Introduction

Jonathan Bernier is to be commended for addressing what he shows to be a surprisingly neglected though decidedly critical topic for New Testament scholarship — the chronology of the New Testament books. The importance of the topic is evident on the surface. When the books of the New Testament were written is vital to questions of authorship, canonicity, and every question of interpretation in the books themselves.

How could a subject this obviously significant be neglected? Surprisingly, it seems it has been! According to Bernier, in the 20th century, the only “monograph-length” study by a professional New Testament scholar was Redating the New Testament by John A. T. Robinson.[1] Now, he tells us, in the 21st century, his own work is the first attempt.

So, we must ask: does this mean that there is a well-established consensus, so that discussion is not necessary? Not according to Bernier:

“This dearth of adequate-length monographs should not be taken as evidence that the dates of the New Testament are so solidly established as to be immune to significant revision but rather as reason to suspect that the dates so frequently affirmed have not been quite so solidly established as we might want to think. Indeed, for such a basic historical matter, there is a somewhat disconcerting multiplicity of irreconcilable views.”[2]

Within the non-consensus reality of present scholarship, Bernier divides the views of contemporary scholars into three general camps: “lower,” “middle,” and “higher.” He explains:

“All three of these frameworks agree that the undisputed Pauline Epistles should be dated to around the 50s of the first century. Lower chronologies date much of the balance of the New Testament corpus prior to 70; middle chronologies date much of the balance to the period between 70 and 100; and higher chronologies date much of the balance of the New Testament to the second century.”[3]

We might wonder if there has always been such a wide disparity of opinion among Christian scholars. Has it always been the case that Christian scholars could not agree on when the books of the New Testament were written? Bernier rightly informs us that, historically speaking, the wide variety of opinion about the composition of New Testament books is a relatively recent phenomenon. In Bernier’s words, “With the emergence of modern biblical criticism over the course of the nineteenth century, scholars queried whether a traditional time line is consistent with the relevant data.”[4] He adds, “New Testament scholarship was right to question the traditional time line. Our convictions regarding the origins of the New Testament should be grounded in historical investigation, not unquestioned acceptance of tradition.”[5]

Here I must register a serious objection. Was it really that scholars were concerned about “relevant data”? Was it not because the Enlightenment and the Biblical scholarship that grew out of it had a deep ingrained bias against the Bible itself and Christian tradition? More than “data,” the issue was presuppositions. The choice then, as also now, is not between “unquestioned acceptance of tradition” or “historical investigation.” From the earliest centuries, Christians have been seriously interested in “historical investigation” for the simple reason that Christianity is an inescapably historical religion, as millions of Christians confess each week in the Apostle’s or the Nicene Creeds.

What the Enlightenment and the Biblical scholarship that grew out of it sought was a new paradigm, a new faith — one that did not depend on an absolute revelation from the Triune God.[6] The problem of different interpretations of New Testament chronology finds its roots in theological and philosophical presuppositions that underly interpretations of historical “data.” That is worth mentioning in passing because Bernier’s own historical investigation, while methodologically rigorous in execution, or at least intentionally so, appears to lack the ground that Christians in centuries prior to the Enlightenment took for granted: 1) that the Triune God is the sovereign Creator and Lord of history; 2) that He delights to reveal Himself to us; 3) that every fact of creation and history is in someway revelatory of the Triune Creator; 4) that we need the verbal revelation of Scripture and the guidance of the Holy Spirit to rightly understand what God is communicating; 5) that God speaks to us as individuals, families, churches, and in innumerable contexts of webs of communities; 6) that knowing God and knowing what He is revealing to us involves humble and sincere faith in Him expressed in a life of worship and obedience to His commandments; 7) that Jesus, through the work of the Holy Spirit and the Word of God is leading His church to a more accurate and full knowledge of the Truth, which is life itself. This all means that truth and knowledge are radically personal and ethical. Knowledge is not primarily about data acquisition or data crunching — though it might include both. Knowledge is ultimately loving fellowship with the Triune God, drawing near to Him in and through everything that He has created, especially the persons He has made in His image, as He guides all to completion in His mysterious wisdom.

Since early church times, Christians have believed that the whole Bible, with its many “books” collected and composed over a period of about 1500 years, is one book, inspired by the Holy Spirit, and is therefore the gift of the Triune God of love. The canon was recognized — not invented — as the Holy Spirit led the church, so that the books we have in our canon constitute a special revelation from the Creator Himself. The Christian tradition, therefore, is a theological tradition, a tradition grounded in Scriptural revelation.

But, to return to Bernier: he presents his own work as a refined critique of the work of John A. T. Robinson’s Redating the New Testament. Bernier suggests three problems with Robinson’s approach: 1) argument from silence; 2) the Neronian error; 3) inadequate attention to methodology.[7]

On my part, I must begin by noting that Bernier’s work is grounded in serious scholarship which is then communicated in a very readable style. However, even though I often agree with his conclusions, in the end, I find his approach fatally flawed. My critique of Bernier will initially focus on issues similar to his critique of Robinson: 1) the argument from silence; 2) the misunderstanding of persecution in the New Testament; 3) Bernier’s inadequate application of his methodology — though for the purposes of this essay, I think it will be helpful to consider the issues in the order of: I. the misunderstanding of persecution in the New Testament; II. Bernier’s inadequate application of his methodology; III. the argument from silence.

