Who wrote the Bible?
Mohamad Mostafa Nassar
Twitter:@NassarMohamadMR
John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
What is the charm of John 3:16?
Well, Evangelical Christians want us to believe this verse promises humankind an effortless salvation, based solely upon Christian belief ā what they call redemption by faith.
But as we all know, the beauty or appeal of a proposition does not make it true. I can propose a lot of wonderful ideas, but a person would be foolish to believe them without verifying their validity.
So, letās do just that with John 3:16 ā letās take a close look and see if we should believe it.
If it is true, the cheap salvation it offers would be the deal of a lifetime.
On the other hand, if nothing supports its validity, we would be crazy to risk our salvation on false “scripture.”
To begin with, who is the author of this New Testament “book” or individual writing of Christian scripture called “John” The disciple?
Contrary to what we might expect, no.
Bart D. Ehrman tells us, “Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John did not write the Gospels.”
Furthermore, “Of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, only eight almost certainly go back to the author whose name they bear: the seven undisputed letters of Paul (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon) and the Revelation of John (although we arenāt sure who this John was).”
The famous biblical scholar, Graham Stanton, agrees: “The gospels, unlike most Graeco-Roman writings, are anonymous. The familiar headings which give the name of an author (āThe Gospel according to . . .ā) were not part of the original manuscripts, for they were added only early in the second century.”
Added by whom? “By unknown figures in the early church.
In most cases, the names are guesses or perhaps the result of pious wishes.”
Which is hardly the level of scholastic accuracy expected of a book of revelation.
The fact that “The gospel according to John” was not written by John, the disciple, is not common knowledge among laity. Nonetheless, Ehrman tells us, “Most scholars today have abandoned these identifications, and recognize that the books were written by otherwise unknown but relatively well-educated Greek-speaking (and writing) Christians during the second half of the first century.”
In addition, acts 4:13 tells us that John was “unlettered.” In other words, he was illiterate.
Stanton poses this compelling question: “Was the eventual decision to accept Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John correct?
Today it is generally agreed that neither Matthew nor John was written by an apostle. And Mark and Luke may not have been associates of the apostles.”
Professor Ehrman is more blunt: “Critical scholars are fairly unified today in thinking that Matthew did not write the First Gospel of John the Fourth, that Peter did not write 2 Peter and possibly not 1 Peter. No other book of the New Testament claims to be written by one of Jesusā earthly disciples.”
Why, then, do our Bibles label the four gospels as Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?
Some scholars suggest something like brandingāthe modern advertising term for the commercial practice of soliciting celebrity endorsements to sell.
A product.
Second-century Christians who favored these four gospels had a choiceāeither acknowledge the gospelsā anonymous authorship or fake it. The bluff proved irresistible, and they chose to assign the gospels to apostolic authorities, thereby illegitimately “branding” the gospels as authoritative.
In the end, we have no evidence any book of the Bible, gospels included, were authored by Jesusā disciples. Furthermore, most scholars accept Paulās authorship in only half of the works attributed to him.
Regardless of who authored what, corruptions and inconsistencies have resulted in more manuscript variants than words in the New Testament!
Jesus and his disciples primarily spoke Aramaic. the common language of Judea in the first century AD, most likely a Galilean dialect distinguishable from that of Jerusalem. This is generally agreed upon by historians. The villages of Nazareth and Capernaum in Galilee, where Jesus spent most of his time, were Aramaic-speaking communities.
Those who wrote the new testament Bible did not know Jesus. And they wrote the Bible after hearing about Jesus in public decades after decades. The Bible is not the book that Jesus wrote.
See here, it is said that Jesus and his disciples spoke Armenian language. This proves that John, Luke, Mark, and Matthew were not disciples of Jesus. They did not know Jesus.–
Allah knows Best
The Gospels Are NOT Eyewitness Accounts
Are the Gospels Eyewitnesses Accounts?
Shredding the Gospels: Contradictions, Errors, Mistakes, Fictions
Contradictions in the Resurrection of Jesus Accounts
The Resurrection Hoax, a Big Scam
Paul The False Apostle of Satan
Prepared by Mohamad Mostafa Nassar
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Arrogance is not only a sign of insecurity, it’s a sign of immaturity. Mature and fully-realized persons can get their points across, even emphatically without demeaning or intimidating others.