Answers to Questions asked on Sunday, February 14th, 2010

Here are the answers to questions asked this previous Sunday (February 14th, 2010).  If you have any followup questions, please comment with the Question # and it will be forwarded to the person who answered the question.

1. Explain "the ring of truth" when it comes to determining a books authenticity. A lot of nonsense has the ring of truth.

 

Many of the false writing attributed events to Jesus and the Apostles that are just counter to our understanding from Scripture We may not have a specific verse of Scripture against it but it runs counter to the teachings we have recieved. An example would be Jesus playing as a boy and some kids in Nazareth. According to one false writing they were giving Him a hard time. As a result He turned them into frogs. Obviously this is not How Jesus treated people in the genuine books and it would be easy to discount this false book as a result of this supposed incident. Keep in mind that there were 5 tests of canonization:

 

Apostolic - does it come from an Apostle or his student

Authentic - does it have the ring of truth

Ancient - has it been used from the earliest times

Accepted - are most of the churches using it

Accurate - does it conform to the orthodox teaching of Jesus and the Apostles

 

The ring of truth was just one helpful tool in separating truth from error.

 

2. You said that John finished writing Revelation about 30 years before 125 AD. So he lived to be 95 is that correct? And how do you know.

 

I cannot tell you definitively how old John was when he died. There is however solid evidence that Revelation was written @95 A.D.. Hence depending on when John was born and I don't know the answer to that he was indeed an older man.

 

As far as the AD 95 date for Revelation that is taken from the book itself as the events described fit much better into the reigh of Domitian AD 81-96 than they do into the reigh of Nero 54-67@. In addition, Irenaus a prominant church father wrote in AD 185 that John wrote Revelation at the end of Domitians reign. In essence, internal evidence and church history are my sources.