Uncovered: The Bible as Historical Document

Carl Creasman
  • 3.5 (2)
  • HISTORY
  • WEEKLY SERIES

You've probably heard of the Bible, maybe even own one or read one. Its typically thought of as a religious book, but at its core it is a collection of ancient primary manuscripts. In this podcast, we will examine the Bible from the perspective of a Historian, to examine its historicity and manuscript strength, to see if we can uncover why the founders of the United States thought this book held value for the construction of our civic system. This podcast is a follow-up series to "Unmoored: America Adrift in Historical Forgetfulness and Finding Our Way Back." That podcast was an examination of what has happened to the USA in the early 21st century. In that examination, it became clear that the US civic system, as originally designed, was based on a moral virtue foundation held in common. For the citizens at that time, the location for that foundation was the Bible. That makes sense when we realize the country was peopled mostly with Christians. The USA is not peopled mostly with Christians today in the early 21st century, so is the Christian faith even worth examining? Perhaps not, at least not at the civic level, but before we decide to jettison or reject what the Founders believed to be necessary, we should examine it. So, we will seek to uncover what is going on in the Bible and whether we can trust it as a historical document. Is what we read accurate as a historian considers primary source documents? Is it possible that the story it tells of a Savior God coming to rescue the humans remotely accurate?

Season 1

  1. EPISODE 1

    Why Use History to Examine the Bible

    Welcome to Uncovered: The Bible as Historical Document.  Episode One sets out to explain the overall concept of the podcast, giving you an overview of the journey to come. This podcast is a follow-up, a sort of "season two" behind my first podcast which was based on my doctoral research.  That podcast, "Unmoored: America Adrift in Historical Forgetfulness and Finding Our Way Back" argued that for our USA founders a crucial piece of the evidence for a flourishing society was a common moral virtue foundation. They argued (including many Founders who were not active Christians or religious) that for citizens to participate, to "run the system," then there had to be virtue and morality. And for those Founders, the Christian faith was the crucial part of sustaining that foundation. BUT...was their reliance and trust in the Bible well-founded? Maybe it was just a nice idea for the late 18th century, but completely unnecessary in the 21st century?  Perhaps today, we have better evidence to prove that the Bible is false or maybe its just the creation of a few individuals in the 400s or the 800s.  As Historian, I want to investigate the Bible because it is the foundation of the faith itself. As our intro states, you've probably heard of the Bible, and maybe even own one. I will stress throughout that you are better off thinking of the Bible NOT as a book, but rather a library of ancient primary manuscripts. In this show, we will examine the Bible from the perspective of a Historian, to examine its historicity and manuscript strength, to see if we can uncover why the founders of the United States thought this book held value for the construction of our civic system. During the Episode, we reference the following that you may want to check out for yourself: Adam Savage's discussion of his credentials The Global Flourishing Project Global Flourishing Report in Nature Article in Christianity Today, written by lead researchers from Harvard's program on Human Flourishing Harvard's "Human Flourishing Program" Defining "Human Flourishing" 2024 State of the Bible report that referenced the Global Flourishing Report, specifically see chapter 3 G. K. Chesterton's The Everlasting Man can be searched at all bookstores or listening libraries

    47 min

  2. EPISODE 2

    History, Historians, and Historicity

    If we are going to examine the Bible as historical document, then its fair to spend time examining what exactly is history. And that of course links to the work that Historians do. In episode 1, we talked about whether or not I, Carl, am a Historian, so hopefully you did listen to the first episode (or go back to catch it). And I am equally as prone to say that I am a Professor (somewhat linking to how British Academics see the top rank of scholarship), and a Professor of History.  So, knowing what History is and what Historians do is vital in order to explain about events or people from the past. Tied to those two concepts is then understanding what the evidence is that supports an event or a person. We must have evidence to tell us of an event or person, but how do we measure that evidence?  In this episode, we will examine how to do that, and then from that evidence, we can better define or examine the historicity of a thing. In this episode, I reference a chart of works from antiquity, and said "you can search it online."  You can, but I found one here within this article that I recommend to you. It has a version of the most recent information from scholar Josh McDowell, from his 2015 book "God Breathed." Some of the other charts you might find online reference earlier data, often from McDowell; clearly the information is available for each ancient source, but you'd have to really do some deep digging on the point.  And clearly, since 2015 (or earlier), new copies could have been found which change the number.

