There is an interesting and greatly unexpected law that is found in the ancient Jewish court system. The Babylonian Talmud records that, “If the Sanhedrin (Jewish court) unanimously find (the accused) guilty, he is acquitted.”

You don’t have to go back and reread that.

You read it correctly the first time even though it sounds completely wrong to your ears.

Jewish lawyer Ephraim Glatt put it simply referring to capital cases in ancient Israel, “The Talmud rules that a defendant who is unanimously found guilty may walk away free!” But why would such a law exist? It appears to be counterintuitive to everything we believe but yet, when we stop to think it, it is based on something we all know to some degree.

That is that when a large group all have the exact same story down to the minute details and come to the exact same conclusion, something must be off.

The Jewish court system held a belief that in a fair capital trial, that out of the 23-71 judges who ruled, at least one should see things in a slightly different way. If they all perfectly agreed, the credibility of the testimony needed to be called into question.

We apply this same logic to witnesses in our court cases today. If every single minute detail perfectly matches up in perfect order with the same wording with another witness’s testimony, we immediately jump to the conclusion that they corroborated their stories. No one remembers exactly what happened in exactly the same way as someone else. A recent study published by the Royal Society of Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences found that the probability of perfect agreement between witnesses is almost zero.

People witnessing the same event or series of events will each bring a slightly different account of what happened because they saw it from a unique vantage point. Invariably, different parts of what they saw, different words that heard, and different details of the setting will stand out more than others.

Understanding this helps us to understand why the Gospels (especially Matthew, Mark, and Luke) have minor differences even as they record the account of many of the same events. For a long time, Bible critics saw this as a problem with the credibility of the Bible. The minor differences had a bright light shown upon them and many put forth claims that these differences proved the Gospel accounts to be less than reliable. Maybe you have even had someone bring this argument up to you.

What we have in these four unique Gospel accounts is not a problem though, it’s a bless-ING! We have four testimonies to the events and ministry of Jesus’ life that are true to their unique perspective and none of the differences are contradictory! Having only one Gospel would leave us desiring a second witness to corroborate the story. Four Gospel accounts that were exactly the same would lead us to believe they were fabricated together. God has preserved for us an amazing witness to the life and ministry of Jesus that we can have great confidence and faith in! Four unique testimonies. Four unique Gospels. One amazing God!

People’s Evangelical Congregational Church is located at 216 Wagner St., Lehighton.