Atheists Should Never Question the Historicity of the Gospels Again. Here's Why.
Were the Gospels and Acts Written Centuries After Christ?
This is an important challenge, and it is also a common one. You are about to see why this is not a problem for Christians.
Why Does This Challenge Matter?
Why does the question matter? It matters because it implies that the accounts in the New Testament cannot be trusted. After all, the New Testament claims to be written by eyewitnesses, describing persons, places and events that they experienced for themselves. If the Bible were written centuries later, it would be vastly less reliable. Think about it: would you trust that someone could accurately retell your life story, if they were writing it from scratch in the 2300s? Even if they had good oral history to go on (say, traditions passed down from you to your grandkids, to their grandkids), how much do you think the story would change in 300 years? Probably pretty significantly, right?
If this objection were to stick, it would have a major effect on whether we can trust the Gospel. And since the Gospel is the answer to mankind's biggest problem (namely, sin, which you learned about last time), this has major implications for humanity, for eternal life, and for our ability to know God. This challenge could potentially undermine the whole Christian message and the biblical worldview. So this is a big deal.
Beware of Your First Response!
This challenge, that the New Testament was written centuries later, deals with evidence. The skeptic has to bank on the assumption that the historical evidence points to late authorship (say, 200–300 years after Christ). If it turns out the evidence does not show this, then he has no case.
Because of this fact, you may be tempted to dive right into the evidence, first thing. Let me advise you not to do this right away. It is not the best way. Remember, you are defending God’s truth, and you need to defend it God’s way.
If you jump in and immediately start giving evidence, you will validate your friend’s way of thinking—even if you do not realize it. By beginning with the evidence, it is as if you are saying, “My skeptical friend, you and I are both neutral, and we both have a worldview that can support the idea of evidence. Therefore, I will present the evidence, and you, using your neutral, fair-minded thinking, will be able to come to the correct conclusion on your own.” This is totally wrong! No one is neutral toward God. By rejecting God, the skeptic is being arbitrary. His non-Christian worldview cannot even explain why historical evidence is a “thing!” You need to show him all this before you get into the evidence. If you do not do so, you will actually be affirming his attempts to think “autonomously” (self-ruled) apart from God.
Your response should be Scripture-first. Now, what does that look like?
Reduce the Unbiblical Position to Absurdity.
Perform a reductio ad absurdum. This is where you unveil the inner contradiction in the non-Christian position, in order to show that it is actually absurd. Let us walk through the three parts of the reductio.
Clarify the Position
In order to adequately respond to the challenge, you must have an accurate understanding of what your the person posing the challenge actually means. Here are some questions you can ask to get there.
“When you say the New Testament was written centuries later, what do you mean by that? How many centuries are we talking about?”
“Is it absolutely true that a historical account written hundreds of years later is less reliable than an early account written by eyewitnesses?”
“By what standard should we judge the historical reliability of a document?”
“How did you come to believe that the New Testament was written centuries later?”
“If the New Testament were written centuries later, what would be the implications of that? Why should that matter to us?” (In other words, “So what?”)
By asking these questions and others, you are seeking to come to a clear understanding of what your friend truly means with this challenge. You are also learning about why he thinks it matters. This will help you answer the challenge more effectively, in a way that directly speaks to what he believes is important. Communicating in this way is a way of loving your neighbor. Are you starting to see why this is a better approach than simply, quickly, diving into the evidence for early authorship of the New Testament?
Now that you have clarified your friend’s position, you are ready to identify the internal contradiction and bring it to light.
Find the Inconsistency
Your goal is to find the conflict between the “destination” he is trying to get to (i.e. the New Testament is not trustworthy) and his “starting point.” His starting point, or basic presupposition, is that there are certain principles—certain rules about historical evidence—that allow us to judge whether a historical document is trustworthy. This is an unspoken assumption (as presuppositions often are), which is why you need to first do the work of clarifying the objection, asking good questions to draw it out.
Exposing these principles is key. So what are they? Your skeptical friend is assuming at least two things.
First, he assumes that a historical account is more likely to be true if it is written earlier and by eyewitnesses.
If he was not assuming this, then why would he be making this objection to the New Testament in the first place? His whole idea is that the New Testament was written later and not by eyewitnesses, and therefore (he concludes) it is less likely to be true—less trustworthy.
Second, he is assuming that the past can be known.
He believes it is possible to study history to learn what happened in the past. If he did not believe this, then he could never make this objection. His whole argument rides on the idea that we can know when the New Testament was written, and that it was not written early by eyewitnesses.
Now we have uncovered the rules of historical evidence that your friend is presupposing. It is time to complete your reductio.
Push Toward the Absurdity
You want to push the skeptic toward the contradiction. Again, this might seem like the opposite of what you want to do. You want to show him his need of giving up his contradictory, unbiblical position. However, pushing him toward the contradiction will actually help you with this. Here is how you can accomplish this.
Address the First Assumption
Address his first assumption by saying something like, “It seems to me like you believe that a historical account is more likely to be true if it is written earlier and by eyewitnesses. Is that a rule for studying history? Rules require a rule giver. Without God, where do laws or rules like that come from? They would have no source. And without God, there would be nothing to keep the rules from changing over time, anyway. If this is a random universe, the rules would be changing unpredictably! For all you know, maybe the rules about authorship and history were totally different in the First, Second and Third Centuries! According to your own skeptical viewpoint, you have no reason at all for trusting in unchanging rules that govern history or truth!” In this way, you are pushing the skeptic toward the contradiction. He wants to believe in rules that govern history and truth, but he has ruled out the ultimate rule giver, God.
Address the Second Assumption
Then, address the second assumption: “Without God, why do you think the past can be known? How do you even know there was a past at all? Christians believe that the Bible is God’s revelation (it reveals truth), and that it has authority. What it says happened, happened. It is the key to being able to study history. It is an authoritative record of what has happened in the past. It does not contain all historical knowledge, but it does let us know that the past can be known, and that the study of history is meaningful. Since you do not believe the Bible is God’s authoritative revelation, you have ruled out the possibility of having an authoritative record of what events happened in the past, and what those events mean. If God has not spoken authoritatively about the past, then you have no basis for even the tiniest bit of certainty about the past.” Here again you are pushing the skeptic toward the internal contradiction of his position. He believes the past can be known, but without the God of the Bible he has no foundation for that belief.
Reductio Accomplished
Now you have reduced the unbiblical position to absurdity. You have unveiled the contradictions of your friend’s point of view. He wants to believe in rules governing the study of history—but he does not believe in God the rule giver! Furthermore, he wants to believe that the past can be known, but he has no basis for believing that such knowledge is possible, without God’s revelation.
Importantly, we have not positively defended the early dating of the Gospels and acts yet. We will do that in a future article. However, it suffices for now to show that the atheist who raises this challenge is being inconsistent with his own principles… and he should never question the historicity of the Gospels again.