How can we trust the gospels

Scott Rae : Okay. You would say it's more about faithfulness and we leave the results at the end of the day to God. We obviously can quantify impact in terms of hundreds of millions, because most of the bible translators who might've been involved in ESV, the NIV, the New Living Translation and so on, many of those have spent time in Tyndale House. When you just look at the print numbers, you can see the big effect.

The Japanese bible translation, the Mongolian bible translation. You can list lots and lots of quantifiable impacts. But I think it's when you try and quantify them spiritually, I think you're stepping over a line.

Scott Rae : Our listeners I think will find it very encouraging that there is this conglomeration of evangelical biblical scholars who care deeply about the biblical text and deeply about being faithful to Jesus who are about their work and have a place to do that. I commend you for that work. You have a PhD in Old Testament. Scott Rae : But you've spent a lot of time as a New Testament lecturer, equal facility in both the biblical languages?

Peter Williams : Yeah, I do both. My undergrad degree was Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Aramaic. That was all of those languages to help you read the bible and relating things I've done, early translations, and I find that when I'm looking at how the text has been transmitted over time that's We want to check that in multiple languages.

So, I use them all whether I'm looking at the old or new testament. What was the impetus behind this new book, Can We Trust the Gospels? I think it's something like 38, words. But I've been thinking about it for 22 years. And I've in fact spoken to hundreds of groups on the subject and I've tried to refine what I'm doing.

And what I'm trying to do is fill a niche for books that are small, which can be given out to people who are asking that question, "Are the gospels reliable? One of the things I try and do in this book apart from be brief is to lead people from knowing nothing through a syllabus so that they can actually understand how we know the gospels are reliable without appealing to authority as I do say and giving transparent references so that people can look up things if they want to.

I give references to specific manuscripts, specific libraries where people can check these things out. And I don't think there's been a book trying to occupy that space in recent years.

I would hope it will be given out far and wide to people who are just asking that question. Scott Rae : You've been at this for a long time. What are some of the primary objections that people have to the historical reliability of the gospels?

Peter Williams : I think when you look at objections, some of the objections are coming from ignorance where people haven't really looked in it, the subject, so they're assuming that everything was written much later and could've been changed over time.

People liken it to the telephone game and so on. I think it's possible to falsify those ideas and show that the writers have to have some really close up familiarity with the time and place they're writing about and the stories have not been corrupted over time.

I think you can show that. Then there's an objection that the writings can't be trusted because they're biased, because they're written by Christians. And look, I compare the four gospels with what was written about the most famous person in the world at the time, who is obviously the Roman emperor.

And we've got more, or at least as much written about Jesus as we have about the Roman emperor, and arguably closer to the time than with the Roman emperor. Overall, I think it stands up very well. People some times say, "Well, don't the gospels contradict each other? And what I think some times people do is they get When it comes to biblical contradictions or alleged contradictions, they get into this sort of point scoring mode where the skeptic scores a point by pointing out a problem and apologist tries to respond, but if we're dealing with Jesus who is a great teacher, and who also spoke in parables, which are effectively forms of riddles, why can't he speak in other forms of riddles?

Why can't one saying actually be in tension with another saying deliberately because he intended it to? One of the first things I want to do is just get people to be honest about things, and stop the point scoring about [inaudible] or I can show you've got a point, I've got a point.

Forget that. Let's look really honestly at these texts and ask the question, "Can we trust them? They know the land. They know where the land goes up and down. They know the traveling distance. They know what people are called. They know Judaism. That's really striking, because Christianity moved away from Judaism really quite fast. But the gospels we find are incredibly Jewish in their flavor. Even Luke, which is the least Jewish. It has really deep knowledge of Judaism.

That suggests these things are written at the earliest phase of Christianity, not written a long time after it'd been spreading. These are the sorts of reasons I'd put for trusting. Scott Rae : Let me bring this scenario to you. Had a conversation with a gentleman from eastern Europe not too long ago who had converted to Christianity from Islam. He's now a doctoral student. I believe he's at Oxford. And he's studying textual criticism in order to be an apologist to Muslims.

