Veritas: A Defense for Biblical Truth

By Ebenezer Nyarko

This book presents a defence of the Christian faith, for a wide audience. It has been written in such a way that it can be understood not only by pastors, but anyone who is interested in proofs that point to the validity and truthfulness of the Bible. It shows how scientists have been able to prove Biblical truths over time. It also highlights how some famous people, such as Christopher Columbus, Thomas Jefferson, C.S Lewis, Charles Finney and Johann Sebastian Bach were dedicated believers in the Christian faith. Furthermore, the book highlights notable Christian people that helped to defend and spread the Christian faith during the time of the Italian renaissance. In addition, insights from Christian theologians are given. Archaeological evidence, supporting truths in the Bible is also provided. The book also points to some Biblical prophecies and their fulfillment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
• Release date: Feb 19, 2020
• ISBN: 9781489728067

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Copyright © 2020 Ebenezer Nyarko.

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Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorized Version). First published in 1611. Quoted from the KJV Classic Reference Bible, Copyright © 1983 by The Zondervan Corporation.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4897-2805-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-2806-7 (e)

LifeRich Publishing rev. date: 02/12/2020

I would like to acknowledge all those

who have directly and indirectly assisted in the publication of this book. I would like to thank God, my family, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, West Bow press, Liferich Publishing and all those who have contributed in some way to this publication. God bless you.

"For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. And I saw Heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but He Himself. And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and His name is called The Word of God" (Revelation 19:10-13 KJV).

CONTENTS

Chapter 1 - Search The Scriptures

Chapter 2 - A Brief Introduction to Cryptology

Chapter 3 - Scientific Evidence Validates the Bible

Chapter 4 - The Italian Renaissance

Chapter 5 - Characteristics of the Word of God

Chapter 6 - Archaeological Evidence

Chapter 7 - Prophecies fulfilled in Christ

Chapter 8 - The witness of the stars

References

About the Author

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CHAPTER 1 - SEARCH

THE SCRIPTURES

Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me (John 5:39 KJV).

God exists out of time in the realm known as eternity. The Word of God is the mind, will and intent of God for all humanity and for all creation. For God, the Supreme Being, who exists out of time to authenticate His Word as a supernatural revelation for all creation, He uses prophecy as a means to achieve this authentication. To the Jewish mind prophecy is pattern; the Old Testament text contains a lot of types and symbols, used consistently to communicate a certain message. It also includes some encryptions within the text, which show that it is of supernatural origin. We will look at some of these encryptions later in this book. To the Greek mind, prophecy is prediction and fulfilment; God says something and it is fulfilled in time, just how He described it. The human being usually tackles things from beginning to end. God can, however, deal with things from the end to the beginning, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure (Isaiah 46:10 KJV). In fact, some Bible teachers recommend reading the book of Revelation first before coming to the book of Genesis, when starting a rigorous study of the Bible. Through prophecy, God describes things in His Word before they happen. The fulfilment of various prophecies in the Bible show that indeed, the Bible is of supernatural origin and confirms that the author exists outside time. About 40 different authors from different places wrote the Bible, with different backgrounds and educational levels over a period of about 1500 years, but the consistency and concord found within it is startling.

Where did the Bible come from?

The Bible has been printed an estimated 5 billion times, in about 2,100 languages since 1815. But, where did it really come from and why should it be accepted as the Word of God? The word ‘Bible’ comes from the Greek word, ‘biblos’, which refers to the inner bark of the papyrus plant. The inner bark of the papyrus plant was used as the material on which writings were made, in the times that the Old Testament Bible was being written. It could be rolled up in the form of a scroll.

The Old Testament was written over a period of 1500 years by 40 authors. It comprises of 39 books arranged in chronological order from the Book of Genesis to the Book of Malachi. The chronological arrangement of the 39 books in the Old Testament Canon do not mean that that was the order in which they were written. The Book of Job is known to be the oldest book in the Bible, but in the Canon, the Book of Genesis is presented first. The Book of Job was known to be around even in the time of the patriarchs, such as Abraham. The word, ‘canon,’ refers to a list of texts, which a particular religious community, regards as authoritative scripture. The list of texts, which we call the Old Testament is referred to as the Tanakh (in Hebrew) by the Jews. The Tanakh consists of three parts. First is the Torah (or Pentateuch in the Greek), consisting of the first five books of Moses, being Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. It is believed that the teachings in the Torah were dictated to Moses by God on Mount Sinai. Chronologically, the Torah begins with the creation of the earth and ends with the death of Moses. In the New Testament, Jesus attributed the Torah to Moses.

The second part of the Tanakh is known as the Nevi’im in the Hebrew. The Nevi’im consists of the Books of the Bible, written by the prophets. The books that make up the Prophets cover the period from Israel’s settlement in the land of Canaan, after the death of Moses, until the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E. The first part of the Nevi’im are made up of 6 narrative books classified as ‘the former prophets,’ covering the history of the Israelites from the time they entered Canaan. These books are Joshua; Judges; 1st and 2nd Samuel and 1st and 2nd Kings. The second part of the Nevi’im is known as the latter prophets. There are two major classes of latter prophets in the Bible; the Major Prophets and the Minor Prophets. The Major Prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. They are referred to as Major Prophets not because they were regarded as more important, but rather, because they wrote down large volumes of scripture. The Minor Prophets are twelve in number, consisting of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi. They are known as Minor Prophets, not because they were regarded as second-rate to the Major Prophets, but rather because they didn’t write large volumes of scripture, like the Major Prophets did. Though some of the books written by the prophets contain historical narratives, most of them were exhortations to the Israelites. Old Testament prophets were seen to be fierce and thus, fear came upon the people when they came to town. New Testament prophets are not supposed to minister like the Old Testament prophets, but should serve as guides for God’s people to edify, exhort and comfort the people. Whilst the Old Testament prophets pointed out the sins of the people and their leaders, their office also involved the foretelling of impending or distant events and hoped for a national revival. Moreover, the prophets dealt with issues concerning the surrounding gentile nations, whose activities and idol worship affected the people of Israel. The prophets, such as Isaiah, also prophesied about the coming of the Messiah, who would come and save them. Prophecies about both the first coming, as well as the second coming were given.

