Gospels are eyewitness accounts

[mindlight]

Almost certainly not. Mark, which the other Gospels draw from, is written with a story structure that reads like intentionally constructed mythology.

Even if you believe that it is inspired by real world events, these aren't "eyewitness testimonies" to real world events. It's a story.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Actually that is complete nonsense. The gospels are written in the form of testimony.( read Richard Bauckham if you want an academic argument on this). Testimony that can be trusted because the witnesses saw what was described and because the primary eyewitnesses were still alive at the time of writing to verify the accounts. The tired old liberalism taught in secular philosophy and theology institutions is well past its sell by date having long been refuted.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Actually that is complete nonsense. The gospels are written in the form of testimony.( read Richard Bauckham if you want an academic argument on this). Testimony that can be trusted because the witnesses saw what was described and because the primary eyewitnesses were still alive at the time of writing to verify the accounts. The tired old liberalism taught in secular philosophy and theology institutions is well past its sell by date having long been refuted.

Are you saying that there is no Chiastic pattern in Mark? That's quite a claim.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Silmarien]

Even if you believe that it is inspired by real world events, these aren't "eyewitness testimonies" to real world events. It's a story.

I don't believe the Synoptics are eyewitness accounts, but why would these two things be mutually exclusive? These patterns are a part of traditional Middle Eastern storytelling (which is why I've seen them used to defend the authenticity and Jewish nature of the Gospel), and there is nothing stopping an eyewitness from retelling his or her story in a manner appropriate for the culture.

 

[Eudaimonist]

I don't believe the Synoptics are eyewitness accounts, but why would these two things be mutually exclusive? These patterns are a part of traditional Middle Eastern storytelling (which is why I've seen them used to defend the authenticity and Jewish nature of the Gospel), and there is nothing stopping an eyewitness from retelling his or her story in a manner appropriate for the culture.

Because, assuming that the story was inspired by real world events, those events would inevitably be distorted in the making of the mythology. That's not the same thing as an "eyewitness account". You can't have it both ways unless you are playing fast and loose with these concepts.

I personally think it more likely than not that it's mythology all the way down, but I'm not claiming that only that is possible. Sure, it could be a mythology based loosely on real world events, much like a movie about a Presidential assassination that doesn't explicitly tie the story to a specific President could be loosely based on knowledge of one or more previous real world assassinations.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Hawkins]

In a recent discussion an atheist raised the view that a great many modern scholars do not consider the gospels to be eyewitness testimony.

In the words of bhsmte:

"The gospels, don't claim to be eye witness accounts and they were penned by anonymous authors, decades after the supposed events they describe."

Jane_the_Bane said:

"As to the historicity of Jesus: the gospels, as religious literature written by fervent believers decades after the fact, are as unreliable a source as Mormon accounts of Joseph Smith's supposed miraculous abilities in translating golden tablets with a seeing stone (just to mention a single example)."

The settled view of the church and the one which accompanied the choosing of the canon was that the authority of these documents rests on the fact that they were direct apostolic testimony to Jesus. So this is quite a serious accusation.

Are the gospels eyewitness testimonies to the life of Jesus?

If you read Josephus' works, you may notice that not everything written down is witnessed by himself. An eyewitness account means what have been written down by a historian and to his best knowledge is ultimately from eyewitnesses.

Even our daily news are conveyed this way. Sometimes our reporters and journalists are eyewitnesses. Some other times they report a piece of news by acquiring information from eyewitnesses. This is so because humans don't have the ability to go back to confirm a past. Either the eyewitnesses to a past event write it down themselves, or a more professional reporter will write it on their behave. That's the way how humans getting to facts happened in the past (or even right now as we speak).

 

[RDKirk]

If you read Josephus' works, you may notice that not everything written down is witnessed by himself. An eyewitness account means what have been written down by a historian and to his best knowledge is ultimately from eyewitnesses.

Even our daily news are conveyed this way. Sometimes our reporters and journalists are eyewitnesses. Some other times they report a piece of news by acquiring information from eyewitnesses. This is so because humans don't have the ability to go back to confirm a past. Either the eyewitnesses to a past event write it down themselves, or a more professional reporter will write it on their behave. That's the way how humans getting to facts happened in the past (or even right now as we speak).

If we restrict reliability to only what was written by the eyewitnesses themselves, there is very little history.