    53 min

  3. EPISODE 3

    Historicity of the Bible

    In Episode 2 we examined the concept of what History is and what Historians do within the field in order to know the veracity of an event, person, or place.  That concept is what is understood as historicity.  Back in Episode 1, we explained that "fancy word" as determining how, or the quality of said event, person, or place as being real, not fiction...not a myth or legend. So, in this episode we apply those same rules or tools for history to the Bible. The Bible, as I have already explained, is a collection (a library) of 66 ancient manuscripts.  That collection is split into two parts.  The first part is a presentation of the Jewish Holy writings, known to religious Jews as the TaNaKh.  The second part is called "the New Testament" by Christians. For both sections, we want to discover how many copies of the originals (the autographs) do we have and what is the dating by the experts.  So, how old/young are the copies, and thus how many years between original and first copy?  Remember, we saw in episode 2 that the average number of manuscript copies is about 150 (with some famous works of antiquity have far, far less, while others having more).  And, we learned that the average time span is about 1000 years from orginal to first copy. Does the Bible do better or worse, or is it in the same spot as the other works from antiquity? We also examine the evidence for determining historicity through internal and external clues.  We first do with looking at the writings of Josephus, Antiquities. For the Bible we focused solely here on the New Testament, looking at creeds within the writings (earlier material memorized and then quoted by the NT writings). For some external clues, we examine the writings of the Church Fathers, and then also writings from non-Christian sources. For the new research about Josephus, that book is called Josephus and Jesus: New Evidence for the One Called Christ. At least at the time of the writing of these show notes, you can download a free pdf here.

    51 min

  4. EPISODE 4

    Examining the Canon...but not a cannon

    Do you remember the bruhaha when Disney bought Star Wars?  When they did, they declared the old Star Wars Expanded Universe as "Legends."  They couldn't obviously destroy all of these old works but they could, and did, declare that NONE of those earlier works was "canon." But what exactly does that mean?  The word "canon" emerges from both Hebrew and Greek thought in which the word literally means "rule," as a ruler, something a person could measure a thing with.  Well from there the word then was extended to mean "a sanctioned or accepted group or body of related works." What this has to do with the Bible is a person could agree that individually, the 66 different manuscripts have strong historical support about their existence and their writing, that they were written when stated (not hundreds of years later).  And yet, this same person could challenge WHY these specific 66 books were included in the collection we call "Bible." When I'm in a hotel and there's a Bible left there by The Gideons, why does that book have those books and not some other books?  Why not more?  Why not less? And the concern is sometimes raised, perhaps most famously in recent times by the book and movie The Da Vince Code," that a secret, exclusive group of people picked these books hundreds of years later. What if they excluded other historical works that would tell a different or more complex picture of this person called Jesus? In episode 4 we will examine first the concept of the canon and then we will investigate what the process was by Jewish thinkers to establish the canonical writings for their Scriptures.  The Christians do, later, have their own impression about these books, but as we shall see, in large measure the Christians simply followed the direction of the Jewish community. Of course that shouldn't surprise us because the first Christians were Jewish.

    53 min

  5. EPISODE 5

    Investigating the Canon Process for the New Testament, pt 1

    Episode 5 continues the study of the Canon of the Bible.  That concept "canon" is a term to describe what is and what is not officially part of X thing, such as "the Shakespeare canon" or "the Star Wars canon." Others may write or contribute things if they wish (so, like fan fiction), but those works are not usually part of the canon. So last episode we examined the concept of "canon" for the Jewish Scripture (what Christians talk about the Old Testament). This episode we turn around attention to the writings about Jesus, the central figure of the Christian faith.  There are 27 official ancient manuscripts contained in that collection, what they called "the New Testament," but are those the correct writings?  Should there be less?  Should there be more? On what criteria did the decision get made?  Was that decision made early (say within the lifetimes of Jesus' disciples) or was it made later, worse 100s of years later? We talk through the history of the composition of these writings, and consider the early ideas of the second generation of "Jesus-followers" who started to quote from these first writings.  Then we discuss the crucial moment of the man Marcion who did first comprise a list, his thoughts about the canon. His list was smaller than the traditional 27, but why? And what did other Christians think about his list? Ultimately, the Christian leaders of the 2nd and 3rd century will describe the official canonical list of writings that were created in the first century, during the life of the original disciples.

