Cold Case Christianity: Wallace lies to you about the accuracy of the Old Testament text

This is my reply to an article by J. Warner Wallace entitled

Cold Case Christianity: 

Establishing the Reliability of the Old Testament: A Timely Test of Transmission 

Posted: 25 Apr 2018 03:00 AM PDT

Establishing the Reliability of the Old Testament - A Timely Test of Transmission
In Cold Case Christianity, I discussed the careful transmission of Biblical texts. A number of my cold case investigations began with a careful examination of the original police reports and records. I got these documents from the police Records Division, where they were carefully collected and maintained for many years. Careful protocols were established to guarantee the preservation of these documents.

Which did not require somebody to copy out by hand what was stated in a prior written document.  We wouldn't have invented photocopying if copying by hand was equally as reliable.  Perhaps modern man found a more reliable way to preserve testimony than God himself?  Or did I forget that God's refusal to invent the printing press back when it would have been most beneficial falls under that "his mysterious ways" mantra that constantly sings in your head?

In one particular case, I had the chance to test this preservation process. After retrieving a report from Records, I called the original detective to ask a series of questions. This particular detective was conscientious enough to keep copies of his reports from his unsolved cases. He brought his copy with him for our interview. My copy from records was exactly the same as the detective’s. The Records Division had done its job, maintaining an accurate and reliable copy of the original documents for over 30 years.

That doesn't exactly sound like the Biblia Hebraica Stuttengartsia 

As it turns out, we can examine the competency of the ancient Jewish “Records Division” and test the ability of ancient scribes to accurately copy (and maintain) the Old Testament with a similar comparison.

Correct, and that's why you cannot decide which form of Jeremiah, Lxx or MT, is closer to the original.

 Here's an inerrantist Christian scholar on Jeremiah's text:

No other book of the Old Testament contains as many textual variants between the Hebrew (MT) and Greek texts (LXX) as does the Book of Jeremiah. In 1862 F. Giesebracht determined that the LXX is about twenty-seven hundred words or one-eighth shorter than the MT.47 A more precise count by Y.-J. Min in 1977 found the LXX to be 3,097 words or one-seventh shorter than the MT.48 The differences include the omission of entire passages in the LXX, the longest being about 180 words. The most significant omissions are 29:16–20; 33:14–26; 39:4–13; 51:41b–49a; 52:27b–30. Other omissions may be a phrase, a sentence, or only a single word or two. The LXX has about one hundred words not found in the MT. Furthermore, some words in the LXX are different from the corresponding words in the MT (variants). Another type variant that occurs is a different arrangement of texts. The most significant one occurs in the messages against foreign nations (chaps. 46–51 in the MT). In the LXX this section appears immediately after 25:13a (LXX = 25:14–31:44) and is also arranged internally in a different sequence from the MT.

Huey, F. (2001, c1993). Vol. 16: Jeremiah, Lamentations (electronic ed.).
Logos Library System; The New American Commentary (Page 30).
Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

Wallace continues:

It’s clear the Jews guarded Scripture with extreme care and precision.

No, it was Jeremiah himself who accused the scribes of employing the "lying pen":

 8 "How can you say, 'We are wise, And the law of the LORD is with us'? But behold, the lying pen of the scribes Has made it into a lie. (Jer. 8:8 NAU)

The theory that the Jews guarded Scripture with extreme care and precision cannot be reconciled with the biblical story of Josiah's reform, wherein the Jews were perplexed upon finding a book of Moses hidden in the wall of a temple being remodeled, and they had to get a female spiritist to give her opinion on it before they could say with confidence that it was truly the law of the Lord.  That would hardly be the case if the Jews "guarded Scripture with extreme care and precision".  nobody seems to care that by the time of Josiah's reign, the Jews had all but forgotten the Law.  From 2nd Kings 22:

