Buddhist scripture

I have been very curious wanting to know for quite a while, between these two groups, which group have more people?
1. Buddhists who have ever read Buddhist scripture (Tipitaka) before.
2. Buddhists who have never read Tipitaka before, but have ever read a few pages of Christian's Bible.

Judging from all Buddhist friends that I knew so far, frankly I am not that confident that the first group has more people than the second group. Why is it so? Obviously, Buddhism, unlike others, is not a book based religion, in the sense that we don't treat Tipitaka as holy book to be venerated. As the result, study of Buddhism (with exception of advanced level), has never really focused on studying Tipitaka directly. (Although,  of course, most (if not all) Buddhist book is based on teaching inside Tipitaka).

For myself, my interest of Buddhist scriptures, in particular the Sutta sections is growing slowly but steadily ever since I met Piya Tan and attended Sutta studies class in 2001. (Just to highlight, I started studying Buddhism ever since I was in Primary one, which mean I really started reading Tipitaka after 12 years of getting in touch with Buddhism). After reading and studying it for quite a while, I really thought that we should incorporate more scripture studies to the study of Buddhism (especially to the children and teenagers for early exposures).
Why do I think so?

1. The Suttas recorded the most direct and unadulterated version of the Buddhist teachings (although I am not suggesting that all the things inside it is spoken by the Buddha as some of it is obviously later addition after the Buddha's passing away). All the Buddhist books that we read today obviously contains a lot of teaching of the Buddha. However, it is obviously more subjective as it will also contain thought and opinion of the authors as well.

2. It is I think one of the way to feel closer to the Buddha. From close study of the Sutta, we will be able to know how the Buddha react upon being challenge, what is the style of the Buddha teaching His disciples, how the Buddha solve problems and wrong doings of his disciples (especially in Vinaya), how is the subtle humour that the Buddha possess, etc.

3. By studying it in context, we will reduce our tendency of quoting the Buddha's word out of context. For example, a few years ago, I have a friend who told me that the Buddha teaches us that there are many ways and many paths to Enlightenment. One can even get enlightened by following non Buddhist teachings. As the prove, this friend quoted that the Buddha said before that on one day, He took a few leaves and asked the disciples that which one is more? The few leaves in my hand or leaves in the forest, and further elaborating to me that since there are many leaves in the forest, following one of these "leaves" (aka teaching) we can also get enlightened. But upon further study of the Sutta (SN 56.31 Simsapa Sutta http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn56/sn56.031.than.html ), This is obviously NOT what the Buddha meant when He said this. In fact, the Buddha is trying to tell us that there are a lot of truths that the Buddha did not teach. However, Why did the Buddha didn't teach them? Because those teachings are not relevant in bringing one to enlightenment!

4. Although it is true that wisdom in Buddhism arises not from theoretical studies of the scripture, but from practice (aka meditation and personal realization), it is also important to know the theory, as probably my teacher told me before "Theory without practice is of no use. However, practice without theory will lead us to more delusion/ ignorance". To put into a Buddhist word, the threefold formulation of Buddhism is - study, practice and realization.