In a different thread discussing the historicity of Luke, one of our interlocutors stated rather matter-of-factly that Luke was written “80-110 AD”. This piqued my interest in the topic of dating the Gospels which I hadn’t thought of for quite a while, though I had studied it in some depth back in my undergrad days. In the section of Wikipedia on dating Mark, the article in a rather straightforward yet unwitting manner acknowledges the antisupernatural bias:
[The Gospel of Mark] is usually dated through the eschatological discourse in Mark 13, which scholars interpret as pointing to the First Jewish–Roman War (66–74 AD)—a war that led to the destruction of the Second Temple in AD 70.
This sums up the antisupenatural bias I remember from my undergrad days that was the main pillar of all such dating theories: Dating this book by assuming the author was looking back on the war in Jerusalem presupposes [without basis or argument] that Jesus could not have predicted the future. Obviously implicit in this claim is the further assumption that Jesus’s eschatological discourse was history put into Jesus’s mouth by the evangelist and knowingly, deceivingly foisted on the readers as a miraculous prediction.
C. S. Lewis’s words of rebuttal to this dating practice can hardly be matched:
In a popular commentary on the Bible you will find a discussion of the date at which the Fourth Gospel was written. The author says it must have been written after the execution of St. Peter, because, in the Fourth Gospel, Christ is represented as predicting the execution of St. Peter. “A book,” thinks the author, “cannot be written before events which it refers to.” Of course it cannot—unless real predictions ever occur. If they do, then this argument for the date is in ruins, And the author has not discussed at all whether real predictions are possible. He takes it for granted (perhaps unconsciously) that they are not. Perhaps he is right: but if he is, he has not discovered this principle by historical inquiry. He has brought his disbelief in predictions to his historical work, so to speak, ready made. Unless he had done so his historical conclusion about the date of the Fourth Gospel could not have been reached at all… Those who assume that miracles cannot happen are merely wasting their time by looking into the texts: we know in advance what results they will find for they have begun by begging the question.
Lewis’s reasoning is spot on - those scholars who date the composition of the Gospels by limiting the date to after the occurrence of any events which those Gospels predict are indeed simply begging the question.
So I am baffled how anyone who affirms Christ’s miraculous powers in general, can give any credence to any arguments that presuppose that Christ did not have the power to have made predictions of the future?
I have encountered an argument (greatly summarized here) for a dating of Mark to c. 65 AD, not because of when prophecies were fulfilled, but because concerns about persecution in the church in Rome would have been more acute after 64, and Mark seems to be addressing some such concerns. I do not find that argument conclusive, but it is an argument that I would consider worth thinking about.
Interesting topic. In thinking about it, I wonder if it is even a valid question to ask as to when a particular gospel was written, as they can into being through a process over many years. Even Luke, which was introduced as written by a named author, is related as having been compiled from other sources from past years, and also testifies that others have done likewise. Presumably, one of those previous compilations was Mark, as it appears to be the source material of much of Luke.
Walton, while speaking primarily of Old Testament writings, speaks of the reality that most of the ancient world was hearing dominant, not text dominant, as most people were not literate. We can reasonably assume that the stories we find in the written gospels started as word of mouth reports and rehashings passed from one community to another community’s bodies of believers. Eventually, those variations that were deemed authentic were retained and eventually put on papyrus. In the case of Luke, perhaps due to the passage of time making the eye-witnesses passing a given.
Did the final editing and redacting of the book stop there? Some scholars put modifications to the text being made into the 2nd century. Does it matter? After all, we hold the text to be that which is inspired, rather than the human authors, according to Walton. With Luke, the oldest witness is dated to the late 2nd century or early 3rd, so pending new discoveries, it is likely we will not have many questions answered.
Maybe true in some cases but steel manning is better than straw manning. From Mark Goodacre’s (a very serious and well respected critical scholar) page:
The primary reason many scholars tend to date Mark’s Gospel after 70 CE is the presupposition that Jesus could not foresee the destruction of Jerusalem – an ideological conviction clearly not shared by all (196).
Read and take serious heed of Goodacre’s extremely informed and devastating response to this:
But this kind of appeal, while popular, tends not to take seriously the literary function of predictions in narrative texts like Mark. Successful predictions play a major role in the narrative, reinforcing the authority of the one making the prediction and confirming the accuracy of the text’s theological view. It is like reading Jeremiah. It works because the reader knows that the prophecies of doom turned out to be correct. It is about “when prophecy succeeds”.
The text makes sense as Mark’s attempt to signal, in a post-70 context, that the event familiar to his readers was anticipated by Jesus, in word (13.2, 13.14) and deed (11.12-21) and in the symbolism of his death, when the veil of the temple was torn in two (15.38). The framing of the narrative requires knowledge of the destruction of the temple for its literary impact to be felt. Ken Olson has alerted me (especially in a paper read at the BNTC three years ago) to the importance of Mark 15.29-30 in this context. It is the first of the taunts levelled when Jesus is crucifie:
So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself!
