Can We Trust the New Testament? by J. A. T. Robinson

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

ACTS AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS

With regard to the prophesies of the fall of Jerusalem, this is a matter of judgement. Are the details so precise as to require us to see them as compressed in the light of the events? Most scholars have thought so in regard to Luke 19.43f which has some very specific predictions of the siege and demolition of Jerusalem. In 21.20 too. Luke has in place of Mark's enigmatic phrase (derived from the book of Daniel), 'when you see "the abomination of desolation" usurping a place that is not his,' the words, 'When you see Jerusalem encircled by armies'. Again in 21.24 he has quite explicitly, 'They will fall at the sword's point; they will be carried captive into all countries; and Jerusalem will be trampled down by foreigners until their day has run its course'. These are generally taken as decisive evidence of prophecy by hindsight. But Dodd argued, conclusively in my opinion, that the details are derived not from what happened in AD 70 (there is no mention, for instance, of the most unforgettable incident, the description of the temple by fire) but rather from Old Testament language about the capture of Jerusalem in 586 BC. Quite independently, the Swedish scholar Bo Reicke has recently come to precisely the same conclusion―and then not only for Luke but also for Matthew as well.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

ACTS AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS

How much weight we should in any case attach to the tradition that Mark depends on the preaching of Peter is debatable. I should be inclined to trust it, though to regard the connection with Mark's Gospel as we now have it as less direct. But in any case the dating of the Apostle's visit to Rome is quite uncertain. It is assumed to be at the end of his life, since he almost certainly died there, but Eusebius the Church historian, whose version is the only one to date the story, puts it during an earlier visit in the reign of the Emperor Claudius (AD 41―54) and indeed in the second year of that reign―and thus well before what would be required for an early dating of Acts. The first draft of St. Mark's Gospel could be as early as 45.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

ACTS AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS

However this has not been taken seriously by most critics (the great German historian Harnack is a noticeable exception). For, it is said, Acts presupposes the Gospel of Luke (Acts 1:1), and Luke presupposes Mark, and Mark is generally dated about 65. The Gospels of Luke and Matthew are usually put well after the fall of Jerusalem―80-90 being again a favorite depository. The main grounds for these judgments are (a) that Mark, according to tradition, represents in part at least, the committal to writing of Peter's preaching in Rome, and such a record would be more likely to be needed after his death (in fact one version of the tradition puts it after his 'departure'―though whether from life or from Rome is uncertain―but others say just the opposite); and (b) that Luke and Matthew, if not Mark, clearly reflect the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, which they say present, after the event, as prophecies on the lips of Jesus.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

ACTS AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS

One of the most remarkable facts about the Acts of the Apostles is that it never mentions this terrible event (which from its excesses won, as Tacitus says, a good deal of sympathy for Christians). Nor does it record the deaths of Peter and Paul, or the outcome of the latter's trial―to which it has been leading up for many chapters. Nor does it confirm the fall of Jerusalem, which Luke's own Gospel is the most explicit in predicting (Luke-Acts being of course by the same author). Various explanations have been offered―including of course the guess that Luke was contemplating a third volume. This is totally unsupported―and even so why should he have broken off volume two where he did? By far the simplest explanation is that Acts finishes where it does because this is where things had reached by the time it was written, two years after Paul's arrival at Rome―that is, about 62. In fact (and this is strongly supported by the Roman historian Sherwin-White whom I mentioned earlier) Acts accurately reflects the conditions of Roman society and Roman law at this very period (and not any later developments), and I am convinced that this is the date of the book.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

