Basic
Worldview:
104
Why Christianity?
History
of Judaism Continued
Judaism
and Christianity Introduction and History
History
of Judaism Continued
Scholarly
Objections and Historicity of Daniel (P. 1)
Historicity
of Daniel (P. 2) & Judeo-Christian Syncretism
A
Few Words on Gnosticism
Christianity
- A Sect of Judaism (P. 1)
Christianity
- A Sect of Judaism (P. 2) & Prophecy in Judaism
Is
Jesus the Jewish Messiah? (P. 1)
Is
Jesus the Jewish Messiah? (P. 2)
List
of Messianic Qualifications & the Resurrection of Jesus
(P. 1)
The
Resurrection of Jesus (Part 2)
Study
Conclusions and Overall Comparisons
Additional
Material
The
Sufferings of Eyewitnesses
Comparison
of Mystical Religions to Judeo-Christianity
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 1)
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 2)
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 3)
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 4)
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 5)
Rabbinical
Judaism Accepts Christian Interpretations (P. 6)
Introduction | Section 1
| Section 2 | Section
3
(Continued from previous section.)
The final blow came in 586 B.C. when Nebuchadnezzar (II),
King of Babylon, conquered the southern kingdom of Judah destroys
the Temple and exiles its people and its nobles to Babylon.
"Judaism - ...the period of the Babylonian Exile and restoration
of the Jews to Judah (6th-5th centuries BCE)...the first fall
of Jerusalem (586 BCE)...Ezra the Scribe and his school (5th
century BCE)." - Britannica.com
"Judaism - After Nebuchadrezzar's decisive defeat of Egypt
at Carchemish (605 BCE), Jeremiah identified the scourge
as Babylon. King Jehoiakim's attempt to be free of Babylonia
ended with the exile of his successor, Jehoiachin, along
with Judah's elite (597); yet the court of the new king,
Zedekiah, persisted in plotting new revolts, relyingÑagainst
all experienceÑon Egyptian support." - Britannica.com
"Judaism - In 587/586 BCE the doom prophecies of Jeremiah
and Ezekiel came true. Rebellious Jerusalem was reduced
by Nebuchadrezzar, the Temple was burnt, and much of Judah's
population dispersed or deported to Babylonia." - Britannica.com
"Diaspora - The first significant Jewish Diaspora was the
result of the Babylonian Exile (q.v.) of 586 BC. After the
Babylonians conquered the Kingdom of Judah, part of the Jewish
population was deported into slavery." - Britannica.com
"Jerusalem - Jerusalem became the spiritual and political
capital of the Hebrews. In 586 B.C. it fell to the Babylonians,
and the Temple was destroyed." - The Columbia Encyclopedia,
Sixth Edition. 2001.
(Somewhere around or just after the Babylonian exile the minor
prophet Obadiah lives and writes.)
Near the end of the 6th century B.C., after the fall of the
Babylonian empire in 538 B.C., Cyrus the Great of Persia allows
the exiled Jews to return to Jerusalem and begin to rebuild
their temple. This work continues and is completed through
the leadership of Ezra the priest, the governors Nehemiah
and Zerubbabel, Joshua the high priest, and the prophets Haggai,
Zechariah, and Malachi.
"Biblical Literature - In any event, it was from this
community that the leadership and the cadres for the resurrection
of the Judahite nation and faith were to come when Cyrus
the Great (labelled "the Lord's anointed" in Deutero-Isaiah)
conquered Babylon and made it possible for them to return
(538). A contingent of about 50,000 persons, including
about 4,000 priests and 7,000 slaves, returned under Sheshbazzar,
a prince of Judah." - Britannica.com
"Biblical Literature - The first great aim was the
rebuilding of the Temple as the centre of worship and thus
also of national existence; this was completed in 515 under
the administration of Zerubbabel and became the place of uninterrupted
sacrificial worship for the next 350 years. The next task
was to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, which was undertaken
by Nehemiah, a Babylonian Jew and court butler who was appointed
governor of Judah and arrived in 444." - Britannica.com
"Babylonian Captivity - also called Babylonian Captivity,
the forced detention of Jews in Babylonia following
the latter's conquest of the kingdom of Judah in 598/7
and 587/6 BC. The exile formally ended in 538 BC, when the
Persian conqueror of Babylonia, Cyrus the Great, gave the
Jews permission to return to Palestine." - Britannica.com
"Judaism - After conquering Babylon, Cyrus so
far justified the hopes put in him that he allowed those
Jews who wished to do so to return and rebuild their Temple...The
labour was resumed and completed in 516;" - Britannica.com
"Zerubbabel - flourished 6th century BC also spelled
Zorobabel governor of Judaea under whom the rebuilding
of the Jewish Temple at Jerusalem took place." - Britannica.com
"Judaism - Nonetheless, intermarriage occurred and
precipitated a new crisis when, in 458, the priest Ezra
arrived from Babylon, intent on enforcing the regimen
of the Torah." - Britannica.com
"Ezra - flourished 4th century BC, Babylon and Jerusalem
Hebrew 'ezra' religious leader of the Jews who returned from
exile in Babylon, reformer who reconstituted the Jewish community
on the basis of the Torah (Law, or the regulations of the
first five books of the Old Testament)." - Britannica.com
"Jerusalem - The city was restored to Hebrew rule later
in the 6th cent. B.C. by Cyrus the Great, king of Persia.
