if the New Testament was written by the Apostles is there any evidence the books can be dated to within the Apostles lifetime and is there any evidence they were written by the people who they are credited to we've already discussed the oral tradition of the New Testament and that it can be reliable even up to the late dates of the Gospels but are not some of these dates too late to have been written by the actual Apostles well first we need to discuss why many historians date them so late the main reason is based on a twofold argument first Mark is assumed to be the first gospel because it is the shortest Matthew and lucre said you'd be based off of Mark so they must have come later and John came last from an independent source then historians point out mark 13 is a vivid prophecy by Jesus of the destruction of the temple in the surrounding events which took place in 70 AD so since the author of Mark speaks so clearly about this event he must have had prior knowledge of it to be so accurate I believe this argument is based on a presupposition that Jesus could not have been who he claimed to be therefore he could not have made an accurate prediction that was fulfilled in 70 AD therefore we have to date the Gospels after 70 AD says Jesus could not predict the future not only is that starting with a presupposition it doesn't seem fair to the text since there is a lot of evidence which leads to early dates for the Gospels it could just be that Jesus was echoing the first destruction of the temple by Babylon and even from a secular standpoint atheist Marie's Cayce or use extensively that March 13 should be dated around 40 ad second it is assumed mark was first because it is the shortest however oral tradition specialists Albert Lord points out oral narrative parallels that we have found doesn't necessarily mean the shorter version is older it may be the result of practical constraints those who argue Matthew was written first argue mark was shortened for a Gentile audience who would not understand the prophecies of the Old Testament being fulfilled and the Jewish context Matthew constantly refers to but that is a topic for another video third there is actually a lot of external and internal evidence which suggests the Gospels were written by the men who they are credited to looking at the external evidence the early church fathers are unanimous that the Gospel of Matthew was written by the disciple Matthew Mark was written by Mark the interpreter of Peter in Rome Luke was written by Luke the companion of Paul and John was written by the disciple John Tertullian writing around 200 AD in North Africa tells us that the documents of the Gospels were written by the Apostles Matthew and John and apostolic men of Luke and Mark prior to that st. Irenaeus of Leones tells us Matthew wrote a gospel among the Jews in their own style while Paul and Peter were preaching in Rome then mark the disciple of Peter handed to us the preaching of Peter then Luke a follower of Paul set forth his own gospel later John the disciple of the Lord put out a gospel while residing in Ephesus so Arrhenius tells us John wrote later than the other three implying the first three were possibly written around the same time clement of alexandria writing in egypt around the same time as a running us tells us the gospels with the genealogies came first mark was done at request while Peter was preaching in Rome and that John came last at the urging of friends so we get the same idea that a reneus tells us that the first three were written around the same time and John came last the Murrah torreón fragment which dates to the middle of the second century is a list of an early Canon the first page was lost however the second page starts with a twitch nevertheless he was present and so he placed them in his narrative the third book of the gospel is that according to Luke Luke the well-known physician the fourth of the Gospels is that of John one of the disciples to his fellow disciples and bishops who had been urging him to write so we are told Luke was 3rd John was last and it starts with the same idea church fathers tell us that mark was present while Peter was preaching in Rome and wrote down what Peter taught although the names on the first page are lost preserve the new CBS ecclesiastical history is a quote from Pappy's of Harappa list written before 125 ad this to the elder used to say mark who had been Peters interpreter wrote down carefully but not in order all that he remembered of the Lord's sayings and doings for he had not heard the Lord or had been one of his followers but later as I said one appears Peter used to adapt his teachings to the occasion without making a systematic arrangement of the Lord's sayings so that mark was quite justified in writing down some things just as he had remembered them for he had had one purpose only to leave out nothing that he had heard did you make no mistake man about it he also says Matthew wrote the logia and the Hebrew dialect to whether Pappas was referring to the Gospel of Matthew for an older list of sayings of Jesus sometimes referred to by scholars as QED we do not know Tim McGrew makes an excellent point regarding all this external evidence if you plot all four Church Fathers on a map you see we have wide attestation of the authors of the Gospels from all over the ancient world this is the kind of testimony we dream of receiving with other ancient documents we have multiple authors in different regions all telling us the same general story we have excellent evidence the Gospels are written by those who they are attributed to on top of this we have no other tradition or testimony which attributes authorship to anyone else there is no competing tradition plus if the Church Fathers just made-up authors to attribute to the four Gospels wires are not unanimous attestation - who wrote Hebrews Hebrews is truly anonymous in church fathers had to try to guess who the author was if they made up the authors of the Gospels why not do the same of Hebrews and also why