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Loading...How can we absolutely know whether we have the original words of the New Testament? And weren’t books of the Old Testament edited progressively over time, so that their texts were even more fluid than those of the New Testament? These are the two questions I address in this week’s Readers’ mailbag. If you have a question you would like me to address, let me know!
QUESTION
“So that there are some places where specialists cannot agree on what the text originally said, and there are some places where we’ll probably never know.” I’ve both heard – and read – you saying the above on multiple occasions, and I’ve always wanted to ask: if we ‘don’t have the originals, or even copies of the originals, or even copies of copies of the originals’, as you often say, then why do you say ‘there are [merely] some places where we simply don’t know what the original text said’? If we don’t have the originals (or copies and so on), then we don’t REALLY know what ANY of the original texts said, right? Beyond just that basic point, can you describe what makes some places in the text significantly less certain than others and maybe a couple examples?
RESPONSE
Ah, this is a good question. As it turns out, it is not so much about our surviving manuscripts of the New Testament as it is about what we can “know” about the past. If I say that there are places in the NT where we will never “know” their original wording, doesn’t that presuppose there are places where we can know? And how can we know, if we don’t have the originals?
It depends on what it means to “know” something. This is a problem for all historical knowledge. How do we know what happened in the past? Strictly speaking, we never really know anything with 100% absolute certainty. Do we know that George Washington was the first president of the United States? Almost all of us would say that yes, we absolutely know that. But what if George had a previously unknown identical twin brother and after George drowned in his attempt to cross the Delaware his brother took his place and later rose to prominence in the political world of the new nation? Is that completely impossible? No, it’s not impossible. So, we may not know for a fact it didn’t happen, but, the reality is, we pretty well know it. We are 99.999% sure that didn’t happen.
But we can’t say that we are 100% sure. I could, of course, give billions of examples. Philosophers for many, many centuries have debated how we know and how we know that we can know, and there are all sorts of complicated theories. Historical knowledge is particularly problematic. It is one thing to know that the square root of 9 is 3 and another thing to know that there really was a moon landing or that Caesar really did cross the Rubicon. Mathematical knowledge is different from scientific knowledge and both are different from historical knowledge.
When we say we know something historically, we are saying that we are virtually certain about it. I am virtually certain that Caesar Augustus was the first Roman emperor. Do I know it as well as I know the square root of 9? No, I can’t say that.
When it comes to the wording of the New Testament, there are passages – most of them – for which I have no doubts whatsoever. I may not know that John 1:1 originally read “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God” with the kind of certainty that I know that I had breakfast this morning, let alone that I know that the sum of ten and five is fifteen. But I know it well enough that I don’t have a single doubt in my head about it. I could be proven wrong later, but I don’t really have any doubts.
For other passages I have more doubts. For others I have lots of doubts. For some I have no idea. The reason there are heightened doubts is all because of the nature of our surviving evidence. Sometimes the wording of a passage is given in such different ways in so many manuscripts, and some of the possible ways of wording it are so hard to understand or to make sense of, and some of the (different) options found in the various manuscripts all have such strong competing merits in their favor, that we really have to make our best judgment and hope we are right. More often, the manuscripts are all agreed and there are no real reasons to doubt they are right. And so we don’t. We “know” the reading of the text at that point. With relative certainty.
QUESTION
Don’t we have indications that some of the books, especially the prophets, have been added to later? That would indicate the text was more fluid than how we think of the NT books.
