Preface: How to Use This Book
This book has one purpose: to help the reader understand the Word of God in its fullest standing. That means three things. First, what the Bible claims to be: God’s own revelation, breathed out by him, authoritative, true, and sufficient. Second, how it came to us: how the sixty-six books were written, recognized, copied, preserved, translated, and carried into every nation. Third, how to read it well: how to understand what it says, and live by it.
The book relies on two kinds of evidence. The first is Scripture itself, which is quoted throughout from the King James Version (KJV) and cited in the text as (Book chapter:verse). The Bible’s testimony about itself is the first witness. The second is historical sources: ancient Jewish and Christian writers, church councils, manuscripts, and the records of the translators. These are cited in the text by author and short title, for example (Josephus, Ag. Ap. 1.38–41), or by author and year for modern scholarship, for example (Metzger 1987). Every source is listed in full in the References at the end of the book, together with an index of the Scripture passages cited in each chapter.
A note on tone and fairness. Christians of good faith differ on certain questions: which books belong in the Old Testament, which Greek text underlies the best translation, and how to interpret some passages. Where they do, this book sets out the positions fairly and says where it stands. Faith in the Bible does not depend on pretending the questions do not exist. It rests on the fact that the historical evidence, honestly examined, supports the confidence the church has placed in the Scriptures for two thousand years.
A note on sources. Ancient works are cited by their standard book, chapter, and section divisions, which are the same in every edition. Modern works are cited for the general support they give, and page numbers are not given. Any reader quoting a modern author directly should check the page in the edition used.