Gospel


Gospel originally meant the Christian message, but in the second century AD the term came to be used also for the books in which the message was reported. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words and deeds of Jesus, culminating in his trial and death, and concluding with various reports of his post-resurrection appearances.
The Gospels are commonly seen as literature that is based on oral traditions, Christian preaching, and Old Testament exegesis with the consensus being that they are a variation of Greco-Roman biography; similar to other ancient works such as Xenophon's Memoirs of Socrates. They are meant to convince people that Jesus was a charismatic miracle-working holy man, providing examples for readers to emulate. As such, they present the Christian message of the second half of the first century AD, Modern biblical scholars are therefore cautious of relying on the gospels uncritically as historical documents, and although they afford a good idea of Jesus' public career, critical study has largely failed to distinguish his original ideas from those of the later Christian authors, and the focus of research has therefore shifted to Jesus as remembered by his followers, and understanding the Gospels themselves.
The canonical gospels are the four which appear in the New Testament of the Bible. They were probably written between AD 66 and 110, which puts their composition likely within the lifetimes of various eyewitnesses, including Jesus's own family. Most scholars hold that all four were anonymous. They are generally not viewed as eyewitness accounts, though this may be partly the result of dubious form-critical assumptions. The gospels are products of literarily creative authors. According to the majority of scholars, Mark was the first to be written, using a variety of sources, followed by Matthew and Luke, which both independently used Mark for their narrative of Jesus's career, supplementing it with a collection of sayings called "the Q source", and additional material unique to each, though alternative hypotheses that posit the direct use of Matthew by Luke or vice versa without Q are increasing in popularity. There have been different views on the transmission of material that led to the synoptic gospels, with various scholars arguing memory and orality reliably preserved traditions that ultimately go back to the historical Jesus. Other scholars have been more skeptical and see more changes in the traditions prior to the written Gospels. John may have been aware of the Synoptics, and there is currently considerable debate over the gospel's social, religious and historical context. In modern scholarship, the synoptic gospels are the primary sources for reconstructing Christ's ministry while John is used less since it differs from the synoptics. According to the manuscript evidence and citation frequency by the early Church Fathers, Matthew and John were the most popular gospels while Luke and Mark were less popular in the early centuries of the Church.
Many non-canonical gospels were also written, all later than the four canonical gospels, and like them advocating the particular theological views of their various authors. Important examples include the gospels of Thomas, Peter, Judas, and Mary; infancy gospels such as that of James ; and gospel harmonies such as the Diatessaron.

Etymology

Gospel is the Old English translation of the Hellenistic Greek term εὐαγγέλιον, meaning "good news"; this may be seen from analysis of ευαγγέλιον. The Greek term was Latinized as evangelium in the Vulgate, and translated into Latin as bona annuntiatio. In Old English, it was translated as gōdspel. The Old English term was retained as gospel in Middle English Bible translations and hence remains in use also in Modern English.
Encyclopaedia Britannica defines gospel as stemming from gōdspel "good story/news," a calque translating Latin evangelium from Greek εὐαγγέλιον "good news."

Canonical gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John

Contents

The four canonical gospels share the same basic outline of the life of Jesus: he begins his public ministry in conjunction with that of John the Baptist, calls disciples, teaches and heals and confronts the Pharisees, dies on the cross and is raised from the dead. Each has its own distinctive understanding of him and his divine role and scholars recognize that the differences of detail among the gospels are irreconcilable, and any attempt to harmonize them would only disrupt their distinct theological messages. The patterns of parallels and differences found in the gospels are typical of ancient biographies about actual people and history, and are thus unproblematic if not read anachronistically.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke are termed the synoptic gospels because they present very similar accounts of the life of Jesus. Mark begins with the baptism of the adult Jesus and the heavenly declaration that he is the son of God; he gathers followers and begins his ministry, and tells his disciples that he must die in Jerusalem but that he will rise; in Jerusalem, he is at first acclaimed but then rejected, betrayed, and crucified, and when the women who have followed him come to his tomb, they find it empty. Whilst not as overt as John, scholars have found that the Synoptic gospels portray Jesus as divine in various ways. Mark apparently believes that he had a normal human parentage and birth, and makes no attempt to trace his ancestry back to King David or Adam; it originally ended at Mark 16:8 and had no post-resurrection appearances, although Mark 16:7, in which the young man discovered in the tomb instructs the women to tell "the disciples and Peter" that Jesus will see them again in Galilee, hints that the author knew of the tradition.
The authors of Matthew and Luke added different infancy and resurrection narratives to the story they found in Mark. Barker suggests that Luke supplemented Matthew’s nativity by adding Mary’s perspective to Matthew’s Joseph. Each also makes subtle theological changes to Mark, though James Barker argues this is exaggerated, with ancient rhetorical practices explaining many differences in the gospels instead. The Markan miracle stories, for example, confirm Jesus' status as an emissary of God, but in Matthew they demonstrate his divinity, and the "young man" who appears at Jesus' tomb in Mark becomes a radiant angel in Matthew. Luke, while following Mark's plot more faithfully than Matthew, has expanded on the source, corrected Mark's grammar and syntax, and eliminated some passages entirely, notably most of chapters 6 and 7.
John, the most overtly theological, is the first to make Christological judgements outside the context of the narrative of Jesus's life. He presents a significantly different picture of Jesus's career, omitting any mention of his ancestry, birth and childhood, his baptism, temptation and transfiguration; his chronology and arrangement of incidents is also distinctly different, clearly describing the passage of three years in Jesus's ministry in contrast to the single year of the synoptics, placing the cleansing of the Temple at the beginning rather than at the end, and the Last Supper on the day before Passover instead of being a Passover meal. However, there are also verses such as Mark 14:49 and Matthew 23:37 often viewed as hints of a longer ministry in the Synoptics. Ancient writing practices involved such chronological displacement and changes, with even reliable biographers including Plutarch displaying them. According to Delbert Burkett, the Gospel of John is the only gospel to call Jesus God, though other scholars including Larry Hurtado and Michael Barber view a possible divine Christology in the synoptics. In contrast to Mark, where Jesus hides his identity as messiah, in John he openly proclaims it.

