The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus

by Lee Strobel

we have 306 of these, several dating back as early as the third century. The most important are Codex Sinaiticus, which is the only complete New Testament in uncial letters, and Codex Vaticanus, whi...

“A new style of writing, more cursive in nature, emerged in roughly A.D. 800. It’s called minuscule, and we have 2,856 of these manuscripts. Then there are also lectionaries, which contain New Testament Scripture in the sequence it was to be read in the early churches at appropriate times during the year. A total of 2,403 o...

In addition to the Greek documents, he said, there are thousands of other ancient New Testament manuscripts in other languages. There are 8,000 to 10,000 Latin Vulgate manuscripts, plus a total of 8,000 in Ethiopic, Slavic, and Arme...

“We can have great confidence in the fidelity with which this material has come down to us, especially compared with any other ancient literary work.”

the late F. F. Bruce, eminent professor at the University of Manchester, England, and author of The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable?: “There is no body of ancient literature in the world which enjoys such a wealth of good textual attestation as the New Testament.”2

Sir Frederic Kenyon, former director of the British Museum and author of The Palaeography of Greek Papyri.

has said that “in no other case is the interval of time between the composition of the book and the date of the earliest manuscripts so short as in that of the New Testament.”3 His conclusion: “The last foundation for any doubt that the scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed.”4

However, what about discrepancies among the vari...

I wanted to zero in on whether

copying mistakes have rendered our modern Bibles hopelessly riddled with inaccuracies.

some variations among manuscripts exist, but generally they’re inconsequential variations

Differences in spelling would be another example.”

Still, the high number of “variants,” or differences among manuscripts, was troubling. I had seen estimates as high ...

“The number sounds big, but it’s a bit misleading because of the way variants are counted,”

“How many doctrines of the church are in jeopardy because of variants?”

“I don’t know of any doctrine that is in jeopardy,” he responded confidently.

“So the variations, when they occur, tend to be minor rather than substantive?”

“Yes, yes, that’s correct, and scholars work very carefully to try to resolve them by getting back to the original meaning. The more significant variations do not overthrow any doctrine of the church. Any good Bible will have notes that will alert the reader to variant readings of any consequence. But again, these are rare.”

So rare that scholars Norman Geisler and William Nix conclude, “The New Testament, then, has not only survived in more manuscripts than any other book from antiquity, but it has survived in a purer form than ...

It was time to turn to the question of the “canon,” a term that comes from a Greek word meaning “rule,” “norm,” or “standard” and that describes the books that have become accepted as official in the church and included in the New Testament.7

“How did the early church leaders determine which books would be considered authoritative and which would be discarded?”

“What criteria did they use in determining which documents would be included in the New Testament?”

“Basically, the early church had thr...

“First, the books must have apostol...

they must have been written either by apostles themselves, who were eyewitnesses to what they wrote about, or by followers of apostles. So in the case of Mark and Luke, while they weren’t among the twelve disciples, early tradition has it th...

“Second, there was the criterion of conformity to what was calle...

was the document congruent with the basic Christian tradition that the church ...

And third, there was the criterion of whether a document had had continuous acceptance and us...

what’s remarkable is that even though the fringes of the canon remained unsettled for a while, there was actually a high degree of unanimity concerning the greater part of the New Testament within the first two centuries. And this was true among very diverse congregations scattered over a wide area.”

British commentator William Barclay said it this way: ‘It is the simple truth to say that the New Testament books became canonical because no one could stop them doing so.’

“We can be confident that no other ancient books can compare with the New Testament in terms of importance for Christian history or doctrine. When one studies the early history of the canon, one walks away convinced that the New Testament contains the best sources for the history of Jesus. Those who discerned the limits of the canon had a clear and balanced perspective of the gospel of Christ.

“Just read these other documents for yourself. They’re written later than the four gospels, in the second, third, fourth, fifth, even sixth century, long aft...

“The Gospel of Thomas ends with a note saying, ‘Let Mary go away from us, because women are not worthy of life.’ Jesus is quoted as saying, ‘Lo, I shall lead her in order to make her a male, so that she too may become a living spirit, resembling you males. For every woman who makes herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven.’ ”

WOW! Don't let the LGBTQ crowd get a hold of this. they'll try saying the Church kept the Gospel of Thomas on top the Canon just because of this.

this is not the Jesus we know from the four canonical gospels!”

“What about the charge that Thomas was purposefully excluded by church councils in some sort of conspiracy to silence it?”

“That’s just not historically...

“What the synods and councils did in the fifth century and following was to ratify what already had been accepted by high and low Christians alike. It is not right to say that the Gospel of Thomas was excluded by some fiat on the part of a council; the right way to put it is, the Gospel of Thomas excluded itself! It did not har...

“You have to understand that the canon was not the result of a series of contests involving church politics. The canon is rather the separation that came about because of the intuitive insight of Christian believers. They could hear the voice of the Good Shepherd in the gospel of John; they could hear it only in a muffled and distorted way in the Gospel of Thomas, mixed in with a lot of other things.

“When the pronouncement was made about the canon, it merely ratified what the general sensitivity of the church had already determined. You see, the canon is a list of authoritative books more than it is an authoritative list of books. These documents didn’t derive their authority from being selected; each one was authoritative before anyone gathered them together. The early church merely listened and sensed that these were authoritative accounts.

In terms of which documents were accepted into the New Testament, generally there has never been any serious dispute about the authoritative nature of twenty of the New Testament’s twenty-seven books—from Matthew through Philemon, plus 1 Peter and 1 John. This of course includes the four gospels that represent Jesus’ biographies.9 The remaining seven books, though questioned for a time by some early church leaders, “were finally and fully recognized by the church generally,” according to Geisler and Nix.10

how much evidence is there for this miracle-working first-century carpenter outside the gospels? Do ancient historians confirm or contradict the New Testament’s claims about his life, teachings, and miracles?

Webster’s dictionary defines corroborate this way: “To make more certain; confirm:

Corroborative evidence supports other testimony; it affirms or backs up the essential elements of an eyewitness account. It can be a public record, a photograph, or additional testimony from a second or third person. It can verify a person’s entire testimony or just key parts of it.

In effect, corroborative evidence acts like the support wires that keep a tall antenna straight and unwavering. The more corroborative evidence, the stronger and more secure the case.

We’ve already heard, through Dr. Craig Blomberg’s testimony, that in the gospels there is excellent eyewitness evidence for the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus. But is there any other evidence to corroborate that? Are there writings outside the gospels that affirm or support any of the essentials about Jesus or early Christianity?

Edwin Yamauchi at Miami University in picturesque Oxford, Ohio,

I started by asking Yamauchi this question: “As a historian, could you give me your assessment of the historical reliability of the gospels themselves?”

“On the whole, the gospels are excellent sources,” he replied. “As a matter of fact, they’re the most trustworthy, complete, and reliable sources for Jesus. The incidental sources really don’t add much detailed information; however, they are valuable as corroborative evidence.”

we do have very, very important references to Jesus in Josephus and Tacitus.

“The gospels themselves say that many who heard him—even members of his own family—did not believe in Jesus during his lifetime, yet he made such an impression that today Jesus is remembered everywhere, whereas Herod the Great, Pontius Pilate, and other ancient rulers are not as widely known. So he certainly did make an impression on those who believed in him.”