How accurate is the bible?

The Bible is a collection of works, varying in accuracy. However I doubt that any of the "historical" writings in the Bible reaches the level of the better ancient historians. None of the books included in the Bible were written to be objective histories.
Nor do archaeology or external historical evidence show it to be especially reliable. (In recent years archaeological investigation of the origins of Israel have completely rejected the idea of Joshuah's conquest and have called the idea of a United Monarchy over Israel and Judah into serious question).

To be honest the best starting point is a book - _The Bible Unearthed_ by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman. The authors are sometimes classed as "minimalists" but they are very far from the extremes of the authors I would put into that class.Here's Finkelstein's web page.
http://www.tau.ac.il/...es/archaeology/faculty/finkelcv.htmlHere's an interview with him
Page not found - Biblical Archaeology Society

Briefly, a good rule of thumb is the later chronologically the less unreliable - but of course that is only a starting point. Everything before Judges is close to worthless as a reliable historical source.

To deal with the first quote.1) The scriptural quotations are not relevant to the archaeological findings.
(If they even apply - most of the Bible is NOT the Word of God in any literal sense).2) He does not mention the variations between the Septuagint and the Masoretic text - or the significant varaiations found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The 400 BC date is wrong for the Septuagint - translation started in the early 3rd Century BC with the Torah with other books translated later, on a piecemeal basis. Early Christians used the Spetuagint rather than the Hebrew.3) None of this says anythign about the transmission of the text prior to 300 BC.To deal with the second source which you give no reference for, it seems that you have badly misunderstood it.1) Mansur's quote for instance is taken out of context - presumably from here:
http://danenet.wicip.org/mbas/mena.html
What he means about confusing fact with faith is jumping to conclusions - associating archaeological finds with the Bible without adequate evidence. Mansur died in 20012) The quote from Finkelstein contains no validation at all - speaking of "...desperate attempts to prove that the Bible was correct". I note also that if this article is your source Page not found · Christianity Without the Religion/Plain Truth Ministries then you have further misrepresented Finkelstein by failing to recognise that "of archaeology" is not part of the original quote. If they think that Finkelstein believes that the Bible is largely accurate they are not familiar with his work (I suggest reading _The Bible Unearthed_ written by Finkelstein with Neil Asher Silberman).3) The third is also largely critical - about the only thing he says is validated by archaeology is that there was a kingdom of Israel.In short, with the possible exception of Mansur, they are NOT saying that the Bible is largely accurate - if anything the opposite. It is accurate only in the broad outline with many inaccuracies.As for the final source I think it unlikely that Glueck has anything to say on the developments of the last thirty years. As the article says "Dr. Glueck died at age 70 in February 1971..."

Lets see.We don't know where Jesus was born - the nativity accounts look quite contrived (not least beacues of the clear differences between them). Nor do we know that he was of the line of David (again differences in the Gospels)We don't know that Jesus was born of a virgin and the child of Iasiah 7 would have to have been born in the reign of Ahaz. For some reason nobody claims that a virgin birth happened then.The rest fare no better. Especially the use of Psalms. Come on ! The Psalms are NOT meant to be prophecies at all.In fact they make a good circumstantial case that the Bible is not accurate. After all it is in many ways a record of religious beleif - and you've just shown just how unreliable that is.

In that case it would make me much happier if you were to post accurate and on-topic posts. Do you think you could manage that ?