Did the New Testament Authors Tell the Truth?
The First "E": Early Testimony
In the original post in this series I outlined The Five E’s and Three C’s of New Testament Reliability. In this post we will expand upon the first “E,” that is, how Early Testimony provides a strong line of evidence in support of the reliability of information given to us by the New Testament authors.
Whenever a past event is being discussed it is most natural to ask “When did the event happen?” Knowing when an event happened, however, is really only a preliminary question when it comes to the reliability of the information being reported. Another question which is very important is “How much time elapsed between the event’s occurrence and its being reported?” It’s not too hard to understand the idea that as far as the reliability of information is concerned, preference is generally given by historians to information which is recorded closer to the time of an event than to information recorded farther from the time of the event.
If a person calls the police to report a break-in at their residence the investigator will want to know when the event occurred. If the homeowner tells the officer that the break-in occurred 6 months ago, what do you think the officer will ask next? Probably, “Why is this just now being reported if it happened 6 months ago?” Everyone involved in crime scene investigation knows that the amount of time which elapses between a crime’s commission and the beginning of the investigation is directly proportional to the likelihood of an investigator being able to determine what took place, who was involved, and to close the case successfully. Why? Because the longer the time gap between the event and the reporting of it the more time the relevant details have to go missing, be forgotten, become obscured, or corrupted (intentionally or otherwise).
The New Testament Documents versus the Qur’an and The Book of Mormon
A perfect case in point is given to us when we contrast the New Testament documents (by which I mean the 27 “books” which comprise the New Testament) against the Qur’an and The Book of Mormon as sources for reliable information about Jesus.
Jesus was born c. 4 B.C. and died in either 30 or 33 A.D. The earliest of the New Testament documents were written no later than the mid 40’s A.D. and the last of the New Testament documents were no later than 95 A.D.1 This being said, we have some early written reports relevant to the life and teachings of Jesus and his apostles which were recorded no more than 15 years after the time of his crucifixion under the order of Pontius Pilate, the then Roman Governor of Judea. Of course reports about Jesus’ teaching, death, and resurrection did not take 15 years to come into being, for oral reporting about what had happened clearly went far and wide much earlier (otherwise to whom are the earliest letters of the New Testament being written?). The letters and Gospels accounts that preserved these reports, however, began to be composed within 15 years of Christ’s crucifixion.2
If we contrast the New Testament documents against the Islamic Scriptures known as the Qur’an we have a notably different story. The Qur’an, claimed by Muslims to be the word of Allah3 as dictated by their prophet Muhammed when he received heavenly revelations, was written in its original form from in the early to mid 7th century A.D. If we accept the earliest dates proposed for its composition (c. 610-632 A.D.) then that gives us no less than 580 years between Christ’s crucifixion and the beginning of the Qur’an’s earliest recordings concerning the life of Jesus.
Given the fact that the Qur’an disagrees with the New Testament documents about some crucial matters (e.g. that Jesus died by crucifixion, that he was God incarnate, etc.) it’s fair to ask which text should be considered more reliable. There are many reasons why we might argue in favor of the New Testament’s reliability concerning the person of Jesus, but surely the brevity of the gap in time between the events of his life and the reporting of those details should be a prominent factor in our considerations.
When one considers the yet much later claims of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (often referred to as Mormons due to their most well known text, The Book of Mormon) concerning Jesus’ life, teaching, and ministry we have an even bleaker situation. The Book of Mormon was not published until 1830, leaving 1800 years between the end of Christ’s earthly ministry and the claims made by Joseph Smith. Admittedly, the LDS claim that The Book of Mormon is a much earlier document reaching back as far as the first century A.D., but there is exactly zero evidence that supports this claim since there is no manuscript tradition whatsoever for their religious texts dating prior to the time of Joseph Smith.
Agreement and Disagreement Among Texts
Now it’s true enough to point out that the Qur’an and The Book of Mormon do agree with some of the claims made by the New Testament documents. For instance, the Qur’an affirms that Jesus was a great miracle worker and prophet. It also affirms that Jesus was born of a virgin. Likewise The Book of Mormon affirms Jesus’ miraculous power, and would also call him “the Son of God.” It is always important to remember, though, that when it comes to establishing the truth it is the differences that matter most.
I don’t know who first said it (I think I first heard it from Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason) but it does us no good to acknowledge that both aspirin and cyanide come in tablet form if we fail to realize that the first relieves pain and the other kills.
Insofar as later texts corroborate (agree with and affirm) earlier texts then this is all well and good. But if a text which comes later, especially if it comes a great deal later, seeks to overrule an earlier source then there must be sufficient reason and evidence as to why the latter is to be preferred over the earlier text. The natural preference and default position clearly should go to texts written closer to the time of the event in question unless there is sufficient reason to discredit them on some other front.
So when the Qur’an says Jesus did not die on a cross4, or that Jesus is not the Son of God5 (and other such claims which are not in harmony with the New Testament) we must ask why we should give it preference over the earlier source? The same goes for The Book of Mormon and the other LDS texts when they make statement contrary to the biblical texts.6
It is not that it is impossible for a report that was written later to be more historically accurate than one that was written earlier. I dare say it’s not only possible but that there are such cases in history. What we should say, however, is that the burden of proof rests upon later reports to demonstrate why and how their texts are more reliable than those which were recorded closer to the event in question. Muslims and LDS members alike claim that their texts are direct revelation from God and that the biblical documents are corrupted, but all the evidence (as this series will continue to unfold) points in the other direction. There is very strong evidence for the reliability of the New Testament7 and this evidence stacks up nicely against the bare assertions often made by its detractors.
Concluding Thoughts
The Early Testimony of the N.T. documents is not the whole case for its reliability but it is certainly an important starting place. The early date of the New Testament documents demand our consideration because they were written closer to the event of Jesus’ life than any other documents. As this series continues I will build upon this base fact with many more angles of support for the claim that the New Testament authors told the truth. This first fact establishes that the N.T. authors were in prime position to know what actually happened and to record it before that truth could be obscured by time and ill will. As we look at other lines of evidence it will become clear that, when taken together, the cumulative case for the reliability of the N.T. is not to be lightly ignored.
In the next post I will build on this by discussing the fact that the N.T. reports were written by Eye-witnesses of Jesus (or close associates thereof) and all of them were composed in a time when their claims could be fairly checked by inquirers.
There are of course claims by critical scholars that some of the N.T. documents were written in the second or even third century. This has, however, been thoroughly debunked. One way this is proven to be false is by consulting the writings of the second century church leaders who quoted the New Testament documents so liberally that we could reconstruct the New Testament text from just their quotations. It would be hard to quote from books which were not already written previous to your quoting them, no?
Gary Habermas has done some really interesting work on the notion of creeds imbedded within the New Testament text which were being recited by Christians as part of assembled worship concerning the life and ministry of Jesus which predate the N.T. itself. Meaning within the New Testament there is a witness to even earlier testimony about the life of Jesus.
Simply the Arabic word for God.
c.f. Qur’an, Surah 4:157.
c.f. Qur’an, Surah 4:171
The Latter Day Saints have three text beyond the Bible which they consider Scripture, The Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great Price, and Doctrines and Covenants.
Note that there is actually great evidence for the reliability of the Old Testament too. For brevity it’s easier to just focus on the N. T. Also, if the N. T. is demonstrably true it retroactively validates the O. T. given Jesus’ own claims concerning the Hebrew Scriptures.
This is going to be another great read! 👍
Your dating of the NT sources in slightly in error - but not by much. 3 could be, notice "could", be as late as 110 CE: Book of John, Second Peter, Epistles of John. The earliest dated records are from the 2nd Century.