Question:
The writings of Paul and the Gospel of John are NOT credible. Reasons are:
1. John was written around 90 CE. If the author of John was with Jesus, it was over 55 years prior! John would have been a senile, Alzheimer ridden 90 year old man! And yet, we are to believe that he could remember, word for word, exactly what everyone (not just Jesus – he quotes others too) said 55 years ago? That is like a 90 year old man remembering every word, every scene, every situation of a play he was in 55 years ago. Can you recite a 10,000 word tract, word for word, you read once 55 years ago? What took him so long? Why did it take “John” 55 years to decide to write about the event that determines the fate of all mankind for the rest of eternity?
2. Paul has no God-given authority to speak. Seeing an apparition does not give one the authority to speak for God. At one point, Paul does claim his knowledge comes from “Revelation” but it is faulty and contradicts what Jesus taught. He does not elaborate on this “Revelation”.
Do you have a response?
Answer:
The evidence leads me to the conclusion that John was written either in the late 70s, or the 80s AD. This was about 50 years after the events. I have a feeling you are a young person, otherwise you would not speak so harshly about old people! I am 69 years old, and I can remember with great vividness what I was doing 50 years ago. The US just elected as president a man who is 78 years old. Whether you agree with his politics or not (I tend not to!), he is certainly lucid enough to lead. I believe you owe an apology to the approximately 75 or 80 year old John who wrote the gospel of John (I intend to be humorous here!). As for why John waited until his seventies to write his gospel, you would have to ask him, but I am afraid you cannot. I can think of no inherent reason it is a bad thing to reflect on what one learned from Jesus over many years before writing one’s gospel.
The gospels are not transcripts. They are faithful renderings of what Jesus said and did, but not word-for-word quotes. We tend to look at the gospels through rationalistic Western eyes, but the audience in the ancient Near East would not expect the gospels to be precise word-for-word recordings of the words of Jesus. I am a man of faith, and I accept the biblical claim that these gospels are “inspired by God” (to quote from 2 Tim 3:16). I believe that the Bible is God-inspired because of the mountain of evidence for its inspiration. If you are curious about why I say this, I suggest you get a copy of my book, “Reasons for Belief” (
https://www.ipibooks.com/products/reasonsforbelief) Also, bear in mind that Jesus spoke in Aramaic, and the Gospel of John is in Greek, so right there you have the original gospel not being a literal transcript of Jesus’ words.
About Paul, you can decide for yourself. What we know with 100% certainty is that the apostles in Jerusalem accepted his account of having seen Christ and as having an accurate account of the gospel. They gave Paul the right hand of fellowship more than once. One account is in Acts 15. Peter described Paul’s writings as “scripture.” (2 Peter 3:15-16). Of course, you are absolutely free to decide what you believe about Paul, but the historical fact is this: all the church leaders we know about, including the apostles and James, the brother of Jesus, accepted Paul and his teaching as authoritative. You say that Paul contradicted Jesus. The apostles did not agree with you. Neither do I agree with you. Unfortunately, you did not cite an example, so I cannot defend my belief that Paul agreed with Jesus, as you gave no examples, but this is my conclusion. Perhaps you can cite a teaching of Paul which contradicts what Jesus taught. Many say that this is the case, but I do not believe you will be successful, but I invite you to make the attempt.
John Oakes
