The Continuing Debate on the Historicity of the Gospels: “Why Four Gospels? The Historical Origins of the Gospels”, by David Alan Black

Since I have been reading some of the latest literature on the historicity of the Gospels I thought I would ask my good friend, Bob Krupp, if he would weigh in on the controversy. I have known Bob as a Seminary professor and I turned to him as an expert in the field of the early church Fathers. I have been reading so much criticism of the Fathers as a source for the historicity of the Gospels, that I requested of Bob to write a book defending them. Bob wrote back to me and said that the book he would have written has already been written and of course he advised that I should read the book. Coming from a man of Bob’s caliber I immediately Amazoned the book and read it the day it arrived. Here are my thoughts on, “Why Four Gospels? The Historical Origins of the Gospels”.

As I began reading the book I understood Bob’s high regard for Black’s work. Black’s theory of the reliability of the Gospels depends entirely on the explanation of the early Church Fathers, such as: Papias of Hierapolis (60-130), Justin (100-165), Irenaeus (130-200), Clement of Alexandria (150-215), Tertullian (160-225), Origen (185-254), Eusebius (260-340), and others. Black lists all the fathers and their statements about the gospels in order to display the weight of Patristic evidence. These Fathers and others of the Ancient Church not only attest to the authority and reliability of the Four Gospels, but provide the historical process of their transmission. But, Black is not promoting his own theory; rather he is seeking to document in writing the theory presented by his colleague and friend, Bernard Orchard of The Gospel Research Institute in London. His theory is called, “The Fourfold-Gospel Hypothesis”, which according to these men was the ancient Church’s view of the Gospels. Thus, they simply see themselves as recovering what the Church Fathers taught. The title of the Hypothesis is based on the language of Ireneus, which tells you something about Orchard’s desire to stay close to the early fathers as “The” authorities on the Gospels.

The Fourfold-Gospel Hypothesis states that Matthew wrote the first gospel for the original church in Jerusalem, Luke was later commissioned by Paul to support his missionary efforts among the Gentiles, Mark was then written as a dictation of Peter’s lectures given to a Roman audience for the purpose of substantiating Matthew and Luke, and then last John was written to fill in missing information in the previous three Gospels and add critical theological features of Jesus. This is a very different scenario than what is painted by Ehrman and his Historical Critical approach to the Gospels. Ehrman and the critical scholars have adopted the 18th century Enlightenment theory that Mark was written first, then Matthew and Luke were written, but depended on Mark and a now lost source known as “Q”. “Q” would be the source information not contained in Mark. This theory is often called the, “Markan Priority”. Orchard and Black offer another explanation for the formation of Mark, which follows the accounts given by Clement of Alexandria. Mark is seen as a “bridge” gospel between Matthew and Luke. Clement says that Peter gave a series of lectures to a Roman audience which was then written down at the request of the Romans who were in attendance. Peter's assistant, Mark, wrote down the lectures, which became the Gospel of Mark. Orchard and Black have concluded that Peter used the scrolls of Matthew and Luke for his lecture material (to support Matthew and Luke as authentic gospels), but also including his own eyewitness experience (material include in Mark, but not Matthew and Luke). To Orchard and Black, this makes more sense than hypothesizing about a mysterious “Q” document that filled in the blanks between Mark and the other Gospels. Besides, with the historical documents provided by the Fathers, Black has the advantage over the Historical Critical approach by the fact that there has never been another source for the Gospels discovered, nor has another source been referred to anywhere in the history of the early church.

The key to accepting the Four-Fold Gospel Hypothesis is, of course, the acceptance of the church fathers as an accurate source of information about the historicity of the Gospels. So, Black spends more than 10% of the book cogently defending the Fathers as reliable sources of information. One of the most ironic facts Black uses to support the reliabililty of the Fathers is the current scholarship on Greek and Roman ancient history. These scholars, unlike the Historical Critical scholars of the Gospels, see the Church Fathers as completely reliable. Also, one of the interesting charges that Ehrman levels against the Fathers in his book, “Jesus Interrupted” is that the Gospels were anonymously written and only later was the authorship ascribed to the Gospels. This was done in order to give them apostolic authority to ward off other heretical writings. Black agrees that it wasn’t until the debates over heresy began in the middle of the second century that we find written attestation by the fathers that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were the authors, but he argues that apostolic authorship was never an issue. Authorship wasn’t officially affirmed in writing until the heresy debates began.

