CORRUPTION OF THE BIBLE
IS AN LDS SMOKESCREEN
The LDS maintains that the Bible has been corrupted and is,
therefore, unreliable. Their unsubstantiated claim is that some
parts have been incorrectly translated, and that sections that had
originally contained covenants and important teachings on salvation
have been removed. However, they have never been able to come up
with any proof to back up their allegations. The first part of this
article deals with the various LDS theories on the subject. And the
last section is devoted to evidence that supports both the accuracy
and the reliability of the Bible.
LDS CLAIMS ABOUT CORRUPTION OF THE BIBLE
There are a great many LDS teachings on the unreliability of the
Bible. Here are just a few:
"Many important points touching the salvation of men, had been
taken from the Bible, or lost before it was compiled."
(Joseph Smith, History of the Church, Volume 1, page 245
)
"Ignorant translators, careless transcribers, or designing and
corrupt priests have committed many errors" (Teachings of
the Prophet Joseph Smith, page 327).
"... who in his right mind could for one moment suppose the
Bible in its present form to be a perfect guide? Who knows that even
one verse of the Bible has escaped pollution, so as to convey the
same sense now that it did in the original?" (LDS Apostle Orson
Pratt, Divine Authenticity of the Book of Mormon, Page
47.)
The Book of Mormon goes one step further in their tirade against
the Bible. It declares that only a fool would believe that the Bible
is an adequate spiritual guide. (In the eyes of the LDS church,
this crude statement gives the Book of Mormon a reason for its
existence.)
"Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and
we need no more Bible. ........Wherefore, because that ye have a
Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither
need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written."
(2 Nephi 29:6, 10)
"..... for behold they have taken away from the gospel of the
Lamb many parts which are plain and most precious; and also many
covenants of the Lord have they taken away. And all this have they
done that they might blind the eyes and harden the hearts of the
children of men" (1 Nephi 13:26-27)
CONTRADICTORY LDS STANCE ON THE BIBLE
When it comes to the Bible, the LDS church speaks with a forked
tongue. On the one hand they insist that it has been so badly
corrupted that it cannot be relied upon. But on the other hand
they maintain that it is their standard scripture, "the
first" among their written guides in faith and doctrine:
"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints accepts the
Holy Bible as the foremost of her standard works, first among the
books which have been proclaimed as her written guides in faith
and doctrine" (LDS Apostle James Talmage, Articles of
Faith, page 236).
"Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
(known informally by the nickname Mormons) believe the
Bible. Indeed, so literally and completely do their beliefs and
practices conform to the teachings of the Bible that it is not
uncommon to hear informed persons say: 'If all men believed the
Bible, all would be Mormons.' Bible doctrine is Mormon doctrine,
and Mormon doctrine is Bible doctrine. They are one and the
same" (LDS Apostle and doctrinal writer Bruce McConkie,
What The Mormons Think of Christ, page 2).
The above quote is both false
and deliberately misleading. The LDS leadership is well aware of
the fact that their doctrines are not biblical. Moreover, they
also admit that the Jesus Christ that they follow is not the Christ
of the Bible (see the relevant article, a link to which is provided
at the bottom of this page.) And eternal progression, the
foundational doctrine on which the Mormon religion stands or falls,
is anti-biblical to the point of being blasphemous, as are their
doctrines on deity and the atonement.
Contrary to LDS Apostle McConkie's false claims in What the
Mormons think of Christ, the Bible vigorously opposes LDS
doctrines. Consequently, Mormons are instructed to use their own
scriptures and revelations as a means of gauging the accuracy or
otherwise of the Bible.
