In the middle part of the 19th century, the research of Phillip Schaff (1819-1893) on the history of the Christian church was published; volume 1 is dated 1858. The other seven volumes followed, but quotations here were copyrighted 1910 and reprinted in 1994. The first tome of 871 pages covers up to A.D. 100; it therefore coincides with the inspired history recorded in the New Testament. The author begins by commenting on some of his sources—the works available to him—as well as other preliminary matters. In these articles observations on topics of interest shall be noted.
Anno Domini
“It was a great idea of Dionysius ‘the Little’ to date our era from the birth of our Savior” (1:56). Although we abbreviate Anno Domini as A.D., it means (and is properly translated) “In the year of the Lord.” When this designation became universally accepted, it showed to all mankind a tremendous contrast of history prior to Jesus versus the age of Jesus’ influence on the world. Schaff says that He is worthy of this position of prominence because He is the “Christ, the God-Man, the prophet, priest, and king of mankind….” He calls Jesus “the sun of the moral universe,” also, which is certainly true. Christians today would argue that the morality of Jesus transcends and is higher than what God put into the Law of Moses (cf. Matt. 5).
Unfortunately, in the last century, Jehovah’s Witnesses decided that they preferred their own designation and began using B.C.E. and C.E., meaning “Before the Christian Era” and the “Christian Era.” Now, aca-demics are using the same terminology as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, but they have changed the meaning to “Before the Common Era” and the “Common Era.” Christians ought not let “scholars” change and diminish the fact that all history is divided by the birth of Jesus. Every adult and student ought to reject and oppose the new designation which is designed to minimize Jesus.
The Three Sects of the Jews
In order to understand the New Testament, Schaff provides the background of the development of the Jews into three categories, but he also compares them to the Greeks during the Inter-Testament period and the Muslims of his day. He suggests that the three schools of the Greeks were the Stoic, the Epicurean, and the Platonic. The three divisions of Mohammedanism are the Sunnis (who are traditionalists), the Sheas (today, the Shias, who adhere to the Koran), and the Sufis (or mystics).
Among the Jews, the Pharisees were the Stoics. “They represented the traditional orthodoxy and formalism, the legal self-righteous, and the fanatical bigotry of Judaism” (1:64). Although the people respected them for their piety, Jesus pointed out that they elevated their traditions over the Word of God so as to make the Scriptures of none effect.
The Sadducees were “skeptical, rationalistic, and worldly-minded, not unlike the Epicureans” (1:65); they rejected oral traditions and most of the Old Testament except for the Pentateuch (the first five books of Moses). They did not believe in angels, spirits, or the resurrection. Many of them were rich and influential (since many of them were part of the Sanhedrin). Caiaphas was a Sadducee.
Historians Josephus and Philo inform us that there was a third group which is not mentioned in the New Testament—the Essenes. They were “a mystic and ascetic order or brotherhood, and lived mostly in monkish seclusion in villages and in the desert Engedi on the Dead Sea” (1:65). Although some have challenged the idea, it is generally thought that the Dead Sea Scrolls had belonged to the Essenes. They only numbered about 4,000. They practiced “communion of goods, but rejected bloody sacrifices and animal food.”
Heathenism
When Jesus entered the world, He found these conditions among the Jews, but what about among the pagans? Schaff describes their theology as involving a “corruption of the moral sense, giving the sanctification of religion to natural and unnatural vices.” He further explains that the religion of Greece
utterly lacks the true conception of sin, and consequently the true conception of holiness. It regards sin, not as a perverseness of will and as an offence [sic] against the gods, but as a folly of the understanding and an offence [sic] against men, often proceeding from the gods themselves… (1:72-73).
Schaff observed that Homer “puts a devilish element” into his deities, which the Roman gods also replicate. The concept of holiness is all but absent. He continues his description of man-made deities:
The gods are born, but never die. They have bodies and senses, like mortals, only in colossal proportion. They eat and drink, though only nectar and ambrosia. They are awake and fall asleep. They travel, but with the swiftness of thought. They mingle in battle. They cohabit with human beings, producing heroes or demigods. They are limited to time and space….
