# Miscellaneous tough questions for Christians **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 24, 2015, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713 "2015-05-24T11:07:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![silvermist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@silvermist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silvermist)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713/281 "2015-06-11T23:24:25Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > But he’s not asking tough questions _of_ Christians-he’s asking for tough questions to _ask_ Christians. Bingo! A smart doper. ---
**Author:** ![JohnClay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@JohnClay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnClay)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2015, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713/282 "2015-06-14T11:08:41Z")
Today’s “Q & A” service was about “Can we trust the Bible?”. The pastor said something like that there were 20,000+ copies of the NT within a few decades of the supposed events while some other things had far less copies and a far longer gap. He also talked about internal and external evidence. Anyway I talked with the guy again about the Bible. He told me about Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53… Isaiah 53 talks a lot about the gospel message at least 100 years before Jesus: > **[Bible Gateway passage: Isaiah 53 - New International Version](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%2B53)** > > Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should... > **[Bible Gateway passage: Psalm 22 - New International Version](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=psalms%2B22)** > > Psalm 22 - For the director of music. To the tune of “The Doe of the Morning.” A psalm of David. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not... See verse 1 and 16-18… He said David was a prophet - I said I had never heard that before. ---
**Author:** ![Razncain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9d8465/32.png) [@Razncain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Razncain)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2015, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713/283 "2015-06-14T15:03:04Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > Today’s “Q & A” service was about “Can we trust the Bible?”. The pastor said something like that there were 20,000+ copies of the NT within a few decades of the supposed events while some other things had far less copies and a far longer gap. He also talked about internal and external evidence. I think you may have misquoted him, because I don’t think anybody could be that mistaken. And it sounds like your preacher got his service exactly right out of Josh McDowell’s _Evidence that Demands a Verdict_ which has been critiqued to death on the internet for all of the errors, omissions, and just shoddy scholarship, along with many think is downright dishonesty with the way he handles and interprets what he calls evidence. McDowell refers to them as manuscripts, some 20,000-25,000 or so of existing NT manuscripts that exist and survive today. It’s important to note that McDowell and I’m sure your preacher fail to also mention of what they are considering NT manuscripts, and that it can be any fragment of papyrus, it doesn’t matter if it is a fraction of an inch, which many are. So we are talking far from complete. There are only a few surviving earlier manuscripts that are mostly complete of all of the gospels, and considered the oldest which are in the form of codices such as Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, Alexandrinus, and Ephraemi Rescriptus, which most believe to be fourth and fifth century. ---
**Author:** ![JohnClay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@JohnClay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnClay)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2015, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713/284 "2015-06-14T21:57:51Z")
The pastor said most weren’t complete - I forgot to mention that ---
**Author:** ![Razncain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9d8465/32.png) [@Razncain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Razncain)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2015, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713/285 "2015-06-14T22:46:23Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > The pastor said most weren’t complete - I forgot to mention that That’s the least of his problems, when you consider in the count, many are just fragments of papyrus. Otherwise, their number would be drastically reduced, and no one, that I’m aware of, except ultra-conservative Christian apologetics would make the claim that all of these NT manuscripts were over 20,000 in number within a few decades of supposed events. I could have spoken better also, when I should have been referring to the codices I mentioned as referring to most of the NT, as well as the OT, not sure why I focused on just the gospels. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miscellaneous-tough-questions-for-christians/720713.md?page=14)