The Gospels present eyewitness testimony from four of the Apostles (St. Matthew, St. John, St. Mark, and St. Luke) who clearly knew Jesus well. The authors do not state their names while narrating the Gospels, but we have evidence from a bishop in Asia Minor named Papias. The document he wrote stating who wrote the Gospels dates from 125 A.D. He was old enough at the time to remember what happened during the Apostolic Age.
We know that the Gospels were written within the lifetime of those who knew Christ. The written date of the Gospel of John can be determined from the Rylands papyrus fragment from the gospel. From an analysis, the papyrus is said to be from the first couple decades of the second century or earlier. This fits in conjunction with the traditional dates of St. John's death, around 100 A.D. From examining composition, most critics will agree with the dating of the Gospels of Saints Matthew, Mark, and Luke before 90 AD. This is withing living memory of the authors, and Christ's life.
It is obvious that the Gospels do not contain any fabulous or mythical material. In the Gospels God performs miracles for a worthy purpose such as saving souls, much unlike mythical tales which tell of magic used only to amaze. When comparing the Gospels to such, it is evident they are completely fundamentally different.
The Gospels are verified by various people not directly involved with the writers or their purposes. A Roman historian in the second century wrote about a group named “Crestiani” led by Christ had been put to death by Pontius Pilate. A Jewish Historian, Flavius Josephus, wrote about Jesus' life and works.
It is evident the authors of the Gospels had no intentions to deceive. They did not have anything to gain per...
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...them were seeing the same hallucination at the same time. And if the Apostles were only seeing hallucinations, why didn't Christ's enemies point out His body in the tomb? Also, Thomas did not believe the Apostles until he had actually seen Jesus and felt his wounds.
The fourth commonly used argument against the Resurrection is the claim Christ had not actually risen, but the Apostle's memory of Him was so strong they used the Resurrection story as a symbol that Christ was still alive in their lives. The Gospels proclaim that the resurrected Jesus was a living man of flesh and blood. The Apostle's wouldn't even believe at first that Christ had risen. St. John also writes at the end of his Gospel that he is an eyewitness, and everything he has written is true. The Apostles had nothing to gain by preaching His Resurrection, and all but John were martyred for doing so.
The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are the origin of nearly everything the Christian Church teaches about Jesus. The Gospels, in turn, serve as the scale or test of truth and authenticity of everything the church teaches about Jesus. It is said that the Gospels are the link between Jesus of Nazareth and the people of every age throughout history who have claimed to be his followers. Although the Gospels teach us about Jesus’ life they may not provide concrete evidence that what they speak of is true there are several other sources.
But saints raising from the dead and appearing to people in the city undeniably stated that this
Stanton, Graham. Gospel Truth?: New Light on Jesus and the Gospels. Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press International, 1995. Paperback.
One of the main characteristics of the gospel of Mark is it’s length. Mark is much shorter than Matthew and Luke, but what it lacks in quantity, it makes up for in quality. The author of Mark does not slow down the gospel story and makes sure that only important and relevant details are included. When Mark is compared with Matthew and Luke, it becomes obvious to see what Mark has eliminated. The author’s omission of Jesus’ birth, lineage, resurrection, and ascension denote careful planning and purpose in the gospel of Mark.
The New Testament is a collection of different spiritual literary works, which includes the Gospels, a history of early church, the epistles of Paul, other epistles and apocalypse. Without deeply thinking or researching of the chronological order of the Gospels, a reader should not have problem to observe that the Gospels begin with the Gospel of Matthew, and to notice that there are many common areas, including content and literary characteristics, among the first three Gospels, the Gospel of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
The gospel of John was recorded after the gospels of Matthew, Luke, and Mark (Jensen p. 175). The advanced nature of John’s gospel verifies that the other three gospels had already been written, and time had elapsed between the other three gospels and John’s gospel (Jensen, p. 178). John’s gospel was written around A.D. 85 with universal application (Jensen, p. 178). Further, John wrote his gospel in Ephesus where he was ministering (Jensen, p. 178).
