Question on the history of the bible...?

Question

Do the historical facts of Jesus's existance and the date of the New Testament stories (perported to be written by Jesus's Disciples) actually occur in the same time frame. i.e. do the dates of each occurence add up?

Sensible answers only please!

Answer 1

These events occurred around two thousand years ago, which means there are many academic and traditional theories about the gospels. Most of these theories hold that the gospels were all written before 100, placing the penning less than 70 years after the event.

Each of the gospel writers wrote to specific audiences, and included/excluded details based on their audience.

-Matthew (a Jew) wrote to Jewish Christians. Much of the gospel of Matthew justifies Jesus as the Messiah. He quotes the Old Testament often. Conservative scholars propose that Matthew was written in the 60's, but liberal scholars prose it may have been written between 80 and 100.

-Mark wrote to a Roman audience. Popular theories hold that Mark was the first to write a gospel. Dates for the writing of Mark's gospel are between 60 and 80.

Luke (a Greek, physician & historian) wrote his account to "most excellent Theophilus." This gospel is written to a Greek audience. Tradionally, Luke is dated between 60 and 63. Critically, the book is dated between 75 and 100.


John wrote to non-Jews. One critical view of dating John's gospel proposes that the gospel was written in stages starting possibly as early as 50, and was probably finished around 100.

Given the timeframe of the lifetime of Jesus and the gospel writers, the accounts focus on the events of Jesus' professional life (his ministry, started at age 30 years), which is why very little is written about Jesus' childhood.

Current academic studies call the gospels according to Matthew, Mark & Luke "synoptic gospels". The synoptic gospels contain much of the same content, sometimes even using similar words and phrases to describe the same event. Some theories suggest that there was a gospel (now lost) which Matthew, Mark & Luke (Matthew was an eye-witnesses to Jesus and the events in his gospel; Mark wrote based on the discourse of Peter; Luke wrote based on eyewitnesses http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%201:1-4;&version=31; ) as a base for what to include in their narratives. This lost gospel is referred to as "Q document." Other theories propose that Mark wrote his gospel account first, and Matthew and Luke both wrote their gospels based on Mark's.

The gospel according to John is not a synoptic gospel, and contains the more original conent not mentioned in Matthew, Mark, or Luke.

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Concerning the issue of translation that TAFF mentioned:
Most modern translations of the Bible come from the oldest docuements in existance. When ancient docuements of the same peice conflict, scholars and translators work to attain what they believe the author orginally wrote. Differences in document sources come from a varity of sources, such as scribes copying down documents being copied, and writing down an oral mispronucation. Another source of variences in texts is marginal notes which were written on a document, and the note became a part of the next copy because the scribe included it.

There's a pretty big misconseption about Bible translations which holds that the Bible was written in Hebrew and Greek, then translated to latin, then to old english, then king james english, then modern english. In reality, most modern translations (NIV, New Revised Standard Version) are new translations from the orginal languages (Greek, Hebrew). These translations use redation--that is, they critically examine differences of sources to acertain the orignal writing.

The King James Translation even translates directly from Hebrew and Greek sources.

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Addressing what words_that_live_on said about languages:

The Old Testament was written in Hebrew (with the exception of the book of Daniel, which was written in Hebrew and Aramaic). The New Testament was written in Greek (with the exception of the book of Hebrews, which was written in Hebrew). Matthew, Mark, Luke (Greek), and John all wrote in Greek. Greek was the common language of the time frame, and each would have spoke Greek fluetnly.

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I think this may have been a little off from the answer you were looking for. I don't know enough about dating events in the gospels to confidently address that.

Answer 2

It was written after Jesus, by a men some say were his disciples, yet they were supposed to be there yet they couldn't get their facts right about what happened, but that's if you believe that. Just think how better way of controlling the human race than changing the words of God, and Jesus so that it would give man control, just look how many times man, not God have gained from the writings of the Bible, yes the truth is in there somewhere, or at least it was once, this is the same for the Koran, and all the other so called good books.
Does anyone really believe that God, or Jesus would want man to disrespect woman. Women are equal and always have been in the eyes of God, or to kill in his name of course not, man however yes.

