The Gospels - Text sources

There are literally thousands of ancient manuscripts of the new testament. Some are only small fragments, some comprise the whole new testament.
Please check here for an introduction to the topic of Textual Criticism of the NT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textual_criticism#New_Testament

Viki2000,

In this posting, I pasted the comments from Callandor and Jason210, which I found relevant from the previous thread. My opinion, of course.

This posting should not be awarded any points, because I'm just trying to bring the previous relevant conversations into this thread.  Hopefully, Callandor and Jason210 will re-post and/or update their content in this thread.

I might post after the conversation restarts

Thanks



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From Jason210

I don't know where you get the 4th century from for Thomas. Even those scholars who consider it to have been written late put it down as mid 2nd century. The rest of them put it to some time between 50 - 100, which would make it one of the earliest scriptures.

Regarding the canonical Gospels, there is also debate about their dates (the omission of the mention of the destruction of the temple of Jerusulem generally being the basis for dating). They all have been dated to the same time as Thomas (50 -150AD) but are believed to have all been written arouind 60 - 70 AD.

The only empirical evidence there is for the dating of Mathew is that is was written before the death of Ignatius in 115AD, but it is believed to have all been written around 60 - 70 AD, and is believed to have been written by the apostle himself.

Note the operative word - believed. The early church is repsonsible for these beliefs.

There is also debate about the authorship of the canonical gospels. Both Mark and Luke were not eyewitness accounts and certainly not written by the dicsiples of the same names.

Since Mathew is based largely on Mark, and on the hypothetical text "Q" then I would say that it was not written by the apostle.

The only one that seems to have been written by an apostle is John, and even that is put down to 90-100 AD. The texts lacks any historical markers also.

From https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/26980437/II-Timothy-4-17.html?anchorAnswerId=35921092#a35921092
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From Callandor
>I don't know where you get the 4th century from for Thomas.

I apologize - I read the article (http://christianthinktank.com/gthomas.html) incorrectly; it the gnostic Nag Hammadi Library that is dated to the 4th century.  The Gospel of Thomas is part of that library, and is thought to have been written in the mid 2nd century, as you say.  The message it contains still puts it at odds with the canonical gospels, and the "borrowing" of material from those gospels puts it at a later date.

Mark is mentioned as the disciple of Peter by Irenaeus (http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/mark.html), and Luke is the disciple of Paul (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luke_the_Evangelist), so both were under an apostle's teaching and would have been given authoritative details about the life of Jesus.  Matthew borrowing material from Mark does not preclude him from being the apostle himself, and since there is no Q document to put our hands on, it's existence is a matter of opinion/speculation, so why base any hard conclusions on that?

>Again, how can one know which is the right concept?

It's partly what we do in this forum, reasoning things out.  It's also partly based on faith, but faith based on historical facts and events.

https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/26980437/II-Timothy-4-17.html?anchorAnswerId=35927910#a35927910
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From Jason210

Gospel of Thomas -- perhaps the text is a forerunner to the gnostic texts and that sets it apart, but there's no scholarly claim stating that it borrows material from any of the Gospels. There's no evidence for that. But it appears to be a primary text, in that it's written in that style, based on oral tradition. It's date is thought to be anywhere between 50 -150 AD. That's what the scholars say.

I agree that Mathew borrowing materials does not mean he cannot be the apostle, but to say that he was the apostle is also speculation. While you claim we should not base any hard conclusions on "Q", much of the dating and authorship regarding the canonical gospels is also speculative, and there are no hard consclusions.

https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/26980437/II-Timothy-4-17.html?anchorAnswerId=35929099#a35929099
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From Callandor

>but there's no scholarly claim stating that it borrows material from any of the Gospels. There's no evidence for that.

It depends on who you read- for example, http://www.pleaseconvinceme.com/index/pg83472
I don't give any credence to the Jesus Seminar, who start out with an axe to grind and who make statements that are based on a bias against a supernatural Jesus.

That gospel is a book that purports to be the real gospel and remained lost and hidden for 19 centuries - that makes alarms go off in my head.   The early Christians were in the best position to know what was the real story, as they were closest to the events, but there were no copies of the Gospel of Thomas circulating around the early churches being widely read.  If there were, you would have multiple places with manuscripts of it preserved.  You don't see any evidence of that.

https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/26980437/II-Timothy-4-17.html?anchorAnswerId=35936290#a35936290
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Form Jason210

By the 3rd century there were already efforts to promote certain books and suppress others. This is two hundred years after the death of Jesus.Certain texts were discerned to be the truth by the early Roman churches which had the power and the money to make the difference. Thomas was popular in Egypt but without the backing of Rome didn't really stand a chance.

Text's written in Rome, like Mark, became more popular.

