Ancient Non-Christian Evidence for the Historical Existence of Jesus

Ancient Non-Christian Evidence for the Historical Existence of Jesus

Many skeptics (including a few popular authors) argue that there is no historical evidence for the existence of Jesus of Nazareth outside the New Testament (which they don’t consider reliable, even though it is, but that’s another topic for another blog). However this simply isn't true. There are several ancient non-biblical references to Jesus of Nazareth outside the New Testament. These sources attest to his being a Jewish teacher and prophet, his execution by Roman Prefect of Judaea Pontius Pilate, and the fact that his followers "worship[ed] him as a god." Do they prove he really was the preexistent, divine Son of God, the Second member of the Trinity and that he really was resurrected? No. They don't.  But they are proof of Jesus' historical existence and of the fact that the earliest Christians worshiped him as God incarnate. Below are the main ancient non-Christian references to Jesus of Nazareth, with the dates of their composition.

From Jewish historian Flavius Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews, 18.3.3 (ca. AD 93):

Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ, and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians so named from him are not extinct at this day.

Nearly all scholars, whether Jewish, Christian or atheist, accept that a "core" of this passage, called the "Testimonium Flavianum" or "TF" for short, is genuine, however many think that an anonymous Christian later interpolated certain words/phrases into it to make it read more favorable to Jesus, thus it reads in the form we now know it. However they have reconstructed what Josephus' original probably looked like, something like:

At this time there appeared Jesus, a wise man. For he was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people who receive the truth with pleasure. And he gained a following among many Jews and among many of Gentile origin. And when Pilate, because of an accusation made by the leading men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so. And up until this very day the tribe of Christians (named after him) had not died out.

What we’re left with is language that looks and sounds exactly like something Josephus would write; it uses many words and catchphrases Josephus uses. Words and catchphrases not likely to be used by a Christian (such as the phrase “wise man” and the fact that it says Jesus gained a significant Gentile following, when, as Christians would know, but Josephus might not, the gospels state that Jesus restricted his earthly ministry primarily to Jews; only after his resurrection did the Church begin to evangelize Greeks).

Furthermore, had an anonymous Christian simply made up the whole episode, they’d have surely placed it after the material on John the Baptist, as in the gospels the material about follows that of John the Baptist, instead of in the section on the excesses of Pontius Pilate, which is where Josephus actually placed it.

In 1971 Jewish Professor Shlomo Pines discovered a 10th century Melchite Arabic Christian text of the TF-a text not in the standard family of GK copies of Josephus. The manuscript in question appears in the "Book of the Title" written by Agapius, a 10th century Christian Arab and Melkite bishop of Hierapolis:

For he says in the treatises that he has written in the governance of the Jews: At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus, and his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon their loyalty to him. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion, and that he was alive. Accordingly they believed that he was the Messiah, concerning whom the Prophets have recounted wonders.

This Arabic translation is important because it is not a Greek translation that was dependent upon the Greek Eusebian family of translations of Josephus, but an independent Arabic version. The copyist who made this translation would be unlikely to have had access to the Greek version. What all this means is that we have multiple, independent manuscript attestation for the same thing (the TF) arguing against the whole of the TF being a forgery. Furthermore, the Arabic version references Jesus' resurrection however unlike the GK versions, it qualifies it by saying that his disciples reported that he appeared to them alive three days later, which sounds much more like what the Jewish Josephus would've actually written. Perhaps this Arabic version, then, is evidence that the Greek version of the TF as we know it is actually a little closer to Josephus' original than we thought? 

Regardless, a core of the TF is accepted as authentic by most Josephan and New Testament scholars.

From Antiquities 20.9.1:

But the younger Ananus who, as we said, received the high priesthood, was of a bold disposition and exceptionally daring; he followed the party of the Sadducees, who are severe in judgment above all the Jews, as we have already shown. As therefore Ananus was of such a disposition, he thought he had now a good opportunity, as Festus was now dead, and Albinus was still on the road; so he assembled a council of judges, and brought before it the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ, whose name was James, together with some others, and having accused them as lawbreakers, he delivered them over to be stoned. . . .

Nearly all historians believe the above reference is totally genuine.

From the Roman historian Cornelius Tacitus' Annals (ca. 115 AD) 15.44:2-8:

Consequently, to get rid of the report [that he was responsible for Rome's burning], Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome. . . 

Tacitus was a very careful, deliberate historian, not prone to reporting hearsay. He was also no friend of Christians. True, he and Pliny were friends thus Tacitus could’ve gotten his information on Jesus from Pliny however as Annals 15.53 indicates, Tacitus didn’t uncritically accept everything Pliny told him.

To the objection that no church fathers quoted Tacitus’ reference to Jesus, so it must be bogus, I would answer, why would they? The reference is extremely unflattering to Jesus and the Christians thus no church father would want to draw attention to it for that reason, and besides, Jesus’ historical existence was never questioned in antiquity. Thus, there was no need to prove Jesus existed since nobody questioned that.

