Why We Can Trust the Gospels as History

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By JP Nunez 9 July AD 2019 8 Comments

Are the Gospels trustworthy as history? Did the stories they tell about Jesus really happen? Christianity is a historical

religion, a faith that’s based on allegedly historical people and events, so the question of historicity is fundamental to our

faith. If the Gospels relate historical fact, then our beliefs stand on some pretty firm ground; however, if they relate fiction,

then we have a very big problem.

So how do we answer these questions? How can we determine if the stories the Gospels tell are really true? From a purely

historical perspective, we cannot have absolute certainty about this (that is impossible in history), but there are a few things

at which we can look to see if they are reliable, a few clues that can tip the scale one way or another. Let’s now take a look

at some of those clues and see what they can tell us about the historical trustworthiness of the Gospels.

Historicity and First Century Judaism

Let’s begin with the nature of the first-century Judaism. Christianity grew out of Judaism, and the whole point of the

Gospels is that Jesus Christ is the climax and goal of the story told in the Old Testament. Now, Judaism (both in the first

century and in the Old Testament) was a historical religion. It was based on past events that supposedly happened in

history, and the Jews were expecting certain future events to occur in history as well (like the coming of the Messiah). As a

result, it would not have made much sense for a group of first-century Jews to just make up things that never

happened. The prominent New Testament scholar N. T. Wright explains this point well in his book The New Testament and

the People of God:

[T]he fact that the evangelists believed themselves to be bringing the story of Israel to its great
climax, the turning-point from which at last the long history of the world would change course,
means inescapably that they believed themselves to be writing (what we call) history…History was
where Israel’s god must act to redeem his people…If we are to think Jewishly, and to see the
evangelists as doing so too, we cannot but conclude that they intended to refer to Jesus and his
historical ministry.1

If they were telling the story of Jesus as the climax of Israel’s history, there is every reason, over
and above biographical curiosity, why they would have intended that their stories should have a
clear historical referent.2

Granted, this doesn’t prove anything, but it does provide us with some evidence that the Gospels are reliable. Telling stories

that never happened would have been counterproductive to their entire enterprise; it would not have made any sense for

them to make up a Messiah or to tell fake stories about some random first-century Jew. As a result, we have good reason to
believe that the evangelists were trying to write history. However, this raises a question for us: even if they wanted to write

history, would they have been able to do so?

Historicity and Anonymous Gospels?

I argue that the writers of the Gospels most likely wanted to write history. Let’s look at one reason why. The Gospels are

traditionally attributed to Matthew (an Apostle), Mark (a close companion of the Apostle Peter), Luke (a close companion of

the Apostle Paul), and John (an Apostle), but modern scholars often reject these traditional attributions. There a few

reasons for this stance, but one of the main ones is that the texts of the Gospels never actually name their

authors. Nowhere do the Gospels come out and tell us who wrote them, so many scholars today claim that the Gospels are

anonymous documents that were later attributed to specific (but, most likely fictional) authors.3

However, this skepticism is unwarranted. First, even though the Gospels never identify their authors within the texts of their

stories, every complete ancient manuscript of the Gospels that we possess today is titled “The Gospel According to…” We

don’t have any complete copies that are actually anonymous; they all contain the names of their supposed

authors. Consequently, the claim that they were originally anonymous is really just an educated guess; it is not supported by

any of the manuscripts we possess.4

Moreover, if the Gospels were originally anonymous, we would expect to see speculation and argumentation about their

authorship in the early Church, but we don’t. Already by the early second century, we see Christian writers confident that

these Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and nobody disputed that. There were other biblical works

whose authorship was disputed, such as the Letter to the Hebrews, which does not name its author either in its text or in its

title, in contrast to the Gospels. Since we see the exact opposite of what we would expect, if the Gospels were originally

anonymous, we have good reason to believe that they were not. 5

Not the Obvious Choices

And that’s not all. While John, one of the three Apostles in Jesus’ inner circle (along with Peter and James), was an obvious

choice to whom to attribute one of the Gospels, the other three authors present no basis for a likely, arbitrary

attribution. Matthew was an Apostle but not a prominent one, and Mark and Luke were not important figures in the New

Testament at all. Simply put, if the early Church wanted to attribute the Gospels to people who would lend them an air of

authority, they made some pretty bad choices. Instead, the most likely explanation for the traditional attributions is that

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John really did write the works that bear their names.

Now, two of these men were Apostles, and the other two were close associates of Apostles (Mark was an associated of

Peter, and Luke was an associate of Paul), so they were definitely in a good position to write accurate history about Jesus’

life and preaching. Because of all this, we already have some good reasons for believing that the Gospels are historically
reliable even before we look at their content. Both their nature as first-century Jewish documents and the likely identities of

their authors attest to this. However, that is only half the story. Next, we have to look at what the Gospels actually say and

see if their content gives us any further clues about their historical trustworthiness.