Textual criticism, I think, has gotten a bad rap as just being this super technical area that doesn't have much relevance to real life and the kinds of things that somebody like him would find important.

But he said the first thing that Muslims said to him after he converted to Christ, as he started defending his faith, is that the text of the bible is so corrupt that it can't possibly be trusted. Just from the point of view of establishing the reliability of the text itself, how would you answer that Muslim criticism as a textual critic? Peter Williams : I have a chapter on that and I think there are many angles into it.

One thing I would say is that the title of the book, Can We Trust the Gospels, is actually deliberate. And some people believe that the Christian needs to prove that there has been no change. And I think that's quite wrong. Because imagine a scenario in which you had a photo of Moses coming down from the mountain with tablets from God. A skeptic could say, "Well, that doesn't prove he didn't falsify them before he came around the corner. But that's proving a negative. You don't have to do that.

I think it's rather proving that there's no reason to think that it has changed. And in fact, you can also go further and say there are lots of reasons to think that there's been huge stability in the text.

One example I give is the opening 14 verses of John. Archaeological discoveries support the historical accuracy of details in the Gospels. Archaeology is the study of the remains of ancient civilizations. With the limitations of archaeology understood, we can say that this field of research has been favorable to the Gospels.

While the list of discoveries is constantly growing, here are a few items worth mentioning. First, we know key details about Jesus and his followers from sources outside the New Testament. Second, none of the information we learn from non-biblical writers contradicts anything in the four Gospels. Here are four examples along with a list of main points for each.

AD — Jewish Historian. AD — Provincial Governor. Hence to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt, and punished Christians, who were hated for their enormities. Christus, the founder of the name, was put to death by Pontius Pilate procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius: but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again, not only through Judea, where the mischief originated, but through the city of Rome also, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.

Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. AD — Roman Historian. AD — Writer. The resurrection of Jesus explains an odd historical phenomenon.

First-century Jews were firmly monotheistic so why did a group of people who worshiped one and only one God start worshiping Jesus? And why did they begin worshiping him right away? Larry Hurtado provides abundant evidence that the worship of Jesus did not develop over time but began immediately in early Christianity. In addition, why did they worship a man who was executed?

There were other messianic figures who died and their movements ended. What was it about Jesus that propelled his movement to spread all over the Roman world after his death?

Many people have claimed to have met Jesus—the Jesus of the Gospels. If the Gospels are accurate, Jesus is alive. And if the Jesus who taught, healed, and loved people is alive, people should still be meeting him. Williams's answer is yes in a surprisingly good book. It is robust and yet very accessible. A great first step in a fair evaluation of the Gospels.

Notes: Nook Coming from the Latin word fides, the word faith used to mean something closer to our word trust.

Trust, of course, can be based on evidence. A problem with this is that the Jewish monotheism from which Christianity arose maintained a sharp dichotomy between the one Creator and everything he created. There was a strict cap on the number of gods at just one. That means that those adhering to Jewish categories would not have imagined Christ as a demigod somewhere in a transition from merely human to fully divine. In Judaism there were no half gods, and so Christ would never have been considered halfway from human to divine, resulting in the impossible number of one and a half gods.

In classic Jewish categories, there simply was no evolutionary path of gradually assigning more and more honor to a being until it was viewed as God. We can conclude that Christ was executed under Pontius Pilate and was shortly afterward treated as God by a group of people who retained the core Jewish belief in one God.

Christianity also spread rapidly, and it was at times difficult to be a Christian. The problem with supposing that novel beliefs arose later is that, by then, Christianity had spread so far and so fast that it would have been difficult to introduce innovations.

What are the Four Gospels? But if we allow that Jesus could predict future events, a major objection to earlier dates is removed. Did the Gospel writers Know their Stuff 52 Tables showing the writers with familiar with local geography 58 The information in the lists, however, would be extremely surprising if we were to think of the Gospel writers as having lived in other countries, such as Egypt, Italy, Greece, or Turkey, and having made up stories about Jesus.

If we start with texts we know can be dated to the second century or later, they look decidedly less Jewish than the four Gospels. For example, we can compare the four Gospels with the Gospel of Thomas, which is from the mid-second century. As is typical for something written in that period, the Gospel of Thomas reflects little Jewish background.