It is true that Tacitus refers to Pilate as a procurator rather than the more accurate prefect however this in itself isn’t sufficient cause to reject his testimony. A procurator was a financial administrator who acted as the Emperor’s personal agent whereas a prefect was a military official however in a backwater province like Judea there was not much difference between these two positions. Furthermore, historians are aware that these terms were often used interchangeably by ancient historians, such as Philo and Josephus, who use both terms to describe the same office. It’s also possible that Pilate held both positions simultaneously. And of course it’s also possible that Tacitus, knowing that prefect was the term used from 6-41 AD whereas procurator was the term used from 44-66, may have been using the term his readers at the time were more familiar with.

From the Roman historian Gaius Suetonius Tranquillas' Claudius (ca. 115 AD) 25:

Because the Jews at Rome caused continuous disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he [Emperor Claudius] expelled them from the city.

Note: This is confirmed in the NT text Acts of Apostles 18:2:

There he [the apostle Paul] met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul went to see them. . .

From Suetonious' Nero, 16:

After the great fire at Rome . . . punishments were also inflicted on the Christians, a sect professing a new and mischievous religious belief.

From the Roman governor Pliny the Younger's letter to the Emperor Trajan (ca. 112 AD) Vol. II, X:96, from his collected "Letters." Pliny had taken action against Christians and was writing to Trajan to explain his actions and ask for further clarification as to how to deal with this illegal faith:

They [the Christians] were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verses a hymn to Christ, as to a god, and bound themselves by a solemn oath, not to any wicked deeds, but never to falsify their word, nor deny a trust when they should be called upon to deliver it up; after which it was their custom to separate, and then reassemble to partake food-but food of an ordinary and innocent kind.

This reference does two things—first, it is evidence that Jesus existed, and, secondly, it is extremely early non-Christian evidence for the Church worshiping Jesus as God incarnate. It dispels the old skeptic argument that Jesus’ deity was a very late innovation by the Gentile Church. Like Tacitus, Pliny was also no friend to the Christians and would not be prone to exaggerate details about a religious sect he was under orders to prosecute. Indeed, the reason he was writing Trajan was for more precise instructions on how to proceed.

From 2nd century AD Greek satirist Lucian of Samosata's The Death of Peregrine, 11-13:

The Christians, you know, worship a "man" to this day-the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on their account . . . You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on faith, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property.

From a letter from Syrian ruler Mara Bar Serapion, in prison, to his son Serapion (ca. late 1st-3rd century AD). Mara Bar Serapion is writing from prison to encourage his son to emulate wise teachers of history:

What advantage did the Athenians gain from putting Socrates to death? Famine and plague came upon them as a judgment for their crime. What advantage did the men of Samos gain from burning Pythagoras? In a moment their land was covered with sand. What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise King? It was just after that that their kingdom was abolished [in 70 AD]. God justly avenged these three wise men: the Athenians died of hunger; the Samaritans were overwhelmed by the sea; the Jews, ruined and driven from their land, live in complete dispersion. But Socrates did not die for good; he lived on in the statue of Hera. Nor did the wise King die for good; he lived on in the teaching he had given.

This one doesn’t reference Jesus by name, but what other “wise king” did the Jews execute prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70?

From the historian Thallus' history of the world (ca. 52 AD). The original work has been lost and exists only in fragmentary citations of other historians. One such historian was Julius Africanus, writing ca. 221 AD. It is debated whether Thallus was the wealthy Samaritan referred to by Josephus who was made a freedman by Emperor Tiberius and who loaned money to King Herod Agriipa I. In writing about Jesus' crucifixion and the subsequent earthquake and darkness reported in the gospels, Julius Africanus quotes a reference by Thallus to a great darkness:

On the whole world there pressed a most fearful darkness; and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. This darkness Thallus, in the third book of his "History," calls, as appears to me without reason, an eclipse of the sun.

Obviously not a reference to Jesus, but to the great darkness that the gospels say occurred during his crucifixion.

From the Jewish Talmud, Sanhedrin 43a (ca. 70-200 AD):

On the eve of the Passover Yeshu [Jesus] was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald went forth and cried, "He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy. Any one who can say anything in his favor, let him come forward and plead on his behalf." But since nothing was brought forward in his favour he was hanged on the eve of the Passover!

There are other possible references to Jesus in the Talmud however these are disputed.

But there are also extremely early non-Biblical Christian references to Jesus.

From the early Church Father Clement of Rome (ca. 90-125 AD):

The Apostles received the Gospel for us from the Lord Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ was sent forth from God. So then Christ is from God and the Apostles are from Christ. Both therefore came of the will of God in the appointed order. Having therefore received a charge, and having been fully assured through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ and confirmed in the word of God with full assurace of the Holy Ghost, they went forth with glad tidings that the kingdom of God should come. So preaching everywhere in country and town, they appointed their first-fruits, when they had proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops and deacons unto them that should believe.

Then there's a reference from Ignatius, bishop of Antioch (ca. 110-115 AD):

Jesus Christ who was of the race of David, who was the Son of Mary, who was truly born and ate and drank, was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, was truly crucified and died in the sight of those in heaven and on earth and those under the earth; who, moreover was truly raised from the dead, His Father having raised Him, who in like fashion will so raise us also who believe in him.

There are many other extremely early non-biblical Christian references to Jesus-these are just two.

Taken individually these references might not look like much, but taken together they look very impressive. To the extent that the overwhelming majority of scholars and historians believe these references are authentic. These ancient chroniclers were all either hostile or indifferent to Christianity, and the historians among them had the reputation of being careful, deliberate historians, not prone to repeating gossip or urban legends. 

