May I ask a general question about the Gospel?

[RKO]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I would love to hear what my friends here think. This is something I have wondered about for years.

At the garden of Gethsemane ( I believe you know the story
Jesus took a couple apostles and went off to pray. They fell asleep. Then Jesus went off by himself and prayed the "Let this cup pass" prayer. he returned to find them sleeping and rebuked them for not staying awqake with him. He was shortly thereafter arrested.

My question is this: If the apostles were sleeping, how do we know what Jesus prayed?

 

[Daughter of His]

2 Timothy 3:16
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,

 

[RKO]

2 Timothy 3:16
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,

Best answer I've ever heard.

 

[Kristos]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I would love to hear what my friends here think. This is something I have wondered about for years.

At the garden of Gethsemane ( I believe you know the story
Jesus took a couple apostles and went off to pray. They fell asleep. Then Jesus went off by himself and prayed the "Let this cup pass" prayer. he returned to find them sleeping and rebuked them for not staying awqake with him. He was shortly thereafter arrested.

My question is this: If the apostles were sleeping, how do we know what Jesus prayed?

That's a good question. Instead of answering directly, I would ask a somewhat rhetorical question - is it reasonable to think that the writers of the gospels heard and recorded directly everything that they wrote, like a stenographer? It seems pretty clear to me anyway, that simply given the difference between the gospels, this is not the case. So who knows - maybe one of them stayed awake long enough to hear it, or maybe the Lord told them later what he had said, or maybe it was inspired by the Holy Spirit...

 

[InnerPhyre]

I have always assumed that the portion in the gospel is the portion that the apostles heard before they fell asleep and that Christ prayed much more than that, but that portion is lost to history because they were sleeping. John is the one who writes out the entire prayer, and him being the youngest, perhaps he stayed awake longer than the old men

 

[ArmyMatt]

Christ also was with them, teaching them for 40 days from Pascha to Ascension, so it coulda come up then as well.

 

[Gxg (G²)]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I would love to hear what my friends here think. This is something I have wondered about for years.

At the garden of Gethsemane ( I believe you know the story
Jesus took a couple apostles and went off to pray. They fell asleep. Then Jesus went off by himself and prayed the "Let this cup pass" prayer. he returned to find them sleeping and rebuked them for not staying awqake with him. He was shortly thereafter arrested.

My question is this: If the apostles were sleeping, how do we know what Jesus prayed?

I had the same question this morning when reading Matthew 17 (when Christ was transfigured and only took John, James and Peter with him - warning them to not tell others). I had heard of others saying that there's no way to have eye-witness accounts if someone was not there for the entire lifetime of a person - but thankfully, there are a couple of ways that one can go about addressing that rather easily

• Tektonics.org Bible apologetics and education

• New Evidence the Gospels were Based on Eyewitness Accounts - bethinking.org

• Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness

• How Do we know that Jesus prayed alone in the Garden? Bible.org

• Theology Network - Biblical Studies - The Historical Reliability of Mark's Gospel

• Lecture by Dr. Peter Williams - New Evidences the Gospels were Based on Eyewitness Accounts

• theologia perennis: The Armchair Theologian: Scripting Jesus: The Gospels in Rewrite

When I read Matthew 17 and wondered "How did someone know exactly what Peter said when asking for some tents to be made for Elijah or Moses and Jesus?" or how they were able to record what were meant to be private events at the time, one thought that came to mind was that someone was probably looking on from a distance (for a point of humor) - possibly one of the other disciples who followed along (like Matthew). Of course, the other was that the disciples told the events afterward to the others and they shared it later on. And on other events when it comes to Christ praying in secret and it being recorded, others have noted that after his Resurrection, during the 40 days he spent conversing with / teaching his apostles and other disciples, it was the case that Jesus recounted to them many of his otherwise unknowable conversations/deeds - some of which were later recorded in the Bible and some of which weren't. It's not hard to consider in light of John 20:30-31 and John 21:25, as they point out that there were many things which Jesus said and did which are not recounted in the Bible...and with each of the Gospel Accounts, they were written for different audiences rather than seeking to be a complete biography of the life of Christ.

 

[RKO]

I have to tell you, I have asked this question a few times and never gotten as plausible an answer as the several I have gotten here.
That little thing is something I have often wondered about. Thank you all for the excellent explanations.

 

[Gxg (G²)]

I have always assumed that the portion in the gospel is the portion that the apostles heard before they fell asleep and that Christ prayed much more than that, but that portion is lost to history because they were sleeping. John is the one who writes out the entire prayer, and him being the youngest, perhaps he stayed awake longer than the old men

Good points to consider. I know the other theory others have placed forward is that John actually got the story from St. John Mark - seeing that his Gospel is the earliest and he was technically one of the people closest to the scene that not many were aware of - the young man who was following Jesus in the shadows and ran away naked when almost caught (Mark 14:40-51)...and John's Gospel was actually the last one written much later. John writing the Gospel he did last and showing in-depth what Jesus prayed may not be an indication that he was present/still awake when all others were asleep - but possibly an indication that he was able to compile more information gathered (After having a longer time to do so) and folks thinking it was him who saw the most because he called himself "the disciple Jesus loved" and tended to describe himself being closer to Jesus than the other 12 (the same man who with his brother asked for special seats with their mother beside Jesus (Matthew 20:20-28)

 

[Chesterton]

Christ also was with them, teaching them for 40 days from Pascha to Ascension, so it coulda come up then as well.

I tend to agree with this. Put yourself in the place of the disciples. Your remarkable friend and teacher, who you didn't always completely understand, has been resurrected from the dead. Wouldn't you have a lot of questions about almost everything that transpired in the last three years?

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

Well, I'm sure the fine details like what we see in the OP's citation could've either come STRAIGHT from the Holy Spirit to the Gospel-writers OR Jesus Himself could've told the apostles about it during the 40 days He was with them prior to the Ascension...