Is Eye-witness Testimony Reliable before a Judge or a Jury?

Welcome to my blog; we are still continuing to deal with the topic, Is NT reliable? In the last blog we saw the documentary evidence to show that NT is reliable given the early date in which the NT books had been written and the large number of manuscripts or copies of the originals available from an early date. Before passing on to the next evidence, the evidence of the eye-witnesses, I want to just dwell on another important matter concerning documentary evidence.

The Errors in the MSS:

Given the large number of MSS available, to the tune of 24,000, there is bound to be a lot of errors that crept up in the course of copy-writing. Imagine the scribes bending forward and meticulously copying down the documents! Also remember that eye-glasses were invented only in 1373 in Venice! Printing press was invented only in the 15^th century at Gutenberg, Germany! No wonder there are some 2,00,000 variants among the MSS,[1] but most of these concern spelling mistakes, wrong order of sequence, etc., and nothing big enough to affect the doctrines of the church.

To give a few examples of such mistakes, verses 1 John 7-8 are found only in 7 or 8 MSS, that too from 15^th or 16^th century onward. These two verses speak about three witnesses in heaven to Christ, the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit; and three witnesses on earth to Christ, the Spirit, the water and the blood. This basically refers to the doctrine of Trinity and seems to be the work of an over-imaginative scribe, who thought of including these parallels, though excellent, not found in the originals. Even if we remove these two verses there are many other references to Trinity in the NT, like Matthew 28:19-20, 2 Corinthians 13:14, and thus this error will not affect the doctrine of the church in respect of Trinity. Later versions like New International Version (NIV) acknowledge the error by indicated in the foot-note that these verses were not found in any Greek manuscript before the 16^th century.

Another example is Romans 16:24, which is not found in the earliest MSS, so the NIV omits even to print this verse. Other versions print it, but indicate that it was not there in the originals. The verse reads, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.” We do not know who inserted this and why for Paul in the very next verse goes on to give elaborate blessings to the Roman church. By omitting this verse, nothing much is really lost.

One more example is the section John 7:53-8:11, which narrates the story of the woman caught in adultery brought before Jesus for a verdict. NIV prints this episode, but indicates that ‘the earliest and most reliable MSS and other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:58-8:11.’ It is a beautiful story, may be included later on from an oral tradition, but its absence in the NT will not diminish in anyway the importance and value of Jesus” teachings.

All these have led scholars to conclude that NT is 99.5% pure as seen from the available MSS.[2] Hence we can be rest assured that the errors that have crept in the NT books are largely insignificant.

Eye-witnesses Account:

Coming to the next evidence for the reliability of the NT, we come across eye-witness’s account. In any murder case, the case is clinched and the culprit grabbed, by two main types of evidences, one eye-witness’ evidence and the other circumstantial evidence. Of these the former are the most important ones, because the witness had seen the crime happening and is giving an account of it. In the absence of such an eye-witness, the jury or the judge has to rely on circumstantial evidences that corroborate the overall testimony to finally arrive at a decision.

In the NT, almost all the books or letters have been written by direct eye-witnesses. Of the four Gospels, Matthew was written by Levi, the direct disciple, who is also called Levi.[3] The Gospel of John was written by another direct disciple of Jesus, John, the son of Zebedee, also known as the beloved disciple, who writes that he is the one who is testifying these things and wrote these down and attests that his testimony is true.[4] He further writes that he has written these things so that the readers might believe that Jesus is the Christ, Son of God and believing thus might have life in His name.[5] John has also written 1 John, 2 John and 3 John and also Revelation, four more books of the NT.[6] Thus both the Gospels of Matthew and John were written by the direct disciples who had spend almost three and a half years with Jesus during his earthly ministry and very valuable as testimonies.

The other two Gospels, Mark and Luke were written not by direct disciples but by those who were very close to the Apostles, who can be called the disciples of the Apostles. Mark was the close associate of the Apostle Peter, who calls Mark ‘my son,’[7] and Church Fathers of repute like Papias (130 AD) and Irenaeus (180 AD) have left in their writings that Mark who was the interpreter of Peter wrote down Peter’s preaching on public demand in Rome. Thus Mark writes from the vantage point of the preaching and teachings of Jesus’ direct disciple and Apostle Peter.

Luke makes it very clear that he set to write a narrative of the happenings around Jesus, gleaning it from the direct disciples who were the eye-witnesses to all these events and who were still living, so that he could write an orderly account. He also wrote a sequel to his Gospel, the Acts describing the early spread of Christianity and the ministry of Paul with which he was intimately connected. Luke was an associate of Paul, accompanying him on his missionary journeys, thus had an intimate knowledge about the teachings of Christ, through Paul and other eye-witnesses who were living then, including Peter.

The next thirteen letters or epistles were written by Paul, who was not the direct disciple of Jesus during his earthly ministry, but was converted, on the road to Damascus when the resurrected Christ appeared to him in a vision and gave him the mission to preach the gospel to the Gentiles. This he did diligently and wrote these letters to the churches he himself helped to establish and to the others.

The book of James is written by James the half-brother of Jesus who was not a disciple during the earthly ministry of Jesus, but became a believer after the resurrection of Jesus and went on to become one of the three pillars of the Jerusalem church along with Peter and John.[8] Jude calls himself as the brother of James, that would mean he was the half-brother of Jesus, has also written a book in the NT.[9] He also had believed only after the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The only book that is anonymous in the NT is the book of Hebrews, but many scholars, assessing from the style of writing and the words used, believe that it was written by Apostle Paul.

Lo and behold, thus it is seen that all the books of the NT were written either by the direct disciples of Jesus, called Apostles or by those who were closely associated with them. Paul also can be categorised as a direct disciple of Jesus Christ and an Apostle. Their eye-witness accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ with whom they spent three years and more, is much more valuable than all the other evidences put together. Who can refute their testimony? Anyone with intellectual honesty and integrity would stand by their testimony and acclaim their testimony as the truth.

Oops, again exceeded my limit! Well, good bye then, till next week, when I will round up the eye-witness account and turn to some more evidences to prove that NT is reliable.   

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[1] Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ, 2001, p.64

[2] Strobel, p. 65

[3] In Mark 2:14, Jesus calls Levi, the tax collector as his disciple; in Matthew 10:3 gives the tax collector’s name as Matthew. 

[4] John 21:29, 24

[5] John 20:31

[6] I John 1:1-3

[7] 1 Peter 5:13

[8] Galatians 2:9

[9] Jude 1

Is New Testament Reliable? Documentary Evidences

This is a million dollar question on which the faith of many people hangs. How do we know that the Gospels are true narratives of Jesus’ birth, life, teachings, death and resurrection? Who wrote these accounts? Are they based on facts or just cooked up stories based on traditions? When were they written? These are some of the questions that daunt the believers as well as the non-believers. We will try and analyse these questions and try to answer them.

For one thing Bible has been the most critically examined book in the world. Unlike Q'uran which is believed to be the direct revelation of the word of Allah and hence cannot be criticized at all, let alone be translated into other languages other than Arabic, Bible, though equally believed to be the Word of God, has gone through many scholars searching it under magnifying glass, as it were and also has been translated into many languages. Different versions are available as well. It is an open book that can stand such a scrutiny and still be the cornerstone of our faith in Christ and God, whom He called His and our Father.

The New Testament (NT) contains 27 books, first four being Gospels dealing with the life and teachings of Christ, followed by Acts, a historical account of the spread of Christianity from Jerusalem to Judea, to Samaria and to the whole of the then known world under Roman Empire. Next come 13 letters of Epistles written by Paul addressed to the various churches most of which he himself had planted; Then come the other letters, Hebrews, James, Peter, John, Jude and finally the Apocalyptic Revelation. All of NT was written in Greek in the first century AD, Greek being the lingua franca of the Roman Empire that ruled over Palestine and the areas and countries around Mediterranean. 

