This is an easy question to answer, but there are many parts to the answer to consider.  First, before we consider the question which Bible, we must address the authority of the Bible itself.  At the very base, your belief in the Bible requires faith.  However, when you think about it, so does everything else in your life.  When you walk across a floor, you have faith that the floor will hold you.  You have faith that the bus you ride in will not crash.  You have faith that the next breath of air you breathe in will not be poisonous. 

What is the Bible?

The Bible is inspired by God

2 Tim 3:16-17 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: (17)That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

2 Pet 1:21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

Literally, the word 'inspiration' means to breathe in.  In this case, holy men were moved by the Holy Spirit (God) which literally breathed into them the very words God wanted put down, into the Bible.  These men were faithful and recorded every word as God wanted them.  From the diligent work of these men, we have a compilation of individual works which we now know as the Bible.

The Bible is without error

Psa 12:6 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.

Psa 19:7-8 The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. (8) The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.

If you have faith in the Bible, the proclamation of the Bible is sufficient.  It is pure and without error.  However because the Bible was literally breathed into men by God, those words are as perfect as God is perfect.  Since God cannot make a mistake, there is no mistake in what HE has said.  Therefore, HIS word is perfect.  

The Bible is complete

1 Cor 13:8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.

Rev 22:18 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: (19) And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

Before the Bible was completed, people still needed to hear from God and see the evidences of His work.  During this time, God sent various 'sign gifts'.  These gifts were given to particular people to prove that God existed.  Some people were prophets - that is, they could hear directly from God and were allowed to see events that would happen in the future.  Some people were allowed by God to heal the sick or wounded.  Some people were allowed by God to hear and understand languages they would not normally understand.  Now that we have the complete Word of God, ALL of these gifts, as they were shown in the Bible have ceased. We can turn the pages of our Bible and see these evidences of God.  

When the last book of the Bible, The Revelation, was completed, so was the Bible.  There are some who have tried to add to the Bible, but there additions only confused or contradicted the Bible.  God imposed a very severe penalty upon those who would add to or take away from the Bible.  Some have also tried to change the Bible.  This is why we see so many different translations today.  Each one is different from the others.  While some falsely claim that these differences only help people to understand the Bible, they actually add a great deal of confusion.  Because these versions are different, well, they are different.  The individual texts of each book contain slightly different accounts.  In some cases, the changes are slight. In others cases, the changes are drastic, even to the point where doctrines are changed. 

The Bible is our final authority for faith and practice

2 Tim 3:16-17 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: (17) That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

As we go through our day to day lives, we encounter different chouices.  In making these choices, we can turn to the Bible as a guide to help us make the right decisions.  If we do this and look to the Bible for every decision in our lives, God has promised that we will be perfected!

The Bible is preserved

Psa 119:89 For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.

Mat 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

1 Pet 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.

1 Pet 1:25 But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.

The Bible was penned over a period of thousands of years.  Throughout this time, God's promise to preserve the Bible was kept.  As men penned portions of the Bible, they were copied and passed around.  You have to remember that at this time, there were no photocopy machines, computers or even printing presses.  A copy was a labor where men would sit and literally copy each part by hand.  It would be natural for errors to creep in using this process.  In fact, many other manuscripts have been corrupted using this process.  The Bible is different, though.  The scribes who copied the original manuscripts had a reverence for the Word of God not seen since their day.  They took the Word of God so seriously that they would literally bathe themselves before copying certain passages.  Their diligence, combined with God's promise has left us with copies of the original manuscripts that are complete and accurate.  We can prove this by comparison.  As these men made copies, there were mistakes.  Sometimes, these mistakes were intentional.  For whatever reason, people tried to introduce their own point of view into the Word of God.  In other cases, these mistakes were accidental.  In most cases, these mistakes were eliminated.  Sometimes, the mistakes were not.  Some of these mistakes have crept into some modern versions.  How do we know which are mistakes and which are not?  We can prove this through the 'majority' text method.  Suppose we searched the world over and found one hundred and seven fragments of Scripture with basically the same passage on them.  Of those, one hundred and three agreed with each other and four did not. Which would you trust?  The obvious answer is to trust the majority, or the ones that agree with each other.  Combine that with the fact that some 'minority' text fragments (the ones which do not agree) also do not agree with doctrines established elsewhere in the Bible. You now have even more reason to believe the majority!  This is exactly how we have proven the Masoretic Hebrew text as the foundation of the Old Testament and the Textus Receptus as the foundation of the New Testament.  

The Bible is scientifically accurate

As science (outside of the Christian's viewpoint) has progressed, we have seen many theories about the world.  For example, there was a time people believed that the earth was flat.  The Bible, however, contains many facts which modern science has only recently proven or discovered!

• Isolation of the sick: Leviticus 13:46  All the days wherein the plague shall be in him he shall be defiled; he is unclean: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.
• Sanitary disposal of human waste: Deu 23:12-13 Thou shalt have a place also without the camp, whither thou shalt go forth abroad: (13) And thou shalt have a paddle upon thy weapon; and it shall be, when thou wilt ease thyself abroad, thou shalt dig therewith, and shalt turn back and cover that which cometh from thee.
• There is nothing supporting the earth: Job 26:7  He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
  
• There are invisible currents in the oceans: Psa 8:8  The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.
  
• The earth is round: Isa 40:22  It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth...

The King James Version

In 1611, another group of men who were faithful to the Word of God came together and translated these two texts into the King James Bible.  These men were every bit as faithful in their earlier counterparts, the Scribes.  So, the King James Bible you hold in your hands today is a perfect, faithful translation of the Word of God and therefore (if you speak English) is the Word of God for you!  Sometimes, there are words which were not directly translated into English.  These are not mistakes.  Baptizo is one of those words.  In the KJV, this word was transliterated. That means that instead of translating the word, they translated each letter of the word into it's English counterpart. Literally, the Greek word baptizo means to dunk or to immerse.  Therefore, the word we see in our Bible, which has been transliterated as baptize also means to immerse.  Sometimes, there are words in Greek which do not have an exact, direct translation into English.  The word we read as LOVE  is one of those words.  In the English language, we can discern which kind of love we are speaking of by the context of the conversation. If you know my family, and I (speaking of my daughter) say I love Laurel, you would understand it to be a sacrifical love - I would do anything to protect my child. However, if I were on a mountain side looking at some flowers, and said, "I love laurel" you might think I was talking about the flower called "Mountain Laurel" and you would know that it's ok, but I wouldn't lay down my life for it. In greek, there are actually two words used in the NT which are translated as 'love'. The first is the word 'agape' which is that all consuming love. 'Agape' is the love Christ demonstrated by sacrificing himself on the cross for our sins. The second word for love is 'phileo'. It is a brotherly love. It would be something like saying, "I love my neighbors." I am not saying that anywhere you see the word 'love' in the NT that there is an error. Nor am I saying that you have to know the original languages to be a Bible scholar. I am saying there are times when it is easier to get to a bit of extra knowledge by knowing the original languages.When you take these facts, as well as the many volumes of other information into account, you can clearly see that the KJV is the Bible for the English speaking people!

Contradictions

There are none. 

If you have a question about the Bible, please let us know.  We would love to help you better understand the Word of God.  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .