BibleAuthenticity, Author at Bible Authenticity

Do We Have Eyewitness Testimony in the Gospels?

July 4, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 8 comments

Titles of the Gospels — Did Matthew, Mark, Luke and John really use any eyewitness testimony when they wrote the Gospels? Were any of these four gospel writers eyewitnesses themselves?

Do we have eyewitness testimony in the gospels?

“Even though we might desperately want to know the identities of the authors of the earliest Gospels, we simply don’t have sufficient evidence. The books were written anonymously and evidently not by eyewitnesses”—Bart D. Ehrman

The Gospels were not written by eyewitnesses, nor did they include any eyewitness testimony, so says the popular agnostic Bible scholar, who has quite a following. While such claims were rare prior to the 1800’s, they have been increasing, and ever more so in recent times. read more

Was Jesus Predicted in the Dead Sea Scrolls?

July 1, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 7 comments

Was Jesus Christ being born in Bethlehem, foretold, or predicted, in advance? Many of the Dead Sea Scrolls have been accurately dated to before Jesus was born.

“Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms”—Luke 24:44 NIV

Critics claim that Jesus was just an ordinary man, and that predictive prophecy is impossible, and therefore deny that Jesus fulfilled any Old Testament prophecies. Since there are so many prophecies that Jesus actually fulfilled, critics resort to claiming that the prophecies in the Old Testament were written after the fact, so as to conform to what happened to Jesus, and also that the New Testament recordings of these fulfillments are frauds, that is, written to conform to Old Testament predictions. read more

JESUS’ BURIAL BY JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA

June 17, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 48 comments

Is there any evidence for the resurrection? — Are the gospel accounts of the death and burial of Jesus by Joseph of Arimathea accurate?

Although all four Biblical gospels report Jesus’ burial by Joseph of Arimathea (Matthew 27:57-61; Mark 15:42:47; Luke 23:50-56; John 19:38-42), there are some skeptics and critics, such as the currently prominent agnostic Biblical “scholar” Bart Ehrman, who deny this fact.

INDEPENDENT EYEWITNESS TESTIMONY

Experts point out that the more independent witnesses reports of an event that are available, the more likely the complete, composite report is true. Matthew and John were disciples of Jesus at the time of his execution, and its aftermath. So was Peter, who appears to have used Mark as his writer of the second Biblical gospel. Luke was familiar with “eyewitness reports circulating . . . from the early disciples,” and says, “having carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I also decided to write an accurate account” (Luke 1:1-3 NLT). So Luke’s gospel was based on accurate eyewitness accounts. read more

PONTIUS PILATE AUTHENTICATED

June 15, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 3 comments

Pontius Pilate stone

“In the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar–when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea”—Luke 3:1 NIV

Pontius Pilate is mentioned in all four the the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and in Acts and 1 Timothy, as the Roman governor before whom Jesus was brought to trial, and who, under pressure, passed the death death sentence upon Jesus (Matthew 27:1-26; Mark 15:1-15; Luke 22:66-23:25; John 18:28-19:16; Acts 4:27; 13:28; 1 Timothy 6:13). Pilate was “governor of Judea” from 26 CE to 36 CE, and is mentioned by the writer Tacitus. read more

HAS ANYONE EVER SEEN GOD?

June 2, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 30 comments

Some people today say they have seen God. Preachers teach that people in the Bible saw God. Is this true? What does the Bible say?

“The Son is the image of the invisible God”—Colossians 1:15 NIV

“To the King eternal, immortal, invisible“—1 Timothy 1:17 NIV

The Bible says that Almighty God is invisible. What is invisible cannot be seen by human eyes. He has always been “invisible”. “I, Yahweh, do not change” (Malachi 3:6 NJB)

“Yahweh said, ‘ . . . no human being can see me and survive.”—Exodus 33:20 NJB read more

IS FAITH INFERIOR TO REASON?

May 8, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 1 comment

Is the Bible reliable? — Is faith inferior to reason?

Atheists assert that faith is inferior to reason. One of the reasons (no pun untended) for this is that they usually have a misconception of what faith actually is, thinking it is blind faith or credulity. True Biblical faith is:

“Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”—Hebrews 11:1 NASB

“Faith shows the reality of what we hope for, it is the evidence of things we cannot see”—Hebrews 11:1 NLT

“Faith” here is from the Greek word pistis, which refers “to confidence that something is real, with a strong implication that action will ensue from this belief” (NLT Word Study System). read more

BIBLE DATES PROVEN TO BE ACCURATE

April 25, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 89 comments

Are Bible dates accurate? In contrast to many other religious works, such as The Koran, Hindu writings, Buddhist, Confucian, the Apocryphal Books, the Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great Price, Doctrines and Covenants, etc., for example, the Bible has a number of dates that can be cross-checked with surviving ancient records and accurately related to our modern calendar and proven to be accurate. These Bible dates

are just some of the ways that the Bible has proven to accurate, authentic and genuine. Some examples follow. read more

SHOULD WE CELEBRATE THE LORD’S SUPPER?

April 7, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 0 Comment

The reason to celebrate “the Lord’s Supper” (1 Corinthians 11:20 NIV) is because Jesus Christ, the Son of God, commanded that his disciples should. Notice:

“And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you'”—1 Corinthians 11:24-25 NIV read more

More Faith to Believe Universe ‘Just Happened’ Than God Created

April 1, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 0 Comment

It has well been said that, “it takes more faith to believe the universe ‘just happened,’ than to believe God created it.”

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”—Genesis 1:1

“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth”, or “When God began to create the heavens and the earth”—Genesis 1:1 NLT margin

Our Milky Way Galaxy has at least 100 billion stars, possibly 200 to 400 billion or several trillion, and is spinning at the incredible speed of 490,000 miles per hour. But even at that super speed, it takes 200 million years to make just one rotation. If one could travel at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to cross it. The average distance between stars is estimated at about 36 trillion miles. There are estimated to be about two hundred billion total galaxies in the universe that are more or less similar to ours, some of which are much larger than the Milky Way galaxy. read more

GEOLOGICAL EVIDENCES OF A GLOBAL FLOOD

March 29, 2023 BibleAuthenticity Comments 0 Comment

The global flood, as described in the Bible book of Genesis, is considered to be a myth by many people and scholars today, but let’s look at how the Bible describes it

“When Noah was 600 years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the underground waters erupted from the earth, and the rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky. The rain continued to fall for forty days and forty nights”—Genesis 7:11,12 NLT

“Finally, the water covered the highest mountains on earth, rising more than twenty-two feet above the highest peaks. All the living things on earth died–birds, domestic animals, wild animals, small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the people”—Genesis 7:19-22 NLT read more