The other work, in contrast, clearly reflects the rejoicing which this latter event brought for the Church. It is the book of Revelation. Usually this is dated about 95, but this dating rests ultimately upon one statement of the Church father Irenaeus at the end of the second century. Since he also thought it was written by John the apostle, this would make it the work of a nonagenarian, which is hardly probable. He was almost certainly wrong too in supposing it to be by the same author as the Gospel and Epistles of John, whose Greek style and cast of mind are markedly different. If we go to the book itself, we find that the seer interprets one of his visions of Rome with its seven kings by the words, 'Five have already fallen, one is now reigning, and the other has yet to come; when he does come he is only to last for a little while' (17.10). This like most of his symbolism is deliberately opaque, but the sixth emperor was in fact Galba, who reigned from June 68 to January 69, immediately after the death of Nero by his own sword. The allusion to this event in chapter 13 and to the expectation confirmed as current at the time by the Roman historians Tacitus and Suetonius, that he would return (like Hitler he was too evil really to be believed dead) underline the seer's preoccupation with Nero, the letters of whose name in Hebrew (the language evidently in which this strange man thought, whatever his pidgin Greek) add up to the number of the Beast, 666 (13.18). A dating in 68-9 is reenforced by another vision in 11.1-13, of the old city of Jerusalem. It is still standing and the worst that happens to it is that in an earthquake (not by enemy action) 'a tenth of the city fell'. If the whole lay in ruins and the smoke of its conflagration, like that predicted of 'Babylon (Rome), had actually been seen, as it was in its capture in 70, it is surely incredible that it should not have been described in the vision. The great Cambridge triumvirate of English New Testament scholars of the last century, Lightfoot, Westcott and Hort, all thought that the book of Revelation came from the period of the Neronian persecution (not that of the Emperor Domitian in the 90s), and I believe they were right. Indeed historians are increasingly questioning whether there was any organized persecution of the Church under Domitian―as opposed to the picking off of prominent individuals, some of whom may have been Christians, for reasons of state. In fact at whatever date we put the book, the figure of the Beast and the almost total martyrdom of the Church in a universal blood-bath is an imaginary projection on to the last times. It is the business of apocalyptic not to describe but to descry. The actual situation depicted in the letters to the seven churches of Asia Minor in chapters 1-3 reflects what need be no more than sporadic Jewish persecution―with but one martyr so far to show (2.13). Yet the frightfulness of the Neronian terror as described by Tacitus could have been sufficient to trigger anything in the seer's imagination:

An immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of arson, as of hatred of the human race. Mockery of every sort was added to their death. Covered with the skins of beasts they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames. These served to illuminate the night when daylight failed.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

But to return to the events arising out of the persecution under Nero, I believe that two more New Testament writings make best sense in this context. The first is the Epistle to the Hebrews, which is certainly not by Paul (despite its heading in the AV) and never claims to be: its style and thought-forms are decisively different. This is regularly dated by the textbooks round about 80-90―a decade convenient as a depository because we know remarkably little about it. But of all the books in the New Testament it would seem to me the least likely to come from after the destruction of Jerusalem and with it the end of the levitical high priesthood and the sacrificial system based on the temple. The author's elaborate argument, that this entire order of things must 'shortly disappear' (8.13), would have been pointless if it all at that moment lay in ruins. Indeed he says that 'the first tent" (representing for him the external structure of Judaism) 'still stands ... which is symbolic of the present time' (9.8f.). The letter I believe is clearly before 70. Yet those he addresses have evidently been through a good deal since they were 'newly enlightened' (10.32) and are in danger of relapsing under persecution that has already carried off their leaders (13.7). To cut a long story short, the Epistle to me makes best sense if sent to a synagogue of Jewish Christians in Rome who had lain low during the Neronian persecution, after the deaths of Peter and Paul (probably in 65-6) and yet before the relief brought by the suicide of Nero in 68―let us say, about the year 67.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

In any case it is this same James who is evidently claiming to be the author of the Epistle of James―and the very way in which he in no way flaunts his credentials as the brother of Jesus or as leader of the Jerusalem Church suggests that he is no impostor. Whether he could personally have written it has been much disputed, largely on the ground of its good Greek. But the mounting evidence going to show that at all social levels Palestine, and especially Galilee and Jerusalem, was bilingual makes this objection look less cogent than it did. Unlike the Epistles of Jude and 2 Peter, which belong to the 'silver age' of the early Church, the Epistle of James has a very primitive air about it. There appears to be no antagonism or even division between the Church and the Synagogue, all Christians, from its opening address in James 1.1 being assumed to be Jews. It shows no signs of developed Christian doctrine or Church order or of the arguments, such as mark the Epistles of Paul, about the terms on which Gentiles could be full members of the Church. It therefore seems to fit best before the great crisis which led to the Council of Jerusalem, when, we read, 'certain persons who had come down from Judea began to teach the brotherhood that those who were not circumcised in accordance with Mosaic practice could not be saved' (Acts 15.1). Indeed these people may have claimed that they were drawing 'all or nothing' implication from what James himself had written (cf. James 2:10: 'If a man keeps the whole law apart from one single point, he is breaking all of it'): hence the need for an official disclaimer from him and the Council (Acts 15.24). In this case the Epistle is likely to have been written not long before, perhaps in about 47. It would then be the first finished piece of Christian writing to have survived.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

