8. Are the Witnesses Honest? (3)

Internal criteria	External criteria
(1) Did he know what he was talking about?	(1) Motive for falsification?
(2) Are there specific irrelevant details?	(2) Confirmation from other sources?
(3) Self-damaging information?	(3) Confirmation from archaeology?
(4) Are the document consistent?	(4) Could contemporaries verify the testimonies?
(5) Is there evidence of exaggeration?

 

Have you ever noticed that if you ask someone to tell you “what happened?”, you often also get a lot of information that is irrelevant to the actual story? The recollection of specific, and many times irrelevant, details is powerful evidence of an actual eyewitness account. If people fabricate stories they will only invent the major story line and stick to that. However, if someone talks or writes about actual events that happened, expanding on details and providing additional, often unnecessary and irrelevant information comes naturally. How do the gospels and Paul’s writings match up with this criterion?

The Gospel of Mark has a powerful illustration of this point. Mark 14:32-52 describes how Jesus and the disciples went to Gethsemane after the Last Supper. In verses 32-42 we read about how Jesus takes Peter, James, and John along with Him and asks them to keep watch. Three times Jesus prays by Himself and returns to find the disciples asleep. The third time, Judas and a crowd sent from the chief priests arrive to arrest Jesus (Mark 14:43-50). This account is also found in the other synoptic gospels (Matthew 26:36-56 and Luke 22:39-53). However, at the end of this section Mark adds:  “A young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus. When they seized him, he fled naked, leaving his garment behind”  (Mark 14:51-52). This “young man” (John Mark himself?) was not part of the previous account on how Jesus was praying and arrested, nor is the young man mentioned at any time later in the gospel. These two verses are completely irrelevant. In addition, the specific detail about “wearing nothing but a linen garment” (who cares?) and that “he fled naked, leaving his garment behind” (who would even want to know that?) shows specific irrelevant detail pointing to honest eyewitness recollection.

In the Gospel of Matthew we find examples of specific and irrelevant detail in the various narrative sections. As an illustration lets look at the description Matthew gives of John the Baptist: “John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey” (Matthew 3:4). Very specific information and also mostly irrelevant for Matthew’s account. The point Matthew is trying to make is that John the Baptist was fulfilling OT prophecy (Isaiah 40:3), was preaching to the people to repent from their sins and be baptized as a sign of repentance. How John the Baptist was clothed and what he ate is interesting to know, but irrelevant detail to Matthew’s account.

Being a physician, Luke has an eye and attention for historical details. His gospel is loaded with specific (and sometimes irrelevant) material. Right in the very first chapter we find his introduction of Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth, the parents of John the Baptist: “In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah [not relevant information] ; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron [is this important to know?]. Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commandments and regulations blamelessly [very specific, nice to know, but really irrelevant].  But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well along in years.[more very specific details]” (Luke 1:5-7). Or look at this section in Acts describing how Paul’s party, on their way to Rome is shipwrecked on the island of Malta :  “When daylight came, they did not recognize the land, but they saw a bay with a sandy beach [is all this really important information?] , where they decided to run the ship aground if they could. Cutting loose the anchors, they left them in the sea [who cares?] and at the same time untied the ropes that held the rudders [do we need to know?]. Then they hoisted the foresail to the wind and made for the beach. But the ship struck a sandbar [more and more details] and ran aground. The bow stuck fast [relevant?] and would not move, and the stern was broken to pieces by the pounding of the surf [details and more details]” (Acts 27:39-41). These three verses sound more like the lines of a movie script than the account of Paul’s travels and all this information can be summarized in a short sentence: the ship sank.

How about the Gospel of John? Let’s read John’s account of the morning on resurrection Sunday. [1] John 20:1-8: “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark [lots of details], Mary Magdalene [incriminating detail, because she is a woman. This would be a very bad choice in the Jewish culture, more about this later] went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved [John being to modest to mention his own name throughout this gospel], and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”[Mary seems to have thought somebody moved Jesus’ body instead of understanding that the resurrection took place]  So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first [now we know that John is a faster runner than Peter….]. He bent over [a historically correct detail as tomb entrances were low] and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in [why not?]. Then Simon Peter, who was behind him, arrived and went into the tomb [fits the personality of Peter of being bold (blunt sometimes) as described in all gospels] . He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus’ head [again, lots of details]. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen [more and more specific information which is not relevant to the story line]. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside [is it important to know the exact order they entered the tomb?].”

Analyzing the narrative sections in the gospels and Acts uncovers abundant evidence of very specific information and many details irrelevant to the main story. Even in the few sections of Paul’s writings that are more descriptive than instructive we find similar patterns. This material does not add to the main message of the accounts, except it is just part of what happened, therefore the authors wrote it down as they recalled the events.

Start reading about the next criterion: (3) Self-damaging information?

 

Internal criteria	External criteria
(1) Did he know what he was talking about?	(1) Motive for falsification?
(2) Are there specific irrelevant details?	(2) Confirmation from other sources?
(3) Self-damaging information?	(3) Confirmation from archaeology?
(4) Are the document consistent?	(4) Could contemporaries verify the testimonies?
(5) Is there evidence of exaggeration?