nonerighteous.com - Why do we believe what the Bible says about Jesus?

Why do we believe what the Bible says about Jesus?

We believe the Bible because it is a reliable collection of historical documents, written by eyewitnesses during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses. They report to us supernatural events that took place in fulfillment of specific prophesies, and claim to be divinely inspired.

"More over I will be careful to ensure that you always have a reminder of these things after my decease. For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to him from the Excellent Glory: 'This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.' And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain. And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts; knowing this first, that no prophesy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit." (1 Peter 1:15-21)

To put our reasons into point form:

1. It is a reliable collection of historical documents.

2. It was written by eyewitnesses during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses.

3. The writers report to us supernatural events that took place in fulfillment of prophesy and claim to be divinely inspired.

IT IS A RELIABLE COLLECTION OF HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS

In order to affirm that the Bible is historically reliable we must apply the same criteria to the Bible that is applied to all historical documents. Three basic principles to determine if a document is historical are laid down by C. Sanders in Introduction to Research in English Literary History: the bibliographical test, the internal evidence test and the external evidence test. We will apply these three tests to the New Testament to determine historicity.

The Bibliographical Test is examining how the documents were transmitted from the originals to us. We don’t have the originals so we must determine how reliable our copies are, we determine this by the number of manuscripts and the time interval between the original copies and the ones we have now.

So how does the New Testament do on this test?

Number of manuscripts:

More than 5686 known Greek (original language) manuscripts, over 10,000 Latin Vulgate, and at least 9300 other early versions (different languages).

Comparison: Homer’s Iliad – 643 manuscripts (2nd most manuscripts)

Caesar’s Gallic Wars – 10 manuscripts

Time interval: The New Testament was written A.D. 50-100.

The earliest fragment is 114 A.D. which is a 50 year time gap, the earliest books from the New Testament we have are 200 A.D. which is a 100 year time gap, and a complete N.T. that can be dated to 325 A.D. which is a 225 year time gap.

Comparison: Homer’s Iliad – Written 800 B.C. and the earliest copy is 400 B.C. which is a 400 year time gap.

Caesar’s Gallic Wars – Written 100-44 B.C. and the earliest copy is 900 A.D. which is a 1000 year time gap.

* Age of manuscripts can be determined by materials, letter size and form, punctuation, text divisions, ornamentation, ink color, and color and texture of the parchment.

Unless you want to flunk all ancient history in this category the Bible passes with flying colors and comes first among all.

The Internal Evidence test

As concerning this test literary critics follow Aristotle saying, “the benefit of the doubt is to be given to the document itself, not arrogated by the critic to himself.” So the principle of this test is to not assume fraud or error unless the author disqualifies himself by contradictions or factual inaccuracies. This doesn’t mean something that just appears to be a contradiction; a difficulty is not an objection.

Dr. Archer in the forward to his Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties says:

“As I have dealt with one apparent discrepancy after another and have studied the alleged contradictions between the biblical record and the evidence of linguistics, archaeology, or science, my confidence in the trustworthiness of Scripture has been repeatedly verified and strengthened by the discovery that almost every problem that has ever been discovered by man, from ancient times until now, has been dealt with in a completely satisfactory manner by the biblical text itself – or else by objective archaeological information.”

Did the author use primary sources?

The authors of the N.T. wrote as eyewitnesses or from firsthand information.

See: Luke 1:1-3, 2 Peter 1:16, 1 John 1:3, Acts 2:22, John 19:35, Luke 3:1, Acts 26:24-26

These claims to be eyewitnesses are valid because the N.T. was written during the lifetimes of those involved in the accounts.

Conservative Dating of N.T. (In some cases [Matthew’s Gospel], now being revised as not conservative enough)

Paul’s Letters

A.D. 50-66

(Hiebert)

Matthew

A.D. 70-80

(Harrison)

Mark

A.D. 50-60

A.D. 58-65

(Harnak)

(T.W. Manson)

Luke

early 60s

(Harrison)

John

A.D. 80-100

(Harrison)

Liberal Dating of N.T. (In some cases, proven to be impossible [John’s gospel]; in others, rarely accepted by competent scholars today)

Paul’s Letters

A.D. 50-100

(Kummel)

Matthew

A.D. 80-100

(Kummel)

Mark

A.D. 70

(Kummel)

Luke

A.D. 70-90

(Kummel)

John

A.D. 170

A.D. 90-100

(Baur)

(Kummel)

The External Evidence Test

Do other historical materials confirm or deny the internal testimony of the documents?

Early Christian writers:

Eusebius in Ecclesiastical History III.39 preserves writings of Papias, bishop of Heirapolis (A.D. 130), in these writings Papius records the sayings of “the Elder” (the apostle John):

“The Elder used to say this also: “Mark, having been the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately all that he (Peter) mentioned, whether sayings or doings of Christ, not, however, in order. For he was neither a hearer or a companion of the Lord; but afterwards, as I said, he accompanied Peter, who adapted his teachings as necessity required, not as though he were making a compilation of the sayings of the Lord. So then Mark made no mistake writing down in this way some things as he (Peter) mentioned them; for he paid attention to this one thing, not to omit anything that he had heard, not to include any false statement among them.”

