It's also interesting that Paul doesn't mention some of the things that are highly significant in the gospels-for instance, Jesus' parables and miracles-but he focuses on Jesus' atoning death and resurrection. Those, for Paul, were the most important things about Jesus-and indeed they transformed Paul from being a persecutor of Christians into becoming history's foremost Christian missionary, who was willing to go through all sorts of hardships and deprivation because of his faith. Paul also corroborates some important aspects of the character of Jesus-his humility, his obedience, his love for sinners, and so forth. He calls Christians to have the mind of Christ in the second chapter of Philippians. This is a famous passage in which Paul is probably quoting from an early Christian hymn about the emptying of Christ, who was equal to God yet took the form of a man, of a slave, and suffered the extreme penalty, the Crucifixion. So Paul's letters are an important witness to the deity of Christ-he calls Jesus 'the Son of God' and 'the image of God." I interrupted by saying, "The fact that Paul, who came from a monotheistic Jewish background, worshiped Jesus as God is extremely significant, isn't it?" "Yes," he said, "and it undermines a popular theory that the deity of Christ was later imported into Christianity by Gentile beliefs. It's just not so. Even Paul at this very early date was worshiping Jesus as God. I have to say that all this corroboration by Paul is of the utmost importance. And we have other early letters by the eyewitnesses James and Peter, too. James, for instance, has recollections of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount."
We also have volumes of writings by the "apostolic fathers," who were the earliest Christian writers after the New Testament. They authored the Epistle of Clement of Rome, the Epistles of Ignatius, the Epistle of Polycarp, the Epistle of Barnabas, and others. In many places these writings attest to the basic facts about Jesus, particularly his teachings, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and his divine nature. "Which of these writings do you consider most significant?" I asked. Yamauchi pondered the question. While he didn't name the one he thought was most significant, he did cite the seven letters of Ignatius as being among the most important of the writings of the apostolic fathers. Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch in Syria, was martyred during the reign of Trajan before A.D. 117. "What is significant about Ignatius," said Yamauchi, "is that he emphasized both the deity of Jesus and the humanity of Jesus, as against the docetic heresy, which denied that Jesus was really human. He also stressed the historical underpinnings of Christianity; he wrote in one letter, on his way to being executed, that Jesus was truly persecuted under Pilate, was truly crucified, was truly raised from the dead, and that those who believe in him would be raised, too. Put all this together- Josephus, the Roman historians and officials, the Jewish writings, the letters of Paul and the apostolic fathers-and you've got persuasive evidence that corroborates all the essentials found in the biographies of Jesus. Even if you were to throw away every last copy of the gospels, you'd still have a picture of Jesus that's extremely compelling-in fact, it's a portrait of the unique Son of God." I stood and thanked Yamauchi for sharing his time and expertise. "I know there's a lot more we could talk about, since entire books have been written on this topic," I said. "But before we end, I'd like to ask you one last question. A personal one, if that's all right." The professor rose to his feet. "Yes, that's fine," he said. I glanced around his modest office, which was filled to the brim with books and manuscripts, records and journals, computer disks and papers, all products of a lifetime of scholarly research into a world of long ago. "You've spent forty years studying ancient history and archaeology," I said. "What has been the result in your own spiritual life? Have your studies bolstered or weakened your faith in Jesus Christ?" He looked down at the floor momentarily, then raised his eyes and looked squarely into mine. He said in a firm but sincere voice, "There's no question-my studies have greatly strengthened and enriched my spiritual life. They have given me a better understanding of the culture and historical context of the events. "This doesn't mean that I don't recognize that there are some issues that still remain; within this lifetime we will not have full knowledge. But these issues don't even begin to undermine my faith in the essential trustworthiness of the gospels and the rest of the New Testament. I think the alternative explanations, which try to account for the spread of Christianity through sociological or psychological reasons, are very weak." He shook his head. "Very weak." Then he added, "For me, the historical evidence has reinforced my commitment to Jesus Christ as the Son of God who loves us and died for us and was raised from the dead. It's that simple."
