I can agree with you about this; mere belief is inadequate. Certainly, just believing something without valid reasons or having blind faith could lead to one very easily being wrong.
The Bible is not vague in claiming to be God’s Word. Do you know how many hundreds times the phrases, “Thus says the Lord” or “The word of God” are used throughout the scriptures? Have you researched how extremely meticulous and careful the scribes and copyists were who penned and passed down the manuscripts because they knew they were handling God’s Word? How is it that over 40 authors from different geographical locations could write the books of the Bible, in three languages, from a wide variety of occupations, over a period of fifteen centuries and yet the complete collection of scriptures is cohesive with a unity which is beyond human ability? How much time have you spent investigating the historical, archeological, and prophetic aspects of the scriptures?
I am sure God does not intend humans He created in His image to have a baseless, unreasonable faith.
The Bible can and should be tested for its reliability by anyone who is sincerely serious to know about God and the reliability or accuracy of the Bible. Many have done so and found the evidence which they needed to conclude that the Bible is reliable and of supernatural origin from God, as revelation to His created beings.
“It’s from Professor Robert D. Wilson, Princeton University professor—this is some years ago. He was, you would have to say, at least one of if not the greatest language experts and scholars of all time! He was fluent in more than 40 Semitic languages. “
“The result of those 45 years’ study, which I have given to the text, has been this: I can affirm that there is not a page of the Old Testament concerning which we need have any doubt.
[Now he gives you an example.] “There are 29 ancient kings, whose names are mentioned not only in the Bible but also on monuments. [I mean, there are more kings than that, but these, in his day, they had found 29 of them whose names were mentioned on monuments of their own time.] There are 195 consonants in these 29 proper names. Yet we find that in the documents of the Hebrew Old Testament there are only two or three out of the entire 195 about which there can be any question of their being written in exactly the same way as they were inscribed on their own monuments [which archaeologists have to date discovered]. Some of these go back 4,000 years and are so written that every letter is clear and correct.”
Compare this accuracy with the greatest scholar of his age, the librarian at Alexandria in 200 BC. He compiled a catalogue of the kings of Egypt, 38 in all. Of the entire number, only three or four are recognizable. That is even the names of the kings.] He also made a list of the kings of Assyria; in only one case can we tell who is meant; and that one is not spelled correctly. Or take Ptolemy, who drew up a register of 18 kings of Babylon. Not one of them is properly spelled; you could not make them out at all if you did not know from other sources to what he is referring.
“If anyone talks about the Bible, ask him about the kings mentioned in it. There are 29 kings referred to, and ten different countries among these 29, all of which are included in the Bible and on monuments. Every one of these is given his right name in the Bible, his right country, and placed in correct chronological order, spelled correctly. Think of what that means!”
How Reliable Is the Bible?
“This is from Sir Frederick G. Kenyon, who was one of the great authorities in the field of textual criticism. He writes: “No fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith rests on a disputed reading. It cannot be too strongly asserted that in substance the text of the Bible is certain. Especially is this the case with the New Testament. The number of manuscripts of the New Testament, of early translations from it, of quotations from it, from the oldest writers of the church is so large that it is practically certain that the true reading of every doubtful passage is preserved in some one or other of these ancient authorities. This can be said of no other ancient book in the world.” He goes on: “It is reassuring at the end, to find that the general result of all these discoveries of manuscripts and all this study is to strengthen the proof of the authenticity of the scriptures and our conviction that we have in our hands in substantial integrity, the veritable Word of God.”
How Reliable Is the Bible?