 8 Then Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the scribe, "I have found the book of the law in the house of the LORD." And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan who read it.
 9 Shaphan the scribe came to the king and brought back word to the king and said, "Your servants have emptied out the money that was found in the house, and have delivered it into the hand of the workmen who have the oversight of the house of the LORD."
 10 Moreover, Shaphan the scribe told the king saying, "Hilkiah the priest has given me a book." And Shaphan read it in the presence of the king.
 11 When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes.
 12 Then the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam the son of Shaphan, Achbor the son of Micaiah, Shaphan the scribe, and Asaiah the king's servant saying,
 13 "Go, inquire of the LORD for me and the people and all Judah concerning the words of this book that has been found, for great is the wrath of the LORD that burns against us, because our fathers have not listened to the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us."
 14 So Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam, Achbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, the son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem in the Second Quarter); and they spoke to her.
 15 She said to them, "Thus says the LORD God of Israel, 'Tell the man who sent you to me,
 16 thus says the LORD, "Behold, I bring evil on this place and on its inhabitants, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah has read.
 17 "Because they have forsaken Me and have burned incense to other gods that they might provoke Me to anger with all the work of their hands, therefore My wrath burns against this place, and it shall not be quenched."'
 18 "But to the king of Judah who sent you to inquire of the LORD thus shall you say to him, 'Thus says the LORD God of Israel, "Regarding the words which you have heard,
 19 because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before the LORD when you heard what I spoke against this place and against its inhabitants that they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have torn your clothes and wept before Me, I truly have heard you," declares the LORD.
 20 "Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you will be gathered to your grave in peace, and your eyes will not see all the evil which I will bring on this place."'" So they brought back word to the king.

NAU  2 Kings 23:1 Then the king sent, and they gathered to him all the elders of Judah and of Jerusalem.
 2 The king went up to the house of the LORD and all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, and the priests and the prophets and all the people, both small and great; and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of the LORD.
 3 The king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the LORD, to walk after the LORD, and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes with all his heart and all his soul, to carry out the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people entered into the covenant. (2 Ki. 22:8-23:3 NAU)

Wallace continues:

The Old Testament Scriptures were revered and protected, largely because early believers considered them to be the holy Word of God.

Some church fathers insisted the text of the OT became intolerably corrupt and had gone missing before the temple was rebuilt, and therefore, Ezra restored them with his magic wand.  Clement of Alexandria (2nd century) is representative:

So much for the details respecting dates, as stated variously by many, and as set down by us.

It is said that the Scriptures both of the law and of the prophets were translated from the dialect of the Hebrews into the Greek language in the reign of Ptolemy the son of Lagos, or, according to others, of Ptolemy surnamed Philadelphus; Demetrius Phalereus bringing to this task thegreatest earnestness, and employing painstaking accuracy on the materials for the translation. For the Macedonians being still in possession of Asia, and the king being ambitious of adorning the library he had at Alexandria with all writings, desired the people of Jerusalem to translate the prophecies they possessed into the Greek dialect. And they being the subjects of the Macedonians, selected from those of highest character among them seventy elders, versed in the Scriptures, and skilled in the Greek dialect, and sent them to him with the divine books. And each having severally translated each prophetic book, and all the translations being compared together, they agreed both in meaning and expression. For it was the counsel of God carried out for the benefit of Grecian ears. It was not alien to the inspiration of God, who gave the prophecy, also to produce the translation, and make it as it were Greek prophecy. Since the Scriptures having perished in the captivity of Nabuchodonosor, Esdra the Levite, the priest, in the time of Artaxerxes king of the Persians, having become inspired in the exercise of prophecy restored again the whole of the ancient Scriptures. And Aristobulus, in his first book addressed to Philometor, writes in these words: “And Plato followed the laws given to us, and had manifestly studied all that is said in them.” And before Demetrius there had been translated by another, previous to the dominion of Alexander and of the Persians, the account of the departure of our countrymen the Hebrews from Egypt, and the fame of all that happened to them, and their taking possession of the land, and the account of the whole code of laws; so that it is perfectly clear that the above-mentioned philosopher derived a great deal from this source, for he was very learned, as also Pythagoras, who transferred many things from our books to his own system of doctrines. And Numenius, the Pythagorean philosopher, expressly writes: “For what is Plato, but Moses speaking in Attic Greek? ”This Moses was a theologian and prophet, and as some say, an interpreter of sacred laws. His family, his deeds, and life, are related by the Scriptures themselves, which are worthy of all credit; but have nevertheless to be stated by us also as well as we can.

Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, ch. XXII

Roberts, A., Donaldson, J., & Coxe, A. C. (1997).

The Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol. II

 Wallace continues:

The Masoretic tradition gives us a glimpse into the obsessive care Jewish scribes historically took with their sacred texts. Scribes known as the Masoretes (a group of Jewish copyists living and working primarily in Tiberias and Jerusalem) took over the precise job of copying the ancient Scripture and transmitting it for later generations.

Yes, they did, but even conservative Christian scholars say the text is in poor condition with little to zero ability to know what the original likely said:

 from A Student's Guide to Textual Criticism of the Bible: Its History, Methods...By Paul D. Wegner:

“Most scholars today have abandoned any attempt to develop and eclectic Hebrew text (combining the best readings from each of the Hebrew manuscripts, similar to the United Bible Societies text of the New Testament).  In the case of the Old Testaement text, scholars have argued for that literary history is very  complicated and  thatt little of it is known.  Some scholars have suggested that the different versions of part or all of t some books may have coexisted or that there many have been different stages in the literary development of a book (e.g., Jeremiah and Ezekiel both have shorter and longer forms).  Tov states: Large-scale differences between the textual witnesses show that a few books and parts of books were once circulated in different formulations representing different literary stages, as a rule one after the other, but possibly also parallel to each other.  The situation is complicated even further by the fact that we do not know when the development, modification and compilation of the books ceased.  In addition, for the vast majority of Old Testament books the oldest extant text was copied at least several hundred years after it was first written.”

Wallace continues:

The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Qumran confirms their amazing ability. In 1947, a Bedouin herdsman found some unusual clay jars in caves near the valley of the Dead Sea. The jars contained a number of scrolls revealing the religious beliefs of monastic farmers who lived in the valley from 150 BC to AD 70. When this group saw the Romans invade the region, they apparently put their cherished scrolls in the jars and hid them in the caves. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain fragments of almost every book in the Old Testament, and most importantly, a complete copy of the book of Isaiah. This scroll was dated to approximately 100 BC; it was incredibly important to historians and textual experts because it was approximately one thousand years older than any Masoretic copy of Isaiah. The Dead Sea Scroll version of Isaiah allowed scholars to compare the text over this period of time to see if copyists had been conscientious. Scholars were amazed by what they discovered.

According to Gleason Archer (author of A Survey of Old Testament Introduction), a comparison of the Qumran manuscripts of Isaiah “proved to be word for word identical with our standard Hebrew Bible in more than 95 percent of the text.” Some of the 5 percent differences were simply a matter of spelling (like you might experience when using the word favor instead of favour). Some were grammatical differences (like the presence of the word and to connect two ideas or objects within a sentence). Finally, some were the addition of a word for the sake of clarity (like the addition of the Hebrew word for “light” to the end of verse 53:11, following “they shall see”). None of these grammatical variations changed the meaning of the text in any way.

