Per my post in "Does believing in God help you play better" I am supplying archaeological evidence to back it up.
There are three basic litmus tests you can put the Bible through. The first one is the one that will not satisfy most of you, but it's pretty simple: changed lives. I've read the Koran. I've read the Rubaiyat of Omar Khyham. I've read the Egyptian Book of the Dead. I've read numerous texts that have spawned religions. While some of them (like the Rubaiyat) contained great poetry, there was never anything in them that "Changed my life" like reading the Bible has. Why are people willing to die in countries where Christianity is outlawed, just for the chance to read a few verses out of this book? The Bible has been printed in more languages, and sold more copies than any other book ever written. It has changed lives in ways that no other book has ever done. And that makes it special.
The second test you can use is an internal test. The internal evidence test reveals the Bible's amazing consistency. The Bible was written by over 40 authors, in 3 languages, on 3 continents, over a span of 1,500 years, and covers hundreds of controversial subjects. Yet, the authors all spoke with agreement; there are no contradictions. [1] From Genesis to Revelation, there is one unfolding story--God's redemption of mankind.
Sir William Ramsey, one of the greatest archeologists to ever live, demonstrated that Luke (author of the Gospel of Luke) made no mistakes in references to 32 countries, 54 cities, and 9 islands. That’s a LOT of geography. Everything he said about how they related to each other, and who was where when is accurate.
The third test is archaeological evidence. I'm going to list what I came up with after researching for just a few minutes.
Some scholars once said that Moses couldn't have written the first five books of the Bible (as the Bible says) because writing was largely unknown in his day. Then, archaeology proved otherwise by the discovery of many other written codes of the period: the code of Hammurabi (ca. 1700 B.C.), the Lipit-Ishtar code (ca. 1860), and the Laws of Eshnunna (ca. 1950 B.C.).
Critics used to say that the biblical description of the Hittite Empire was wrong because the Hittite Empire (they though) didn't even exist! Then archaeologists discovered the Hittite capital in 1906 and discovered that the Hittite's were actually a very vast and prominent civilization. Archaeological and linguistic evidence is increasingly pointing to a sixth-century B.C. date for the book of Daniel, in spite of the many critics who attempt to late-date Daniel and make it a prophecy after the detailed events it predicts.
For the New Testament, Dr. G.R. Habermas points out that within 110 years of Christ's crucifixion, approximately eighteen non-Christian sources mention more than "one hundred facts, beliefs, and teachings from the life of Christ and early Christendom. These items, I might add, mention almost every major detail of Jesus' life, including miracles, the Resurrection, and His claims to deity." [2]
Liberal scholars used to argue that a town named Nazareth didn't exist at the time of Jesus, until archaeology of the last few decades confirmed its existence. The Gospel's portrayals of the temple, Pilate's court, Jesus' crown of thorns, and the mode of His execution have all also been confirmed.
Norman Geisler explains Ezekiel's prediction that the city of Tyre "would be destroyed and its ruins cast into the sea (26:2). This provoked scoffing because, when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Tyre, he left the ruins right where they fell--on the land. But 200 years later, Alexander the Great attacked Tyre and the inhabitants withdrew to an island just off the coast for safety. In order to reach them, Alexander threw all of the debris, stones, timbers, dust, and everything else, into the sea to build a causeway that would reach the island." [3]
Sir Frederick Kenyon, who was second to none in issuing statements about manuscripts, said this about the New Testament: "The interval between the dates of original composition and the earliest existing evidence [i.e. the earliest copies we have] become so small to be in fact negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially has having been written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and general integrity of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established." [4] He further said that "No fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith rests on a disputed reading." The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which date from 200 B.C. to A.D. 68, included a copy of every Old Testament book except for one. Comparison with the texts of a thousand years later shows little or no variation and change between them.
Isaiah 20:1 says Sargon, king of Assyria, captured Ashdod. Absence of confirming evidence caused skeptics to question the existence of Sargon for many years. But then his palace was discovered in 1843 and a victory stela commemorating his victory over Ashdod was discovered in the ruins of Ashdod itself in 1963.
Thousands of cuneiform tablets have been found in different places in the middle east which date to the time covered in Genesis. One large cache of tablets was found at Tel Mardikh in Syria. These tablets are from the Empire of Ebla dating from around 2,000 BC. They confirm many details found in the Biblical stories about the Patriarchs. Versions of the Biblical stories about creation, the flood, and the tower of Babel have been discovered. Many of the specific social rules and customs described in the stories about Abraham and his sons have been verified as the current practice among the Semitic people in that time and region. This would include such things as the adoption custom, Genesis 15:4, having a child by a handmaid, Genesis 16:1-2, selling one's birthright, Genesis 25:27-34, selecting a son's wife, Genesis 24:10, and the price of slaves, Genesis 37:28. What's more, many of these tablets are written in a language very similar to the ancient Hebrew in which the Bible was written. They refer to many of the places visited by the Patriarchs, and they confirm the current use of names such as Abraham, Esau, Ishmael, Israel.
2 Kings 18:13-19:37 describes the invasion of Judah by Sennacherib, king of Assyria. Many of the details of this story have been remarkably verified by archaeological discoveries. The Assyrian siege of Lachish has been verified by excavations and a large relief found in Sennacherib's palace. The fact that Sennacherib was unable to take Jerusalem is verified by his own account recorded on a monument known as the Taylor Prism which dates to 689 BC. The Bible records that Sennacherib was murdered by his own son, 2 Kings 19:37. This fact was verified when a clay tablet was found in the royal archives of Nineveh giving the same account.
1. I (the author, Matt Perman) have personally looked into the issue of alleged contradictions, and after thorough investigation, have never found one to hold. Norman Geisler, who has studied the Bible exhaustively for over forty years and been confronted with numerous dificulties, is of the same conclusion. A valuable resource for further investigation on this mater is Geisler's When Critics Ask.
2. Gary Habermas and Antony Flew, Did Jesus Rise From the Dead? (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), p. 43.
3. Norman Geisler and Ronald Brooks, When Skeptics Ask (Wheaton, Illinois: Victor Books, 1990), p. 198.
4. Sir Frederic Kenyon, The Bible and Archaeology (New York: Harper and Row, 1940), pp. 288, 289.
I have much more where this came from, but this post is already quite long. If you have made it all the way down here, thanks for your interest!
Love,
Sarah
Topic: archaeological evidence supporting the Bible