Early New Testament Evidence

This summary is the result of my own tallying, going through every verse, using Metzger, UBS, Barrett, ANF, Adamantius, and other sources. For this summary we are going to limit ourselves to what was written or preserved prior to 325 A.D., though there is a lot of corroborating evidence after then too. There were 74 Greek and 1 Coptic New Testament manuscripts prior to 325 A.D.. There were 91 or so Christian authors, writing about 5480 pages with 9272 New Testament quotes.

Percentage of verses quoted.

New Testament section	Total number of verses	Pre-Nicene Manuscripts	Pre-Nicene Writers	Combination of Manuscripts & Writers
Gospels	3799 verses	2008 = 53 %	3319 = 88 %	3494 = 92 %
Paul	2033 verses	1489 = 73 %	1175 = 58 %	1727 = 85 %
Gospels plus Paul	5812 verses	3496 = 60 %	4494 = 77 %	5220 = 90 %
Rest of N.T.	2140 verses	1659 = 78 %	692 = 32 %	1854 = 87 %
Total New Testament	7652 verses	64 %	65 %	89 %

The entire New Testament 350 was quoted by Christian writers or in Bible manuscripts by 350 A.D.

The details are all in www.biblequery.org/Bible/BibleReliability/EarlyChristianNTQuotes.html (or .docx) for exactly which New Testament verses are in which manuscripts and early Church writings.

Early New Testament Reliability

From ancient New Testament manuscripts and church writers, we can be sure of about 97 % of every word in the New Testament, or 3 % uncertainty. Only about 1.2 % have a change in meaning.

New Testament section	Total Greek Words	Greek Words in question	Uncer-tainty	Words with mean-ingful changes	Uncertainty of meaning
Gospels	65068	2158	3 %	1117	1.7 %
Paul	32408	740	2 %	182	0.6 %
Gospels plus Paul	97476	2898	3 %	1299	1.3 %
Rest of NT	40836	1046	3 %	403	1 %
Total New Testament	138312	3947	3 %	1702	1.2 %

You can see the breakdown by book at https://www.biblequery.org/ntmss.html. You can see the individual variants that comprise this number at www.biblequery.org/[bookname]%20Manuscripts.html replacing [bookname] with the book’s name.

Classifying Uncertainties

N.T. Uncertainty Classification	Uncertain word count	Contribution to uncertainty
1-word uncertainties	1187	30 %
2-word uncertainties	289 * 2 = 578	15 %
3-word and 4-word uncertainties	(100 * 3) + (51 * 4) = 504	8 % + 5 %
5-word and 6-word uncertainties	(39 * 5) + (17 * 6) = 297	5 % + 3 %
7-word and 8-word uncertainties	(15 * 7) + (8 * 8) = 169	3 % + 2 %
9-word and 10-word uncertainties	(10 * 9) + (10 * 10) = 190	2 % + 3 %
order of Rom 16:25-27 & 1 Cor 14:34-35	53 + 36 = 89 words	2 %
John 7:53-8:11 & Mark 16:9-20	169 + 166 = 335 words	9 %
Other 11+ word uncertainties	29 words	14 %
Total uncertain words	3927	100 %

This is online at https://www.biblequery.org/ntmss.html

Early Old Testament Evidence

Early Christians generally quoted from the Greek version of the Old Testament called the Septuagint. I have not yet summarized who quoted which verses. But we have the Dead Sea Scrolls (all written before 68 A.D.) mostly in Hebrew, with a few Greek copies. Eleven caves preserved about 95,000 fragments, 40,000 in cave 4 alone or both Biblical and non-Biblical writings.

We also have a few other manuscripts of the Old Testament.

At Masada was found Mas1C containing Deuteronomy 33:17-21; 34:2-6

Nahal Hever has XHev/Se3 of Deuteronomy 9:5-6, 21-23

The Wadi Murabba’at site has Deuteronomy 10:1-3; 11:2-3; 12:25-26; 14:29; 15:1 or 2, called Mur 2.

O.T. section / Category	Copies/fragments	Earliest copy	Commentaries
The Law	97	250 B.C.	1
Parallel Torah	1	?	0
Prophets	77	225-175 B.C.	7 + possibly 1
Writings	26 or so	225-150 B.C.	1 + possibly 1
Total O.T. Dead Sea scrolls	205	250 B.C.	9 + possibly 2
Total non-Biblical Dead Sea scrolls	667		0

Chester Beatty IX-X (Septuagint Ezekiel, Dan, Esther) Third century

British Museum MS Oriental 7594 Sahidic Coptic Deuteronomy, Jonah, Acts Third/fourth century

Early Old Testament Reliability

This is for the Hebrew text prior to 70 A.D. at Qumran, Masada, Wadi Murabba’at, and Nahal Hever.

O.T. section / Category	Verses quoted	Total Verses	Percentage
The Law (Torah)	2601	5817	45 %
Prophets	3060	9290	33 %
Writings	1855	7902	23 %
Approx. Total O.T.	7516	23009	33 %

By 350 A.D. we have manuscripts with every verse of the Septuagint Old Testament quoted. We also have the Septuagint (LXX) Greek translation of the Old Testament. For some parts like the Torah, the translation is fairly close. For other books the LXX is not as close and some books, such as Jeremah, seems to be an abridged version.

For Further Reading

https://biblequery.org/Bible/BibleReliability/ExistingNTManuscripts.html (and .docx)

https://biblequery.org/Bible/BibleReliability/ComparingTheReliabilityOfTheNewTestamentAndTheQuran.html (and .docx)

https://biblequery.org/History/Archaeology/DeadSeaScrolls.html (and .docx)

https://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/manuscripts/greek_classics.htm

https://www.toughquestionsanswered.org/2012/12/11/how-do-other-ancient-texts-compare-to-the-new-testament/

https://truediscipleship.com/manuscript-evidence-for-the-superior-new-testament-reliability/

Comfort, Philip W. (editor). The Origin of the Bible. Tyndale House, 1992.

Martinez, Florentino Garcia. The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated : The Qumran Texts in English 2nd edition. Published by E.J. Brill and Eerdmans’, 1996.

VanderKam, James C. The Dead Sea Scrolls Today. Eerdmans’, 1994.

VanderKam, James and Peter Flint. Forward by Emanuel Tov. The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Harper San Francisco 2002.

Vermes, Geza. The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls In English. Penguin Books 1997. (633 pages)

by Steven Morrison Ph.D.