Why Are There Differences in the Gospels?
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Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John each wrote a gospel, an ancient biography, of Jesus. None of them are exactly alike.
This isn’t a shock to Christians. Throughout church history people noticed these differences. Reflecting on the Gospels as a whole invites us to contemplate the harmony, as some have done by putting together harmonies of the Gospels, and also on the unique purpose of the different authors.Others, who disagree with Christianity, highlight the differences as contradictions undermining the trustworthiness of the Gospels.
How should we approach the differences between the gospels? Do they discredit the history recorded in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John?
I think the differences can be accounted for in a way that affirms the historical reliability of the Gospels.
Difference = Contradiction?
Differences do not necessarily amount to contradictions. Apologist Tim Barnett highlights two assumptions readers must make for the differences to be genuine contradictions. First, we must assume silence means denial. For example, Luke doesn’t mention Mary and Joseph staying in Egypt. Matthew does. But silence doesn’t prove denial, just as the absence of evidence does not necessarily equate to evidence of absence. Luke doesn’t say, “After Jerusalem, they went immediately to Nazareth,” ruling out an extended stay in Egypt.
When someone asks what we did today, we don’t give them a play-by-play of everything that happened. Silence about having breakfast does not necessarily mean denying we ate cereal.
Second, for these to be genuine contradictions we must assume that the Gospel writers intended to give a chronological account of Jesus. The Gospel writers followed the literary genres of their time. They were working with the standards of the ancient historian, not a modern one. Modern historians require precision in chronology, so a WWII history will be very specific about dates, places and death counts of key battles. Ancient historians did not operate with the same rules. Gavin Ortlund highlights some differences between ancient historiography and modern historiography. It was acceptable for the ancient historian to arrange their material thematically not chronologically to make a theological or political point. Differing orders of events wouldn’t trouble the first readers of Matthew, Mark and Luke. Thematic structure and theological emphasis easily accounted for that.
We need to interpret the Gospels according to the intention of their authors. Yes, they are history, but not history written according to the standards of modern historiography. You can still find them un-compelling and untrue, but differences in chronology or details do not equate to contradictions, undermining their historical reliability, according to their literary genre.
Why are there differences in the Gospels? Let’s look at one test case, the accounts of post-resurrection appearances.
Differences in The Resurrection Account
Alex O'Connor sees the differences in the accounts of the resurrection as evidence of a mythological development calling for belief without evidence.
I think an alternative explanation is more plausible.
First, O’Connor is selective with the evidence he chooses. For example, Matthew explicitly addresses an alternative story about Jesus’s body being stolen rather than resurrected (Matt 28:11-15). This internal evidence for why Matthew includes details that Mark doesn’t is ignored.
The development theory is easily countered by the timeline of the New Testament as a whole and the Christian witness to Jesus’s resurrection. While Mark was likely the first gospel, it was not the first text of the New Testament. Some of Paul’s letters were written before any of the gospels, notably, 1 Corinthians, where in chapter 15 Paul says,
For I passed on to you as most important what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve. Then he appeared to over five hundred brothers and sisters at one time; most of them are still alive, but some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. (1 Cor 15:3–7).
This statement, received by Paul, circulated among churches shortly after the events in Jerusalem. This statement about the death, burial, resurrection, and post-resurrection appearances of Jesus, based on the testimony of eye-witnesses, was embedded in the Christian community before any of the gospels were written.
This early creedal statement shows that we don't have a development from no resurrection appearances to some appearances, then finally a call for belief despite evidence to the contrary. Rather, the account of Jesus's death, burial, resurrection and appearance was present and deeply embedded in the church from the beginning. Right under the nose of the empire that crucified him. A mythological development explanation of the differences neglects this mature statement of the Christian gospel existing before Mark puts ink to paper.