The Temple was rebuilt (538-515 B.C.; known as the Second
Temple) by Zerubbabel, a governor of Jerusalem under the Persians.
In the mid-5th cent. B.C., Ezra reinvigorated the Jewish
community in Jerusalem. The city was the capital of the
Maccabees in the 2d and 1st cent. B.C." - The Columbia Encyclopedia,
Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Ezra - It is said that Ezra came to Jerusalem in the
seventh year of King Artaxerxes (which Artaxerxes is not stated)
of the Persian dynasty then ruling the area. Since he is introduced
before Nehemiah, who was governor of the province of Judah
from 445 to 433 BC and again, after an interval, for a
second term of unknown length, it is sometimes supposed that
this was the seventh year of Artaxerxes I (458 BC), though
serious difficulties are attached to such a view. Many scholars
now believe that the biblical account is not chronological
and that Ezra arrived in the seventh year of Artaxerxes II
(397 BC), after Nehemiah had passed from the scene." - Britannica.com
"Nehemiah - flourished 5th century BC also spelled
Nehemias Jewish leader who supervised the rebuilding of
Jerusalem in the mid-5th century BC after his release from
captivity by the Persian king Artaxerxes I." - Britannica.com
"Nehemiah - Nehemiah was the cupbearer to King Artaxerxes
I at a time when Judah in Palestine had been partly repopulated
by Jews released from their exile in Babylonia. The Temple
at Jerusalem had been rebuilt, but the Jewish community there
was dispirited and defenseless against its non-Jewish neighbours."
- Britannica.com
"Nehemiah - originally combined with Ezra to form a
single book in the Hebrew canon. In the Septuagint, Ezra and
Nehemiah are combined as Second Esdras. The book narrates
the return to Jerusalem of Nehemiah, the cup-bearer of Persian
King Artaxerxes I, as governor of the city-state. In the first
period of Nehemiah's governorship (445-433 B.C.) as
related in the book, Jerusalem's walls were rebuilt. There
follows an account of the census taking during the earlier
era of Zerubbabel in c.520 B.C. The work continues with the
return of Ezra in 458 B.C.; the reading of the Jewish
law; the national confession of sin; a return to Nehemiah's
first governorship; and a brief account of his second term,
which began sometime after 433 B.C." - The Columbia Encyclopedia,
Sixth Edition. 2001.
Although the history of the nation of Israel continues, the
scriptural record of Judaism describing that history pretty
much ends with the events concerning the rebuilding of Jerusalem
and the second Temple in the 5th century B.C. The Jewish canon
of scripture is then dated between the time of Moses during
the 13th century B.C. and the time of rebuilding of the Temple
and Jerusalem in the 5th century B.C. with Ezra, Nehemiah,
Zerubbabel, and the prophets Haggai, Malachi, and Zechariah
(roughly ending in the decades after 444 B.C.)
There is one notable scholarly challenge to this rule, the
Book of Daniel the prophet, which we will cover momentarily.
For now we will exclude a discussion of the Book of Daniel
and deal simply with the rest of the Jewish scripture in terms
of their historicity.
