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22 The Virgin Birth and the Messiah

Many that dis agree with us ve he mently pres ent an other ar gu ment sim i lar to the fol low ing:

"The New Testament has been proven 99 percent accurate."

Ninety-nine per cent may be a bit of wish ful think ing, but let's as sume that we ac cept their
state ment. In fact, we do be lieve that the New Tes ta ment is highly re li able. The ques tion is, do
THEY ac tu ally ac cept their own ac cu racy es ti mate? Are they will ing to stand by their state ment?
Since they so force fully pro mote the idea that the New Tes ta ment is 99 per cent ac cu rate, then they
must also ac cept what is im plied by their state ment, which is that the New Tes ta ment is 1 per cent
cor rupt! Are they will ing to ad mit that ONE OUT OF EVERY 100 WORDS IN THE NEW
TESTAMENT IS INCORRECT, based on their own vig or ously stated po si tion of 99 per cent New
Tes ta ment ac cu racy? Ob vi ously, if they ad mit 1% er ror they will have to ad mit it is quite pos si ble a
few of those 1 out of 100 in cor rect words (or added words) may lie within the al leged birth ac counts
of the Mes siah! There are 7957 verses in the New Tes ta ment. Are those pro mot ing 99 per cent ac -
cu racy will ing to ad mit that by their own es ti ma tion roughly 80 New Tes ta ment pas sages pres ent
false in for ma tion? De pending on where those 80 (as a min i mum) are lo cated, they may GREATLY
af fect one's un der stand ing of "Scrip ture".

In truth, even those that as sume 99 per cent ac cu racy for the New Tes ta ment still re fuse to
ad mit there may be 1 per cent er ror. Even if they do, they ALWAYS sub jec tively se lect those pas -
sages they con sider to be within the list of er ro ne ous verses based upon their own per sonal bias. In
other words, those that ac cuse us of dis card ing pas sages we choose not to ac cept do pre cisely the
same thing when shown the nu mer ous New Tes ta ment pas sages that con flict with their own be liefs!
They are proven to be hyp o crit i cal re gard ing the ac cu sa tions they hurl against those like our selves!

The dif fer ence be tween Hope of Is rael Min is tries and those that hyp o crit i cally ac cuse us of
se lec tive New Tes ta ment ac cep tance is that we, un like our ac cus ers, use the same ap proach as the
"no ble" Bereans (Acts 17:11). We TEST the verses of the New Tes ta ment by com par ing them to
what is writ ten in the Old Tes ta ment, just as the New Tes ta ment au thors com mand. This test is vir -
tu ally never used by Chris tians or coun ter feit Messianics. There fore, our use of dis cern ment to de -
ter mine what may be in cor rect within the New Tes ta ment is not only Scrip tural, but is also
com manded from within the very pages of the New Tes ta ment. Since we fol low the com mand to
test the ap os tolic writ ings us ing the Old Tes ta ment, we are more of "New Tes ta ment be liev ers"
than our Constantinian Chris tian op po nents! WE ACTUALLY FOLLOW THE NEW TESTA-
MENT MORE CLOSELY THAN OUR OPPONENTS DO!

Chris tians and coun ter feit Messianics need to re al ize that their faith in the in fal li bil ity of the
New Tes ta ment writ ings is ac tu ally faith in the in fal li bil ity of the men who col lected, cop ied (ed -
ited), and can on ized the New Tes ta ment manu scripts! When a Chris tian states a be lief that the New
Tes ta ment is the "Word of God", what they are ac tu ally na ively ac cept ing as per fect are im per fect
men that his tory proves were VERY anti-He braic, anti-Se mitic, steeped in the mys tery sun-god re -
li gions -- and po lit i cally mo ti vated! Chris tians are not even aware of what their faith ACTUALLY
in volves or in whom their faith is ACTUALLY placed! They never stop to con sider what they are
ACTUALLY bas ing their "faith" upon! And of course, very few Chris tians have the slight est idea
of what REALLY hap pened dur ing those cru cial first 4 cen tu ries fol low ing the death of Yeshua.
Worst still, most Chris tians don't care!

The Berean Voice