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ArishMell · 70-79, M
The translation from as original or at least early manuscripts as were known at the time, was entrusted to a panel of the best linguists and Bible scholars of the time.
Though claiming its linguistic veracity - which is all that can be tested - can be tested by using part of its own contents is a rather odd, circular claim.
It could be tested for straightforward translations against far earlier versions, which will be mainly Mediaeval monastic Latin ones; and for the Old Testament, against the Torah's books common to both. (The Biblical OT is not quite the same as the Torah, with different books and in a different order.)
The bigger problem over the centuries would not be translation errors although they well exist, but successive editing to modify the narratives.
It may be possible to test parts against any of the original writings from well over 2000 years previously that have been found in recent times, such as among the Dead Sea Scrolls fragments which include parts of the set called "The Apocrypha" (simply, documents not used in Christians and Jewish scriptures) or surviving in some ancient Jewish or Coptic archive.
Though even if you proved quite correctly that some passage was not quite what its author had actually written, you'd probably unleash an unholy chorus of literalists abusing you for saying the passage familiar now, is wrong!
Though claiming its linguistic veracity - which is all that can be tested - can be tested by using part of its own contents is a rather odd, circular claim.
It could be tested for straightforward translations against far earlier versions, which will be mainly Mediaeval monastic Latin ones; and for the Old Testament, against the Torah's books common to both. (The Biblical OT is not quite the same as the Torah, with different books and in a different order.)
The bigger problem over the centuries would not be translation errors although they well exist, but successive editing to modify the narratives.
It may be possible to test parts against any of the original writings from well over 2000 years previously that have been found in recent times, such as among the Dead Sea Scrolls fragments which include parts of the set called "The Apocrypha" (simply, documents not used in Christians and Jewish scriptures) or surviving in some ancient Jewish or Coptic archive.
Though even if you proved quite correctly that some passage was not quite what its author had actually written, you'd probably unleash an unholy chorus of literalists abusing you for saying the passage familiar now, is wrong!