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Was Jesus just a myth?
Was Jesus simply a mythical figure, a fabrication by
religious zealots who wanted a symbol to rally behind for whatever reason
they needed at the time? Or, was Jesus an actual person who lived in
Israel 2000 years ago? Most often, those who deny Jesus as a historic
figure denounce the New Testament writings, particularly the gospels, as
fabrications or highly embellished stories passed down through the years.
They must do this. Otherwise, they would have to acknowledge that Jesus
lived. The Gospels as history - date of authorship
According to the
Christian church, the four Gospels were written by the apostles and/or
those under the direction of the apostles of Jesus. That means that they
were written under direction of eyewitnesses of the actual events. Also,
none of the gospels mention the destruction of the Jewish temple in 70
A.D. This is significant because Jesus had prophesied concerning the
temple when He said "As for these things which you are looking at, the
days will come in which there will not be left one stone upon another
which will not be torn down," (Luke
21:5, see also
Matt. 24:1;
Mark 13:1). If the gospels had been written
after that date and if they were fabrications, then surely they would have
contained the account of the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the
temple which are known historical facts. Yet, Matthew, Mark, and Luke
contain no such information. Luke was written before Acts (Acts
1:14). The book of Acts, a history of the
Christian church, which doesn't mention the fall of Jerusalem either, nor
does it record the deaths of Paul, James, and Peter which all happened in
the early 60's. This means that Acts was written at least by A.D. 62 and
Luke was written before that. Therefore, the time between the events and
the writings is around 30 years. This further means that the eyewitnesses
were around who could have corrected any statements written in the
gospels. Yet, we have absolutely no corrective or contradictory writings
from that time, from anyone, denying the accounts of the gospels. For
more information on this please see
When were the gospels written and by whom? The Gospels as history - historical content The gospels do not have the sense of myth. If anything, they are written as eyewitness accounts. Consider the first four verses of the gospel of Luke which clearly states that it is a researched document.
This is not how myths are made. This is how you uncover evidence and record it. Luke examined the witnesses, interviewed them, and checked out the facts. In Luke 2:1-2, we have historically verifiable information: "Now it came about in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth. 2This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria." Also, see Luke 3:1-2, "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip was tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene, 2in the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness." We clearly see numerous historical statements that have been verified through archaeology. This is precise record keeping, not extravagant additions. In fact, "Sir William Ramsey has shown that in making reference to 32 countries, 54 cities, and 9 islands he made no mistakes!" 1 Sir William Ramsey (1851-1939) was a classical scholar and archaeologist. He taught at Oxford England, Aberdeen. He authored several scholarly books dealing with archaeology and had a major influence upon it as a science.Nevertheless, there are many verifiable things found in the gospel accounts.
There are many many more citations verified by archaeology that demonstrate the accuracy of the gospels. When they mention events dealing with rulers, places, events like a census, who was governor, etc., they are all accurate historically. The Gospels as history - accuracy of transmission
A very important issue
is whether or not the Gospels have been accurately transmitted from the
original writings down to the copies that we have today. Yes, they have
been accurately transmitted to us. The truth is that the New Testament
documents are 99.5% textually pure. This means that only 1/2 of 1% of all
the documents, of all the copies in existence has any question about the
text. If this is compared to any other ancient writing, the New Testament
comes out way ahead. See
Manuscript evidence for superior
*For a larger,
more complete chart please see
Manuscript evidence for superior Miscellaneous Information
Noted Oxford expert on
literature and myths, C. S. Lewis, said, "I have been reading poems,
romances, vision-literature, legends, myths all my life. I know what they
are like. I know that not one of them is like this [the Gospels]."2
Conclusion
There is no
reason to doubt the reality of Jesus as a historic figure. The gospel
accounts are four different accounts from four different people. They were
penned by either eyewitnesses or under the direction of the eyewitnesses.
These same gospels were distributed throughout the region very quickly and
we have no account anywhere on any of the contemporaries attempting to
refute any of the facts written in them -- including those accounts
dealing with the miracles of Jesus.
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