2 Peter and Jude (which are clearly interconnected, since most of the material is reproduced in similar words and in the same order as 2 Peter) are much more problematic and frankly not very important. I treat them briefly here so as to get them out of the way. 2 Peter has survived as the one New Testament document still thought to have been written in the middle of the second century (under the false name of the Apostle), But the grounds for putting it so late appear to me to be a great deal less than compelling. I would completely agree that it cannot, on stylistic ground, be attributed to the same hand as 1 Peter. But I am not at all sure that it could not have been written during the Apostle's lifetime, by an agent on his behalf, as a final testament and reminder of the fundamentals of the faith to the churches of Asia Minor shortly before his departure to Rome. Perhaps indeed we can actually name the agent. For Jude describes how he has been forced to interrupt a longer letter to send an urgent appeal to the same readers to unite in the defense of the faith against false teachers (Jude 3). I suggest that that letter was 2 Peter, and that the earlier one on the same topic to which he refers in 2 Peter 3.1 is not our 1 Peter (whose recipient and theme are very different) but that which Jude had written to them under his own name. For the style and much of the material are identical. In this case there would be no good reason for rejecting Jude's claim to be the brother of James, the Lord's brother (who, after all, would want to pretend to be Jude?), and to date the Epistles of Jude and 2 Peter before James's martyrdom in 62: for they breathe no hint of persecution, in marked contrast to 1 Peter.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

The death of Nero had been preceded in July 64 by the fire of Rome, which Tacitus, the Roman historian, tells us led to Nero fastening on the Christians as scapegoats after failing to allay the rumors that he himself had started it. Since he had by then already planned and begun the rebuilding of Rome, including a stupendous palace for himself, we can hardly put this persecution earlier than 65. If 1 Peter comes from the apostle Peter (and the reasons for doubting this are to my mind not compelling), then it looks from references to 'the fiery ordeal that is upon you' (4.12) as if it dates from the beginnings of the persecution. For I would agree with those who think that the allusions in the Epistle are best explained by the hypothesis that the material was originally prepared as sermon material for a congregation in Rome (perhaps at Easter baptism), before, under the pressure of events, it was hastily converted into a letter (by the addition of 1.1f. and 5.12-14) and sent off to Asia Minor. If so we could date 1 Peter with a fair degree of accuracy in the spring of 65.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

For the rest of the New Testament writings it will be convenient to consider them with reference to the two further landmarks mentioned earlier, one at each end of the Roman Empire: the death of Nero in 68 and the fall of Jerusalem in 70.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

THE EPISTLES AND APOCALYPSE

Paul's letters roughly occupy the 50s. The earliest are probably 1 and 2 Thessalonians (50-1), followed by 1 Corinthians (55), 2 Corinthians and Galatians (56) and Romans (57), though some would put Galatians before the Council of Jerusalem in 48. Others would put the 'captivity epistles' (Philippians, Colossians and Philemon, and, if it is Pauline, Ephesians) up to a couple of years later, during his imprisonment in Rome (60-2) described in Acts 28.16-31. But I am convinced that they fit better into his earlier detention at Caesarea (57-9) described in Acts 24.22-7. The same applies, I now think, (though this would not be generally accepted), to 2 Timothy, where the mention in 4.16 of 'the first hearing of my case' refers. I believe, not to some hypothetical trial (and subsequent release) in Rome, but to that under Felix, in Acts 21-4. In fact I am persuaded that the other two Pastoral Epistles, 1 Timothy and Titus―whether Paul himself actually penned them or had them written on his behalf―can also be fitted in earlier still, before he was in prison. This again would usually be denied (in fact many would put them years after his death, with genuine fragments possibly incorporated). But with regard to the main body of the Pauline Epistles there is not much difference of opinion. The value of thus being able to date at any rate the major Epistles with considerable confidence between 50 and 60 is that it supplies an absolute scale against which to measure other developments. It also shows how much can happen in a decade.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