From a literary perspective, the book’s 90 pages are very readable and easily read in one evening. It is written as a summary of the Four-Fold Gospel Hypothesis and is not written for the scholar. So, in this sense it is a very good comparison read with Ehrman’s “Jesus Interrupted”, which is also not a scholarly presentation. One difference, however, is that Ehrman is broader in his scope and seeks to deal with a lot of other controversies beside the transmission of the Gospels. For instance, Black does not deal with any of the conflicts between the gospels, where Ehrman does. Black’s book will keep you focused on one issue, the reliable transmission of the Gospels. You'll have to get the conflicts answered in another book.

As I was reading Ehrman’s, “Jesus Interrupted” I felt strongly that this was a dangerous book for an uninformed reader. Ehrman presents his “Historical Critical” case that the Gospels are largely legendary without any question or debate. In fact, Ehrman even told the story in his book that when he lectures in churches about his Historical Critical Gospel theory people are often shaken in their faith and wonder why they have never heard of this view of the Gospels before. Well, he never suggests that his view is controversial and unorthodox! He simply asserts that the Historical Critical approach, that led him to distrust the Gospels, is unquestionable fact and accepted by the Biblical scholarship at large. It is very intimidating. However, when you read authors such as Bauckham and Black you find a very different and compelling approach in support of the historicity of the Gospels. This book read in conjunction with Bauckham’s, “Jesus and the Eyewitnesses” provides a very persuasive argument that the Gospels are real history. I like being fair and the stakes for truth are high, so I would recommend reading Ehrman and Black "before" making any conclusions.

Are The Gospels Historically Reliable? A Review of Bart Ehrman’s, "Jesus, Interrupted", and Richard Bauckham’s, "Jesus and the Eyewitnesses"

These are two of the latest and most compelling books written on the subject of the historicity of the Gospels. Bauckham’s book came out in 2006 and Ehrman’s in 2009. The books are written in very different styles and with different purposes. Ehrman’s book was written on a more popular level, while Bauckham’s book is written in the style of a doctoral dissertation. Reading Bauckham is like being served a meal, but he first takes you in to the kitchen to show you the recipes and process of how the meal is cooked. Ehrman’s book is the meal without the explanations. So, Bauckham is a more thorough, but complicated read. I felt like I had to plow through Bauckham to get to the interesting insights, because he spends so much time taking you to his sources and building his case. Ehrman was more enjoyable to read. You don’t have to know arguments A, B, and C in order to understand argument D, as you do with Bauckham. But, Bauckham is covering new ground with his ideas, so he does the right thing as a scholar to provide careful reasoning and support. Ehrman is no less scholarly than Bauckham, but Ehrman is writing to the masses who do not know about the controversy over the historicity of the Gospels. Part of his stated purpose is to expose the masses of church going Christians to the 200 year old system of Historical Criticism, which views the gospels as non-historical. He claims that the reason most Christians don’t know about this method of doing history is because scholars have not communicated it on a level that people can understand. He also blames it on seminary trained students who have not properly taught their congregations that the Gospels are unreliable historically. But, he never concludes that maybe these students do not agree with the Historical Critical Method. Rather, he attributes the confusion to the pastoral interest to see the Gospels as devotional rather than historical.

Ehrman’s thesis is that the gospels were written by unknown authors far removed from the actual events, who wrote in different places with differing agendas. This is why the gospels are full of discrepancies and therefore cannot be trusted to give us the real history of Jesus. Bauckham’s thesis is that the gospels were biographical accounts of Jesus’ life written within the living memory of the eyewitnesses and that the eyewitness testimony of the disciples was the basis for the written Gospels. Therefore, the Gospels can be trusted to give us the real history of Jesus. Here are several reasons Bauckham and Ehrman are diametrically opposed to each other:

First, and most foundational, they have differing theories of how we should "do" historical analysis of the Gospels. Ehrman explains that the Historical Critical method requires a skeptical and disinterested analysis of the text of the Bible, as well as comparing the texts with other related documents of the period. By “disinterested” he means you cannot have a theological or personal interest in the outcome of the study of the text. You want to let the text speak for itself without any bias, so that you can let the chips fall where they may. For instance, you cannot bring with you to the study of the Gospels the assumption that God inspired the text of the Gospels. That would be a theological interest that would keep a scholar from getting to the real history behind the text. Bauckham appears to be a textual critic, but unlike Ehrman he is not skeptical of the gospels as real history. His study leads him to the conclusion that ancient historians at the time of Christ had a very high view of historical accuracy because of their trust in eyewitness testimony. Bauckham’s theory of historical knowledge is based on what the ancient historians thought about history, whereas Ehrman’s theory applies a modernist skeptical understanding of history.