"The most reliable way to measure the accuracy of any biblical
passage is not by comparing different texts, but by comparison with
the Book of Mormon and modern-day revelations." (Church News,
June 20, 1992, page 3, quoting a letter from the First Presidency
[Presidents Benson, Hinckley and Monson] dated May 22, 1992, to all
of the Church)
In light of the above, one can only assume that the earlier,
dishonest statements about their teachings conforming completely to
those of the Bible, were nothing more than a deliberate smoke screen
designed to conceal the fact that Mormonism is an unbiblical
religion and that their doctrines are exclusive to the LDS church
alone. For instance:
The doctrine that God was once a man and has progressed to become a
God is unique to this church. (Official LDS Lesson Manual, 1997,
page 34, "The Teachings of Brigham Young")
The two irreconcilable LDS stances, one claiming that Mormonism is
completely biblical and the other claiming that the Bible has been
incorrectly translated and that there are important sections
missing, are what is termed, "running with the hares and
hunting with the hounds." In other words, they enable the LDS
to put forward whichever opposing point of view suits them best at
any given time.
And there's a very good reason why they need these two
contradictory approaches. On the one hand, in order to justify the
fact that their doctrines are unbiblical, they use the excuse
that the Bible has been corrupted and is unreliable, and that they
have modern day revelation. On the other hand, the LDS leadership
discovered a long time ago that it is far easier to win converts
to their church, if they are under the mistaken impression that
Mormonism is biblical. So they send their missionaries out with
Bibles tucked under their arms, and with careful instructions
to avoid being drawn into a discussion regarding any of their
exclusive, unbiblical doctrines.
It is the policy of the LDS church to deliberately withhold
knowledge of their real teachings until after the prospective
proselytes have been baptized into Mormonism. Only then are they
indoctrinated into the nitty gritty of Mormonism, in a carefully
planned, graduated manner.
In the real world we call that deception.
Let's tackle some of the LDS's accusations regarding their
allegations about the Bible being corrupted and unreliable:
DIFFERENCES IN MANUSCRIPTS
There are minor variations in some of the available manuscripts.
However, because of the vast number that are now in our possession
(many thousands), it is an easy matter to sort out those that do
not agree. Concerning those that do vary, scholars have
come to the following conclusions.
"A careful study of the variants of the various earliest
manuscripts reveals that none of them affects a single doctrine of
Scripture. The system of spiritual truth contained in the standard
Hebrew text of the Old Testament is not in the slightest altered
or compromised by any of the variant readings found in the Hebrew
manuscripts ..... It is very evident that the vast majority of
them are so inconsequential as to leave the meaning of each clause
doctrinally unaffected" (Gleason Archer, "A Survey of
the Old Testament," page 25).
"Only about one-eighth of all the variants had any weight,
as most of them are merely mechanical matters such as spelling or
style. Of the whole, then, only about one-sixtieth rise above
'trivialities,' or can in any sense be called substantial
'variations'. Mathematically this would compute to a Text that
is 98.33 percent pure." (Norman Geisler and William Nix,
"A General Introduction to the Bible," page 365).
And Professor Richard L. Anderson, of the LDS's own Brigham Young
University, had this to say:
"For a book to undergo progressive uncovering of its manuscript
history and come out with so little debatable in its text is a great
tribute to its essential authenticity. First, no new manuscript
discovery has produced serious differences in the essential story.
This survey has disclosed the leading textual controversies, and
together they would be well within one percent of the text. Stated
differently, all manuscripts agree on the essential correctness of
99 percent of all the verses in the New Testament."
THE CANON AND SUPPOSED "LOST" BOOKS
The LDS maintains that manuscripts are missing from the biblical
canon.
According to Josephus the Jewish historian, the Old Testament
canon was considered as being closed at the time of Ezra. And the
Lord Jesus accepted each of the main divisions of the Old Testament
canon (the law, the poetic books and the prophets) as being
authoritative and accurate, and regularly quoted from them.
When it comes to the New Testament, during the first centuries of
the church's existence there were ongoing comments made by Polycarp,
Clement, Irenaeus and many others, about certain books not having
been accepted as scripture. There was seldom any disagreement over
which were genuine scriptures and which were not, and by AD 303
there was complete consensus regarding the canon.