Second, O’Connor highlights distinctions but ignores similarities, both in the details and the “lessons.” In the details, the Gospels are remarkably consistent. All of them name Pontius Pilate as the Roman Governor who sentenced Jesus to die. Jesus’s betrayal, trial, mocking, beating, crucifixion, burial, the sealing of the tomb with a large stone, the fact that the stone was rolled away without human agency, an angelic encounter at the empty tomb, and a commission to tell others are all consistent in each gospel. The differences are on the fringes, not at the core.
Gavin Ortlund points out how these details could’ve easily been countered if they were not true:
The Gospels were written and circulated within the lifetime of many who would have remembered the events described. . . . Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are anchored in the first-century world of Roman politics, Palestinian geography, and Jewish religion… The canonical Gospels are teeming with little details tethered to historical events (like the census of Caesar Augustus), places (like the Sea of Galilee), and people (like Pontius Pilate). Therefore, much of what the Gospels claimed to receive on the basis of eyewitness testimony (e.g., Luke 1:2) would have been, in principle, verifiable at the time of its writing. If the Gospels had concocted or dramatically warped historical events, this could have been pointed out by people still alive—just as a history book about the Great Depression published in the 1970s could be judged by people who had lived through the events described.
This consistency in the details is why we don’t have to speculate about the core belief of Christianity.
Finally, thematically, Mark and John make a similar point about belief without seeing the physical body of Jesus post-resurrection. Jesus tells Thomas, “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe” (Jn 20:29). Mark makes the same point in a different way.
The second last verse in Mark says, “But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you to Galilee; you will see him there just as he told you’ ” (Mk 16:7). Mark ends with an announcement of Jesus’s resurrection and a call to follow him. The mockers at the cross yelling “Come down now from the cross, so that we may see and believe” (Mk 15:32) is contrasted with this call to meet Jesus in Galilee, “just as he told you.” Mark’s readers would draw the same lesson Jesus gave through Thomas; “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.” Discipleship is a call to trust Jesus and follow him, not in the absence of evidence, but in the confidence of a relationship.
The interplay between faith and sight is present in Mark, the earliest Gospel, and in John, the latest Gospel. This theme runs from the start to finish in the Gospels and is not a later addition.
Taking the evidence as a whole and not selectively, like O’Connor does, gives us a good idea of why the differences are there. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were different people, and like any four people, shared the story with a different perspective. They also wrote to different audiences so the questions they raise and answer are going to be different, as with Matthew addressing counter resurrection narratives. Different audiences and different questions require different nuance and emphasis.
This, along with understanding the literary genre of ancient history, I find, is a plausible account of why the gospels have differences and are historically reliable.
Differences and Reliable Eyewitnesses
I’ve shared just one possible explanation for the differences between the gospels and applied it to just one test case. I do not intend to go point-by-point through every difference, that would take an entire book and this article is already longer than my usual. The question of whether these differences undermine the trustworthiness of the gospels, though, is an important one. It’s worth extended thought.
The existence of differences, especially if they can be explained by literary genre, and audience, as I suggest, are no reason to question their reliability.
Nobody expects eyewitness testimony to be identical on every point. If it were, it wouldn’t be credible. The Judicial Council of California instructs jurors not to discount eyewitness testimony just because of inconsistencies. “Do not automatically reject testimony just because of inconsistencies or conflicts. Consider whether the differences are important or not. People sometimes honestly forget things or make mistakes about what they remember. Also, two people may witness the same event yet see or hear it differently.” Inconsistent doesn’t mean unreliable. J. Warner Wallace, a former detective, says, “No two people are alike, so no two people experience an event in precisely the same way. Don’t panic; that’s normal. In fact, if three different witnesses tell you precisely the same thing, be suspicious.”
We should read the gospels with an honest humility that doesn’t paper over the differences and the difficulties they may raise. We should seek to understand why they are there and how they contribute to the New Testament witness of Jesus. I have found working through the differences doesn’t create suspicion but strengthens my confidence in the Gospels.