The major festivals of the Christian year often prompt major cover stories in the nation\u2019s weekly news magazines. Time , Newsweek , and US News & World Report all regularly feature major articles timed for Christmas and Easter. The days of these cover articles may soon be over, however, since US News & World Report is no longer publishing a print edition, and Newsweek \u2019s final print edition will be dated December 31, 2012.<\/p>\n
In years past, these cover articles had featured the work of reporters who interviewed a range of scholars and authorities from several theological perspectives. More recently, both Time and Newsweek have instead featured essays written by a single author.<\/p>\n
Timed for this Christmas, Newsweek just released a cover essay by Bart D. Ehrman, who is well-known for his belief that the New Testament is largely historical fiction. \u201cWho is Jesus?\u201d is the question on the cover. \u201cThe Myths of Jesus\u201d is the headline on the essay itself. Newsweek \u2019s agenda is clear, and it has chosen to feature a cover article denying the historical basis of Christmas as one of its last print editions.<\/p>\n
Ehrman begins, predictably, by reviewing the controversy concerning the so-called \u201cGospel of Jesus\u2019 Wife\u201d that emerged earlier this year when Professor Karen King of Harvard University claimed a tiny papyrus fragment to be a monumental discovery. Even as she insisted that the fragment did not prove in any sense that Jesus had a wife, she fueled the confusion in carefully-staged media appearances in which she referred to the fragment as \u201cThe Gospel of Jesus\u2019 Wife.\u201d<\/p>\n
A professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Ehrman\u2019s academic specialization is in the history of the New Testament and its times. As such, he dismissed the papyrus fragment as either irrelevant or a hoax. He writes, \u201cAs it turns out, most experts on early Christianity have come to think the fragment is a hoax, a forgery produced in recent years by an amateur who, unlike King and scholars of her stature, was not well versed in the niceties of Coptic grammar and so was unable to cover up the traces of his own deceit.\u201d<\/p>\n
A close look at that statement reveals a strong critique of Professor King who, according to Ehrman\u2019s logic, should have been able to detect problems with a papyrus fragment probably manufactured by an amateur.<\/p>\n
Ehrman cites that controversy, however, in order to make the point that there were hundreds of \u201cproto-gospels\u201d about Jesus floating about in the first few centuries of the Christian church, and that much of what modern people think they know about Christmas is actually not to be found in the New Testament.<\/p>\n
He rightly states:
\n \u201cAs Christians around the world now prepare to celebrate Jesus\u2019 birth, it is worth considering that much of the \u2018common knowledge\u2019 about the babe in Bethlehem cannot be found in any scriptural authority, but is either a modern myth or based on Gospel accounts from outside the sacred bounds of Christian Scripture.\u201d
\nOf course, that is profoundly true. The New Testament tells us that Jesus was born in unusual circumstances and placed in a manger because \u201cthere was no room in the inn.\u201d There is no innkeeper in the New Testament, however. There is no record of the number of the magi, no reference to December 25 as the date of Christ\u2019s birth, and no mention of barnyard animals, much less a little drummer boy.<\/p>\n
Beyond these rather familiar issues, Ehrman also points to a host of claims about Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and the larger Christmas story that amount to \u201clegends and fabrications\u201d that are rightly recognized as implausible and untrue.<\/p>\n
Ehrman then turns to press his case on the New Testament itself. After reviewing a number of traditions and non-biblical accounts he asks, \u201cAre the stories about Jesus\u2019 birth that are in the New Testament any less unbelievable?\u201d<\/p>\n
He then says that the answer to that question \u201cdepends on whom you ask.\u201d To leave no doubt, Ehrman answers the question directly in his essay. The New Testament writings \u201care not historically reliable descriptions of what really happened when Jesus was born,\u201d he asserts.<\/p>\n
Ehrman juxtaposes those who are \u201cinterested in affirming the narratives of Scripture\u201d and those who are more interested in \u201cknowing what actually happened in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n
He then explains:
