The pack of extra stuff that Pam hands out at the beginning of each session is so complete - I regret that I don't always make time to read everything that she gives. The pages of cross-references facilitate taking the week's work on the road and that's what I did yesterday: doing the lesson during their tennis practice and at Chuck E. Cheese's. No need to bring along another book for looking up referenced verses.

As I integrated her handouts with the printed Precepts material by lesson, the page on textual criticism caught my eye and I read it. I don't know which study Bible the article is taken from, but I suspect it's from the NIV Archaeological Study Bible because that's one she has and I don't. Anyway, I asked her in email. The first paragraph of the article is quoted verbatim here ("Any book copied by hand ...") without a citation reference.

And, you know, the article's affirmation of the textual integrity of the Bible, its validation of the Bible's reliability isn't something I reject. Just that, if I wasn't already convinced, this article wouldn't do it.

For instance,

"Significantly, while textual errors do exist among the Biblical witnesses, they do not destroy the Bible's credibility or message. Just as an alert reader can understand a book or newspaper article that has typographical errors in it, so too God's Word is able to speak for itself in spite of the minor corruptions that have arisen through scribal transmission.

Taking that popular newspaper analogy too far.

A typo in a book or newspaper is not in the same league as a textual variant in the manuscript tradition of Scripture. In the first place, that typesetter's typo isn't brought forward, partially corrected, joined by new typos, etc. through 1,000's of uniquely-created editions. In the second place, if there is a serious misunderstanding,¹ the author or journalist is probably still around to straighten it out.

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¹ Kathleen Parker at the National Review seems to misquote Pelosi, substituting the more common but incorrect expression "doctrines of the church" for the exclusively Catholic phrase "Doctors of the Church." I'm guessing Parker isn't Catholic.