The Bible is a reliable historical document

My opponent’s definitions are good for the most part but I reserve the right to bring up new definitions if my opponent tries to win the debate on topicality. Bible: the collection of sacred writings of the Christian religion, comprising the Old and New Testaments. [3] I do say that I am using the Protestant Bible. This excludes added books such as from the Mormons, Catholics, etc. Burden of Proof My opponent's burden will be to affirm the resolution and show that the Bible is indeed a reliable marker of the beginning of the world, ext. Well I’m not going to focus on the creation of the universe and I hope that this will not become an evolution verses creation debate. My burden will simply be to refute my opponent's arguments and bring some of my own to show that the Bible does contain false historical information. Agreed, but I reserve my right to refute this in later rounds. Good luck and Satan be upon my opponent. I do understand that this is a casual debate and jokes are made, however, this is insulting. I hope that the audience will take this into account when voting on the issue of who had better conduct. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Now on to my case Contention 1: The Bible is the most documented ancient text in the history of the world. We obviously don’t have the original books written in the Bible. So how do we know if what we have carries any resemblance of the original? We you look at the earliest copies that we have and we compare them. Let’s say someone wrote an essay that was 100 words. The problem is that the original essay is nowhere to be found, but there are two hand copies of the essays. Every word in the essay is the same except the last. So we would have a 99% pure text in the two manuscripts. It’s the same process when dealing with any ancient document. So let’s see how the New Testament Scriptures compare to other ancient documents. Author Date Written Earliest Copy Approximate Time Span between original & copy Number of Copies Accuracy of Copies Lucretius died 55 or 53 B. C. 1100 yrs 2 ---- Pliny 61-113 A. D. 850 A. D. 750 yrs 7 ---- Plato 427-347 B. C. 900 A. D. 1200 yrs 7 ---- Demosthenes 4th Cent. B. C. 1100 A. D. 800 yrs 8 ---- Herodotus 480-425 B. C. 900 A. D. 1300 yrs 8 ---- Suetonius 75-160 A. D. 950 A. D. 800 yrs 8 ---- Thucydides 460-400 B. C. 900 A. D. 1300 yrs 8 ---- Euripides 480-406 B. C. 1100 A. D. 1300 yrs 9 ---- Aristophanes 450-385 B. C. 900 A. D. 1200 yrs 10 ---- Caesar 100-44 B. C. 900 A. D. 1000 yrs 10 ---- Livy 59 BC-AD 17 ---- ? ?? 20 ---- Tacitus circa 100 A. D. 1100 A. D. 1000 yrs 20 ---- Aristotle 384-322 B. C. 1100 A. D. 1400 yrs 49 ---- Sophocles 496-406 B. C. 1000 A. D 1400 yrs 193 ---- Homer (Iliad) 900 B. C. 400 B. C. 500 yrs 643 95% New Testament 1st Cent. A. D. (50-100 A. D. 2nd Cent. A. D. (c. 130 A. D. f. ) less than 100 years 5600 99.5% The New Testament is the best documented ancient text in the world, and the Old Testament has a 99% accuracy when we compare the Dead Sea Scrolls to each other. It should be obvious that the biblical documents, especially the New Testament documents, are superior in their quantity, time span from original occurrence, and textual reliability. People still question if the documents are reliably transmitted to us, but they should rather ask if the biblical documents record actual historical accounts. Contention 2: The Bible documents the world, and the world vice versa. The Roman historian Josephus mentions several people from the New Testament along with other writers who confirm the story. Flavius Josephus (AD 37? -101? ) mentions Jesus - Antiquities, Book 18, ch. 3, par. 3. Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, (9) those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; (10) as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day. Here are the rest of the non-biblical accounts. . http://carm.org... And also the Bible is a book of history. It could be said that the Bible is a book of history -- and it is. The bible describes places, people, and events in various degrees of detail. It is essentially an historical account of the people of God throughout thousands of years. If you open to almost any page in the Bible you will find a name of a place and/or a person. Much of this can be verified from archaeology. Though archaeology cannot prove that the Bible is the inspired word of God, it has the ability to prove whether or not some events and locations described therein are true or false. So far, however, there isn't a single archaeological discovery that disproves the Bible in any way. Nevertheless, many people used to think that the Bible had numerous historical errors in it such as Luke's account of Lysanias being the tetrarch of Abiline in about 27 AD (Luke 3:1). For years scholars used this "factual error" to prove Luke was wrong because it was common knowledge that Lysanias was not a tetrarch, but the ruler of Chalcis about 50 years earlier than what Luke described. But, an archaeological inscription was found that said Lysanias was the tetrarch in Abila near Damascus at the time that Luke said. It turns out that there had been two people name Lysanias and Luke had accurately recorded the facts. Also, the walls of Jericho have been found, destroyed just as the Bible says. Many critics doubted that Nazareth ever existed, yet archaeologists have found a first-century synagogue inscription at Caesarea that has verified its existence. Finds have verified the existence of Herod the Great and his son Herod Antipas. The remains of the Apostle Peter's house have been found at Capernaum. Bones with nail scars through the wrists and feet have been uncovered as well demonstrating the actuality of crucifixion. The High Priest Caiaphas' bones have been discovered in an ossuary (a box used to store bones). There is, of course, a host of archaeological digs that corroborate biblical records on places such as Bethsaida, Bethany, Caesarea Philippi, Capernaum, Cyprus, Galatia, Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, Corinth, Ephesus, Rome, etc. For more on this see, . http://carm.org... There are many such archaeological verifications of biblical events and places. Is the Bible trustworthy? Absolutely! Remember, no archaeological discovery has ever contradicted the Bible. Therefore, since it has been verified over and over again throughout the centuries, we can continue to trust it as an accurate historical document. Good luck to my opponent in the next round and just so you know, I have a lot of info under my contentions and I only really expect you to attack my contentions. The info is what my arguments represent. I do this so that I don’t have to use all 8,000 characters in each round. Sources: . http://carm.org... . http://carm.org... . http://carm.org...