I. Misunderstanding Persecution in the New Testament

Here I confess that I might not be offering an entirely fair critique of Bernier — since I am arguing from silence! — but I think the issue is worth mentioning, even if only briefly. Bernier’s various discussions of persecution limit the issue primarily to Nero versus Domitian, whereas in the New Testament itself — apart from the book of Revelation — persecution is almost wholly the persecution of Christians by Jewish leaders. It is in fact a continuation of their hatred for and persecution of Jesus. How antipathy toward Jesus applied also to the early church and her leaders is easy to comprehend, since the apostles professed loyalty to Jesus and proclaimed Him as Messiah. How hatred for Jesus and the church developed into enmity from Rome as well as Jews can be seen in the book of Revelation and is known from history. But this, then, limits the persecution prophesied by Jesus and Paul to the persecution by Nero, since by the time of Domitian, Jewish influence and provocation would probably not be an issue — not to mention the paucity of evidence for widespread persecution during his reign.[8]

II. Inadequate Application of Methodology

Bernier’s method is inferential and inescapably so. There is no other method for considering questions related to New Testament chronology. He writes, “The central question is when the texts later collected into the Christian New Testament were composed. The answer is primarily between the years 40 and 70 of the first century. The method is inferential: through (1) defining the research questions; (2) generating hypotheses through the work of synchronization, contextualization, and authorial biography; and (3) adjudicating hypotheses by utilizing the criteria identified as freedom from fallacy, evidentiary scope, and parsimony.”[9]

In this essay, I will only address the inferential method of “generating hypotheses.” Bernier identifies “three basic procedures to generate hypotheses” for the chronology of the New Testament books: “synchronization, contextualization, and authorial biography.” He explains his approach succinctly: “Synchronization seeks to establish the text’s temporal relationship to other events or situations, including the composition of other texts. Contextualization seeks to establish the text’s probable relationship to the general course of early Christian development. Authorial biography proceeds from what we know about the author and seeks to establish when in her or his life a given text is best situated.”[10]

I will briefly consider each of these, though not in order and not entirely separately. My discussion will be limited to the synoptic Gospels and Acts, the place where Bernier begins and, apart from the Olivet Discourse, perhaps the most important issue for New Testament chronology, since there is a general consensus on the epistles of Paul. Discussion of John’s writings will be included in my comments on the Olivet Discourse.

Bernier believes that evidence favors the priority of the Gospel of Mark[11], which is the consensus position of scholars today, but he favors an earlier date than is common — from AD 42 to 45.[12] Before we consider, the Gospel of Mark, however, we will look at Matthew, which historically, has been considered the first written Gospel — an opinion which finds an advocate in the most important relatively recent work on the synoptic problem: Wenham’s, Redating Matthew, Mark and Luke.[13] All three of Bernier’s procedures are relevant, especially the text’s relationship to the course of early Christianity and the author’s biography.

For contextualization, consider Robinson’s comment: “Matthew represents the gospel for the Jewish- Christian church, equipping it to define and defend its position over against the arguments and institutions of the main body of Judaism. But, in contrast with the Judaizers, it is a Jewish-Christian community open to the Gentile mission and its tensions. For while Matthew contains some of the most Judaistic (5:18f.; 10:5; 15:26; 18:17; 23.2f.) texts in the gospels, it also contains the most universalistic (21.43; 24.14; 28.19).”[14] Robinson himself concludes that this corresponds with the situation in Palestine between AD 50 and 64[15] — a conclusion that misses what is most important in the earliest church’s reality!

Consider: at Pentecost Jews were gathered in Jerusalem from all over the Roman empire and beyond (Acts 2:7-11). 3000 of them were baptized that day (Acts 2:41) and many of them would have returned to their faraway homes. From the very birthday of the Christian church, the need for a Gospel for Jewish believers was evident and compelling. In numbers too great to be instructed directly, newly baptized Jewish Christians — people of The Book — in Jerusalem, Judea, and all over the empire desperately had to have a new book!

The need for a book only increased. For approximately the first ten years of Christian history — we have no clear chronology from Pentecost to Cornelius — as numbers increased dramatically, virtually all Christians were Jews who had come to believe in Jesus. Thus, the 3000 who were baptized at Pentecost and the thousands that followed needed a Gospel that would equip them “to define and defend its [their] position over against the arguments and institutions of the main body of Judaism.” Until and even after the church officially spread to Gentiles, with Peter’s mission to Cornelius, the demand for the Jewish Gospel did not diminish. Contextualization requires the Gospel of Matthew to be written very early because the situation in the Jewish church called for it.

The very little we can learn from Matthew’s biography confirms this, if we are attentive to it. Bernier is not.[16] Matthew’s biography demonstrates both the prerequisites and the passion for a Gospel from the very beginning of Christian history, but Bernier — following Richard Bauckham[17] — erases Matthew’s biography from history. According to Bauckham and Bernier, Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27, 29) and Matthew (Matthew 9:9; 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15) are not the same person.[18] They are wrong. The tax-collector that Jesus called to be a disciple had two names, both Semitic, a rare but not impossible case. Levi was probably the original name for the tax-collector from the tribe of Levi; Matthew — perhaps related to the Greek word for “disciple,” or a short form of the name “gift of God” — would have been his new name as a follower of Christ. Comparing the accounts in the synoptic Gospels makes this abundantly clear. After all, how many tax-collector disciples of Jesus would there have been? How many newly-called tax-collectors would have given a banquet as soon as they became a disciple?

