Last week I claimed the nicest thing we can do for ourselves is consider what happens in the next life and used Pascal’s Wager and my own list as a starting point. Because it’s so important, let’s go a step further by looking at Jesus from a historical standpoint. After all, we need to understand that believing in Jesus should be more than a feeling. There needs to be logic and real reasons behind it or we’re at risk of falling away, especially in our world full of skepticism and conspiracy theory hunters.
In previous lessons I’ve mentioned how I read, Letters from a Skeptic where a very smart philosopher and theologian pastor, Gregory Boyd, answered his dad’s questions about Christianity. His whole basis for why we should believe in a God starts with Jesus. This is very different than the approach I took when I was younger. When I was a teenager I tried proving there was a God by proving creationism, the belief that God created the world in seven days and not through the ever changing theory of evolution. I bet you can guess how well I did with that argument. By doing this I was now trying to argue two things the person didn’t already believe. Yeah, that was pretty dumb. The problem was I really just wanted to share information I found fascinating. It was great for my own development of faith, but unfortunately, I was really just annoying to others, especially my grade 11 biology teacher who was a firm evolutionist. It’s strange how a 50 year old man wouldn’t want to listen to an excited teenager argue against something he believed and taught for his entire adult life. Thus, Boyd using Jesus as a starting point makes a lot more sense, so let’s do the same here.
When I was studying for my Masters of Theology Degree we looked at how the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and the various letters were chosen to be in the New Testament while other books like the Gospel of St. Thomas, Judas, and Mary were rejected. The first official list of the 27 books of the New Testament were found in a letter by Athanasius, a bishop of Alexandria, in 367CE and then it was formally recognized in 393CE at the councils of Hippo and later reaffirmed at a number of other councils (councils were formal meetings by the current church leaders). These books, however, were already widely assumed to be God inspired, so there weren’t any real surprises for making the list (although Hebrews is sometimes questioned because authorship is debated). In order to be included in the Bible, the books had to pass certain basic criteria. The quick summary is they needed apostolic origin, universal acceptance, be regularly used for liturgical purposes, and follow a consistent message. The most important factor for being included in the Bible was the book had to be written by or connected to an apostle, which is why the author Luke is considered acceptable because he was closely tied to the Apostle Paul as represented in the excellent movie, Paul, Apostle of Christ with Jim Caviezel (the same guy who played Jesus in The Passion). Being directly connected to an apostle meant the book had to be written within so many years of Jesus’ ministry. This also meant it had to be accepted by the earliest churches and those who were actual witnesses of what took place. This meant any differences between the details of Jesus’ life as written by the four Gospels were acceptable, but the overall message was the same. These books and letters accepted in the New Testament were all shared among the early churches as a way to encourage and teach. For instance, Paul may have written a letter to the Philippians, but that was shared with others because the messages were for universal benefit. These books and letters being shared was crucial because for many churches, this was all they had to follow and to make sure the leadership wasn’t getting wonky, which was a growing problem in the early church, especially with the Gnostics who liked to think they were smarter than everyone else (not that anyone today can be guilty of that). Books like the Gospels of Thomas, Judas, or Mary were rejected by the council forming the New Testament because they weren’t shared in the local churches and more importantly they were written about two hundred years after those actual people died, which made their endorsements a bit of a challenge… unless there was a zombie apocalypse back then we didn’t know about.
In Letters from a Skeptic the author uses the critical-historical manner to demonstrate that Jesus can be believed from a historical viewpoint rather than someone saying it’s “God’s Word.” He briefly compares it to reading the Book of Mormon, a book Mormons believe is God’s Word. He states that he doesn’t believe in that book because historically it doesn’t do very well when tested unlike the New Testament that easily passes. So what is this test? It’s actually a two part test.
The Internal Criteria:
- Is the writing an eyewitness account, based on an eyewitness account, or hearsay? (i.e. does the author have the authority to be writing about this?)
- Because firsthand sources tend to include unnecessary details whereas fabricated stories tend to be more generalized, does the document contain irrelevant material?
- Is there anything included to make the author or main characters look bad?
- Is there consistency to the document?
- Do things seem exaggerated and/or seem more of legend than truth? (e.g. “We walked to school uphill both ways.”)
The External Criteria:
- Is there incentive to make something up in the story whether to look better or make money?
- Are there other outside documents that help substantiate what the book claims?
