PhilosopherJay

Oliver Stone's Alexander the Great had Robin Lane Fox as an historical consultant and illustrates many well known facts about Alexander the Great.
In the 3 1/2 hour Final Cut version, when the movie opens, Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals, is dictating a history. The viewer believes that he is watching that history and Stone has faithfully reproduced it.

At the very end of the narrative, we are told that the library at Alexandria burned down, and the movie suggests that this contained the only copy of Ptolemy's history of Alexander. Since there is no existing copy of Ptolemy's history, the narrative we have just watched cannot be true. Thus, since we have lost the narrator's work, we must conclude that the whole work is fiction and it is impossible for it to be an accurate history. The movie ends with a self-confession that the work is not a history, but a fiction.

It seems to me that Mark and John similarly contain such "ending confessions" of the impossibility their narratives.

Mark:

16.8 And they went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to any one, for they were afraid.

Since nobody was told the story, how could the story ever be told? Obviously it couldn't. Therefore, the reader understands that the story must be fiction.

John:
21.24 This is the disciple who is bearing witness to these things, and who has written these things; and we know that his testimony is true. 21.25 But there are also many other things which Jesus did; were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

The things that people do are quite finite and easily put into a book. Only the imagination can hold a creature that does so many things that the world (the universe) cannot hold them all. Therefore the witness is admitting that he is baring witness to infinite, impossible things. The reader understands by this that the whole narrative has been a fiction.

Are there any lines in Matthew or Luke that people think might be confessions that their works are impossible to be taken as history and must be fiction?

SeekingKnowledge

Well it's definitely an interesting observation, Jay.. Thanks! But sorry, I don't have an answer in the least.. (ask me next week though, LOL)

Switch89

As for the ending of Mark, I don't think we can conclude too much: The original ending may have been lost. Even if what we have is the original ending, remember that 1 Corinthians 15 talks about the apostles having visions and such, so that may very well be how the religion started: through visions.

As for the ending of John, I'd say that he was grossly exaggerating. What he was trying to convey was that Jesus did lots and lots of good things.

As for me, I think that the biggest indications that the gospels are at least partly fictitious comes from the symbolism they use. Check out Michael Turton's commentary on Mark to see what I mean:

http://www.michaelturton.com/Mark/GMark_index.html

mountainman

Dear Philosopher Jay,

What about the Other Weird Gospels which have been handed down to us in various forms of anathema from the same time immemorial? The apochryphal gospels (and acts, etc) of the new testament. Is your OP purposefully excluding the writers of the "Other Gospels", whoever they may have been? Or to put it another way, can the NT apochrypha contribute to an understanding of the OP?

And in regard to the canonical gospels, do you regard them as a "package"? It occurs to me that if your position is such that the canonical gospels are representative of a "package", then what is attributed to one or more of them (ie: their status as fiction) will arguably then be applied to the entire package.

Happy New Solar Year, and best wishes,



Pete

Bokoura

Interesting.

The second point, though, could easily have been a hyperbole, and not really his opinion.

judge

Maybe they said nothing till the next day, or the next month.

Doug Shaver

I don't know about your life, but a book reporting everything I've ever said and done would have to be the size of several unabridged dictionaries.

I don't think the author of John was admitting to writing fiction. I think he was using a figure of speech. It's called hyperbole.

Ben C Smith

I agree, and would add my suspicion that the author is also obliquely referencing the other (the synoptic) gospels he knew had been written about Jesus, and from whose main storyline he had largely departed in adding many new pericopes and removing many old ones.

Ben.

bacht

At Pentecost, when filled with the Holy Spirit? [re Acts]

PhilosopherJay

Hi Pete,

I think the numerous other gospels connect with the canonical gospels in complex ways.

The canonical gospels were not written to be a package. I suspect somebody around 200 C.E. found each of them useful in refuting Marcion's version of Christianity and put them together to be used as a weapon against Marcion's followers. I suspect it happened in Alexandria.

Warmly,

Jay