Sven

Just a hint: Your question will look more serious if you spell "Testament" correctly.

Brett89

We know that Mark, Matthew, Luke, John were real people who wrote the 4 books about jesus life and so on, but....we dont know that all that stuff acutally happened, they could have just made it up because they wanted to believe there was a better after life, and that OT scripture was correct, so they basically faked the prophecies?? do i got it right?

Peter Kirby

Well, that is about what you might come up with if you were trying to make sense of the odd comment here or there within a conservative Christian paradigm, but no.

To respond to your statements with all their literal corrections (there were more than four gospels, the authors were not named MMLJ, and we don't know who they were but by inference from what they wrote; it's not about them wanting to believe in a better afterlife, and the reasons for fabricating fulfilled prophecy run deeper) would create a parody of understanding, just as understanding evolution through a negation of Special Creation would be silly.

To suggest a way in, imagine that you are the author of the Gospel of Mark. Imagine that you have before you, as your available materiel, your cultic experience as part of the Christian sect, your knowledge of the creed that Christ died for our sins and rose on the third day, your understanding of Christ as the fulfillment of Hebrew Scripture on the one to come, and perhaps a few bits of tales of wonder and sayings of a sage attributed to Jesus during his life, which stuck out in your mind.

How do you tell the story of your Christ, his death, and the beginning of the gospel with this necessarily limited "data"? Assuming that you want the end product to be a literary work, and not a nonfictional recounting that revealed the nitty gritty processes of your reasoning as it developed.

I would suggest you would, by necessity, start turning to the Hebrew Scripture to find information to supplement your knowledge of the creed and cult. Not because you delight in making stuff up, but because it is--in your belief--the place where all that has come to pass is brought out in to the light of understanding. By putting a scriptural framework to your story, you make sense of your belief that he is the Christ, and drive it home to your reader with stories that show the connection between what is foretold and what you have told about Jesus.

Doug Shaver

It didn't get them executed. Nobody was ever killed for claiming that Jesus died for the sins of the world or for claiming that he rose from the dead.

Brett89

they saw jesus preform miracles.....no man can do that inless hes "god" or a ghost, haha. They wrote down what they saw him doing during their time with him right?

Sven

What exactly about "the authors were not named MMLJ, and we don't know who they were but by inference from what they wrote" did you not understand?

Brett89

i didnt understand, i thought we already know that MMLJ were the authors...

Sven

It's in the third line of Peter's post. I suggest you read the whole thing again.

And this is a fact accepted by all but the most fundie biblical scholars. I even learned it in school!

RED DAVE

From Brett89:
We know no such thing. All we have is the name of the author of Luke. So, you're wrong even on that point. Of course, someone wrote these books, but not the traditional authors. The names of the authors are traditional and were invented yearrs later. And they wrote decades after the events. None of them were eyewitnesses nor, probably, did they have access to eyewitness accounts. They didn't even write in the language spoken by the people of that time and place.

From Brett89:
[QUOTE]but....we dont know that all that stuff acutally happened, they could have just made it up because they wanted to believe there was a better after life, and that OT scripture was correct, so they basically faked the prophecies?? do i got it right?[/quote[This part is basically corrected. The faking of prophecies involved stretching the meaning of OT texts to fit imaginary or real events.

From Brett89:
They saw no such thing. They were not eyewitnesses, nor did they probably have such access.

From Brett89:
Wrong. See the important work of Rowlings and Tolkien in this regard.

RED DAVE

Amaleq13

I've merged Brett89's latest thread with one begun earlier since the first post appears to be an effort to respond to the earlier post rather than a new subject.

Doug aka Amaleq13, BC&H moderator