The Gospel of Barnabas - Is it to prove that the Holy Bible is in error?

The Gospel of Barnabas first appeared in the latter part of the sixteenth century in the hands of Fra Marino, a monk who had converted to Islam. The document was written in Italian. It is likely that Fra Marino himself put it together, using a number of sources. It did not become known until this century. The manuscript is now in the imperial library of Vienna.

In recent years Muslims have been claiming that The Gospel of Barnabas was written by the Barnabas of the Bible and is the true story of Jesus. They take great delight in charging Christians with "hiding" this "gospel." It is worthwhile, therefore, for Christians to know at least a little bit about this fraudulent book.
(Reference: David Sox, The Gospel of Barnabas, 1984, London, George Allen & Unwin)

The Gospel of Barnabas at issue today contains Islamic ideas, which does not conform with 4 Gospels in the Bible. As Islam originates only in 610 A.D., the Gospel of Barnabas cannot dates from the early Christian period. The Gospel of Barnabas by its name is not a prophecy that predicts the emergence of Islam over 500 years after the Bible was written. A number of statements in the Gospel of Barnabas, moreover, are irreconcilable with the history and geography of Palestine, so that it appears hardly conceivable that the author of the Gospel of Barnabas could have lived in Palestine. A reliable source which reports about the contents of the gospel and which dates from before the beginning of 8th century is lacking. Several indications in the text itself speak in favor of a late medieval or early modern date of composition. The following examples thus make it most probable that the text was composed between 14th and 15th century:

1. The Gospel of Barnabas makes the accusation of the falsification of the Old Testament through the human traditions of the false Pharisees, although the party of the Pharisees originated only between 135 and 104 B.C.

2. In the Gospel of Barnabas, Adam even recites the Islamic confession of faith, which, of course, no one could have known in the early Christian period, since Islam originated only in 610 A.D.

3. As the Gospel of Barnabas reports, the promise of the birth of Jesus was given to Ishmael, and not to Isaac, and Ishmael was to be sacrificed by Abraham instead of Isaac: this is the Islamic view of the story of Abraham which contradicts with the Bible till today.

4. Several prophets, such as Adam, Abraham, Ismael, Moses, David, and Jesus, the son of Mary, are confirmed as messengers of Allah.  This is, of course, the view of the Quran, but it is not a conception in Christianity, which Bible draws a considerable distinction between Adam, Abraham, and Jesus and does not characterize all equally as messengers.

5. According to Gospel of Barnabas, Jesus is not descended from David. In the Bible, the statement of Jesus' descent from David is clearly recorded.

6. In the Gospel of Barnabas, the command is given by God to Mary and Joseph to keep Jesus away from wine, strong drink, and impure meat -- that is, pork: the prohibition of pork and wine is, however, an Islamic prohibition, not a Biblical one.

7. According to the Gospel of Barnabas, Jesus is sent only to Israel, this corresponds to Muslim theology, which assumes that each historical prophet was sent only to his own particular people. Gospel of Jesus have to be preached to the whole world according to the Bible.

8. In the Gospel of Barnabas, when Jesus receives his revelation at the age of thirty, he is bathed in a bright light and surrounded by angels while accomplishing his midday prayers, while the angel Gabriel gives Jesus a book which penetrates to his heart. It is a Muslim view that Gabriel conveyed Muhammad's message to him. Jesus Christ  receives the revelation from God the Father and not from angel or book.

9. In the Gospel of Barnabas, Jesus refers to Muhammad as the greater of the two whose shoelaces he is not worthy enough to untie, which contradicts with Quran. The original version is that Jesus assumes the role played by John the Baptist in the New Testament.

10. In the Gospel of Barnabas, Jesus announces the coming of Muhammad and already speaks the name of Muhammad. Jesus asks God to send Muhammad to save the world. In Jesus' time, no one knew that, six centuries after Jesus' death, Muhammad, on the Arabian peninsula, would claim to be sent by God and to preach the truth. In the Christian view, it is impossible that Jesus announced Muhammad and asked God, his father, to send Muhammad. There is no prophecy about the birth of Muhammad in the Bible and no signs to authenticate it. However, Jesus has many proven signs from prophecy.

11. The crucifixion of Judas in the Gospel of Barnabas does not agree with the eye-witnesses such as Apostle Matthew, Apostle John and Apostle Peter recorded in the Christian Gospels. An Islamic interpretation of the Crucifixion is offered which, however, could be reconciled with the only reference in the Quran to the Crucifixion (Sura 4, 157-158).

12. The Gospel of Barnabas undertakes an apologetic interpretation of Christianity when it alludes to the idea that the Apostle Paul has deviated from some Christian dogmas. For example, Barnabas laments having been seduced by Paul into adopting the teaching of Jesus' divine sonship. The idea that Paul was the spoiler of original Christianity is a view repeated again and again by European Bible critics and Islamic apologists equally. This view is totally unfounded as Paul receives revelation from Jesus Christ and He is most learned in religious laws amongst the 12 Apostles.

