/christian/ - Christian Discussion and Fellowship

>>612373

Read "The Authentic Gospel of Jesus" by Geza Vermes.

Honestly I prefer to just own it fully. The Bible is a liturgical canon full of pseudographia, and there was a clear development. Christianity is a philosophy and spiritual integrity that is defensible logically above all other religions, regardless of these things, we know Christ rose, and we know He was crucified, we know He taught, and we know the miracles are real.

Nothin' to defend, it is clear.

>>612373

>Are there any "Good" arguments to explain John's clear development to make Christ seem more God like or do we simply say that the gospels aren't the best account of Christ's life and we rather should rely on the testimony which come from the Jerusalem disciples themselves .

Or couldn't it be that John was just more accurate because he was actually there and he only bothered to write it all down because people finally convinced him that at least one of the apostles should write one?

>>612373

Mark immediately begins with an affirmation of Christ’s divinity. It’s just that Mark is less clear about it than John

>1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;

>2 As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.

>3 The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.

>4 John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.

John the Baptist is to prepare the way before Jesus’ face. That’s a quotation from Malachi. Here’s the OT verse

>17 Ye have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied him? When ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in them; or, Where is the God of judgment?

>Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts.

So the messenger (John the Baptist) is to prepare the way before the God of judgement (Jesus). Mark is saying Jesus is God, he’s just less clear about it than John is

I have heard the theory that St. John's gospel was actually written first, or very early on.

Also its likely that the gospels were originally written shorter simply because the apostles were around to tell the full story- ie they'd be able to tell the gospel in more detail than in Mark and so forth

but then as more and more of the apostles were martyred the gospel of John was written to tell the full gospel

so it hadn't so much developed as more and more of what the apostles taught was written down by them as more were martyred

at least thats my guess

The problem is the implication that the gosples only existed once they were written down. All of the information they present was already there. It just wasn't written down until later, and for different reasons.

There is an argument ofr example that St Mark's Gospel was the shortest because he wanted to use it to preach to as many as possible since he believed that the parousia was just around the corner, so it only really covered the "cliff notes" as it were. In the earliest versions it didn't even have the current ending with the Resurrection which was probably seen as redundant, as it was expected already. The problem Mark's audience would have had then was "OK, so this guy rose from the dead. But what was so special about him?"

Then take St Luke's gospel which was essentially a compilation of the Gospel that he had received as well as additional material from other memebers of the Church who knew and walked with Christ personally. Again, nothing here is "original" since it was already either part of the gospel, or parts of tradition which had not been recorded yet (e.g. the infancy gospel).

It's kind of like a lot of history books as we have them today. A book like "WW2 in 60 minutes" will contain a lot less information than a book like "All Hell Let Loose" by Max Hastings, even though they both cover the same points. It doesn't mean that e.g. Hastings made stuff up.

>>612378

Not really convincing. This is pure hypothetical. We know for a fact that there are moments that john tries to hide moments in the other gospels that might make us wonder if Jesus was really God. For example:

>And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”

Matthew 26:39

And

>Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour.

John 12:27

See the development?

>>612379

Yeah, not going to deny this but even this doesn't sufficiently account for this:

>And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”

Matthew 26:39

And

>Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour.

John 12:27

See the development?

>>612390

>Matthew 26:39

occurs in the garden

>John 12:27

occurs during the last supper

John spends several chapters with the things Jesus says at supper and runs very quickly through the garden.

The garden might be an embarrassing story for him whereas, for other followers, it demanded utmost focus. After all, John fell asleep instead of keeping vigilant

I mean, after everything they said during dinner it was certainly very late and no surprise they were very tired- but, if the disciples fell asleep- how do they know what Jesus said?

Was it possible Matthew just assumed Christ was there to pray for asking the cup to pass based on what the disciples reported he'd said at dinner and to the Sanhendrin's representatives in the garden?

It has great dramatic effect but, if everyone was asleep, how do we really know what Christ was praying about? Just saying.

>>612397

Or, perhaps Christ told them what he was going to pray about but John didn't write it because he wrote his whole gospel from personal memory and didn't witness that.

The dates were arrived at because those dates fit the development theory. The development theory was not arrived at because of the dates. You're taking as evidence something that was concluded from the argument.

>>612397

>It has great dramatic effect but, if everyone was asleep, how do we really know what Christ was praying about? Just saying.

Partly because it's not as if when the He left the disciples they just slept. He was after all a stone's throw from them. They could conceivably hear what He was saying, and noting His posture and the fact He was repeating His prayer, before they fell asleep. Don't forget this also happened to them three times. It's not a minor detail.