The late and beloved Farrell Till shot this shit down almost 30 years ago:

With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, believers in the inerrancy doctrine thought they had found cause to rejoice. In Cave One at Qumran was found a manuscript of the book of Isaiah containing all 66 chapters except for only a few words that were missing where edges of the scroll had crumbled. Although many spelling variations were found in the text, the content of the Qumran scroll was found to be remarkably parallel to the Masoretic text of 895 A. D. Translators of the Revised Standard Version in 1952 found only 13 textual differences in the manuscript that they considered important enough to affect their translation of Isaiah. When scholars dated the manuscript at circa 100 B.C., Bible fundamentalists believed they had found in the Qumran text of Isaiah indisputable proof that through the long, silent centuries Jewish scribes had been scrupulously faithful in transmitting their sacred books. After all, if a thousand years had brought no significant changes to the text of Isaiah, couldn't we believe that the same was true of the other Old Testament books?

This would make an impressive argument were it not for subsequent discoveries that were made at Qumran, which Bible inerrantists have been very reluctant to talk about...

Farrell Till, “The Jeremiah Dilemma”,

Skeptical Review (1990, July-August)

 And under Christian reasoning, Wallace is reluctant to talk about the Qumran evidence for bible books other than Isaiah, so the only way Farrell Till could have known that fundamentalists were very reluctant to talk about those matters, is if he was inspired by God.  How else could he have foreseen such things?

(for the skeptical reader, I saved most of Farrell Till's "Skeptical Review" articles, I can sent you the executable file that will give you most of issues or so if interested.  This site has most issues between 1990 and 1995; wayback has preserved many of Till's online posts between 2004 and 2006, from a now-defunct website. See here for wayback's preservation of articles from more skeptical authors at the now-defunct website).

Wallace continues: 

What compelled the ancient scribes to treat these documents with such precision and meticulous care?

What compels Christians to play with live rattlesnakes at church?

It was clearly their belief the documents themselves were sacred and given to them by God.

Then the Jews of Jeremiah 8:8 were a sorry exception.

The ancient Jewish scribes didn’t have access to photocopiers, microfiche, or digital imaging like modern police-department Records Divisions do,

And if God was really moving through them, he could have simply waved his magic wand and had the Jews invent the printing press.

but they understood the importance of Divine record keeping, and they used the first-century equivalent in technology (the meticulous tradition of their Masoretes) to carefully guarantee the accuracy of the texts.

You are clearly an "apologist" with a fundamentalist axe to grind.  No responsible Christian scholar would rave about such ideological fantasies as this.

J. Warner Wallace is a Cold-Case Detective,

That's right, he isn't a scholar.  If he was, he would have known that the people most knowledgeable about the state of the OT text, do not find it to be the shiny perfect idol that Wallace apparently does.

Answering Dan Wallace's question on historical reliability of the New Testament

Daniel Wallace allows customer to purchase a "course" that will help them answer certain questions:



Perhaps my input will help Dr. Wallace ensure his paying customers obtain more bang for their buck:

Can we trust the NT documents?

Can we "trust" the Apocrypha?  Depends on what you mean.  Yes, they are generally historically reliable, but that's a far cry from saying every last little detail they mention is historical truth.

Whether a historical source can be "trusted" often cannot be answered simply "yes" or "no", because all sources are imperfect.  Here are some justifications for remaining skeptical of the accuracy or honesty of some of the NT writers:

1 - Apostle Paul admitted his willingness to give his audience a false impression of his true beliefs, if he thought doing so would increase the number of his followers:

 18 What then is my reward? That, when I preach the gospel, I may offer the gospel without charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel.
 19 For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, that I might win the more.
 20 And to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win Jews; to those who are under the Law, as under the Law, though not being myself under the Law, that I might win those who are under the Law;
 21 to those who are without law, as without law, though not being without the law of God but under the law of Christ, that I might win those who are without law.
 22 To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, that I may by all means save some.
 23 And I do all things for the sake of the gospel, that I may become a fellow partaker of it.
 (1 Cor. 9:18-23 NAS)

I've been asking fundies for years how Paul could believe himself free from the law, yet present himself to orthodox Jews as if he believed himself under the law, and do all this without giving a false impression of his true theological convictions.  Apparently, if Paul was honest, he would have made sure when he took a Jewish vow with others in Acts 21:18-26, that Jews who took the vow with him correctly understood that he believed these laws were waxing old, and ready to vanish away (Hebrews 8:13).  What are the odds, though, that Paul clearly specified this particular nuanced form of his beliefs to them?  One has to wonder: when Paul had Timothy circumcised "because of the Jews" (Acts 16:3), was he telling those Jews, during the surgery, that Paul regards everything distinctly Jewish in his pre-Christian life as feces (Philippians 3:4-8, v. 8 "rubbish", Greek: skubalon, feces, waste)?

