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Whether due to mistranslation, copyist error, anachronism, modern usage, invention, misunderstanding, forgery, propaganda, or any other mechanism, an error of text is an error of fact when that text is to be used as the sole source of authority.
 In assessing whether or not any Biblical errors really exist, our most powerful tool is to see if there are any internal inconsistencies or contradictions within the Bible, itself. In these cases, no outside facts, opinions, or other subjective factors come into play. When we place contradictory passages side by side, we cannot be accused of injecting outside biases; because the Bible, itself, is the only standard of comparison. [In Chapter 3 (Problem Quotations) that standard is eased somewhat.]
Thousands of people have spent the gifts of millions of other people to argue the relative theological merits of contradictory Bible passages when they would have made a much bigger contribution to our understanding by figuring out why these passages were contradictory to begin with. For example, it can be of no theological importance to ask whether God was subject to fatigue or not (Gen 2:2, Ex 31:17, Isa 43:24, Isa 40:28) until the basic question is resolved as to why these passages contradict each other. Since two contradictory statements cannot both be true, one or the other of them must be untrue. Therefore, if we find any contradictions in the Bible, it would be much more important to apply our time and resources to find out whether (a) the Bible is the word of God, but it contains untruths (i.e. God is dishonest and, therefore, unworthy of worship) or (b) the Bible is not the word of God (i.e. it’s a blasphemous fiction and, therefore, worthless as a basis for theological arguments).
Which is it? Once we know the answer to this question, we will be able to move on to real theological issues with some degree of confidence that the Bible might contain even useful questions, much less definitive answers.
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