with the motto “Glory be only to God.” Bernardus Guidonis, the Inquisitor in Toulouse instructed the layman as to never argue with the unbeliever, but as to “thrust his sword into the man’s belly as far as it will go.” George Ryley Scott describes how the inquisitors, gorged with their inhumanity, and developed a degree of callousness rarely rivaled in the annals of civilization, with the ecclesiastical authorities condemning every faith outside of Christianity as demonic.

At the time of the Reformation, Protestants decided that, because the additional books weren't in the Hebrew Bible, they shouldn't be in the Christian Bible, either (though they were included in early editions of the King James Bible). Catholics, at the Council of Trent (1546), decided to keep the "deutero-canonical" books.