Answer 3

There have been a few good answers here already. However you must keep in mind that the New Testiment,and the Old, probably bear little resemblance to what was originally written;this is due to mis translation and the corruptive nature of man to twist the original teachings to suit their own agenda. Even the Dead Sea scrolls are shrouded in secrecy.Historically there is no susbstantiated record of Jesus or his Disciples in fact there historical records of other Holy men of the time. This is not to deny that Jesus existed only that he was not very significant at the time as there were many others doing a similar sort of thing.

Answer 4

Actually yes it has proven to be very accurate in comparison to historical data. There are some questions between the first three gospels and the accuracy of them this is termed the synoptic problem. Mark is thought to have been written first and Matthew and Luke utilized it as a source. Matthew and Luke also had an additional source known as the "Q" source.
Suprisingly Mark was dated as having been written in excess of 20 years after Jesus death. Followed later (70-90 ad) by Matthew and Luke.
Luke was known as being a historian and as such would have researched historical accuracy in his text much more then mark or Matthew. Keep in mind that they had very few resources (no internet or great compilations of information) and utilized memory and stories (primary method of early jews and Christians) to recount the life of Jesus.
The question may be asked why they waited so long to write about Jesus, the answer is that they did not think they would need to. It was assumed by the early church that Jesus would be returning and there would be no need to document. The Apostle Paul infurred this many times when he mentions not needing to be married and remaining pure amongst other thoughts.
As the first Christians started dying off it became evident that Jesus was not coming back as soon as they had thought so they set about recollecting for the sake of posterity.

Answer 5

A lot of the dates given for these occurances are guestimations. They do not even have the exact year Jesus was born, so how could they possibly date anything else? The guess for his birth is anywhere from 6 BC to 6 AD and they use "King" Herod's reign to decide that, rather than finding any external source to back it up. As for the Gospel accounts, I think the earliest one is considered to have been written around 60 AD? If Jesus was even born in 6 AD a lived to be 33 yrs old, that just puts his death at 39 AD.
None of these dates are verifiable outside of the Bible.

Answer 6

Approximate Times When New Testament Events Happened
Jesus' Birth
BC/AD - 30 - Matthew, Mark, Luke, John
30 - 40 Acts
40 - 50 Peter in Prison
Paul's first missionary journey
50 - 60 Paul's second missionary journey
Paul's third missionary journey
60 - 70 Paul a prisoner in Rome (Acts 28)
Paul's probable further travels
Paul in prison
Paul's death
70 Jerusalem destroyed
50-70 Paul's Letters
90 John exiled on Patmos
90 - 100 Revelation

Note: We do not know exactly when the New Testament letters were written. The writers did not date their letters as we do today. People who have studied the Bible very carefully think the letters were written about the times shown here.

The four writers of the Gospels tell the same story each in his own way. The Synoptic Gospels are striking in their similarities. There is but one gospel with four preparations. The combined gospel records set forth a Personality rather than present a connected story of a life. There are four Gospels with one Christ, four accounts with one purpose, and four sketches of one Person.

Answer 7

There are a lot of controverse about specific dates. For sure, they does not know exactly dates about these events.

Primitive christians are not concerned about document, same happened with Maomet (only after its death they started to define rules and successor and then, build up the religion). These religions use to be warmful and friendly until men change into Hate and war. God's love is the way and is what is written in all those books. Basically all winners religions monoteists from Middleeast have the same basic Idea.

As soon as they started to acquire knowledge and bring more educated people, they started to write Jesus's history. Many of these documents went to the first primitive organized churches (Coptic for example).

Coptic church are between the most ancient christian churchs in the world. tehy provided material during the long period when the bible got the consistency of a single book.

Sure, you have human interference, but it doesn't take out the divinity of these words. Positivism way to see things where there is no half trues are the wrong way to undertand our past.

Try to illagine that time. Is it possible that a fisherman know how to write? They used papirus like egyptians? It took long time and many hands to disseminate word of God. (as happened with all other religions). Torah, Talmud (Hebrew).