Sort of makes you wonder whether the "all things to all men" hypocrisy also affected his epistles.  Does Paul tell Christians to obey secular authorities (Romans 13:1-3) because he seriously believes this, or solely because he happens to be imprisoned at Rome, and recognizes that telling his followers to obey secular authority will make Rome look a bit more favorably on him?

2 - Clement of Alexandria's beliefs about gospel origins justify suspicion toward gospel accuracy:

Quoted by Eusebius in Church History, Book 6, ch. 14

Again, in the same books, Clement gives the tradition of the earliest presbyters, as to the order of the Gospels, in the following manner: The Gospels containing the genealogies, he says, were written first. The Gospel according to Marks had this occasion. As Peter had preached the Word publicly at Rome, and declared the Gospel by the Spirit, many who were present requested that Mark, who had followed him for a long time and remembered his sayings, should write them out. And having composed the Gospel he gave it to those who had requested it. When Peter learned of this, he neither directly for- bade nor encouraged it. But, last of all, John, perceiving that the external facts had been made plain in the Gospel, being urged by his friends, and inspired by the Spirit, composed a spiritual Gospel. This is the account of Clement.
Schaff, P. (2000). The Post-Nicene Fathers (electronic ed.). electronic ed. Garland, TX: Galaxie Software

Clement's statement that the gospels with the genealogies were written first, (Matthew and Luke) is held false by the majority of Christian bible scholars, who hold that Mark was the first gospel written.

Clement's statement that Peter didn't discourage Mark's gospel writing but also didn't encourage it, raises an eyebrow or three:  If Peter believed, like modern-day conservative Evangelicals do, that Mark's literary effort was the inerrant word of God, would Peter have been so apathetic toward the inerrant word of God?
(Peter's apathy itself raises problematic questions itself:  How could Peter possibly refuse to encourage the writing down of his preaching?  Was there an early apostolic belief that Jesus would come back within the lifetimes of the apostles, no need to publish written works?   Did Peter believe written gospels lacked the presence of the Holy Spirit that presumably was present in oral preaching?  If Clement is wrong in this information, doesn't Eusebius' uncritical quotation indicate that incorrect views about the apostles were capable of successfully duping even the earliest church fathers?)

Clement's statement that John wrote his gospel in a "spiritual" way that was distinct from the "external facts" type reporting done by the Synoptic authors, necessarily requires that in this context, "spiritual" meant some type of literary endeavor that had John doing more in his gospel than reporting the "external facts".  If Clement is telling the truth, then it is a strong argument that the reason most of the high Christological sayings of Jesus in John's gospel aren't paralleled in the Synoptics, is because John's materials are the "spiritual" parts John was adding to his gospel, which were different in nature than the "external facts" (i.e., different than sayings the historical/biological human Jesus actually mouthed).

Indeed, if Matthew had heard Jesus utter the high-Chistological sayings now confined to John's gospel, is it likely Matthew would have knowingly "chose to exclude" such strong supporting material?  If you can believe that, maybe you can believe the author of a book entitled "Sexual Scandals of the Bill Clinton Presidency" would knowingly "choose to exclude" all mention of the Monica Lewinsky affair (!?).  Yes, anything is always possible, but the person who wins the history debate is the person who shows her view to have more probability of being true than the other theories.

