When were the four gospels written and how do these compare to the time frame in which other ancient biographies were penned?
Let us discover the answers to this question.
A. Time frame of when the New Testament books were written
According the standard scholarly dating, the gospel of Mark was written in the
70s, the gospels of Matthew and Luke in the 80s and the gospel of John in the
90s. All of these gospels were written within the lifetime of a multitude of
eyewitnesses, who would have corrected any fallacies if false information about
Jesus were going around.
However evidence shows that these gospels were probably written even earlier
than that. Take the book of Acts, for example, written by Luke. This book ends
abruptly. The apostle Paul is the central character of this book and he's under
house arrest in Rome. That book stops right there. These are the last two verses
of Acts: Acts 28:30-31 "For two whole years Paul stayed there in his own rented
house and welcomed all who came to see him. Boldly and without hindrance he
preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ."
What happened to the apostle Paul? The book of Acts doesn't tell us, probably
because this book was written before the apostle Paul was put to death. This
means that Acts cannot be dated any later than 62 A.D.
Now, the book of Acts was written after the gospel that Luke wrote, and since
Luke references part of the gospel of Mark, the gospel of Mark dates even
earlier! If we allow a year between each book, Mark would have been written no
later than 60 A.D., or even earlier. If Jesus was crucified around 30 to 33
A.D., the time span between his resurrection and the writing of the first gospel
would be less than 30 years! If we compare this with the time frame of other
ancient literature, this is like a news flash!
Now, the letters of the apostle Paul were written even earlier than that!
B. Comparison with the time frame of other ancient biographies.
Now let us compare our findings with how long after the fact other ancient
documents were written.
I. Alexander the Great
The two earliest biographies of Alexander the Great were written by Arian and
Plutarch. They were written more than 400 years after Alexander's death in 323
B.C. Historians consider these biographies reliable.
Ii. Zoroaster
Zoroaster live in the seventh century B.C. (born around 630 B.C.) Most of the
Zoroastrian scriptures were not written until after the third century A.D. His
most popular Parsi biography was written in 1278 A.D. This is a time span of
more than 1800 years!
Iii. Buddha
Buddha lived in the 6th century B.C. His first biography was written in the
first century A.D., 600 years after the fact!
Iv. Mohammed
Mohammed lived from 570 A.D. to 632 A.D. His biography was not written until 767
A.D., more than a century after his death.
Compared to all of these ancient writings, the New Testament was written like a
news flash and is the only series of books that were written while eyewitnesses
were still alive! Which documents would you trust more? Ones that were written
100 to 1800 years after the fact, or the ones that were penned while
eyewitnesses were still alive?
The Bible is trustworthy. It is God's Word directed to us. In it you will
discover jewels that will lead to eternal life. The most precious jewel it
contains, though, is that God wants to have a personal relationship with each of
us. To Him, this mattered so much that He was willing to die to re-establish the
broken relationship between mankind and Himself. Will you accept His friendship
and start an intimate relationship with Him? Come discover this amazing
friendship in your life. Welcome Him into your life and accept His call at
http://www.answers2prayer.org/saviours_call.html
Rob Chaffart