Few educated people, certainly few academics, question Jesus' existence. Yet many religious skeptics (not all) are resistant to even believing that Jesus existed at all, as if to admit that Jesus existed also forces you to admit that he was/is the resurrected Messiah, when these are actually two different arguments. Even the liberal academic, former co-founder and Fellow of the Jesus Seminar, Prof. John Dominic Crossan, who doesn't believe in either Jesus' deity or his resurrection (he believes Jesus’ dead body was eaten by wild dogs) asserts:

That he [Jesus] was crucified is as sure as anything historical ever can be. (Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, p. 145)

Commenting on the ancient evidence for Jesus of Nazareth, NT scholar Prof. Craig Evans of Arcadia Divinity School writes:

No serious historian of any religious or nonreligious stripe doubts that Jesus of Nazareth really lived in the first century and was executed under the authority of Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea and Samaria. Though this may be common knowledge among scholars, the public may well not be aware of this. . . . (Craig A. Evans and NT Wright, Jesus, The Final Days: What Really Happened, p. 3). 

In fact, of the literally thousands of New Testament scholars and academic historians worldwide, I only know of two--Richard Carrier and Robert Price, who seriously question Jesus' historical existence. Only they and a handful of "Jesus mythicists," such as popular authors G. A. Wells dispute Jesus' historical existence. In my opinion, to dispute Jesus' historical existence is akin to arguing for a flat earth.

Sources: 

 Bart D. Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth

Craig A. Evans, Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels

Craig A. Evans and N. T. Wright, Jesus, the Final Days: What Really Happened

 

Gary Habermas, The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ

Timothy Paul Jones, Conspiracies and the Cross

Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews.

John P. Meier, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus

E. P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus

Cornelius Tactitus, The Annals of Imperial Rome

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillas, The Twelve Caesars

N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God.

N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God

N. T. Wright, Who Was Jesus?

N. T. Wright and Marcus Borg, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions

Edwin M. Yamauchi, "Jesus Outside the New Testament," in Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus, ed. by Michael Wilkins and J. P. Moreland

Christopher Price, "Did Josephus Refer to Jesus?" at: http://www.bede.org.uk/Josephus.htm

The Talmud, Mishna & Gemara at: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/talmud_&_mishna.html

“The Testimony of Tacitus” at: http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexist/tacitus.html

Excerpts from the Gnostic Gospels

Excerpts from the Gnostic Gospels Showing their Radically Different Cosmology and Theology.

The so-called "Gnostic gospels" have been wildly popular over the past several decades, in particular ever since Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code was published. I am convinced that the majority of people who are so enthralled with the Gnostic gospels really don't understand them. My first blog was on ancient Gnosticism and its resurgence of popularity. This fourth blog will examine what the Gnostic gospels actually teach, and whether it constitutes anything which could be called "good news."

As should become apparent shortly, the so-called “Gnostic gospels,” were rejected from the NT canon for very good reasons. Firstly, they were all written too late—the earliest Gnostic texts only date from ca. 150 AD, long after the NT gospels were completed and being quoted as sacred scripture.

Secondly, the Gnostic texts teach an alien cosmology and theology. Essentially, Gnosticism was Platonism on steroids. In Platonism, the abstract was more real than the concrete or physical; in Platonism the created material universe is a shadow or copy of the real, eternal realm of the Forms (concepts like Goodness; Beauty; Truth; Justice; etc.). Gnostics took this a step further, saying that the physical universe was the evil creation of a false, imposter god, often identified with the Hebrew God Yahweh. At creation, certain “divine sparks” became trapped in physical bodies. Jesus, in Christian Gnosticism (there were pagan forms of it) came to earth to teach these (mostly male) “spiritual people” how to realize their divinity, free their divine spark, and escape the constraints of physical existence (kind of like the Ancients in the three Stargate series). In Gnosticism Jesus’ body is just an illusion, or one that the Christ spirit merely takes over and inhabits, and at his crucifixion, he switches places with Simon, who is killed in his place. In Gnosticism, the original sin was creation. Gnostics tended to be anti-creation, anti-feminine; anti-Jewish; and though some were libertines, others were aesthetics. Of the fifty-two Gnostic texts discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1947, only five actually indentify themselves as gospels. The italics in what follows are mine.

On the Mistake of Creation.

From the Gospel of Philip, ca. 180-250 AD:

“The world came about through a mistake. For he who created it wanted to create it imperishable and immortal. He fell short of attaining his desire. For the world was never imperishable, nor, for that matter, was he who made the world.”—The Gospel of Philip, 75

.

From the Gospel of Mary, ca. 120-180 AD:

"Matter gave birth to a passion that has no equal, which proceeded from something contrary to nature. Then there arises a disturbance in the whole body, That is why I said to you, 'Be of good courage,' and if you are discouraged, be encouraged in the presence of different forms of nature. He who has ears to hear, let him hear."—Gospel of Mary 8:2b-5.

From The Treatise on the Resurrection, ca. 170-200:

“Strong is the system of the Pleroma; small is that which broke loose and became the world.” –The Treatise on the Resurrection 46:35-38.

