Little Dot

Can someone explain to me why it is so important that the gospels don't agree word for word?

Little Dot

I was follow the discussion in

"Origen, Baptism and the Missing Line from Mark and Matthew"

No one can give a a reason why they think that the gospels have to agree word for word? :constern02:

aa5874

Who claimed the Gospels must agree word for word?

But, it must be noted that ALL the Gospels and even the Pauline writers in the NT claimed Jesus was RAISED from the dead.

The authors of the Gospels agree, sometimes word for word, with the Myth description or the non-historical implausible activities of Jesus.

The authors of gMark, gMatthew and gLuke virtually AGREE, almost word for word, that Jesus walked on water, TRANSFIGURED and was raised from the dead on the THIRD day.

It is EXTREMELY significant that the Synoptics AGREE that Jesus TRANSFIGURED BEFORE he was crucified.

Toto

Very few people on these boards think that the gospels are true or accurate, so no one says that they have to agree. The purpose of the discussion is to figure out what they mean, and how they developed, and what this tells us about early Christians.

How do you explain the fact that they don't agree? What do the disagreements in words and concepts tell you?

stephan huller

I can only speak for myself here but the fact that they disagree isn't what interests me. If there were five witnesses to a car crash and the police took statements from everyone you'd expect differences. If the police went to the scene of the same accident and took down mostly verbatim accounts from all five witnesses about the details of the crash with only a word or a sentence being added and then an extra bit here or there thrown in for good measure, the detective would call a special crime unit because he would immediately recognize they had all been coached by someone.

It is impossible to have four or five eye-witnesses come up with verbatim testimonials totally independent of one another.

Sometimes I book groups into theaters which get booked out for schools to attend. We get thousands and thousands of kids seeing the same show and the teachers ask the kids to write a letter to the performers describing what they liked about the performance. I have received literally 10,000 or so 'testimonials' - never did I have a single paragraph duplicated among the students. Far less a complex narrative about something as abstract as God coming to earth and getting nailed to a cross - an event that had only one 'believing' eyewitness.

spin

And at the same time there is a strong literary connection between three of the gospels, as though two have worked from, improve on, and added to the third. If this is the case, then the differences can tell us about early developments in the religion.

Huon

If the four canonical gospels did agree word for word, there would be only one canonical gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

And I do not mention the gospel of Truth, the gospel of Thomas, the gospel of Peter, the gospel of the Twelve, the gospel of Basilides, the gospel of the Egyptians, the gospel of the Hebrews, and some other gospels.

The differences between these gospels show that the early followers of Christ did not believe exactly the same ideas.

Kapyong

Gday,

If there were four authors developing a popular religious myth, you'd expect differences.

Your comment is a very common apologetic, but it's a faulty argument, it begs the question - it assumes that Jesus existed to start with.

Sure - eye-witnesses to historical events can differ. But that doesn't mean you can argue the OTHER way - that these differing stories are therefore about historical events. It doesn't follow.

So that's why I answer with the corollary :
If there were four authors developing a popular religious myth, you'd expect differences.

But so what?

Neither statement tells us WHETHER it was historical or not - because differences can come from eye-witness, OR from myths.


K.

Juststeve

It is important that there are differences among the Gospels because the differences falsify the claim that all the Gospels are inerrant.

Steve

avi

No. Certainly not.

Falsify: Let's address the OP:

It is important that there are differences among the Gospels because the differences refute the claim that all the Gospels are inerrant.

One observes this particularly in studying the "original" Greek texts, which themselves fail to present text identical from one edition to another, i.e. they are NOT word for word in agreement.

a. They are supposed to reflect the thinking of an omniscient supreme deity. How could there be confusion about the supreme being's thought?

b. That they do NOT agree word for word, is evidence, somewhere along the line, during the past 2300 years, of falsification, i.e. fraudulent insertion/deletion of text.

avi