Consider the stories: Jesus sees a man (named “Matthew” in Matthew; named “Levi” in Mark and Luke) “sitting at the tax office” (“τὸ τελώνιον” — Mathew 9:9; Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27) — a word used nowhere else in the New Testament, but used in each of the synoptic Gospels. In all three synoptic Gospels, Jesus said “follow Me,” which Matthew/Levi immediately did. Again, in all three Gospels, though less clearly in Matthew’s own Gospel,[19] the tax collector Levi become-disciple- Matthew, holds a feast to which he invites tax collectors and sinners so that they can hear Jesus (Mathew 9:10; Mark 2:15; Luke 5:29). In the Gospel of Matthew, he is mentioned in the list of the disciples as a tax collector (Matthew 10:3). This is all we know of Matthew. There are no other stories of him.

That is all we know, but it is enough. Levi/Matthew was a tax collector who had heard Jesus and believed in Him. When Jesus called, Levi/Matthew was already ready to be a disciple and he knew his Master’s heart. He left everything immediately to follow Jesus, but also, just as immediately, he invited tax collectors and sinners to his home for a “great feast” (Luke 5:29) in order to introduce them to Jesus. Though the Pharisees were offended, Jesus’ response to them shows how deeply Matthew understood Jesus’ mission: “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance” (Luke 5:32, Matthew 9:13; Mark 2:17).

Matthew, being from the tribe of Levi and having worked as a tax collector, might have been the best educated of Jesus’ disciples. Like other learners in his day who attended lectures by a great rabbi, Levi almost certainly took notes of Jesus’ teaching,[20] which he could transcribe and put together into his Gospel,[21] when the pressing need for the story of Jesus became evident at Pentecost.[22] Matthew, the zealous evangelist, would not have waited silently for 40 years or even for 2 years. He would have put his pen to work as soon as possible to give Jewish believers a true testimony of Jesus and His teachings.[23] As James Jordan says, “It is perfectly reasonable to suppose that within a month after Pentecost copies of Matthew’s Gospel were in circulation.”[24] Thus, I suggest the year AD 30, the year of Jesus’ ascension and Pentecostal evangelism, as the year for the Gospel of Matthew — in some form.[25]

How about the Gospel of Mark? First, contextualization: it was probably about 10 years after Pentecost when Peter was compelled by the Spirit to preach the Gospel to Cornelius and his household, the first Roman converts.[26] For Peter, this was his third “Pentecost,” counting his visit to the Samaritans with John as the second (Acts 8:14-17).[27] Thus, Peter led the apostolic church to follow the program outlined by Jesus: “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Peter’s baptism of Gentile Romans laid the foundation for Paul’s more extensive work among Gentiles, the main subject of Acts 13-28.

From the time of Peter’s preaching to the Romans, the need for a Gospel especially aimed at their particular needs and situation would have been obvious and we can assume that Mark and Peter would have been as eager to work on a Gospel project as Matthew had been. Bernier estimates that the Gospel of Mark would have been written between AD 42 and 45.[28] The biography of Peter and the context of the early church provides the background for estimating that Mark — though not the first Gospel in the Augustinian estimation — would have been written early, for the need had arisen from the time of Cornelius’ conversion.[29]

For the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts, Bernier quotes Harnack: “The more clearly we see that the trial of St. Paul, and above all his appeal to Caesar, is the chief subject of the last quarter of Acts, the more hopeless does it appear that we can explain why the narrative breaks off as it does, otherwise than by assuming that the trial had actually not yet reached its close. It is no use to struggle against this conclusion. If St. Luke, in the year 80, 90, or 100, wrote thus he was not simply a blundering but an absolutely incomprehensible historian!”

Bernier judiciously comments: “Harnack’s argument is not from silence. Rather, it is an argument from presence, indeed, the presence of an extended (eight chapters!) discussion of Paul’s legal challenges and an ending that leaves said challenges unresolved. And Harnack makes a strong case. It is frankly difficult to either disagree with or improve upon his argument. Either Acts was completed ca. 62, when the Acts narrative ends with Paul in Rome, or Luke’s aims in these last chapters remain opaque.”[30]

The Gospel of Luke, the first of the two volume set, naturally preceded Acts. Bernier suggests a date of about AD 59, especially on the basis of his analysis of Luke’s biography. I would assume an earlier date also on the basis of Luke’s biography and the argument from contextualization that, as in the cases of Matthew and Mark, the need for a Gospel to the Greek arose during the years of Paul’s ministry, especially in Ephesus and Corinth.[31]

Thus, with reference to the synoptic Gospels and Acts, arguments from synchronicity, contextualization and authorial biography favor early dates, as Bernier also opines, but a more careful application of his methodology could have led to a significantly different, much more detailed and contextually far richer picture of the background for the Synoptic Gospels and Acts and would have restored the Gospel of Matthew to its proper place, rather than viewing it as possibly “pseudonymous,” by which Bernier meant, “not by the apostle Matthew.”

III. The Argument from Silence and the Olivet Discourse

Bernier’s approach to New Testament chronology fails most seriously in his critique of Robinson’s appeal to the argument from silence and in his surprising neglect of the Olivet Discourse, — fails as a chronological argument, fails as an understanding of Biblical theology, fails as an understanding of Jesus’ teaching, and fails as an understanding of the chronological statements in the New Testament epistles and Revelation. To restate this in terms of Bernier’s approach, from the perspectives of synchronization and contextualization, Bernier misses 1) the literary and cultural context of Jesus’ teaching, 2) the Biblical background for Jesus’ teaching, and 3) the context of the apostolic church’s appropriation of Jesus’ teaching.

All three of these contexts are related to the “argument from silence” that Bernier critiques. According to him, Robinson relies too much on an argument from silence, asserting: “It is of course quite true that the New Testament never refers to the fall of Jerusalem as a past fact. It does not necessarily follow, however, that this silence in and of itself is particularly significant for establishing the dates of the New Testament. Indeed, I argue that in most cases it is not.”[32] How significant the silence is depends upon what Jesus is actually teaching in the Olivet Discourse.