RESPONSE
Yes indeed! The most obvious example is the book of Isaiah, which almost certainly consists of the work of three different authors living at three different periods in Israel’s history. Here is some of the evidence of that, as I lay it out in my textbook on the Bible:
Evidence of Multiple Authors
Most of the first 39 chapters of Isaiah clearly date to the ministry of Isaiah of Jerusalem in the 8th century BCE. This is obviously true of the very end of the section, written when Hezekiah was king of Judah and was feeling threatened by envoys who had been sent to him from the surging power of Babylon. Isaiah tells Hezekiah that it is true, that in the future, the Babylonians will indeed wreak havoc in Judah – but it will not be in Hezekiah’s own time (39:5-8). Immediately after this, rather than continuing with a proclamation of eventual doom, the text shifts drastically in an effort to comfort the people of Judah who have now, already, suffered for the sins they have committed. This portion of the book appears to have been written a century and a half later:
Comfort, O comfort my people says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for her sins (40:1-2)
Now, according to these later portions of the book, God has taken his wrath out on his people, Judah, but will restore them. And what is more, he will now turn on the Babylonians whom he earlier used in order to afflict Judah. (Chaldea, in this quotation, is another name for Babylonia):
Sit in silence, and go in darkness, daughter Chaldea! For you shall no more be called the mistress of kingdoms. I was angry with my people, I profaned my heritage; I gave them into your hand, you showed them no mercy…. But evil shall come upon you, which you cannot charm away; disaster will fall upon you, which you will not be able to ward off. (47:5-6, 11)
Judah, on the other hand, will be brought back from exile, through the wilderness, just as Israel once before passed through the wilderness on the way to the Promised Land after its exile in Egypt; only now there will not be suffering en route; instead, God will make the Judeans’ path easy and joyful:
A voice cries out, “In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together.” (40:3-5)
What is more, we are told that Jerusalem “will be rebuilt” (indicating, of course, that it has been destroyed), that the Temple will be as well (so that it too has disappeared), and that this will be done by none other than Cyrus (44:28). Cyrus was the king of Persia who overthrew the Babylonians in 539 BCE and allowed the Judean exiles to return home, to build the walls of Jerusalem.
Clearly this part of Isaiah is not presupposing a time in the 8th century BCE, but in the 6th century, after the Babylonians had destroyed Judea and its Temple, and taken the people back into exile in Babylonia.
What is more, the final chapters of Isaiah seem to presuppose an even later time – after the exiles had returned from captivity and were functioning once again, on a more limited basis, in the land.
How do we explain these anomalies in the book of Isaiah?
The Three Isaiahs
Scholars have long thought that there are three sections of the book of Isaiah, each attributable to a different prophet, living at a different time, facing a different situation. Roughly speaking, the book divides as follows:
First Isaiah. Chapters 1-39 (with some exceptions) go back to Isaiah of Jerusalem, prophesying in the 8th century BCE. He is predicting a coming judgment on the nation of Judah.
Second Isaiah. Chapters 40-55 were written by a later prophet who shared many of the perspectives of Isaiah of Jerusalem, but who was living about 150 years later, in the middle of the 6th century, after the Babylonian captivity had begun. He is preaching consolation for those Judeans who had suffered because of this military defeat.
Third Isaiah. Chapters 56-66 were written by a yet later prophet who appears to have been writing after the exiles had returned from Babylon. He is exhorting the returnees to live in ways pleasing to Yahweh.
At some later time, a redactor took these three texts of prophecies and combined them on a single scroll, so that all of them appear to derive from Isaiah of Jerusalem; but in reality, only a portion – though a sizeable portion – of them do. In the following discussion I will be speaking only of First Isaiah; in the next chapter I will discuss the other portions of the book.
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Wow! Two excellent questions with two excellent answers. Readers of this blog who have not read Dr. Ehrman’s “Misquoting Jesus” will find lots of similar material in that book. I used to think that the one thing Dr. Ehrman had not done, and I wished that he would do, was putting it all (textual and historical Biblical criticism) together in one, concise book. Actually, I now think his textbook on the Bible and his textbook on the New Testament come very close to accomplishing that task.
Wasn’t Isaiah one of the few texts of any lengths found among the Dead Sea Scrolls? And it had very few differences with the modern text? I have heard it was the same, word for word and the text we have today.
Yes, it is very similar indeed. The changes I’m referring to were made hundreds of years before the Dead Sea Scrolls.
When comparing the two Isaiah scrolls found in the Dead Sea Scrolls collection and considering how one was longer/different from the other, do most of the differences/additions occur within one of the three particular authors, or are the additions somewhat evenly distributed throughout?
There are several scrolls of Isaiah found among the DSS, and their differences, I believe (though someone can correct me) are not restricted to just one portion of the book.