Athanius wrote a letter in the 3rd century urging his congregation NOT to read "erroneous" literature and suggested the first example of the present day book list. The next 300 years would see the enforcement of that book list, and it is because of the successfulness of that enforcement process that books like Thomas were almost lost completely. Bishops would travel round Europe to stop the circulation of the "erroneous" texts, and people just stopped reproducing them. Sometimes worse happened -- for example,  in 447 AD Pope Leo the Great ordered Gnostic texts to be burnt!

And yet againts all odds, the Nag Hamadi library survived, in small pieces mixed with sand in a desert. One could argue that it was God's intnetion that it be found...

https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/26980437/II-Timothy-4-17.html?anchorAnswerId=35937016#a35937016
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There's not much more to add.

MARK
The mainstream view is that Peter (the Rock) and James went to Rome and after an argument with James, Peter preached to the public until he was excuted. From his testimony or preachings emerged the Gospel of Mark (55-70AD).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Mark

Meanwhile, oral traditions continued elsewhere and it is believed that of these two texts emerged: The Gospel of Thomas, and the hypothetical "Q" text that has yet to be discovered if it existed at all. Thomas was merely a list of sayings by Jesus with no narrative or structure and is for that reason consider ot be a primary text - a mere collection of sayings.

MATHEW AND LUKE
Both "Q" and the Gospel of Mark are believed by mainstream scholars to have been the basis for the the two later books, Mathew and Luke, with the possible influence of Paul.

JOHN
The source is believed to be  mostly from one of the disciples. It may have been based on an earlier work but the version that appears in the Bible is dated at 90-100 AD it is believed that the final text was by a non-disciple.

There's not much more to say.

AD 70 is a useful marker for historians because it was a watershed event for the Jewish people at that time - the destruction of the Temple.  For anyone writing about the Jewish people at that time, it would be incredible to leave it out.  It would be akin to leaving out the events of Sept 11, 2001 when writing about the American people and government after the turn of the millenium.

Constantine did not convert to Christianity until 318 AD, so any thoughts of a Roman church authority cannot be before that, and it wasn't until Pope Leo, who is thought to be the first pope, that any Roman church authority was claimed.  The original church started in Jerusalem and spread from there, and most of the disciples were originally part of that church.

The books of the New Testament are all mentioned in some way in the writings of the church fathers dating from the second century, so there was already general acceptance by believers as to what books should constitute the sacred writings.  Only after certain other books appeared, claiming to be written by the disciples, was it necessary to produce a list of accepted writings.

Jason210,

"Regarding the dating of the canonical Gospels, the omission of the mention of the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem (AD 70) is generally the basis for dating. For this reason they all have been dated to around 50-70 AD."

I understand the reasoning for 70 CE being the latest date, but what sets the earliest date as being 50 CE?  Couldn't the texts have been composed earlier?

Thanks

Additional info:
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/index.html

That seems like a very good site. Thanks Viki.

If you are in for a good read and want to understand the different types of evidences, and overall appologetics from a lamens perspective, read The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.  It's a great book packed with relevant information that can aid you in understanding all aspects of Christianity along with the exact question you asked.  It's a great, easy and very understandable read.  It's great to see all these folks so knowledgeable on the Gospels... Awsome stuff Everyone!

Actually I have seen some years ago the documentary, now also on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMvaSAwL7_k

What, if any, conclusions does it report?

For me it was interesting to watch it as Strobel's personal struggle as a testimony for others.
I do not know how much will bring to the present topic any light the above documentary, but will be interesting to contact Strobel directly and ask him about sources that he studied and convinced him.

Okay.  Let me rephrase my question.

Were you able to tell what Strobel was convinced of?  Or, is it difficult to tell from the documentary?  If not, what do you think he was convinced of?

Thanks in advance.

That is simple and easy to follow video presentation:
- he was a person (reporter) that believed Jesus was a legend and all the believers, followers are people that did not searched enough for proves and accepted it too easy or due to tradition or what ever other reason that the faith in something that cannot be true.
- he decided to make his own research and to create for his job a nice articles by bringing the "real truth" to the light, so the people to not be foolish with such kind of "legends". He was convinced that he can do it, especially having at his hand access to different sources and good connections to obtain all kind of info.
- it took him some years and instead of making a series of articles as he imagined would be, a inner fight with himself started, because he could not find the proves that he thought he would find. Contrary, the story ends with the man "converted", becoming a believer, convinced that the "legend" of Jesus is true, so later he started to present his findings and resources (that convinced him) to the others in different presentations with public.

I hope I am clear enough to your questions, if I remember well Strobel's story

Furthermore he was an athiest and he began his quest to disprove Christianity however, by the end of the whole thing, the spirit of God revealed the truth to him.  Pretty cool and as viki said very easy to follow.

Thanks