Wilczek, You are getting ahead of me, the topic of the historical Jesus follows this in a future post. I intend on proceeding one topic at a time, and will not leap frog from topic to topic.
Textual comparison:
In antiquity such writings as Homer’s Illiad and later the Scriptures were memorized by men, because both were considered sacred and used in defense of such doctrines pertaining to heaven, earth and hades. In addition, both were used as primers to teach students how to read. (XHapters in the History of New Testament Textual Criticism 1968 Oxford University Press)
As E.G. Turner points out that, "Homer was no doubt the most widely read author in antiquity. (Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World, Princeton University Press, 1971.
By comparison the Illiad was written 900 B.C. the earliest copy is dated at 400 B.C., a 500 year difference, with only 643 extent mss copies. However, the New Testament out weighs this, having in excess of 24,000, many are not fragments, the earlies dated at 125 A.D. , giving a difference of 45 years. This is significant in light of textual corruption, the further a mss is displaced from the original document, the greater the corruption of the text. For example, the Illiad has 15,600 lines of which over 764 are corrupted, or of questionable origin. The New Testament has 20,000 lines of which 40 are suspect. The Illiad has 5% corruption as compared to 1/2 of 1% for the N.T. Keeping in mind the Illiad is the best preseved document of antiquity.
The National epic of India, the Mahabharta, has suffered even more corruption. It is about 8 times the size of the Homer’s combined works, roughly 250,000 lines. Of these about 26,000 are corrupted, with in 10%.
Concerning N.T. textual corruption, Benjamin Warfield wrote in his Introduction to Textual Criticism of N.T., quotes Ezra Abbot’s opinion about 19/20th of the N.T. textual variation “. . . have little support . . . although these are various readings and of the 19/20th of the remainder are of little importance that there adoption or rejection would cause no appreciable difference in the sense of the passages where they occur.”
Essentially the corruption are of little concern and can be dispensed.
Philip Schaff in Comparison in the Greek N.T. and the English Version states, the variants that exist in some MSS do not “alter any article of faith or precept of duty, which is not already abundantly sustained by other undoubted passages, or by the whole tenor of scripture teaching.”
Fenton John Anthony Hort, whose life has been with the MSS states, "The proportion of words virtually accepted on all hands as raised above doubts is very great, not less than 7/8th of the whole. The remaining 8th, therefore formed is a great part by changes of (word) order (probably in translation, this is not uncommon, I have spent the better part of 5 years studying N.T. Greek and word order in Greek is not of any import, as in English) and other comparatives trivialities, constitutes the whole area of criticism. Hort goes on to even state that the textual corruption could be as little as 1/16th of the entire N.T.
Warfield referring to Richard Bentley, "the real text of the sacred writer is compentently exact; . . . nor is one article of faith or moral precept either perverted or lost . . . choose as awkwardly as you will, choose the worst by design out of the whole lump of readings.
Schaff quotes two separate authors, first, “We possess so many MSS, and we are aided by some many versions, that we are never left to the need of conjecture as the means of removing errata.” (Tregallen, Greek N.T., “Protegomena,” P.X.) The second author, Scrivner, as far as he is concerned, " the copiousness of the stories from causing doubt or perplexity to the genuine student of the Holy Scripture, that it leads him to recognize the more fully the general integrity in the midst of partial variation. (Companion to the Greek N.T. and English Version, MacMillian, Co. 1883.
The conclusion is obvious that the textual integrity out weighs any other document of antiquity, in accuracy, number of MSS and least amount of corruption. This is foundational, because if the Bible is corrupted or not well documented the remainder is trival. My next post I will present the reliabilty of the New Testament authorship and dates of books. As always please be patient, this the only computer with an internet connection. 
