Who Wrote the NT Gospels? (3/5)

One of the primary reasons why Christians accept the NT Gospels as historically reliable has to do with who wrote them. Christians believe that each of the NT Gospels were written either by an eyewitness of Jesus’ life and ministry or in consultation with eyewitnesses of Jesus’ life and ministry. For centuries, Christians have confessed that: 

• Matthew, the tax-collector and early follower of Jesus, wrote the Gospel According to Matthew.

• Mark wrote down and arranged the memories of the Apostle Peter in the Gospel attributed to him.

• Luke, the “beloved physician” (Col 4:14), and traveling companion of Paul, wrote the Gospel According to Luke.

• John, the son of Zebedee, who leaned back on Jesus’ chest at the last supper, wrote the Gospel According to John. 

Contrary to the confession of the Church, Ehrman doubts that these traditionally accepted authors actually wrote the four Gospels of the New Testament. It seems Ehrman has two primary reasons for his doubts. The first is that these authors don’t directly name themselves as the authors in the body of these texts. The second is that the NT Gospels are written in Greek while the traditionally accepted authors would’ve been Aramaic-speaking Jewish peasants—in a time when most were illiterate. Regarding the authors of the NT Gospels, Ehrman writes:

“It is highly unfortunate that we don't know who really wrote these accounts. Still, even without knowing their names, we can say a few things about them. Unlike the lower-class, Aramaic-speaking, illiterate peasants, who were numbered among Jesus's followers, the authors of the four gospels were highly educated, fully literate, Greek speaking Christians of a later generation who lived outside of Palestine.” [1]

We have already dealt with Ehrman’s claim that these authors lived outside of Palestine in the post before this one; but what about the rest of Ehrman’s assessment? Are the NT Gospels anonymous? Would Jesus’ disciples have been able to write the NT Gospels? The rest of this post is dedicated to answering these questions. 

ARE THE NT GOSPELS ANONYMOUS?

On page 106 of Jesus Before the Gospels, Ehrman writes: 

“The first thing to emphasize about Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John is that all four are completely anonymous. The authors never indicate who they are. They never name themselves. They never give any direct, personal identification of any kind whatsoever.” [2]

This claim by Ehrman is technically correct. The NT Gospels are formally anonymous in that the authors do not name themselves as such in the body of these texts. However, there are a couple of good reasons to believe that the NT Gospels were received as written by the traditionally accepted authors from the beginning. 

First of all, if you take the collective witness of the early Church throughout the Roman empire in the second and third century (e.g. Papias from Asia Minor; Justin Martyr from Palestine; Irenaeus from Europe; and Tertullian from Northern Africa) and compare it to the Muratorian Canon (an authoritative list of Scriptures from the second century), you will find that they are all in agreement with what the Church at large held regarding the authorship of the NT Gospels. In fact, there are no early records of anyone arguing for different authors. NT Scholar Brant Pitre summarizes the evidence this way:

“As far as we know, for almost 400 years after the lifetime of Jesus, no one—orthodox or heretic, pagan or Christian—seems to have raised any serious doubts about who wrote the gospel of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.” [3]

If the NT Gospels were originally anonymous in the sense that no one knew who wrote them, then we would expect there to be competing traditions in the early centuries regarding their authorship. That is not what we find. 

A second piece of evidence that the NT Gospels were received as written by their traditionally accepted authors from the beginning is that all extant manuscripts sufficiently intact to have a place for a title indeed have one. And these titles unanimously ascribe to those manuscripts the traditionally accepted authors. In fact, there is not a single existing manuscript that attributes these texts to anyone else. Is this what we would expect if there were doubts about who wrote the NT Gospels early on? Not likely. Furthermore, had the authors of these texts been unknown, how likely would it be that the early Church would assign to them the authors they did? Luke and Mark were not even part of Jesus’ original disciples! 

WERE JESUS’ DISCIPLES UNQUALIFIED TO WRITE THE NT GOSPELS?

According to Ehrman, no disciple of Jesus would have been qualified to write any of the NT Gospels since they would have been illiterate, Aramaic-speaking, Jewish peasants. However, this claim is overstated for several reasons.

First of all, the area from which Jesus chose his disciples and spent the majority of his life and ministry was known as “Galilee of the Gentiles” (Mt 4:15)—an area surrounded by Greek states, heavily influenced by Hellenism, and bisected by the Via Maris carrying Greek-speaking travelers. Some of Jesus’ disciples even had Greek names (e.g. Andrew and Philip). And so, though it is true that Aramaic had become the dominant language used by the Jews in the first century, Greek influence permeated Israel. For this reason, it is not difficult to imagine that Jesus and some of his disciples spoke Aramaic primarily, read Hebrew for religious purposes, and had a working knowledge of Greek. [4]

Though many in first century Palestine were illiterate, it is possible that some of Jesus’ disciples could have been among the few who could read. Matthew, for example, was a tax-collector in Galilee which would have “required him to collect, copy and record information, probably in multiple languages.” [5] Luke was a well-known physician (Col 4:14); and though that vocation looked differently in ancient times, it is likely he could read as well. Even if none of those who followed Jesus were literate, professional scribes were available for hire in the first century. [6]

Beyond all of this, if the first disciples of Jesus were willing to put their lives in danger to spread the news about Jesus, it seems likely that these same disciples would have been motivated to use whatever resources were available to them to produce a written record of their memories of Jesus before they passed. 

CONCLUSION

The testimony of the early church and the manuscript evidence is that the NT Gospels were written by their traditionally accepted authors. If this is so, these texts are either the products of the eyewitness testimony of those who walked with Jesus (as was the case with Matthew and John) or in consultation with eyewitnesses who did (as was the case with Mark via Peter and Luke via consultation with other eyewitnesses, see Luke 1:2). This is no small matter when one considers the value of eyewitness testimony for historical inquiry. Ehrman’s objections on this front are overstated. 

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[1] Bart Ehrman, Jesus Before the Gospels: How the Earliest Christians Remembered, Changed, and Invented Their Stories of the Savior (New York: HarperCollins, 2016), 128-129.

[2] Ehrman, Jesus Before the Gospels, 106.

[3] Brant Pitre, The Case for Jesus: The Biblical and Historical Evidence for Christ (New York: Image, 2016), 53. Pitre admits there is one possible exception to this by a group called the Alogi who according to Ephiphanius’ fourth century description appear to have rejected John the Apostle’s authorship of the Gospel according to John. See Pitre, 53n45..

[4]  Paul Barnett, Jesus & the Rise of Early Christianity: A History of New Testament Times (Downers Grove, IL: 1999), 47-48, 104, 140, 148, 232.

[5] Timothy P. Jones, Misquoting Truth: A Guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehrman’s Misquoting Jesus (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2007), 115.

[6] Jones, Misquoting Truth, 117.