Can we trust the Gospels as genuine Historical Documents?
It is fashionable among those who oppose Christianity or have serious reservations about it, to put forward the argument that there is no record of the events recorded in the gospels written earlier than about 40 years after the events happened. An account that far removed from the event, they say, cannot be trusted for accuracy or objectivity.
It came to me recently that this is simply not true. Forty years for human memory is nothing. I can remember in vivid detail events that happened to me 91 and even 92 years ago - when I was just one year old. I remember that it felt good to be noticing things around me as I lay on my back on the table having a nappy change, my brothers close by watching - and me enjoying the attention!
Someone will say this early a memory is unusual, but that is irrelevant to our discussion here. Adults remember things much more fully than a ten-month-old, and in full context. The point is that memory is reliable and to some degree infallible! I am conscious of the feelings of that moment and that, no one can deny me. It is my consciousness. As my earliest fully formed awareness of me and you and us and them, all distinct and separate, it forms the very ground of my self-awareness because it is my earliest awareness of me.
If we only relied on eyewitness accounts recorded in the immediate aftermath of an event we would have nothing. The police need to gather impressions before they are contaminated or modifed on reflectioin, but only in reflecting do we gain a mature understanding of an event.
As for the record, Luke is specific about sourcing his record from eyewitnesses. Time and again the gospels refer to the fact that the disciples did a lot of thinking and wondering, and asked questions. Mary kept it all in her heart, ie. pondered on it her whole life through.
The gospels are in fact mature accounts of the man and his mission by people who had worked through their experience thoroughly and satisfied themselves of its objectivity. By the time the gospels were committed to the defining form of writing the disciples were convinced of the truth of what they were recording. They had not been dreaming or hallucinating. Their memories differed in details here and there, but as to the substance they were in full agreement. Not just four writers, but four different communities, each with its own pespective but all at one about the essentials.
This note is not intended for winning arguments, but simply as a wake up call to myself to look closely at what people say and if it's important enough give it plenty of careful thought. That's all.