For the irony to work, the reader has to understand that the Temple has been destroyed; the mockers look foolish from the privileged perspective of the post-70 reader, who now sees that Jesus’ death is the moment when the temple was proleptically destroyed, the deity departing as the curtain is torn, the event of destruction interpreted through Gospel narrative and prophecy.
The point that is generally missed in the literature, especially that which comes from a fairly conservative perspective, relates to the attempt to understand the literary function of the predictions of destruction in Mark’s narrative. John Kloppenborg is one of the few scholars who sees the importance of the literary function of the predictions, noting the role played by the literary motif of “evocation deorum” echoed here in Mark, e.g.
This raises a crucial distinction between omens and rituals that (allegedly) occurred before the events, and their literary and historiographic use in narrative (446).
Discussions about whether the historical Jesus was or was not prescient may be interesting, but in this context they miss the point. The theme of the destruction of the temple is repeated and pervasive in Mark’s narrative, and it becomes steadily more intense as the narrative unfolds. Jesus’ prophecies in Mark attain their potency because “the reader understands” their reference.
You can read that page and see James Crossley’s reply. He is a non believer and genuine critical scholar that dates Mark potentially to ca 40CE after the Caligula crisis.
Also to add on Mk 14:14-19, see scholar Hendrika Roskam (The Purpose of the Gospel of Mark in its Historical and Social Context, pg 91):
Jesus continually speaks of the events as things that will happen ‘in those days’. Therefore, one would expect Mark’s Jesus to say in v. 19 'such as has not been…until then, not until now. …The ‘now’ in v. 19 seems to reflect Mark’s time rather than Jesus.
In a footnote she notes Mark 13:19 is based on Dan 12:1 which instead reads “that day”.
Adding more: Spencer McDaniel (Here’s How We Know the Canonical Gospels Were Originally Anonymous) writes:
This argument, however, has a major flaw that Christian apologists have, for the most part, ignored. The most significant part of the passages I have quoted above is not actually Jesus’s prediction itself, but rather the way gMark describes his prediction. You see, in gMark 13:14, the author inserts his own authorial comment to the reader: “ὁ ἀναγινώσκων νοείτω.” This means “Let the reader understand.” In making this comment, the author of gMark is clearly hinting to the reader in his own voice that the prophecy Jesus has just made had recently been fulfilled.
See also Evocatio Deorum and the Date of Mark by Kloppenborg.
Also, here are ten potential reasons for dating Mark after 70CE by a scholar on Academic Biblical at Reddit (Christopher Zeichmann). Some of them may have what you deem a supernatural bias.
Mark 13:1-2 describes the destruction of the temple with far greater accuracy and specificity than generic discourse on the temple’s fall (contrast, e.g., 1 Kgs 9:8; 1 En. 90.28-30; Josephus J.W. 6.300-309).
Mark 13:14 seems to refer to Vespasian, despite occasional arguments for the zealot Eleazar or the Emperor Gaius. The citation of the Danielic vision in Mark 13:14 parallels Josephus citation of Daniel’s prophecy of the temple’s fall in A.J. 10.276.
The fact that the various portents enumerated in Mark 13 are prompted by the question in Mark 13:1-2 as to WHEN the temple buildings will fall. In so doing, Mark explicitly encourages the reader to understand everything that follows in light of the temple’s fall.
This is a more complex argument that isn’t always easy to articulate. But Mark 14:57-58 and 15:29 slanderously attribute to Jesus the claim that he will destroy the temple and raise it again in three days. What is striking is that the controversy is over Jesus’ role in bringing about the destruction -NOT whether or not the temple will actually fall. This assumes that the temple’s fall was not a matter of controversy in Mark’s context.
Another complex argument, but Eric Stewart has written a book arguing that Mark configures Jewish space away from the temple and synagogues and instead onto Jesus. Words that were normally used to describe activity related to those sites (e.g., language of gathering, ritualized activities) are relocated onto Jesus. Stewart contends that this is ultimately language of replacement. Though Stewart does not explicitly connect this with Markan dating, its relevance is obvious.
The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Mark 12) is an obvious allegory regarding the punishment of Jews for their rejection of Jesus. What is interesting is that the parallel in the Gospel of Thomas 65 (which is much more primitive than Mark’s) omits any reference to punishment. This suggest the allegorization is part of Markan redaction.
The cursing of the fig tree links the notion of an unproductive fig tree and its destruction to an unproductive temple and its (eventual) destruction.