 

[mindlight]

If you read Josephus' works, you may notice that not everything written down is witnessed by himself. An eyewitness account means what have been written down by a historian and to his best knowledge is ultimately from eyewitnesses.

Even our daily news are conveyed this way. Sometimes our reporters and journalists are eyewitnesses. Some other times they report a piece of news by acquiring information from eyewitnesses. This is so because humans don't have the ability to go back to confirm a past. Either the eyewitnesses to a past event write it down themselves, or a more professional reporter will write it on their behave. That's the way how humans getting to facts happened in the past (or even right now as we speak).

The genre of historical reflection was affirmed by direct experience in those times. Both Josephus and Thucydides were regarded as authoritative precisely because of their direct experience of the events they described and their nearness to sources that could affirm what they said. So Josephus for example had experience of both sides of the Jewish - Roman war and included direct testimony from key generals for instance. In the same way the gospel writers were direct witnesses or the immediate disciples of those who were and their accounts were regarded as authoritative because they could be checked by actual witnesses to the events. It is not just that there were apostles who provided the key texts but also that there was a wider network of witnesses many of them named in the gospels who would also witness and confirm testimony. Bauckmanns book on the gospels as eyewitnesses has an interesting chapter where he reviews the usage of names in the gospel accounts. He concludes that the varying patterns of gospel writers sometimes declaring a name and sometimes referring to anonymous person had to do with naming witnesses still alive at the time of writing. These witnesses were still able to testify at the time of writing to the truthfulness of the accounts in the contexts in which the gospel was being received. The gospel writers (unlike later apocalyptic writers or indeed in Muslim scholarship where fabrication seems a crucial issue) did not tend to increase the naming of individuals (with excruciating but ultimate made up details of their lives) but rather they preferred anonymous references to them except when naming them could directly affirm the authenticity of the gospel. So if you belonged to a congregation which also included the children of Simon Cyrene then it was useful to see them named in the scripture as witnesses who could confirm the events of their fathers life for instance.

 

[mindlight]

If we restrict reliability to only what was written by the eyewitnesses themselves, there is very little history.

If we fail to recognise the direct testimony of those by whom the gospels were written to Christ then we miss the authenticity and intimacy of the personal encounters which they are describing.

We do not testify to some fabricated myth of a man, as in the case of Mohammed or Buddha, but rather to a real Person with whom we can relate today and with whom the gospel writers had a direct and living face to face relationship.

 

[mindlight]

Are you saying that there is no Chiastic pattern in Mark? That's quite a claim.


eudaimonia,

Mark

No there are Chiastic patterns but that does not in any way detract from the direct witness of Peter to Christ which Mark recorded. When you tell your testimony many times you find memorable ways to say what you are saying. Add in the inspiration of the Spirit and we are looking at direct testimony that also sounds good.

 

[ananda]

If we fail to recognise the direct testimony of those by whom the gospels were written to Christ then we miss the authenticity and intimacy of the personal encounters which they are describing.

We do not testify to some fabricated myth of a man, as in the case of Mohammed or Buddha, but rather to a real Person with whom we can relate today and with whom the gospel writers had a direct and living face to face relationship.

As a Buddhist, I don't testify to the life of Buddha as a point of faith, because He - and a relationship with Him - is not the basis or requirement for my practice, or for my "salvation" (nibbana).

 

[2PhiloVoid]

In a recent discussion an atheist raised the view that a great many modern scholars do not consider the gospels to be eyewitness testimony.

In the words of bhsmte:

"The gospels, don't claim to be eye witness accounts and they were penned by anonymous authors, decades after the supposed events they describe."

Jane_the_Bane said:

"As to the historicity of Jesus: the gospels, as religious literature written by fervent believers decades after the fact, are as unreliable a source as Mormon accounts of Joseph Smith's supposed miraculous abilities in translating golden tablets with a seeing stone (just to mention a single example)."

The settled view of the church and the one which accompanied the choosing of the canon was that the authority of these documents rests on the fact that they were direct apostolic testimony to Jesus. So this is quite a serious accusation.

Are the gospels eyewitness testimonies to the life of Jesus?