As I emerged from Yamauchi's building into a sea of college students scurrying from place to place in order to make their next class, I reflected on how satisfying my drive to tiny Oxford, Ohio, had been. I came seeking corroboration for Jesus, and I walked away with a rich reservoir of material affirming every major aspect of his life, miracles, deity, and victory over death. I knew that our brief conversation had only scratched the surface. Under my arm I was carrying The Verdict ofHistory, which I had reread in preparation for my interview. In it historian Gary Habermas details a total of thirty-nine ancient sources documenting the life of Jesus, from which he enumerates more than one hundred reported facts concerning Jesus' life, teachings, crucifixion, and resurrection. What's more, twenty- four of the sources cited by Habermas, including seven secular sources and several of the earliest creeds of the church, specifically concern the divine nature of Jesus. "These creeds reveal that the church did not simply teach Jesus' deity a generation later, as is so often repeated in contemporary theology, because this doctrine is definitely present in the earliest church," Habermas writes. His conclusion: "The best explanation for these creeds is that they properly represent Jesus' own teachings ." That is stunning corroboration for the most important assertion by the most influential individual who has ever lived. I zipped up my coat as I headed for my car. Glancing back one more time, I saw the October sun illuminating the stone inscription I had first noticed when I walked onto the campus of this thoroughly secular university: "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free."
Questions for Reflection or Group Study 1 .Is there an incident in your life in which you doubted someone's story until he or she offered some corroborating evidence? How was that experience similar to learning about the kind of corroborative evidence that Yamauchi presented? 2. What do you consider to be the most persuasive corroboration that Yamauchi talked about? Why? 3. Ancient sources say that early Christians clung to their beliefs rather than disavow them in the face of torture. Why do you think they had such strongly held convictions?
For Further Evidence More Resources on nis Topic Bruce, F. F. Jesus and Christian Origins outside the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974. Habermas, Gary. The Historical Jesus. Joplin, Mo.: College Press, 1996. McDowell, Josh, and Bill Wilson. He Walked among Us. Nashville: Nelson, 1994.
Does Archaeology Confirm or Contradict Jesus-'Biographies?
There was something surreal about my lunch with Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald. There he was, casually munching on a tuna fish sandwich and potato chips in a conference room of a North Carolina courthouse, making upbeat comments and generally enjoying himself In a nearby room a dozen jurors were taking a break after hearing gruesome evidence that MacDonald had brutally murdered his wife and two young daughters. As we were finishing our meal, I couldn't restrain myself from asking MacDonald the obvious questions. "How can you act as if nothing is wrong?" I said, my voice mixed with astonishment and indignation. "Aren't you the slightest bit concerned that those jurors are going to find you guilty?" MacDonald casually waved his half-eaten sandwich in the general direction of the jury room. "Them?" he chortled. "They'll never convict me!" Then, apparently realizing how cynical those words sounded, he quickly added, "I'm innocent, you know." That was the last time I ever heard him laugh. Within days the former Green Beret and emergency room physician was found guilty of stabbing to death his wife, Colette, and his daughters, Kimberly, age five, and Kristen, age two. He was promptly sentenced to life in prison and carted off in handcuffs. MacDonald, whose story was masterfully recounted by Joe McGinniss in the best-seller and TV movie Fatal Vision, was cocky enough to think that his alibi would help him get away with murder. He had told investigators that he was asleep on the couch when drug-crazed hippies awakened him in the middle of the night. He said he fought them off, getting stabbed and knocked unconscious in the process. When he awakened, he found his family slaughtered. Detectives were skeptical from the start. The living room showed few signs of a life-and-death struggle. MacDonald's wounds were superficial. Though he had poor eyesight, he was somehow able to provide detailed descriptions of his attackers even though he had not been wearing his glasses. However, skepticism alone doesn't win convictions; that requires hard evidence. In MacDonald's case detectives relied on scientific proof to untangle his web of lies and convict him of the slayings. There's a wide variety of scientific evidence that's commonly used in trials, ranging from DNA typing to forensic anthropology to toxicology. In MacDonald's case it was serology (blood evidence) and trace evidence that dispatched him to the penitentiary. In an extraordinary-and for prosecutors, fortuitous coincidence, each member of MacDonald's family had a different blood type. By analyzing where bloodstains were found, investigators were able to reconstruct the sequence of events that deadly evening-and it directly contradicted MacDonald's version of what happened. Scientific study of tiny blue pajama threads, which were found scattered in various locations, also refuted his alibi. And microscopic analysis demonstrated that holes in his pajamas could not have been made, as he claimed, by an ice pick wielded by the home invaders. In short, it was FBI technicians in white lab coats who were really behind MacDonald's conviction. Scientific evidence can also make important contributions to the