Monday 05 June

Aims

Bible and Church aims to present world-class scholarship directly to the church, providing Christians with evidence in support of the historical basis of the faith, and renewing confidence in the Bible.

Evidence of Eyewitnesses.

Whose testimony can we trust? A widely held idea is that Christian beliefs arose over a long period of time through a mixture of gullibility and conspiracy. Early Christian records are held to be legend, myth or fabrication.

Evidence of History.

Who has the true message of Jesus? Probably the most popular idea in relation to the Bible is that books have been missed out or put in due to political pressure and various media have been full of talk about ‘other gospels’.

Evidence of Manuscripts.

The four gospels and the other gospels compared. A popular idea is that the Bible has been corrupted, either by deliberate falsification or simply lost through passage of time. Such ideas are promoted in the British media.

Confidence in the Bible

We are being bombarded with false information about the Bible. It’s alleged that it has been corrupted by power-hungry Christians. They are charged with having omitted books they did not like, and changing the original message of Jesus

EVENTS

Next Conference

Northern Ireland

DATE TO BE CONFIRMED

Belfast Bible College

Gospels Expert

Dr Simon Gathercole is Editor of the Journal for the Study of the New Testament and Lecturer in New Testament at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.

Simon studied Classics and Theology at Cambridge University, completed his doctorate at Durham University, and was appointed Lecturer, then Senior Lecturer in New Testament at the University of Aberdeen. Some of his books include: Where is Boasting? Early Jewish Soteriology and the New Perspective on Paul, and The Preexistent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark and Luke. He is an acknowledged expert on early apocryphal gospels, having written The Gospel of Judas: Rewriting Early Christianity (Oxford University Press).

He has written a commentary on the Gospel of Thomas. He is married to Rosie and has two children, Martha and Freddie.