3 - If the Christian scholarly consensus be true that Mark was the earliest published gospel, well, Mark doesn't mention the virgin birth story.  You will say Mark didn't think it necessary to repeat what his intended audience already believed, but that obviously speculative answer has the following faults

   a) that assumes without evidence that Mark's intended audience surely did believe Jesus was born of a virgin, something you cannot establish,
   b) saying Mark didn't wish to repeat, contradicts the testimony of Clement, supra, which is generally the same from other church fathers, namely, that Mark's specific purpose in writing down the preaching of Peter, was to exactly "repeat" for the requesting church the gospel material Peter had previously preached to them...gee, maybe Peter didn't preach the virgin birth?  A doctrine that would support Mark's theme "Jesus is Son of God" more powerfully than most of Mark's currently canonical material?
   c) your motive for trivializing Mark's silence on the virgin birth is nothing other than your presupposition that bible inerrancy (and thus agreement of bible-authors on all doctrines) is an untouchable icon of cherished truth.

4 - Luke, by saying in his preface that he obtained his info from eyewitnesses, leaves the false impression that eyewitnesses were his primary source material. But if the consensus of Christian scholarship is correct in saying Luke borrowed much text from Mark's earlier gospel, then Luke's primary source was not eyewitnesses, but only hearsay, because Mark is not an eyewitness (and it is  rather convoluted and trifling to say Mark's dependence on Peter means Mark's account should be viewed as the record of an eyewitness).  That is a justifiable reason to be suspicious that Luke was willing to give a false impression, and like any good historian, he would know a lie would have better chance of being successfully deceptive if he spins it in just the right subtle way and cloaks it with other historically valid references.

5 - Another blow to Luke's general credibility is his account of the debate between Judaizers and Apostles in the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15).  How does Luke represent the apostles?  99% of the chapter is devoted to the arguments of the apostles and their actions afterward.  How does Luke represent the Judaizers?  He quotes a short summary sentence of their basic position (15:1), then repeats it once (v. 5), that's it.  Suppose you surfed to an atheist blog where the atheist author described a debate between a Christian and some other atheist, not otherwise recorded.  The atheist blogger only quotes two sentences from the Christian in that debate, but devotes about 40 paragraphs exclusively to what his fellow atheist said in the debate, and what that man did after leaving.  If you would accuse this atheist-blogger of a level of bias that rises above what objectivity would allow, you must say the same about Luke, because he did the same thing.

6 - Peter makes clear in Acts chapter 1 that only those who were direct disciples of Jesus before he died, could possibly qualify as apostles, and further asserts that because Judas fell, there is a "need" to increase the number of apostles back to 12:

 21 "It is therefore necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us--
 22 beginning with the baptism of John, until the day that He was taken up from us-- one of these should become a witness with us of His resurrection."
 23 And they put forward two men, Joseph called Barsabbas (who was also called Justus), and Matthias.
 24 And they prayed, and said, "Thou, Lord, who knowest the hearts of all men, show which one of these two Thou hast chosen
 25 to occupy this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place."
 26 And they drew lots for them, and the lot fell to Matthias; and he was numbered with the eleven apostles. (Acts 1:21-26 NAS)

Several problems:  Peter appears to believe the number of legitimate apostles cannot be more or less than 12, which means Paul, the 13th apostle, is false.  The author of Revelation specifies "12 names" of the "12 apostles" in the "12 foundation stones" of the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:14), which mathematically excludes Apostle # 13, Paul.  Sure, the language is figurative, but the constant repetition of 12 likely draws from the Revelator's belief that those who set the foundation for the new city do not number more than 12. (Some apologists trifle and say Peter was wrong to replace Matthias, but the praying and casting of lots and other things, including no sign of divine disapproval, make clear that the allegedly inspired author of Acts 1 didn't think replacing Judas with Matthias was error).

