Are the Four Gospels Trustworthy?

[POI]

1. As the title implies, are the four Gospels trustworthy?
2. If so, are they completely trustworthy, or maybe only completely trustworthy where they really need to be?
3. Do they even need to be trustworthy?

[1213]

Did people have Last Names in the Bible?
They actually did not have surnames, or what the western world calls last names.
source[/indent]

Maybe it was not last, or surname. It could have been second name, so that people would understand that he is not some other Jacob. There was a habit to give same names for people that the family already had, which is why there are several Jacobs, Johns... ...would be logical to give second names so that people would know who they mean.

...Jesus begins his ministry after John's arrest. Mk.1:13,14.
Jesus begins his ministry before John's arrest. Jn.3:22-24.

Weird, these don't have even the word ministry in them:

Quite right, but neither need use the word itself. As long as the two events took place, which both verses attest to.

I don't think there is a contradiction in those two, because they don't seem to be exactly about the same thing.

No, but I find it extremely unlikely that Jesus would be tempted twice by Satan, yet neither book bothering to mentioning such significant assaults.

I understand this so that Jesus was tempted by Satan forty days:

And He was there in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts. And the angels ministered to Him.
Mk.1:13

[1213]

... Just for a test, you show me why it is not an error that Matthew has Jesus born before Herod died in 4 BC but Luke has him born after the Roman takeover in 6/7 AD?

Hint, you cannot redate Herod's death, nor make the census of Quirinus anything but the one Acts calls'the days of the census' when Gamaliel revolted which Josephus tells us is when Rome took over after Herod's son was deposed. And finally there is no room anymore for a governorship of Quirinus before his only one in 6 - 12 AD.
...

How would you prove you are correct with those claims?

[Goose]

The issue of alleged contradictions amongst the Gospels has been mentioned numerous times in this thread. Indeed, TRANSPONDER, in particular, has brought it up in one way or another in almost every single post in this thread.

If that is not to be trusted (and I say the evidence says it is to be rejected as totally contradictory stories that trash and idea of witness credibility,the as Paul put it (though in a rather different context) the Christian Faith is in vain.

Yet they contradict terminally. So I argue that, even after all the attempts to excuse and explain these contradictions, the only sound conclusion is that there was no resurrection - appearance (as Mark really shows) and three were separately invented and as one would expect, totally contradict each other.

We are only partway through, but you can see the pattern, The contradictions make the story doubtful/the contradiction show the stories are reliable.

Of course you may say it is not a 'meaningful' error.But should you do so, that is just evasion, as an error in non -meaningful things means that we should be doubtful about claims of meaningful things, like the resurrection which is nearly as bad for contradictions.

How about when they hand you contradictions? Which of each pair do you NOT trust as being the true one? (Ya can't trust them both.)

I’m trying to understand the argument and how it relates to the general reliability (I’m using the word reliability instead of trustworthiness) of the Gospels. It seems the gist of the contradictions argument is that the presence of contradictions between texts argues for the general unreliability of, presumably, at least one text. Is that basic gist of the argument? If it isn’t, I’m having difficulty understanding how it relates to the thread.

As I see it, if any verse in the bible can be shown to be false, any other verse could be false as well. Maybe verse X is true, but there's also the chance it could be false. A person simply doesn't know. Want to trust something that could be false? Go right ahead. Considering the claimed omnipotence and omniscience of god one would think he'd insure that no such doubt would ever show up in his book. But it does.

So let me see if I have this straight, as you see it. If it's possible that something in the Gospels is false, then they are not trustworthy. Isn't that basically what you are arguing?

[TRANSPONDER]

[Replying to Goose in post #23]

That's not exactly what I'm arguing. Let's argue that an omnipotent hands on God that wanted His Book to be exactly what he wanted to to convey, He's magically alter any mistake or translation so that mistakes were corrected and every translation would read the same. If that were the case, there would be no doubt or argument.

But it isn't the case, so it is the word of God, but the mistakes of men. So a few slips, errors and variants could be forgiven. But it couldn't have stuff that was wrong, correct? Well, the debates are about things that are wrong according the science, really, or about prophecies that didn't happen (Tyre for instance) and about the contradiction; where the Bible disagrees with itself. Whether we buy the apologetics or not it is inescapable that the Bible does work as a book micromanaged to be without error or mistake. It is at best something where the errors can be explained, or at least, don't much matter.

