I will freely admit I am a doubter, and I should be specific by saying I am NOT a denier.
I do believe Jesus was a man. I believe he was killed on the cross and placed in a tomb. I believe John absolutely smoked Peter in a race to the tomb. And I guess I do believe Jesus was then found to be alive and was alive for some time. So I suppose I do believe in some sort of miracle. I am uncomfortable extrapolating belief in one miracle to belief in all miracles. I believe man is fallible, and that man may have corrupted the translation or transcription or storage of the word of God over time. I don't mean that to say intentional corruption, but just that it isn't perfect (but not that it needs to be). I struggle with what is next for me, and I would like something to be next for me.
I respect the heck out of that, and I appreciate you being honest about where you are at.
In terms of the text being corrupted (intentionally or unintentionally), the Bible has gone under a lot of scrutiny in that regard; it's called textual criticism. What you may not know is that there is a mountain of manuscripts dating back to as early as the 2nd century. Copies of early manuscripts have been found across a vast range of locations and periods. Scholars take these texts, date them, and then use them to compare what is said to discern what, if anything, has changed.
I'll show you an example of one that is well-known. John 7
Link If you look down at the bottom of the page you will read where a portion of what was known as John 7 into chapter 8 has an
[The earliest manuscripts do not include 7:53–8:11.] note in it. That story had been in the gospel of John for a long time and a lot of people quoted it, some still do. But because of textual criticism and discovery of earlier manuscripts, it was determined that this story was not in the earliest manuscripts. That transparency should at least put you at some ease.
In terms of sheer volume of text scholars can use to compare and discern what is valid and what is not, there are 5800 Greek manuscripts, 10000 Latin manuscripts, and 9300 manuscripts of other languages. Being able to compare these manuscripts that span across multiple periods of time, languages, and regions it would be pretty easy to pick out things that were added in a certain area because later copies in the area would show the same addition, but not copies of the text that were in another region. Does that make sense?
That's a lot of text that corroborates the same story over and over again. If you want to dig into it further, let me know and I'll give you some links to some people who are way smarter than me who have done the work.
You're right, man is fallible. But Jesus claimed to be more than a man. And if He really did rise from the dead that is something to definitely look into.
One of the biggest convincers of Jesus being who he said he was to me was Saul's story, later to be known as the Apostle Paul. If you don't know about Paul, he was an up and comer in the Jewish teacher's (Pharisees). He studied hard and was rising through the political ladder. He was actually one of the early persecuters of Christians in Jerusalem. Eager to please the Jewish leaders, he asks for permission to go and round up some Christ-followers in a town called Damascus. He was granted that permission but on his travels to Damascus he has a run in with the risen Lord. Read it here:
Link
Now, something happened that day, something real, because Saul gave up everything he had going for him to follow this Jesus character.
