Cultural and Archaeological Credibility of the Bible

The biblical accuracy is unparalleled when compared to ancient documents. This sermon looks at a few cultural and archaeological details that demonstrate its credibility. 

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:05

Good afternoon. Some of the high school students a few weeks ago went on a tour to France and Italy, and Mrs Bell wrote a daily update of what happened as they went on their tour. Suppose 100 years from now, somebody happened to see those daily updates and realized that there is some really critical information in it for the Louvre and, let's say, the Sistine Chapel, and so they wanted to see if Mrs Bell actually wrote it at that time. Was it a live update or did she write it 20 years later? And so then they would examine what she wrote and examine the circumstances under which she wrote it to see whether it was actually a credible document that she presented.

Speaker 1 1:04

Now accusations have been made against the Bible to say that certain parts of the Bible are not true, and so they question both the credibility and the historicity of the Bible. So this afternoon, in a sermon entitled Cultural Credibility, I want to look at seven different cultural and archaeological facts that show us that the Bible is credible. Let me just read the passage that we read today again Matthew, chapter 26, verses 14 through 16. Then one of the 12, whose name was Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priest and said what will you give me if I deliver him over to you. And they paid him 30 pieces of silver and from that moment he sought an opportunity to betray him. I want to say seven unrelated things. I may rush a little bit and if there's no time I'll skip a couple of them, but I hope to say seven unrelated things that show the credibility of the Bible.

Speaker 1 2:03

First, let's look at the last king of Babylon. I've got a question for the 11th and 12th graders. Okay, 11th and 12th grade, no chocolate this time. You guys have to answer it, just for pride's sake. 11th and 12th grade who was the king that witnessed the writing on the wall? Who was the king Close close? Who was the king that witnessed the writing on the wall? Yes, yes, sorry, belshazzar is right. All right, now that story is in Daniel, chapter five. So let me just quickly tell you the story in brief.

Speaker 1 2:51

Belshazzar threw a party for a thousand of his team members and had a wild time. And during the middle of the party there was a hand that came on the wall and wrote four words and nobody could decipher it. They called Daniel. Daniel came in and he deciphered it and the essence of what was written was your days are numbered and the Medes and the Persians are gonna take over. And soon after that, darius, the Mede king came and took over. That night they destroyed the Babylonian king.

Speaker 1 3:28

Now let me just back up for one second and say a broad overview of the kingdoms at that time. The Babylonian Empire was first, or what is called the Neo-Babylonian Empire was first. Then there was the Medo-Persian Empire, then there was the Greek Empire under Alexander the Great and then there was a Roman Empire that came in BC 27, I think, with Octavius Caesar. So there's the Babylonian Empire, the Persian Empire, the Greek Empire and the Roman Empire. And one of the unique things about Daniel is that he was around for two of the empires and, if you remember, the Roman Empire went for about 500 years. So the whole, all four empires, went for a thousand years almost. And here is Daniel at the cusp, at the end of one empire and at the beginning of the second empire.

Speaker 1 4:25

Now the biblical account is that Belshazzar was the last king of Babylon and that night the Persian empire took over. But the secular historical account is that there is another king called Nabonidus, who is the last king of Babylon. So when there is a question well, is this secular history right or biblical history right? And when you think that, you say, well, I think the biblical history is wrong. Daniel got it wrong. How do we reconcile this?

Speaker 1 4:59

In the late 1800s, three cuneiform texts were found on these cylinders, these copper cylinders called as the Versa Count of Nabonidus, the Nabonidus Chronicles and the Cyrus Cylinder. And there were two things that came out of these cuneiform writings. One was that Nabonidus had a son by the name of Belshazzar, had a son by the name of Belshazzar, and second, that he left 10 years before the end of the empire. He left to worship his moon god Sin. He left his son as a co-regent, as a co-king of Babylon, and went to Arabia for 10 years. And so the biblical account is correct that Belshazzar was the last king and the secular historical account is correct that Nabonidus was the last king.

Speaker 1 5:54

Second, let's look at a story in John chapter five. This is a story of the paralyzed man. The paralyzed man is a guy who was there for 38 years and he did not get healed when the waters were shaken up. And so Jesus comes to this region and he heals this man. And listen to what John says in John chapter 5, verse 2.

