CONTEMPORARY CATHOLIC BIBLICAL SCHOLARSHIP: CERTITUDES OR HYPOTHESES?
A Commentary
Msgr. Michael J. Wrenn January 8, 1988
One of the axioms of contemporary Biblical scholarship is that the
exegesis of a text depends on its dating. The question of dating truly
conditions our understanding of the Gospels: at least insofar as what is
essential to the text is concerned, witnesses were still very numerous when
they were being composed and their statements could be verified. They were
not transmitting their imaginings but rather their testimonies. In the
words of the Prologue of the Gospel of St. Luke: "Many have undertaken to
compile a narrative of the events which have been fulfilled in our midst
*precisely as these events were transmitted to us* by the original
eyewitnesses and servants of the word. I, too, have carefully placed [or
been carefully informed by these witnesses] the whole sequence of events
from the beginning and I have decided to set it in writing to you,
Theophilus, so that Your Excellency may see how reliable the instruction was
that you received."
Scholarly introductions to the New Testament demonstrate that a
consensus has been established among most Catholic scholars regarding the
dates of the composition of the Gospels. For example, the majority of
scholars place the composition of the Fourth Gospel toward the end of the
first century and place the Gospel of Matthew around 85. They generally
place the Apocalypse [Revelations] and the Acts of the Apostles at the end
of the first century as well.
But in 1976 a bomb went off in scholarly circles with the
publication of the late Anglican Bishop John A.T. Robinson's "Redating the
New Testament." Robinson's book is not only scholarly, but it is extremely
amusing. He tells us that for a long time, that is, up until the
respectable age which he has attained, he believed everything which he had
been taught in the field of historical-critical exegesis, everything which
the German school propounded. And one day some years ago he asked himself a
simple question, one of those which are at the heart of major scientific
breakthroughs: "On what are the theses of the critical school, regardless of
the dating of the composition of the Gospels *SCIENTIFICALLY* based?" To
this question, posed in the cocktail hour of his life, Robinson was unable
to secure a response. Being the good English Empiricist that he was, he set
about, in a scientific way, to look again at the entire matter of the dating
of the books of the New Testament.
He starts with a very simple, evident, and startling fact. No
text in any book of the New Testament proves that a particular author had
been aware of that most startling event in the history of Judaism during the
first century of the Christian era - namely, the Taking of Jerusalem and its
destruction by the Emperor Titus in the year 70 A.D. In the entire New
Testament, there is not one word of commentary on this catastrophic event,
even when occasion would have seemed to present an opportunity for it, or
even tow arrant it, as for example with respect to Jesus' prophecies, which
forecast the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem. If the Greek texts
which report these prophecies, which could be read in Matthew, Mark or Luke,
had been written *after* the destruction of Jerusalem, they would have been
followed by comments stressing that history had verified these prophecies.
The Gospel of Matthew is *constantly* concerned to show or to
emphasize that a particular ancient prophecy is verified by the events.
This would have been a golden opportunity to add a comment which would have
validated the sayings of Our Lord. Everything, however, takes place as if
the Four Gospels had been redacted as we read them today in Greek AT A TIME
WHEN THE TEMPLE WAS STILL STANDING. [Empasis by editor].
Claude Tresmontant, a distinguished scholar at the Sorbonne, sets
forth his own views not only on the language but also the dating of the New
Testament, and provides an argument from archaeology to help confirm the
thesis of Robinson. He observes, in his recently published work "The Hebrew
Christ," that almost all scholars tell us that the Fourth Gospel was
redacted around the end of the first century. Yet we read in John 5:2 that
"there IS (in Greek, 'estin') at Jerusalem, at the Sheep Gate, a pool named
in Hebrew 'Bethzatha.' It has five porticoes." [Note once again the use of
the *present* tense]. How do you conclude that around the end of the first
century of our era an author would have written "there IS at Jerusalem a
pool" when Jerusalem would have been destroyed some 25 or 30 years before,
reduced to a heap of stones with a Roman encampment, at the very time,
positioned on top of it? If one referred to a monument which existed at
Hiroshima before the destruction of 1945 and which had not been
reconstructed, one would not say there IS, but there WAS. Moreover, during
this century, there were actually *found* the remains or ruins of this pool
with five porticoes. The author wrote in the present indicative [mood]
BECAUSE THE POOL EXISTED WHEN HE WROTE. The Gospel of Matthew was written,
therefore, before 70 A.D.