That happens to be true - at least on the word-for-word level.
This belongs to the
Accuracy and Inerrancy Portion of this Forum.
However, in the development of the New Testament canon there is sufficent evidence that quite a deliberate effort was exerted to authenticate the genuine writings about Christ
(Luke 1:1-4))
Inasmuch as many have undertaken to draw up a nnarrative concerning the matters which have been fully accomplished among us.
Even as those who from the beginning became eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us,
It seemed good to me also, having carefully investigated all things from the first, to write [them] out for you in an orderly fashion, most excellent Theophilus,
So that you may fully know the certainty of the things concerning which you were instructed. (Luke 1:1-4)
Luke was deliberately on guard that his audience was getting accurate information on the life of Jesus.
Paul and his company of co-workers also deliberately sought that the churches received only authentic epistles of the apostles:
Now we ask you, brothers, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering to Him, that you be not quickly shaken in mind nor alarmed, neither by a spirit nor by a letter as if by us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way ..." (2 Thess. 2:1-3a)
The apostles deligently acted as watch dogs over false teachings that might be circulating. Peter deligently assured his audience on the grounds of him being an eyewitness and that they were getting authentic testimony and teaching about Jesus:
Moreover I will also be ddeligent that you may be able, after my exodus, to bring these things to mind at all times.
For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we became eyewitnesses of that One's majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory, a voice such as this being borne to Him by the magnificent glory:
This is My Son, My Beloved, in whom I delight.
And this voice we heard being borne out of heaven while we were with Him in the holy mountain. (2 Peter 1:15-18)
The Apostle John pointed to his and his fellow apostles personal eyewitness testimony to assure his audience was getting authentic apostolic teaching:
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we beheld and our hands handled, concerning the word of life. (And the life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and report to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us);
That which we have seen and heard we report also to you that you also may have fellowship with us, and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ." (1 John 1:1-3)
The Apostle John was deligent that his audience did not gullibly believe every teaching from false prophets:
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but prove the spirits whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. (1 John 4:1)
The Apostle John also warned that those who rejected their message were not to be trusted but rejected themselves:
We are of God; he who knows God hears us, he who is not of God does not hear us. From this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deception. (1 John 4:6)
Those books which were authorized by the apostles were recommended for reading in the churches. Therefore the believers in the churches knew the authentic teachings from public readings in thier meetings:
And when this letter is read among you, cause that it be read in the church of the Laodiceans also, and that you also read the one from Laodicea. (Col. 4:16)
Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and keep the things written in it, for the time is near. (Rev. 1:3)
The writings of New Testament apostles were collected along witht the Old Testament Scriptures. The eyewitness Peter recommended that such attention should be given to the letters of the Apostle Paul:
And count the long suffering of our Lord ro be salvation, even as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you,
As also in all his letters, speaking in them concerning these things, in which the unlearned and unstable twist, as also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own distruction
Therefore Peter not only put Paul's letters on the level of the Old Testament Scriptures but he also trained his audience to recognize people who twisted apostolic teaching.
We see evidence that latter NT books quoted earlier NT books as Scripture. Paul quoted Luke as Scripture:
For the Scripture says, "You shall not muzzle an ox that is treading out the grain," and, "The workman is worthy of his pay." (See 2 Timthy 5:18 compare Deut. 25:4; Matt. 10:10; Luke 10:7)
In Luke 10:7 Jesus is recorded to have said "And in that house remain, eating and drinking the things from them, FOR THE WORKER IS WORTHY OF HIS WAGES. Do not move from house to house."
Jude quoted the Apostle Peter (Compare Jude 17 and 2 Peter 3:2). And it is evident also how careful Jude was to teach the same things as were taught by Peter.
Luke assumed that Theophilus possessed his first book as a former account:
The former account I have made, O Theophilus, concerning all the things that Jesus bagan both to do and to teach ... (Acts 1:1)
In addition to be very deligent to preserve authentic New Testament teaching, the teachings were also often intended for a wide group of churches.