Speaker 1 6:19

Now there is in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Gate, a pool in Aramaic called Bethesda which has five roofed colonnades. The only problem was nobody's found this pool, and so they questioned whether John was completely making this up. But in 1964, they found a pool complex in the grounds of the St Anne's Church. So last year I went to Israel and I saw the pool complex and we went to the St Anne's Church, which is 1,000 years old and it's got this echo chamber. It's called the echo chamber and everybody who comes there wants to sing because the acoustics are fantastic. So of course we went and we sang and the acoustics are fantastic. So of course we went and we sang and the acoustics were fantastic. But in the grounds of the St Anne's Church in northeast Jerusalem is this pool facility, this pool complex that they found. And what they found and let me just read this verse again Now there is in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Gate, a pool in Aramaic called Bethesda which has five roofed colonnades.

Speaker 1 7:26

This pool was one kilometer from the Sheep Gate. Just like John said, it would take eight minutes to walk from the Sheep Gate to the pool and it was a double pool with a roofed bridge. It was a double pool with the roofed bridge. So when you look at it it has five colonnades, and I saw the five colonnades when I went there last year. And the name of the pool is Bethesda. Now I'm not going to go into it, but in 1947, they discovered these scrolls in the Qumran region, scrolls that were 2,000 years old, and on these scrolls they found a plural name of this pool, which was Bethesda Tein. And what Bethesda Tein means is the house of double flowing, referencing the double pools of the pool at Bethesda. So the details given by John are incredibly accurate. Third, bethesda I have a question for the seventh and eighth graders how was the death of Jesus confirmed?

Speaker 1 8:35

How was the death of Jesus confirmed? Yes, a spirit, absolutely right. Okay, let me just read the verses about it. John, chapter 19, verses 32 to 34. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who had been crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs, but one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear and at once they came out blood and water. In 1968, near East Jerusalem, they found the remains of a man by the name of Yehohanan, and something interesting about the his remains was that at the heel of his foot, on the calcaneus bone, they found that a nail was pierced through. So they knew that this man had been crucified and this was remains from the first century, around the time of Jesus. And so they found this man who was crucified with a nail still on his calcaneus bone, on the heel of his bone, and the other astounding thing that they found is that both of his legs were fractured, because that was the custom at that time. So the biblical account was was corroborated.

Speaker 1 9:54

Fourth, let's look at Alexander, and let me just read a verse from Luke, chapter 9, verse 59, and this is Jesus saying to another. Jesus said follow me, but he said, lord, let me first go and bury my father. Now, when I first read this verse years ago, I thought to myself man, what is this guy walking around? His father just died. Why is he walking around mingling with the crowd? He should go and bury his father. So what does that mean? Is his father lying there dead and he just has to go bury?

Speaker 1 10:35

In 1941, in the Kidron area of Jerusalem, there was an ossuary found. An ossuary is a bone chest, and this is why he said let me go bury my father, because the custom at that time was to wait a year after a person died, take the bones, put it in this bone chest and then bury that. And so, in 1941, in the Kidron area of Jerusalem, an ossuary was found that had the name Alexander the Cyrene son of Simon, the Cyrene son of Simon, alexander the Cyrene son of Simon. Who was this? In Mark, chapter 15, verse 21,. It reads and they compelled a passerby, simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross. If this is the same person, we have the bones of the son of the man who carried the cross of Jesus Christ.

Speaker 1 11:39

Fifth, let's look at names. Historians have discovered lists and documents and letters from the time of Jesus and they've accumulated the names that were used at that time. There were three categories of people. One were the Jews that were living in Israel the Israeli or the Palestinian Jews. Second are the Jews that are scattered outside of Israel, called the Diaspora, or the Grecian or the Hellenistic Jews. Third are the Gentiles that are living outside that were the non-Jews and New Testament scholar Richard Bauckham. He studied the names in the Bible, and there were two unique features. One is that the frequency of the names used in the New Testament correspond only with the 3,000 names of the names used in the New Testament correspond only with the 3,000 names of the Israeli Jews and not from the other two groups, which means that the biblical accounts, the gospel accounts, were written at that time and not fabricated years later. But another unique feature about the Palestinian or the Israeli Jewish community is that, since there were multiple of similar names, they would have a little description after that. So, for example, they would have James the son of Alpheus and James the son of Zebedee. So it was a feature of the Israeli Jewish names.

Speaker 1 13:11

Now, what I'm going to say next you may never have read about, because it's not in the usual Bible translations. I looked at the Greek New Testament and I compared it with some of our usual Bible translations, and this verse Matthew, chapter 27, verse 17, is only translated exactly in the 2011 NIV version, not even in the 1984 NIV version, and this is how it reads. So, when the crowd had gathered, pilate asked them which one of you do you want me to release to you? Do you want me to release to you Jesus, barabbas or Jesus who is called the Messiah. You see, both their names were Jesus, but because of the way that the writing is done for these Palestinian Jews, they give a descriptor after that it is Jesus, barabbas or Jesus who is called the Christ, and the Bible, as we can see, is very accurate with the times Sixth. Let's look at the widow in Nain.