From The Gospel of Truth, ca. 250-350 AD:

“Ignorance of the Father brought about anguish and terror; and the anguish grew solid like a fog, so that no one was able to see. For this reason error became powerful; it worked on its own matter foolishly, not having known the truth. It set about with a creation, preparing with power and beauty the substitute for the truth.” –Gospel of Truth 17:10-20.

The Contemptible Nature of the Human Body.

From the Gospel of Philip, ca. 180-250 AD:

”No one will hide a large valuable object in something large, but many a time one has tossed countless thousands into a thing worth a penny.  Compare the soul. It is a precious thing and it came to be in a contemptible body.” –Gospel of Philip 56: 25-26.

From the Book of Thomas the Contender, ca. 150-225 AD:

“But these visible bodies survive by devouring creatures similar to them, with the result that the bodies change. Now that which changes will decay and perish, and has no hope of life from then on, since that body is bestial. So just as the body of beasts perishes, so also these formations perish. Do they not derive from intercourse like that of the beasts? If it (the body) derives from intercourse, how will it beget anything different from beasts?”—Gospel of Thomas the Contender 139:4-10.

Androgyny as the Ideal State.

From The Gospel of Philip, ca. 180-250 AD:

“When Eve was still in Adam death did not exist. When she was separated from him death came into being. If he enters again and attains his former self, death will be no more.” -  The Gospel of Philip, 68:25.

“If the Woman had not separated from the man, she should not die with the man. His separation became the beginning of death. Because of this Christ came to repair the separation which was from the beginning and again unite them. But the woman is united to her husband in the bridal chamber. Indeed, those who have united in the bridal chamber will no longer be separated. Thus Eve separated from Adam because it was not in the bridal chamber that she united with him. – The Gospel of Phillip, 70:10-20.

From The Exegesis of the Soul, ca. 200-225 AD:

“Wise men of old gave the soul a feminine name. Indeed she is female in her nature as well. She even has her womb.

“As long as she was alone with the father, she was virgin and in form androgynous.” –The Exegesis of the Soul 27:20-25.

On the Undesirability of Femaleness.

From Zostrianos, ca. 260-300 AD:

“Flee from the madness and the bondage of femaleness and choose for yourself the salvation of maleness. You have not come to suffer; rather, you have come to escape your bondage.” –Zostrianos 139: 5-8.

From The Gospel of Thomas, ca. 175-200 AD:

“Simon Peter said to them, ‘Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.’

“Jesus said, ‘I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she, too, may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.’” –Gospel of Thomas, saying 114.

From The Dialogue of the Savior, ca. 120-180 AD:

“The Lord said, ‘Pray in the place where there is no woman.’”

“Matthew said, ’Pray in the place where there is no woman, he tells us, meaning, “Destroy the works of womanhood,” not because there is any other manner of birth, but because they will cease giving birth.’” –The Dialogue of the Savior 144: 16-20.

The Spirit-Being Jesus  Takes Over Another’s Body.

From The Second Treatise of the Great Seth:

“I [Jesus] visited a bodily dwelling. I cast out the one who was in it first, and I went in. . . . I am the one who was in it, not resembling him who was in it first. For he was an earthly man, but I, I am from above the heavens. I did not refuse to become a Christ, but I did not reveal myself to them . . .” ­–Second Treatise of the Great Seth 51:25-29; 30-52:10.

There is No Sin.

From The Gospel of Mary, ca. 120-180 AD:

“Peter said to him, ‘Since you have explained everything to us, tell us this also: What is the sin of the world?’ The Savior said, ‘There is no sin, but it is you who make sin when you do the things that are like the nature of adultery, which is called “sin.”’ –The Gospel of Mary 7:12-14.

Jesus Doesn’t Suffer or Die.

From The Second Treatise of the Great Seth, ca. date unknown:

“And I [Jesus] did not die in reality but in appearance lest I be put to shame by them because these are my kinsfolk. . . . For my death which they think happened, happened to them in their error and blindness, since they nailed their man unto their death. . . . It was another, their father, who drank the gall and the vinegar; it was not I. They struck me with the reed; it was another, Simon, who bore the cross on his shoulder. . .  And I was laughing at their ignorance.” –Second Treatise of the Great Seth 55:290; 30-35; 56-9-20.

From The Apocalypse of Peter, ca. 200-225 AD:

“The Savior said to me, ‘He whom you saw on the tree, glad and laughing, this is the living Jesus. But this one into whose hands and feet they drive the nails is his fleshly part, which is the substitute being put to shame, the one who came into being in his likeness. . . .

“And he said to me, ‘Be strong, for you are the one to whom these mysteries have been given, to know them through revelation, that he whom they crucified is the first-born and the home of demons, and the stony vessel in which they dwell, of Elohim, of the cross, which is under the Law. But he who stands near him is the living Savior, the first in him, whom they seized and released, who stands joyfully looking at those who did him violence, while they are divided among themselves. Therefore he laughs at their lack of perception, knowing that they are born blind. So then the one susceptible to suffering shall come, since the body is the substitute. But what they released was my incorporeal body. But I am the intellectual Spirit filled with radiant light.” –­Apocalypse of Peter 81:5-24; 82:18-83:15.

From the First Apocalypse of James, ca. 180-250 AD:

“The Lord said, ‘James, do not be concerned for me, or for this people. I am he who was within me. Never have I suffered in any way, nor have I been distressed. And this people has done me no harm.

