Truth or fiction?

Fictional history often betrays itself with what are called ‘anachronisms’. This is when an object, person or event is attributed to the wrong period. They can be rather glaring and undermine credibility in the whole story.

Some anachronisms are humorous mistakes. Fans of archaeology might note the maps that appear in Raiders of the Lost Ark showing Indiana Jones’ plane flying over Thailand and Jordan in 1936 (see photo). Those countries did not exist, or at least had no such names, until some years later. In the 1959 film Ben Hur one of the chariot racing Roman soldiers is wearing a wristwatch. In the 2004 Troy movie, coins are placed on the eyes of corpses, problematic as it is set centuries before the invention of coins.

Anachronisms in historical stories can simply reflect the time in which they were written and do not necessarily undermine the credibility of the story they tell. In fact, most of us have probably retold Biblical stories to children using little anachronisms to help our listeners engage. David packed his lunch in a tupperware box or Jonah put his sunglasses on. Such flavour is inaccurate but probably harmless and tells us more about the time in which the story is being retold.

The so-called Gospel of Barnabas is one of the apocryphal gospels that gives an alternate story of the life of Jesus. It has been popular among Muslims as it seems to provide an account of Jesus in keeping with the trad-itional Islamic view. However, no scholar considers it to be older than the Middle Ages. Anachronisms abound in the text. We are told Jesus was born during the rule of Pontius Pilate (in which case he would have been executed while still an infant), wine was being stored in wooden casks (not in first-century Judea), and that sugar and gold were of equal rarity (the trade in sugar came much later). Whatever else the Gospel of Barnabas might be, it was not written by Barnabas and does not belong to the first-century world.

We can test the credibility of the Bible by seeing whether anachronisms abound, or whether it fits with what we know of the ancient world during the times about which it speaks. When put to this test, the Bible stands up to scrutiny. Whether it is the use of iron and chariots, the price of a slave, or weights and measures, Biblical authors give many indications that they are aware of the age about which they write and can even draw upon personal knowledge.

For most of the Old Testament period a shekel was a weight rather than a coin. It refers to a quantity of some product such as gold or silver. The Persians developed coinage. Darics, pure gold coins, correctly first appear in books set after the time of the Exile (Ezra 2:69; Neh. 7:70). There is a mention of darics at time of Solomon (1 Chron. 29:7), though this refers to its value as a weight rather than a coin. Rather than an anachronism, scholars call that use of language ‘prolepsis’. It indicates that Chronicles was written during the Persian period and used language appropriate for that time.

There are many indications all through the Bible that the authors either rely on eyewitness material or authentic traditions, even if they shape that material for their own contemporary audiences. The Gospel of Barnabas is a good example of faulty historical fiction and provides a contrast with the Biblical books that are reliable historical records.