The name Bart Erhman has risen to
prominence in recent years due to several successful books he has published
that are highly critical of the New Testament text. He has five New York Times
bestsellers: How Jesus Became God,
Misquoting Jesus, God’s
Problem, Jesus Interrupted, and Forged.[1] In
his late teens, Erhman became a fundamental evangelical Christian. It was
during his graduate studies when he began to doubt the inerrancy of the Bible,
leading him to become a “liberal Christian” for many years.[2]
However, his complete break with Christianity came when he could no longer
accept the existence of God with all the pain and suffering in the world. Today
he identifies as a humanist and agnostic.[3]
Erhman’s main attack on Christianity
has come as textual criticism of the New Testament. One of his arguments is the
New Testament text does not coincide with what was written in the original
copies. Erhman believes some of the changes were purposefully made, motivated
by theological dogmas.[4] He
has raised doubts about the reliability of the New Testament and does not
believe the Gospels can be harmonized.[5]
As Christians, how can we defend
against these kinds of attacks Erhman and others like him lodge against the
Bible? Does Erhman have a valid case or is this simply contaminated “evidence”
given as an excuse to abandon his original beliefs? I will leave that for you
to decide.
Are the New Testament Copies
Corrupted?
Source criticism of the New
Testament texts show overwhelming evidence that the writers did not deliberately
try to mislead, exaggerate, or even lie through their narratives. If Christ’s
disciples were corroborating a lie to make Jesus some kind of hero, they did it
in all the wrong ways. They place Jesus eating with sinners which was looked
down upon by Jews. Jesus heals a paralytic man in Capernaum and declares that
his sins are forgiven despite the Jews following the sacrificial system. All
four gospels mention that Judas betrayed Jesus. This would have been a disgrace
for any Jewish teacher to have a traitorous student.[6] If
these writers were propagating lies, they did a terrible job at it.
Some critics like Ehrman point to
the fact that the first fifteen or so years after Christ’s ministry did not
develop any written documents on the life of Christ. The narrative was passed
down orally opening the door for mistakes and exaggeration. What Ehrman fails
to explain is the Jewish culture in the first century was highly trained in
oral transmission. These were not people who were clumsy and inexperienced in
preserving oral narratives. Jewish school boys spent years memorizing the Old
Testament. By the time they were adults, they would have had much of the Old
Testament memorized. Rabbis would have the entire Old Testament memorized! New
Testament scholar Craig Blomberg says, “To memorize the amount of information
found in a single Gospel, therefore, was child’s play for many first-century
Jews and Greeks. As the first generation of Christians, believing Jesus was
God’s heavenly sent Son, began to treat the accounts of his ministry with the
same respect and devotion they did their Scriptures, they would have been
careful to pass them on faithfully.”[7]
Not only was the oral transmission
carefully done but the copying of the original texts was held to a high
standard. Scribes had to follow strict rules when copying sacred scriptures. Just
the sheer number of hand-written copies that still exist is mind-boggling with 5,600
copies in Greek.[8]
Even Erhman’s co-author friend Bruce Metzger admits, “No key doctrine of the
Christian faith has been invalidated by textual uncertainty.”[9] If
only Erhman could accept the truth.
[1] Ehrman,
Bart D. 2019. Books Published. Personal Website. Accessed April 4, 2019.
https://www.bartdehrman.com/books-published/
[2]
Ehrman, Bart D. 2014. Interview by Scott Burdick.
[3]
Ibid
[4]
Rajkumar, Richard. 2016. “A Beginner’s Guide to Understand and Answer Dr. Bart
Ehrman”. Christian Apologetics Alliance. August 18. Accessed April 4, 2019. http://christianapologeticsalliance.com/2016/08/18/a-beginners-guide-to-understand-and-answer-dr-bart-ehrman/
[5]
Ibid
[6]
Blomberg, Craig L. The Historical Reliability of the New Testament:
Countering the Challenges to Evangelical Christian Beliefs (Nashville,
Tennessee: B&H Academic, 2016), chap. 3, Kindle.
[7]
Ibid. chap. 1, Kindle.
[8]
Slick, Matt.2008. “Manuscript Evidence for Superior New Testament Reliability”.
Christian Apologetic &Research Ministry, October 12. Accessed April 4,
2019. https://carm.org/manuscript-evidence.
[9] Metzger,
Bruce.2011. “For Most of its Long History, the Bible was Copied by Hand. How
easy was it for a Mistake to Enter into this Process?”. Christian Bible
Studies, June 28. Accessed April 4, 2019. https://www.christianitytoday.com/biblestudies/bible-answers/theology/biblecopiedhand.html?start=1