7 - Many of Paul's initial followers eventually stopped thinking he was a true apostle.  Paul started the Galatian churches, yet remarks with cursing that they apostatized from the true gospel (Gal. 1:6-9).  Despite the fact that Barnabas was personally chosen by the Holy Spirit to be Paul's ministry helper (Acts 13:2), "even Barnabas" was persuaded by the Judaizers that Paul's views about table fellowship were incorrect (Gal. 2:13).  Paul says nobody stood with him at his first defense but that he was delivered from the lion's mouth anyway (2 Tim. 4:16-17), meaning the defense in question was one he made before secular authorities who had authority to execute him, which thus must have occurred well into his Christian career.  How's that for proving that the 1st century Christians were mightily transformed by the resurrection of Jesus into fearless preachers who would stand by each other to the death?  

Paul also complains of other Christians abandoning him with "You are aware of the fact that all who are in Asia turned away from me, among whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes. (2 Tim. 1:15 NAS).  So it is likely when Luke says Paul was forbbiden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia (Acts 16:6), what really happened is that Paul knew by naturalistic means he would never get any followers in Asia, others agreed, and blindly assumed this must surely mean the "Holy Spirit" is "forbidding" them to go there.  Sort of like the scared man who runs away from a fist fight, then later says he did so because God "forbade" him to fight.  Wrong.

8 - Conservative Christian commentators have stumbled long and hard over Galatians 2:2:

 1 Then after an interval of fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along also.
 2 And it was because of a revelation that I went up; and I submitted to them the gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but I did so in private to those who were of reputation, for fear that I might be running, or had run, in vain.
 (Gal. 2:1-2 NAS)

Why reason does Paul say he chose to speak only in private with those of repute?  "for fear that I might be running, or had run, in vain."

What potential discovery of running in vain was Paul speaking about?  The answer is not difficult:  Paul was genuinely fearful, before arriving in Jerusalem on this trip, that the original apostles of Jesus might actually disagree in a public way with his version of the gospel.  If they did, that would effectively prove his gospel efforts (running) had been in vain.  So apparently Paul sought to guard against this real possible outcome by meeting with them only in private.  Then, if they disagreed with his version of the gospel, the private nature of the bad news would help mitigate it from spreading and discrediting his ministry.  Commentators say this interpretation is contrary to Paul's stark confidence in the truth of his own beliefs elsewhere, but Paul's desire to meet the higher apostles in private is a powerful textual clue that, at least at this point in time, Paul wasn't the loudmouth confident fire-preaching fanatic he was at other times.

However, the answer is difficult for those who espouse inerrancy, since they cannot plausibly argue for any interpretation of "fear" and "vain" that will harmonize with the context while also harmonizing with the rest of the bible.  Indeed, if we must presume Paul never doubted the truth of his version of the gospel, then why would he be motivated to speak only in private with the higher apostles when presenting his gospel to the Jerusalem church?

Finally, most Christian scholars admit that Matthew took Mark's "Jesus COULD not do many miracles because of their unbelief", and "tones it down" to say "Jesus DID not do many miracles..."

Mark 6:5-6

Matthew 13:58

1 And He went out from there, and He came into His home town; and His disciples followed Him.  2 And when the Sabbath had come, He began to teach in the synagogue; and the many listeners were astonished, saying,  "Where did this man get these things, and what is this wisdom given to Him, and such miracles as these performed by His hands?      3 "Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James, and Joses, and Judas, and Simon? Are not His sisters here with us?" And they took offense at Him.     4 And Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his home town and among his own relatives and in his own household."  5 And He could do no miracle there except that He laid His hands upon a few sick people and healed them.  6 And He wondered at their unbelief. And He was going around the villages teaching. (Mk. 6:1-6 NAS)

53 And it came about that when Jesus had finished these parables, He departed from there.  54 And coming to His home town He began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they became astonished, and said,  "Where did this man get this wisdom, and these miraculous powers?  55 "Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?  56 "And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?" 57 And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his home town, and in his own household."  58 And He did not do many miracles there  because of their unbelief. (Matt. 13:53-58 NAS)