The figures and events pertaining to Jewish history described
in the Jewish scripture occur between the mid 2nd millennium
B.C. with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel). But the written
record doesn't begin with Moses until the 13th century B.C.
continuing until the last of the prophets and the books of
Ezra and Nehemiah in the middle to late 5th century. So, in
order to determine whether or not these persons and events
can be considered historic and these books attributed to the
authors who are credited with them, we need only apply our
requirements for historicity to the historical documentation
for these works.
If the historical documentation for the Jewish scriptures
meets these requirements then the figures and events described
therein must be considered to have actually lived and occurred
in history. Likewise, we will have to accept that the proclaimed
authors of these books actually did write the works for which
they are credited just as is the case for the works of Plato,
Xenophon, Plutarch, Sophocles, etc.
Based on our three requirements for historicity the chief
questions then are how many copies of the books of the Jewish
scripture do we have and when do these copies date from. Here
again, for reference are the standards for establishing historicity:
1. That at least two copies of supposed original manuscripts
must survive into modern times.
2. Surviving copies of the original manuscripts must be written
within 1400 years or so after the figures and events they
describe.
3. The supposed original documents can be written by people
who were first, second, or third-hand witnesses to the events,
or who were more than two generations or even five hundred
years removed from the actual persons or events that they
are describing.
Here is the historical documentation for the books of Jewish
scripture.
The first five books of the Jewish scripture (called the Pentateuch)
were written by Moses. (In fact, the claim that these books
were originally written by Moses and passed on to his successors
comes from the books themselves - Exodus 17:14, Exodus 24:3-4,
7, Deuteronomy 17:18, Deuteronomy 28:58, 61, Deuteronomy 30:10,
Deuteronomy 31:24, 26.) These books are estimated by scholars
to have been originally written in the 16th to 13th century
B.C.
"Torah - 1: the five books of Moses constituting the Pentateuch
2: the body of wisdom and law contained in Jewish Scripture
and other sacred literature and oral tradition 3:
a leather or parchment scroll of the Pentateuch used in a
synagogue for liturgical purposes." - Merriam-Webster's Online
Dictionary
"Ten Commandments - Dating the Ten Commandments involves
an interpretation of their purpose. Some scholars propose
a date between the 16th and 13th centuries BC because Exodus
and Deuteronomy connect the Ten Commandments with Moses and
the Sinai Covenant between Yahweh and Israel." - Britannica.com
The first collection of Mosaic scriptures is said to come
between the 13th and 11th centuries A.D.
"Old Testament - In the 10th cent. B.C. the first of a
series of editors collected materials from earlier traditional
folkloric and historical records (i.e., both oral and
written sources) to compose a narrative of the history of
the Hebrews who now found themselves united under David and
Solomon. Stemming from differing traditions originating among
those living in what was later the northern kingdom of Israel
and those in the southern kingdom of Judah, we can trace two
dominant compilations, known as the E (preferring the epithet
"Elohim" for God) and the J (preferring the epithet "Yahweh"),
respectively. These were combined by a Judaean some time after
the fall of the northern kingdom and are to be found inextricably
associated in Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, Joshua, Judges, First
and Second Samuel, and First and Second Kings. According
to scholars, this combined JE narrative is the bulk of the
earlier Old Testament." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth
Edition. 2001.
But, as we said the essential question is when were the earliest
copies of the Jewish scriptures that we have today written?
The Jewish scripture is preserved in two main traditions,
the Greek translation called the Septuagint, and the Hebrew
translation, called the Masoretic Text.
The earliest copies of the Masoretic Text that we have today
were written in the 10th century A.D., which does not meet
the requirement for historicity since this would be 1400 years
after the latest events described in it and perhaps 2900 years
after the earliest ones.
"Old Testament - The Old Testament was written in Hebrew,
with a small portion in Aramaic (parts of the books of Daniel,
Ezra, and Jeremiah). The text of the Hebrew Bible (called
the Masoretic text, see Masora) had been standardized
by the 10th cent. A.D., but the only existing Hebrew texts
of biblical books before this time have been found at Qumran
(see Dead Sea Scrolls). The origin of the Masoretic version
is unknown." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Masoretic text - traditional Hebrew text of the Jewish
Bible, meticulously assembled and codified, and supplied
with diacritical marks to enable correct pronunciation. This
monumental work was begun around the 6th century AD and completed
in the 10th by scholars at Talmudic academies in Babylonia
and Palestine, in an effort to reproduce, as far as possible,
the original text of the Hebrew Old Testament." - Britannica.com
However, the Septuagint is dated to the 3rd century B.C. and
it was this Greek version of the Old Testament that was used
and adopted by the early Greek speaking Christian Church during
the first century A.D. This means that the Jewish scriptures
are well within the requirements for historicity with the
gap between the events described and the written record being
largely between 1000 and 200 years.