Second, Ehrman and Bauckham have conflicting views of how the history of Jesus was transmitted and then written down as the Gospels. Ehrman sees the transmission of the eyewitness testimonies as “oral tradition”. That is, the witnesses testified originally to one or more people and then the story was retold to the next person or group and so on down the line. Finally, after countless transmissions of the stories the gospels were written down as fragments with the gospels as the final product. The fragments were the basis for the synoptic gospels, written between 35 and 65 years after Jesus died. He compares the impossibility of trusting this kind of historical transmission with the well known example of the telephone game. A story is told to one person, then that person tells the story to the next person, so that by the time it passes through several people it is a different story. (pg. 147). Bauckham sees Ehrman’s theory as outdated and wrong headed, based on how the Ancients actually “did” their history. To him, the Historical Critical method of Ehrman does not take the Ancients seriously. Actually, Bauckham’s whole book is a refutation of the kind of historical theory that Ehrman espouses. I think this is what makes the comparison reading of these two books interesting. Bauckham makes the case that the Ancients were very distrustful of any historical accounts that were not rooted in eyewitness testimony and which were not written during the “living witness” of the person who witnessed the events. In other words, the gospel writers wrote down what was testified to them by the actual witnesses, or by trusted elders of the Christian Community who carefully preserved the testimony of the witnesses. The discrepancies or contradictions can be accounted for by the nature of the gospel literature as biographies and the various perspectives from which the witnesses saw the events unfold. Bauckham never deals with the actual discrepancies, as Ehrman does, but that is not his purpose. However, it is clear from the development of this theory that he would not see them as irreconcilable.

Third, Ehrman and Bauckham have a very different understanding of the reliability of eyewitness accounts. Basic to Bauckham’s theory is the reliability of testimonial evidence. He builds a case for accepting testimonial evidence as a valid means of gaining historically accurate information. He claims that it is as valid epistemologically as inference, perception and memory. He acknowledges that it requires trust and cross examination, but we can ultimately rely on it. After all, this is how the Ancients understood the recording of history; they would have been careful. Furthermore, Bauckham has a persuasive chapter on “Eyewitness Memory” where he develops his theory that eyewitness recollection, as in the case of the gospels, is highly reliable as a source of history. He builds his case upon memory studies and theory. Ehrman completely overlooks this kind of possibility and dismisses the eyewitness concept of history within the space of one paragraph, essentially “declaring” eyewitness testimony unreliable (page. 103). Bauckham builds a case that demonstrates the gospels to be eyewitness accounts that were embraced by the leadership and community of the earliest churches. The stories were kept faithfully in tact, according to Bauckham. He bases much of his support for this upon Papias, an early church historian. Papias’ writings do not survive, but fragments of his writings are recorded within the writings of others contemporary to him. Papias was a second generation believer who claimed to know “the elders” who had known the original disciples. Papias provides a history that supports the authorship of the gospels by Mark and Matthew based on the eyewitness testimony of the disciples. For instance, he claimed that Peter’s testimony was the basis for Mark’s gospel. Ehrman addresses the Papias question, but dismisses Papias as unreliable and therefore untrustworthy.

I must say that I found myself appreciative of Ehrman’s clear and fair presentation of the problems with the gospels. He showed a number of apparent contradictions between the Gospels that I think every thinking student of the Bible must deal with. However, I came away distrustful of Ehrman’s conclusions. He often makes the claim that the Bible is “full” of contradictions, which renders them untrustworthy. His chapter titles are very suggestive of this kind of “all-or-nothing” conclusion, “A World of Contradictions”, “A Mass of Variant Views”. He leaves no room for discussion about whether or not the discrepancies in the gospel texts can be reconciled. He does not present any opposing arguments. He simply states that the discrepancies are impossible to reconcile. But, what about Bauckham’s theory of the Ancient concept of doing history? Ehrman does not even address this theory, which appears to be a very valid approach. For all the claims that the Historical Critical Scholars make about being “historical” in their scholarship, I don’t see Ehrman addressing Bauckham’s historical approach to history. Perhaps he dismisses it as non-sense and unworthy of consideration?

Ehrman concludes the book with his understanding of who the “real” Jesus of history is. But, if we cannot trust the gospels to give us the “real” history, as Ehrman argues, then what is his source? As with all such historical critics Ehrman is left with a “pick-and-choose” approach to the Gospels for the discovery of the historical Jesus. A major criticism of those who utilize the Historical Critical Method to find the real historical Jesus is that the Historian creates his own Jesus. If you read those who follow Ehrman’s historical methodology you get a different picture of Jesus from each historian. There is the Jesus of John Dominic Crossan, who sees Jesus as, “The Wise Sage”. There is Marcus Borg’s Jesus, who he sees as, “The Man of the Spirit”. There is Bart Ehrman’s Jesus, who he presents in this book as, “The Apocalyptic Prophet”. And so on…. Of course, this is understandable if the gospels are not completely historical. You have to cherry pick what you think is true and what is not. But, how is this more trustworthy than accepting an eyewitness testimony in the Gospels as historical? I think a follower of Bauckham’s theory would be able to see a much more objective picture of who Jesus was, because the sources are the four historically trustworthy gospels. Every scholar is on the same playing field when defining the historical Jesus and so you get a more unified picture of him.

