Perhaps you are among the skeptics who question
whether the Jesus of the Bible ever lived. In a sense, that is wise, because
you want to be sure something is true before you believe it. Many thinking
skeptics have changed their minds when they examined the evidence. Let us
journey with these skeptics to see what caused them to change their thinking.
Is it possible that an informed, intelligent
person living in this scientific age can honestly believe in the Biblical
Jesus? Is the Jesus of the New Testament fact, or fiction?
It may come as a relief to some and as a
surprise to others, that there is compelling evidence that the New Testament
account of Jesus is historically trustworthy. You don’t have to sacrifice your
intelligence in order to believe in the New Testament Jesus.
In this article, we will consider some of the
reasons why the descriptions of Jesus in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are
historically accurate.
Evidence of Authorship
and Dates
Many skeptics do not believe that Matthew,
Mark, Luke, and John wrote the gospels that bear their names. They claim that
the gospels were written by unknown authors between A.D. 70 and 100, and that
the gospels contain numerous myths about Jesus.
However, there is strong evidence that the
Biblical portrayal of Jesus is true. The earliest church leaders, whose
writings have come down to us, consistently believed that Matthew, Mark, and
Luke wrote the gospels ascribed to them. Not one of the church leaders
attributed these gospels to anyone else.
Is it reasonable to believe that an anonymous
author, trying to gain respectability for his writings, would write under the
name of Matthew, a hated tax collector, or Mark, a turncoat who forsook Paul
and Barnabas on their first missionary journey, or Luke, a gentile? The authors
of the Gnostic gospels that appeared in the second and third centuries always
named their false gospels after highly respected people.
Internal Evidence in
Luke and Acts
Luke was a careful historian. He claimed he had
“investigated everything from the beginning” and had written down “an orderly
account” of the life and teachings of Christ (Luke 1:1-4). No doubt, he had
interviewed numerous eye-witnesses while doing his research. Luke’s gospel is
based on eye-witness testimony.
Archaeologists have verified the accuracy of
Luke’s historical references in the book of Acts. Luke is regarded as one of
the greatest historians in the first century.
Since scholars have demonstrated that Luke was
accurate in areas that can be tested in Acts, it is reasonable to believe that
he was accurate in areas that cannot be tested in his gospel. Luke was a
scientist, a medical doctor, and a trustworthy historian. There is good reason
to believe that he was telling us the truth about Jesus.
The “we” and “us” statements in Acts 16, 20,
21, 27, and 28 indicate that Luke (Paul’s physician and traveling companion)
was the author of the New Testament book of Acts. Luke devotes the last ten
chapters of this book to events leading up to Paul’s trial before Caesar. But
the book ends abruptly without a word about the outcome of the trial. The only
plausible explanation for this sudden, unfinished ending is that Luke completed
the book while Paul was still under house arrest in Rome, awaiting trial. If
that is true, the book of Acts must be dated prior to A.D. 62. Since Luke wrote
his gospel before he wrote Acts (Acts 1:1), the Gospel of Luke must be dated
even earlier, within thirty years of the death of Christ. That means there was
not enough time for myths to develop.
Evidence in the
Writings of Irenaeus
Irenaeus, a second century church leader in
Gaul (now France), wrote that “Matthew produced his gospel, writing among the
Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul proclaimed the gospel and
founded the church in Rome”. Peter and Paul were still preaching in Rome when
Matthew wrote his gospel.
Since Peter and Paul were martyred by Nero
between A.D. 64 and 68, the gospel of Matthew must have been written prior to
A.D. 68. In his gospel, Matthew recorded the things he had seen and heard as a
follower of Jesus. His gospel, therefore, consists of eyewitness testimony.
Irenaeus continued, “Mark, the disciple and
interpreter of Peter, also transmitted to us . . . what Peter had preached”
(Adv. Haer. 3.1.38-41). Mark shared with us what Peter had preached about
Jesus. Peter had reported what he had seen and heard while following Jesus. The
gospel of Mark, therefore, contains Peter’s eye-witness testimony about Jesus
Christ.
Evidence of Accuracy
in Oral Transmission
One reason skeptics reject the Jesus of the New
Testament is that the gospels are based on oral tradition. But oral tradition
was trustworthy in Jesus’ time–for several reasons:
1. Oral traditions were memorized and passed
down from generation to generation. Jewish rabbis memorized the Hebrew
scriptures. Jewish boys between the ages of five and thirteen studied only one
subject in synagogue school. They memorized scripture. Memorization was the
primary method of learning in the first century. It is still the primary method
of learning in many parts of the world today.
2. More than 80% of Jesus’ teachings were
poetic in nature and were easily memorized.
3. In the first century, it was not necessary
to quote a person verbatim as long as the content of the message was accurate.
In fact, quotation marks did not exist in the Greco-Roman world.
Skeptics point to the “contradictions” between
the gospels as proof that they are not historically reliable. However, these
variations do not discredit the gospels. In fact, historians point to the
variations within the gospels as evidence of their authenticity. Absolute
conformity would indicate collusion.
1. The apostles provided stabilizing leadership
in the church between A.D. 30 and 60, the period during which most of the New
Testament was written. Since the apostles were eye-witnesses of the life and
teachings of Jesus, they would have corrected any erroneous myths that
developed. Moreover, the apostles were led by the Holy Spirit (Matthew 10:20;
Luke 12:12; John 14:26; 16:13,15; Acts 4:8).
2. Some of Jesus’ teachings in the gospels are
very difficult to understand and follow. Many of the ethical teachings in the
Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) are so difficult that the church has not been
able to live up to them. They are not teachings that the church would have
invented. They come from a higher source.