We will now start examining the many evidences to show that NT is historically reliable. First we will examine the Documentary Evidences.

I.                  Documentary Evidences

1). Number of Manuscripts available:

Any ancient book or treatise is evaluated on the number of manuscripts available and the dates from which these become available. Like the ancient Greek epics, Iliad and Odyssey written by Homer or Republic written by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, the disciple of Socrates, the NT books are also available in the form of their manuscripts (MSS) only. The originals of all these have been lost and these works survive only as MSS, meticulously copied by the scribes and others.

The number of copies available becomes crucial to determine whether or not these books are genuine and authentic. For example, Homer’s epics were written around 8^th century BC and some 650 MSS of these are available. Plato’s Republic comes a cropper with only 7 MSS. In contrast the NT books, all written within the first century AD, have around some 24,000 MSS as follows:[1]

1.     Greek MSS                         -  5664

2.     Latin Vulgate MSS             -  8000 to 10,000

3.     Ethiopic, Slavic, Armenian – 8000

These MSS are from the first century AD onward to later times, written mostly in papyrus scrolls and parchments. These are sometimes only fragments containing a few verses, may be a few pages of an Epistle or a full book or the Epistle itself. All these MSS are preserved in the various museums around the world today.

The complete collection of the 27 books of the NT as we have now is found in the form of two codices, collection of books, the Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.[2] These date around 350 AD. The former is kept safely in the British Museum and the latter in Vatican City, Italy and can be seen even today. This is amazing to say the least. You don’t see this happening in any other ancient book or treatise.

2). Dates of the manuscripts:

Again to compare with some of the ancient writings, Caesar’s writing Gallic War was composed between 58 and 50 BC, of which only 9 or 10 good copies are available today and these are dated 850 AD, some 900 years after the original writing of Caesar![3] To give another example the book History written by Thucydides in 460-400 BC, is available in the form of MSS of which only eight have survived and these are from 900 AD![4] Compared to these the first fragments of the NT MSS are available from 130 AD onward.[5]

You will be surprised to know that the biography of Alexander the Great, the Macedonian Emperor who conquered the world and came even up to the shores of Indus River in India was written some 400 years after his death, which took place in Babylon in 323 BC. The later a book it written after the events it is narrating, the less reliable it will be, because in the intervening years, distortions and fables and traditions could creep in and crowd out the real facts of the narrative.

Since fragments of MSS on the NT are available from 130 AD onward[6] and full books are available in 350 AD, it can be said without any hesitation that the NT of today reflects factual and reliable information as it was written in the first century AD.

3). Dates of writing of the Books in NT:

We will try and fix the dates of the NT books from the date when Christ was crucified. The clue to Jesus’ crucifixion comes from Luke the author of the Gospel of Luke. Luke records, “In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar … the word of God came to John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness.”[7] This refers to John the Baptist, who came as a forerunner to the Messiah, Jesus Christ.[8] From secular Roman records we know that Tiberius became the Emperor (Caesar) in 14 AD. So the 15^th year of Tiberius would be 29-30 AD. This is the time when John the Baptist was preaching repentance and Jesus himself comes and gets baptized by John.[9] Jesus must have been around 30 years that time as mentioned by Luke.[10]

It is also recorded that the earthly ministry of Jesus was for three years and a half. John indicates three Passovers that Jesus attended at Jerusalem,[11] which means he was in active ministry for three years and odd. So around the age of 33 or so Jesus was crucified, the year being 30 AD. Luke our historian gives the names of people in authority, Tiberius Caesar was the Roman Emperor, Pilate was the Roman Governor of Judea, Herod Antipas was the tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Trachonitis and Lysanias Tetrarch of Abilene; Annas and Caiaphas were the Jewish high priests.[12] All these names are historically verified from secular records and found to be true.