Undesigned Coincidences 89 In an undesigned coincidence, writers show agreement of a kind that it is hard to imagine as deliberately contrived by either author to make the story look authentic 89 Personal note: I find this argument to be exciting and compelling What we see is this: there is no obvious reason to conclude that one author has copied the other, but the two narratives present the two characters in ways that accord with each other.

In both stories, she is also the more active. The easiest interpretation of this is that both Luke and John are describing true characters.

This model accounts for a lot in a simple way. Luke 9 connects with Mark and Luke 10 with John. Both accounts in Luke pertain to character and present characters in ways that appear corroborated by other texts.

The simple assumption that we are dealing with truthful records explains the textual phenomena with one stroke. John does nothing with this information, but it makes sense in the light of Luke , which locates the miracle near Bethsaida 93 The miracle, someone might argue, arose as the story was told from one person to another and was exaggerated. But the problem with treating the central part of the story—the miracle—as careless exaggeration is that the undesigned coincidences suggest careful transmission of peripheral details.

If transmission of the major elements of a story has been careless, we should not expect the minor elements to be well transmitted.

Therefore, the idea that the miracle account arose through careless exaggeration involves an unrealistic process of selective corruption of information in the story. It lacks explanatory power for the current shape of the text. This connection can be supplied only if we combine information from the Gospels and Josephus. The simplest explanation is that we have basically true complementary accounts, each recording part of a larger body of events.

Do we have Jesus actual Words? We must remember that when the Gospels were written, these two rules just did not exist. Personal note: This is a great point. Ive never heard it made Ancient truthful and responsible quotation did not need to observe our modern rule of marked boundaries Any other explanation will be more complex.

They are also arguably the most scrutinized texts. That is, if past discoveries are any indication of future discoveries, and if what we currently know about scribes and manuscripts is any guide to what we will find out in the future, we do not expect to find evidence of significant change.

It is those who suppose that major change occurred before our earliest manuscripts who are proposing a radical discontinuity between all the centuries we know about and the time immediately before our earliest copies.

Can we imagine someone changing the four Gospels then? This also is difficult, because Christianity was spreading fast. What about Contradicitons? It is somewhat similar to how Dickens opened his A Tale of Two Cities with a whole list of contradictions to characterize the inconsistencies of an era.

Who would make all this up? For an atheist, believing in Gospel miracles is extraordinary. For many believers in God, the belief that living things arose spontaneously from nonliving things is equally hard to swallow, as is the belief that conscious things arose from nonconscious things, two ideas that many atheists have little difficulty accepting We may put the conclusion so far like this: were it not for the many miraculous reports in the Gospels, most historians would be very happy to treat their accounts as generally historically reliable.

The empty tomb could be explained in terms of some people having removed the body, which would have been bizarre, but might have been part of a strategic deceit by a small number. Yet that would not explain the many claims by different people to have seen Jesus risen from the dead. I like it! A far easier position is to make a single supposition, that all of history hangs on Jesus. It is a single and simple supposition, but I am not claiming that it is a small one.

Of course, if Jesus is the Word who is coeternal with God, and the one who has come to save the world, then the question of the trustworthiness of the Gospels is not a mere issue of historical interest.

Jul 06, Lucas G. As the title suggests, throughout this book, Williams seeks to answer the question of whether or not the gospels that is, the New Testament books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John can be considered trustworthy sources of information.

For many Christians this may seem like a silly question - of course we can trust them, they're part of the inerrant word of God. But to many outside the faith, the question seems equally as silly, but for the opposite reason. To these skeptics, the gospels are wort As the title suggests, throughout this book, Williams seeks to answer the question of whether or not the gospels that is, the New Testament books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John can be considered trustworthy sources of information.

To these skeptics, the gospels are worthy of very little trust. It is common to hear skeptics raise concerns about the gospels in an attempt to dismiss any claim of historical reliability. Some point out that the gospels were written decades after the events deacribed within them took place.

Others bring up that at least two of the authors were not even eyewitnesses to the events they describe. Furthermore, all of the authors are followers of Jesus, a fact that many skeptics believe make their writings too biased to be valuable. All these concerns and more are answered by Williams in this concise and readable text.

