This post seeks to answer two questions regarding the documents that comprise the New Testament:

• When were the New Testament documents written?
• Who wrote the documents? Were they really eyewitnesses?

1. When were the New Testament documents written?

Although we cannot pinpoint exact dates for the New Testament books, we can use both internal evidence and external evidence to determine their approximate dating. (Most of the information in this section is adapted from Dr Paul Barnett’s excellent book Is the New Testament Reliable?)

First, the external evidence. In the early church fathers we find many quotations of the New Testament. Three authors who wrote at the turn of the century (Clement in about 96AD, Ignatius in about 108AD, and Polycarp in about 110AD) all quote heavily from the New Testament. In summary, the only two books not quoted by these writers is 2 John and Jude. This of course does not mean that these two books were definitely not written by 100AD, but only that they were not specifically quoted by these three early writers. So on this basis, we can conclude that all (or nearly all) of the New Testament books were written before the end of the first century.

However, we can in many cases be more exact. In the case of Paul’s letters, I’ll quote Dr Barnett rather than try to reinterpret his already concise prose:

When Paul arrived in Corinth, he met Aquila and Priscilla who had recently “come from Italy … because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to leave Rome” (Acts 18:2) This dovetails with the Roman historian Suetonius, who wrote that Claudius banished from Rome all Jews because they were continually making disturbances about Christ and Christianity (Claudius 25). Scholars of Roman history date this expulsion to c. AD 49. We conclude that Paul arrived in Corinth some time during AD 50. An inscription that fixes the beginning of Gallio’s one-year appointment as proconsul in Achaia at July AD 51 confirms this, a detail that corresponds with the reference in Acts that “when Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews made a united attack upon Paul and brought him before the tribunal” (Acts 18:12) Since 1 Thessalonians, by common consent, was written from Corinth soon after Paul’s arrival there (1 Thes 3:6 and Acts 18:5), we conclude that this letter was written in AD 50. This represents the earliest generally accepted extremity of the time frame. Few scholars dispute this date, although some may place Paul’s letter to the Galatians earlier, about AD 48. (Paul Barnett, Is the New Testament Reliable?, 37-38)

So the earliest of Paul’s letters was written approximately 20 years after Jesus’ death. This fact is not generally disputed among scholars (Christian or not). The earliest of Paul’s letters are in fact the earliest books of the New Testament. Barnett goes on to explain that the latest of Paul’s letters would have been written at the end of the sixties (before AD 68 when Nero died).

While 20 years may seem like a long time, this is much, much sooner than other historical documents we have that are considered reliable by all historians. However, we have even earlier material than this. In 1 Corinthians (written by Paul in about 54AD) chapter 15, verses 3-8 comprise an early church creed which is much earlier than 1 Corinthians itself. There are many reasons why scholars conclude this is an early creed (See Gary Habermas in Lee Strobel’s book Case for Christ, 229):

• Paul introduces it by using the words received and passed on. The original Greek words were rabbinic terms for passing on tradition.
• The stylized structure of the passage indicates it’s a creed. (It is similar to other known creeds.)
• The creed uses words and phrases that Paul rarely or never uses himself.
• It uses certain words that are similar to Hebrew ways of narration.
• There is no copy of 1 Corinthians that lacks the creed.

The creed itself has been dated to within only a few years after Jesus’ death! For comparison, this creed is at least 100 years earlier than the so-called “Gospel of Judas” which was recently made famous. This is the equivalent of a newsflash in ancient times. Here is what the creed, the earliest Christian testimony we have, affirms: “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles …”

This of course does not prove the claim is true, merely that the Christian gospel claim was not made up many years later, but was in fact preached from the very beginning. For an analysis of this passage and the significance of its contents, see The Significance Of 1 Corinthians 15.

2. Who wrote the documents? Were they really eyewitnesses?

Given that the New Testament documents were written within the timeframe that the eyewitnesses to Jesus were still alive (as per above) it is certainly possible that the documents were indeed written by eyewitnesses, as the authors themselves claim to be (ex. Luke 1:2, John 21:24, 1 John 1:3, 2 Peter 1:16). I have already written a brief post on Dr Richard Bauckham’s excellent book (published just this year) Jesus and the Eyewitnesses which argues persuasively from (again) both internal and external evidence that the New Testament was indeed written by eyewitnesses.

If you are interested in this topic, here’s a link to Bauckham’s brief interview with Christianity Today magazine: They Really Saw Him: Richard Bauckham argues that the Gospels are based on eyewitness testimony, not “anonymous community traditions.” The key, he says, is in the names.

So in summary, we do have very good reasons to believe that the New Testament documents were both written extremely early (especially compared to all other ancient historical documents) and also were written by eyewitnesses as claimed by the authors themselves.

“At this gathering [the Council of Nicaea],” Teabing said, “many aspects of Christianity were debated and voted upon - the date of Easter, the role of the bishops … and, of course, the divinity of Jesus … until that moment in history, Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet … a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless. A mortal.” (Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code, Chapter 55)

The Da Vinci Code repeats a common claim: That Jesus never claimed to be God, and this belief was made up by much later followers. Let’s take a look at just one way that Jesus claimed divinity: He accepted worship.

First, Jesus (quoting the Old Testament) claimed that God is the only legitimate object of worship: “Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.” (Matthew 4:10; Deut 6:13).

Second, Jesus accepted worship many times, including just a short time later when the disciples all worship Him (Matthew 14:33). Additionally:

Jesus accepted worship from Thomas (John 20:28); all the angels are told to worship Jesus (Heb. 1:6); wise men worshiped Jesus (Matt. 2:11); a ruler bowed before Him in worship (Matt. 9:18); a blind man worshiped Him (John 9:38); Mary Magdalene worshiped Him (Matt. 28:9); and the disciples worshiped Him (Matt. 28:17). [source]

Note carefully what we never find Jesus saying. He never corrected anyone by saying something like “Woah guys, you’ve got it all wrong, I may be a good teacher but don’t worship me!”