No Bodily Resurrection of Jesus or Anyone else.

From The Exegesis on the Soul, ca. 200-25 AD:

“Now it is fitting that the soul regenerate herself and become again as she formerly was. The soul then moves of her own accord. And she received the divine nature from the father for her rejuvenation, so that she might be restored to the place where originally she had been. This is the resurrection that is from the dead. This is the ransom from captivity.” –The Exegesis of the Soul 134: 9-14.

.From The Gospel of Philip, ca. 180-250 AD:

“Those who say the Lord died first and then rose up are in error, for he rose up first and then died. If one does not first attain the resurrection he will not die.” –Gospel of Philip 56:15-17.

After having examined what the ancient Gnostics actually believed about God, matter and creation, the feminine, procreation, and resurrection from their own texts, I honestly can't see anything that could be called "good news." The only way to do so is to reinterpret these texts to fit modern presuppositions, which is what many people, both scholars and ordinary folks do. But the Gnostics themselves wouldn't recognize these reinterpretations. The Gnostics were not a group of warm, fuzzy, environmentally friendly, pro-feminine, post-modernists who sat in a circle holding hands while singing Kum-Ba-Ya. They could be every bit as exclusivist, intolerant and dogmatic as the orthodox catholic Christians are said to have been, if not more so.

So it should be a no-brainer why the orthodox catholic Church rejected these texts and their alien cosmology and theology.

Sources:

Darrell Bock, Missing Gospels: Uncovering the Truth about Alternative Christianities

Philip Jenkins, Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost its Way

James M. Robinson, ed. The Nag Hammadi Library

Peter Jones, Stolen Identity: The Conspiracy to Reinvent Jesus (in church library)

The Nag Hammadi texts are online at: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/gnostics.html

How We Got the New Testament Canon

How We Got the New Testament Canon

Notes about the NT Canon:

Canon: from the ancient Greek word kanon, meaning  a rod, esp. a straight rod used as a rule; a rule or standard; a series or list, as in the canon of the New Testament. The list of Christian texts which are acknowledged to be, in a unique sense, the rule of belief and practice of the Church. (Bruce, pp. 17-18)

The Criteria of Canonicity used by the Early Church Fathers:

The early church didn't pick gospels at random (eenie, meenie, minie, moe, pick a gospel by the toe), nor based upon which ones they liked better than others. They actually had criteria they used. Now this criteria isn't explicitly stated in any one text however it is apparent from a careful reading of the earliest fathers that to be considered canonical 

1. A text had to have been written by an apostle (for example Matthew or John) or the disciple of an apostle (for example Mark or Luke)

2. A text had to date from the first century AD

3. A text had to be widely read and recognized throughout the whole church.

4. A text had to teach the faith the church had always proclaimed orally.

As the Muratorian Canon Fragment of ca. 175-200 AD demonstrates, just because a text was wildly popular didn't mean it would make the cut. The Shepherd of Hermas was a hugely popular Christian text that, as the Muratorian Fragment says, was rejected because it didn't meet two of the criteria of canonicity: 

"But Hermas wrote the Shepherd very recently, in our times, in the city of Rome, while bishop Pius, his brother, was occupying the [episcopal] chair of the church of the city of Rome. And therefore it ought indeed to be read; but it cannot be read publicly to the people in church either among the Prophets, whose number is complete, or among the Apostles, for it is after [their] time." 

So if, as many skeptics claim, the early church simply chose the gospels and letters it liked or agreed with for inclusion in the canon, and tossed out those it didn't, Hermas and other popular texts would've been included in the canon. But they weren't.

Paul’s Letters:

Many people aren't aware that the majority of Paul’s letters were written before the first gospel.  Indeed Paul is our first written witness to Jesus Christ. I Corinthians 15:3-7 is an early Christian creedal statement that all scholars, whether Christian, Jewish, agnostic or atheist, consider authentic:

For I handed on to you as first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day, in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. (NRSV)

Drs. Gary Habermas and Mike Licona comment:

How is this creed dated? Jesus’ crucifixion has been dated at A. D. 30 by most scholars, who also date Paul’s conversion to between 31 and 33. Paul  went away for three years after his conversion, afterwards visiting Peter and James in Jerusalem (Gal. 1:18-19). Many scholars believe Paul received the creed from Peter and James at this time. . . . Accordingly, even if Paul was not given the creed at this time, he learned information from two of the most prominent disciples who had known Jesus. (Habermas and Licona, p. 260, n. 25)

Prof. Timothy Paul Jones says:

So how can scholars know that these words actually came from early oral history? In the first place, Paul introduced this summation with two Greek words that clearly indicated it was oral tradition. These two words were paradidomi  (“handed over” . . .) and paralambano (“received”). Ancient readers understood these two words—when used together—to imply that the writer was quoting words that he or she intended to become oral tradition. In this way, Paul clearly indicated that he was about to pass on oral tradition.

There are also clues in the text that suggest where and when the tradition began. Even though Paul was writing in the Greek language to Greek people, he calls Simon Peter by his Aramaic name, Cephas . Then, there’s the repeated phrase “and that”—a repetition that seems odd unless you’re familiar with Hebrew or Aramaic. The phrase rendered “and that” is the Greek translation of a familiar Hebrew and Aramaic method for joining clauses. Based on the vocabulary and grammatical patterns in these verses, it seems that this tradition originally circulated in the Aramaic language. . . .