Speaker 1 14:17

Now the third account of the gospel was written by Luke, and Luke, as we know from the book of Acts, is a physician who was a court traveler with Paul. Let me ask a question for the ninth and 10th graders. All right, where is Luke from? Where is Luke from? I know it's a tricky question. It's unfair. Luke is not from Israel. Luke is from Antioch in Syria. His parents were Greek, he was probably Greek or he was one of the Grecian Jews, but the fact is that he did not grow up in Israel. So when you read the gospel accounts of Luke, you will see that he centers most of the stories around Judea. Let me just give you a little geography of Israel at that time. Galilee is up north and Galilee has Nazareth, cana, bethsaida, capernaum and the Sea of Galilee. Below that is Samaria. At the bottom is Judea. Judea has Jerusalem, bethlehem, bethany, jericho and so on. So when Luke writes his gospel he centers it around Judea, around Jerusalem. So he knows more of the customs around Judea and less of the customs up in Galilee.

Speaker 1 15:59

Let's read a passage of Scripture, and as I read it I want you to pay attention to the sequence of events that happens Luke, chapter 7, verses 11 through 15. Soon afterward he went to a town called Nain, which is up in Galilee, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him. As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her he had compassion on her and said to her do not weep. Then he came up and touched the casket. The bearers stood still. He said young man, I say to you, arise. And the dead man sat up and began to speak and Jesus gave him to his mother. Jesus talks to the mother first and then touches the casket, and from that we know that Luke was accurately describing what happened. Why? Because if the funeral procession was in Judea, the casket would go first and the crowd would come afterward, but a funeral procession in Galilee, in the province of Galilee, the crowd came first, the casket came afterward, and that is why that sequence of events is accurate to reality. Jesus met the mother first, because she was part of the crowd that came first, and then he went to the casket. So Luke records this accurately, even though it is a very minor cultural difference. It was just an inadvertent detail that he added.

Speaker 1 17:46

Finally, let's look at the cost of a slave. Joseph, as we know, as we know the story of Joseph, he was sold as a slave by his brothers, and let me just read this verse In Genesis, chapter 37, verse 28,. Sold as a slave by his brothers. And let me just read this verse in Genesis, chapter 37, verse 28 the Midianite traders passed by and they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of silver, and they took Joseph to Egypt. Now this happened in the 18th century BC. Okay, we are in the 20th century AD, so almost 1800 years. On the other side, the price of a slave was 20 shekels. I'm gonna track the years on one side and the cost of a slave on the other side.

Speaker 1 18:36

So the cost of a slave was 20 shekels at 1800, or the 18th century BC, about 400 years after that, in the 13th century BC, during the time of Moses, what was the cost of a slave? Let me just read the verse In Exodus, chapter 21,. Verse 32, if the ox gores a slave, the owner shall give their master 30 shekels of silver. So for Joseph it was 20 shekels. At the time of Moses, in the 13th, 14th century BC it was 30 shekels and then four centuries later, in the 8th century, it was 60 shekels and then four centuries after that. In the 8th century it was 60 shekels and then four centuries after that. In the 4th century BC, during the Persian Empire that we talked about earlier, the cost of a slave was 90 shekels of silver. I mention this because the accusation was that Joseph's account was actually fabricated and written earlier than it should be. But when you look at the cost of the slave, you know that his account, the account of Joseph, was accurate shekels of silver and going up at the time of Jesus, 400 years later, it would have been about 120 shekels. The cost of a slave at the time of Jesus was 120 shekels.

Speaker 1 20:18

And now we come to that passage that we read at the beginning Matthew, chapter 26, verses 14 to 15. Then one of the 12, whose name was Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priest and said what will you give me if I deliver him over to you? And they paid him 30 pieces of silver. Ladies and gentlemen, judas Iscariot over to you and they paid him 30 pieces of silver. Ladies and gentlemen, judas Iscariot sold his master for one fourth the cost of a slave. We looked at the credibility of the Bible from the standpoint of culture and archeology. The whole point of looking at the credibility of the Bible from the standpoint of culture and archaeology, the whole point of looking at the credibility of the Bible, is to argue that what the Bible says about the main subject of the Bible, that is, jesus Christ, is absolutely true. And because we have credibility that the Bible is true, we can put our faith and our trust in Jesus that the Bible describes. Thank you.