The proper approach begins by treating the Bible as any other historical document, with no presumption of inspiration. Next, we apply principles of textual criticism to the extant biblical documents to determine what the original autographs likely were. As it turns out, there is much more evidence for the accuracy of biblical documents than for any other documents of classical antiquity. We are faced, not with uncertain conjecture, but rather with an abashment of riches when it comes to the number of manuscripts with which we have to work, and the high degree of accuracy of knowing what the original manuscripts actually said.
Next, having determined the historical accuracy of the text of the biblical documents, we examine the accuracy of the writers of these documents. No matter how far historically we push any writer of a biblical book, the outcome is always that the writer is accurate in the recording of history. Even when there has been some question as to the accuracy of this or that writer, later archaeological digs have always vindicated these writers. So now what we have is not only a document that is accurate from the standpoint of what it originally said, but also accurate in every place we can check it against historical fact. We then can safely assume that if the writers of the biblical documents are completely accurate in every area that can be verified form other sources, likely they are just as accurate in those areas that cannot be verified from other sources. In other words, we can have complete confidence in the accuracy of all that they record.
Next, we examine the type of testimony that the writers are giving and we find that it is eye-witness testimony. The writers are recording things they have actually seen—and this in the fact of much opposition. The Jews, for instance, could have written their own documents countering these claims—or better yet, produced the dead body of Jesus, whom the New Testament writers claim rose from the dead—but they didn’t. We also find that most of the significant eye-witnesses willingly died for their belief in the truthfulness of their testimony. If this were a hoax, one might expect one very deluded eye-witness to die for his belief, but not many.
Finally, we find that these writers record the very words of Jesus, in some cases after much careful research. Jesus claimed over and over again to be God. His claim can be taken in only one of three ways: he was either a liar, a lunatic (either of which would immediately disqualify him from any further consideration as a “good” and “moral” teacher), or God himself. Because of the previous evidence of the willingness of the part of the eye-witnesses to die for their belief that Jesus rose from the dead, we must conclude that Jesus did indeed rise from the dead. And since Jesus is the only person in history who ever accomplished his own resurrection, we must conclude that he was neither a liar nor a lunatic, but that he was just whom he claimed to be; namely, God. And if he is God, then whatever he says must be unfailingly true and authoritative. One of the things he says is that Scripture is completely authoritative and infallible. Another thing he says is that his apostles have been vested with unique authority. (Eric D. Svendsen, Evangelical Answers: A Critique of Current Roman Catholic Apologists [Lindenhurst, N.Y.: Reformation Press, 1999], 97-98; Svendsen admits that this is similar to Keating’s “spiral argument” in Catholicism and Fundamentalism [Ignatius: 1988]—one struggles to see “normie” Protestants engaging in textual criticism and other methods discussed above to ascertain for themselves the truthfulness of the New Testament manuscripts, let alone the rest of the Bible; also note, it appears that Svendsen is not a presuppositionalist)