In the beggining was the verb and from the verb(word?) God create everything. Quite intresting fact: There are same inscription, but changing God to Ptah within Nubiam (Sudan) pyramid thousand years before.

Answer 8

The Bible itself is the principal evidence that Jesus Christ is a historical person. The record in the Gospels is not a vague narrative of events at some unspecified time and in an unnamed location. It clearly states time and place in great detail. For an example, see Luke 3:1, 2, 21-23.

The first-century Jewish historian Josephus referred to the stoning of “James, the brother of Jesus who was called the Christ.” (The Jewish Antiquities, Josephus, Book XX, sec. 200) A direct and very favorable reference to Jesus, found in Book XVIII, sections 63, 64, has been challenged by some who claim that it must have been either added later or embellished by Christians; but it is acknowledged that the vocabulary and the style are basically those of Josephus, and the passage is found in all available manuscripts.

Tacitus, a Roman historian who lived during the latter part of the first century C.E., wrote: “Christus [Latin for “Christ”], from whom the name [Christian] had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus.”—The Complete Works of Tacitus (New York, 1942), “The Annals,” Book 15, par. 44.

With reference to early non-Christian historical references to Jesus, The New Encyclopædia Britannica states: “These independent accounts prove that in ancient times even the opponents of Christianity never doubted the historicity of Jesus, which was disputed for the first time and on inadequate grounds by several authors at the end of the 18th, during the 19th, and at the beginning of the 20th centuries.”—(1976), Macropædia, Vol. 10, p. 145.

Answer 9

there is no reliable contemporary confirmation of any of the events of Jesus' life.

the roman historians tacitus and josephus cover the period of Jesus' ministry (which happened under the emperor tiberius) but neither of them seem aware of a jewish messiah operating in palestine at the time.

(there are apparent mentions of Jesus in both tacitus and josephus - but both are 'by the way' type comments - which would be very odd for such an important religious leader as Jesus - and both show strong evidence of being later forgeries).

when you consider that the 'star of bethlehem' would have been visible all over the world (presumably) it is very odd that no chinese astronomers noticed it.

and if after Jesus' crucifixion the dead left their tombs all over jerusalem (matthew 27) it seems surprising that no-one except the evangelists noticed this.

we know pontius pilate was a real person, we even know he was the governor of judaea. if pilate authorised the crucifixion only to see the temple veil split, the sky darken, and the dead rise again - how come he never converted to christianity?

the deal with the bible is either you accept the bible and suspect everything else is wrong. or else you accept everything else and admit that it is the bible which is dodgy.

when you have a headache, do you say a prayer or do you take an aspirin?

Answer 10

Dates? There are NO specific dates mentioned in the Bible at all. Each author wrote in chronological order from their own perspective and what they apparently witnessed.

Among the four Gospels: Matthew, Mark and "John" were actual witnesses, while Luke [a physician] wrote his Gospel based on Mark's writings and parables he learned or heard from other Apostles.

It was also Luke who wrote the Acts of the Apostles and most all the letters or Epistles attributed to Saul/Paul --who was not among the Apostles either.

Personally, I feel that "John" --a far too common name then and now-- was actually written by "someone else" who was very close to Jesus and spent a lot of time with Him to be able to provide intricate details and dialogues. However, it has been attributed to John, who is claimed to be the "beloved" Apostle.

This "someone else" seems to have also written the 'Epistle to Hebrews' due to the similarity in writing style, but was attributed to Paul, too. But I digress...

The basic chronology starts with the Anunciation [Announcement], the Nativity, fast-forward to His public Ministry, Last Supper, Crucifixion, and Resurrection.

It's best that you take the time to read it and see for yourself. But once you're done, don't forget to read the Old Testament as well.

Peace be with you!

Answer 11

Do you know that there is a whole heap of books that were not included in the bible by the early church? There was a fairly hefty edit applied - and it explains why even the gospels contradict eachother - they all tend to be 3rd, 4th, etc hand versions of a popular social story.

It happened all the time with other religions - wonder why they have holy books as well? EVen the ones that started before Christianity.

Sorry guys - different theme, same plot - still fiction