The tearing of the temple veil upon Jesus’ death assumes some kind of divine causality that portends the entire temple’s eventual destruction.
There are a few references that only make sense after the Jewish War. For instance the language of legion in Mark 5:1-20 only works after the War, since before the War the military in Palestine and the Decapolis was not legionary. As an analogy, a story wherein a demon named “Spetsnaz” is exorcized from a Crimean denizen should strike the reader as anachronistic in its politics if depicted as occurring in 2010; one would assume the story had been written after the Russian annexation of Crimea in February 2014, in which the aforementioned special forces were active.
I have an article coming out in CBQ’s July issue arguing that the question of taxation (12:13-17) is full of anachronisms that only make sense after 71 CE: no capitation taxes were collected by coin in Judaea before 71, it’s strange that Jesus (a Galilean) is depicted as an authority on Judaean taxes (though Galilee and Judaea were part of the same province starting 44 CE), etc.
To add one more, Eric Eve sees Mark as a response to Flavian propaganda after the fall.
At the end of the day, arguments for a post 70 dating of Mark are very robust and do not remotely hinge on anti-supernatural bias. There are reasons for favoring an earlier dating as well.
If I read a story accurately describing the events of 9/11, I would assume it was written after the planes hit the buildings. This is how history works as well. Theologians and apologists just shouldn’t care about the date of the gospels as much as they/you do. If God inspired them and kept them free from error, why does 50CE matter vs 80CE for GMark? When and who is trivial when God wrote it. CS Lewis and you both should be intelligent enough to know that if you ask historical questions, you will get historical answers. I’m not sure why either of you expect otherwise. Scholars shouldn’t need to explain why they don’t think Moses narrated his own death.
When we interpret and make conclusions, these are always based on some assumptions. Dating of the Gospels is no exception.
The post-70 dating is heavily dependent on the assumption that detailed telling of future events, either as a prophecy or an extremely accurate insight, is not possible. The list of reasons why Mark should be dated after 70CE shows it. Details in Mark are interpreted in a purposeful way that reflect the basic assumption.
The use of terms might have more weight as evidence if there would be terms that were not used before 70 CE. The points 9 and 10 in your list try to utilize this kind of evidence but are not convincing.
The reference to legion (point 9) does not prove anything. Legion was a Roman word used for centuries before the event. As these areas were part of the Roman empire, local people would know what a legion is and might use it at least occasionally.
The reference to taxation (point 10) is also not credible. There were different kind of taxes in the Roman empire - you can make a search with the words ‘taxation in ancient Rome’ to read about the taxes yourself. In Judaean area, the taxes were mainly collected by tax collectors (a tax farming system) but even these funds were intended as taxes to the empire (minus the share of the tax collector that depended on the greed of the tax collector). Both goods and coins were collected as taxes.
In the narrative, Jesus was not in the role of an authority on Judaean taxes. It was an attempt to trap a troublesome rabbi with a question where both a ‘yes’ and a ‘no’ would be bad. Saying ‘no’ would be a rebellion against Rome, punishable by the Romans. Saying ‘yes’ would paint Jesus as a collaborator of the hated occupiers.
When was Mark written? I do not know but I think that pre-70 is more likely than post-70.
My basic assumption is that Jesus could know the destruction of Jerusalem when he lived, and his disciples would have believed the words of their rabbi. Following questions about the destruction would start from the belief that what Jesus told would happen.
You must not have read the first half of what I wrote and simply looked at the list because this was addressed. The quotation from Goodacre completely and unequivocally renders that claim dead. Goodacre, Kloppenborg, Winn, etc., say that Mark’s Gospel works best as post 70CE literature. The irony and temple ramping up makes the most sense then. Whether or not Jesus was truly prescient, and whether or not he spoke of the temple’s destruction (he wasn’t the only one!), is irrelevant. Mark can still write after the fact and his narrative makes the most sense then.
But yes, scholars will also reject supernatural explanations. Just as “God made those layers on the mountain” is rejected by scientists as a scientific explanation, whether true or not, so is, “this individual had magic powers” for historians seeking historical explanations. It is very obvious that texts date after the latest events they mention. Conservatives know this. They always argue (speculatively from silence mind you!) and claim since Acts doesn’t narrate Paul or Peter’s death, it must date before they occurred. Yet they dispute arguing positively based on events the Gospel do seem to know of? This is a double standard.