not give all four Gospels prominent names surely they could have done better than Mark and Luke who never met Jesus and were later disciples of the Apostles if you're just making it all up why not pick two of the other disciples it would have made the Gospels look better instead of attributing them the men who were never considered church founders or disciples of Jesus some skeptics try to claim the Gospels cannot be trusted because they do not mention the authors internally but this was how the majority of ancient biographies were written the majority of works from the ancient world have to be externally attributed BP Sanders says the claim of an anonymous history was higher than that of a named work in the ancient world an anonymous book rather like an encyclopedia article today implicitly clean complete knowledge and reliability if we reduced the impact of the Gospel of Matthew had the author written this is my version instead of this is what Jesus said and did so looking at the external evidence we have good evidence they are written by the Apostles in men who they are attributed to so the claim of layer imposters is without evidence and unwarranted so if we compare this external authorship for the Gospels with other ancient works you can see how much better off the New Testament is compared to these others the first person to attribute the annals to Tacitus is not until st. jerome Sioux City these works are not attributed to him until police over two hundred years later whereas with the New Testament we've multiple authors within 150 years and one author who is less than fifty years from the source who even testified they were still living disciples in his day moving on we have a lot of good evidence the first three Gospels can be dated to prior to 70 AD first none of the Gospels directly mentioned the destruction of the temple and this is inconsistent with their style of pointing out things that happen after the fact for example when all four Gospels mentioned Judas for the first time they all make the note that he later became a traitor so when the Gospels talk about past predictions or events they are keen to mention the later effects like the Judas would later become a traitor in acts 11 Luke mentions the prediction of a coming famine then notes this happened during the reign of Claudius in John chapter 2 we see a conversation between Jesus and the Jews where Jesus speaks of raising up his body after three days in verse 22 John mentions what Jesus was speaking about was when Jesus was raised from the dead all these examples indicate that when the Gospels mentioned something spoken in the past and having been fulfilled by the time they were writing they would mention that it had already taken place however it is clear Jesus predicted the destruction of the temple as recorded in Matthew Mark and Luke they simply mentioned that Jesus predicted this yet do not indicate it as already happened this seems inconsistent with their style of mentioning when something was fulfilled or later occurred by the time they wrote especially with Matthew who loved to mention Old Testament passages that will fulfilled in his lifetime second the language of the Gospels in acts indicates they were written in a pre persecution time in 64 AD the first great Christian persecution began Christians were fed to wild animals burned alive tortured and crucified because of this anti Roman works like the revelation of John and the forged apocalypse of Peter were produced which didn't paint Rome in a good light or speak well of their persecutors later in Hell scholars note these works represent the anguish Christians were feeling during and after great persecutions and the new anger they now had for the Roman persecutors however in the Gospels in acts we do not see the same attitude towards Rome Luke off and paints Romans in a good light such as a Roman who rescued Paul from dying at the hands of Jews in another later treating Paul kindly as well as a Roman centurion who comes to Jesus for help mark betrayed a Roman centurion as one of the few at the cross who understood Jesus was the son of God Rome has never really made out to be the enemy in the Gospels or acts but the focus is more on the Jewish sects who were persecuting them long before Rome started thus this indicates an early dating for these documents third external and internal evidence both indicate matthew was writing to a Jewish audience however the destruction of the temple in 70 AD wiped out the large Jewish population and scattered the remaining if Matthew was written after 70 AD to whom was he writing there lacked a centralized group his gospel would have been directed at furthermore Matthew mentions details that would only matter to a Jewish population still centered in Jerusalem such as the field Judas hanged himself in John Wynnum says some of the apologetic like the account of the suicide of Judas in the account of the guard of the tomb seems of no great theological significance yet of particular interest to those who frequented Jerusalem it makes more sense Matthew was writing a gospel for Jews in Judea prior to 70 AD forth in Jesus and the eyewitnesses Richard baulkham cites evidence that many elements of Mark fit with a community prior to 70 AD one aspect pointed out is the Gospels are filled with names which represent an authoritative list of witnesses people could question to verify the Gospel accounts however in many places in the synoptic Gospels many key eyewitnesses are left anonymous scholars like Gert thysen and Craig Evans point out key witnesses were left anonymous for their protection since they still could have been prosecuted by the Jewish authorities for example in mark we are told someone cut off the ear of a soldier in trying to protect Jesus into retelling of the story he's left anonymous for his protection since if his name was told the Jewish authorities who still had power in Jerusalem could arrest him for attacking a soldier however by the time John is written we find out it is Peter thus