Historicity and Embarrassing Stories

To begin, let’s look at a few texts in the Gospels that the evangelists would have considered potentially damaging or

embarrassing. For example, we can look for stories or sayings that seem to denigrate Jesus. If the Gospel writers simply

made their stories up, they would not have included such events, but if they were trying to write accurate history, then they

would have simply recorded the facts as they actually happened, regardless of how much they might seem to contradict

their own beliefs.

When we look at the Gospels, we find that all four of them do in fact include such details. For example, Mark 6:1-5 says that

when Jesus returned to his hometown, he wasn’t able to perform many miracles there because of the people’s

disbelief. This event seems to cast doubt on Jesus’ power to work miracles, so it clearly fits this criterion. The fact that

Mark chose to include it despite its potential for embarrassment shows that he was genuinely concerned about the facts as

they historically happened, not just about made-up stories that simply supported his own theological agenda.

The other Gospel writers did the same thing. We find little bits and pieces that seem to belittle Jesus in Matthew 27:46

(when He cries “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” on the cross), Luke 3:21 (when Jesus is baptized, an event

that could imply that Jesus needed to repent and be cleansed of His sins), and John 14:28 (when Jesus says “The Father is

greater than I”). All four Gospels show that their authors were interested in relating events as they actually happened, even

when those events were potentially damaging or embarrassing.

Historicity and What the Gospels Don’t Say

Next, we can look at what the Gospels don’t say. That may sound a bit odd, but bear with me. The New Testament tells us

that the most pressing theological issue facing the first Christians was the incorporation of Gentiles (non-Jews) into the

Church. More specifically, it was the question of whether or not Gentile converts had to be circumcised and follow the

Jewish Law.6 Now, if the evangelists were simply making stuff up, we would expect them to include some stories or sayings

of Jesus that touch on this issue.

But they don’t. Jesus sometimes hints at the future inclusion of Gentiles in the Church, but he never says anything about

whether or not they need to be circumcised or follow the Jewish Law. This shows once again that the Gospel writers were

interested in histortcal facts, in what actually happened. They did not simply invent stories or sayings of Jesus to fit their

needs or to further their own theological agendas; instead, they recounted things that actually happened.

Summary: Reasons to Trust the Historicity of the Gospels

Admittedly, we’ve only scratched the surface of this issue, and there is a ton more we can say about the historical

trustworthiness of the Gospels, but from what we have seen here, we can be confident that our faith does have a solid basis

in history. We have good reason to believe that the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life are largely accurate and that the Jesus

they depict is in fact the real Jesus who lived and preached 2,000 years ago.

Endnotes
1) N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), 397.

2) N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), 399.

3) For example, Udo Schnelle, The History and Theology of the New Testament Writings (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998),

240; E P. Sanders and Margaret Davies, Studying the Synoptic Gospels (Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1989), 6, 13.

4) Curtis Mitch, “Introduction to the Gospels,” in The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: The New Testament, ed. Scott Hahn and

Curtis Mitch, xv-xxiii (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010), xvi; D A. Carson and Douglas J. Moo, An Introduction to the New

Testament, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 2005), 140.

5) Curtis Mitch, “Introduction to the Gospels,” in The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: The New Testament, ed. Scott Hahn and

Curtis Mitch, xv-xxiii (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010), xvi, n. 2; Paul Rhodes Eddy and Gregory A. Boyd, The Jesus

Legend: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007), 391-

392.

6) St. Paul’s Letter to the Galatians is all about this , and the Council of Jerusalem, the first Church council in history, was

called to discuss this very issue (Acts 15:1-21).

 GOSPELS, HISTORICAL RELIABILITY, JP NUNEZ

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 JP NUNEZ
JP Nunez has been a theology nerd since high school. He has master's degrees in both
theology and philosophy (with a concentration in bioethics) from Franciscan University
of Steubenville, and he spent three years in Catholic University of America's doctoral
program in biblical studies before realizing that academia isn't where he wants to be.
During his time in Steubenville, he worked for two years as an intern at the St. Paul
Center for Biblical Theology, where his responsibilities included answering theological
questions and helping to format and edit their Journey Through Scripture Bible studies.
He blogs at JP Nunez: Understanding the Faith Through Scripture.

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8 thoughts on “Why We Can Trust the Gospels as History”

CHRISTOPHER
JULY 10, AD2019 AT 4:14 PM

Yes, I believe the Gospels were created by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. We easily forget that, before the printing
press, only 10% knew how to read and/or write. The tribe of Levi would likely be the majority of that 10% since it was
their job to be Priests. Matthew almost certainly knew how to read and write because the Romans hired him as a tax
collector – He was educated. Luke was a Physician, and a brilliant writer! Peter and John were fisherman – almost
certainly illiterate. Peter and John were also likely “rock stars” and had no trouble finding the top scribes available
(Mark and Anonymous). All in all, I would not be surprised if all of them did not have some help because all are very
well organized, and I can even see apprentice scribes getting a piece of the action. Paul (Levite) surely was literate,
but he was just as remote as Luke to Jesus` ministry – but Luke was a far better writer. I trust the Gospels with my
life.

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