The contents of the Bible have dealt with controversy in regards to its inerrancy since publication, and will surely continue to. Historians progress to learn more about biblical stories in order to provide evidence for the reliability of information. Many believers today understand that not everything in the Bible has been factually proven. An outstanding topic many scholars pay attention to lies within the four gospels. The three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, replay essentially the same story with minor inconsistencies, while John portrays Jesus in an entirely different way. The differences in each gospel are due to how each gospel entertains different portrayals of the life and understanding of Jesus himself, in order to persuade
Although the New Testament is the main source of information regarding Jesus’ life, Jews often disregard it as a reliable source of information. It was not written until two to three generations after Jesus, hence it cannot be considered a primary source. Also, from a Jewish perspective, the aim of the Gospels is not to give an accurate account of Jesus’ life and teachings; the Gospels served as missionary documents containing accounts recorded by biased evangelists. They reflect the aims of the church rather than actual facts, and their writers were more concerned with the advancement of Christianity than the transmission of factual historical information. For these reasons, it is impossible to separate the historical Jesus from the divine Christ presented in the Gospels, and Judaism regards the Gospels as unreliable and irrational.
While modern scholars have been unable to authenticate the Gospel of Matthew’s author, traditionalists, dating back to 140 CE have asserted the Gospel of Matthew was written by Levi, a tax collector in Antioch (Harris, 2014). Papias, a second century bishop of Hierapolis, initially stated Levi wrote the Gospel of Matthew in Aramaic. However, modern day scholars have been unable to find any evidence to validate the Gospel of Matthew was originally recorded in Aramaic. Therefore, scholars have concluded, Bishop Papias was likely not referring to the canonized version of the Book of Matthew. Furthermore, after closely examining the book of Matthew, it is apparent the author relied heavily on the Gospel of Mark as a source, which was written between
This Gospel with precisely placed first as introductory PB and "the Messiah, the son of the living God" (Matthew 16: 16). Although the author's name is not mentioned in the Bible, the nas testimony all the church fathers who first (since c. 130 ad) stated that the Gospel was written by Matthew, one of the disciples of Jesus.
All the gospels have one thing in common. Mary Magdalene was the one person that arrived the first day of the week also known as Easter Sunday to visit the tomb after Jesus’ cruxifixction. In class we mentioned how each gospel describes what was seen at the site. Mary went to the tomb to anoint Jesus with spices and discovered that the body was nowhere to be found. She rushes back to the city to announce to everyone that Jesus rose from the
Damrosch, David, and David L. Pike, eds. "The Gospel According to Luke." The Longman Anothology of World Literature. Compact ed. New York: Pearson, 2008. 822-33. Print.
At the very beginning of the gospels the authors make their representation of Jesus known to the reader, but they rely upon different methods. Mark focuses on Jesus’ role as a servant is apparent as he quotes the prophet Isaiah: “Here is my messenger, whom I send on ahead of you!” (Mark 1:2) This is a rather simple statement, and the use of the word “messenger” connotes a sense of being under another’s command; Jesus is seen as an intermediary between God and man. John’s introduction to Jesus is much more majestic and poetic, devoting many verses to explaining his divine relationship with God: “In the beginning there was the divine word and wisdom. The divine word and wisdom was there with God, and it was what God was. It was there with God from the beginning. Everything came to be by means of it” (John 1:1-3).
John was one of the first twelve disciples of Jesus and therefore an eye-witness (John 19:35); John brings out the spiritual significance as well as recording the practical aspects of Jesus' works and words. John lived to be older than any of the other writers. It is therefore likely that he was familiar with their accounts and wanted to supplement theirs with additional teaching and miracles by Jesus which had a bearing on the situation towards the end of the first century AD.
Many people do no believe in the resurrection of Jesus because most of the evidence depends on the Bible. I; however, do believe in the resurrection because of three main reasons. The first reason in that I don't believe that it would be possible for so many people to believe in a lie for hundreds of years. The second reason I believe in the resurrection is because many people claim that their was a mass hallucination, but it is highly unlikely for that many people to have the same hallucination at the same time. Finally, my last reason is that if the apostles had faked it, I highly doubt that they would be willing to die for a lie. In conclusion, I believe in the resurrection because it would be hard for so many people to believe in a lie and all the arguments against it don't make sense.