Taking this date 30 AD, the year of Jesus’ crucifixion as the bench mark, we see that within 18 years the first Epistle of Paul to Galatians has been written! Paul must have been converted within 3-5 years after the crucifixion. By 48-49 AD, he has written the letter to the Galatians.[13] Within such a short time there is no time even to insert any traditions or fables or stories in these books or epistles. Paul’s letter to the Romans was written around 57 AD, he was imprisoned and sent to Rome in 62 AD and was martyred in 64-65 AD, when Emperor Nero let loose persecution of the Christians.[14] With such historical details available there is no ground to doubt the authenticity of these NT books.

Similarly the dates for the Gospels have also been worked out. Mark is seen as the earliest Gospel written between 55 and 65 AD,[15] which is within 25-35 years of the crucifixion and Matthew between 60 and 65[16] AD and Luke written around 64-68 AD and John around 85-90 AD.[17] Within such a short span of time there is absolutely no scope for fudging the facts and figures reported in these books.

Oh, my goodness, I have overshot my self-imposed limit of 4 pages per blog! I think it is time for me to stop and let you digest all these facts and come back for more the next week. Good bye, and God bless you all.

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[1] Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ, Zondervan Publishing House: USA, 1998, OM Books, Secunderabad: India, Indian ed. 2001, Reprint 2006, p.63.

[2] Strobel, p.62

[3] F.F. Bruce, New Testament Documents: Are they Reliable? Intervarsity Press, 1960, OM Books, Secunderabad: India, Indian ed., 2004, reprint, 2006, p. 21

[4] Ibid

[5] Ibid, p. 22

[6] Bruce, p. 22

[7] Luke, 3:1-3

[8] Luke 3:4

[9] Luke 3:21-22

[10] Luke 3:23

[11] John 2:13; 6:4, 7:14,37; 11:55, 12:1

[12] Luke 3:1-2

[13] Application Study Bible, NIV, Tyndale House Publications and Zondervan Publishing House: USA, 1991, p.2112

[14] F.F. Bruce, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans: An Introduction and Commentary, Tyndale NT Commentaries, 1963, Martino Publishing: USA, 2011, p.14; Douglas Moo, The Epistle to the Romans, W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Company: USA, 1996, pp.4-5; Dodd, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, Fontana Books, London, 1959, p.19

[15] Application Study Bible, p. 1722

[16] Ibid, p.1636

[17] Ibid, p. 1866

Apologetics: Is New Testament Reliable?

Ever since I came into the Lord in 1993, studying Bible with commentaries had been my passion; I was equally passionate about defending the Gospel and proving that Christ alone is the true God worthy of worship. As I engaged in arguments with my Hindu colleagues, I realized I needed more ammunition. I set about researching the matter and making it a subject for my PhD thesis. Then came my struggle for the next almost 10 years to read, study and write about Western philosophy, history of England, Christianity, Hinduism, Eastern philosophy, British Civil Service in India, modern history of India and ethics resultant of the influence of the religions, Christianity and Hinduism, as witnessed in the Administrative Service of which I was part of and conducting a survey among the serving officers of the IAS in the Karnataka cadre.  

This also involved a year’s study of the Pre-PhD programme at SAIACS as a full time day scholar, a concise course in Theology in 2000.[1] Later I completed my MA in Divinity from Union Biblical Seminary (UBS), Poone in 2012. I did prove in my dissertation that the Indian Civil Service of British India (ICS), all said and done was much more ethical than the present Indian Administrative Service of the Indian government (IAS), constituted after Independence, mainly because of the ethics taught in Christianity, based on the Bible and the life and teachings of Christ, were loftier as compared to almost no great ethics taught by Hindu social treatises like Manusmriti and Arthasastra. This has come out as a book, “Values and Influence of Religion in Public Administration,” published by Sage in 2011.

My steam went out as I came under barrage of criticism from my colleagues for writing such a book and I realized I needed to be more diplomatic and put forth facts in a non-antagonistic manner. I was searching for avenues to learn such an art and came across a certificate course on Christian Apologetics run by Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM), Chennai and underwent the three weeks course in 2014 as a resident student. Ever since I have been investing in the books on Apologetics and following the leaders in this movement globally.