telling us that by the time John was written which is the last gospel keeping Peters identity secret was no longer necessary as by this time the Jews had lost their power in Jerusalem thus the passion narrative in mark must be placed prior to 70 AD as gird thysen says only in Jerusalem was there a reason to draw a cloak of anonymity over followers of Jesus who had endangered themselves by their actions the date could also be pinpointed parts of the passion account would have to have been composed within the generation of the eyewitnesses and their contemporaries that is somewhere between 30 and 60 AD Bachmann cites several other examples that mark keeps anonymous for their protection telling us parts of mark were written early and while the Sanhedrin still had power in Jerusalem fifth and most importantly look at how the book of Acts ends the final section is a build-up to Paul's trial in Rome several chapters are spent building up for Paul to head to Rome and face trial however Acts ends with Paul arriving in Rome and the statement he lived there two years at his own expense there is no mention of his trial or if he was ever released or not the climactic build just ends without a payoff it is a great poll arrived in Rome in 60 ad based on the fact that acts mentions a change in procurator from Felix to Festus which dates to 59 AD acts record to his Festus that sent Paul for trial in Rome thus of Acts ends two years later with Paul still waiting for trial in Rome it would seem that as when acts was completed otherwise why would Luke bill to a climactic trial only to leave his readers guessing if Paul was released or not tradition teaches Paul was released at this time so it would have been the perfect note to end on and Paul was finally released and headed back out to preach the gospel once again as the Lord instructed so the likely possibility is that Acts was completed before the trial which probably disappointed his reader but his good historical data for us today Luke also begins acts by mentioning this is his second book therefore his gospel would have been written before acts in before 62 ad this would imply mark was also written earlier since Luke was mostly based off of Mark thus we have plenty of evidence that at least the first three Gospels and acts were written before 70 AD and even before 62 ad therefore from internal and external evidence we can estimate when they were completed Church Fathers tell us mark was written in Rome and is the account of Peters preaching Emperor Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome in 49 AD but the decree would have ended in 54 ad when Claudius died this would have allowed Peter and mark to go to Rome and preach however Peter probably didn't go to Rome right away since Paul's letter to the Romans which is dated the 56 ad doesn't mention a Greek Peter yet Paul greets dozens of others by name it is unlikely he would have left peter out thus mark was most likely written after 56 ad when Peter would have arrived so probably between 57 and 60 ad Luke mentions he gathered sources for his gospel in the first chapter which most likely would have happened while Paul was in prison under Felix in Judea this would have allowed Luke to acquire the sources for his Gospels by speaking and meeting with the early church however internal evidence indicates Luke relied heavily on mark therefore completion would not have happened until Paul and Luke arrived in Rome where he could draw from mark the account of Peter and his own sources to finalize a Gospel between 60 and 62 AD as well as write Acts now you see be a slice of tradition that Peter went to Rome in the 40s under Claudius to deal with the heretics Simon Magnus it is possible mark was with him there in mark would have written as early as the 40s this would tentatively move Luke back as well however neither of these are necessary in it lacks extensive data whether Matthew existed prior to mark or his base off a mark is debatable most scholars believe Matthew is based on mark however from external evidence there is a possibility Matthew was the first gospel written early church historian Eusebius places Matthew as early as 41 ad however other Church Fathers like erroneous seem to suggest a later date therefore Matthew was probably written in Judea somewhere around the 50s and 60s in Aramaic and was later translated in Greek some internal evidence may suggest John was written before 70 AD John 5:2 speaks in present tense of a sheep gate by a pull in Jerusalem which would not have been there if John was writing after 70 AD however external evidence suggests John was written after his exile and after he completed revelation external evidence also indicates John lived well into old age so he could have written as late as 96 ad however the Murrah torreón fragment says the disciple Andrew was with John when he wrote his gospel and it is unlikely Andrew would have also lived as long as John therefore John could be dated anywhere between 66 and 96 ad church father Pappy is in a statement that Matthew wrote the loggia may be referring to an early collection of Jesus's acts and statements which scholars refer to as QED if this document did exist it would predate the Gospels in the writing of it probably would have started during the ministry of Jesus Matthew being a tax collector would not only have known Greek and Aramaic but would also have access to papyrus for writing however there is no agreement on what QED would have contained and there is not good evidence it even existed plus a study of oral tradition shows it wasn't necessary the dating of most of Paul's letters is not speculative as there are generally agreed upon dates however we will discuss the other New Testament books in more detail in another series where we can look at each book individually generally speaking though there is plenty of evidence to date the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament books reasonably within the Apostles lifetimes and there is no reason to doubt their authorship you