"Old Testament - The original Old Testament canon was the
Septuagint, long used in the Greek-speaking church and
still retained by the Orthodox churches. This Hellenistic
Jewish translation originated with the translation of the
Pentateuch in the mid-3d cent. B.C. Later translations
were made from it or patterned after it. The canon of the
Septuagint included the books of the later Hebrew canon,
with the addition of several others, most of which were those
now reckoned deuterocanonical by Roman Catholics and apocryphal
by Protestants." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition.
2001.
"Septuagint - oldest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew
Bible made by Hellenistic Jews, possibly from Alexandria,
c.250 B.C." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition.
2001.
"Septuagint -: a Greek version of the Jewish Scriptures
redacted in the 3d and 2d centuries B.C. by Jewish scholars
and adopted by Greek-speaking Christians." - The Columbia
Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Biblical Literature - The Septuagint Pentateuch, which
is all that is discussed, does, however, constitute an independent
corpus within the Greek Bible, and it was probably first
translated as a unit by a company of scholars in Alexandria
about the middle of the 3rd century BCE." - Britannica.com
"Biblical Literature - A Greek translation of the Old
Testament, known as the Septuagint because there allegedly
were 70 or 72 translators, six from each of the 12 tribes
of Israel, and designated LXX, is a composite of the work
of many translators labouring for well over 100 years...The
Pentateuch of the Septuagint manifests a basic coincidence
with the Masoretic text. The Qumran scrolls have now proven
that the Septuagint book of Samuel-Kings goes back to an old
Palestinian text tradition that must be earlier than the
4th century BCE, and from the same source comes a short
Hebrew recension of Jeremiah that probably underlies the Greek."
- Britannica.com
Of course the most important historical documentation for
the Jewish scripture (also contained in the Christian Old
Testament) comes from the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
"Dead Sea Scrolls - ancient leather and papyrus scrolls
first discovered in 1947 in caves on the NW shore of the Dead
Sea. Most of the documents were written or copied between
the 1st cent. B.C. and the first half of the 1st cent. A.D."
- The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Dead Sea Scrolls - Three types of documents have been
found in the caves near Qumran: copies of books of the
Hebrew Bible, e.g., Isaiah, of which two almost complete scrolls
have been found." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition.
2001.
"Dead Sea Scrolls - Other texts, not related to the
Qumran scrolls, have been found in the area around the Dead
Sea. At Masada other scrolls were found, including manuscripts
of Sirach and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. In the caves
at Wadi Murabbaat, c.11 mi (18 km) S of Qumran, many documents
were found concerning Bar Kokba's army, as well as more biblical
manuscripts. Other documents from the Bar Kokba era were discovered
in caves S of En Gedi. These findings, written in Greek, Aramaic,
and Nabataean, included biblical fragments, psalms, various
legal documents, and a lost Greek translation of the minor
prophets. The oldest documents, found at a site 8 mi (13
km) N of Jericho, were left by Samarians massacred by Alexander
the Great in 331 B.C." - The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth
Edition. 2001.
The series of quotes below sufficiently establishes the significance
of the Dead Sea scrolls, but more importantly, the historicity
of the Jewish scripture.
"Biblical Literature - Until the discovery of the Judaean
Desert scrolls, the only pre-medieval fragment of the Hebrew
Bible known to scholars was the Nash Papyrus (c. 150 BCE)
from Egypt containing the Decalogue and Deuteronomy. Now,
however, fragments of about 180 different manuscripts of biblical
books are available. Their dates vary between the 3rd
century BCE and the 2nd century CE, and all but 10 stem
from the caves of Qumran. All are written on either leather
or papyrus in columns and on one side only." - Britannica.com
"Biblical Literature - The most important manuscripts
from what is now identified as Cave 1 of Qumran are a practically
complete Isaiah scroll (1QIsaa), dated c. 100-75 BCE,
and another very fragmentary manuscript (1QIsab) of the same
book. The first contains many variants from the Masoretic
text in both orthography and text; the second is very close
to the Masoretic type and contains few genuine variants. The
richest hoard comes from Cave 4 and includes fragments of
five copies of Genesis, eight of Exodus, one of Leviticus,
14 of Deuteronomy, two of Joshua, three of Samuel, 12 of Isaiah,
four of Jeremiah, eight of the Minor Prophets, one of Proverbs,
and three of Daniel. Cave 11 yielded a Psalter containing
the last third of the book in a form different from that of
the Masoretic text, as well as a manuscript of Leviticus."