Two problems are created here: If most scholars are correct that Mark is the earliest gospel, and are also correct in their consensus that Matthew borrowed extensively from Mark, then apparently, Matthew did not believe Mark's text constituted the "inerrant" word of God, or he wouldn't have felt compelled to make this change any more than Daniel Wallace feels compelled to replace "word" with "Jesus" in John 1:1.  So the gospel authors changing and modifying the text they drew from allegedly "inerrant" sources is a kick to the inerrantist apologist's teeth.

Second, Matthew's motive for the change is a serious problem, since it is perfectly evident that by changing "could not" to "did not", Matthew hides the fact that the original form of this story spoke against Jesus' level of power.  If you have gospel authors who change each other's texts so as to erase evidence that they disagreed with each other on matters involving Jesus, let's just say you won't be bowling over atheists with the power of the gospel anytime soon...not even if you pray about it first.

How do we know that the NT we have now
is the one the apostles actually wrote down?

Matthew is a case of fatal problems of authorship and text:

1 - Papias said Matthew wrote down the oracles of the Lord in the Hebrew dialect or style, and all other early fathers commenting on the same issue are unanimous that Matthew wrote in Hebrew "letters".  The English translation of Matthew in your bible does not arise from any Hebrew manuscript, but from manuscripts written in Greek.  Despite the church fathers clearly being interested in which language Matthew wrote in, they never mention him writing a second original in Greek, despite the fact that they make their comments in the 2nd-4th centuries, when any alleged Greek edition by Matthew would have enjoyed no less circulation in the church than the Hebrew version did.  Jerome in "Lives of Ilustrious Men" says Matthew was written in Hebrew, and was translated into Greek in his day by an unknown person.  He would hardly talk like that had a Greek version of Matthew been circulating since the first century. Worse, Wallace himself doesn't think canonical Greek Matthew reads like "translation-Greek", so Wallace kills even the alternative option that canonical Greek Matthew might be a translation from Matthew's Hebrew.  Thus there is good historical reason to say an unknown person exercised a completely unknown degree of influence on the content of Matthew's gospel before you ever read a bible, and as such, Matthew is disqualfied as a resurrection eyewitness because we cannot decide with any reasonable degree of confidence to what extent the material in Matthew 28 goes back to Matthew himself.

2 - Read a book by Bart Ehrman called "The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: the effect of early Christological Controversies on the Text of the New Testament".

Have errors crept into the text over the centuries?

 Yes, as Wallace admits the "long ending" of Mark 16, present in many manuscripts, actually isn't original.  Wallace may say such textual variant is not historically or doctrinally significant, but it surely is:  Most Christian scholars, including Wallace, believe Mark was the earliest published gospel.  If that is correct, and if the majority + Wallace are also correct that the long ending of Mark was not written by Mark, then the earliest published gospel lacked stories of a resurrected Jesus appearing to others.

This creates reasonable justification to believe that the only reason the other three later gospels contain resurrection appearance stories is because of legendary embellishment.  If you feel your own theory to explain this data has greater explanatory scope and power than the embellishment theory, by all means, post a reply.

If most scholars are correct that Luke borrowed much text from Mark's gospel, then when Luke acknowledges the presence of other written gospels, and says he himself thus chose to write to ensure Theophilus would know the "exact truth" about the Jesus issues, Luke 1:1-3, one of the prior written accounts Luke is likely admitting to correcting, would be Mark's, and now we have not just Matthew but Luke correcting the inerrant word of God.

How do you answer someone who says there are 

thousands of textual variants, so the NT can't be trusted? 

By correctly informing them that Barry Jones's above-cited arguments, justifying skepticism of the NT, are a far bigger problem for apologists than noting the number of textual variations there are in the NT manuscripts :)