[Questioner] This next question is related.
What's the best explanation for the
differences between John and the other
gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke. Especially
with regards to the crucifixion and the
resurrection. [Craig] Boy,
again, this is an issue of great
debate and contention. In Matthew,
Mark, and Luke, Jesus seems to celebrate
the Passover Thursday night, that seems
to be the Passover meal, right, that's the
last supper. And then he's crucified the
next day on Friday. But in John's Gospel,
John has the Passover on Friday as
Jesus is slain, as he is dying on the
cross, it is the very hour at which the
priests in the temple are sacrificing
the passover lambs. Now how do you
explain the difference between John and
the other three with regard to this?
Well, one possibility that the historian
has to reckon with is John has simply moved
the date of the crucifixion to Friday
rather than Thursday because he wants to
emphasize that Jesus is our Passover
sacrifice, that he is a passover lamb he
died for our sins and so John out of
theological motives might have shifted
the time of the Passover to make it
coincide with Jesus death on Friday.
That's one alternative and that's
certainly historically possible. Another
alternative is that Jesus simply ate the
Passover early with his disciples
knowing that he was going to be arrested
he provoked his arrest in Jerusalem
Jesus decided to celebrate Passover
Thursday night rather than Friday night.
So that would be like having your
Christmas meal say on Christmas Eve
instead and he may have even been using
a different calendar that located
Passover on that Thursday evening rather
than on Friday so all of those would be
possibilities. And I don't have any firm
opinion as to what is the most likely
explanation
this is one of those areas where I'm
willing to simply say we don't know
and keep an open mind.
[Questioner] Are there many of those types of, I guess
you could call it, inconsistencies in the
Bible?
[Craig] Yeah I almost don't, I hesitate to
call them inconsistencies Alex because you
see, ancient historical writers exercised
a freedom with respect to their sources
that we would not perhaps permit a
modern historian to do. Remember I said
that the Gospels tend to consist of
little snapshots of Jesus life and that
these are not always chronologically
arranged. In ancient biography the
authors would sometimes arrange their
material thematically to illustrate, for
example, the essential character traits
of the hero, his bravery or his courage.
And so they would group the stories
around that theme and so in that case
they don't necessarily follow a strict
chronology. And so it would be
anachronistic in a way to call this an
inconsistency on John's part. It may
simply be that he's exercising the
freedom here that was part of ancient
historical writing. Another example of
this in the Gospel of John, you asked if
there were many, one of the other most
important examples is the story of the
cleansing of the temple where Jesus goes
into the temple and over turns the
tables of the money changers. In Matthew,
Mark, and Luke,
this occurs during Passion Week - the last
week of Jesus' life. John
however has the story of the cleansing
of the temple early in Jesus ministry,
not during Passion Week. It seems that
he's moved it to earlier in Jesus
life. Now some people will try to
harmonize this by saying well maybe
Jesus cleanses the temple twice once at
the beginning of his ministry once at
the end - that's what I used to think. I
thought well that's how you
solve the problem. But now I'm more
inclined to think that given the nature
of ancient historiography. It's not an
error that would be anachronistic to say
this is an inconsistency if John for
theological reasons wanted to tell the
story of the cleansing of the temple
earlier then later in the narrative and
that the story itself is the same. How
Jesus goes into the temple overturns the
money changers tables and and drives out
the animals and thinks of himself I
think is fulfilling the prophecy of
Zechariah that there will be no commerce
in the temple on that day when Messiah
comes.