A. Jesus’ Teaching

The Olivet Discourse is not, of course, Jesus’ only long sermon, but comparing Jesus’ teaching in parallel passages in the Synoptic Gospels is revealing. We note: 1) the fullness of the Olivet parallels, and 2) the emphasis on fulfillment.

1) Fullness of the Olivet Parallels

It is common knowledge that Matthew’s Gospel records far more of Jesus’ teaching than the other Synoptics. But comparing Jesus’ teachings in the Synoptics is revealing, for it places the Olivet Discourse in a special position. Matthew gives us five significant sermons by Jesus to compare with Mark and Luke. First, the Sermon on the Mount, so important in Jesus’ ministry, finds no parallel as a distinct sermon in Mark and is paralleled in Luke by a shorter but similar sermon at a different place and time (Luke 6:17ff.). Second, similarly, though paralleled in Mark and Luke, Jesus’ sending of the disciples on the mission to lost sheep of Israel (Matthew 10:1-42) is not at all emphasized in the other synoptics as it is in Matthew. Again, the third discourse on parables of the kingdom is recorded partially in Mark (4:1-34) and Luke (8:4-18) and is covered more fully than the first two discourses, but the emphasis in Matthew still stands out (Matthew 13:1-53). The fourth discourse is instruction for the new community, the ecclesia (Matthew 18:1-35). Mark and Luke include Jesus’ instruction about greatness in the kingdom — a topic which is repeated in Jesus’ teaching at various times — but there is no parallel discourse on the new community as such. Thus, overall the first four of Jesus’ sermons recorded in Matthew find relatively little parallel in Mark and Luke.

With the Olivet Discourse, all is very different! Though Matthew’s treatment is more comprehensive, in the three Synoptic Gospels no other sermon by Jesus is given such attention or is so fully paralleled.[33] Matthew (23-25), Mark (13), and Luke (21) all record this sermon at length and, given the popularity of the Synoptic Gospels in the early church, we can be confident that this sermon was known widely and well. Jordan’s detailed exposition of the Olivet Discourse begins with Matthew 23 — not paralleled as such in Mark or Luke — in which Jesus denounces the scribes and Pharisees in language that alludes to previous covenantal judgments in Israel’s past, and even before, clearly linking the coming judgement on Jerusalem with all the covenantal judgments recorded in the Old Testament.[34]

2) The Emphasis on Fulfillment

Jesus prophesy of the coming of the Son of Man is concluded in all three Synoptic Gospels with the most forceful language imaginable.

Amen, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away. (Matthew 24:34-35; cf. Mark 13:30-31; Luke 21:32-33).

The “all these things” that Jesus spoke of included signs in the heavens — “the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven” — and the sign of the Son of Man. The signs in the heavens, however, are not a prophesy about what will literally happen to the sun, moon, and stars, but typical Old Testament language of covenantal judgment (Isa 13:10; 24:23; Ezekiel 32:7; Joel 2:10, 31; 3:15), based upon the symbolic meaning of sun, moon, and stars which were created in the beginning to be “signs” and to “rule” day and night (Genesis 1:14-18).

The sign of the Son of Man is easily misunderstood in modern English translations. Matthew 24:30 should be translated something like this: “Then will appear the the sign of the Son of Man in heaven, and then all the tribes of the land will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” Note: Jesus did not say that “the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven,” but, as in Young’s literal translation, “then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in the heaven.” The sign, in other words, is not appearing in heaven. It is rather a sign that the Son of Man is already in heaven — the sign that Jesus had ascended to the the Father on the clouds with power and glory, as Daniel 7:13-14 prophesied.[35]

When the generation that killed Jesus saw His prophesies about the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple coming to pass, they would understand that Jesus had been vindicated as Messiah through the fulfillment of His most terrifying and chronologically unequivocal prediction — a prediction that they knew well in their own distorted form (Matthew 26:61; 27:40; Mark 14:58; 15:29).

B. Biblical Background

To apply the principle of Synchronization means at least that we do not forget that the Olivet Discourse did not appear in a vacuum. As Jesus Himself implies (Matthew 24:37-39, etc.), it is anticipated by the whole history recorded in Scripture. To appreciate this, we must consider the place of God’s sanctuary — the primary subject of the Olivet Discourse (Matthew 24:1-3; Mark 13:1-4; Luke 21:5-7) — in Biblical history, for Biblical history from the Garden of Eden to the coming of Christ centers on God’s sanctuary. Eden was the first sanctuary: the place for God and man to meet. But Adam and Eve were expelled. Then, from the time of the flood, there was no sanctuary until the gift of the Mosaic covenant and the tabernacle. At last, God’s house was again with man and man could again approach Him, almost as if Adam had not been expelled from Eden! But the tabernacle was also judged and the house of God had to be rebuilt in the days of Solomon, only to be judged again through the Babylonians. Ezra rebuilt God’s house and, after many years of trials, Herod the Great instituted an expansion and glorification of the house. It was that magnificent temple that the disciples were so impressed with that Jesus said would be judged.

What is evident even from this very superficial survey is the centrality of the sanctuary from Genesis to Jesus. Within this framework are tragic cycles. Each begins with God graciously giving a sanctuary. But repeatedly the sanctuary people sin. Repeatedly they are warned, but they do not repent. Repeatedly, judgement is prophesied. Repeatedly the prophesied judgement comes. Then, the fulfilled judgment is recorded in painful detail. The traumatically tragic pattern cannot be missed: Gift, Rebellion, Prophetic warning, Judgement, Record of judgment.