My own view is that I’ll stick with the Apostle Peter’s presentation of the historical Jesus, who said, “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. II Peter 1:16

Book Review: "A History of God: The 4000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam", By Karen Armstrong

I would prefer the subtitle, Man’s Quest to Interpret God. But then, that assumes there is an objective God that one can interpret, which is a God Armstrong does not acknowledge. It is not clear from the book what Armstrong even believes about God, but it is clear that she is steeped in God. What Armstrong does in this sweeping account of the 4000 year history of Judaism, Christianity and Islam is unfold the countless conceptions that people have had about God over the course of 4000 years. This is the best “bare bones” historical read on religion I have enjoyed since reading Kenneth Lattourette’s, "History of Christianity". Armstrong is clearly a monkish scholar, having layed out a 4000 year history with such comprehensive, yet intimate knowledge of the subject, that you can imagine her sitting at her desk year after lonely year preparing this work. Her account of Man’s quest to understand and know God appears at first to be remarkably dispassionate and unbiased. She is careful and faithful to the task of unfolding all the relevant data. She doesn’t take sides, but gives fair and equal time to the development of all the known ideas about God within these three religions. Her impartial cause is likely aided by the fact that she was once a cloistered nun who gave up her habit and Catholic Faith for the equally austere but detached world of the historical writer. She seems to understand the God of Man, but she is mindful to keep a scholar's distance from Him. However, for all her impartiality, no one is completely unbiased when writing history. So it is with Armstrong that you find her developing interpretive “themes” of the historical data.

One such thematic interpretation is her recurring interest in showing the interaction between the Zeitgeist (“Spirit of the Age”) and one’s conception of God. We all know that people are influenced by the times in which they live and Armstrong does a fabulous job showing these influences upon humankind's understanding of God. A case in point is the influence of Greek philosophy upon the early Christian writers and subsequent development of the organized Church. She displays that in history there isn’t any conception of God apart from the historical, cultural and social setting of the time. Her message is that God, therefore, is a product of the times; a human creation.

A second theme is her interest in showing us the startling relationship between contemporaneous religions at each critical point in history. For example, she makes an insightful observation that Jesus and Buddhism brought about a like-minded kind of faith at the same period of history, yet in different and independent regions of the world. The Buddhist bodhisattvas was similar to the Christian devotion to Jesus in that both were a movement for the masses without distinction to socio-economic class. This was something new. She is adept at showing these developing ideas of God. In more recent times, such as in the period of the 18th century Enlightenment, Christianity became extremely individualized and pietistic, which was described as the “Great Awakening”. What Christians today may not know is that while Christians then were experiencing the Great Awakening, Judaism was enjoying its own “awakening” with the inception of Hasidism. As she draws these parallels between contemporaneous religions the reader’s take away is that the human quest to know God follows mankind's evolutionary path.

A third theme is the biggest take away of them all; God is evolving and we need to create a God suitable for our Zeitgeist. She writes on page 84, “All religions change and develop. If they do not, they will become obsolete.” If anything is clear about Armstrong’s message in this book, it is that man’s understanding of God has evolved through time in such a way that God has grown with man. And, God will necessarily continue to evolve as does humankind. In her last chapter, entitled, “Does God Have A Future?” she seeks to bring our thinking to a place where we can both understand religion’s potential for good and bad upon society and our need for a God suitable to the times in which we live. The question is, what will God look like in the 21st century? She closes the book with these final words, “…if we are to create a vibrant new faith for the twenty-first century, we should, perhaps, ponder the history of God for some lessons and warnings.” This interpretation of God in relationship to our Zeitgeist contrasts with the New Atheists, such as Hitchens and Harris, who advocate for Atheism as the only solution for mankind in this age. But, Armstong insightfully disagrees. She writes on page 362, "Like sexuality, religion is a human need that affects life at every level. If suppressed, the results are likely to be as explosive and destructive as any severe sexual repression." My own prediction is that in this shrinking world, God will thrive. But He will do so in a theological climate of reconciliation, ecumenicism, and universalism.

In general, I would highly recommend this book for anyone interested in a great overall history of religion. In particular, I would recommend that Christians read this book for no other reason than seeing the relationship between Judaism, Christianity and Islam; and especially Islam. While the book is comprehensive it is not superficial. You will come away with a solid understanding of the origin and development of each of these religions.

Peace,

Joe Staub