“Different taxes” is very vague. In my experience, vague generalities are the type of argument people use when they have already made up their mind and want to maintain their beliefs and not steel man those who disagree with them. Instead of randomly searching google, how about just reading the referenced article from CBQ and learning detailed information about taxes at the time? Here is what the author says inside:
Second, numismatic evidence regarding the production and circulation of denarii and other coins depicting the emperor’s profile in first-century Judea war- rants attention. Mark once again uses a Latinism, in this case δηνάριον to denote a specific monetary denomination—it is not a generic νόμισμα. Denarii were rare in the southern Levant, especially in Galilee, before Nero’s death in 68 c.e., which suggests that the pericope in its Marcan form derives from after that time.15 Numis- matist Danny Syon shows that there was relatively strict observance of Roman imperial and Roman provincial currency zones (slightly north of the provincial border dividing Syria from Judea-Batanea-Nabatea) until after the Jewish War. Consequently, only a single prewar denarius has been found in Galilee, though the region attests 75 denarii minted between 69 and 135 c.e. The number of denarii is less drastic for the province of Judea as a whole, but still overwhelming: 79 dena- rii in the period 63 b.c.e.–68 c.e., as opposed to 374 denarii in the period 69–135 c.e. The periods differ in length, but the average number of denarii per year illus- trates the change in coin circulation: 0.01 denarii/year in Galilee before the war, and 1.14/year in Galilee between the wars; 0.60/year in Judea before the war, 5.67/ year in Judea between the wars. But even these data understate the stark nature of the numismatic evidence. Kenneth Lönnqvist observes that zero denarii are known in any prewar Judean coin hoards. Denarii that were minted before the war have been found exclusively either in hoards deposited during the war or later, or as stray finds for which the original context is usually uncertain.16 There is no reason to think such coins were in wide circulation before the war. Archaeologists and numismatists have also noted the striking dearth of denarii in Batanea, the Decapo- lis, and southernmost Syria (e.g., Ptolemais, Dor, Haifa) until Vespasian’s reign, under whom there was a concerted (if only half-successful) effort to inject imperial coinage into the Roman East.17 Syon concludes, “I think that it is quite clear that Roman imperial coins started arriving to Palestine in any appreciable numbers only in the Flavian period.”
Notice how not vague this is. The name of the article is The Date of Mark’s Gospel Apart from the Temple and Rumors of War: The Taxation Episode (12:13–17) as Evidence , by scholar Christopher B Zeichmann. I can send you a pdf of it if you want. As the author admits, its potency depends on provenance–more specifically, Mark being composed in the Southern Levant. It has its limitations and whether ultimately right or wrong, I assure it is very credible whereas your “there were many taxes” is not.
Jesus is irrelevant here. I’m sure he was questioned on taxes many times. What matters for dating is what the final form of the narrative in Mark looks like. As Zeichmann writes:
This anachronism of coinage is significant because the denarius is absolutely essential to the pericope in Mark; the emperor’s portrait prompts Jesus’ riposte to his opponents’ challenge. It is Caesar’s coin because it depicts his title and profile. If such coins were exceedingly uncommon for decades after Jesus’ death, it would stand to reason that the pericope in its Marcan form derives from that later period.
In its Marcan form. This does not mean the incident in Mark does not reflect the voice of Jesus. Only that Mark wrote in his own time. Mark may have simply adopted tradition and the words of Jesus to his own time and circumstance. He is already writing to Gentiles in another language. Ipsissima verba vs Ipsissima vox.
No one dating ancient texts is here to “prove” anything but conservatives who oddly think a text must be 20 years earlier despite being inspired by God. Rather, critical scholars look at what seems most probable. I agree this argument is not bullet proof. No argument for dating 2,000 year olds works based on internal analysis is. Not all scholars would agree with it:
Here is what Adela Yarbrough Collins writes in her Hermeneia commentary on Mark.
During the first century CE, a Roman legion consisted of fifty-four hundred men, including 120 legionary cavalry.74 The Latin word legio (“legion”) could also be used in a transferred sense to refer to (1) the troops of other nations; (2) an army, a large body of troops; or (3) a large body of men. It may be that, in the original form of the account, the “name” Legion was chosen to express an anti-Roman sentiment. Caesar’s tenth legion (Legio X Fretensis) had, among other things, the image of a boar on its standards and seals. This legion was stationed in Cyrrhus, a city of northwestern Syria, from 17 CE to 66 CE, when it was moved to Alexandria for the projected campaign against Ethiopia. Instead, it took part in the first Jewish war and was subsequently stationed in Jerusalem. The author of Mark was probably familiar with this legion and its symbol, but it is doubtful that the pre-Markan composer of the story was.