That is the history that the New Testament writers cherished as their own — even Luke, though a Gentile, cherished this history because baptism brought him into the family of Abraham (Galatians 3:27-29). Prophesied judgment of the sanctuary and fulfillment of that prophesy was central to the Scriptures the New Testament writers accepted as the Word of the One True God. It is the paradigm within which they would consider Jesus’ prophetic announcements of temple judgment because fulfillment of a prophet’s words was primary proof of his prophetic office (Deuteronomy 18:21-22).

C. Apostolic Church

Given the importance of the Olivet Discourse and Jesus’ emphasis on fulfillment, we should expect that this discourse would have made an impact on the apostolic church, especially if Matthew had been written in AD 30, or at least quite early, and was widely distributed. Is there evidence of this? As we should anticipate, Jesus’ prophesy is echoed throughout the New Testament. But there is far too much material here to even begin to do justice to it.

There is abundant evidence that the New Testament writers and their churches anticipated a soon coming of the Son of Man. Note: this is not to suggest that they did not also look forward to a Second Coming of the Son of Man to bring world history to its climax.[36] They certainly did, but that is another issue. The question is: Did Christians in the apostolic era look for a fulfillment of the Olivet prophecy within the generation of Jesus’ sermon?

Briefly and incompletely, consider the following.

First, surprisingly, Bernier claims: “The Epistles of John offer little joy to the chronologist. There are virtually no chronological indicators in these three letters.”[37] Perhaps that depends on how one interprets the Olivet Discourse. 1 John’s words, however, speak clearly of the beginning of a fulfillment of Jesus’ prophesy: “Little children, it is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come, by which we know that it is the last hour” (1 John 2:18). Twice John repeats a key for the chronologist of his day: “it is the last hour.” Then, he tells them how they can be sure that the last hour has arrived: “many antichrists have come.” John is clearly alluding to Jesus’ words in the Olivet Discourse: “For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many.” (Matthew 24:5; cf. also, Mark 13:6; Luke 21:8). It is not yet the end, but John sees that the prophesied end is approaching. The fulfillment of Jesus’ words is near at hand.[38]

John is not alone in that view. The epistle of James, likewise, — one of the very first books of the New Testament, written by James the brother of the apostle John and the first apostolic martyr[39] — urges his readers to be patient until the coming of the Lord, adding that His coming is “at hand” (5:7-8). He is clearly not speaking of the end of history but of the parousia that Jesus announced (Matthew 24:3, 27, 37, 39). Paul, too, spoke of the Lord being “at hand” (Philippians 4:5) and of the “day of Christ,” which again rather clearly speaks of the AD 70 parousia. Remembering Jesus’ warning that many would fall away, Paul prays that the Philippians will be blameless in the “day of Christ,” the day that Jesus would appear to judge Jerusalem and the temple, the day that the old covenant would be brought to a definitive end. In 1 Peter 4:7, Peter spoke of the same judgment, saying, “the end of all things is at hand.”

Preoccupation with the fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy is particularly evident in the apostolic church’s consciousness that Christians before the fall of Jerusalem were living in the “last days.”

What “last days”?[40] The New Testament basically speaks of last days of the old covenant era that began with Adam — last days that could only end after Israel had been given a generation to repent, culminating with the public vindication of the Second and Last Adam. In other words, the destruction of the temple that Jesus’ predicted was not merely the end of the nation of Israel as God’s special covenant nation, it was the end of the covenantal era that had begun with Adam and continued until Jesus’ incarnation, death and resurrection, and judgment on the temple, which included judgment on the whole era from Adam to AD 70.

It was because the judgment in AD 70 would be cosmic and age-transforming that Jesus could say: “For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened” (Matthew 24:21-22).

It may seem odd to us that Jesus would say that the judgment of AD 70 would be a greater judgment than the Noahic deluge or Yahweh’s judgement on Egypt or Nebuchadnezzar’s judgment on Jerusalem in 586 BC, but that would be because we fail to see the cosmic implications of AD 70. New Testament writers, on the other hand, understood that they lived in the “last days” of an era that stretched from the creation of the world. Jesus was going to bring in a new world.

Thus, the book of Hebrews begins by saying that God who spoke in the past through the prophets, has “in these last days spoken to us in His Son.” James warns: “You have heaped up treasure in the last days” (5:3). Peter spoke about scoffers coming “in the last days” (2 Peter 3:3) and Jude used similar language (18). Paul reminded Timothy that “perilous times will come in the last days” (2 Timothy 3:1). All of this, like John’s words quoted above, shows the impact of the Olivet sermon on the apostolic generation.

There is much more, but I close by referring to 2 Peter and Revelation. Leithart’s exposition of the book of Second Peter argues at length and in detail that the entire book of 2 Peter — continuing the message of 1 Peter — focuses on the promise of Jesus’ coming in AD 70 to judge the old world and bring in a new world, the world of the new covenant.[41] Similarly Jordan[42] and Leithart[43] argue at even greater length and in greater detail, especially Leithart, that the entire book of Revelation is primarily about things that “must shortly take place” (1:1) “for the time is near” (1:3), in other words, Jesus’ coming to judge Jerusalem and the temple, to bring a full end to the old covenant and bring in the new.

To conclude, virtually every book in the New Testament shows the apostolic church’s anticipation of Jesus’ soon return to bring about the final end of the old covenant. In a short essay, I cannot by any means provide adequate evidence of the apostolic church’s preoccupation with the Olivet Discourse and its prediction of Jesus’ soon coming to judge Jerusalem and the temple, but it is noteworthy that even a superficial survey can appeal to Paul, Peter, John, James, and Jude! That is quite a list of apostolic witnesses. We can be sure that when these men traveled and preached that this topic would have been an essential part of their teaching, since they knew that they and their churches were living in the last days, for the time of fulfillment was near.

