Vaticanus and Alexandrinus

[erwan]

a lot of people seem to believe that truth is in the oldest scrolls
is there a big hole between these scrolls and the others ?
why should i believe that these scrolls are nearer Jesus will than younger scrolls
Thank you very much

[ded2daworld]

There is no sure thing but the older scrolls are closer to the originals and therefore more accurate.
Think of a copy machine:
You put the original in and make a copy. Now you take the original out and put in the next copy. You repeat this several times, each time taking the copy just made and putting it in to make the next copy from. In this way you can see the first copy from the original would be your best copy.
Think of a sentence in a classroom:
The teacher makes up a short sentence and tells one student. That student is to tell it to another and that student to another until all thirty kids have heard the sentence. The last kid speaks the sentence he heard and the teacher reveals her original sentence. They are very different, but the first kid she told is probably closer to the truth than any others. First to hear he is closest in time to the original.

Scripture is kind of like a combination
The copier copies perfectly in that no words are rearranged, missplaced, missing, etc.
The verbal sentence is subject to human error when copying. A person can be very diligent when copying but when hand copying sometimes errors occur from even an extra dot of ink changing a word. On top of that, the problem of translation creeps in when translating the originals into another language. "What did God mean to say when he said that? is difficult because a word for word translation is impossible and language idioms crop up that change the meaning.
So going back to the oldest, we are most likely to get closest to what was originally "God breathed"
A perfect example is in old England Farmers would put there potatoes "in hell" for the winter. They simply meant they were burying them. Hell got associated with being buried (dead) and underground. In the earth.

[sheila]

Always..we must remember..the things of God are revealed at His timing and discretion.......

  it has been said...'surely you are a God who hides Himself".

    the Great Mystery of God is the greatest story ever told,...it procedes ever forward to it's consumation.

[reFORMer]

For now, rather than attempt to select a digest of the following that is in turn a condensed version of another work behind it, I offer you a link to a good discussion of this issue from a much more conservative source than popular ideas that uncritically accept Vaticanis, Alexandrinious, Siniaticus and more than one of certain of these, and so on (each differing from the others thousands of times.)

http://www.avpublications.com/avnew/downloads/PDF/HazMat/U-pp_730-796_Chapter_20_The_Wobbly_Unorthodox_Greek_Orthodox.pdf

[reFORMer]

If you go to this site . . .

http://www.avpublications.com/avnew/home.html

in the right hand column you can click on chapter previews and samples of several of the books Riplinger has written.  There is much information there. 

I am not a King James only believer; but, she makes a good case for it being superior to most that is out there.  I do like the Concordant Literal.  Not everybody tolerates its quirky vocabulary.  Then again, they feel the same about the KJV.  One interesting point to be made about the KJV is that it has less big words and is easier to understand by 3rd graders than NIV (proven by tests) which was marketed as being easier for 3rd graders to read than the KJV.  There are a number of other features to the KJV that give it an advantage over contemporary versions.

[Paul L]

a lot of people seem to believe that truth is in the oldest scrolls
is there a big hole between these scrolls and the others ?
why should i believe that these scrolls are nearer Jesus will than younger scrolls
Thank you very much

Unfortunately the "original" scrolls of Holy Writ no longer exist, at least so far as we know. The Old Testament was originally written in Paleo-Hebrew, a script common about 1000 BC which is basically the language & script of the ancient Phoenicians, examples of it are online. The Dead Sea Scrolls contains documents that are the closest we come to to Paleo-Hebrew (Phoenician), so you might want to go to a website and look for the Thomas Scroll, it is written in Paleo-Hebrew (Phoenician) script.

The Septuagint scrolls are the oldest complete texts we have of the Old Testament, it is a Greek language translation written 100-200 years before Christ, parts of which are found in the Dead Sea scrolls. The Masoretic text is the Jewish translation of the Old Testament into modern Hebrew, it was written about 1000 AD probably from the Greek Septuagint, and is very close to the Greek Septuagint.

The New Testament scrolls being Codex Sinaiticus (found at a monastary on Mt Sinai ), Codex Alexandrinus (found in Alexandria Egypt), these are the oldest of the New Testament, a couple other good ones are not quite so old, of course all are written in Greek and available online in whole or part.

[thinktank]

I'm not sure but I think they have found older manuscripts than those.

[Paul L]

I'm not sure but I think they have found older manuscripts than those.

Of what? Old Testament or New?

I know there has been a halted excavation beneath an apartment complex in Jerusalem which contains the ossuaries of first century Judeo-Christians. Some believe inside those ossuaries are not only the remains of some who were actually some of Christ's disciples, but which may also contain the oldest writings of the New Testament, inscriptions on the exteriors of a few of these ossuaries have led some Biblical scholars to believe this could be the case. However, we may never know the truth of the matter because the Jewish owner of the apartment complex has refused permission for further excavation.