The story comes from an earlier time but when Mark writes is a different question. Even if Mark can be shown to know of and expect his audience to know of the tenth legions role in the Jewish war, this does not mean the whole narrative is fiction. As Collins goes on to explain:
There is, however, no theme of opposition to Rome in Mark. Assuming that the remark of the centurion at the foot of the cross is not ironic, this Roman soldier expresses faith in Jesus as the Son of God, or at least as the son of a god.79 It is more likely that the earliest audiences would have read the story of the Gerasene demoniac in connection with the theme of the battle between Jesus and Satan. Daniel and the book of Revelation speak of heavenly armies. The Matthean Jesus, rebuking the disciple who cut off the ear of the slave of the high priest, said to him, “Do you think that I am not able to appeal to my Father, and he will send to me immediately more than twelve legions (legiw’ne") of angels?” (Matt 26:53). As the Markan Jesus alluded to a kingdom of Satan in the Beelzebul controversy, so here he implies that one of Satan’s legions has taken possession of the unfortunate man. The aim of the story is not—at least not primarily—to make a statement about the Romans, but to show how Jesus rescued the man from his plight and restored him to a normal life.
I personally wouldn’t use legion to date Mark. But if I thought Mark dated post 70CE it could certainly change how I understand the story in its Markan form. Adam Winn thinks Mark is writing against Flavian propaganda and reads the story as such:
Powerful Exorcist
One of Jesus’ most remarkable powers is his power over supernatural forces, i.e., demons. Remarkably, Jesus is able to exorcise demons by audible com mand alone and does not need the aid of formulas and incantations, nor does he need to call on higher powers. Such power over the supernatural realm would have been highly impressive to Mark’s Roman audience. It is also a power that Vespasian lacked. Mark makes it clear to his readers that the emperor’s power is limited to the earthly sphere, but Jesus’ power extends into the supernatural sphere.
Of particular interest, is Mark’s encounter with the Gerasene demoniac. Many scholars have discussed the significance of the demon’s name, “Legion.” Some interpreters have argued that Mark used the name purposefully to allude to Roman imperial power, a power which certainly depended on its many legions.15 In light of a Markan polemic against Vespasian, such a political interpretation takes on new significance, as an obvious parallel between Jesus and Vespasian surfaces. One of Vespasian’s great strengths was his military prowess and power. All the might of the Roman legions was under his con trol, available to do his bidding. In this pericope, Mark presents Jesus as the commander of legions, but legions of demons rather than of Roman soldiers. While Vespasian commands the armies of the physical realm, Jesus has the power to command more powerful armies, those of the supernatural realm.
Mark’s presentation of Jesus as an exorcist shows that the sphere of Jesus’ power is greater than Vespasian’s. The emperor’s power is limited to the natu ral world, while Jesus’ power extends to the supernatural world. In one par ticular exorcism story - the healing of the Gerasene demoniac - we see a unique detail that seems tailor-made for a Markan polemic against Vespasian. This pericope could be read as a Markan response to Vespasian’s awesome military might, one of the more compelling features of the new emperor’s resume. Because Jesus’ resume clearly lacks such military prestige, Mark cleverly takes Jesus’ power as an exorcist and portrays it through a military motif. Unlike Vespasian, Jesus never commanded military legions, but even more impressively, he did command legions of powerful demons.
Winn continues:
Mark also records two stories in which Jesus heals a blind man. The first story has remarkable similarity to the accounts of Vespasian’s healings. In Mark 8:22-26, Jesus, like Vespasian, heals a blind man by placing his own saliva on the man’s eyes. Many interpreters have noted the similarities between these two healing accounts, but none has argued for a substantial relationship between them.17 Most interpreters use the Vespasian account as evidence that spittle/saliva was commonly regarded as a healing agent in the ancient world, locating Jesus’ actions in the world of ancient medicine. But if our reconstructed historical setting is correct, and Mark is respond ing to a christological crisis created by Flavian propaganda - propaganda that includes these healings - a more substantial relationship between these two accounts seems probable. Mark’s readers would certainly have seen the similarity between this Markan account and the recent reports of Vespasian’s healings. The temporal proximity of Mark’s composition and Vespasian’s healings makes it highly plausible that the evangelist purposefully created a parallel with this Flavian propaganda. By including miracles stories that parallel the actions of the emperor (3:1-6; 8:22-26), Mark is able to highlight the polemical purpose of all his healing pericopes. He not only demonstrates for his readers that Jesus had already performed these remarkable healings performed by Vespasian, but also that Jesus performed even more miracles, many of which surpassed those of the emperor. Mark’s presentation of Jesus as a healer, therefore, undermines Vespasian’s resume and bolsters Jesus’.18
Adam Winn, The Purpose of Mark’s Gospel is the book if interested.
Seeing Mark as post 70CE, written during intense Flavian propaganda, can certainly unlock entirely new understandings of the Gospel in places. It is quite fascinating and given the huge number of scholars who now accept this date range, Christians should certainly take these readings seriously if their goal is to understand what scripture intends to teach.
And as I have noted, there are also reasons for dating Mark on the earlier side of the temple destruction.Scholars are divided with 65-75 being the typical range.