13. As a matter of fact that there are also statements in the Gospel of Barnabas which cannot be reconciled with either the Quran or with the Bible. Among those statements deviating from the Quran are, for example, Barnabas' comments concerning Hell as merely a temporary place of residence for the sinner. The Quran leaves no doubt whatsoever that those who are once exiled to Hell must remain there eternally.

14. Another contradiction with the Quran is the oft-repeated statement in the Gospel of Barnabas that Muhammad is the Messiah, while it at the same time repeatedly denies that Jesus is the Messiah. Sura It characterizes Jesus, however, as chrissto (Christ). The assumption, therefore, is that the author did not know that Christ is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word for Messiah (the Anointed).

15. In the Quran, Jesus is born in Jerusalem; in the Gospel of Barnabas, in Bethlehem. In the Quran, he is born under a palm tree; in the Gospel of Barnabas, in an inn. In the Quran, Mary suffers much pain at Jesus' birth (cf. Sura 19, 23); in the Gospel of Barnabas, she gives birth to Jesus painlessly.

16. The Quran recognizes seven heavens (Sura 2, 29); the Gospel of Barnabas, nine. The tenth heaven there is Paradise.

17. The Gospel of Barnabas clearly pleads for monogamy, while the majority of Muslims recognize in Sura 4, 3 the permission for marriage with up to four women.

18. The Gospel of Barnabas itself stresses that the original Biblical gospel was falsified. If Barnabas actually would have been a contemporary of Jesus, then the formation of the New Testament would not yet have been concluded. With this statement, the Gospel of Barnabas would have forecast its own fate. In addition, his geographical and historical mistakes make clear that the author of the Gospel of Barnabas can neither ever have visited Palestine nor can he have lived in the first post-Christian century:

19. In the Gospel of Barnabas, Nazareth is a town on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. Nazareth, however, stands upon a hill some distance from the Sea of Galilee. According to the report in the Gospel of Barnabas, Jesus ascends from the Sea of Galilee to Capernaum. Capernaum, however, lies directly on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. According to the description in the Gospel of Barnabas, Nineveh lies near the Mediterranean coast. It, however, is to be found in the interior on the banks of the Tigris.

20. In the Gospel of Barnabas, the dates given for the birth of Jesus, compared with the terms of office of Pilate, Ananias, and Caiaphas, do not agree with the historical record.

21. The Gospel of Barnabas reports 600,000 Roman soldiers in Palestine. There were, however, perhaps so many soldiers only in the entire Roman Empire, but certainly not in Palestine.

22. The Gospel of Barnabas also reports 17,000 Pharisees at the time of the Old Testament; the party of the Pharisees, however, originated only in the second century before Christ.

23. The Gospel of Barnabas describes a European summer: everything bears fruit. In Palestine, however, it rains in winter, and in the summer the land is dry.

24. According to the description in the Gospel of Barnabas, the year of jubilee is celebrated every one hundred years, while the Old Testament names a period of fifty years. In the year 1300, Pope Boniface VIII fixed the date for the celebration of the year of jubilee as once in every hundred years. But already in 1343, Clement VI shortened the period to fifty years and announced the next jubilee celebration for 1350. Thus, the interval between celebrations of the year of jubilee was fixed at one hundred years, as the Gospel of Barnabas describes it, only in the period between 1300 and 1343. Urban II, in 1389, shortened the interval still further to thirty-three years, and Paul II, in 1470, fixed a twenty-five-year interval, which has been retained to the present.

25. The Gospel of Barnabas urges behavior patterns which remind one strongly of monastic asceticism. Thus, in several passages, laughing is condemned as a sin, but crying counts as a sign of the spiritual life.

26. The Gospel of Barnabas cites Bible verses according to the Latin Vulgate translation, which was completed only at the end of the 4th century and became the official Catholic Bible.

27. The Gospel of Barnabas reports that Jesus and his disciples had kept the forty days. The forty-day fast before Easter was introduced only in the 4th century and is supposed to be a reminder of the suffering and death of Jesus, which was impossible before his death.

28. The Barnabas gospel mentions a gold coin: the dinar, comprised of 60 minuti. This coin was used for just a short time in medieval Spain, a point of argument which appears to support the thesis of a Spanish origin for the Gospel of Barnabas.

29. In the Barnabas gospel, wooden barrels are mentioned as a method for storing wine; in the Near East, however, leather wineskins were usual.

30. In contrast to the Quran, the Gospel of Barnabas describes how Mary delivers her child without suffering pain, a teaching which first came into fashion in the Church in the Middle Ages.

31. The Gospel of Barnabas stresses the importance of alms, fasting, pilgrimages, and fivefold daily prayer, which Jesus also performs, whereby the text indicates a period after the origin of Islam in the 7th century.

32. The forbidden fruit in Paradise, which the Old Testament does not specify by name, is said in the Gospel of Barnabas to be an apple, also a development from later church history.

These and several other points form the basis of most of the treatises and papers written by non-Muslim authors in rejection of the assumption that the present-day Gospel of Barnabas in the Italian language is a document from early church history.

Is the Gospel of Barnabas concealed from the public?

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