With respect to the former option, Williams clearly articulates how the gospels not only ought to be considered reliable sources of history, but also how they actually qualify as more reliable than almost every other ancient source we have.

In other words, all concerns raised by skeptics about the historical reliability of the gospels apply equally or with greater severity to almost every other ancient text. The implication is clear; if one wants to dismiss the gospels then the intellectually honest thing to do would be to dismiss all of ancient history.

With that said, it seems most skeptics go a different route and resort to special pleading. For some reason, the normal methods of determining reliability of an ancient text aren't good enough when it comes to the gospels. It seems the reason for this reduces to nothing more than a distaste for miracles. That is, the skeptic has rejected the possibility of miracles before even approaching the gospels, and since they all contain miracle accounts, it doesn't matter what the historical evidence indicates about their reliability.

To allow that the gospels are historically reliable would require allowing the possibility of miracles. Therefore, if the skeptic wishes to maintain the position that miracles are impossible, they must treat the gospels as unreliable despite all evidence to the contrary. I have written a longer review than I typically would have because this book is so important. In fact, I would recommend everyone read this, Christian or not.

And I especially make that a recommendation for those who haven't read anything on this topic before because I doubt you will find a more clear and concise discussion elsewhere. Jul 25, Daniel Supimpa rated it it was amazing Shelves: biblical-studies , christian-origins.

A superb introduction to the question of reliability of the four Canonical Gospels in the New Testament. Williams creates an accessible overview of the arguments in favor of the historical trustworthiness of these documents without massively long footnotes one could say, only the ones crucially necessary for his argument , yet developing a coherent and solid argument overall. The main point for the author is that the simplest historical explanation for the canonical Gospels' origin is that 1 A superb introduction to the question of reliability of the four Canonical Gospels in the New Testament.

The chapters begin with an overview of non-Christian sources Cornelius Tacitus, Pliny the Younger and Flavius Josephus , indicating several facts: - the confirmation of the basic facts about Jesus that are present in the canonical Gospels - the worship of Jesus in earliest stages of Christianity - the persecution of early Christians - the rapid and wide spread of Christianity - the knowledge by Christian leaders about Christ's family origins.

After this initial chapter, Williams develops key questions that corroborate cumulatively to his case. These questions are about what is the genre of the Gospels, the accuracy of the evangelists' presentation of 1st century Palestine and Judaism in face of other historical evidence available to us, the presence of undesigned coincidences when evangelists show agreement in subtle and inferent information that is hardly explained by intentional alteration of facts to make them look authentic , an analysis of the reliability of Jesus' words as presented in the Gospels.

These chapters deal mainly with the question of the information 'behind' the formation of the text, i. Finally, chapters present the case for the accurate preservation of these traditions in textual artifacts.

Dirk Jonkind show themselves valuable for the development of the argument. The questions of corruption of manuscripts, contradictions and how unlikely it is to propose that someone, at a very early stage of Christianity less than fifty years after Jesus' crucifixion , would control previous spread traditions and corrupt them all over the Roman Empire—and beyond. The conclusion of the argument is a semi-evangelistic open end: if the New Testament Gospels present Jesus reliably, then one should really consider what his message summons one to.

Williams is crystal clear, and as simple as necessary for the sake of his argument. Surely, this is a lifesaver for initial contact with the issue, and worth your time and money. Here truly is the man who came first to the Jews but who also was Saviour of the world. The other real strength of the volume is where Williams speaks about his own research concerning textual transmission of the Greek in the New Testament. He leaves us in no doubt that rational people can hold that the text of the Gospels has been passed down the centuries with integrity.

Williams leaves us in no doubt that rational people can hold that Gospels have been passed down with integrity. But for others — like the friend I described at the beginning of this review — a more thorough treatment of the evidence by a genuine expert at the forefront of research is necessary. With transgender issues raising difficult questions, this book from Vaughan Roberts offers a helpful introduction. Adrian Holloway examines the question of how sure we can be that Jesus really rose from the dead.

This video examines the historical evidence for the life of Jesus, including discussion of the non-biblical evidence.