    49 min

  6. EPISODE 6

    Investigating the Canon Process for the New Testament, pt 2

    In episode six, we dig even deeper into the process, or the concerns about, the canon of the New Testament. We saw in episode five that Christian leaders in the 2nd-4th century affirmed a specific list of writings that were consistently in use by the first Christian followers of the 1st century.  It is fair, though, for us to challenge the fact that those leaders said "these are in the canon."  Did they have any criteria? Were they just picking their favorites? Was there any effort to specifically exclude other writings? We spend the back half of this episode looking at those other writings, specifically writings that are also given the title term "Gospel."  Finally I end the episode with a list of reasons why I think the decision of these early Christian followers is authoritative, holds up to scrutiny. Writings of the Church Fathers (there are many, so this links to a decent holding site of the many writings).  You could also purchase a variety of books for the writings of the Church Fathers. Here's a link to Amazon's list. The Gospel of Thomas The Gospel of Philip The Gospel of Peter ("Gospel of the Cross") The Gospel of Mary Infancy Gospel of Thomas The Gospel of Judas

    41 min

  7. EPISODE 7

    Variants and Contradictions in the Evidence

    A fair question to ask about writings from antiquity is about the many variants within all the various copies of the one document in question, or to notice that the evidence that we have about an event can seem to present contradictions to said historical event or narrative.  So this episode will examine both issues, starting with the work of textual scholars. Those scholars spend their lives becoming deeply comfortable with the original languages, materials used for writing, and other contextual information useful to determining how to deal with the variants. We will consider some of the rules used by textual experts. As an example of the work of textual scholarship, we again reference new scholarship about Josephus. For the new research about Josephus, that book is called Josephus and Jesus: New Evidence for the One Called Christ. At least at the time of the writing of these show notes, you can download a free PDF here.  We mention the specific text in question and you can read it here. For the issue of contradictions, we bring back the story of the assassination of Julius Caesar and then spend time examining an historical event from the Second Punic Wars, when the Carthagian General Hannibal took an army from modern-day Spain to the Italian peninsula. To do that, his army had to cross both the Pyrenees mountains and the Alps.  With war elephants!! We know both of these things happened, but within the evidence apparent contradictions occur. The Bible has those moments as well. One core answer for those comes in the reality of how ancient biographies were consistently focused on telling something of value or import of the historical figure. They were not as focused on the precise detail of how the story is presented. In the end, what we try to present is that the overarching narrative is secure. We may have some details for which we may not be able to discern which set of details is correct, but no historian doubts the veracity of the narrative.

    54 min

  8. EPISODE 8

    Historical Investigation of the Resurrection

    The Resurrection of Jesus, the man from Nazereth, stands at the center of the Christian faith.  It is the core historical event, either in support of the claim or in denial of the claim.  From the earliest evidence, we see all of the supporters of Jesus and the story around the resurrection, place that Resurrection at the center of their claim that this person Jesus was also the "Son of God." Through this podcast series, we have examined the Bible historically and discovered that the New Testament in particular is the most historically secure set of documents from antiquity. That then leads us to this moment to investigate this central claim. It should be obvious, but if Jesus or His followers never claimed that He was the Son of God, and that He had come back to life after his death, no one would quibble about the historicity of these documents. We know His death by crucifixion is one of the most highly attested events from antiquity. Some scholars will attempt to question "the how" but the vast majority understand there was this person Jesus, and he was killed by crucifixion. But then we then are confronted with the fact that there was an empty tomb. The followers of Jesus made the audacious claim that he was back, that he was alive. Why we must examine it in light of history is that the world was transformed by the followers of Jesus. We are "stuck with" examining Christianity whether we like it or not. By 150 AD, citizens from across the Empire, including many non-Jews, had adopted "the Way," this Christian faith that centers on a story that this man Jesus rose from the grave, and is now alive. By 300 AD, the faith was throughout the Empire, with some estimates suggesting as many as 25%, maybe 30% citizens had converted. During the episode, we include research by Sean McDowell in his second edition work The Fate of the Apostles. You can find it available on Amazon or elsewhere books may be ordered.