Also Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (A.D. 180) who considered the four gospels as established fact and speaks about how the gospels were written, Clement of Rome (A.D. 95) uses scripture as a reliable and authentic source. Ignatius (A.D. 70-110) Bishop of Antioch knew all the apostles and was a disciple of Polycarp who was a disciple of John, he was martyred for his faith. Polycarp (A.D. 70-156) was a disciple of John who died of martyrdom at 86, his death demonstrated that he trusted the accuracy of John’s teachings; he was capable of verifying the truth of John’s teachings.

Early non-Christian writers:

Tacitus (first century Roman Historian) on the great fire of Rome for which some blamed Nero:

“Consequently to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.”

Obviously not a Christian historian.

Also:

Suetonius chief secretary to Emperor Hadrian (A.D. 117-138) confirms Acts 18:2, Josephus (A.D. 37-A.D. 100) Pharisee and historian under the Romans confirms James the brother of Jesus, and that Jesus was identified by others as Christ, confirms John the Baptist. Thallus (A.D. 52) preserved only in fragmented citations, cited by Julius Africanus (A.D. 221) in reference to a supposed solar eclipse that followed the crucifixion of Christ. Pliny the Younger (A.D. 112) in a letter to Emperor Trajan describes the early Christian worship practices, which shows that Jesus was worshiped as God, and the Christians met to eat together. Emperor Trajan responded to Pliny’s letter with guidelines for punishing Christians, including that they wouldn’t be punished if they worshiped the roman Gods and thus proved themselves to not be Christians. Talmud writings compiled between A.D. 70 and 200, Sanhedrin 43a confirms the fact and time of the crucifixion and the intent of the religious leaders to kill Jesus. Lucian 2^nd century Greek writer sarcastically critiques Christians confirming that Christians worshiped Jesus, introduced new teachings in Palestine, crucified because of his teachings, his teachings include that all believers are brothers, deny false gods, worshiping Christ, and living according to his laws, and that the Christians believed themselves to have eternal life, and disregarded material possessions.

Also no longer existent but a document referred to by Justin Martyr (A.D. 150) and Tertullian (A.D. 200) The Acts of Pontius Pilate, a purportedly official document is referred to as a means to verify the crucifixion and the miracles of Jesus.

This is what we can verify from non-Christian early sources:

Jesus was from Nazareth
He lived a wise and virtuous life
He was crucified in Palestine under Pontius Pilate during the reign of Tiberius Caesar at Passover time, being considered the Jewish King
He was believed by his disciples to have been raised from the dead three days later
His enemies acknowledged that he performed unusual feats they called ‘sorcery’
His small band of disciples multiplied rapidly, spreading even as far as Rome
His disciples denied polytheism, lived moral lives, and worshiped Christ as divine.

This confirms the view of Christ in the Gospels.

Archaeology also confirms the Bible as Historical.

See here. (Opens in a new window.)

IT WAS WRITTEN BY EYEWITNESSES DURING THE LIFETIME OF OTHER EYEWITNESSES.

In the accounts written, the writers often claim to have been eye witnesses to these events themselves, challenge the readers to confirm their facts, and even refer to their readers as having been eyewitnesses of these events.

Also: Luke 1:1-3, 1 John 1:3, Acts 2:22, John 19:35, Luke 3:1, Acts 26:24-26

These claims to be eyewitnesses are valid because the N.T. was written during the lifetimes of those involved in the accounts.

THE WRITERS REPORT TO US SUPERNATURAL EVENTS THAT TOOK PLACE IN FULFILLMENT OF PROPHESY AND CLAIM TO BE DIVINELY INSPIRED.

Based on points 2 and 3, we can safely believe that the events recorded in the Bible are accurately recorded, in so far as those things which could be verified or contradicted by those living at the time. What was written in the N.T., if false, would be contested by those living at the time; No one would have believed the accounts of the apostles and Christianity would never have begun. Also were these accounts false, since we are sure they were written by first hand witnesses, the authors would have admitted to falsifying the accounts rather than suffer martyrdom for something they knew to be a lie. People will die for what they believe to be true, but not for what they know to be a lie.

Specifically, the account of the resurrection of Jesus would not have survived to be spoken of if the body had been brought forth. What’s more, many men claimed to have seen Jesus after his resurrection and died for those claims; were the claims false they would not have willingly died claiming they had seen the risen Jesus. Jesus prophesied that he would rise from the dead after three days and did so. Based on the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, the N.T. can be trusted beyond historical accuracy and into the realm of application.

We know that Jesus did rise from the dead after three days, and on this historical fact we base our trust that Jesus' death can cleanse us from all sin and reconcile us to God.

Extra Information:

http://www.tektonics.org/ntdocdef/gospdefhub.html

http://www.tektonics.org/lp/nttextcrit.html

The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel

Conservative Dating of N.T. (In some cases [Matthew’s Gospel], now being revised as not conservative enough)
Paul’s Letters	A.D. 50-66	(Hiebert)
Matthew	A.D. 70-80	(Harrison)
Mark	A.D. 50-60 A.D. 58-65	(Harnak) (T.W. Manson)
Luke	early 60s	(Harrison)
John	A.D. 80-100	(Harrison)
Liberal Dating of N.T. (In some cases, proven to be impossible [John’s gospel]; in others, rarely accepted by competent scholars today)
Paul’s Letters	A.D. 50-100	(Kummel)
Matthew	A.D. 80-100	(Kummel)
Mark	A.D. 70	(Kummel)
Luke	A.D. 70-90	(Kummel)
John	A.D. 170 A.D. 90-100	(Baur) (Kummel)