There is a valid reason why not all available documents were
included. Some failed to meet the strict criteria deemed necessary
to qualify for inclusion. For instance, in order to be accepted as
being truth, they had to fit in with what had already been taught
in the existing scriptures, i.e. if a book denied Christ's
incarnation it was obviously not truth, and so on. The Gospel
According to Thomas contained teachings that contradicted the
already known scriptures, indicating that was obviously not
inspired scripture, so it was rejected. Some books doing the
rounds had falsely claimed to have been written by one of the
disciples or close associates of the disciples, and so on, and
were proved not to have been. Of course these did not qualify
either as they were based on deception. The Gospel of Phillip
was excluded as it wrongly depicted Christ in a manner that did
not fit in with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John's revelation of Him.
So it could not have been inspired. Then too, many of the
apocryphal books taught the heresy of gnosticism.
Suffice to say that there was a very good reason for the
rejection of each and every one of the so-called lost books.
ALLEGED CORRUPTION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT
In attempting to explain why there is no mention of LDS doctrines
in the Bible, LDS Apostle James E. Talmage suggested that some
time during the fourth century Mormon doctrines and teachings
must have been removed from the Bible.
However, besides having been recorded in the Bible, the apostles'
teachings were also quoted in numerous sermons, letters and
documents. And by the time the fourth century came around these
writings had been copied out a great many times and widely
circulated. So if Mormonism had been taught by the apostles there
would have had to have been a record of it somewhere. But nobody,
anywhere, has ever found so much as a trace of anything even
remotely resembling Mormon doctrine in the Christian church's
teachings.
Critics of Mormonism are of the opinion that Joseph Smith used
the excuse that the Bible had been corrupted as a dishonest ploy
to justify the fact that the doctrines he taught were radically
unbiblical.
LDS historian Hugh Nibley felt that the reason Mormon teachings
weren't mentioned in the Bible was because the original New
Testament had been sabotaged before any copies had been made.
But scientific evidence to the contrary discounts his theory. As
already mentioned, a fragment of the gospel of Matthew was
scientifically dated before AD 70 and possibly as early as in the
AD 30's. This means that it was written during the lifetime of the
very people who had been witnesses to the events it mentions. And
they would have objected if the true facts had not been correctly
recorded.
Other complete documents available are dated between about AD
70-807. At this stage in the history of the church, Christ's
original apostles would have taught and trained those who
were earmarked for leadership. And there was an extremely strict
criteria laid down in the New Testament for selecting leadership.
They would had to have been godly, mature, spirit filled
Christians of the highest moral and spiritual calibre, whose
doctrine was sound, who knew the scriptures and were capable of
correcting error, and whose faith had already been tested and
proved.
Furthermore, it would have been necessary for the entire
Christian church, including the leadership from every single
area in the world where there had been Christians, all to
have become apostate simultaneously. And at the same time as
apostatising they would all have had to, once again
simultaneously, reject their previous doctrines and adopt an
entirely different belief system that opposed and did away with
the very tenets the church had sacrificed, suffered and died
for.
This idea is too far fetched to even warrant consideration.
THE BIBLE'S RELIABILITY
When it comes to deception Satan is a master of the art, and we are
no match for him. So God has provided us with spiritual armour for
our protection (Ephesians 6:12-17). As per verse 17, When we use
the Bible as our standard of truth, it serves as a spiritual sword,
capable of decimating spiritual deception and error.
Christ Himself used the Bible as a spiritual sword when He was
under attack by Satan in the desert (Matthew 4). Consequently Satan
failed in his efforts to get Him to take the route of fame rather
than the way of suffering that had been laid down for Him by God.
His use of the Bible as a weapon foiled Satan, and he was forced to
retreat, defeated. Then too, when Paul preached the New Covenant
gospel of Christ to the Jews at Berea, they checked in their Bibles
daily to see whether the things he was telling them were true (Acts
17:10-12). And sure enough, the prophecies about the coming Messiah
lined up with what Paul had been telling them about Christ and His
atonement for the sins of mankind. So many of them trusted in Him
for salvation.
If we follow the above examples by conscientiously checking
up on whether or not the spiritual teachings we receive line up with
the Bible, we will not be led into error. But in order to have the
will to do this, we need to have faith in the Bible's reliability,
bearing in mind that faith isn't a blind, mindless belief, an
emotion, or a warm feeling in our bosom, as Mormons have been taught
to believe it is. Nowhere in the Bible are we told to have faith in
our feelings. Feelings are notoriously unreliable. Having faith
doesn't mean that we have to be gullible or throw our brains out of
the window.