I am enjoying the discussion, but what about the idea that the gospels were written using the reteospectoscope, or if written earlier were refined and edited by the church community in telling or passing it along, seeing as no intact writings to examine until a couple of hundred years later, as I understand? It does bring up the problem as to why we’re not later events like Peter and Paul’s deaths not included, but perhaps the editing process was only of the existing story, not intended to make it a sequel.
In some ways the Gospel of Mark was certainly refined and edited. Matthew and Luke both turned it into their own Gospels by adding a lot to it and changing things. John had a second ending appended and a number of other redactions.
Many of the traditions in Mark most certainly date to ca 30CE, but when we date these texts—written literary works—ultimately, all we can do is date the final redaction as we have it. The full compositional history is largely lost to us.
Him writing earlier and not knowing them is one clear solution. There is no rule though saying Acts has to mention them though it has struck many readers with hindsight as Peculiar. This of course assumes Paul’s fate was well known at the time and our traditions are correct
Maybe the author of Luke-Acts wants Christianity, which was otherwise seen as a pernicious superstition to educated Romans, to seem more sophisticated and having Rome kill the book’s two heroes creates a conflict of interest with his main purpose of showing how the Gospel is respectable and goes from Jerusalem to Rome, the Jewish centers to the world’s center. Objections like this one don’t work:
The purpose of Acts was to show how Christianity arrived in Rome - now that Paul has arrived this has been accomplished . This is not the case - Christianity arrived in Rome well before Paul. We know this not only from historians (e.g. Justin, Clement of Alexandria, Eusebius, Jerome, etc.) but also from Paul’s own epistle to the Romans. Paul wrote an epistle to Rome ~3 years before he himself arrived there, and there was already a Christian community there to write to.
That type of objection doesn’t settle the issue in my mind because the entire construct may be artificial and theological for Luke. Matthew and Luke are Galilee based after Jesus’s death. Luke also may very well have an allusion to Paul’s death in Acts 20:25.
It seems scholars are mixed on Acts:
Data from Pervo’s Dating Acts (a work I want), 359–63 (as of about 18 years ago)
those who date Acts in the 60’s: 28%
those who date Acts in the 70’s-80’s: 44% (consensus)
those who date Acts in the 90’s: 18%
those who date Acts after 100: 10%
Not referencing Paul’s death alone is not the only evidence to look at. There are many things to consider.
Does Acts have a collection of Paul’s letters?
Is Acts dependent on the work of Josephus? (increasing in popularity it seems)
Does Luke show knowledge of Titus encircling the Temple ca 70 CE.
When does Mark, which Luke is dependent on, write?
Does Acts allude to Paul’s death.
Did the author intend a third volume?
Luke can date anywhere from 60-140CE.
But again, for people who think the text inerrant and written by God, I have to ask… why so much attention to this issue? It is a historical question.
I ultimately think the middle position (ca 85) on Acts is losing ground. Acts is probably either early (ca 60s) or late (100-140CE).
I don’t feel especially strongly about when they were written, except that late dates are often used to cast doubt on the reliability of their contents, both scholarly and popularly. Hence even Phil’s original comment that first piqued my curiosity on the topic…
So if I ask a “historical” question about the resurrection, I (and Lewis) should be completely satisfied by the “historical” answers we get from historians that reject the possibility of the miraculous?
Um, no.
As a Christian I would not accept scholarship regarding answers to questions that relate to the resurrection from scholars who reject the possibility of the miraculous, for obvious reasons. So while the dating of the gospels is certainly of less weight, why would I similarly accept similarly faulty methods when the conclusion is similarly interconnected with the question of the miraculous?
I very much appreciate your list of other considerations, and will give them due consideration when I have more time - But I nevertheless maintain a stance of skepticism: this topic has enormous potential to be tainted with a confirmation bias… If a scholar either consciously or unconsciously has already completely dismissed even the possibility of miraculous prediction, then any pre-70 AD date for the Gospels is simply and utterly impossible in their mind and will not even be considered. As such, all additional evidence or data will be interpreted through that lens.
I imagine a similar list of “other” evidence could (and has) been offered by historians that argue against a miraculous resurrection and for some alternate theory. And I’m sure that said historians would dutifully claim that all this other evidence stood on its own, they weren’t rejecting the resurrection outright simply due to its supernatural nature. But if that historian utterly rejects the concept of the miraculous, then I start with a justified skepticism in the objectivity or legitimacy of his interpretations of even the additional data… his investigation has been biased and tainted from the start, and of course he was going to come to a naturalistic conclusion when he looked at any particular datum.
So of course unbelieving secular or critical scholars will examine all the other texts and considerations you mention and conclude they all fit with a post-70AD date. But this was a foregone conclusion. Hence Lewis’s point - " Those who assume that miracles cannot happen are merely wasting their time… we know in advance what results they will find for they have begun by begging the question."