It is not, therefore, merely an argument from silence when we point to the fact that the New Testament never mentions the fulfillment of the enthusiastically anticipated and constantly mentioned prophesy by Jesus. It is an argument based as much on the universal presence of the Olivet prophesy in the faith of the apostolic church. It is simply not possible that such an event could have happened and yet never be noted. AD 70 is still future for the writers of the New Testament.

Conclusion

I said in the introduction that Bernier is to be commended for addressing a profoundly important, but largely neglected topic: the chronology of the New Testament canon. By devoting a book-length discussion to the issue, Bernier will, I hope, bring the matter to the table for New Testament introductions and for commentaries on individual books. If his book can accomplish that, it is a significant contribution.

However, Bernier’s doubt that Matthew and Levi are the same person and also the author of the Gospel not only misses the theology of Matthew’s biography, but the humble beauty of his sympathy with the mission of his Lord — which must also have been the motive behind the production of his Gospel.

Bernier’s misinterpretation of the Olivet Discourse is a more fundamental error. Bernier interprets the Olivet prophesy as a prophesy of the end of the world, the “second coming,” rejecting specifically N. T. Wright’s approach in favor of James Crossley’s: “All this suggests, then, that first- century Christians really did believe that people could literally travel on clouds, and that Jesus really was expected to return from heaven on such a mode of transport. Moreover, it seems to be particularly associated with the early church and not the historical Jesus.”[44] Crossley adds: “It is also important to note that the second coming was particularly associated with the early church and not the historical Jesus, although its origins can be seen as a development of Jesus’ teaching on the kingdom (cf. Mk 14.25; Mt. 16.28/Mk 9.1).”[45] Finally, Crossley opines: “All this suggests that Christians really did expect the return of Jesus within a generation, that post-70 Christians really did have problems with non-fulfilment, and that the son of man coming on clouds was not a reference to the vindication of Jesus’s predictions of the fall of Jerusalem. . . .This evidence suggests that the predictions of ‘end times’ and the parousia within a generation were too strong to be challenged when first-generation Christians were still alive. This shows that first-generation Christians really did expect end times to happen within their lifetimes (cf. 1 Cor. 7.29-31), including Paul himself at this stage of his life, a view which he would eventually doubt (2 Cor. 1.8-9; Phil. 1.20ff.).”[46]

Thus, it seems that Bernier and Crossley regard Jesus’ prophesy as a prophesy of the end of history — a prophesy which obviously went unfulfilled. If this interpretation were true, it would mean that in terms of the Mosaic standard of Deuteronomy 18:15-22, Jesus was a false prophet and not the Messiah. In this view, the Olivet Discourse would turn out to be the vindication of the scribes and the Pharisees, who justly condemned a false prophet! I hasten to add that I do not believer Bernier holds to such a conclusion.[47]

I have been a Christian minister in various capacities for about 50 years and the pastor of the Mitaka Evangelical Church in Tokyo, Japan since 1981. If I had read Bernier 50 years ago and been persuaded that Jesus falsely predicted the end of the world and that the apostolic church was duped into believing that prophesy, I seriously doubt that I would have been interested in the fact that the New Testament documents were probably all written before AD 70.[48]

But I do not believe that Jesus’ prophesy was false or fanatic. Jesus’ words were symbolical, metaphorical, referring to God’s coming judgment on Jerusalem and the temple. That prophesy, like the prophesies of the Old Testament “son of man,” came true, vindicating Jesus as Messiah.

Bernier’s book is good in that it may provoke others to consider the chronology of the New Testament books, but insofar as Bernier believes that Jesus prophesied the end of the world, which seems not to have happened, his book fails as a reading of the Olivet Discourse and the many New Testament allusions to it. We need something better than Bernier, but perhaps he provides the stimulus for someone to write it.

[1] John A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1976).

[2] All quotations from the Kindle version, Jonathan Bernier, Rethinking the Dates of the New Testament: The Evidence for Early Composition (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2022), p. 2.

[3] Bernier., p. 3.

[4] Bernier, p. 5.

[5] Bernier, p. 5.

[6] In Peter Gay’s words, “The philosophes’ experience, I discovered, was a dialectical struggle for autonomy, an attempt to assimilate two pasts they had inherited —Christian and pagan — to pit them against one another and thus to secure their independence. . . . As the subtitle of this book makes plain, I see the philosophes’ rebellion succeeding in both of its aims: theirs was a paganism directed against their Christian inheritance and dependent upon the paganism of classical antiquity, but it was also a modern paganism, emancipated from classical thought as much as from Christian dogma.” Peter Gay, The Enlightenment: An Interpretation — The Rise of Modern Paganism (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1966), p.xi.

[7] Bernier, p. 8.

[8] See the discussion by Leithart in Peter J. Leithart, Revelation 1-11 (London: Bloomsbury, 2018), pp. 36-43.

[9] Ibid., p. 32.

[10] Ibid., p. 27. I cannot imagine which “her” he might have in mind.