Bart, are you familiar with the book “Who Wrote the Bible?” by Richard Elliott Friedman? If so, what did you think of it? As a layperson, I found the book fascinating. It is Friedman’s take on who wrote Genesis through 2 Chronicles.
Yup, terrific book
Dr. Ehrman, I’ve come to suspect that even First Isaiah is not quite authentic either. That is, I think for the most part First Isaiah is an exilic or a post-exilic work as well. That isn’t to say that I don’t think any parts of First Isaiah are pre-exilic. I think many of the passages may date from as far back as the reign of Hezekiah — a scrap here, fragment there. However, I think the actual compiling and redacting of First Isaiah was done during or after the Exile.
The most obvious reason for being thus suspicious is, of course, how from Isaiah 36 to 40 it’s pretty much a word for word copy of 2 Kings 19 to 21. Now, of course, that leaves us with a chicken and egg problem. Did the author of Isaiah copy 2 Kings, or did the author of 2 Kings copy from Isaiah, or did the authors of Isaiah and 2 Kings copy from a common source, or — perhaps — was the author/redactor of Isaiah and 2 Kings the same person? I can’t say. Do you have any theories on this?
I suspect that we may find a clue in the fact that the books of Chronicles just so happens to have word for word agreement with parts of the books of Samuel and books of Kings, as well. I suspect that there was, at some point, a cottage industry in compiling, redacting and documenting Israelite history and historical records, and it would make sense — to me, at least — that this point in history was during a time when a lot of educated, literate Israelites had a lot of time on their hands with which to take stock of the previous centuries’ events and of their role in history in general (i.e. the why’s and wherefore’s), and that time would have been during and just after their exile in Babylon.
Those chapters are usually thought of as an interpolation into the text of 1 Isaiah. Most of Isaiah 1-39 does seem most plausibly situated in the 8th c, it seems.
Not sure that this is on topic, but maybe it is, kinda.
I’m currently reading through Law’s “When God Spoke Greek” and sections of it are about NT citations of the OT. His point is that the NT authors seem to have used mostly or entirely some version(s) of the Septuagint, choosing and adapting those parts that made their theological case. If the then-extant Hebrew versions were used, it was not the rule by any means. And, of course, the Septuagint translators necessarily interpreted the 200-300 BCE Hebrew in light of what they understood it to say.
Comments?
I”m afraid I haven’t read it. But it sounds interesting!
This is wandering a bit afield of the subject of this ‘blog, but I wanted to mention a discussion I once had with a friend concerning the distinction between the “historical or (if you will, the original) text” and the “sacred text”.
We were discussing the role of textual criticism and the apparent concerns that, say, many fundamentalist Christians have with the topic (I.e. typically viewing it as a blatant attack on “The Word of God”). My friend –who is Jewish– said something that took me aback. That is, he claimed that in the eyes of many Jews, the form of the Massoretic Text –and whether it might have textual issues– is not really a problem
That is, certainly textual criticism is an important topic from which we can learn much. But while it may be true that the MT may not, in all cases strictly preserve a putative “original text”, that this didn’t really matter; because throughout its history and tradition the underlying Rabbinic Judaism has, roughly speaking, “defined” the MT to be _The_ “sacred text”.
Or to phrase this slightly differently: that this text, in this form, is the text that Rabbinic Judaism –as a community– has _agreed_ has this status. And it from this that the text draws its authority.
Now, I don’t know how common my friend’s opinion is; or how [small-o] “orthodox” it might be viewed in general. But I have to admit to having a lot of sympathy for this point of view, both in terms of the text and in the more general case.
In short, the teaching and orthodoxies of _all_ religions are rife with internal contradictions and inconsistencies. (Apologists argue otherwise, but the evidence pretty strongly indicates that it may be all but impossible for it to be otherwise.)
Or to state this another way, the religion of virtually any community is –essentially by definition– the collection of beliefs, faiths, and practices that that community has agreed –and continues to agree– is important to them. This, it would seem is just one more example of that.
Yes, there are Christian theologians who hae taken a very similar line with respect to the Christian Bible (this seems similar to the views of Brevard Childs, e.g.)