    1h 24m

  9. EPISODE 9

    Conclusion Means the Search Starts Now

    We arrive at the end of our journey of investigating the Bible as a Historical document, as a Historian would any other set of evidence.  In our concluding episode, we take a look back at our episodes, offering insights that each of us gleaned. We also answer a couple of listener comments, hopefully satisfactorily. We even talk about zombies!! If you enjoy the King Arthur story (legend?, history?, myth?), we spend time considering its historical strength. In particular I use this historical personage as a way to consider the strength or weakness of evidence for biographies, for the people we know of from history. There are many movies and plays centered on the Arthurian legend, and during the episode, I mentioned a movie that stars Clive Owen and Kiera Knightley, along with the wonderful Mads Mikkelsen.  I called it "Arthur" but its actually "King Arthur." I told about these two songs and love for you to hear them: U2 "40" DCTalk's "What If I Stumble" song starts with the quote Matthew read from Brennan Manning where he says "The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door and deny Him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable."  We read this quote to help us seque into our last section, where we close out the entire series.   In a sense, that last section was me desperately calling out to any Christian listening to realize that often the reason why some do not believe Christianity or will not follow Jesus because of what they see lived out in front of them.   I do believe, and I think we have demonstrated, that the historical evidence is overwhelming in support of the historicity of the Bible.  And that historical evidence proves, to me beyond a doubt, that there is this Maker, this Creator Being who wants a relationship with us humans that He created. Episode 8 showed the depth of evidence to prove the resurrection. So for my non-Christian listeners, I desperately want you to see the beauty and life available. And yet, to my Christian listeners, there is a desperate need for each believer of Jesus to live out what Psalm 1 says is a delight in walking in God's ways, in following what is written in this Bible.

    59 min

  10. 08/11/2025

    An Introduction to Uncovered

    Carl and Matthew are back in the studio with this next, but new, podcast. This "episode 0" is an overview intro of the coming podcast.  Episode 1 will come out in mid-September, with the following episodes coming weekly after that.   This podcast does have a link back to the first podcast, Unmoored as that podcast argued that the US founders believed that to make this governing idea work ("government of the people"), there had to be a common moral virtue foundation.  For those founders, the foundation was based around Christianity.  Should we care today about that? What evidence is there that Christianity is real or worth our time? To study or understand any religion or philosophy, you must look at the foundational documents. For Christianity, that is the Bible.  This podcast will not be looking at the religious concepts within the Christian faith, but rather we will examine the Bible as a historical document.  We will consider the tests and concepts that Historians apply to any moment, event, or personage from the past. Episode 1 will be coming out in mid-September.

    18 min
  • 10 Episodes

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About

You've probably heard of the Bible, maybe even own one or read one. Its typically thought of as a religious book, but at its core it is a collection of ancient primary manuscripts. In this podcast, we will examine the Bible from the perspective of a Historian, to examine its historicity and manuscript strength, to see if we can uncover why the founders of the United States thought this book held value for the construction of our civic system. This podcast is a follow-up series to "Unmoored: America Adrift in Historical Forgetfulness and Finding Our Way Back." That podcast was an examination of what has happened to the USA in the early 21st century. In that examination, it became clear that the US civic system, as originally designed, was based on a moral virtue foundation held in common. For the citizens at that time, the location for that foundation was the Bible. That makes sense when we realize the country was peopled mostly with Christians. The USA is not peopled mostly with Christians today in the early 21st century, so is the Christian faith even worth examining? Perhaps not, at least not at the civic level, but before we decide to jettison or reject what the Founders believed to be necessary, we should examine it. So, we will seek to uncover what is going on in the Bible and whether we can trust it as a historical document. Is what we read accurate as a historian considers primary source documents? Is it possible that the story it tells of a Savior God coming to rescue the humans remotely accurate?

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