[ded2daworld]

Just my opinion, 
Anything they find won't mean a thing.
If it's stuff that contradicts scripture, it's not from God.
If it's stuff that agrees with scripture, then we already have it.

Kinda like Noah's ark. If you believe it won't change your mind. If you don't believe, it won't change your mind.
Don't get me wrong, finding stuff buried for centuries is interesting but nothing changes life like the word of God.

"I'm not bothered by the parts of the Bible I don't understand, I'm bothered by the parts I do understand."
                                                                                                                     - Mark Twain

"Not knowing what to do doesn't bother me, it's knowing what to do and not doing it that bothers me."
                                                                                                                       - Jeff Smith   

[reFORMer]

a lot of people seem to believe that truth is in the oldest scrolls
is there a big hole between these scrolls and the others ?
why should i believe that these scrolls are nearer Jesus will than younger scrolls
Thank you very much

Scholars have said that, other than word order, these earlier Uncial copies (all capital letters with no spaces between words) differ from the Cursive (like handwriting, capital and small letters, separate words) in only about 50 places, and none of these are essential for any important doctrine.

[eaglesway]

Just my opinion, 
Anything they find won't mean a thing.
If it's stuff that contradicts scripture, it's not from God.
If it's stuff that agrees with scripture, then we already have it.

Kinda like Noah's ark. If you believe it won't change your mind. If you don't believe, it won't change your mind.
Don't get me wrong, finding stuff buried for centuries is interesting but nothing changes life like the word of God.

"I'm not bothered by the parts of the Bible I don't understand, I'm bothered by the parts I do understand."
                                                                                                                     - Mark Twain

"Not knowing what to do doesn't bother me, it's knowing what to do and not doing it that bothers me."
                                                                                                                       - Jeff Smith   

Ouch, Wow, Yup

[sheila]

yep..it's very frustating to know God's will,desire to do it....and be hindered in carrying it out....because

  the flesh is weak..  with sin/enmity against the very spirit o life in it.

.certainly He has given us a treasure in earthen vessels..........but by MY SPIRIT is His 'word'..so that

  no flesh[vessel] shall boast  of it's strength. ...2 Cor 12;9  My GRACE IS SUFFICIENT FOR YOU

   FOR MY POWER IS MADE PERFECT IN WEAKNESS..........

    what? the power of an indestructable life[GOD] is made 'perfect" in weakness...

   Now, the Dwelling of God is with men,and He WILL LIVE WITH THEM

[eaglesway]

I think that the greatest evidence of sin in the flesh hindering the expression of the divine nature is the inability of believers to find themselves in one heart as one soul. Since Jesus expressed this as the purest expression of discipleship and kingdom(John17) and declared that is was the means by which the world would see Him in us and know that we are His disiples- our poverty of functional union is the greatest declaration of all that "we are all like sheep gone astray, each one on his own way"....carnal babes unable to fulfill the will of the Father and the Son, " That you may be one, even as I and the Father are one...."

The natural man is unable to receive the things of God, for it is foolishness to him. The gathering of all things into one in Christ is by the Spirit, and it is expressed in this age as a body of believers growing up in all things into the head, even Christ.

Lord, have mercy.

[reFORMer]

a lot of people seem to believe that truth is in the oldest scrolls
is there a big hole between these scrolls and the others ?
why should i believe that these scrolls are nearer Jesus will than younger scrolls
Thank you very much

Scholars have said that, other than word order, these earlier Uncial copies (all capital letters with no spaces between words) differ from the Cursive (like handwriting, capital and small letters, separate words) in only about 50 places, and none of these are essential for any important doctrine.

That was a little unclear.  The differences are not only word order; but, also a word here or there, maybe even a phrase.  When it comes to something a half or a whole verse or several verses, there are only about 50 points of differences.  Where I've read that, and how accurate a comment it is, I lack the knowledge to say.
________________________________________

It mostly seems the people of God tend to know only a big God and individual believers.  That's where the consciousness of Media Christianity is.  There's little or no experience of a many-membered Christ so it isn't even missed.  The bride (or, Eclessia) is not thought of.  Try to expose it and the reaction is apathetic.

Bring it up in what little discussion is allowed in "Sunday School Class" and, since it is other than what is done, two things happen.  There is a rejection through false knowledge:  "we already have that."  There's no realization that they never plan to self-consciously meet waiting on the Lord to lead forth through any and every member present.  The other thing is the messenger has challenged with another authority than tradition or whatever person is running things has supplied us with.  Push a little and rejection of the messenger on the basis of "rebellion" ensues. 

As long as people are trapped in men's tradition and bureaucratic Gentile authority it is unlikely they'll be allowed into the unity of the kingdom of God very much.

[eaglesway]

Scofield did a lot research into "interpolations', for someone interested in that, a Scofield reference bible would provide some insight..... maybe there is one online, I think e-sword has Scofield's commentary