Most likely, Paul learned this tradition around AD 35 when he visited the city of Jerusalem. (Jones, pp. 91-92)  

There is good evidence that by the end of the first century AD, collections of Paul’s letters were in circulation. Certainly by the beginning of the 3^rd century, a corpus of 13 Pauline letters existed and was considered canonical. (Patzia, p. 88)

II Peter 3:16 says:

So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures. (NRSV)

Concerning this text from II Peter Drs. Andreas J. Kostenberger and Michael J. Kruger, write:

Most notably, this passage does not refer to just one letter of Paul, but to a collection of Paul’s letters (how many is unclear) that had already begun to circulate throughout the churches—so much so that Peter could refer to “all his [Paul’s] letters” and expect that his audience would understand that to which he was referring. . . . Peter’s reference to the letters of Paul as “Scripture” is made quite casually, as if he expected his readers would have already known about Paul’s writings and would agree that they are Scripture  . . .  Peter does not give any idea that Paul would have objected to the idea that his letters would be considered “Scripture.” Moreover, Peter himself does not seem to think it is odd that a letter from an apostle would be considered authoritative Scripture by the communities that received it. . . . (Kostenberger and Kruger The Heresy of Orthodoxy, pp. 127-128)

Even if, as some scholars believe, II Peter is an anonymous text dating to ca. 100-125 AD, it is still evidence for the fact that certain letters of Paul were regarded as canonical at a very early date.

By 90-100 AD, Christian texts like the Didache (The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles) and I Clement were quoting from several of Paul’s letters as if they were sacred Scripture.

Dates of Composition of the Pauline Letters:

Text                 Date

          

Galatians   ca. 49-56 AD

I Thessalonians   ca. 50 AD

II Thessalonians ca. 52 AD

I Corinthians ca. 55 AD

II Corinthians ca. 57 AD

Romans   ca. 58 AD

Colossians   ca. 61 AD

Ephesians   ca. 61 AD

Philippians ca. 61 AD

Philemon   ca. 62 AD

I and II Timothy and Titus, between ca. 64 and ca. 67 AD

Dates of Composition of the NT Gospels:

Text                 Date:       

     

Mark   ca. 65-70 AD                                          

Matthew   ca. 65-75                                            

Luke-Acts (orig. written as one narrative) ca. 65-70 (Most        

Likely Acts dates to before Paul’s death under Nero

ca. 67 AD.

John,  ca. mid 60s AD/90s AD                                                 

Dates of Composition of the Other NT Letters

Text                   Date:

James  ca. 52 AD

Hebrews   ca. 65 AD

Apocalypse (Revelation) ca. 67-69 AD/ mid-90s AD

 Jude   ca. 65-70 AD

 I, II and III John ca. 90s AD

I and II Peter   ca. 60s AD/ ca. 100-125 AD

Note: The preceding are the generally accepted dates. Some scholars (such as N. T. Wright and the late J. A. T. Robinson) believe all of the NT may have been written before the fall of Jerusalem in AD 69. I incline towards this view.

Dates of Composition of Some of the Apocryphal and Gnostic “Gospels” and Why They Were Rejected from the Canon:

Didache:  Ca. 90-100 AD:    Though perfectly orthodox and in agreement with the NT, it couldn’t be connected to an apostle.

Epistle of Barnabas:   Ca. 90-100 AD:   Though popular, rejected because it contains a false prophecy and was anti-Jewish in tone.   

Shepherd of Hermas: Ca. 150 AD:  Though popular, not a 1^st century text written by an apostle, but a mid-2^nd century text written by Hermas, brother of Pius, Bishop of Rome.

                                                                                                                

Diatesseron: Ca. 173 AD:   A late 2^nd century Syrian harmony of the NT Gospels by Tatian, a student of Justin Martyr.         

Gospel of the Hebrews:  1^st century AD?:  Lost by the 2^nd century AD. The possible Hebrew original of Matthew.

Gospel of Peter:  2^nd century AD: Not actually written by Peter and has a docetic flavor (the physical reality of Jesus is downplayed.)

Gospel of Judas: Ca.   140-160 AD:   A dualistic (two gods), Sethian Gnostic, anti Jewish, anti- creation text in which Jesus dies but isn’t resurrected. His death is to show an enlightened few (mostly male) "spiritual people" how to escape the material world and discover their inner divine spark.                                                                                                         

Gospel of Thomas:  Ca. 175-200 AD:  A proto-Gnostic, dualist, anti-creation, anti-Jewish, anti-feminine (see saying 114) text which was heavily dependent upon the NT gospels, esp. Tatian’s late  2^nd c. Syrian gospel harmony the Diatesseron.  Thomas teaches initiates to realize their divinity and escape the constraints of the space-time universe.

                                                                                                 

Infancy Gospel of Thomas: Ca. 150 AD:  Not a 1^st century AD text, and presents many fantastic non-biblical legends about the infant and boy Jesus.  Unlike the NT gospels, this text shows no knowledge of 1^st century, 2nd Temple Palestinian Judaism. 