As a (secular) Jew myself who interacts regularly with a lot of “orthodox” Jews, I can say that most devout Jews have — and admit to having — a bit of a split personality when it comes to the veracity and inerrancy of the received Masoretic text of the Torah — what psychologists would call a cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, most Jews are well aware that there are plenty of errors in the Torah — textual, historical, scientific, etc. — and they will fully admit that these errors exist and that they are empirically false. On the other hand, those same practicing Jews will claim to believe that every “jot and tittle” of the Torah is the word of God Himself, received word-for-word by Moses on Mt. Sinai (or is it Mt. Horeb? See how screwy the Torah is?), that no man can “subtract from or add to the word of God” and that, therefore, the entire received Torah is the Truth with a capital T.
So you may be wondering, what’s going on in the heads of these Jews that they can hold such contradictory beliefs? Psychologists have a fancy word for the human ability to hold contradictory beliefs. They call compartmentalization. Compartmentalization is literally the dividing up of the human mind into mental states that were they normally united would cause frustration, confusion and discordance within the mind, but when separated and compartmentalized, they allow for contradictory behavior, beliefs and attitudes. The logic behind such compartmentalization is presumed to be the alleviation of the aforementioned cognitive dissonance.
There’s one Rabbinic story that I think perfectly encapsulates this idea. The founder of the modern Chassidic movement, Baal Shem Tov, was claimed to have miraculous powers, such as levitating (cf. Thomas Aquinas). Most Chassidim “know” that these stories are legend, and yet they believe them anyway. There’s an old Chassidic saying: “Someone who believes in all the stories of the Baal Shem Tov and the other mystics and holy men is a fool; someone who looks at any single story and says ‘That one could not be true’ is a heretic.” That, in a nutshell, is compartmentalization of cognitive dissonance.
Prof Ehrman
I have become interested in the figure of the Holy Spirit. But when I do book searches I am deluged with fundamentalist/charismatic/evangelical screeds that are the exact opposite of what I’m actually looking for. Has any critical scholar done the research on the figure of the Holy Spirit in the development of Christianity? Is there an expert in this field? Is there a seminal text or texts? Have you written on this subject in any forum?
Thanks!
I don’t know of any critical scholar without Christian beliefs taking this on, though I imagine someone has! The most thorough study by a fine Christian scholar is Gordon’ Fee’s book on the Holy Spirit (in the NT)
I was very preoccupied with what the “originals” said for the longest time, but really, I think we have it for the most part. I think what’s difficult to know is if Jesus really did heal the leper or if he didn’t give a sermon on the mount, what part of it did he actually teach?
I know that the Messianic prophecies in Isaiah were not really about Jesus, but they read like they are! I have a tough time understanding what those prophecies truly meant.
ARE they prophecies? Is Isaiah 53 in the future tense? Is it about the messiah? Does it not say things toward the end of the passage that clearly do not apply to Jesus at least? According to Jews, these are not messianic prophecies. All that is Christian interpretation. The New Testament writers and other Christians are very good at that and very poor at seeing or admitting that interpretation is what they’ve done. The biggest whopper is the claim that there is a story of the Fall in Genesis 2-3.
Right. The Gospel writers and Paul had the same passage available to them. I would like to know how they explained it!
With Chaldea being an epithet for Babylon, is the Abraham story in Genesis likely a post-exilic narrative, to suggest that Israel was destined to go into and return from Babylon, as Abraham came from “Ur of the Chaldees?”
Second question: You (and other scholars) maintain that Jesus’ followers were faced with a dilemma when he was crucified, because no one believed that a true messiah could come to such an ignominious end. Yet Psalm 89 ends thus:
36 I have sworn by My holiness, once and for all; I will not be false to David.
37 His line shall continue forever, his throne, as the sun before Me,
38 as the moon, established forever, an enduring witness in the sky.” …
39 Yet You have rejected, spurned, and become enraged at Your anointed.
40 You have repudiated the covenant with Your servant;
You have dragged his dignity in the dust.
41 You have breached all his defenses, shattered his strongholds.
42 All who pass by plunder him;
he has become the butt of his neighbors.
43 You have exalted the right hand of his adversaries,
and made all his enemies rejoice.
44 You have turned back the blade of his sword,
and have not sustained him in battle.