The Gallio date depends on the lucky accident of a discovery of an inscription at Delphi published in 1905. A key date for which it would be most helpful if we had equally firm evidence is when Festus succeeded Felix as procurator of Judea (Acts 24.27), for this would give us an end-term for Paul's missionary career and journey to Rome. But unfortunately and rather surprisingly, we have not. Nevertheless, we can build in the basis of the intervals supplied at first hand by Paul himself in Gal. 1.18 and 2.1 (whose evidence is excellent but whose interpretation is much disputed) and by the author of Acts (who is very thin and vague at some points but very detailed and trustworthy at others, especially when, from the "we" in the narrative, he himself was in all probability present). From these and other sources we may infer that the Council of Jerusalem described in Acts 15 took place about 48 and that Paul finally reached Rome, as a prisoner, about 60.

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

Nothing so world-shattering or mind-exploding is happening on the much smaller scale of New Testament chronology. But I could not give my own answer to the question, Can we trust the New Testament?, without querying some of the reigning assumptions of the critics. For, as in archaeology. the number of firm absolute dates is far smaller than might be imagined: the rest, with the relative intervals and interconnections, have to be filled in by inference and deduction.

Here are some of the fixed points that are generally agreed:

AD 30 the crucifixion (possibly, but less probably, 29 or 33).
AD 51-2 Gallio proconsul of Achaia (Acts 18.12).
AD 68 the death of Nero
AD 70 the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans.

To be continued...

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

A similar sort of revolution has been going on in prehistoric archaeology, and comparisons are instructive. Radio-carbon 14 dating and the modifications of this introduced by the evidence of tree-rings and in particular those of the incredibly long-lived California bristle-cone pine (the story is well told in Colin Renfrew's Before Civilization) have upset the picture. Not only have they affected the overall span―in this case stretched it, so that monuments like Stonehenge are quite a lot older than was previously supposed. Much more significantly, they have confounded the assumptions on which the patterns of distribution, dependence and diffusion were so confidently based. For example, it was assumed that the megaliths of Brittany and Ireland (and the ideas and skills needed to build them) must have spread by diffusion from a single source in the Near East, whereas the datings now demonstrate that they were earlier and came into being independently. So many of the arguments about relative datings have been shown to be circular. Insert a new set of assumptions and another equally consistent pattern can emerge―with the intervals expanding or contracting according to the time available. It shows how much of what appears an established scholarly consensus rests not on hard facts but on the presuppositions by which they are interpreted.

To be continued...

[John Reece]

Can We Trust the New Testament?

Chapter 4: THE GENERATION GAP

When was the New Testament written? The layman could be forgiven for expecting that by now the scholars might have settled such an elementary question. Yet the time-span over which the New Testament documents have been held to come into being has expanded and contracted in concertina fashion―or rather having been stretched to its greatest lengths by the extreme German critics of the nineteenth century it has been contracting fairly steadily ever since. At the turn of the century, the span extended from about AD 50 to AD 150―and that was already a good deal shorter than it had been on some reckonings. By the middle of this century, with the isolated exception of one book, it was halved, from about AD 50 to about AD 100. I am personally of the opinion that it should be halved, or more than halved, again, from about AD 47 to just before AD 70. I am aware that this is an extreme position and I am compelled at this point to refer for the scholarly basis of it to a recent book of mine, Redating the New Testament. I merely give a summary of its arguments here. The reader should be warned that most New Testament scholars would not agree with me. But I believe that it represents the direction in which things are moving and I am convinced that the critical orthodoxy reflected in the textbooks rests on far less solid evidence than the consensus would suggest.

To be continued...