- Britannica.com
"Biblical Literature - The importance of the Qumran
scrolls cannot be exaggerated. Their great antiquity brings
them close to the Old Testament period itselfÑfrom as early
as 250-200 BCE. For the first time, Hebrew variant texts
are extant and all known major text types are present. Some
are close to the Septuagint, others to the Samaritan. On the
other hand, many of the scrolls are practically identical
with the Masoretic text, which thus takes this recension back
in history to pre-Christian times. Several texts in the
paleo-Hebrew script show that this script continued to be
used side by side with the Aramaic script for a long time."
- Britannica.com
With the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls we now have copies
of the Hebrew scriptures that come from the 3rd century B.C.
dating them between 200-1000 years after the people and events
they describe. This well within our time requirements for
historicity.
So, unless we want to discard that Plato wrote Republic or
Alexander the Great ever lived along with a great deal of
other historical information on ancient persons and events
we must accept the historicity of the Jewish scriptures. This
means that the figures described in the books of the Jewish
Bible lived when they are said to have lived, did what they
are said to have done, taught what they are said to have taught,
and wrote what they are said to have wrote.
This last conclusion is very important. Unless we want to
forfeit the idea the Plato wrote Republic and that the ideas
contained therein originated with him we must accept that
Moses wrote the Pentateuch. Unless we want to throw out Homer's
Illiad or Aristotle's Peotics as works from these authors
we have to accept that Isaiah wrote the Book of Isaiah and
that Ezekiel wrote the book attributed to him. Unless we want
to throw into question Xenophon's Anabasis, Herodotus' History,
Thucydides' History, Lucretius' On the Nature of the Universe,
Polybius' History, Tacitus' History (or Annals), Seutonius'
Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Pliny the Elder's Letters, Plutarch's
Parallel Lives of the Famous Greeks and Romans, Flavius Josephus'
Jewish War and Jewish Antiquities, and Sophocles' or Euripedes'various
plays, all of which contain valuable historical information,
we must also accept that the writers of the books of the Jewish
Bible did, in fact, write the books that are attributed to
them. Anything else would be a glaring contradiction and an
unjustified double standard.
So, we must conclude that the Jewish scriptures and the figures
and events that they describe are historical. But what about
the Christian scriptures and the figures and events they describe?
Can or should they be considered historical?
New Testament Historicity
In order to determine whether or not the figures and events
described in the New Testament are historical we can simply
compare the standards for historicity that are employed to
determine the historicity of other ancient figures and events.
We can use the standards for historicity that we compiled
from the list of non-controversial figures and events that
we looked at earlier in the same way that we have previously
done with Judaism.
Here again, for reference, are those requirements for considering
a person or event to be historical:
1. At least two copies of supposed original manuscripts describing
that person or event must survive into modern times.
2. Surviving copies of the original manuscripts must be written
within 1400 years or so after the figures and events they
describe.
3. The supposed original documents can be written by people
who were first, second, or third-hand witnesses to the events,
or who were more than two generations or even five hundred
years removed from the actual persons or events that they
are describing.
When we compare these standards to the available historical
documentation for the New Testament we can see that there
is more than enough evidence for us to conclude the figures
and events that it describes actually did live as well as
teach the things that are attributed to them. Below are some
quotations from common reference books, which establish the
historical documentation and dating of the Christian scriptures.
Afterwards, more specific information is provided in order
to give more supportive detail than is offered in the brief
quotations from the online resources.
"New Testament - the distinctively Christian portion
of the Bible, consisting of 27 books of varying lengths dating
from the earliest Christian period. The seven epistles
whose authorship by St. Paul is undisputed were written
c.A.D. 50-A.D. 60; most of the remaining books were written
in the era A.D. 70-100, often incorporating earlier traditions.
All were written in the koin idiom of the Greek language."