45 You have brought his splendor to an end
and have hurled his throne to the ground.
46 You have cut short the days of his youth;
You have covered him with shame….
47 How long, O LORD;
will You forever hide Your face,
will Your fury blaze like fire?
…
50 O LORD, where is Your steadfast love of old
which You swore to David in Your faithfulness?
51 Remember, O LORD, the abuse flung at Your servants
that I have borne in my bosom [from] many peoples,
52 how Your enemies, O LORD, have flung abuse,
abuse at Your anointed at every step.
Jewish Publication Society Inc.. JPS TANAKH: The Holy Scriptures (blue): The New JPS Translation according to the Traditional Hebrew Text (pp. 1215-1216). The Jewish Publication Society. Kindle Edition.
Most, if not all of that passage seems to refer to the nation and the monarchy, rather than a particular anointed one, but the question is still relevant, I think. Does this psalm not indicate that some Israeli thinkers, at least, questioned whether God would always come to the aid of his anointed ones and, if so, could followers of Jesus not just as well have concluded that God had chosen Jesus, then rejected him for some fault or failure?
1. Yes, my colleague John van Seters wrote several books arguing that the Abrahamic traditions were quite late 2. Yes, you could see how someone might refer the passage to the messiah, but so far as we know, prior to Christianity, no one did.
I don’t think most of Jesus’ followers were faced with a dilemma when he was crucified. For those who had come to believe he was the messiah, almost all of them must have simply realized they were mistaken, mourned their loss and mistake and the death of a good man and gotten on with their lives. There’s also a good chance that many Jews thought Jesus was some sort of prophet and were his “followers” without believing he was the messiah. Those who first believed he’d been resurrected might have developed a reconstructed view of God, the messiah, and Jesus but, even if there really was a resurrection, very few (relatively speaking) would have witnessed it and found a way to keep believing in him.
I’m hoping you will elaborate on this question, either as part of a weekly mailbag post, or as a separate post.
The West is in the process of redefining marriage to include same gender couples. Some scholars of the Bible have argued that such a view of marriage is not necessarily inconsistent with a valid reading of the texts. My question concerns plural marriage. Polygyny was normative in the Middle East when the earliest parts of the Bible were written, but it later became less normative and, ultimately, taboo. Some Christian sects (the Latter Day Saints, for example) have practiced polygyny, but for the most part have abandoned it under pressure from the state.
Is there an argument to be made, based on your study of the biblical texts and Jewish/Christian history, for a reexamination of plural marriage, not restricted to polygyny (which is an artifact of patriarchy) — but also to include polyandry and open marriages?
My view is that we don’t need to adhere to practices of antiquity — polygynous or otherwise — to determine what makes best sense for the morals of modern society. We live in a completely different universe from the figures portrayed in the Bible and the biblical authors themselves, and I don’t think their persepctives should be construed as normative for us, one way or the other. (I don’ think their views about what to do about witches or disobedient children — kill them! — apply today, nor do I think their views of marriage.). Just my view!
The institution of marriage, in the modern world, is not essentially a religious one, much less a Bible-based one. It is a civic one.
I understand that. People who do not necessarily take the bible as gospel will analyze it sometimes to convince those who do that it does not always say what they have assumed it says. The question of homosexuality is one such instance and many bible believers have been reconciled to the notion that same-sex unions are not inconsistent with scripture. My question concerned the presumption in the west (or the U.S. at any rate) that monogamy is the only marital arrangement that should have state recognition. I feel confident that the banning of polygamy in the U.S. was a direct act of persecution againt Mormons for their practice of polygyny — polyandry has never been a common practice in this country, as far as I know.
So I asked if the bible might be used, as with the homosexuality/same sex union debate, to reexamine our religious presuppositions about plural marriage? Like it or not, what the bible says (or doesn’t say) influences our public discourse.
