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Why were the Gospels written down?

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
Actually, I think the record supports historicity of a rabbi named Yeshua who did something amazing and changed people's lives. If people were intensely discussing and carrying forward the story of His ministry for several decades, and then finally wrote it down, that says to me they were probably talking about a real guy, and I think is one of the main reasons that most historians do accept that.

The problem, again, is that's not good enough, they have to puff it up into an historical record of a God/man, which of course doesn't exist in the slightest, and would had the NT events actually happened.
 

AllanV

Active Member
This popped into my head the other day. I wonder if anyone here can shed light on it:

Apparently, the Gospels were handed down through an oral tradition for decades and decades. Then, they were written down. But why were they written down? And why then?

It seems that oral tradition was working for them (or was it?); why the decision to change things?

They are written down for this generation and those whose minds have been opened up in a supernatural way to knowing the truth. The scriptures are a confirmation and a measure against wrong doctrine. There are over 300 versions of Churches that use the bible and there is no supernatural. They all use there own understanding and fall into error.
 

dogsgod

Well-Known Member
Actually, I think the record supports historicity of a rabbi named Yeshua who did something amazing and changed people's lives. If people were intensely discussing and carrying forward the story of His ministry for several decades, and then finally wrote it down, that says to me they were probably talking about a real guy, and I think is one of the main reasons that most historians do accept that.

The problem, again, is that's not good enough, they have to puff it up into an historical record of a God/man, which of course doesn't exist in the slightest, and would had the NT events actually happened.
What record supports historicity of a rabbi named Yeshua?
 

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
What record supports historicity of a rabbi named Yeshua?

What I mean is, Mark is thought to have been written around 70 AD. That's only around 40 years after Jesus died. To me, that's remarkably close in time. And we don't know, but it seems like His followers were talking about what had happened for those forty years. Something happened, something remarkable, it changed their lives. They spent the next 40 years talking about it. Then they started writing it down. At least, that seems like the most likely scenario. If so, then they were talking about an actual person, a teacher, Yeshua, who changed their lives.

I think that's a big hairy deal. Apparently not many Christians agree with me.
 

dogsgod

Well-Known Member
What I mean is, Mark is thought to have been written around 70 AD. That's only around 40 years after Jesus died. To me, that's remarkably close in time. And we don't know, but it seems like His followers were talking about what had happened for those forty years. Something happened, something remarkable, it changed their lives. They spent the next 40 years talking about it. Then they started writing it down. At least, that seems like the most likely scenario. If so, then they were talking about an actual person, a teacher, Yeshua, who changed their lives.

I think that's a big hairy deal. Apparently not many Christians agree with me.
Mark appears to be an allegorical fiction, almost every detail of his life comes from "Old Testament" scriptures. The earliest Christian writings, the Epistles, give no details of an earthly Christ, in fact much of what Paul says makes sense if Jesus Christ is not an historical person. There is not a single writing or mention of him from his supposed lifetime. Maybe you view them as accounts of actual events just as gentiles began to view them by the end of the second century.
 

logician

Well-Known Member
What I mean is, Mark is thought to have been written around 70 AD. That's only around 40 years after Jesus died. To me, that's remarkably close in time. And we don't know, but it seems like His followers were talking about what had happened for those forty years. Something happened, something remarkable, it changed their lives. They spent the next 40 years talking about it. Then they started writing it down. At least, that seems like the most likely scenario. If so, then they were talking about an actual person, a teacher, Yeshua, who changed their lives.

I think that's a big hairy deal. Apparently not many Christians agree with me.

If MULTITUDES of people were following this supposed jesus around who was performing great miracles in Jerusalem, why did no historian who lived in or around Jerusalem at the time bother to write about it, especially since many of them wrote about the most pidly and unimportant things otherwise.
 

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
Wait, I didn't say anything about multitudes; they appear to have been a small group. No one wrote about it because nothing of interest or importance happened to anyone who wasn't in the group. What happened to them is that their lives were changed by their interaction with their teacher. That's what it looks like to me--not that I have a lot of expertise on the subject.
 

logician

Well-Known Member
Wait, I didn't say anything about multitudes; they appear to have been a small group. No one wrote about it because nothing of interest or importance happened to anyone who wasn't in the group. What happened to them is that their lives were changed by their interaction with their teacher. That's what it looks like to me--not that I have a lot of expertise on the subject.

So the gospels are dead wrong on this one?
 

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
So the gospels are dead wrong on this one?