- The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Biblical source - The main sources of evidence are:
manuscripts of the New Testament in Greek dating from the
2nd to the 15th century AD (some 5,000 are known);
early versions in other languages, such as Syriac, Coptic,
Latin, Armenian, and Georgian; and quotations from the New
Testament by early Christian writers." - Britannica.com
"Biblical literature - The New Testament consists of
27 books, which are the residue, or precipitate, out of
many 1st-2nd-century-AD writings that Christian groups
considered sacred." - Britannica.com
The New Testament begins with four Gospels, which record Jesus'
life, teachings, death, and resurrection, we have two first-hand
witnesses (Matthew and John) and two second-hand witnesses
(Mark and Luke) all of which were written within 50-70 years
after Jesus' death in approximately 30-33 A.D. (Mark 50-70
A.D, Matthew and Luke 60-80 A.D., and John 90-100 A.D).
The earliest manuscript copies of these works is of John's
Gospel in 130 A.D. Matthew, Mark, and Luke have copies from
around 200 A.D., less than 150 years after the original was
penned. Paul's letters, written in 50-65 A.D. also have copies
from 200 A.D.
But besides the Gospels we must cover the existing manuscript
evidence for the New Testament. The Christian New Testament
is based upon over 5,000 Greek manuscripts and fragments of
manuscripts, which we still have today and which contain all
or portions of the New Testament. As we said earlier the oldest
of these manuscripts (a fragment of John's Gospel) dates from
130 A.D., just 25-35 years after John originally wrote his
Gospel account and the Book of Revelation.
There are two parchment copies of the entire New Testament
(Codex Vaticanus and Codex Siniaticus) that date from 325-450
A.D., just 300 years after Jesus lived. We have papyrus copies
of portions of the New Testament that date from 180-225 A.D.,
just 150 years after Jesus lived. From these papyrus documents
we can construct all of Luke, John, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians,
Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians,
Hebrews, portions of Matthew, Mark, Acts, and Revelation (leaving
out only James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2, and 3 John and Philemon.)
There is a fragment of papyrus containing John 18:31-33 and
37, which dates from 130 A.D.
In addition to the Greek manuscripts, there are more than
1,000 copies and fragments of the New Testament in Syrian,
Coptic, Armenian, Gothic, and Ethiopic. And there are 8,000
copies of the Latin Vulgate, which date back to 384-400 A.D.,
just 350 years after Jesus lived.
Last, but not least, we have thousands of quotations from
the early Church writers, who lived and wrote during the first,
second, and third centuries, from which it is possible to
reconstruct the entire New Testament with the exception of
fifteen to twenty verses or so.
Here are the New Testament qualifications for historicity
compared to the list of requirements for historicity that
we established earlier:
1. At least two copies of supposed original manuscripts describing
that person or event must survive into modern times. Over
5,000 copies of original manuscripts describing Jesus, his
words and deeds, and those of his early followers survive
into modern times.
2. Surviving copies of the original manuscripts must be written
within 1400 years or so after the figures and events they
describe. The various copies of original New Testament
manuscripts were written between 100 and 170 years after the
persons and events they describe. The original documents upon
which these copies are based were written between 50-100 A.D.,
only 20-70 years after the persons and events that they describe.
3. The supposed original documents can be written by people
who were first, second, or third-hand witnesses to the events,
or who were more than two generations or even five hundred
years removed from the actual persons or events that they
are describing. The New Testament documentation includes
original writings by eye witnesses who had first-hand accounts
as well as second hand witnesses who originally penned these
works during, just after, or within a generation or two (70
years) at the most of the persons and events that they describe.
Additionally, there are many first and second century documents
from second hand witnesses, which contain portions of the
New Testament from which it is possible to construct almost
the entire New Testament. These were written within 30-250
years of the persons and events that they describe. The copies
that we have of these original works were made by third or
fourth generation persons who wrote within 100 to 200 years
of the persons and events described.
By comparing the available historical documentation for the
New Testament with our qualifications for historicity of other
ancient figures, events, and writings, we can clearly see
that the historical documentation of the life, teaching, and
works of Jesus far exceeds that of any other ancient figure.
So much so that to deny the historicity of Jesus' life and
teachings or the authorship of his biographies by Matthew,
Mark, Luke, and John, or the authorship of the rest of the
New Testament books, would force us to abandon all of the
ancient historical record to complete obscurity.
