Has the Bible been corrupted?

The Gutenberg Bible, the first printed bible

Sometimes our Muslim friends suggest that the Bible, and in particular the New Testament has been corrupted. Just to deal with the subject very briefly...

1.      There is no evidence that the NT has been corrupted from the original text. On the contrary there is substantial evidence that the words have been preserved – from the sheer number of very old copies available and the remarkable and material correspondence between them all.

2.      For Muslims it is crucial that they can prove that the Bible was corrupted because in the Qur'an Muslims are told to respect the Gospel revealed by Jesus Christ and read by Christians. So the only way to avoid reading and believing in the Jesus revealed in the New Testament is to say it has been corrupted. However, it seems that no-one, including Muhammad himself suggested this in the 7^th century. By this time there is no doubt that copies of the same Bible that we currently have, were in circulation. For example, Codex Sinaiticus is an almost complete NT that pre-dates Muhammad and is available to see in the British Library. Apparently, in the first four centuries after Muhammad, no Muslim theologian seriously contended that the Gospel texts were not authentic.

3.     We understand that there is no better evidence that the Qur’an has been preserved, but in the end this is not really an issue for Christians. The question is, what were the words of the Qur’an in the first place? Are they the sayings of a man or men, doing their best to call people away from idolatry and to codify their way of life, or was it the word of God? Muslims believe it to be the word of God but because it contradicts the Bible Christians believe it was the good intention of men in their culture using their understanding of the Bible; but it was not a revelation from God.

So Christians believe they must bring their Muslim friends back to Jesus – the ultimate revelation from God.