The following facts reveal the Bible to be a reliable standard of
authority and truth, in which we can safely trust:
THE BIBLE IS HISTORICALLY TRUE
In the early 1800's, the University of Paris printed an academic
paper denouncing the Bible. They mentioned more than eighty
historical facts that they claimed were untrue. However, within
the next 100 years archaeological discoveries had confirmed the
accuracy of the biblical record concerning every one of those
so-called errors.
We have literally thousands of ancient, independent documents that
support the trustworthiness of the biblical record. And
archaeologists have confirmed the existence of biblical cities,
nations, and individuals. They've also unearthed countless coins,
artifacts, and evidence of civilizations and wars recorded in the
Bible. Yet they've never found anything that has contradicted or
disproved the Bible's accuracy.
Compare this with the dismal record of absolutely no proof at all
ever having been found concerning the LDS's foremost scripture, the
Book of Mormon, which they maintain is more accurate than the Bible.
The evidence in favour of the Bible is overwhelming, and there is no
evidence at all in favour of the Book of Mormon or of Mormon
doctrine. On the other hand, there is a great deal of evidence that
proves both the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham to have been
fraudulent. Yet the LDS continues to throw stones both at the
Bible and at the doctrines of biblical Christianity.
ACCURACY OF OUR COPIES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
Strict regulations were enforced in the copying of Old Testament
scriptures. An authentic specimen had to be used, and copyists
weren't allowed to deviate from it in any way. Nothing was
permitted to be written down from memory, not even a dot. If any
mistakes were made, the faulty copies were either burned or buried,
as was every document that showed any sign of wear. Many other
precautions were also taken, some even more elaborate than these,
such as the counting of every letter on each page. So it's unlikely
that errors would have crept into the copying of the Old Testament.
It doesn't make sense to imagine for one moment that people who
were so fanatically fastidious about the accuracy of their
scriptures, and so in awe of them, would adulterate them or hack
out great big portions of them. Nor would they permit others to do
so. Those Jewish folk guarded their scriptures jealously and
reverentially. Don't forget that the primitive church was
completely Jewish, and a large number of the early church
consisted of converted Jews, all of whom had this very same
reverence for scripture.
In 1947 an Arab shepherd boy discovered a vast quantity of ancient
manuscripts in some caves, which became known as the Dead Sea
Scrolls. They pre-dated anything we'd previously possessed, and
included portions of every Old Testament book except Esther. Many
of the scrolls were in fragments, but those they have pieced
together agree with our modern Bibles.
Amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls was a complete copy of the book of
Isaiah, written in an early form of the square letter. This
dates it as far back as the second century before Christ, which
makes it the same rendering of Isaiah that was read and quoted
by the Lord Jesus. He accepted and proclaimed it as the true
Word of God. And this very ancient copy of Isaiah agrees with
our modern English translations of today. So the LDS will need
to come up with another excuse to justify Joseph Smith's
alterations to the book of Isaiah in his so-called Inspired
Translation of the Bible (see the link to an article on this
subject, at the end of this page).
ACCURACY OF OUR COPIES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT
As we've learned more about ancient biblical languages we have
been able to translate them more precisely. But this hasn't changed
the actual meaning of the content in any way.
We possess more than 3,000 New Testament manuscripts dating from the
fourth century. A few of these have minor variations. However, as
most of them do agree, it's an easy matter to sort out which are the
reliable texts.
Some copies of John's writings dating from 200 AD have come to light.
They agree with our Bibles. We also have the writings of the
apostolic fathers and the church fathers. (The apostolic fathers
were the disciples of the apostles, and the church fathers were the
disciples of the apostolic fathers.) Their combined writings contain
the entire New Testament, except sixteen verses, which are only the
introductions to the epistles. And their versions of the New
Testament scriptures agree with our modern translations. Furthermore,
besides these, there were literally thousands of other early
Christian writings citing verses from the Bible, that agree with our
Bibles of today. So we can rest assured that our modern New Testament
is in line with the original writings.
In real terms, the New Testament is easily the best attested ancient
writing in terms of the sheer number of documents, the time span
between the events and the document, and the variety of documents
available to sustain or contradict it. There is nothing in ancient
manuscript evidence to match such textual availability and integrity
(Ravi K. Zacharias, page 162, Can Man Live Without God?
Word Publishing, 1994.)
Luke wrote two books, his gospel and the book of Acts. Because he
never mentioned either the destruction of Jerusalem that occurred in
70 A.D.or the apostle Paul's execution, these books must have been
written some time after the imprisonment of Paul but prior to his
appearing before Nero. This dates them within thirty years of
Christ's ministry. And in their book Eyewitness to Jesus,
German and British scholars Drs. Carsten Theide and Matthew
D'Ancona refer to a fragment from the Gospel of Matthew, that
scientific evidence revealed was also written before AD 70,
possibly as early as AD 30. This means that these three books, and
probably all the others too, were written and circulated during
the lifetime of the eyewitnesses to the events recorded. So they
would have been able to vouch for their accuracy.
Because of the overwhelming evidence available, it is unlikely that
errors could have crept into our versions of either the Old or New
Testaments.
THE BIBLE IS OUR STANDARD OF TRUTH
The Bible is the standard of truth provided by God to enable us to
test all spiritual teachings. But once we start relying on it, Satan
knows that he will have lost the battle for our souls. So he puts a
great deal of effort into trying to discredit it. And he's very
subtle. Remember what he said to Eve in the garden of Eden? He
insinuated that perhaps God didn't quite mean what he'd said so she
shouldn't take it too seriously. And she believed Satan, instead of
taking God at His Word. As a result both Adam and Eve lost their
righteous natures, their immortality and their fellowship with their
Creator.
Satan is carrying on that same campaign of disinformation today,
except this time it's against God's written word, the Bible.
Over all these long years that they've been in existence, the
LDS has never ever been able to produce any evidence whatsoever,
biblical, historical or archeological, that so much as suggests
that either a complete apostasy of the early church or a
corruption of the Bible ever took place, as they maintain they
did. They have the same amount of evidence here as they have
for their Book of Mormon being true, precisely nil. In fact they
have never ever been able to produce any credible evidence that
backs up any of their claims concerning their church being
legitimate or their accusations that biblical Christianity of
today is not legitimate.
Surely, if these claims had any substance, something would have
been found by this time, to back them up.
CONCLUSION
We have discovered that although the LDS church claims on the one
hand that the Bible is unreliable due to corruption and missing
covenants; on the other hand, they maintain that their beliefs and
practices so conform to the teachings of the Bible, that if all
people would only believe the Bible, they would all become
Mormons.
However, if truth be known they worship an unbiblical God, follow
an unbiblical Jesus Christ, and their basic doctrine of eternal
progression is unbiblical to the extent of being blasphemous.
After considering all the facts, our conclusion is that the LDS's
claim that the Bible has been corrupted was merely a deceptive tool
that enabled Joseph Smith, who was a known confidence trickster and
who had embarked on a career of deception whilst still in his youth,
to bring into being a religion that served his own purposes, and
over which he could reign supreme.
The first link given below will take you to an article that
discusses the three different Gods that have been worshipped by the
LDS, each for a lengthy period of time. Quotes from
LDS literature that can be checked,
are provided. The second link leads to an article on the reliability
of the Bible, the third to an article on the Jesus of Mormonism,
who is not the biblical Jesus Christ, and the last link to an
article on Joseph Smith's inspired translation of the Bible:
The Mormon Gods, Past and Present
The Bible and its Reliability as a Spiritual Weapon
The LDS Jesus Christ is Not the Saviour of the bible
Joseph Smith's Inspired Translation of the Bible
You will also find a comprehensive index of referenced articles
explaining various aspects of Mormonism and comparing them with
what the Bible teaches, by clicking on the "Home"
button below.
Copyright 2007, Mormonism and Biblical Truth. All rights reserved.