I'm not so much talking about matters of translation -shopping or Interpretation as I just dealt with regarding chariots of Led or whether you could enslave your neighbours, it the ones where the denial is so egregious, so dishonest, that they draw attention to the failure of the Bible, and its' apologists. And the two salient points about Bible contradictions are that they are undeniable to any reasonable person and pretty hard to explain away, but they are found all through, not just a few slips and errors; they are big, damning and constant.

[Miles]

The issue of alleged contradictions amongst the Gospels has been mentioned numerous times in this thread. Indeed, TRANSPONDER, in particular, has brought it up in one way or another in almost every single post in this thread.

If that is not to be trusted (and I say the evidence says it is to be rejected as totally contradictory stories that trash and idea of witness credibility,the as Paul put it (though in a rather different context) the Christian Faith is in vain.

Yet they contradict terminally. So I argue that, even after all the attempts to excuse and explain these contradictions, the only sound conclusion is that there was no resurrection - appearance (as Mark really shows) and three were separately invented and as one would expect, totally contradict each other.

We are only partway through, but you can see the pattern, The contradictions make the story doubtful/the contradiction show the stories are reliable.

Of course you may say it is not a 'meaningful' error.But should you do so, that is just evasion, as an error in non -meaningful things means that we should be doubtful about claims of meaningful things, like the resurrection which is nearly as bad for contradictions.

How about when they hand you contradictions? Which of each pair do you NOT trust as being the true one? (Ya can't trust them both.)

I’m trying to understand the argument and how it relates to the general reliability (I’m using the word reliability instead of trustworthiness) of the Gospels. It seems the gist of the contradictions argument is that the presence of contradictions between texts argues for the general unreliability of, presumably, at least one text. Is that basic gist of the argument? If it isn’t, I’m having difficulty understanding how it relates to the thread.

As I see it, if any verse in the bible can be shown to be false, any other verse could be false as well. Maybe verse X is true, but there's also the chance it could be false. A person simply doesn't know. Want to trust something that could be false? Go right ahead. Considering the claimed omnipotence and omniscience of god one would think he'd insure that no such doubt would ever show up in his book. But it does.

So let me see if I have this straight, as you see it. If it's possible that something in the Gospels is false, then they are not trustworthy. Isn't that basically what you are arguing?

Trust depends on one's belief in the reliability, truth, or sturdiness of something, so, as I see it, trustworthiness depends on the individual. Personally, if I was looking into Christianity as a choice I wouldn't put much trust in the gospels or the Bible as a whole, particularly if required to acknowledge the Bible is inerrant and/or infallible, meaning that every single statement of the Bible calls for instant and unqualified acceptance. Would you? Or, like so many "liberal" Christians, would you cherry pick the Bible; keeping those verses that agreed with your theology while ignoring those that didn't?. The end run most Christians use to get around difficult, immoral, and contradictory verses.



.

[TRANSPONDER]

Our pal Goose is right that I harp on contradictions quite a lot Though I also do problems like prophecy of Tyre failed, evidence is against the Flood, the Bible itself rules out Exodus any time before the 12th -11th c BC, Slavery scuppering the claim to Bible morality, the blasphemy charge makes no sense to a non - Christian (the Sanhedrin could not have proposed it), Daniel works better as history of the Ptolemaic wars up to the Maccabean revolt, cast as Prophecy (1) and fallacies such a definite promise to answer prayers, which we all know doesn't happen.

But right from the start (70's - 80's) I noticed that lists of contradictions were rather popular but they never did anything with them. They simply said 'This cannot be the inerrant word of God', and the apologists simply said 'So it isn't perfect, but it is still true'. I saw then that piffling problems like how many hats Samuel wore or whether the Baptist wore a camel hair or sheepskin loincloth, got argued about but such contradictions as would raise doubts about whether the Gospels (because they are what matters, not the OT) were reliable as a true account didn't crop up. I don't know whether the apologists only make a deal of answering the easy ones like one or two angels or how many were in a particular army so as to pretend that all the other problems were just as easily answered, but Atheists and Bible critics are failing if we let'em get away with it. There are bigger problems.

I have dealt with the discrepant dates of the nativities and the strenuous apologetics excuses, even though Joseph lives in Bethlehem according to Matthew is one that seems to be overlooked. But the flight to Egypt totally contradicted by Luke is as good as 'no trip to Galilee' after the resurrection in Luke-Acts. And it is frankly painful for me to have to point out the ignorance or dishonesty we see in apologists trying fiddle what the Bible says to make it say something else.