[11] William Farmer commented on the ideological backgrounds for the priority of Mark: “Social philosopher Rosenstock- Huessy visualized the Gospels serving the Church as the lips of Jesus. Using this image we can see that in order for these fundamental documents of Christian faith to function as they should in the church, it is necessary for them to be properly disposed one to the other. Rosenstock-Huessy was well enough acquainted with German academic history to know that something happened during the nineteenth century that had served to distort the twentieth century voice of Jesus. He recognized that an influential ‘assured result’ of nineteenth-century German Protestant Gospel criticism, namely the primacy of the Gospel of Mark, had in fact never been established, and that this revolutionary reversal of the relationships between the Gospels had far reaching canonical consequences. This placed Rosenstock-Huessy fundamentally at odds with the established world of theological scholarship, since it was inconceivable to most of his colleagues that German New Testament scholarship could be mistaken on such a fundamental point as the assumption of Markan primacy.

The theory of Markan primacy has led to the academic practice of interpreting the text of the Gospel of Matthew, the foundational Gospel of the Church, in the light of Matthew’s presumed changes to the text of Mark. The twist of Jesus’ lips that followed from this paradigm shift diminished the Jewish content and character of his message. In this way Markan primacy ironically helped pave the way for anti-semitic German Christianity in the Third Reich. Moreover, Christian interest in the book of Isaiah (in which book Rosenstock-Huessy could see the whole of Christian faith prefigured), was discounted as due to a subsequent preoccupation of the Apostles, rather than as due to Isaiah’s place as a decisive beginning point for understanding Jesus’ own reading of the Law and the Prophets.” in Henning Graf Reventlow and William Farmer, ed. Biblical Studies and the Shifting of Paradigms, 1850-1914 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press Ltd, 1995), pp. 15-16. Perhaps it was not about “data” versus “tradition” after all.

[12] Bernier., p. 69.

[13] John Wenham, Redating Matthew, Mark and Luke: A Fresh Assault on the Synoptic Problem (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1992. ). Wenham is must reading for anyone seriously interested in New Testament chronology.

[14] Robinson, p. 101.

[15] Robinson., p. 104.

[16] “Authorial biography is of limited utility in establishing the date of Matthew’s Gospel. On the one hand, this is because Matthew’s Gospel is the Synoptic Gospel most likely to be pseudonymous . . .” Bernier, p. 80.

[17] Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), pp. 108-12. Bauckham is at his worst in these pages, but his approach shows how very practical it is to follow Wenham’s view of the priority of Matthew. Bauckham’s speculation depends upon Mark being prior and the author of the Gospel of Matthew revising Mark rather than the reverse.

[18] “It is almost certain that ‘Matthew’ and ‘Levi’ here are not intended to be alternative names for the same person.” Bernier, p. 81.

[19] Matthew, being modest, says “the house” (Matthew 9:10), but Mark (2:15) and Luke, most emphatically (5:29), make it clear that it was the house of Levi/Matthew.

[20] Alan Millard, Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), pp. 210-29 and Alan Millard, “Literacy in the Time of Jesus: Could His Words Have Been Recorded in His Lifetime?” in Biblical Archaeological Review, 29:4, July/August 2003 (https://www.baslibrary.org/biblical-archaeology-review/29/4/4).

[21] “There is but one hypothesis known to the present writer which can meet the requirements of the data which has been discovered in this study. It is the hypothesis that the Apostle Matthew was a notetaker during the earthly ministry of Jesus and that his notes provided the basis for the bulk of the apostolic gospel tradition. The use of notebooks which were carried on one’s person was very common in the Graeco-Roman world. In ancient schools outline notes . . . were often taken by pupils as the teacher lectured. The notes became the common possession of the schools and circulated without the name of the lecturer. Sometimes an author would take this material as the basis for a book to be published. . . . Shorthand was used possibly as early as the fourth century B.C. and certainly by Jesus’ time. The Oxyrhynchus papyri show that scribes and clerks were often trained in shorthand. Rabbinic tradition was transmitted by the employment of catchwords and phrases which were written down in shorthand notes. Thus, from both the Hellenistic side and the Judaistic side it is wholly plausible to suppose that one from the apostolic band was a note-taker-especially since the relationship of Jesus to his disciples was that of a teacher, or rabbi, to his pupils.” Robert Horton Gundry, The Use of the Old Testament in St. Matthew’s Gospel: With Special Reference to the Messianic Hope (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1967) pp. 181-82.

[22] See: Wenham, pp. 116-135, 201-202.

[23] See my essays on the Gospel of Matthew for more detailed discussion: https://theopolisinstitute.com/dating- matthew-1/ https://theopolisinstitute.com/dating-matthew-2/.

[24] James B. Jordan, Matthew 23-25: A Literary, Historical, and Theological Commentary (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 2022), p. 5.

[25] See: James B. Jordan, “The Production of the New Testament Canon: A Revisionist Suggestion,” Biblical Horizons, no. 56, 1993, and Peter J. Leithart, “Covenant Recapitulation in New Testament History,” https://theopolisinstitute.com/ covenant-recapitulation-in-new-testament-history/.

[26] Based on information in Keener, I estimate somewhere between 50 and 200 people gathered to hear Peter. See Craig S. Keener, Acts: An Exegetical Commentary, Volume 2: 3:1-14:28 (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2013), pp. 1786-87.

[27] Peter’s third Pentecost in Acts is very much emphasized in the story itself in Acts 10 and by repetition in Acts 11. Though it is not specifically tied to chronology, it was a landmark for the apostolic church. Bernier never mentions it, though it seems relevant to his speculation that Peter and Mark may have been in Rome in AD 42. See: Bernier, pp. 73 ff.

[28] Bernier, p. 77.

[29] For more details, see my essay, “Did Peter Found the Church in Rome?” at theopolis.com

[30] Bernier, p. 62. Bernier’s point here is important and highly relevant for his own complaint about Robinson relying on an argument from silence.