Evidence from the
Gospel of John
Skeptics believe that the Gospel of John was
written by an anonymous author near the turn of the second century. They point
to John’s exalted view of Christ as evidence that myths had developed by the
time the fourth gospel was written.
It is true that John portrayed Jesus as the
incarnation of the divine Word (John 1:1-14). It is also true that John, alone,
recorded the seven “I Am” sayings of Jesus. Jesus said to the Jews, “Before
Abraham was born, I am” (John 8:58), thus assuming God’s name and declaring his
own divine nature (Exodus 3:14). When Jesus appeared to Thomas following his
resurrection, Thomas exclaimed, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28).
Are such statements myths that developed late
in the first century? In the next article, we will examine evidence that John’s
high view of Jesus represented the views of the earliest Christians.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke also portray Jesus as a
divine being. Jesus calls himself “the Son of Man”, identifying with the man in
Daniel 7:13-14 who comes to God, receives authority, glory, and power, and is
worshiped by people of every nation and language.
The Jesus of the first three gospels forgives
sins (Mark 2:5), accepts worship (Matthew 14:33), and refers to himself as
bridegroom, the Lord of harvest, the rock, the shepherd, and other analogies
used in the Old Testament with reference to God.
It is interesting to note that the Gospel of
John supplies more historical and geographical references than Matthew, Mark,
and Luke do. It is from the Gospel of John that we learn about the three-year
ministry of Jesus and about the Jewish feasts that he attended.
More evidence from the
Gospel of John
Irenaeus (early second century) acknowledged
John as the author of the fourth gospel. No church leader after Irenaeus
questioned John’s authorship.
The writer of the fourth gospel was a Jew who
quoted from the Hebrew text (John 12:40; 13:18; 19:37), and who was acquainted with
the Jewish feasts (John 2:12; 13; 23; 5:1; 7:2; 10:22; 11:55).
The author of the fourth gospel claimed to have
“beheld” (Greek etheasametha) the
glory of the One and Only (John 1:14). This verb always implies a physical
examination. In other words, the author was an eye-witness of Jesus’ glory.
(See also John 19:35; 21:24-25.)
The author uses present tense verbs 161 times.
In John 5:2, he says, “there IS (Greek esti)
in Jerusalem, near the Sheep Gate, a pool, which in Aramaic IS called Bethesda
and which IS surrounded by five colonnades”. The use of the present tense verb
“is” suggests that the Gospel of John was written prior to the destruction of
Jerusalem in A.D. 70 at which time the Pool of Bethesda vanished from history.
For centuries, skeptics denied the existence of
such a pool and claimed that the author of the fourth gospel had fabricated the
story. But in recent years, archaeologists have excavated the Pool of Bethesda
in northeastern Jerusalem. The water level is forty feet below the ground, and
the pool is surrounded by five columned walkways just as John reported. This
discovery supports the author’s claim that he was an eyewitness of the things
he described (John 21:24).
Evidence from Josephus
Flavius Josephus, a Jewish aristocrat, was the
earliest non-Christian writer to mention Jesus Christ. In his Jewish
Antiquities, Book 20, Chapter 9, Josephus wrote that the Sanhedrin judges
“brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called the Christ, whose
name was James”.
In his Jewish Antiquities 18:63-64, Josephus
wrote that “Jesus, a wise man . . . was a doer of wonders”. “He drew many after
him, and Pilate, at the request of the chief Jewish men, condemned him to the
cross”.
Evidence from the
Jewish Talmud
The Babylonian Talmud was written and edited
over a period of several centuries. The section referring to Jesus was written
between A.D. 70 and 200. A passage from Sanhedrin 43a reads, “On the eve of
Passover, they hanged Yeshu [one version says, Yeshu of Nazareth]. . . . He was
going to be stoned, because he practiced sorcery and enticed and led Israel
astray. . . . But not having found anything in his favor, they hanged him on
the eve of Passover”.
This testimony from hostile Jewish leaders
verifies that Jesus was hanged (a Jewish expression for crucified) on the eve
of the Passover. They verify that Jesus had performed miracles, which they
classified as sorcery. Jewish leaders had plotted to stone Jesus to death, but
instead, they had Him crucified. The main points in this passage are in total
agreement with the gospels.
Evidence from Pliny
the Younger
Pliny the Younger was the Roman governor of
Bithynia (now Northwest Turkey) in the early second century. Pliny wrote a
letter to Emperor Trajan asking for advice about punishing Christians who “were
accustomed to meet on a fixed day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to
Christ as to a god”. This letter is dated about A.D. 112.
Pliny’s letter to Trajan verifies that Jesus
was worshiped as a divine being in the early second century.
Evidence from
Cornelius Tacitus
Tacitus was the most important Roman historian
in the second century. About A.D.115, Tacitus wrote in his Annals 15:44 that
“Christus [Christ], from whom the name [Christians] had its origin, suffered
the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberias at the hands of one of our
procurators, Pontius Pilate”. Similar statements about Jesus Christ are found
in the writings of Lucian of Samosata, Mara Bar-Serapion, Suetonius, and
Thallus.
Conclusion
Any person who examines the evidence with an
open, unbiased mind will conclude that Jesus was a historical figure in the
first century who died on a Roman cross during the reign of Tiberias Caesar
while Pontius Pilate was the governor of Judea.
The gospel accounts of Jesus are based on the
eye-witness testimony of good and honest men who were willing to die for their
faith. The Jesus of the Bible New Testament is fact, not fiction.