In other words, if the historical documentation for the New
Testament is not enough to establish that Jesus did exist,
teach, and do what is attributed to him and that the Gospels
were written by their namesakes, then how can we conclude
than any of ancient history actually occurred? To dispute
that Jesus lived is to dispute the existence of Alexander
the Great or Socrates or Plato. To doubt that John the Apostle
wrote the Gospel of John or the Book or Revelation is to doubt
that Julius Caesar wrote Gallic Wars, or that Plato wrote
Republic, or Aristotle, Poetics, etc. If the historical documentation
for these persons and events is sufficient to establish their
historicity then we must also accept that Jesus was an actual
man who lived, taught, and did what is recorded about him
in the New Testament.
But it must also be noted that the level of historical documentation
so far exceeds the standards that are employed for determining
the historicity of ancient figures and events that it really
sets the standard. Consider the superiority of the standard
for historicity that can be set based upon the historical
documentation for New Testament persons and events as compared
to that of other historical figures.
The standard requirements for historicity are:
1. That at least two copies of supposed original manuscripts
must survive into modern times.
2. Surviving copies of the original manuscripts must be written
within 1400 years or so after the figures and events they
describe.
3. The supposed original documents can be written by people
who were first, second, or third-hand witnesses to the events,
or who were more than two generations or even five hundred
years removed from the actual persons or events that they
are describing.
The Christian qualifications for historicity are:
1. Over 5,000 copies of original manuscripts survive into
modern times.
2. Surviving copies of the original manuscripts are written
within 50-170 years or so after the figures and events they
describe.
3. The supposed original documents are written solely by persons
with first or second-hand knowledge of persons and events
they describe and who all lived within a single generation
of those persons or events.
The difference in these two standards of historical documentation
is staggering. As opposed to the measly 2 copies, the New
Testament has over 5,000 copies. The closest historical document
to the New Testament is Homer's Illiad with 643 copies. But
in terms of the dates for these copies the New Testament copies
were all written within 50-170 years of the persons and events
they describe as opposed to the astounding 1400 years allowed
by modern scholars. Additionally, the New Testament is entirely
composed of first and second hand accounts, while other historical
documents are accepted when the author has absolutely no connection
to the subject and may be separated by 500 years or more from
the figures and events they describe.
Indeed, while we cannot reject the historicity of New Testament
figures and events without also discarding all of ancient
history, if we were to develop requirements for historicity
based upon the New Testament documentation we could dismiss
basically any ancient person or event that is not described
in the Bible.
Obviously, there is no need to do this. We are just making
a point. If a reasonable standard is fairly applied we must
accept the historicity of New Testament figures and events
and we must accept that the authors of the New Testament did
actually write the texts that are attributed to them.
Additionally, we should also point out that no alternative
record of Jesus' life is available. Though several Gnostic
gospels profess an alternate understanding of Jesus' teaching
than that recorded in the New Testament several significant
differences must be acknowledged.
First, the New Testament, especially the Gospels (Matthew,
Mark, Luke, and John) contain a large amount of narration
regarding the events of Jesus' life. Gnostic documents are
devoid of such historical information and instead only provide
Gnostic teaching. This being the case, the historical Jesus
cannot be found in the Gnostic writings, but can only be found
in the Christian New Testament.
One of the chief Gnostic works, the Gospel of Thomas, exemplifies
this point.
"Thomas, Gospel of - a collection of sayings, composed
originally in Greek, attributed to the "living" (i.e., resurrected)
Jesus. Some of the sayings were previously known from papyri
discovered at Oxyrhynchus and published in the late 19th cent.
The sayings are similar to those of Jesus in the canonical
Gospels. It is possible that the Gospel of Thomas is as early
as the New Testament Gospels; more likely, the work is
based on the sayings of Jesus preserved in the Gospels and
edited from a gnostic point of view. The Gospel of Thomas
is more encratite (antimarriage) and ascetic in tone than
most gnostic works. See also Nag Hammadi" - The Columbia
Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
The quotes below demonstrate two facts. First, as we have
said, the Gnostic texts were not concerned with and do not
present historical details of Jesus life. Second, the Gnostic
texts date to a period AFTER the writing of the New Testament.
