Roland

I've recently been reading Roman historians like Suetonius and Tacitus and have been struck by just how different in form and style their writing is from that of the gospels.

These writers often quote sources by name and they use dialogue very infrequently. In short, they seem to be writing history in much the same way a modern historian would do.

The gospels, however, read much more like NARRATIVES, with plot development and characters who engage one another in lengthy conversations. In other words, the gospels feel more like literary inventions than do the works of Suetonius and Tacitus.

Do others get this feeling? And are there precedents in ancient times for the style of writing we find in the gospels? The gospel writers not only never quote sources but they never even identify themselves. For instance, we never have "Mark" say, "I heard from my friend Elizabeth who knew Mary Magdalene that...." Is it simply because the writers were composing their works as references for the faithful and NOT as historical accounts for the rest of us?

FordMadoxBrown

I think the notion that the Gospels could haev been intended as actual biography or history stems friom conditioning (ie. people are told it when they're children by people they respected then).

Quite apart from the fact that thing happen inthe Goespels which we know don't happen inthe real world, tht things hapen inthe Goepsels which have no independent corroboration in History (yes, i do mean the Gospels, not Genesis!) we are left with the unignorable resempbance between them and OT books. Luke parallels Deuteronomy quite closely, for example.

For anyone with an open mind (that is who isn't convinced even before examining the quesion) it should be clear that the Gospels are theological rather than historical narratives.

Roland

That's an excellent point, Ford. Since the gospels are dealing with such fantastic, supernatural events, one would assume the writers would be MORE concerned about citing eyewitness sources than the run-of-the-mill historian. In fact, rather than providing simply a narrative type biography, why didn't the early writers run around and try to get as many eyewitnesses as they could to state what they witnessed and swear to it? That would sure be more convincing to us today - and, I would hope, to others at that time as well.

Vorkosigan

<Camera pan: Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka, exotic ruins lost amid trees. In the foreground VORKOSIGAN looks up, surrounded by the remains of 2,000 year old monastic housing. A gigantic dagoba looms in the background. Left center: the family of VORKOSIGAN sprawls on a wall, drinking water.>

<VORKOSIGAN looks up>

Are the gospels theological narratives with no historical data relevant to Jesus life? Probably. But even if they are fiction-constructions, how would you prove how much and what history they contain?

<VORKOSIGAN looks fondly back at family. In background daughter SHERIDAN's voice can be clearly heard>

"Daddy, how much longer do we have to stay here? I'm sooooo bored! Can we go back to the hotel and play cards? I hate traveling.....Ruins are really boring."

<VORKOSIGAN sighs>

Vorkosigan

ichabod crane

There's no question that the gospels are not and were never intended as historical works. They are collections of narrative stories and sayings of Jesus. But it doesn't follow from this that nothing in the narrative actually happened. Clearly, many of the details in the narrative correspond with what we know of the contemporary world. So the setting at least was intended to be realistic. For example, John makes reference to the five porticoes at the pool of Beth-zatha (Jn. 5:2). But this was destroyed by the Romans, and it is only recent excavations that have confirmed that John was correct. This indicates someone who lived not too long after the destruction of Jerusalem.

Magdlyn

The canonical gospels and many non-canonical ones are hagiographies.

def--A worshipful or idealizing biography. A biography of a saint.


Genesis and Exodus.

Bingo.

graymouser

Plainly hagiographies. Look at the convoluted attempts to legitimize Jesus by portraying him simultaneously as a descendant of David and as a virgin birth from a god. Both of these are ancient ways of glorifying a subject. Most of the stories are outlandish, folk tale-ish miracles that we would not take seriously in any other hagiography, mixed in with sayings taken from two centuries of Jewish common wisdom and with various soteriological and eschatological beliefs.

I refuse to believe that anyone in the Roman Empire could have written something intended to be a narrative history of factual events where a man is crucified and subsequently buried. It simply didn't happen, and were most people actually acquainted with the process outside of the Gospel accounts they'd laugh at the prospect.

-Wayne

Bede

Actually, Philo recounts a case of a crucified man being handed over to his family for burial and Joesephus of individuals actually being taken off the cross after influencial intervention on their behalf. Unusual but by no means impossible.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

ichabod crane

This is an amazing statement. Are you saying that no-one in the Roman Empire could believe in resurrection from the dead? Millions of people alive today believe in it! People today believe miracles occur all over the place. Just look at Benny Hinn - there are thousands of people who swear that they have seen him do miracles. I'm not saying he actually does them, I'm just saying that lots of people believe it, and believe it sincerely. In ancient cultures like Rome, such beliefs would have been even more prevalent. You can't project modern naturalism onto the first century. And what about the fact that all sorts of miraculous events were recorded in the Old Testament, including resurrections from the dead (I Kings 17:22). You can't argue that I Kings is a hagiography; it just doesn't fit the genre.The average Jew no doubt thought such things could happen.

I'm not saying that Jesus did rise from the dead; but I certainly think that whoever wrote the gospels sincerely thought that he did rise from the dead. Why would they not? You can't write with that kind of conviction if you don't believe what you're writing. But the fact that they believed it, doesn't mean that it's true.

With regard to hagiographies, the fact that something is a hagiography (if we accept that classification) doesn't mean that nothing in it is historical. For example, hagiographies might contain information about where the saint in question was born, where they lived and so forth, which might be quite valid. It just means that the biography is idealized, not that it is entirely fictional.

And Genesis and Exodus cannot possibly be hagiographies. They don't fit the genre at all. Genesis is a compilation from lots of different sources of lots of different kind of writing. Exodus also combines things like a legal code with narrative. Can you name any hagiography that contains anything like the book of the covenant? I don't know of any.

SLD

Well, I supppose we can't know for sure, but I don't think this statement is necessarily true. I think they were creating a religion. They were obviously using elements from other religions, ones their readers/listeners would have been familiar with, and even used dialogue from a religious play at least at one point. They may very well have been using literary elements in their writings to get their readers to a "deeper" truth - i.e. we should all love one another, etc.

SLD