Third, in Acts we find the early Christians doing exactly what Jesus didn’t do, objecting strongly when people try to worship them. In Acts 10, Peter goes to visit a man named Cornelius, where we read: “As Peter entered the house, Cornelius met him and fell at his feet in reverence. But Peter made him get up. “Stand up,” he said, “I am only a man myself.“ (Acts 10:25-26) This is exactly what we don’t find Jesus saying! A similar example occurs to Paul and Barnabas in Acts 14:11-15.

To state this briefly:

• Jesus claimed only God should be worshiped.
• Jesus accepted worship.
• Therefore, the earliest Christians considered Jesus divine and Jesus affirmed their belief.

All of this accords with what was preached in the early Christian church. In fact, the usual tenancy that often needed to be corrected was to emphasize Jesus’ divinity at the expense of His humanity!

The only way to attempt escape from this conclusion is to argue that the New Testament is not an accurate historical record. Now, besides the fact that the earliest records we have of what Christians believe are the New Testament documents, there are also many other good reasons to believe the New Testament is an accurate historical record.

Further reading:

• Jesus: A Biblical Defense of His Deity - Online version of a book which defends Jesus’ claim to deity.
• The Historical Accuracy of the Gospels - Dr Craig L Blomberg gives reasons to believe the historical accuracy of the gospels.
• Jesus? Who is He? - A quick Flash-based presentation for your kind consideration.

Back to the Dawkins & McGrath interview. Around the twenty-six minute mark of the interview, Dr. Dawkins says:

… the evidence for the life of Jesus and what he did, historically speaking, is remarkably thin, I think, modern theologians surely agree about that don’t they?

In reply, Dr. McGrath begins by noting the remarkably early dating of the New Testament texts … but then within a few seconds leaves the argument about the historical reliability of the New Testament starts talking again about the explanatory power and significance of the events the New Testament records. When I heard this, I thought, “No! Don’t let this issue go unchallenged!” While I think the explanatory power of Christianity is an important topic, this was a fantastic opportunity for McGrath to lay out the positive case for the reliability of the New Testament, because certainly many modern theologians (and historians, for that matter, whose primary concern is history after all) don’t agree that the evidence is “remarkably thin”. (See Gary Habermas’ article Recent Perspectives on the Reliability of the Gospels for an outline and commentary on the approach of modern scholarship.)

Firstly, here are some of the salient points regarding the historicity of the New Testament:

• The New Testament texts are extremely early. They can be dated closely to the events that they record, much closer than other historical documents from ancient history. The earliest was written approximately 20 years after the crucifixion (compared with hundreds of years for many other political and religious figures whose historicity is not in doubt) and the documents also contain church creeds which date even earlier. The most important of these creeds, found in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7, is usually dated to within 5 years of Jesus’ crucifixion! This is, historically speaking, the equivalent of a newsflash.
• These early documents are the result of eyewitness testimony. Richard Bauckham’s recent book Jesus and the Eyewitnesses persuasively argues this point from both internal and external evidence. (Bauckham’s interview with Christianity Today, “They Really Saw Him” touches on a few of the points from the book. Note that the link may break after June 2007, I’m not sure how CT’s online article posting works.)
• There are in existence approximately 5,686 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament (full copies, books, portions, and fragments). Compared to all other ancient writings, this is virtually a mountain of manuscripts. Having so many copies makes it possible to cross-check them against one another to ensure that the text we use today matches extremely closely to the original text. And it does.
• Contrary to popular opinion, there are several references to Jesus in non-Christian sources. See for example the online version of Habermas’ chapter Ancient Non-Christian Sources from his book The Historical Jesus.

For more on these issues, one site to check out is Jesus: Fact or Fiction … which includes lots of video clips, which surely beats my boring prose, eh? (Hey, you made it this far, I must be doing okay!)

Secondly, even if we take a much more critical stance, and (somewhat arbitrarily) throw out most of what the New Testament contains, a case can still be built that the resurrection (the most central and important event in Christian history) actually did occur. This is called the “minimal facts” approach, and is built upon only facts considered historical by the vast majority of scholars (both Christian and secular, liberal and conservative). Actually, although Habermas’ survey of hundreds of sources yielded 12 agreed-upon facts, the case can be built using only four of those twelve!

For an excellent overview of the “minimal facts” approach, see Habermas’ article The Facts Concerning the Resurrection.

Just for fun, you can also watch a rather one-sided dialog between Habermas and skeptic Tim Callahan on the resurrection: Part 1 & Part 2 (WMV files). In fairness, Callahan does not provide some of the most sophisticated arguments a critic may use, but nevertheless this dialog demonstrates the power and effectiveness of the minimal facts approach.

I can see that this ridiculousness is probably going to be fairly big. Already the old Da Vinci Code Blog was spammed by someone advertising the official website. (Posting twice from the same IP within minutes under different names.)

So I made up a page explaining some of the many problems with the James Cameron documentary “The Lost Tomb of Jesus”, aka “Jesus Family Tomb”. It contains links to several other pertinent resources on this topic. Click below to read it:

Feel free to pass the link around, copy it to your own site, hang it on your fridge, whatever. I’ll work on it some more later when I have more time; this is a “preliminary” version. We already went through this once with the lamentable Da Vinci Code, and now it’s started all over again …

Related reading: In addition to my page linked above, a “Top Ten” list has been posted to Christian Newswire: Ten Reasons Why The Jesus Tomb Claim is Bogus: Leading Scholars Say Discovery Channel ‘Documentary’ Makes for Good TV, Bad History and Bad Science