Real Jesus?

Real Jesus?
How do we know what we know about Jesus?

As many of you know, I grew up in a Christian home. My parents were missionaries. I grew up attending church. So obviously I was a Christian and would be a Christian.

You would think. Come with me to me: age 19. Living in Drammen with my uncle and aunt after a year at Sagavoll folkehøgskole.

Oh, if people asked me I said that I was a Christian. I knew all the right things to say. I was a fairly good boy. Didn’t smoke or drink or have sex. I even read my Bible. Mostly every day. So far, so good. See, that’s conditioning. That’s growing up as a Christian. I knew how to behave. I was, to quote my Dad, “evangelically house-trained”.

But I wasn’t a Christian. A Christian is a Christ-one, one who belongs to Christ. A Jesus person. Because my Christian life was in a box. God in a box. I took him out in the morning, listened to His Word as I read the Bible, prayed to Him – then carefully put Him back in the box for the rest of the day, and ignored Him. I struggled along in the rest of the day with my own problems and issues and sins. To be honest, I was fairly selfish, especially towards my uncle and aunt, and my cousins who were 3 and 1 at the time. God made no impact on my life whatsoever. My life. God. In His box.

Until one day he broke out of the box, much to my surprise! The beginning of autumn 1995 I had an experience that changed my life. Forever. Eternally.

But an experience is just that – an experience. It is something internal to me. There is no evidence of the reality of that experience. I claim to have met with God – how do you know that is true. There are many, many people who claim to have met with God. How do you know what they say is true? Jospeh Smith, founder of the Mormons, and Muhammed, founder of Islam, were just two such men who claim to have met with God. But how do we know?

Experience is not enough. We need evidence. Is there any evidence to back up my experience, or should it be dismissed as a psychological crisis?

Did Jesus really exist? Or is Jesus like Winnie-the-Pooh (Ole Brumm) – a great character that we all love, and has some wise things to say, but isn’t real. Come on.

Let’s investigate. Engage the little grey cells!

Let’s start our journey back through time in AD 325 at the First Church council in Nicea under Roman Emperor Constantine. This was a gathering of bishops and minsters from all across the Roman Empire. Many say it was here they made up Jesus.

1. Theory 1: The Bishops and Constantine made Jesus up in 325AD

From the records we know there were around 300 bishops at the council from all across the Empire, representing about 1800 bishops. These bishops all had lots of congregations under them. This is a HUGE amount of Christians. So the first problem to trouble our little grey cells is: where did all these Christians come from in the first place? If this is where Jesus was made up, where did all the Jesus followers come from?
And if they believed in an ordinary Jesus – and then the council came out and said “no, THIS is the Jesus you must believe in” – how do you think people would react?

In fact, we know how. Because we know that what the council was about. They kept minutes of their decisions. The big argument was “Is Jesus fully God or is he God’s first creation”. The Council said that the Bible teaches that Jesus is God, and that to say otherwise is heresy. And that argument created massive problems in the church for about 300 years afterwards. Can you imagine what completely changing Jesus would have done? Or making up a new religion and then saying “this is your religion”.
But history gives us no evidence for that. No evidence of a church in upheaval.

There is also no evidence that they discussed creating a Bible. The decisions they made included things like “you are not allowed to castrate yourself” – apparently a problem in those days – “young women are not allowed in the house of minister if it looks suspicious” – good rule even today, flee from temptation, and a whole load of other things. None of them were “write a new Bible”

So, if they didn’t do this, what did they do? Oh, maybe they put together the Bible – well, the New Testament – by carefully selecting the stories about Jesus as superman, as God, and leaving out the stories where he was just an ordinary guy. That’s how they twisted thing.

2. Theory 2: The Bishops and Constantine carefully selected the books of the Bible to make the Jesus they wanted in 325AD

Let’s look at the evidence. Hmm. There isn’t any. In fact, the canon of the Bible – that is which books make up the Bible – canon – not cannon BOOM – c a n o n. was not even discussed at the council.

Maybe it was done in secret. And the new Bible came out. We know that Constantine ordered 50 Bibles made in 331AD.

But we still have that problem that no-one made a fuss. Do you think it would work today if we had a big council and said actually, Jesus wasn’t the saviour, but it was Peter who did all the miracles. He was the real power behind the Messiah. How well do you think that would go down? I mean people have been put to death over whether you can baptise babies or not and whether you need to go all the way into the water or just have it sprinkled. Put to death! And this was changing the basis, the foundation of the Christian faith.

The second problem is that we have copies of the New Testament before and after 325AD. And they match. Finding Papyrus Bodmer XIV-XV (P75) wrecked this theory. P75 is from 175AD – 150 years before the Council. And it matches Codex Vaticanus which is dated to 325AD (the year of the Council). And Codex Vaticanus matches what we have in our Bibles today. The same words. The same Jesus. The Jesus of history. Powerful. Able to heal at a word. Full of grace for sinners. Full of judgement for the self-righteous. One who went to the cross to save sinners – and said that he would rise again on the third day. And then did so. That’s the Jesus of the Bible and has always been the Jesus of the Bible.

