Christians Have Known About Gospel Contradictions for 1,800 Years

Links Mentioned in this Episode:
- https://www.bartehrman.com/gospelcontradictions - Dr. James Barker's course, The Gospels Contradict Each Other. Now What?, will be recorded live over eight lectures, October 19th to 22nd, with recordings available afterward. You can find out more and sign up at this link.

*Episode Outline:*
0:00 What was the Diatessaron, and why did Tatian combine the four Gospels into one?
2:34 What is a Gospel harmony, and how does it merge Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?
3:39 Why Christians create Gospel harmonies and how they can erase contradictions
6:24 How readers have been harmonizing the Gospels in their heads for centuries
7:08 The problem with harmonization: losing each Gospel writer’s distinctive voice
9:31 How early Christian scribes changed Gospel texts to make them agree
10:36 Origen’s unusual solution to contradictions: interpret them spiritually
13:07 New course: The Gospels Contradict Each Other, Now What?
15:30 The Gospel of the Ebionites and one of the earliest attempts to harmonize the Gospels
19:03 Why John the Baptist eats pancakes instead of locusts in the Gospel of the Ebionites
20:48 Who was Tatian, the creator of the Diatessaron?
23:36 Why no complete copy of the Diatessaron survives today
24:58 How scholars try to reconstruct the lost Diatessaron
26:35 Why copies of the Diatessaron were eventually destroyed
30:01 Why some Christians preferred keeping the four Gospels separate
31:16 How the differences between the Gospels can actually help readers understand them better
33:34 Scholar Spotlight: E. P. Sanders and how he transformed the study of Jesus, Paul, and Judaism

*Episode Description*

The four canonical Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, are central to Christianity, yet they do not always agree. In this episode of *Misquoting Jesus*, Dr. Bart Ehrman explores one of the earliest attempts to solve that problem: the *Diatessaron*.

Created by the second-century Syrian scholar Tatian, the *Diatessaron*, meaning “through the four,” combined the four Gospels into a single continuous narrative. The goal was both to provide a fuller picture of Jesus and to smooth over discrepancies that could trouble believers or attract criticism.

Bart illustrates the problem with harmonization using a modern example. Mark says Peter will deny Jesus three times before the rooster crows twice, while Matthew simply says before it crows. One modern harmony resolves this by having Peter deny Jesus six times, creating a story found in none of the original Gospels.

This highlights a larger problem: harmonization can erase each Gospel writer’s distinctive theology. Matthew emphasizes Jesus as the fulfillment of Jewish scripture, while John portrays him as the pre-existent divine Word. Their accounts of Jesus’s final moments also differ dramatically. Mark presents Jesus crying, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” while John’s Jesus calmly declares, “It is finished.” Combining these accounts can obscure what each author intended to communicate.

Although no complete copy of Tatian’s original *Diatessaron* survives, scholars reconstruct it through quotations, Ephrem the Syrian’s fourth-century commentary, and later Gospel harmonies preserved in languages including Latin, Arabic, and Old English.

Ultimately, the church preserved four separate Gospels rather than one harmonized account. Their differences provide distinct perspectives on Jesus and reveal that debates about scripture and his identity were already taking place in the earliest centuries of Christianity.

*Three Key Takeaways:*

1. *The Problem of Gospel Contradictions is Ancient:* Christians noticed differences among the Gospels as early as the second century. Responses ranged from scribal changes and theological explanations to Tatian’s full Gospel harmony.

2. *Harmonization Comes at a Cost:* Combining the Gospels can smooth over contradictions, but it also erases each author’s distinctive style, theology, and portrayal of Jesus.

3. *The Survival of Ancient Texts is Not Accidental:* The *Diatessaron* disappeared partly because it was difficult to copy and partly because church leaders rejected Tatian’s theology and favored the four canonical Gospels.

*Also watch these episodes:*

The Gospel Truth: What Are the Gospels of the New Testament?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vp3Wq-5u8Rg

Why the Doctrine of Inerrancy Contradicts the Gospels
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2MUeKNpds8

How Did Scribes Change the Gospel of Mark?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDX_EXb5pT8

#GospelHarmony
#FourGospels
#GospelContradictions
#earlychristianity
#MisquotingJesus