I’m not sure what a “reteospectoscope” is, so I may be missing the point of your question here, so please correct me if I do. But based on what I think you’re asking…
Textual criticism is a significant factor on this question… If an original manuscript was copied and copied and copied early in its life, and these copies made it to vastly divergent geographical locations where they were again copied and copied… then any later editing would be immediately detectable through wide divergences in various extant texts.
In other words, If all we had was a single copy of a Gospel from c. 400AD, and all other extant manuscripts were understood to have been copied from that one, then we could indeed be concerned that there may have been who knows how many edits, modifications, and the like that had happened over the previous 300 years or so.
But the sheer number, variety, and geographic dispersion of extant manuscripts confirms the degree to which what we have reflects what is in the original, and any such attempts at theological editing are easily detectable. Perhaps the most famous example is 1 John 5:7 (known as the Johannine Comma), which is easily recognized as just such a late edit because it is absent from nearly all other extant Greek manuscripts.
There could conceivably have been the kinds of edits or refinements you mention, but they’d have to have been made very quickly after the writing of the document but before there were many copies being circulated for them to be undetectable to us.
The abrupt end of Acts, along with the absence of major events that would be expected to be included had Luke known of them, though not conclusive, is very compelling evidence to me that the book was indeed composed (or completed?) right near that time. This factor demands serious consideration, and I think should require compelling counterevidence to reject.
I personally find absurd the idea so often suggested: that for “thematic” reasons Luke wouldn’t have wanted to mention the martyrdom of apostles or other church leaders (James brother of Jesus, Peter, or Paul), as that would be a downer to his theme and he wanted his account to sound triumphant… when he had no issue noting the death of James the apostle as well as Stephen’s death.
This is the kind of thing that arouses my skepticism, and to me is a bit akin to claiming that Peter Jackson’s “Return of the King” had additional endings appended to it. The fact that there exists in a work a very natural ending, but the work continues to another ending, is not by itself evidence of later editing by a different party.
I don’t think it is disputed that there is what seems could be a very natural ending to the gospel at the end of John 20, yet there’s an additional chapter with what seems another ending… but the conclusion that this was an example of editing or refinement by the larger church community seems completely without warrant or evidence. Unless I’ve missed something, there is no textual warrant whatsoever for this claim, is there? (as there is for the woman caught in adultery?)
If we had a large number of mostly complete early manuscripts then yes, but the earliest manuscripts are all highly fragmentary. You don’t get mostly complete manuscripts until the, I believe, 9th century. And all of the manuscripts show accidental and deliberate scribal changes.
The earliest manuscript of a New Testament text is a business-card-sized fragment from the Gospel of John, Rylands Library Papyrus P52, which may be as early as the first half of the 2nd century. The first complete copies of single New Testament books appear around 200, and the earliest complete copy of the New Testament, the Codex Sinaiticus, dates to the 4th century
Exactly. the earliest complete manuscript of Luke is, according to Wikipedia:
“The fragment𝔓4 is often cited as the oldest witness. It has been dated from the late 2nd century, although this dating is disputed. Papyrus 75 (= Papyrus Bodmer XIV–XV) is another very early manuscript (late 2nd/early 3rd century), and it includes an attribution of the Gospel to Luke.
“The oldest complete texts are the 4th-century Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, both from the Alexandrian family; Codex Bezae, a 5th- or 6th-century Western text-type manuscript that contains Luke in Greek and Latin versions on facing pages, appears to have descended from an offshoot of the main manuscript tradition, departing from more familiar readings at many points.”
So we have a couple of hundred years of refinement that occurred before we actually have a text to criticize. Ultimately, it becomes that text we regard as inspired, rather than the non-existent copy first written. It becomes an issue of faith rather than reason and analysis. I am comfortable with that, but can understand the discomfort of some who like things tied up with a neat bow.
By the was, my fat finger hit the wrong letters on my screen keyboard, and retrospectoscope refers to looking back at something through the lens of retrospection.
I misremembered the 9th century and was digging around for a reference when you responded.
Look at your own reference. Some of the complete NT books date to 3rd century. That is still 200+ years after the fact. Somewhere I came across a chart showing the percentage of the NT attested in manuscripts by age and in the first few centuries it is a small percentage.
Edit to add: I read it several years ago and found The Earliest Christian Artifacts by Larry Hurtado interesting. It is copyrighted 2006 and so is probably out of date.
Neither of them were killed by Rome. Again, it fits with Luke wanting Christianity to be respected to educated Romans. Notice how Pilate wants nothing to do with killing Jesus. It’s the Jews who push for the death. Luke is in a pickle. He has to deal with the fact that Jesus was crucified by Rome and his two most prominent “apostles” were summarily put to death by Rome as well. This just may not serve Luke’s purposes (assuming it happened).