There is no evidence that the Bishops and Constantine selected the stories to go into the Bible. The core of the Bible (the four gospels and most of Paul’s letters, as well as Revelation) was fixed very early on (around 150AD). A few other letters went in and out over the years as church leaders debated whether they really were historical writings or later additions – until the books we have today were finalised around 380-400AD.

So, the books we have in the Bible were not changed by the bishops and Constantine. But maybe someone changed them between then and now. I mean, that’s 2000 years of copy after copy. Should be pretty easy to change something?

3. Theory 3: The writings were changed between then and now

Well, it would be pretty easy to change something if we didn’t have a ridiculous number of New Testament manuscripts. More than 5600 copies at last count – and we keep discovering more!

If we follow the evidence we find copies of manuscripts going in different directions to different parts of the Roman Empire. Comparing those copies from different branches reveals what the original manuscript contained. If copies from two or three different branches match, then we know what the original said. Likewise, the more copies we have, the more we can isolate any errors and be rid of them.

The evidence that we have for the New Testament writings are ridiculously strong. They are hilariously overbalanced when it comes to historical reliability. Put them in the ring with any other historical source the New Testament stomps it into the ground like a 500lb gorilla versus an ant. Let me give you an example: Julius Caesar we all know of: Rome’s first Emperor and great military leader. We know of him through the writings of Tacitus. In fact, most of what we know about Roman history comes from Tactius. He is the great Roman historian. He wrote around 100AD – 150 years after Julius Caser. Know when the earliest copy of his writings we have comes from? 1100AD. 1000 YEARS after it was written. How many historians think therefore that it is unreliable? None.

The earliest of the New Testament letters were written in 51-55AD – only about 15 years after Jesus death and resurrection. As in most people were still alive who witnessed what happened with Jesus. So very, very close to the actual happenings. Know when the earliest copy we have if New Testament books? If you were listening closely and said Papyrus Bodmer XIV-XV or P75 you’d be wrong by nearly 75 years. Yes! We actually have a piece of physical parchment from 100AD – still within living memory of the Cross. It’s called Papyrus 52 or the John Rylands fragment. It’s a tiny piece of John’s gospel, 9cm x 6cm, which matches what we have today. Historically this is incredible. It’s the historical equivalent of having a high-speed camera clicking away, recording what happened.

Okay, so we’ve followed the evidence all the way to the events of Jesus life. We know that the bishops and Constantine didn’t make things up, they didn’t change the Bible in any way, and they didn’t select the Bible. What we have in the New Testament today is what was written down between AD51 (1 Thessalonians) and AD95 (Revelation).

4. Theory 4: The disciples made it up

Now this is a much cleverer theory. Now you don’t have to explain why there were so many Christians, or why the church existed, or if the New Testament documents were changed. Sounds like a winner.

Let’s investigate. Use the little grey cells. Now for this to happen – for it to be true that the disciples made it up – we need means, motive, and opportunity.
Means: did the disciples have the skill to pull off the greatest con in history?
Motive: what did they personally gain from this?
Opportunity: could they actually pull it off?

It’s like a being investigated for a murder – if any of those are missing, I didn’t do it. I might have the means (a gun), the motive (I hated the person) – but not the opportunity because I was 1000 miles away when it happened. Or I might have been right next to him, and hated him – but I had no gun, no means. Or I had a gun (means), and I stood right next to him (opportunity), but he was my brother whom I loved – no motive.

So let’s engage the little grey cells in this scenario. Did they make it up?

First: means.

We need to understand that we are not in the year 2015, or even the year 1800, or 1000 – we are way back around 40-50 AD. The literary world was very different then. Most people couldn’t read or write. Popular fiction didn’t exist. In fact there were basically two types of literature: factual, and mythical. Mythical was about the gods and their dealings with us in ancient times. But on-one ever wrote myths like facts. The idea was just stupid. Why would you do that? “To entertain” we say. To which the Romans would respond “That’s idiotic! Myths are myths and facts are facts. Only a fool would mix the two.”

And the disciples certainly aren’t writing myths. They are very clear that what they are writing is historical, eye-witness facts. In 1 John 1:1 John writes We proclaim to you the one who existed from the beginning, whom we have heard and seen. We saw him with our own eyes and touched him with our own hands. He [Jesus] is the Word of life.

In the gospel of Luke, Luke writes “Many people have set out to write accounts about the events that have been fulfilled among us. 2 They used the eyewitness reports circulating among us from the early disciples. 3 Having carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I also have decided to write a careful account for you, most honourable Theophilus, 4 so you can be certain of the truth of everything you were taught.”

CS Lewis was a professor of Mediaeval and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge University, says this: “I have been reading …myths and legends all my life. I know what they are like. And I know none of them are like…these gospel texts…The reader who doesn't see this simply hasn't learned how to read."