The gods are involved by their marriages in perpetual jealousies and quarrels. They are full of envy and wrath, hatred and lust, prompt men to crime, and provoke each other to lying and cruelty, perjury and adultery (1:73).
They sound more like corrupt human beings with special powers than anything that might be thought of as Divine. Why was that? Two reasons come to mind. The first is that man “changed the truth of God into a lie,” according the Romans 1:25 (KJV). We cannot, therefore, imagine that whatever kind of Deity men invented to replace the true and living God would ever come close to the original concept. About the only trait that was kept was power greater than that of mortal men.
The second principle is stated in Psalm 50:21b: “You thought that I was altogether like you.” Even with Jehovah, people imagined Him to be like mankind; how much easier was it for people to concoct deities and ascribe to them human characteristics! So the gods are jealous, spiteful, lustful, adulterers, and so on—all the things that men are. Men want the gods to be just like them, and when mankind creates gods, they create them in their own image—corrupt and given to sin. The true and living God is genuinely higher than man in every way (Isa. 55:8-9). He possesses true holiness and true righteousness. He never allows Himself to be tainted with corruption, and He cannot be tempted to sin. The God of the Bible is not like man; He is purer than man and above sin altogether.
In recent decades, mankind is at it again, trying to pretend that God and Jesus are corrupt. Reported on June 30th of this year (2014) was that singer Elton John believes that Jesus would support homosexual marriage today. This flaky idea is nothing more than man wanting God to approve of sin, but the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit will have no hand in anything so sordid. God already defined marriage “in the beginning,” and He will not change the definition just because man has become perverted in his thinking and affections. In order for men to justify their own actions, they must degrade the nature of God. If that does not work, then they invent deities who have no power but will let them behave as immorally as they desire, which is heathenism in action.
Jesus
Having set forth the religious background of the time into which Jesus was born, Schaff next begins his description of Jesus:
Jesus Christ came into the world under Caesar Augustus, the first Roman emperor, before the death of king Herod the Great, four years before the traditional date of our Dionysian aera [sic]. He was born at Bethlehem of Judaea [sic], in the royal line of David, from Mary, “the wedded Maid and Virgin Mother.” The world was at peace, and the gates of Janus were closed for only the second time in the history of Rome (1:101-102).
Of course, Schaff is correct about the date of Jesus’ birth being four years off. The idea of dividing the history of the world by the birth of Jesus was a good one, but the timing of the precise date was off by at least four years. Probably, the year selected as the birth of Christ was chosen by the best means available at the time, but we have better information now.
The author includes some strange endorsements of the fact that Jesus is God. One comes from Rousseau, the 18th-century philosopher who influenced the world toward liberalism and lived immorally himself (Schaff refers to him as an infidel) acknowledged: “If Socrates lived and died like a sage, Jesus lived and died like a God” (1:107). The second comes from the Emperor Napoleon, who made an argument for the Deity of Jesus:
I know men, and I tell you, Christ was not a man. Everything about Christ astonishes me. His spirit overwhelms and confounds me. There is no comparison between him and any other being. He stands single and alone (1:110).
Jesus is not Divine, however, because of these two endorsements, as interesting as they are—but because of the claims He made and the evidence He offered to substantiate those claims (His widespread use of miracles). Critics may constantly challenge and deny them, but they cannot explain, then, why thousands believed Jesus to be the Son of God.
Herod and Quirinius
One of the arguments still used by atheists to disprove the accuracy of the Bible is to object that Quiri-nius (Cyrenius, KJV) was not governor which Luke recorded him as being in 2:2 Scholars could find historical records confirming that Quirinius was the governor of Syria beginning in A. D. 6—ten years after the birth of Jesus, which had to be prior to the death of Herod the Great in 4 B.C.; thus, they assumed that Luke was wrong. However, archaeological research independent of religion discovered that Quirinius was twice governor of that region—once from 4 to 1 B. C. and again from A.D. 6-11 (1:122). What this discovery in the writings of Tacitus (confirmed by an inscription on a monument) means is that Quirinius was governor two times.
