Historicity of the Bible

The historicity of the Bible is the question of the Bible's relationship to history—covering not just the Bible's acceptability as history but also the ability to understand the literary forms of biblical narrative.[1] One can extend biblical historicity to the evaluation of whether or not the Christian New Testament is an accurate record of the historical Jesus and of the Apostolic Age. This tends to vary depending upon the opinion of the scholar.

Quotes

• There is no evidence of a United Monarchy, no evidence of a capital in Jerusalem or of any coherent, unified political force that dominated western Palestine, let alone an empire of the size the legends describe. We do not have evidence for the existence of kings named Saul, David or Solomon; nor do we have evidence for any temple at Jerusalem in this early period. What we do know of Israel and Judah of the tenth century does not allow us to interpret this lack of evidence as a gap in our knowledge and information about the past, a result merely of the accidental nature of archeology. There is neither room nor context, no artifact or archive that points to such historical realities in Palestine's tenth century. One cannot speak historically of a state without a population. Nor can one speak of a capital without a town. Stories are not enough.
  • — [1] The Bible in History: How Writers Create a Past Thomas L. Thompson

• So although much of the archaeological evidence demonstrates that the Hebrew Bible cannot in most cases be taken literally, many of the people, places and things probably did exist at some time or another.
  • — Jonathan Michael Golden.[5] Golden, Jonathan Michael (2009). Ancient Canaan and Israel: new perspectives. Oxford University Press. p. 275.

• The fact is that we are all minimalists—at least, when it comes to the patriarchal period and the settlement. When I began my PhD studies more than three decades ago in the USA, the "substantial historicity" of the patriarchs was widely accepted as was the unified conquest of the land. These days it is quite difficult to find anyone who takes this view. In fact, until recently I could find no 'maximalist' history of Israel since Wellhausen. ...In fact, though, "maximalist" has been widely defined as someone who accepts the biblical text unless it can be proven wrong. If so, very few are willing to operate like this, not even John Bright (1980) whose history is not a maximalist one according to the definition just given.
  • — Lester L. Grabbe.[143], pages 57–58 Grabbe, Lester L. (2007-10-25). "Some Recent Issues in the Study of the History of Israel". Understanding the History of Ancient Israel. British Academy. pp. 57–67. doi:10.5871/bacad/9780197264010.003.0005. ISBN 978-0-19-726401-0.

• The authors of the nineteenth century were hostages, as we are no doubt too, to the questions they set themselves. Though they cast aside the old theological questions, they remained attached to the notion of a providential history. Although they borrowed the techniques of positivist scholarship, took inspiration from methods perfected by natural scientists, and adopted the new perspective of comparative studies, they continued to be influenced by the biblical presuppositions that defined the ultimate meaning of their work. Despite differences in outlook, Renan, Max Muller, Pictet and many others joined ro- manticism with positivism in an effort to preserve a common allegiance to the doctrines of Providence.
  • (Olinder 1992, 20) quoted in Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. ch 1