Composition

Like the rest of the New Testament, the four gospels were written in Greek. The Gospel of Mark probably dates from around AD 70, Matthew and Luke around AD 80–90, and John AD 90–100, which puts their composition likely within the lifetimes of various eyewitnesses, including Jesus's own family. Despite the traditional ascriptions, all four are anonymous, and scholars have largely agreed they do not represent eyewitness accounts, though this may partly be the result of dubious form-critical assumptions. Most scholars view the author of Luke-Acts as an eyewitness to Paul. However, Paul never met Jesus. Before the gospels were written, he claimed to have had a vision of Jesus after his death and later met his brother James. The form-critics largely viewed the gospels as compilers of transmitted traditions, but the gospels are now seen as biographers engaging in literarily creative and imaginative form of art. Though the texts are anonymous, many scholars have defended the attributions to Luke and John, though many others have abandoned this view.
The form critics of the twentieth century viewed the gospels as compilers of tradition analogous to other collections of folktales by primitive communities steeped in eschatology, but today scholars recognize the gospels as Greco-Roman biographies by conscious authors with their own theological agendas. Burkett argues the emergence of the gospels can be summarized by oral traditions passed on as unordered units, written collections of miracle stories and sayings, and proto-gospels preceding and serving as sources for the gospels, which combined proto-gospels, written collections, and oral tradition. The dedicatory preface of Luke testifies to the existence of previous accounts of the life of Jesus. According to Chris Keith, there is no incontrovertible evidence the gospel traditions circulated as written narratives, testimonia, or notes prior to Mark.
Mark is generally agreed to be the first gospel. According to Boring, Mark uses a variety of sources, including conflict stories, apocalyptic discourse, and collections of sayings. However, Helen Bond writes that source criticism largely fallen out of favor in gospels scholarship, though some elements remain. Most scholars believe Matthew and Luke, independently used Mark and a hypothesized Q source, with unique material called M and L, though alternative hypotheses that posit the direct use of Matthew by Luke or vice versa without Q are increasing in popularity within scholarship. The Gospels represent a Jesus tradition and were enveloped by oral storytelling and performances during the early years of Christianity, rather than being redactions or literary responses to each other. Mark, Matthew, and Luke are called the synoptic gospels because of their close similarities of content, arrangement, and language. Alan Kirk praises Matthew in particular for his "scribal memory competence" and "his high esteem for and careful handling of both Mark and Q", which makes claims the latter two works are significantly theologically or historically different dubious. The author of John may have known the synoptics, but did not use them in the way that Matthew and Luke used Mark. The increase in support for John’s knowledge of the Synoptics is correlated with the decline of the signs source hypothesis, and there is currently considerable debate over the gospel's social, religious and historical context.
All four also use the Jewish scriptures, by quoting or referencing passages, interpreting texts, or alluding to or echoing biblical themes. Such use can be extensive: Mark's description of the Parousia is made up almost entirely of quotations from scripture. Matthew is full of quotations and allusions, and although John uses scripture in a far less explicit manner, its influence is still pervasive. According to Wesley Allen, their source was the Greek version of the scriptures, called the Septuagint and they do not seem familiar with the original Hebrew, though other scholars point out that Matthew in particular has quotations closer to the Masoretic and could understand Hebrew.