I’ve been plagued with teaching composition, aka “comp.” Whether it’s been a college prep course during my high school teaching years or online or at the local community college, I’ve taught it year-in, year-out for fifteen years. A necessity of the course is the oft dreaded research essay, wherein students have to find reliable, credible source materials to support their contentions. Consequently, it would be duplicitous of me to teach source reliability and authorial credibility and not value those qualities in the texts that support my belief system.
Since I believe in Jesus Christ as both Savior and Lord, clearly it’s reasonable and expected for me to face inquiries, whether my own or those of others, regarding the integrity of the New Testament text collection. Yet of intrigue to me, some educated, thoughtful, esteemed people in my world open to reading and ascribing reasonable trust to other ancient historical material withhold that reasoned openness in considering the New Testament. Therefore, I have a couple of requests: First, do contemplate your own openness to this material--questioning with a view to getting to the truth of it is admirable, whereas a questioning obduracy reveals more about the reader’s credibility than that of the text’s. Secondly, I’m not an expert on analyzing historical documents. Still, I do wish to provide my reasoning for deeming the New Testament a credible, reliable collection.
Four different testimonies regarding Jesus Christ-- “the gospels”--and several letters from early disciples/apostles--most frequently St. Paul--to early Christian communities make up the New Testament “library.” While the letters and the content of the gospel accounts merit much discussion and clearly play a role in establishing credibility, I will try to focus this brief discussions to the textual credibility of the four gospels, each simply entitled with an authorial name: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
It’s certainly fair to question the early church’s inclusion of these four gospels (and the letters) to the exclusion of other purported accounts of Christ (and other early church materials). Also, some question the motivations of church authorities--once having gained enough political power--in simply selecting texts because those texts would support certain political agendas. First, the inclusion of these four gospels was a matter of their being recorded nearer the actual event: all four gospels were written prior to 100 AD, whereas other purported accounts of Christ’s life were written well after that, some up to 200-300 years. Early church leaders understood the necessity of proximity to occurrence and included these four and understandably excluded others--their distance from the event corrupted the account. Also, though the church did not develop corporate or established status until the fourth century, early Christian communities had been circulating these gospels and letters--undoubtedly, some other materials were lost--for a couple centuries prior to an organized formalizing of the canon. Therefore, when the powers-that-be selected New Testament content, much of their work was already done since local churches had already deemed the included texts credible.
And regarding the Church’s gradual and unfortunate organization of a political agenda, since when has the words of the Bible ever really stood in its way when the Church has tragically indulged darkness? History reveals that it was more efficient to simply ignore or malign the biblical text than take the time to manipulate (including/excluding) content in order to justify the injustices.
Even though the four gospels reflect the earliest dating in relationship to events, still some time had passed since Christ’s death in 33AD and the timing of the writing of the gospels some years later. However, it’s impressively noteworthy as Gregory Boyd and Paul Rhodes Eddy have stated the Gospels “together with the whole New Testament, have far better textual attestation than any other ancient work.” They go on to discuss the “roughly 5,500 ancient Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, either in fragments or in whole,” which is certainly far more copies than any other ancient historical work, for example only nine copies exist of Josephus’s Jewish War and only ten of Livy’s Roman history. Further, the dating of copies in relationship to actual events is even more impressive when we consider that “the earliest copy of Homer’s Iliad we possess dates approximately nine hundred years after the original--and that is remarkably good by ancient standards” (Lord or Legend? Wrestling with the Jesus Dilemma, 2007). Indeed, copies of the New Testament are dated remarkably far closer to the originals than that.
Still, it’s reasonable to question the expanse of time, albeit brief, between the documenting and the events. In response, two factors: first, some credible consideration has been given to likelihood that other written attestations existed prior to the writing of the four gospels we have, which may have provided source material to these authors. However, it's worthwhile to note that given the early dating of their initial accounts, these four were highly likely to be eye-witnesses of these events. Indeed, all four are mentioned in other New Testament materials as participants in the events. Secondly, while our modern world indulges in journalism-as-events-occur, the ancient world did record and pass on history orally, and as I’ve mentioned before, it seems chronocentric to suggest that as a result only the modern world has a handle on history: in fact, due to their “historical interest and the community’s checks and balances, some experts in the field of oral traditions have gone so far as to argue that, at times, history preserved in orally dominant communities may actually be more reliable than history written down by elite individual historians in modern contexts” (Boyd and Eddy). As the “author” delivered the content orally, the audience could challenge, refine, and hold the speaker accountable. With writing, the text is there to stay, for a time at least, due to its inherit lack of audience immediacy. Therefore, the combined close proximity of the author to the actual events, the potential use of another earlier written source, and the reliability of oral contributions altogether provide for the gospels’ credibility.
Be that as it may, a thoughtful read of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John does reveal discrepancies. Some is due to each account being structured to specific readers: while the ancient world valued historical veracity, flexibility in organization and inclusion/exclusion of some material were subject to audience targets. For example, Matthew is written for a Jewish audience; hence, the extensive inclusion of Old Testament referencing; Mark, the shortest of the Gospels may have had more of Roman audience in mind since Christ says the least in this account, while one action after another is described--more palatable to an action-oriented Roman crowd; Luke, the educated gentile, a doctor in fact, takes the most historical route even indicating he had done some research, and it’s not surprising his focus particularly on Jesus’ healings; lastly, John has that distinct Greek appeal, beginning his account with logos, and quotes Jesus the most, thereby appealing to those more interest in oral presentation and argument. So some discrepancy is due to differing authorial angles. Nevertheless, the essentials remain intact in all four. Lastly, some account disagreements exist simply because they are told through different eyes. Frankly, the fact that these disparities exist attest to the gospels’ overall credibility. We are all familiar with differing eyewitness angles on crimes and accidents. Four identical accounts suggests collaborative conspiracy to me. Four differing accounts with agreement on the essentials provides not only credible evidence but also the integrity of that fallible human stamp.
Although much more could be said and will be in future posts when dealing with New Testament content, of concluding consideration for now, it is also fair to ask if other ancient materials outside the New Testament confirm the events included. Certainly, scholars in this regard develop this miles more than my best efforts could; however, Boyd and Eddy, who are among those scholars, discuss at some length the following ancient writers in whose writing New Testament material appears: Pliny, Tacitus, Josephus, Lucian, Thallus, Suetonius, and Celsus. Those are certainly enough for a solid endorsement of New Testament credibility while keeping in mind that “the vast majority of all that was written in the ancient world has perished in the sands of time” (Boyd and Eddy). If not, perhaps the list would be even longer.
Of course, it is always good to thoughtfully question these texts. Still, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and the remainder of the New Testament as well as the Old have proven credible enough to me that those texts may now question my credibility as a human being: what do they have to say about my humanity? About humanity in general? About the meaning of life? About human motives, hopes, fears, goodness, evil? Love? Is there hope for healing? Redemption? Salvation? Restoration?
The Bible can certainly withstand questioning. It’s a complex, beautiful, human and divine text that has stood for centuries. Question it. But do not neglect reading it. Unless you wish to avoid its questions for you.
If you’re open, consider reading the Luke or John--my favorites.
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