Why do some say the New Testament was written 100-300 years after Christ died?

Question

When the truth is that it was written before the close of the first century by those who either knew Christ personally, had encountered him, or were under the direction of those who were His disciples?

Thank You rukiddin... I am shocked by so many "appearing" to "know" what they are talking about....when really they are only repeating something they were told in error!!!

Answer 1

You're right. The Catholic Encyclopedia states: "The New Testament was not written all at once. The books that compose it appeared one after another in the space of fifty years, i.e. in the second half of the first century.

Written in different and distant countries and addressed to particular Churches, they took some time to spread throughout the whole of Christendom, and a much longer time to become accepted. Still it can be said that from the third century, or perhaps earlier, the existence of all the books that today form our New Testament was everywhere known. However, uniformity existed in the West from the fourth century. The East had to await the seventh century."

Perhaps some are confused with when the New Testament was written and when it became uniform/consistent.

For those who are insisting that you are wrong, I thought you were wrong, too, before I.......researched it.

Answer 2

It became never written on the close of the 1st century, the memories have been surpassed down over hundreds of years by utilising he mentioned he mentioned earlier it became placed into scripture, and it became the scribes that wrote the recent testomony hundreds of years after the certainty, there is surely no data in historic historic previous that mentions the Christ, no longer even the Roman empire that supposedly crucified him, even archaeology can discover no data of the Christ different than what the bible says and the bible isn't the main credible e book available immediately.

Answer 3

Hi, Eartha,

Most critical scholars agree on the dating of the majority of the New Testament, except for the epistles and books that they consider to be pseudepigraphical (i.e., those thought not to be written by their traditional authors). For the Gospels they tend to date Mark no earlier than 65 and no later than 75. Matthew is dated between 70 and 85. Luke is usually placed within 80 to 95. The earliest of the books of the New Testament was First Thessalonians, an epistle of Paul, written probably in 51, or possibly Galatians in 49 according to one of two theories of its writing. Of the pseudepigraphical epistles, Christian scholars tend to place them somewhere between 70 and 150, with Second Peter usually being the latest.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/new_testame...

Most scholars agree that the New Testament writings were completed by the end of the first century. However, final decisions on the New Testament canon came much later. Wiki continues:

The New Testament canon as it is now was first listed by St. Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, in 367, in a letter written to his churches in Egypt, Festal Letter 39. Also cited is the Council of Rome, but not without controversy. That canon gained wider and wider recognition until it was accepted at the Third Council of Carthage in 397.

This is an important problem for those who ignore history and teach that the Bible alone carries valid information about faith and morality. Jesus obviously did not teach this; he did not write the Bible. There is no mention in the gospels of Bible only for the very good reason that the gospels were not completed until about 90 AD. There were only a few scattered apostolic letters circulating through most of the first century.

Instead, the gospel was spoken by Jesus, and then by the apostles. In II Thess 2:15, Paul shows the everyday reality of a spoken gospel: "So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter from us."

Cheers,
Bruce

Answer 4

They say things like that so they'll have an excuse to ignore it.

They never notice that Luke claimed to be with Jesus from the beginning of his ministry - of course, that alone would be a great miracle, if he wrote that 300 years later!

They never notice that Matthew was a tax collector that left all to follow Jesus.

They don't like the idea that Acts, written by Luke (yes! The very same Luke that wrote the gospel when he was 300 years old!) wrote about Saul witnessing Stephen being martyred and then later on, becoming a Christian on the road to Damascus!

It's amazing how much light the Bible throws on all those commentaries, eh? :-)

Answer 5

Most of the stories in the bible were passed down orally until between 120 and 200 years after Jesus died, as most people were illiterate, then they were transcribed, in numerous languages, and there were different versions of facts and events) of the same texts.
The Catholic Church gathered many of these texts and versions together and compiled a bible that followed their teachings and left out other texts -- the Gospel of Judas and others that were at variance to their teachings. It is here that many of the mistranslations, both deliberate and accidental, took place.

Answer 6

The earliest extant fragments from any book of the NT date to the mid 2nd century.

Paul's letters were given to us by Marcion in the early 2nd century, and most scholars agree Marcion invented much if not all of Paul's writings. The Gospels are based on the destruction of Jerusalem, not Jesus, and so the earliest one dates no earlier than 70 CE.

The NT itself was compiled in the late 4th century as a result of an effort started by Constantine in the early 4th century.

http://www.rationalrevolution.net/articles/gospel_mark.htm

Read what real researchers are discovering, and you'll be forced to agree it's true.

Answer 7

I have learned in depth due to many discussions on my blog with a Catholic lady it is because the Roman Catholic church wants to claim to be the "mother" of the Bible and that is when their group met and decided canon. HOWEVER for a much clearer picture of Bible history in a chart check out this site
http://www.buzzardhut.net/index/
When you get there you will see a menu on the left, scroll down to #5 God's Word and look under there for Bible History Chart and it gives a easy 'see at glance' history of most Bibles AND underneath it gives some other things to read on Bible history.

Answer 8

They are misled or trying to deceive... Some have confused the compilation with the composition. The "Muratorian Canon," dated around 160AD, establishes that the canon of the New Testament has remained virtually unchanged since that time... This is long before liberal/atheist theology claims it was written, so the error of their claim should be obvious.

... With a fragment of the Fourth Gospel dated around 125AD, we have strong evidence that it existed long before it was written???

lostcause: This IS evidence other than the Bible.

Answer 9

CHRISTIANS CONFESS
Dr. W. Graham Scroggie of the MOODY BIBLE INSTITUTE, Chicago, one of the most prestigious Christian Evangelical Mission in the world, answering the question — "Is the Bible the Word of God?" (also the title of his book), under the heading: IT IS HUMAN, YET DIVINE. He says on page 17:
"Yes, the Bible is human, though some, out of zeal which is not according to knowledge, 1 have denied this. Those books2 have passed through the minds of men, are written in the language of men, were penned by the hands of men, and bear in their style the characteristics of men." (Emphasis added).
http://www.irf.net/irf/videogallery/index.htm
(www.irf.net)
this site will be helpful to you in understanding christianity,different world religions , their believes. text documents as well as videos are available and some dabates with other religious scholors

Answer 10

The New Testament wasn't one book, it's several books in a compilation, some of the books WEREN'T written until 100-300 years after He died.