The Council of Nicaea and the Canon:

Skeptics and popular authors often assert that the NT canon was decided in 325 AD at the First Council of Nicaea (the second was in 787 AD) however Nicaea had nothing to do with the formation of the canon—that was for all practical purposes already decided long before 325 AD. Nicaea dealt with deciding the date to celebrate Christ’s resurrection, routine matters of clerical discipline, and, most importantly, dealt with the heresy of the presbyter Arius who denied Jesus’ full divinity and coexistence with/as God. The Nicene Creed was an outgrowth of this council.

Who Really Wrote the Gospels?

While it is true that the canonical gospels do not identify their authors, we have extremely early, 2^nd century attestation for their traditional authorship. For example, the 2^nd century Church father Papias of Hierapolis (ca. 60-140 AD), a disciple of the apostle John wrote:

The Presbyter [John] used to say this also: Mark, having become Peter’s interpreter wrote down accurately, but not in order, all that he remembered of the things said and done by the Lord. For he had not heard the Lord or been one of his followers, but later, as I said, a follower of Peter. Peter used to teach as the occasion demanded, without giving systematic arrangement to the Lord’s sayings, so that Mark did not err in writing down some things just as he recalled them. For he had one overriding purpose: to omit nothing that he had heard and to make no false statements in his account. (Eusebius, Bk 3.39, Maier trans. pp. 129-130)    

        

Polycarp of Smyrna (ca. 65-ca. 160 AD) wrote in 130 AD:

Matthew composed his Gospel among the Hebrews in their language [Hebrew], while Peter and Paul were preaching the Gospel in Rome and building up the church there. After their deaths, Mark-Peter’s follower, and interpreter—handed down to us Peter’s proclamation in written form. Luke, the companion of Paul, wrote in a book the Gospel proclaimed by Paul. Finally, John—the Lord’s own follower, the one who leaned against his very chest—composed the Gospel while living in Asia.

 Both Papias and Polycarp were only one generation removed from the apostles. Besides, no other authors were ever put forward in the early church for the gospels—not even by early 2^nd century heretics like Marcion, Basilides or Valentinus. Everyone took for granted that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote them. Besides which, ancient scrolls often had tags attached, which gave the author’s name. Over time, assuming they had them, these tags could’ve been lost from the NT gospels. (Jones, p. 98). Had the authorship of the gospels really been anonymous, according to Prof. Timothy Paul Jones:

Most likely, each church would’ve connected a different author with each Gospel. Churches in Asia Minor might have ascribed a Gospel to the Apostle Andrew, for example, while churches in Judea might have connected the same Gospel with Thaddeus or James or Jude. 

But what would be the likelihood that every group of Christians in the Roman Empire would come up with Mark’s name to describe the shortest Gospel or that everyone would name Matthew as the author of the Gospel that begins with a genealogy? And what’s the probability of every church in the Roman Empire choosing Luke as the writer of the Gospel that bears his name or selecting John’s name for the last of the New Testament Gospels? In mathematical terms, the answer would be pretty close to zero. In practical terms, the answer is, it ain’t gonna happen, baby. (Jones, pp. 101-102)

Early Quotations from the NT:

By ca. 90-100 AD, early Christian writers like the author of I Clement were quoting from the canonical NT as authoritative. For example, Clement quotes or alludes to: Titus, I Peter, Hebrews, Romans, I Cor., James, Matthew, and Luke.

In 110 AD, the martyr bishop Ignatius of Antioch quotes or alludes to: John, James, Acts, Galatians, I and II Timothy, II Thessalonians, Philippians, Matthew, Romans, Ephesians, Luke, I and II Cor., and possibly Revelation.

Canonical Books Accepted in the Roman Church by ca. 175-200 AD, from the Muratorian Canon Fragment: The Muratorian canon fragment (called a fragment because its first portion is missing) is a list of books accepted as canonical around 170/175-200 AD by the Roman Church. It was discovered in the 1700s by an Italian priest named Muratori (hence its designation Muratorian Canon Fragment). As can be seen, by ca. 175 nearly every book in our NT was already considered canonical, and those that weren’t eventually were.

Luke, John, Acts, I and II Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, I and II Thessalonians, Romans, Philemon, Titus, I and II Timothy, Jude, I and II John, Apocalypse (Revelation of John), Apocalypse of Peter (apocryphal, later rejected), Wisdom of Solomon (apocryphal, later rejected).

Matthew and Mark aren’t mentioned because the first part of the document where they were listed is torn hence the document begins with Luke. Hebrews and James aren’t mentioned.

Even heretics like Marcion of Sinope (ca. 100-ca. 160 AD) recognized only the canonical NT.

Marcion, a wealthy ship-owner, was born at Sinope, a seaport on the Black Sea of Asia Minor and was brought up in the apostolic faith. As an adult Marcion developed proto-Gnostic ideas, including a belief that the Gospel message and the New Testament were too Jewish, hence he withdrew from the Church and started his own sect. Marcion “re-worked” the New Testament, basically by dropping any Old Testament or Jewish references, and rejected all of the canonical New Testament writings save Luke’s gospel and the letters of Paul, again, edited to remove any doctrine or theology he thought was Jewish. Had there been any serious contenders for alternate gospels circulating in his day, like the Gospel of Thomas, Marcion would have used them, rather than mutilate the accepted New Testament texts.

In the early centuries of the Church (up to the 4^th c. AD), only seven texts now in our New Testament were ever disputed-they were: Philemon, Hebrews, James, II Peter, II John, III John, Jude.