James is addressed to
"twelve tribes in the despersion" (James 1:1). And Peter's First Epistle was written
"to the exiles of the dispersion". The book of Revelation was written to
"the seven churches" of Asia Minor.
Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would lead the disciples into all truth. We believe that the passing down to us of 27 such authentic apostolic books is part of fulfillment of that promised of Christ.
Even if other apostolic books then circulating which we do not have today existed, we believe that they contained no new truth. Paul referred to another epistle in 1 Corinthians 5:9. We do not have it. We also do not have the letter written to the Laodiceans which Paul refered to in Colossians 4:16. We know that it was recommended to be read to the two churches. So it must have been consistent with apostolic teaching.
But Christian scholars assume that these letters contained no new truth in addition to that taught in the 27 extant books. I believe that God is not incompatent to be able to preserve for His church that which He deemed important for disciple's edification.
There are many other evidences that the apostles were deligent to preserve the authentic teachings of Christ. Paul's warnings are numerous. His instructions to His junior co-workers Timothy and Titus were filled with vigilance that the ministry would not be corrupted by mistakes in behavior or in instruction. He know what was
"healthy teaching" and what was not. He cautioned the church from being
"carried away" by winds of different teachings. He charged co-workers not to teach differently. He went from house to house and sat personally with families and withheld nothing that was profitable for their spiritual development, declaring to them the whole counsel of God. He also charged Timothy to teach everything he taught without given prejiducial preference to one aspect over another.
We're confident in our New Testament. And the last surviving of the orignial twelve apostles closed off the canon of the New Testament with an anathema that no one better add or subtract from the completed revelation (Revelation 22:18,19). The last living apostle signs off on the canon of the New Testament. No apostolic book after he died was possible because Christ promised to lead the apostles into
"all truth". Christ fulfilled all. His apostles told all and the last apostle completed the canon of the New Testament.
We've got no reason to suppose that it was reported accurately.
The above explanation gives us rise that John did report accurately. The alledged sloppiness over which you WISH the early church allowed the authentic teachings of Jesus to be corrupted is just that, your wishful thinking.
You wish to pass on to us some kind of foolishness that the resurrecdtion of Jesus was just some mistaken idea that somehow got retrofitted into His teachings. You're pretty much silent up to now as to HOW this happend or WHY it would be deliberately done. I have given evidence that it was not at all easy under the watchful eye of the apostles, to tamper with the record of what Jesus did and said.
You:
After all John was likely written 60 years after events. You can't even manage to accurately follow the thread of this conversation. And you've already admitted that the disciples would reassess what Jesus had said after the crucifixion - you called that an "obvious FACT".
The discples had the wonderful experience of walking with Jesus for three and one half years. The evidence is that they did not expect His minsitry to end with a crucifixion. The did not expect that He would be killed. Humanly speaking everything about Jesus being killed would seem as a defeat of Jesus. Therefore some of the things He said probably did not register with them in full impact.
After three days of dejection and disappointment Jesus crashed through the gates of death and was resurrected from the grave. He not only reminded them that He told them this would happen. He also went over the Scriptures of the Old Testament again and explained how the things in the Law and Psalms and Prophets predicted suffering, death, and resurrection of the Messiah.
In writing his Gospel of John John recalls that Jesus spoke of the destroying of the temple and its being raised by Him in three days. Now it has more impact upon him that Jesus was speaking of the temple of His body. I cannot insist that Jesus TOLD them that at that time. That I cannot prove. It is not unusual that He may have reminded them and explained, as we see Him doing after His resurrection in Luke 24.
However, the
"three days" plus all the other reaching about resurrection in John STRONGLY indicate that Jesus was using a metaphor. He latter said
"I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE" (John 11:25)
He said that He received the charge from His Father to lay down His life and take it up again in John 10. He also said that He had the authority to lay His life down and the authority to take it up again.
No one should deny that Jesus spoke some mysterious things. And no one can argue that many of the things He spoke are open to varied interpretations. But in the instance of the challenge to destroy the temple that He might raise it in three days, it stretches the imagination that He was not metaphorically speaking of Himself.
