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[Traitor]

Doesn't it bother you that the Bible was written 400 years after Jesus supposedly lived? After that much time goes by, how can you believe that the words written by mere man were what Jesus meant?

[jimwalton]

Wow. We have a few things to talk about here. First of all, Jesus' historicity. He is mentioned by a plethora of ancient writers: Tacitus, Josephus, Suetonius, Thallus, Ignatius, Pliny the Younger, and Lucian. On the basis of historical sources, there is no reasonable doubt that Jesus existed as a man. There is no evidence from antiquity that the existence of Jesus was ever denied by those who opposed Christianity. It is also widely agreed as implausible that Christians invented him. Today nearly all historians, whether Christian or not, accept that Jesus existed.

Secondly, you have been misinformed about the 400 years. There is broad evidence of the Gospels by the end of the 2nd century (within 150 years of his life).

- Clement of Alexandria (AD 90) quotes from or alludes to the Gospels.
- Barnabas of Alexandria (AD 100) quotes from the NT Gospels twice
- The Didache (early 2nd c.) quotes from Matthew
- Hermas (early 2nd century) quotes from all four Gospels, and alludes to the existence of all four.
- Ignatius of Antioch (around AD 100) quotes from the Gospels about 4 times
- Tatian wrote a harmony of the 4 Gospels in about AD 175.
- Irenaeus (around AD 180) quotes heavily from all four Gospels.

Etc and etc, on an on it goes. The Gospels were clearly in place and recognized by AD 150. In addition...

- A piece of John's Gospel is in existence, dated to AD 125-150.
- We have a fragment of Matthew (P104) from AD 150
- We have another fragment of Matthew (P4) from the late 2nd century.
- We may have a piece of Mark from AD 90. It's a fairly new discovery.
- We have a manuscript of Mark from about AD 250.
- We have a piece of Luke (P75) from AD 175-225 and another one (P4) from late 2nd-early 3rd century

In other words, whoever told you the Bible wasn't written for 400 years after Jesus lived was greatly misinformed, and you have been misled as well.

[Traitor]

So the closest you come to Jesus is 90 years. Great. How about you wrote a book about Calvin Coolidge with no written records, and see if anyone believe you.

[jimwalton]

No, the extrabiblical records we have put us within about 60 years. The Gospels are probably within 30-40 years, in other words, still during the lifetimes of eyewitnesses. It's like asking someone to talk about the Reagan Presidency. It's not that tough. Plenty of people are around who experienced it. There are even still plenty of Vietnam vets around to tell us about something that happened 50 years ago. That's not a long stretch.

Also, do you realize that we have nothing written during the reign of Nero? Everything we know about Nero comes from about 30 years later. Everything. Is it believable, then?

Do you realize that everything we know about Alexander the Great was written hundreds of years (200-400 years) after his death? We know NOTHING of Alexander from his own era. Do you throw that out? Be careful how quick you are to judge, or we end up tossing away a whole lot of what we consider to be history. Actually, the 30-60 years later for Jesus isn't out of the question at all, historically speaking. We have evidence that the Gospels were in place before the end of the century (within 60 years or less of Jesus' death). The Gospel writings are probably within 30-40 years of his death, if not earlier. Paul's writings (1 Corinthians 15, for example) is from within 25 years of his death, and the creed of 1 Cor. 15.3-6 has been analyzed by scholars to be within 5 years of Jesus' death. Historically speaking, we have a lot of credible information, far closer than the 400 years of your original post, and even quite a bit closer than your 90-year claim now..