"Nag Hammadi - a town in Egypt near the ancient town
of Chenoboskion, where, in 1945, a large cache of gnostic
texts in the Coptic language was discovered. The Nag Hammadi
manuscripts, dating from the 4th cent. A.D., include 12
codices of tractates, one loose tractate, and a copy of Plato's
RepublicÑmaking 53 works in all. Originally composed in Greek,
they were translated (2d-3d cent. A.D.) into Coptic.
Most of the texts have a strong Christian element. The presence
of non-Christian elements, however, gave rise to the speculation
that gnosticism, which taught salvation by knowledge, was
not originally a Christian movement. Until the texts'
discovery, knowledge of Christian gnosticism was confined
to reports and quotations of their orthodox opponents, such
as Irenaeus and Tertullian. Among the codices are apocalypses,
gospels, a collection of sayings of the resurrected Jesus
to his disciples, homilies, prayers, and theological treatises."
- The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
"Patristic Literarture - Almost the entire vast literature
of Gnosticism has perished, and until recently the only original
documents available to scholars (apart from extracts such
as those already mentioned, which were preserved by orthodox
critics) were a handful of treatises in Coptic contained in
three codices (manuscript books) that were discovered in the
18th and late 19th centuries. The most interesting of these
are Pistis Sophia and the Apocryphon of John, the former
consisting of conversations of the risen Jesus with his disciples
about the fall and redemption of the aeon (emanation from
the Godhead) called Pistis Sophia, the latter of revelations
made by Jesus to St. John explaining the presence of evil
in the cosmos and showing how mankind can be rescued from
it." - Britannica.com
So, we can see that the search for the historic person of
Jesus starts and stops with the New Testament since they pre-date
all other literature about him and since competing writings
about Jesus do not present an alternative version of Jesus'
life.
The Historical Jesus
Having shown that we must accept the accounts of the New Testament
as the historical record of Jesus' life we can now use those
accounts in order to provide a concise presentation of some
essential historical details about Jesus, his disciples, and
the spread of early Christianity.
According to the Luke's Gospel, Jesus began his ministry at
about 30 years old, during the 14th year of the reign of Tiberius
Caesar.
Luke 2:52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and
stature, and in favour with God and man. 3:1 Now in the
fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius
Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch
of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituraea and
of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of
Abilene, 2 Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the
word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness.
3 And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching
the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins...21
Now when all the people were baptized, it came to pass,
that Jesus also being baptized, and praying, the heaven
was opened, 22 And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape
like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which
said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.
23 And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of
age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which
was the son of Heli.
"Tiberius Caesar - 42 B.C.-A.D. 37, second Roman emperor
(A.D. 14-A.D. 37)...Tiberius succeeded without difficulty
on the death of Augustus in A.D. 14." - The Columbia Encyclopedia,
Sixth Edition. 2001
Since Tiberius became the emperor of Rome in the year 14 A.D.
this would mean that Jesus was around 30 years old at about
the year 28 or 29 A.D. Of course this is no great surprise.
Jesus' ministry lasted three years during, which he taught
his disciples and proclaimed his message throughout Judea.
At the end of those three years he was tried and crucified.
The New Testament claims that he rose again on the third day
afterwards. After that his disciples continued his ministry
and proclaimed him to be the long-awaited Jewish Messiah.
Both Jews and Gentiles became followers of Jesus' teachings
and spread the gospel throughout the known world under persecution
from both the culture around them as well as the Roman empire.
The record of these events is preserved for us in the New
Testament through the four gospels, the Book of Acts, and
the epistles to the first century churches. (For a more detailed
account of these developments we recommend reading the New
Testament beginning with the Gospels and the Book of Acts.)
Having thoroughly established the historicity of the Jewish
and Christian scriptures, their authorship, and the figures
and events that they contain we will now continue forward
and begin our examination of the claims made by Judaism and
Christianity. This examination will proceed in several steps.
First, we will examine a common, scholarly objection that
is offered against the historicity and reliability of the
Judeo-Christian scriptures. Second, once we reject this objection,
we will take a more in depth look at the historicity and reliability
of the Book of Daniel, an important prophetic, historical,
and messianic Jewish work. Third, we will investigate whether
or not Judeo-Christian theology was influenced by other religious
views as is sometimes suggested. Fourth, we will establish
that Christianity is legitimately derived from Judaism. And
fifth, we will demonstrate that the evidence offered by Judeo-Christianity
does, in fact, provide reasonable substantiation for its claims.