That and a lot of other stuff. I'm not saying the gospels are true or mostly true, just that it looks like something happened to people that mattered a lot to them, and it seems to have involved their deceased teacher. If I were a Christian evangelist, I would be working the heck out of that, not making stuff up.
 

dogsgod

Well-Known Member
That and a lot of other stuff. I'm not saying the gospels are true or mostly true, just that it looks like something happened to people that mattered a lot to them, and it seems to have involved their deceased teacher. If I were a Christian evangelist, I would be working the heck out of that, not making stuff up.
Except it appears to be made up. If they lost a teacher that mattered so much to them, then why is the entire crucifixion scene constructed of verses taken from the "OT"? Actually, one has to look into the construction of the gospels to see how they were put together and what their sources were, it's most revealing.
 
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angellous_evangellous

Guest
Wait, I didn't say anything about multitudes; they appear to have been a small group. No one wrote about it because nothing of interest or importance happened to anyone who wasn't in the group. What happened to them is that their lives were changed by their interaction with their teacher. That's what it looks like to me--not that I have a lot of expertise on the subject.

That's basically what I've been saying...
 

kadzbiz

..........................
This popped into my head the other day. I wonder if anyone here can shed light on it:

Apparently, the Gospels were handed down through an oral tradition for decades and decades. Then, they were written down. But why were they written down? And why then?

It seems that oral tradition was working for them (or was it?); why the decision to change things?

I think they were worried about the Chinese Whisper syndrome.
 

logician

Well-Known Member
Wait, I didn't say anything about multitudes;

I didn't say you did, I did. You say something remarkable happened to his followers - what? You have no evidence whatsoever to back up this statement. I pointed out the bible says MULTITUDES of people followed him, but no historian of the time picked up on this REMARKABLE fact. There seems to be a great disconnect between history and the gospels.
 
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angellous_evangellous

Guest
I didn't say you did, I did. You say something remarkable happened to his followers - what? You have no evidence whatsoever to back up this statement. I pointed out the bible says MULTITUDES of people followed him, but no historian of the time picked up on this REMARKABLE fact. There seems to be a great disconnect between history and the gospels.

They sure did. You simply refuse to aknowledge them. And historians of today don't think that the historical Jesus had a large following... the Gospels themselves were written at a time when the historical Jesus was becoming historically significant because more and more people started to convert to Christianity.

We've been over Josephus. We've been over Luke-Acts. I'm almost certain that you've never heard of the Gallio Stone or the Erastus inscription.

Pliny recognizes the spread of Christianity in 103 when he was Propraetor of Bithynia.

You say that there's no evidence but there is. You simply choose to reject it.
 

dogsgod

Well-Known Member
They sure did. You simply refuse to aknowledge them. And historians of today don't think that the historical Jesus had a large following... the Gospels themselves were written at a time when the historical Jesus was becoming historically significant because more and more people started to convert to Christianity.

We've been over Josephus. We've been over Luke-Acts. I'm almost certain that you've never heard of the Gallio Stone or the Erastus inscription.

Pliny recognizes the spread of Christianity in 103 when he was Propraetor of Bithynia.

You say that there's no evidence but there is. You simply choose to reject it.
We're not saying there isn't evidence of a religion, we're saying there isn't evidence for a Jesus Christ figure living when the gospel of Mark says he did. Historians don't think he had a large following, what a laugh, where did you pull this out of? Changing the story of your book in order to suit your preconceived view only works for believers. You might want to read about Acts and Josephus to learn something about how your "history" book was written.
 
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angellous_evangellous

Guest
Historians don't think he had a large following, what a laugh, where did you pull this out of?

Well, they use historical-critical methods that you know nothing about.
 
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angellous_evangellous

Guest
You might want to read about Acts and Josephus to learn something about how your "history" book was written.

I read on the average 1000 pages a day in four languages, studying both the original evidence and the histories derived from them.

And I brought up the relationship between Josephus and Luke-Acts, to which you thoughtlessly posted a website [which I seriously doubt that you even bothered to read].

Spoken like someone who has never read Luke or Acts.

*if you close your eyes, it's almost like Luke, Acts, and Josephus don't correspond at all*
 
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angellous_evangellous

Guest
You might want to read about Acts and Josephus to learn something about how your "history" book was written.

As I pointed out on the other thread, this is the Achilles Heal of the argument:

Luke could not have written before 79 A.D., and could well have written much later since the rate of publication in antiquity was exceedingly limited and slow, requiring hand copies made by personal slaves (though at first oral recitations would be more common than written copies); and in order to draw material from the Jewish Antiquities, as he appears to have done, Luke could not have written before 94 A.D., and again could have written much later for the same reason.

Because of the slow rate of dissemation and publication, it is impossible that Luke copied Josephus. They would have had to have been written down at almost exactly the same time, and Luke-Acts is quoted in literature before Josephus.
 
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