By way of conclusion, it is hard to know what to say about an article like Eichenwald’s. In many ways, it embodies all the misrepresentations, caricatures, and misunderstandings of the average non-Christian in the world today. It is short on the facts, it has little understanding of interpretive principles, it assumes that it knows more about theology than it really does, and it pours out scorn and contempt on the average believer.

On Christmas Eve, I wrote part one of my review of Kurt Eichenwald’s piece (see here), and highlighted not only the substantive and inexcusable litany of historical mistakes, but also the overly pejorative and one-sided portrait of Bible-believing Christians. The review was shared by a number of other evangelical sites and thinkers—including the Gospel Coalition, Tim Challies, Denny Burk, Michael Brown, and others—and ever since I have been digging out from under the pile of comments. I appreciate that even Kurt Eichenwald joined the discussion in the comments section.

But the problems in the original Newsweek article were so extensive that I could not cover them in a single post. So, now I offer a second (and hopefully final) installment.

False Claims about Christians Killing Christians

In an effort to portray early Christianity as divided and chaotic (not to mention morally corrupt), Eichenwald repeatedly claims that Christians went around murdering each other in droves. He states:

Those who believed in the Trinity butchered Christians who didn’t. Groups who believed Jesus was two entities—God and man—killed those who thought Jesus was merely flesh and blood…Indeed, for hundreds of years after the death of Jesus, groups adopted radically conflicting writings about the details of his life and the meaning of his ministry, and murdered those who disagreed. For many centuries, Christianity was first a battle of books and then a battle of blood.

Notice that Eichenwald offers no historical evidence about the mass killing of Christians by Christians within the first few centuries (we are talking about the pre-Constantine time period). And there is a reason he doesn’t offer any. There is none.

Sure, one can point to instances in the medieval period, such as the Inquisition, where Christians killed other Christians.  But, Eichenwald claims that Christianity began this way: “for hundreds of years after the death of Jesus.” This is another serious historical mistake that needs correcting.

When it comes to who-killed-who in the earliest centuries of the faith, it wasn’t Christians killing Christians.  It was the Roman government killing Christians.

Interestingly, the “heretical” groups like the Gnostics–whom Eichenwald presents as the victims–tended to avoid this government persecution. When the Roman officials looked to pour out their wrath on Christians, it was almost always those of the “orthodox” variety (although there were exceptions). Eichenwald either doesn’t know this, or just failed to mention it.

Portraying early Christians as mass murderers makes for great rhetoric. But it makes for lousy history.

Overstating the Popularity of “Other” Gospels

Continuing his portrayal of early Christianity as a movement in “chaos,” Eichenwald claims that other gospels were just as well-known as the canonical ones:

The reason, in large part, was that there were no universally accepted manuscripts that set out what it meant to be a Christian, so most sects had their own gospels. There was the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, the Gospel of Simon Peter, the Gospel of Philip and the Gospel of Barnabas.

However, Eichenwald’s presentation here is enormously misleading. Apocryphal gospels were not nearly as popular, as wide-spread, or as well-established as the canonical ones. This can be demonstrated in a number of ways, but one simple way is just by observing how many manuscripts we possess of each gospel.

The physical remains of writings can give us an indication of their relative popularity. Such remains can tell us which books were used, read, and copied. When we examine the physical remains of the canonical gospels from the earliest centuries, we quickly discover that they were, far and away, the most popular.

For the gospel of John alone, we have approximately 18 Greek manuscripts from the second and third centuries. The most Greek manuscripts we have for any of the apocryphal gospels listed by Eichenwald is just two (Gospel of Mary). And the Gospel of Barnabas (a very late and notoriously unreliable “gospel”) has zero from this time period.

Blatant Exegetical Fallacies

Throughout the entire article, Eichenwald betrays his limited understanding of even the most basic interpretive and exegetical principles. He assumes that if the Bible really teaches a certain doctrine, then you will find chapter and verse stating that doctrine in a single passage. So, if the Bible really teaches the doctrine of the trinity, then we should find a verse using that word, or saying it succinctly.

He asks:

So where does the clear declaration of God and Jesus as part of a triumvirate appear in the Greek manuscripts? Nowhere.

It is clear that Eichenwald wants a single passage that either says the word “trinity” or describes God directly in a tri-fold manner. But, Eichenwald is committing two fundamental exegetical fallacies. First, he is confusing word and concept—one of the most common exegetical mistakes. If a text does not contain certain wording, he assumes it means it doesn’t contain certain concepts. But, this is demonstrably false. A verse can refer to a concept without mentioning certain key words.

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