Still no example of a text variant that changes any important doctrine
Central doctrinal point of Christianity == something Christians were so riled up by at some point that they were willing to torture and kill those disagreeing with it.
But most Christians were not so riled up. The vast majority. So there's nothing fitting your description here. I.e., there's nothing "Christians" were so riled up over that they tortured and killed those disagreeing. Unless by "Christians" you mean only a small minority of Christians.
Can you name a "central doctrinal point" they fought over? You can't define a "doctrinal point" as "whatever they fought over" or such language. Can you name a particular Bible teaching or event which they fought and killed over?
If they took it so seriously, I'm inclined to believe it was central to them.
If you're right, you should be able to give a particular example of such a "doctrine" they killed for.
In the U.S. Civil War each side killed over their belief in favor of and against slavery. Similarly, can you give an example of a war that was fought over a Bible doctrine? or a Bible event? or a teaching, like the virgin birth, or the Trinity, or the resurrection?
If the same questions aren't central to you and your friends whom you generalize here as 'today's Christians', then kindly consider yourself belonging to the irrelevant fringe . . .
All that matters is believing, not "belonging" to some group.
. . . and shut up about general Christianity accordingly. You did sound like some kind of Catholic to me, possibly extending as far as Anglican, but one never knows. How about you come clean about your particular sect?
I was raised in a Baptist church. But many times I remember it said that it was not church membership or baptism or being religious or even attending church which mattered, but believing in Christ. And "believing in the Bible" was spoken of, however, the pastor once told me privately that he rejected some passages in the Bible, like the story of Jesus defending the adulteress from being stoned, because it was not in the original bible text.
And in other ways it became obvious that there were certain general beliefs of Christians which were not central doctrines, or maybe optional, or maybe not even true.
In one sermon the pastor considered which "doctrines" really mattered essentially, and which ones not, and he said there was only one that was definite -- the resurrection of Christ. You have to believe that one, but maybe that's enough.
Anyway, applying the above principle: virgin birth/Mary's cream pie by the HS == central doctrinal point.
It's standard doctrine. But no wars have been fought over it. And no biblical text has been altered in order to promote it or downplay it. There's no text variant in the manuscripts on this.
The Ebionites did not believe in the virgin birth, but they were among the early Christians.
One can believe in Christ without accepting the virgin birth story.
And it's not just the original Luke. The presence of the incoherent genealogies of Joseph also point to an earlier phase when such genealogies were considered important (trying to fulfill a particular messianistic prophecy by making Jesus descend from King David), and thus the changes in order to support the virgin birth extend to the synoptic gospels.
Perhaps all that, but there are no text variants in the manuscripts suggesting an alteration of the text in order to promote this doctrine. The point is that the copyists did not change the text substantially in order to promote a particular doctrine. Or, whatever text variant has been found was not one that impacted on this or any other major doctrine.
Your claim: Ehrman does not acknowledge any textual changes that would have doctrinal impact. But he does accept that the gospels were doctored wrt the virgin birth. This claim has been shown as false.
No, the virgin birth was in the original Matthew and Luke accounts. They were put there in the earliest versions we have, or "doctored" into those accounts, you could say. But there was no later change of the text by a copyist to put it into the account. It was in the earliest account we know of, not "doctored" into it later.
The "textual changes" that have NOT occurred are any later change by a copyist, later than the earliest version we have, which impacted major doctrine. That claim is true. That's what Ehrman agrees with.
I.e.,
the text was not changed by later copyists to impact the doctrine or establish new doctrine.
Yes, time for you to recant your claim that there were any changes in the text, from a copyist, which changed the doctrine.
Matthew 28:19 could not possibly have contained the current reference to the Trinity, otherwise Eusebius would have quoted it as such and not as ending in 'baptize in my name', which the apostles are indeed shown later to be doing. So we can reasonably conclude that the original text did not include the Trinity.
So far the experts do not conclude this. All the translations and versions still contain the traditional "Trinity" language. And there is no variant reading offered in the margins. The most reliable complete manuscripts contain the traditional reading.
They are reluctant to change the text based on quotes from patristic writings if the most-used manuscripts agree on the reading. The patristic quotes are generally not used to revise the text in disagreement with the major manuscripts.
But maybe they'll change it some day if there's enough evidence that the earlier or original text was different. Most of the new manuscripts that turn up have the ending of Matthew completely missing, so the evidence is lacking to determine if it was in the earliest manuscripts. This is from:
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=61180 and
http://www.godglorified.com/matthew_2819.htm
From the Didache:
7:1 Concerning baptism, you should baptize this way: After first explaining all things, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in flowing water.
http://www.paracletepress.com/didache.html
The Didache is an early church document, assigned to the 1st century by most scholars. This indicates that the "Trinity" idea was not introduced centuries later, but was already floating around at a very early point, and was probably familiar among the various Christ cults.
There may be plenty of reason to regard Mt. 28:19 as later, but still it reflects a very early idea, as the Didache quote shows, plus there's a lack of manuscript evidence for the alternate reading. Rather, there are the patristic quotes which alone are not enough.
So, even if the "Trinity" language in Mt. 28:19 is later, maybe a copyist addition, the same language was also early and cannot be shown to originate from later than 200 AD or so. It probably originates from the 1st century.
So the copyist in question, even in 300 or so, was not introducing anything new. The "Trinity" idea already existed in many different forms. This formula "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" is not the only expression of the "Trinity" idea, which is early.
It's true that some Christians are troubled by Mt 28:19 possibly being a later addition. But most of them are not. Even if this wording was added later, it was standard wording already accepted, and is not any real doctrinal change of importance. Nevertheless, as you can see from the above Catholic message board, someone chose to get
re-baptized according to the other formula "in the name of Jesus" without the trinity words. Apparently worried that their original baptism was not authentic because the wrong magic words were uttered.
If some believers think there has to be a particular formula like this and it makes a big difference what words are incantated, what does it matter? The baptism ritual was adopted from John the Baptist and the Essenes, and possibly was not something Jesus ever commanded. Or if he did, maybe he just meant that if you want to do this ritual, then do it in his name, or the FSHG.
Baptists teach that sprinkling is not genuine baptism. But this too is a fuss over nothing. It's not taken all that seriously.
99% of the changes not impacting doctrine does not mean shit. It just means scribes were so bad they made a lot of mistakes.
No, not mistakes but mostly legitimate spelling changes or appropriate word substitutions.
With even worse scribes you'd easily push that number up even higher. You'd have to show that number to be 100%, because that's the threshold for no doctrinal changes in the text;
It's all babble until you give one example of a significant doctrinal change introduced into the text by a later copyist. You've given no example yet. Even if it turns out that there is one, it must be so rare as to be impossible to find, considering that you still haven't found one.
. . . anything less means, you guessed it, doctrinal changes.
No, it means nothing if you can't give one example of a significant change in the text, or one doctrine that is changed.
And changes in any allegedly god-inspired doctrine clearly show that the doctrine is false, even for those who don't think that claiming divine inspiration alone makes claims false by default.
There is no significant change in the text, regardless of your claim to be divinely-inspired. Even if you are the Real McCoy infallible Pontifex Maximus on all god-inspired doctrines, you still haven't given an example of a copyist change in a NT text that altered any important doctrine.
