This is the continuation of the series of blog posts on proving Christianity and apologetics.
In this blog we discuss why the Bible can be trusted and deemed reliable. There are three basic areas of evidence that we are going to explore: authorship, archaeological support, and historical evidence.
Authorship
The first thing we need to establish is that The Bible is really the biography of Jesus, specifically the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. These 4 books of the Bible contain the core truths about Christianity, that Jesus was born into the earth, that He was God’s son and He died on the cross for our sins and was resurrected. Those are really the essential beliefs that we have as Christians. Now many people have tried to undermine what those gospels say, but what do the facts tell us?
The earliest thing we need to determine is that the 4 men were real and they actually wrote the gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are the supposed authors of the gospels and we find upon further examination that there is no disagreement with that. Craig Bloomberg, a famous New Testament Bible scholar and professor, outlined how in fact there were many people who wrote supporting the authorship – this includes major early bishops in the church.
But even with this fact in place, there are many reasons that they could have lied. We’re going to run through some of the 8 tests that are used when questioning witnesses in a court of law.
The first is the intention test, this test seeks to determine whether it was the stated or implied intention of the writers to accurately preserve history. We see this most clearly in the gospel of Luke, which begins like this: “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.” Based on this we can see that the author of this gospel just wanted to get the facts.
Next we have the ability test, could the authors actually have witnessed or written about what happened. We have to remember that we’re in a foreign land in a distant time and place and in a culture that has not yet invented computers or even the printing press, Books—or actually, scrolls of papyrus—were relatively rare. Therefore education, learning, worship, teaching in religious communities—all this was done by word of mouth. Rabbis became famous for having the entire Old Testament committed to memory. So it would have been well within the capability of Jesus’ disciples to have committed much more to memory than appears in all four gospels put together—and to have passed it along accurately.
Then we have the consistency test, which looks at whether the sources agree on the main facts. The reality is all 4 of gospels agree on the main facts, however there are some discrepancies, which scholars have come to agree is because of the oral tradition. Even the most obvious discrepancies never undermine the core claims about Jesus. Simon Greenleaf of Harvard Law School, one of history’s most important legal figures and the author of an influential treatise on evidence said the following – “There is enough of a discrepancy to show that there could have been no previous concert among them; and at the same time such substantial agreement as to show that they all were independent narrators of the same great transaction.”
Now that we’ve discussed why we believe in the authorship of the gospels, let’s discuss the archaeological support.
Archeology Support
If the Bible says that Jericho was in a certain place, and archaeology verifies it, that fact does not prove everything in the Bible is true. Archaeology cannot prove Spiritual Truths. It does however mean that the Bible is more trustworthy in general, and for that reason should not be ignored.
Let me say it in the most upfront manner possible: Archaeology has never proven the Bible false. There are some things it hasn’t yet supported, but it has never proven it false. Let me mention some things that have been supported.
Luke, the author of the Gospel of Luke and Acts, has been proven accurate by archaeology in regard to 32 references to countries, 54 cities, and 9 islands. That’s 95 different references, all of which have been supported by archaeology.
John, the author of the Gospel of John, 1-3 John, and Revelation, mentions in his Gospel that near the Pool of Bethesda there are 5 porches. For years, archaeologists believed John to be wrong. No such place had been discovered. But recently, 40 feet under ground, 5 porches were discovered.
There are 25,000 sites that show connection with the Old Testament that have been located in the lands of the Bible.
This is only a few short things, but archeology has time and again shown that there were important facts that were correct.
Finally, we have historical evidence…
Historical Evidence
When it comes to the Bible, we have a lot of historical evidence. And we not only have a lot, but we have it from several different sources. Let’s explore what we have. At the end, I’ll ask you if you think that is enough to prove that the Bible is historically accurate.
Historically speaking, a piece of writing was passed along on animal skins or papyrus, which was sort of like paper. What exists of those copies is referred to as manuscript evidence. We’re just going to call them ancient copies.
We have over 24,000 ancient copies of the New Testament alone.
In case you are wondering, that’s a lot, more than any other ancient writing. Aristotle was a philosopher who lived and wrote around 300 BC. However, we only have 5 copies of anything he wrote. 5!
Tacitus was a Greek Historian, who actually wrote just a little after the Bible was completed. We have a lot from him. Guess how many? The answer is 20 copies of what he wrote.
As you can see, the historical evidence is huge. No one doubts Aristotle or Tacitus wrote the copies we possess, and we only have a few from them. Why would anyone doubt the Bible when it has over 1,000 times more ancient copies than anything else?
But there’s more! Have you ever played the game telephone? There’s a simple truth to that game. The further the words got from the beginning, the easier it was for them to get messed up. That’s one argument against the Bible. How can we have what the original writers intended to say? It must have been twisted to what others wanted it to say, etc. Those are fair criticisms.
Just because we have a lot of ancient copies doesn’t make them reliable. So, like the game of telephone, we have to figure out how close the ancient copies we have are to the originals. Again, the Bible trumps all other ancient documents.
Let’s consider Aristotle again. He lived in 300 BC, and the earliest copy we have of anything he wrote is from 1100 AD, some 1,400 years earlier. That’s a long time, for sure. Tacitus is another example. His earliest copy is 1,000 years from when he lived.
The Bible, on the other hand, is much closer. Of the 24,000 copies we have of the New Testament, 230 of them date before 600 AD—a difference of only 550 years or so. And some of the copies date much closer. In the last 20 or so years, a study has been conducted on a portion of Matthew’s Gospel that some believe is either an original or copied while Matthew was alive. There is most definitely a piece of a copy of the Gospel of John that dates to 125 AD, perhaps as soon as 35 years from John’s life.
With all that evidence, and with the closeness of it to the original, why would anyone doubt the accuracy of the Bible? On top of the evidence we have discussed, there’s a lot more we didn’t cover! The Bible is a trustworthy document.
There are many things in our world that claim truth. But whether the Bible is accurate is the single most important truth that you’re going to encounter in your life, and is literally the difference between life and death. Truth matters. If the Bible is not true, we’re all wasting our time. But here’s the thing, even with the overwhelming evidence that the bible is true, there is one important thing that every Christian needs to have. That thing is faith. Faith is being sure of what you believe regardless of the evidence. That for me is what holds me strong to my belief in God, not the archaeological evidence, or the authorship facts or even the historical evidence, but my faith that Jesus died for my sins, and yours as well.