It’s a good argument and a large number of scholars have used it but it’s an argument from silence and no one said Luke was writing a complete history of the church. He could have planned a third volume or been content with how he showed the gospel going from Jerusalem to Rome. That we find the end abrupt certainly does not mean the 1900 year old author did. Keeping an eye on Rome makes sense.
There is counter evidence in spades.
Dependence on Jospehus (Potential)
Dependence on Mark (certain)
Acts alluding to Paul’s death (potential)
Dependence on Macion’s gospel (possible)
Access to collection of Paul’s letters (possible)
Luke knowing about Titus in his expansion of Mark (probably)
Our earliest witness (Irenaeus) saying Mark wrote after Peter’s death.
Acts ecclesiology more closely resembles the mid-second century church fathers than 1st century Pauline or early Gospel material.
“And where as the Gospel of Matthew, for example, seeks to justify the existence of the Jesus movement as an increasingly gentile body, Luke and Acts justify an existing boundary between two religions, “Judaism” and “Christianity,” the latter of which is the valid heir of God’s promises.” --Pervo
Not to mention it has to be established that Peter and Paul were actually martyred before wondering why this isn’t mentioned. Maybe they were not and the later accounts are legendary. What is the evidence?
Also, check this out:
Acts makes no mention of Nero’s persecution of Christians in the mid 60s.
Neither does any other ancient writer besides Tacitus, including Christian ones, and including non-Canonical Christian Gospels. If a lack of mention of the Neronic persecution is proof that a Christian writing was composed before 70, then we have to count all the Gnostic Gospels as pre-70 too.
Luke ending with events in the early 60 is only one piece of evidence. Don’t put all the eggs in one basket.
Plenty of evidence for textual corruption before the manuscript record and plenty of sources to read about the potential redaction of John. Parts of it seem greatly disordered. But I’d rather not start going into detail on multiple issues at once. The dating of the synoptics/Acts is already time consuming.
You are correct that those thousands of manuscripts are mostly many centuries removed. And as Nongbri has shown, the Rylands fragment can date to ca 200.
You can sort each one by date. Not a lot before 200CE to be sure.
What bothers me is the table says “manuscripts” but means any fragment of a complete book. What I can’t find is a reference which indicates when we had enough fragments to put together a complete copy of each book. I believe in some cases we just have to go by the complete copy and those are always late dated.
Well, not exactly… The data you’re observing doesn’t mean that the church essentially had free rein to make edits up until ~350AD or whenever Codex Sinaiticus or the earliest extant codex was written… because there were plenty of other copies of the books in circulation that ended up being the basis for the other ancient codices we have extant (Vaticanus, Alexandrinus).
Consider this thought experiment… Wikipedia’s page on Codex Sinaiticus observes:
According to textual critic Fenton Hort, Sinaiticus and Vaticanus were derived from a much older common source, “the date of which cannot be later than the early part of the second century [~140AD?], and may well be yet earlier”".
I’m hardly an expert, but if I take this textual critic at face value… limiting the discussion to just these two codices which are believed by this textual critic to be derived from a common source in around 140AD or so, after which their manuscript families diverged. Hence, then, from ~140 on, if someone did try to make some significant modification to the text that they had, then it would have found its way into one of these extant codices that we have, but not in the other, and the modification would be obvious. And that is just illustrating the idea given those two codices… There are plenty more sources that push the date of any common source for everything we do have extant way back.
Or, put yet another way… due to the whole science of textual criticism and the numbers of manuscript families, we know there were indeed various changes that were made in these early times of the church… there are entire documents that catalog every single different reading between manuscripts. They are indeed legion. But we know all of this because any change that a scribe made, no matter how small, in even those earliest decades after the autograph, will be detectable by us… as the change will only be found in certain manuscript families but not in others. Hence why we know that certain parts of our Bibles (alternate endings to Mark, the woman caught in adultery, etc.) simply were not part of the original text.
So I grant that these modifications were indeed occasionally attempted… I reject the idea that they could have been happening on a vast scale or for any period long after the autographs without them being easily detectable by us given what textual criticism is able to determine about the changes we do know of.
It is just not viable to suggest that major theological edits or other such modifications were made to these texts during “a couple hundred years” or so after the autograph, and this would remain somehow undetectable to us… for this to have happened would have required a seriously vast conspiracy… every other extant manuscript, dispersed across the entire empire, would have had to have been destroyed and replacements distributed with the new modifications (all this happening without any extant record of discussion or debate), for us not to be able to detect such changes at such late timeframes. This is unrealistic in the extreme.