However, a problem still remains, and Schaff was honest enough to admit it, although he was confident that an explanation would eventually be found. This second problem is that the first time Quirinius became governor, Herod the Great had not yet died. Someone else was governor over the region until after Herod’s death; then Quirinius became governor. The explanation for this apparent discrepancy is that the word governor has more than one meaning. The Greek word is used twice as a verb but 22 times as a noun. Usually as a noun, it is translated “governor,” but it is rendered “princes” in Matthew 2:6 and “rulers” in Mark 13:9 and Luke 21:12. Thus it can refer to one of the political leaders of a region and not always refer to the office of a governor. Quirinius was certainly one of the leaders of the region prior to being made governor in 4 B.C., and that could be the reason Luke chose that term.
Dates
Concerning the birth and death of Jesus, no precise months or years are given in the Scriptures, except for making approximations. Generally speaking, the shep-herds were not out in their fields at night in December, January, or February, which means that Jesus was probably born in some other month. Some notable names defended the 25th of December even so; among them are Jerome (the author of the Vulgate translation used from about A.D. 400 until the 1,500s) and Augustine. No one observed that date, however, prior to the 4th century.
Clement of Alexandria reported that some Christians regarded May 20 as the Lord’s birthdate; others believed it was April 19th or 20th (1:119). Several months have actually been selected, but the fact is that no one knows the date for certain; if God wanted us to know the date or celebrate the birth of Jesus, He would have told us when it was. We know the time of year for the crucifixion more precisely because it occurred during the Passover week. It would have occurred from March 22nd to April 25th, and the year was probably A.D. 29. God did not intend for the followers of Jesus to observe either day, or Christians would have clarity in the matter—not confusion.
Geographic Notes
Schaff wanted his readers to have some knowledge of the geography of the region, since “Jesus spent His life in Palestine.”
It is a country of about the size of Maryland, smaller than Switzerland, and not half as large as Scotland, but favored with a healthy climate, beautiful scenery, and great fertility of soil, capable of producing fruits from all the lands from the snowy north to the tropical south; isolated from other countries by desert, mountain and sea, yet lying in the centre [sic] of three continents of the eastern hemisphere… (1:137-38).
In a footnote on page 137, the author adds that Palestine averages 150 miles in length, and the average width from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea varies from 80 to 90 miles. Probably as we read and study the cities and the battles fought in the Old Testament (and the number of men killed), we might envision something of greater size. Of course, our states today would seem much larger if everyone walked where they went and interstates were absent.
At the time of his writing, the town of Bethlehem was still present, and the shepherds were “still watching the sheep,” and children could be “seen gleaning after the reapers in the grainfields,” just as Ruth once did. Tourists visit the traditional spot in the fast-flowing Jordan River, a few miles from Jericho, where it is believed that Jesus was baptized (1:139, 141). According to the scholar, Ernest Renan (a contemporary of Schaff’s),
Nazareth was a small town, situated in a fold of land, broadly open at the summit of the group of mountains which closes on the north the plain of Esdraelon. The population is now from three to four [probably five to six] thousand, and it cannot have changed very much (1:141).
The wheat fields of Shechem (between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal), where Joshua once read the Law of Moses to the Israelites (Joshua 8:33-35), are still white unto harvest (John 4:35) (1:142). Schaff describes the city of Tiberias, built by Herod Antipas as a dirty place and then comments on the oft-mentioned cities of Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazim, where Jesus did many mighty works, as having utterly disappeared from the earth (1:143).
The temple that Herod constructed on Mount Moriah, “once the gathering place of pious Jews from all over the earth, and enriched with treasures of gold which excited the avarice of the conquerors, has wholly disappeared” (1:144). What a tragic thought! God has shown, however, that when His people depart from Him, He will depart from them after repeated warnings. He allowed Babylon to destroy the original temple in 536 B.C., and He allowed Rome to destroy Herod’s temple in A.D. 70. Jesus also warned a dying church that He would remove their candlestick (Rev. 2:5). Do we ever learn?