As leading scholars speak out against the supposed new "evidence" that Jesus was married, religion and culture expert Dr. Alex McFarland says this is yet another attack on Christianity.
Harvard Divinity professor and historian Dr. Karen L. King publicly unveiled a parchment fragment last week that suggests to some that Jesus of Nazareth may have had a wife.
The fragment, dated from the fourth century and written in Coptic, an ancient language that resulted from the writing of Egyptian using Greek characters, appears to show Jesus referring to "my wife …" and states that "she will be able to be my disciple."
Dr. McFarland, director of Christian Worldview and Apologetics at the Christian Worldview Center at North Greenville University in South Carolina, says this text has little or no authority, because it is so far removed from Jesus' own lifetime.
"I don't think that we should totally revise our understanding of Jesus just based on this fourth century Coptic text, with a different ethnic, different language, different people very far removed from the life of Christ," McFarland declares. "I would say this can't tell us anything definitive about Jesus."
He maintains that his disagreement with the finding has nothing to do with the singleness and celibacy of Jesus. Sex, he says, is a wonderful act within the confines of marriage.
"The New Testament gospels don't tell us anything about Jesus being married," Dr. McFarland points out. "The Old Testament prophecies about the coming Messiah clearly indicate His mission was not marriage and procreation, but atonement and salvation. And also, this would presuppose really that He didn't rise and that He adheres to live out the life of a husband and father, which is not at all in keeping with what we know about the historical Jesus."
Along with other speakers, McFarland will discuss this latest archaeological find and what it proves or denies about Jesus' ministry at the Truth for a New Generation Conference, where apologists will present the Christian worldview and teach others to defend it. The conference will be held September 28-29, 2012 at First Baptist North Spartanburg Church in Spartanburg, South Carolina.