There are contradictions well known such as the Genealogies and the blatant lie that one is the Genealogy of Mary - they are both said in the Bible to be the line of descent to Joseph. I understand their reasoning: "This is true - we know it on faith - so one must be a different but relevant line, Mary's of course, no matter what it actually says'. This is the 'Ghost Bible' - one that works and the actual Bible that gets read is not the 'True' one. That takes spiritual inspiration to understand.

I know what is going on and it's upsetting my breakfast. So I'll leave it there, and look at the big omissions. Well the excuse there upsets my lunch, too, where neglect of not only stunning events like the transfiguration, or the raising of Lazarus bothers me a lot, but omission of theologically vital stuff like every single sermon in John from the synoptics or every single synoptic parable from John. Cue the 'they did not hear about it' excuse, while at the same time, insisting that events outside the loop of apostolic cognisance like dirty deals done in conclave by Caiaphas or between the tomb guard and the Sanhedrin get known. But there we are in the back to front logic of Faith where what is remotely possible counts more than what is far more likely.

But the lack of a penitent thief in anyone but Luke must on all reason be put down to invention. It is a stunning and theologically important event. How could the other synoptics not have known of it, never mind John? The fact is that the gospels are more full of really big, bad contradictions than my puddin is full of plums. And apart from sheer volume, the seriousness of them must scupper Gospel reliability, especially in the resurrection, which if anything, God should have made darn sure it was watertight. It isn't. Not only does it leak like the Wyoming schooner, but the darn thing is hardly glued together.

And the thing that stuns me is not the degree of denial to which Bible apologists go - that's par for the course - but the amount that Bible critics seem to miss, overlook or let the Bible apologists get away with (2. p.s).

(1) which would make the 'messiah, cut off ' Onias III High priest, and nothing to do with Jesus.

(2) p.s Just as I ached for support for doubters and deconverts in the 80's 90's and there was none, I feel the aching need for an atheist thinktank (a bit like Talk Origins; Rational Wiki hardly scratches that surface). Where ALL these problems are listed, discussed and known, not just the ones the Believers want to discuss. The goddless can log on for the Answers, just as the apologist here can log onto a Bible apologist website (as they do as I recognise cut and paste all the time. Which answers a puzzle an apologist will post some very good well argued and researched stuff and when after discussion it gets refuted, the erudition vanishes and it collapses in abuse, denial and attempts to run away claiming a win. The answer is they cut, paste and post a good argument, but when that fails, they fall back on the best the have which is nothing but ignorant denial and abuse. I knowed I'd understand it sometime

[Goose]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #24]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #26]

You are typing a lot of words and stringing together various disconnected points but not making a coherent overarching argument. I read both your posts around half a dozen times trying to make some sense of what exactly it is you are arguing. I’m still somewhat baffled about your argument although you must be arguing, in some roundabout way, against general reliability. If not, I don’t understand what else you could be arguing.

You have pointed to (ad nauseam) what you see as contradictions, minor inaccuracies, omissions, etc. If I were to grant for the sake of argument every single one where would that leave us? Clearly you see these issues as sufficient to render the Gospels as generally unreliable. What you aren’t showing is why that is the case; why those issues force us to conclude they are generally unreliable. All I have to do, at this point, is counter argue that other ancient texts, thought to be generally reliable, also have contradictions, minor inaccuracies, omissions, etc. We are then left with either throwing out most of ancient history or accepting the Gospels along with other ancient texts as generally reliable.

[Goose]

As I see it, if any verse in the bible can be shown to be false, any other verse could be false as well. Maybe verse X is true, but there's also the chance it could be false. A person simply doesn't know. Want to trust something that could be false? Go right ahead. Considering the claimed omnipotence and omniscience of god one would think he'd insure that no such doubt would ever show up in his book. But it does.

So let me see if I have this straight, as you see it. If it's possible that something in the Gospels is false, then they are not trustworthy. Isn't that basically what you are arguing?

Trust depends on one's belief in the reliability, truth, or sturdiness of something, so, as I see it, trustworthiness depends on the individual. Personally, if I was looking into Christianity as a choice I wouldn't put much trust in the gospels or the Bible as a whole, particularly if required to acknowledge the Bible is inerrant and/or infallible, meaning that every single statement of the Bible calls for instant and unqualified acceptance. Would you? Or, like so many "liberal" Christians, would you cherry pick the Bible; keeping those verses that agreed with your theology while ignoring those that didn't? The end run most Christians use to get around difficult, immoral, and contradictory verses.

