The following analysis was first written in May of 2015 for a group of dear friends with whom I was working through some questions related to the Christian faith of my childhood and early adult years. Beginning in my early-mid 30s, for the first time in my life I began to seriously question the veracity and authority of the Bible. This analysis was an output of that process of questioning. (DL, Sept. 6, 2021)

Bart Ehrman’s arguments about who Jesus actually was and how he came to be thought of as he is now among Christians all take as their starting place a conviction that the four gospels which describe Jesus were not supernaturally delivered and are not literally, word-for-word true and error-free.

In order to enter into Ehrman’s arguments, one must be able to entertain the possibility that the four gospels are not 100% true and reliable guides to history. This is the key leap for a person like Ehrman who moved from evangelical faith to agnosticism. At one point he believed that the gospels are 100% historically reliable; at a later point he did not.

The parts of Ehrman that I’ve read so far delve briefly into the question of the gospels’ reliability, but mostly take it as an assumption that they are not 100% reliable. But for those in our position, the question needs more detailed attention.