Winners Write History

"History was written by the winners, so of course we'll have to doubt all the established sources and dig up the minority reports and support the suppressed losers"

How would you respond to this issue raised by Da Vinci Code?

Boy, am I glad nobody thought of asking that question abt 'winner writes history' at the Da Vinci Code forum!

I'd really be stumped, honestly...

Yew Khuen offered an interesting way of opening up the discussion ie
"If history turns out the other way and the orthodox reports turn out to be the minority, would we support them too?" (something to that effect)

Now, under 'not-so-stressful' circumstances, I also google a bit and found these soundbytes may help (rephrased slightly from Douglas Groothius):

"The idea that the Gnostic writings were suppressed by the early Christian church does not, in itself, provide support one way or the other for the historicity of their reports.

If truth is not a matter of majority vote, neither is it a matter of minority dissent.




It may be true that "the winners write history," but that doesn't necessarily make them bad or dishonest historians. If it does, we should hunt down Nazi historians to give us the real picture of Hitler's Germany and relegate all opposing views to that of dogmatic apologists who just happened to be on the winning side."

Feel free to rephrase it in as simple and concise a manner in your chats with friends... Be creative and have fun (?)!