I have been greatly blessed by Apologetics and I thought instead of taking just another book from the Bible for study in my Neighborhood Fellowship Group (NFG) of my church, Koramangala Methodist Church, (KMC), I should share my learning about the subject with my group. Thus started this series and lo and behold, after completing the first topic, “Is the New Testament (NT) reliable?” I am writing this blog giving a synopsis of the same. It might run into more than one blog and hence I plead your patience and indulgence regarding it. I need to acknowledge the interest and enthusiasm of my NFG group for venturing to write this blog. Let God’s name be glorified and His Kingdom be built on solid grounds. 

Apologetics:

What is Apologetics? Sounds like being apologetic about something, isn’t it? On the contrary it is defending one’s faith. The Greek word ‘apologia’ meant a ‘reasonable defense.’ It is a defending one’s case before one’s opponents, like the Greek philosophers Socrates or Plato did. Paul followed a similar course when he defended his faith in Christ before King Agrippa, in answer to his critics and accusers in Acts 26:2; in Philippians 1:17 Paul says he was appointed for the defense of the gospel. 1 Peter 3:15 gives a better basis for such a defense, “…and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear.” This then is Christian Apologetics, to defend the faith and hope we have in Christ in the face of opposition and criticism, with meekness and fear.

Christianity is not a blind faith in something supernatural; it is a reasonable faith, which can be argued and proved on reasonable grounds. It has to be done in humility and fear of God, without offending another man’s self respect. Ever since Paul and Peter the Apostles, and then through the Church Fathers, and the Christian philosophers, writers and leaders of Reformation and later, defending our faith has been the normal duty of the Christians.

Today in the 21^st century things are not very different from that prevailed in the 1^st century AD, when Paul and Peter lived. We are living in a pluralistic society which values relativism and syncretism. A Hindu friend would put it casually ‘all gods are the same; all religions are but different paths to the same god.’ Another Hindu would ask ‘why was God so cruel and indifferent that He did not come to the help of Jesus when he was crucified?’ A Muslim would say ‘Jesus was not the one who was crucified, but someone else died in his place; Jesus was taken to the heavens before he was crucified, so he never died.’ Another person might say ‘Jesus was a wise teacher, a great philosopher like Buddha, and not a God.’ ‘How do we know that what was written some 2000 years back was really true?’

How do we encounter such questions and doubts? How do we answer them? These questions are asked not by vindictiveness, but because the people of other faiths do not understand and know about Christ and Christianity. Along with a knowledge of what is written in the Bible and its books, we need to know more about the history of the secular world around the time of Christ and later, history of Christianity, the backgrounds of the biblical books written, about the authors of the various books written and the context in which they wrote and much more to give suitable answers to these questions. A study of Apologetics would take you through all these and equip you to answer the critics in a confident manner with facts and reason it out with the skeptics in a friendly manner.

Is The New Testament Reliable?

As you know there are 27 books in the NT; first four are gospels, dealing with the birth, life, ministry, teachings of Christ and his death and resurrection. Then appended is the historical book, the Acts, which narrates the spread of Christianity from Jerusalem to Judah and Samaria and to the Roman world at large. Thirteen of Paul’s letters or Epistles follow this; then is Hebrew whose authorship is in doubt and after that comes 1 & 2 Peter, 1-3 John, Jude and then the Apocalyptic book Revelation which is the last in the list.

So, how do we know that these books are authentic? What are the norms with which we can prove our case? For this express purpose, we will look at the Documentary evidences, evidence of Eye-witness accounts, evidence through Chain of custody, corroborative evidences from other writers of secular books and writings of first and second centuries AD and finally Archaeological evidences to support the claim that what has been written in the NT books are true and reliable.

As I am self-imposing a limit of four pages per blog, I need to stop here and continue this in the next blog which, I assure, will come by next week. You can take this blog as an introductory one. I will take up the Documentary evidences in my next blog. Till then bear with me and good bye. God bless you all.

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[1] I had taken a two years sabbatical for the purpose.