All seven eventually gained canonical status—but even had they remained in dispute, we would lose no distinctive NT teaching about Christ or Christianity that isn’t contained in the other undisputed books.

The So-Called “Corruption of Scripture” by Christian Copyists:

As even the popular agnostic NT textual critic Bart Ehrman admits, 99% of the textual errors in the NT are innocent, accidental scribal errors, such as copying the same word or sentence twice, accidentally leaving out a word or sentence, misspelling a word, misreading a word in the original, etc. He admits that we are able to “reconstruct the oldest form of the words of the New Testament with reasonable (though not 100 percent) accuracy,” recovering “the oldest and earliest stage of the manuscript tradition for each of the books of the New Testament.” (Ehrman, The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture, p. 62) And of the remaining handful of genuine textual variants, none of them ultimately changes any essential teaching in the NT (despite Ehrman's insistence that these remaining variants are indeed serious). (Jones, p. 77).

The Truth about Oral History:

Some of Jesus’ teaching in the canonical gospels may have been written during his lifetime (at least one of his disciples, Levi/Matthew, as a tax collector, was literate, though some of the others likely were as well). The rest circulated as oral history. Skeptics often claim that oral history is unreliable, and cite the modern game “telephone,” where one person whispers a phrase to another person, who whispers it to another, and so on, and by the end of the game the original message gets terribly garbled, as proof.

However the telephone analogy is a bad example because what critics fail to realize is that the ancient cultures that produced the NT were oral societies, in which perhaps only 15-20% of the people could read. Hence the ancients put more stock in oral tradition than in written material. To ensure that the material was passed on accurately, there were safeguards in place. For one thing, it was a community endeavor, in which the community would correct the tradent (story-teller) if he got something wrong, thus, as Prof. Mark Strauss says, oral tradition was self-correcting all the way. Studies have been done over the past 30 years which demonstrate the ability of so-called “primitive” oral societies of accurately passing down oral history through several generations. Tradents were free to organize the material to meet the needs of the occasion, and certain peripheral details might vary, however they were not free to drop/add anything important. (Eddy and Boyd) As Dr. J. P. Moreland says, this was sacred tradition, not simply what Joe was having for dinner Wednesday night.

The Superiority of the NT over any Other Ancient Texts:

There are presently about 5,500 ancient manuscript copies and manuscript fragments in existence today of the New Testament in Greek alone. In addition, we also have over 19,000 ancient manuscript copies of the New Testament in Syriac, Latin, Coptic, and Aramaic. So that the total number of ancient manuscript copies of the New Testament is something like 24,000. Compared to other ancient writings you thus discover that the NT manuscripts far outweigh any of the others in both quality and quantity. There are literally thousands more ancient New Testament manuscripts than any other ancient texts. The internal consistency of the New Testament texts is about 99.5% accurate and textually pure. No other ancient texts even come close! (Slick)

Our earliest copies of many ancient Greek and Roman texts date to several centuries after they were originally written. For example, our oldest manuscript copy of Plato, originally written between 427-347 BC, date to 900 AD—1200 years later and there are only seven of them! Our earliest copies of Aristotle, originally written between 384-322 BC, date to 1100 AD—1400 years later and we only have forty-nine copies of them. And our earliest copies of the writings of Julius Caesar, originally written between 100-44 BC, date only to 900 AD—1000 years later and we only have ten copies! But we have over five thousand ancient manuscript copies of the New Testament, a few gospel fragments which date to about 120 AD, a mere twenty years after the last gospel, John’s, was written! And our earliest complete New Testaments, Codices Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, date to approximately 350 AD, a mere two hundred-fifty years after the New Testament was written!  

Sources:

F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture

Paul Rhodes Eddy and Gregory A. Boyd, The Jesus Legend: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition

Bart D. Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth

Bart D. Ehrman, Jesus Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (and Why We Don’t Know About Them)

Eusebius of Caesarea, The Church History, trans. and ed. by Paul L. Maier

Craig A. Evans, Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels

James Garlow, The Da Vinci Codebreaker

Gary R. Habermas and Matthew Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus

Rudolph Kasser, Marvin Meyer and Gregor Wurst, The Gospel of Judas

Andreas J. Kostenberger and Michael J. Kruger, The Heresy of Orthodoxy: How Contemporary Culture’s Fascination with Diversity has Reshaped Our Understanding of Early Christianity

Timothy Paul Jones, Misquoting Scripture: A Guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehrman’s Misquoting Jesus

Arthur G. Patzia, The Making of the New Testament: Origin, Collection, Text and Canon at:

http://books.google.com/books/about/The Making  of  the  New  Testament.html?id=d7aRqeBaBp8C   

Nicholas Perrin, Thomas, the Other Gospel

William G. Rusch, The Trinitarian Controversy

N. T. Wright, Judas and the Gospel of Jesus: Have We Missed the Truth About Christianity?

Matt Slick, “Manuscript Evidence for Superior New Testament Reliability” at: http://carmi.org/manuscript-evidence

"The Muratorian Fragment" at: http://www.bible-researcher.com/muratorian.html

“Dating the New Testament: Writings of the Early Fathers,” at: http://www.datingthenewtestament.com/Fathers.htm 

Early Christian Writings at:  http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/index.html