The third section of the Tanakh is known as the Ketuvim in Hebrew. The Ketuvim, translated into the English language means ‘writings.’ The Ketuvim was inspired by the Holy Spirit, just as the Torah and the books written by the prophets were inspired. The Ketuvim are a collection of what is known as wisdom literature, poetry and historical works. They comprise of the books of Psalms, Proverbs and the book of Job, known as the poetic books or wisdom literature. Then the five scrolls comprising of the books of Song of Songs, Book of Ruth, the Book of Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and Book of Esther. Then the other books consisting of 1st and 2nd Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah and Daniel. The book of Daniel is sometimes classified under the writings and not under the prophets because some of the prophecies of Daniel were not for the period within which he lived and were sealed until many centuries later. They were for much later generations like the times we find ourselves in. It is believed that the Old Testament scriptures were pulled together by Ezra the scribe during his lifetime.

There is a period of 400 years between the Old Testament and the New Testament period, which many people refer to as the silent years. Within this time, God did not say anything to the Israelites. The events which transpired during this time are, however, described in the last books of Daniel, especially in the eleventh chapter.

The Old Testament was written mainly in Hebrew, with the exception of some few portions in the Book of Daniel, which were written in Aramaic. It is believed that the Torah was dictated by God to Moses on Mount Sinai. The other portions of the Old Testament involved the writings of the prophets, priests or kings, or scribes who prepared manuscripts of the message that the servants of God received under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. For example, Baruch was the name of Jeremiah’s scribe. Ezra is also known to have been a scribe who compiled the Old Testament Canon, as we have it in the scriptures.

Between the 7th and 11th centuries, a group of Jewish scribe-scholars known as the Masoretes painstakingly rewrote the Old Testament in such a way as to ensure that the grammar and vocabulary was as accurate and error-free as possible. The Masoretic text came up about 1000 years after the Septuagint. The manuscripts produced by the Masoretes, are known to be highly accurate, since they had to destroy a whole page of text and start all over, if even one mistake was found in the script. They knew the exact number of words in a book. They also knew the word in the exact middle of the book. They produced what is commonly known as, the Masoretic Text. The Leningrad Codex, also known as the Leningradensis, is known to be the oldest complete Hebrew Bible, which has been preserved to date. The Leningrad Codex is known to be the most complete Hebrew codex and is one of the best examples of the Masoretic text.

The Hebrew Bible got translated into Greek when Ptolemy II, who was one of Alexander the Great’s generals recruited seventy scholars in Alexandria, Egypt, to translate the Hebrew Old Testament into Greek. The resulting product became known as the Septuagint, which is a Latin word for seventy. Since Israel came under Greek rule for many years, Greek became the primary language for the Israelites. Most of the quotes from the Hebrew Bible in the New Testament are taken from the Septuagint.

New Testament

Until the invention of the printing press in the 15th century, the texts of the Bible were written as manuscripts by hand, by the scribes on papyrus or parchment that was obtained from animal skins. The New Testament was initially written in the miniscule script style on parchment. Later, they wrote on paper. Paper was invented in ancient China in the 1st century.

Records indicate that there are over 5,800 complete or fragmented New Testament Greek manuscripts, about 10,000 Latin manuscripts and about 9,300 manuscripts in various other ancient languages. This gives us the assurance that the New Testament Scriptures we have in the Bible are highly accurate. The New Testament, unlike the Old Testament, which was written over many centuries, was written in a lifetime. The Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; the epistles of Peter were written by Peter; the epistles of Paul were written by Paul; the epistles of James were written by James; the epistle titled Jude was written by Jude, the brother of Jesus; the Revelation of Jesus Christ was written by John the apostle.

One of the most important texts in the world, known as the Codex Sinaiticus, which was handwritten over 1600 years ago, contains almost the whole of the New Testament in Greek. It was discovered by a German scholar named Lobegott Friedrich Constantin (von) Tischendorf in a monastery at Mount Sinai.

Another very critical ancient text is known as the Codex Vaticanus, which was discovered in the Vatican. It is believed to have been created in the 4th century and has been kept in the Vatican Library since the 1400s. The Codex Vaticanus, in addition to some other Greek texts, was the primary source text that the Dutch scholar and theologian known as Desiderius Erasmus used for his work on what became known as the Textus Receptus. Codex Vaticanus was not flawless and had some errors. Textus Receptus, which is Latin for, ‘The Received Text,’ was the name given to the first published Greek version of The New Testament. It is also known as the Traditional Text, Majority Text, Byzantine Text, or Syrian Text. It became a standard for many years. It was the textual base for translations into other languages in the Reformation period. It also served as the vorlage for translations such as the Luther’s German Bible, William Tyndale’s English Bible and the King James Version. Textus Receptus served as the standard Greek text for the New Testament for the next 300 years from Erasmus’ time, but By the 1800s, many more early copies of New Testament texts were discovered, which led to new published editions of the New Testament. Instead of a few copies, scholars now had access to several thousand manuscripts. Now, there are over 5,800 complete or fragmented New Testament Greek manuscripts available.

Another very important version of the Bible is known as the Vulgate. It is a Latin version of the Bible, which was completed by St. Jerome, a theologian and a historian who lived in the 4th century. In the time in