Let’s forget about the doctrine of inerrancy, it’s a rabbit trail. You have said here you wouldn’t put much trust in the Gospels but the main argument you have presented is the contradiction argument. It seems you are arguing that if they contain contradictions it’s possible they are false. If it’s possible they are false then they are not trustworthy. Isn’t that the gist?

[Miles]

As I see it, if any verse in the bible can be shown to be false, any other verse could be false as well. Maybe verse X is true, but there's also the chance it could be false. A person simply doesn't know. Want to trust something that could be false? Go right ahead. Considering the claimed omnipotence and omniscience of god one would think he'd insure that no such doubt would ever show up in his book. But it does.

So let me see if I have this straight, as you see it. If it's possible that something in the Gospels is false, then they are not trustworthy. Isn't that basically what you are arguing?

Trust depends on one's belief in the reliability, truth, or sturdiness of something, so, as I see it, trustworthiness depends on the individual. Personally, if I was looking into Christianity as a choice I wouldn't put much trust in the gospels or the Bible as a whole, particularly if required to acknowledge the Bible is inerrant and/or infallible, meaning that every single statement of the Bible calls for instant and unqualified acceptance. Would you? Or, like so many "liberal" Christians, would you cherry pick the Bible; keeping those verses that agreed with your theology while ignoring those that didn't? The end run most Christians use to get around difficult, immoral, and contradictory verses.

Let’s forget about the doctrine of inerrancy, it’s a rabbit trail. You have said here you wouldn’t put much trust in the Gospels but the main argument you have presented is the contradiction argument. It seems you are arguing that if they contain contradictions it’s possible they are false.

If it's a true contradiction

...........Jehoiachin was both eight years old (2 Chronicles 36:9) when he began to reign, and eighteen years old (2 Kings 24:8) when
...........he began to reign.

one of the verses has to be false, doesn't it? . Of course it does. . AND, perhaps even both of them.

If it’s possible they are false then they are not trustworthy. Isn’t that the gist?

That's how I see it. Would you trust a physics textbook if some of the statements in it were false? How about a road map if some of the roads were incorrectly shown?

.

[Goose]

Let’s forget about the doctrine of inerrancy, it’s a rabbit trail. You have said here you wouldn’t put much trust in the Gospels but the main argument you have presented is the contradiction argument. It seems you are arguing that if they contain contradictions it’s possible they are false.

If it's a true contradiction

Jehoiachin was both eight years old (2 Chronicles 36:9) when he began to reign, and eighteen years old (2 Kings 24:8) when he began to reign.

one of the verses has to be false, doesn't it? Of course it does. And perhaps even both of them.

Firstly, that’s an OT example. This thread concerns the Gospels. Secondly, I’m not sure that even qualifies as a true contradiction, at least not in the explicit sense: X and ~(X). This particular case is just as easily explained as a copyist error. Some manuscripts read “eighteen” at 2 Chronicles 36:9.

"Jehoiachin was [f]eighteen years old when he became king, and he reigned for three months and ten days in Jerusalem. He did evil in the sight of the LORD." – NASB

The foot note to [f]: As in LXX and some Heb mss; MT eight years

If it’s possible they are false then they are not trustworthy. Isn’t that the gist?

That's how I see it.

Do you see it that way with your own senses? After all, it’s possible they are feeding your brain false information. It’s possible you are a brain in a vat and your senses are falsely telling your brain you are sitting in a chair looking at a computer screen. Therefore, your senses are not trustworthy. So why do you trust your senses? I suspect it’s because you have no choice, you have to trust your senses.

Would you trust a physics textbook if some of the statements in it were false?

I may not have any other choice. What’s the alternative? Throw the entire text book in the trash because something in it is known to be false? That seems irrational. We don’t throw the entire discipline of physics out the window as untrustworthy because some ideas within physics have been shown false.

How about a physician's diagnosis of your ailment if some of his past diagnoses of that ailment were false?

I may have no other choice. What if he were the only physician available with experience diagnosing that ailment? I suppose it might depend upon his track record as well. If he has been correct more times than not when making those past diagnoses of that ailment then, yes, I would trust him because the laws of probability would suggest I should.