Bible questions, answered honestly

Plain-English answers to the contested questions about the Bible. Every page is grounded in primary sources (Josephus, Eusebius, Jerome, manuscripts, inscriptions) and names the live readings without forcing a verdict.

• Was Quirinius really governor of Syria when Jesus was born?

  Josephus places Quirinius's Syrian governorship and census in AD 6, about a decade after Herod the Great died in 4 BC. Luke 2:2 puts the census during Herod's reign. The discrepancy is real, and the reconciliations are debated.

• Did Mark's Gospel originally end at 16:8?

  The two oldest complete manuscripts (Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus, both 4th century) end Mark at 16:8. Most modern Bibles bracket verses 9-20 because the textual evidence for the longer ending is later and uneven.

• When was the book of Daniel written?

  Most academic scholars date Daniel's final form to about 165 BC, during the Maccabean revolt, because chapter 11 reads as accurate history through 167 BC and then becomes wrong about Antiochus IV's death. Traditional and conservative readers hold a 6th-century date with the precision read as genuine predictive prophecy.

• Is the story of the woman caught in adultery original to John?

  The passage is missing from the earliest manuscripts of John, including P66, P75, Codex Sinaiticus, and Codex Vaticanus. Some later manuscripts place it after Luke 21. Most scholars regard it as an early Christian tradition that floated into John's Gospel in the medieval transmission.

• Did the walls of Jericho actually fall? What archaeology says.

  Kathleen Kenyon's 1950s excavations dated Jericho's destruction layer to roughly 1550 BC, far too early for either biblical exodus date. Bryant Wood's 1990s redating argued for around 1400 BC, matching the biblical early date, but the carbon-14 evidence remains contested.

• What is the abomination of desolation?

  In Daniel (9:27, 11:31, 12:11) the phrase originally pointed to Antiochus IV's pagan altar erected in the Jerusalem temple in 167 BC. Jesus reuses the language in Mark 13 and Matthew 24, which most readers apply to the AD 70 destruction of the temple, the antichrist of the end times, or both.