I get that your question to Bart was not whether scripture should guide us but whether, in it, there is any basis, if someone wanted to use it, to argue for other forms of marriage. Off the top of my head, I would think that there are and the biblical-based arguments could be made. However, if what you’re talking about is the more narrow matter of using such arguments to show Bible-based religionists who insist on monogamy that ” that [the Bible] does not always say what they have assumed it says,” all I can say is, “Good luck.” Those who already take the Bible as Gospel will not listen. I am writing a criticism of Christian fundamentalism and am long over the illusion that I change the mind of a fundamentalist. Fundamentalists are not my market. Where the project you’re talking about would need to happen and have a better chance of happening is among those who jobs it is to be part of a secular government–in Congress and in the courts. Legislatures, of course, are still beholden to their constituencies, but they are at least also called upon to honor civil rights and there is some pressure to not let religion pressure their decisions as much as it might outside their jobs. As far from perfect as our courts are, the pressure to be fair, just, and secular and to honor the Constitution is even greater there.
I think it can easily be argued that even the NT (but especially the OT) have no prohibition of polygyny (one male multiple female). Monogamy was a later societal invention that essentially created a welfare “redistribution of sex” state to decrease violence. I am not sure if Romans practiced polygyny or monogamy, so it couldve also have been merely introduced through that, in the event that the secular society already had begun the practice of monogamy. The church would have been greased for something like monogamy anyway with its celibacy/anti-sex sentiment (probably stemming from the belief that the world was ending soon anyway). Eventually, it would just wind up a convenient tool in the churches/societies power of access to sex.
I believe you wrote that you were convinced that the current version of the beginning of John’s gospel is an accurate version of what the author actually said. You may be right, but I doubt that this gospel has very much if anything to do with Jesus’ actual teachings. In John’s gospel Jesus, the humble Galilean, speaks like a Greek philosopher–a very pompous Greek philosopher. He also attacks the Jews as if he were not one himself. In general, the gospels may be regarded as historical fiction, but this one is sheer fantasy.
Yes, it is important to differentiate between two issues. One issue is: do we know what an author wrote? Second issue is: is what he wrote historically accurate. For the Gospel of John, I would answer, Issue one: we have a pretty good idea for most passages, in my judgment, though I could be wrong since we don’t have the original Issue two: most of Jesus’ sayings in the Gsopel of John are probalby not things he actually said. I dn’t think they are “sheer fantasy,” but they are later theological reflections on the meaning of Jesus, rather than his actual words.
If i remember correctly, in John (and probably only in John) does Jesus refer to jews as distinct from himself. For eaxmple, refering to jews as “you jews”, refering to the jewish scriptures as “your law” (doesnt it say in your law…). It also contained a verse that said something like “moses brought law, but jesus brought truth”.
Bart, you said that you don’t have a single doubt that John 1:1 originally read “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” Could you please sum up why you don’t?
To doubt it would require a reason. That is how the verse is worded in every single Greek, Latin, Syriac, Coptic, etc. manuscript — many many hundreds, thousands, of manuscripts — to come down to us from antiquity. What would be the grounds for doubting it?
I wasn’t suggesting there was a good reason. I just didn’t know the basis for the near certainty. Thanks.
earliest piece which includes john 20:28 is from p66
in this papyrus there is a hole and the words “…my god” are missing
how then is one to determine what was written ?
are the later manuscripts used to determine what was said?
if the words above and below the gap are exactly the same as the can we say with confidence that “my god” was written on p66?
There are lots of manuscripts that give all of 20:28. So far as I know none of them lack “my God.” I’m not aware of any debate over what John wrote here.
I was wondering to what extent you’ve engaged with the text, The Ascension of Isaiah. I’ve read that parts of it have been dated as early as 88 CE. Do you think it could have influenced the Gospel writers when they were compiling their work? Or would it have been the Gospels influencing The Ascension?
88 CE? Not, like 86 or 89? Wow! It’s a very interesting text. I have a rather lengthy discussion of it in my book Forgery and Counterforgery.
In response to my questions about the Ascension of Isaiah you said–
“88 CE? Not, like 86 or 89? Wow!”
I know right? Who dates this stuff?
“I have a rather lengthy discussion of it in my book Forgery and Counterforgery.”
Really? Well, then, go ahead and send it to me so I can read it! My birthday is next Sunday, so it’ll be the perfect present. I should be finished with Did Jesus Exist by the time it gets here. Thank you! 🙂