[31] After a long discussion about Luke himself and his Gospel, Wenham concludes, “the likeliest date for its composition would seem to be somewhere in the early 50s.” Wenham, p. 238.

[32] Bernier, pp. 9-10. See also, his summary of John Lange: “(1) There is a document, D, extant, in which the event, E, is not mentioned’; and (2) ‘E must be such that, if it had occurred, the author of D could not have overlooked it.’” Bernier, p. 10.

[33] The Gospel of John does not record the Olivet Discourse. Instead, John, given a revelation from Jesus, expands the Olivet Discourse into a whole book: Revelation. See: Peter J. Leithart, Revelation 1-11 (London: Bloomsbury, 2018), pp. 26-32.

[34] See the previously cited James B. Jordan, Matthew 23-25: A Literary, Historical, and Theological Commentary. Jordan’s commentary is the most detailed and theologically rich exposition of the Olivet Discourse available in the English language. It is available as a pdf for only $10, at least at the time of my writing. https://store.americanvision.org/ products/matthew-23-25-a-literary-historical-and-theological-commentary

[35] See: Jordan, Matthew 23-25, p. 178.

[36] For Crossley and Bernier, these two issues are combined. They believe the apostolic church looked forward to the end of history, which, then, did not happen. So, they would not disagree that the apostolic church anticipated the fulfillment of Jesus’ prophesy. But they would see that as a disappointed hope, since Jesus did not come to end history!

[37] Bernier, p. 113.

[38] “John’s [John the baptizer’s] message was urgent: the winnowing fork is already in the hand of the winnower. So was Jesus’: the kingdom of God is at hand. Judgment is coming, and it is coming now. Jesus predicted a dire catastrophe, which he labeled ‘the end,’ that would happen within ‘this generation’ (Mt 24; Mk 13; Lk 21), and this prophetic warning was integral to his entire mission to Israel. John writes that it is the ‘last hour’ when ‘the world is passing away’ (1 Jn 2:17-18). Peter warns that the ‘end of all things is near’ (1 Pet 4:7); James adds that ‘the Lord is near,’ a ‘Judge’ who is ‘standing right at the door’ (Jas 5:8-9); and Hebrews warns about the ‘day drawing near’ (Heb 10:25). Revelation begins with an assurance that the ‘time is near’ (Rev 1:3) and ends with the words of Jesus, ‘I am coming quickly’ (Rev 22:20). There is a final judgment yet to come, but the emphasis of the New Testament is on imminent judgment. Wrath is coming against Israel, but not just Israel. Wrath is revealed from heaven against all the unrighteousness and ungodliness of humanity. God is preparing to judge the world, so that the ‘end of all things’ is just around the corner.” Peter J. Leithart, Delivered From the Elements of the World: Atonement, Justification, Mission (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2016), p. 133.

[39] See Chapter Two of Jeffrey J. Meyers, Ancient Wisdom for Today’s Christian Dissidents: The Epistle of James Through New Eyes (West Monroe, LA: Athanasius Press, 2022, Kindle Edition).

[40] “The phrase “last days” also has a broader reference in some passages, designating not only the apostolic period but the whole period from the exile through the apostolic period, the whole period of the ‘seventy weeks’ of Daniel 9. About Nebuchadnezzar’s vision of the statue, Daniel says that God ‘has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will take place in the end of the days’ (Dan. 2:28), and he goes on to explain that the vision begins with Nebuchadnezzar himself (2:38). Similarly, a vision of the wars that followed Alexander’s campaigns (Dan. 11) gives ‘understanding of what will happen to your people in the end of the days’ (Dan. 10:14).” Leithart, 2 Peter, p. 91.

[41] Peter J. Leithart, The Promise of His Appearing: An Exposition of Second Peter (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 2004).

[42] James B. Jordan, The Vindication of Jesus Christ: A Brief Reader’s Guide to Revelation (Monroe, LA: Athanasius Press, 2008).

[43] Peter J. Leithart, Revelation 1-11 (London: Bloomsbury, 2018), and Revelation 12-22 (London: Bloomsbury, 2018).

[44] James G. Crossley, The Date of Mark’s Gospel: Insight from the Law in Earliest Christianity (London: T & T Clark, 2004), p. 24.

[45] Crossley., p. 25.

[46] Crossley., pp, 26-27.

[47] For something that is probably like Bernier’s view — the polite word for which is “obfuscation” — see: Ben F. Meyer, The Aims of Jesus (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2002), pp. 242-248 “In his 1961 study of the role played by one biblical text (Hab. 2:3) post-biblical Judaism’s encounter with the problem of a seeming ‘delay’ in the fulfilment of biblical prophecy, August Strobel provided a solid index to the non-isolation of ‘the delay of the parousia’. Indeed, the problem which so many theologians supposed was peculiar to the prophecy of Jesus was in fact recurrent through the whole history of biblical prophecy. Israel did not repudiate prophetic predictions on the ground of disparity between the regularly recurrent motif of imminence and the regularly recurrent lack of immediate fulfilment but rather, while hoping and praying for early fulfilment, learned to expect it in the kairos of God’s own choosing. Similarly, it did not occur to the first Christians to repudiate the predictions of Jesus on the ground that they were not immediately fulfilled. On the contrary, for all their puzzlement over ‘non-fulfilment’, they repeated, restated, reaffirmed the prophecy.” p. 247.

[48] There are other views on the Olivet Discourse that do not imply that Jesus was a false prophet. For example, see: Andreas J. Kostenberger, Alexander E Stewart, and Apollo Makara, Jesus and the Future: Understanding What He Taught about the End Times (Wooster, OH: Weaver Book Company, 2017).