We
have previously considered the affirmation of archaeology affording us evidence
of the trustworthiness of the Bible.
Today, our lesson will bring another witness to the court of reason:
THE
TESTIMONY OF HISTORY.
Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set
in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us, just
as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word
delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having had perfect
understanding of all things from the very first, to write to you an orderly
account, most excellent Theophilus, that you may know the certainty of those
things in which you were instructed. (Luke 1:1-4 NKJV)
Luke
does not claim to be an eyewitness, but a meticulous historian who interviewed
eyewitnesses in his research. Sir William
Ramsey was a renowned historian who purpose to discredit Luke’s history. The opposite occurred. Following his investigation, he concluded “Luke’s
history is unsurpassed in trustworthiness.”
Although
Luke was not an eyewitness to the events of which he wrote, there were
eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Christ who provided contemporaneous testimony
of the fact.
and that He was seen by Cephas, then by
the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of
whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all
the apostles. Then last of all He was
seen by me also, as by one born out of due time. (1 Cor.15:5-8).
How
reliable were these witnesses? The
number of them and the fact they were willing to suffer and die for their
testimony make it implausible to explain anything other than that they saw
Jesus alive from the dead.
When
the Bible is compared to other historical documents, it surpasses them in the
sheer volume of ancient manuscripts, their proximity to the events described
and the accuracy of the contents. Erwin
Lutzer says that “Entire books have been written confirming the historicity of
the Bible in matters related to geography, chronology, history of empires, and
customs of each period.”
The Jewish
historian, Josephus, wrote in the first century AD and stated, “At this time
there was a wise man called Jesus, and his conduct was good and he was known to
be virtuous.… Pilate condemned him to be crucified and die. But those who had
become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he
had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive.”
To
the Jewish historian, we add the witness of a Gentile--the Roman historian
Tacitus. He penned these words in AD 116,
[N]either
human effort nor the emperor’s generosity nor the placating of the gods ended
the scandalous belief that the fire had been ordered [by Nero]. Therefore, to
put down the rumor, Nero substituted as culprits and punished in the most
unusual ways those hated for their shameful acts … whom the crowd called
“Chrestians.” The founder of this name, Christ [Christus in Latin], had been
executed in the reign of Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilate … Suppressed
for a time, the deadly superstition erupted again not only in Judea, the origin
of this evil, but also in the city [Rome], where all things horrible and
shameful from everywhere come together and become popular. (translated from Latin by Robert E. Van
Voorst, Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient
Evidence [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000], p. 43)
So,
from Jewish and Roman sources—those who were not followers of the Christian faith—and
the history of the Biblical writers themselves which measures up to the
standards of how we gauge authentic history, we have every reason to be
confident of the accuracy of the Word of God.
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