This modern way of writing – Harry Potter, da Vinci code, Tom Clancy’s novels - believable stories, with real historical detail mixed in with fiction, made-up stuff, that way of writing hadn’t been invented yet. It was totally unknown. Myths were myths and written like myths. History was history and written like history. No-one would ever, or had even thought of, writing myth like history.

Now it could have happened. Maybe one of the disciples stumbled upon this way of writing and kept it secret. Could have happened. But that’s a massive leap forward. Literature develops like anything else progressively, on the backs of what has come before, like technology. To say the disciples knew this way of writing is like saying the disciples shot Judas with a gun. It’s possible that they developed some kind of basic gun – out of nothing, then never used it again, and it was never heard of again until over a thousand years later. Possible. Not very likely. So “the disciples made it up” fails the means test. They couldn’t do it.

Second: motivation.

Haha, you might think, look how powerful the church is. It’s all about money. Like the Catholic Bishop who spent 14 million euros on his house, or the TV evangelists who preach about God wanting you to be rich – and they get rich, while their listeners get poor.

But you’re reading today’s reality back into history. For the disciples, the gospel of Jesus was a death sentence, not a pathway to riches. All the disciples were either martyred or imprisoned. They were arrested, tried, beaten, left for dead, stoned, mocked, ridiculed, spat at, caused riots, wherever they went. And in many parts of the world, still goes on today. The disciples died for Jesus – would they do that if it were a story they’d made up? Wouldn’t you just say “wait, I made it all up”. They gave their lives because they were convinced that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Saviour – and that to know him is to know Almighty God himself.

So, they didn’t have the skills to write modern fiction, so fail the means test. All they gained was suffering and hardship, so fail the motive test. But what about opportunity? Surely they had the opportunity. I mean they were the ones closest to Jesus, they could have said whatever they wanted.

True. If they were off in the desert somewhere and no-one else is around. If you’re Muhammed off in a cave, or Joseph Smith in a room by yourself. Oh, then you can claim great miracles occur. I can tell you I went up into the mountains and saw a great light and that the angel Gabriel himself stood before me… but you’ve just got to believe me.

That’s what these genius fraudsters, con-artists should have done. Put Jesus doing all these things far away and long ago. But we know the New Testament was written within living memory of the death and resurrection of Jesus. It was written when people were still alive – you could ask them did this happen. And if you’ve read any of the gospels you know that all of Jesus’ ministry happened very publically. His death on the cross was an extremely public event – everyone saw him die. He was dead.
And his resurrection was equally public. The women saw him. His disciples saw him. Two disciples on the road to Emmaus saw him. Then Thomas saw him and touched him. Then he ate breakfast with Peter. Then over 500 people saw him at one time – most who were still alive when those words were written. Go and speak to them.

Our 4^th theory: “the disciples made it up” fails every test. The disciples did not have the means, the motive or the opportunity to fake this.

5. Theory 5: Jesus rose from the dead, and everything he said and did is historical truth.

You know, we don’t even need the gospels to know that Jesus existed. Non-Christian historians and non-Christian writings give evidence that Jesus did exist, that he did die, and that Christians were running around convinced that he rose again from the dead.

Suetonius, Roman historian, in 120AD reports on Jews being expelled from Rome in 49 AD because of rioting about “Chrestus”.

Pliny the Younger in 110AD writes to Emperor Trajan asking if he must continue executing Christians because all they do is worship Christ Jesus "as a god" and promise to do good.

Mara bar Serapion in 70AD warned his son not to persecute wise or good men, like Socrates, Pythagoras, and 'the Jews who killed their wise king.'

In 55AD – very, very early! – Thallos, Roman historian, writes about the darkness during Jesus’ crucifixion.

Josephus, Jewish historian, writing between 60-100AD, writes about Jesus doing miracles, the chief priests taking him to Pilate who condemned him to death – and how instead of stopping Christianity, this seemed to make it grow stronger.

My favourite quote, however comes from Tacitus, the Roman historian, who wasn’t really a fan of Christianity. “Christians derive their name from a man called Christ, who, during the reign of Emperor Tiberius had been executed by sentence of the governor Pontius Pilate. The deadly superstition, thus checked for the moment, broke out afresh not only in Judea (Jerusalem) the first source of the evil, but also in the City of Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world meet and become popular”.

The growth of Christianity was extremely rapid. Like ripples in a pond when you throw a stone, we see that something momentous happened in Jerusalem in around 33-38AD.

History tells us that in Judea, in Palestine, 2000 years ago, there was a man who claimed to be God, and proved it publically with mighty works, a predicted death, and a dramatic resurrection from the dead. Many, many people believed this message very early on – and they could have gone and spoken to eye-witnesses, talked to people who heard Jesus. If it was false, it would have died out. Instead, the church grew massively, not by the sword, like some other religions, but in the face of the sword. Because it’s truth.

These events did not happen off in corner, like in a magic show where you can’t see behind the curtain. But in full view of everybody. This happened. Jesus lived, ministered, died, rose again.

No other theory fits the facts.

So what are you going to do with Jesus?

What are you going to do with Jesus?