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What Kind of Proof Do You Need?
Why understanding the Bible means asking more than whether its stories really happened
Over the past week, I have noticed a trend in the comments beneath my articles. Whenever I explore an unusual detail in the Bible, particularly something from the Gospels, there’s a reasonable chance that somebody will demand proof that it actually happened.
It can be polite and curious, but often it’s much more confrontational, as if I have neglected a part of the article. Either way, the expectation seems to be that if I’m writing about an event from two thousand years ago, I should provide evidence that it happened exactly as the Bible describes.
The thing is, I don’t really object to that. Asking for evidence is perfectly reasonable, especially when somebody is making an extraordinary claim. But these exchanges have made me realise that the question I am being asked is rarely the one that made me want to write the article in the first place.
When I read the Gospels, I’m usually wondering why a writer included a particular story, or why they described something differently from another Gospel. What did they expect their original readers to understand? What might I be missing because I live two thousand years later?
