Do the variations in the early texts of
the Bible affect what we might believe?
FAQs (017)
No, they don't.
Writing in 'A survey of the Old Testament' Gleason Archer says that
"none of them (the variant readings) affects a single doctrine of Scripture".
The editors of the Revised Standard Version of the Bible also say that
"out of the thousands of variant readings in the manuscripts, none has turned up that requires a revision of Christian doctrine".
Consequently while we may not, for example, be quite sure whether Emmaus (a town mentioned in the New Testament) was 7 kms, or 17 kms, from Jerusalem (different early manuscripts give different figures) neither this nor any of the other minor variations affects the essential truths of the Bible. That Jesus has risen from the dead, for example, a fact which two disciples discovered while walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus is not compromised by the fact that we don't know exactly how far it was that they had to walk.
Most modern translations of the Bible note in the margin, or in footnotes, where any part of the text is in doubt, and give the variant options. Check them for yourself, and while you do so, study the vast majority of texts over which there is no doubt.
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