\n \u201cAnd there is indeed a very wide swath of scholars \u2014 Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, agnostic, and others \u2014 who have a very different view of the accounts of Jesus\u2019 birth in the New Testament and who realize that there are problems with the traditional stories as they are recounted for us in Matthew and Luke, the only two Gospels that contain infancy narratives. However valuable these writings may be for theological reflection on the meaning and importance of Jesus \u2014 and why should anyone deny that they are tremendously valuable for that? \u2014 they are not the sorts of historical sources that we might hope for if we are seriously engaged in trying to reconstruct the events of history.\u201d
\nIn other words, Ehrman argues that Matthew and Luke simply can\u2019t be trusted to convey historical truth. He points to what he insists are inconsistencies and erroneous historical claims, arguing that though some attempt to explain these questions in an attempt to affirm the veracity of the gospels, it is better just to abandon them altogether if you are \u201cseriously engaged in trying to reconstruct the events of history.\u201d<\/p>\n
Just as a practical matter, a reading of Bart Ehrman\u2019s many books, along with similar efforts, reveals that those who claim to abandon the New Testament in order to \u201creconstruct the events of history\u201d find themselves coming back to the New Testament again and again. The reason for this is simple \u2014 there are no comparable sources.<\/p>\n
Ehrman reveals his real agenda in the sentence that follows his denial of the historical truthfulness of the New Testament. He asserts, \u201cFor some Christian believers that is a problem; for others, it is a liberation, as it frees the believer from having to base faith on the uncertainties provided by the imperfect historical record and the fallible historians who study it.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Ehrman\u2019s view, liberation comes in freeing the believer from a faith based in the claims of the New Testament, or in any historical record, for that matter.<\/p>\n
The interesting point about Ehrman\u2019s proposed path of liberation for Christian believers is the fact that Ehrman is himself no longer a believer. He was once a conservative evangelical, but now describes himself as an agnostic who has left the church.<\/p>\n
Like many others, Ehrman tries to argue that the New Testament is still useful for \u201ctheological reflection on the meaning and importance of Jesus.\u201d He asks, \u201cAnd why should anyone deny that they are tremendously valuable for that?.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the New Testament does not present itself merely for the purpose of theological reflection. It makes unvarnished historical claims and direct statements of fact. Ehrman attempts to sideswipe this truth, stating that the New Testament contains writings identified as \u201cgospels\u201d rather than \u201chistories.\u201d But the word \u201chistory\u201d in that sense is a fairly modern invention. The gospels do contain interpretation and theological elaboration, but all four gospels, including Matthew and Luke, contain explicit and pervasive historical material \u2014 the bedrock historical claims of Christianity itself.<\/p>\n
Christianity stands or falls on the truth concerning Jesus, and thus it also stands or falls on the authority and truthfulness of the Bible. What you believe about historical truth defines what you believe about Jesus Christ. Without the revealed truths of the New Testament, there is no Christianity, just superstitions and fantasies about Jesus.<\/p>\n
Interestingly, Bart Ehrman does believe that Jesus existed. In a recent book he debunks those who dismiss all claims about Christ as mere myth. He believes Jesus to have been a Jewish apocalyptic prophet, but not God incarnate in human flesh.<\/p>\n
The cover article in the magazine, timed for maximum publicity at Christmas, was a premeditated act. Securing Bart Ehrman to write the essay set the course, and the cover art is intended to sell the magazine.<\/p>\n
So, in the waning days of Newsweek as a print magazine, the editors decided to take on the New Testament. Readers should note carefully that it is Newsweek , and not the New Testament, that is going out of print.<\/p>\n
________<\/p>\n
Bart D. Ehrman, \u201cWhat Do We Really Know About Jesus?,\u201d Newsweek , Monday, December 17, 2012. http:\/\/www.thedailybeast.com\/newsweek\/2012\/12\/09\/what-do-we-really-know-about-jesus.html<\/p>\n
R. Albert Mohler, Jr., \u201cThe Gospel of Jesus\u2019 Wife? When Sensationalism Masquerades as Scholarship,\u201d Thursday, September 20, 2012. http:\/\/www.albertmohler.com\/2012\/09\/20\/the-gospel-of-jesuss-wife-when-sensationalism-masquerades -as-scholarship\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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