- Is there archeological evidence to support the document?
- Is there anyone who could claim it’s made up, had a motive to share this, but did not?
Based on the four main rules for a book to be included in the New Testament we already looked at, a lot of these rules are easily achieved. A modern day person might argue Jesus walking on water sounds like it’s breaking the fifth Internal Criteria, but it still would’ve had to pass the test of being approved by an eyewitness (the apostle connected to the book) and the many followers of the time. That means people who met Jesus would’ve had to been like, “Yeah, walking on water seems like something He’d do.”
The biggest question that needs to be addressed is what did the apostles have to gain by promoting these books about Jesus? Martyrdom. That’s not a great reward… or maybe that’s me. Considering there wasn’t any money to be made and originally the apostles were in hiding because they were so scared after their leader was brutally murdered on a cross (a natural response), something drastic must have happened to change all of their minds around the same time. The Gospels say the change was Jesus showing up in normal body form with holes in his hands and feet (i.e. not a ghost) to the apostles (and hundreds of others). The fact the apostles, those closest to Jesus, were so scared they hid and the only ones brave enough to go to the tomb and find it empty were women (a very embarrassing fact for the apostles to have included in the Gospels), proves the third internal criteria was achieved. Someone might argue the apostles changed their minds because they missed the fame that being with Jesus brought, but people back then weren’t as fame driven as we are today. If anything, back then fame as a Jew in Rome was very bad for your health, like death on a cross bad.
As far as outside sources to confirm what’s written in the Gospels, Boyd gives the following examples: “Tacitus (55-120) Suetonius (early second century), Josephus (ca. 37-97), Thallus (mid first century), Pliny (early second century), as well as ancient Jewish writings written against the Christians (the Talmud).” What’s impressive about this list is Boyd wrote this before the internet was around. He actually needed to do real research for this and not just Google it. The most important point for Boyd is that: “even those who remained opposed to Christianity did not deny that Jesus did miracles, and did not deny that His tomb was empty. The facts behind the Gospel are not questioned. What is questioned is how the facts were established. The opponents claimed that Jesus did what He did either through trickery, or the power of Satan, and that the disciples stole the body of Jesus.” That’s why even today Boyd notes that there are many instances of archaeologists claiming to have proven the Gospels wrong, but eventually something is found to disprove that person’s finding and bring back the truth of the New Testament. Essentially, anyone who tries to disprove the New Testament from a historical standpoint falls flat.
I argue that most skeptics about Jesus’ existence haven’t been to Israel. It’s a lot harder to deny that fact in the land where He lived and shown in documentaries like Following the Footsteps: Walking where Jesus walked. In this documentary they claim to visit specific spots where Jesus walked including where Peter and Andrew lived and held prayer meetings. From other sources I know there is some debate where some things happened (mostly because people are trying to make money), but there are many confirmed spots for where Jesus had been with the most important spots having churches built on them like where he was born, the Church of the Nativity, commissioned by Constantine in 326CE.
As far as evidence for the fourth external criteria, Christianity was not welcomed with open arms. On one side many of the rich Jews hated it to the point they had murdered Jesus and persecuted believers sometimes to the point of death like with the martyrdom of Stephen as recorded in the Book of Acts. Persecution like that was what the Apostle Paul was originally involved in before he suddenly changed and risked his life promoting Jesus (more embarrassing information about a main character). Even now in 2024, for true Jewish people, reading the New Testament is considered forbidden. On the other side, many of the Romans back then considered Christianity a cult where members drank the blood and ate the body of its leader. Despite this hatred, Christianity exploded in the early days, but at the same time, because of the persecution believers faced (which was made insanely worse in Rome after 64AD by Nero who discovered hungry lions and helpless victims could entertain stadiums of people), believers would be incredibly protective of what was taught about Jesus and Christianity. From a logical standpoint, if you’re at risk of a brutal death, you’re definitely doing your research before committing to something so dangerous. Considering many of the early believers would have heard Jesus specifically say, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me,” (John 14:6) either He was the greatest blasphemer who deserved death (or to be locked in a dungeon for insanity) or He really was what He claimed. If people back then believed He was worth dying for, maybe people today should be taking this idea a little more seriously.
This week may you consider from a historical stance whether Jesus is worth looking into or not. (Another source to check out is the Case for Christ movie, documentary, or book)
Rev. Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people (like me)