Whether the Apostle John recalled that Jesus Himself explained what He meant or whether John put two and two together and told us what Jesus meant, I trust John's word over your explanation. Your explanation comes out of a strenuous attempt to a supposedly "demothologized" reading of John. And in doing so, your explanation of John's comment is far less believable than the explanation that John perceived the real meaning behind Jesus' words.
Lastly, in this post, I would offer further evidence that John had it right. That is the speech of Stephen before he was stoned to death.
Acts chapter 7 records the speech that Stephen the first Christian martyr gave before the priests stoned him. In that long speech Stephen recounts the history of Israel through the Old Testament. Stephen goes through many many matters important to the Jew's history as told in the Scriptures. It is very significant at which point he sums up his comments and concludes his scathing remarks:
"This [tabernacle] our fathers, having in their turn received, also brought in with Joshua when they took possession of the nations, whom God drove out before the face of our fathers until the days of David,
Who found favor before God and asked to find a habitation for the God of Jacob, But Solomon built Him a house.
Yet the Most High does not dwell in that which is made by hands, even as the prophet says, Heaven is My throne, and the earth is a footstool for My feet. What kind of house will you build for Me, says the Lord, or what is the place of My rest? Has not my hand made all these things?
You stiff-necked and uncircumscised in heawerts and ears, you always oppose the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did you also do." (See Acts 7:44-51)
Stephen's speech indicates a major theme of the Hebrew Bible and the teaching of Jesus. That is that God could not really be contained in a physical building no matter how splendidly constructed of precious materials. The preference of God was to be seen in the lives of Godly, holy, sanctified, and consecrated humanity.
The prophetic passage that Stephen quoted continues to have God saying that for His rest and His habitation He would look to a certain kind of man. That is a man of contrite spirit and who trembled reverently at the word of God. Not to a physical temple would look for His habitation and rest in reality - BUT TO A KIND OF MAN.
This was perhaps Stephen's final historical point with which he summed up the eternal purpose of God. God wanted to live in a MAN.
This shows not only Stephen's grasp of God's heart in the Hebrew Bible but also his understanding of the mission of Jesus. Jesus was the MAN in WHOM the Most High God was pleased to live as His habitation. In this Son of God the Old Testament God had His habitation and rest.
Therefore for Jesus to say
"Destroy THIS TEMPLE and in three days I will raise it up" underlined that He, Jesus of Nazareth, was the human habitation of God. God lived in Him. And as such He was indestructible and eternal. Though He might be subject to death as any man, He would nonetheless vindicate that the indestructible God Who cannot be destroyed LIVED in Him, was one with Him, was mingled with Him, was blended with Him, acted in Him, moved, worked, and spoke in Him. He was the reality of the human temple and house of the Most High God.
Stephen understood. John understood. The other apostles understood. I understand because they passed it on to us. I hope that you someday can understand as well.
And just how difficult is it to "hoodwink" somebody who uncritically believes everything you write ?
I haven't believed everything YOU have written about how one of the most intimate apostles assists us to understand what Jesus meant when He used a famous metaphor.
So really I am not proposing anything complicated or unlikely or any sort of conspiracy. You don't need a vast conspiracy to produce YOUR posts, do you ?
I think it is unlikely that the apostle John mistook what Jesus meant since he gave his whole life to the propogation of His Master's teaching.
I think it is unlikely that John decided to push his own original ideas and fabricated a meaning which he then dishonestly attributed to his Master.
Lastly, I think that it is BELIEVABLE that a Person like Jesus Christ would perform deeds which matched the moral power of His teachings. Had any other typical human being said to have come back from death on his or her own, I would be more skeptical of course.
That a Person like Jesus come back to life after He was destroyed on a cross of torture, is believable. The deed matches the unusual power of His teaching.
Now, we have had a stong contention between us. Anything I said which crossed over into a personal attack I apologize for. But I very much have to stand by my example.
Jesus prophesied that if He was destroyed that He would be resurrected in three days. I think He fulfilled that prediction.
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