Personally, I'm not even sure WHY it matters whether the Gospels are, in and of themselves, eye-witness accounts. For me it's enough to consider that they CONTAIN some kind of actual information of the past, a past that took place not too long before they were written. Considering things more from within a coherence framework rather than in a correspondence framework, it's just as feasible to me to believe that Jesus was who He said He was and did what He said He would do through the writings of those who knew somebody who knew somebody who knew the actual personage of Jesus. I'm not in need of the psychological succor that might come from being able to hold aloft in my petty little hands some gospel account that I can claim is an "eye-witness testimony"--------------as if that would just make everything super hunky-dory if it was.

Besides, even if the Gospels were in and of themselves eyewitness accounts, not many people would actually give a 'rip' (despite all the lip-service that seems to imply they would ...). Even now, we see the lack of positive reaction to what Paul says about his own "eyewitness" experiences, and a lot of people don't believe him, so I have a hard time thinking people would care that much more for a Matthew or John who also claimed to have seen "Him RISE AGAIN!!!"

 

[Silmarien]

Because, assuming that the story was inspired by real world events, those events would inevitably be distorted in the making of the mythology. That's not the same thing as an "eyewitness account". You can't have it both ways unless you are playing fast and loose with these concepts.

But an eyewitness account is not some sort of magical, perfect rendition frozen in time. Firsthand accounts do get distorted, memories do shift over time to fit with events that happened later. We are humans--reworking things that they fit into a preferred narrative is part of what we do. It isn't playing fast and loose with concepts to acknowledge this, unless you have an idealized, unrealistic impression of what an eyewitness account actually is. (Many Christians do, but that is beside the point.)

I personally think it more likely than not that it's mythology all the way down, but I'm not claiming that only that is possible. Sure, it could be a mythology based loosely on real world events, much like a movie about a Presidential assassination that doesn't explicitly tie the story to a specific President could be loosely based on knowledge of one or more previous real world assassinations.

Really? I don't find fullblown mythicism plausible at all. Amongst other problems, the Pauline Epistles do serve as a primary, contemporaneous account of the origins of the religion. Peter is very explicitly established there as a real figure and leader in the movement, and unless we think that the founder of a religion is going to purposefully paint himself in a bad light by spreading false stories about his moral failures (not really what you see in cult leaders at all), his betrayal at Gethsemane or something similar probably actually happened.

Also, Paul never really seems to focus on arguing that Jesus actually existed, which is what you would expect if his detractors were pointing out that the whole thing was bogus all the way down. It's more likely than not that mythologization occurred to one degree or another (as it did with Alexander the Great and practically every other famous figure in antiquity, since this is how ancient history worked), but viewing the core of the story as an amalgram of different characters seems to rely upon the premise that people 2000 years ago were too stupid to keep things straight.

 

[ananda]

Personally, I'm not even sure WHY it matters whether the Gospels are, in and of themselves, eye-witness accounts. For me it's enough to consider that they CONTAIN some kind of actual information of the past, a past that took place not too long before they were written. Considering things more from within a coherence framework rather than in a correspondence framework, it's just as feasible to me to believe that Jesus was who He said He was and did what He said He would do through the writings of those who knew somebody who knew somebody who knew the actual personage of Jesus...."

If belief is the central requirement of Christianity, then knowledge of "what to believe" becomes essential. If the message (e.g. gospel writings) is unclear and imprecise, then the "what to believe" becomes questionable, and brings doubt to the message of belief itself.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

If belief is the central requirement of Christianity, then knowledge of "what to believe" becomes essential. If the message (e.g. gospel writings) is unclear and imprecise, then the "what to believe" becomes questionable, and brings doubt to the message of belief itself.

Sure. I don't disagree with your point on a general level. However, when we say that we need to have some knowledge about "what" to believe, there is no specific delineator, delimitor, or even published disclaimor that guides us to know, in no uncertain terms, just what and to what extent we HAVE to have such and such theological content within our perceptions and understanding about Jesus of Nazareth in order to believe. Besides, as I've said before, the Epistemic Indicia within the Bible, or even the New Testament alone, indicate that God has His hand on at least one of several dials that control our ability to believe. It's not simply a matter of "Here's some stuff. Read it. Believe it." There's more to Christianity than just the bible. There's the actual existential living out and working out of our understanding of the contents of a non-comprehensive, and not always so clear, holy book ...

The catch-22 is that the epistemology within the N.T. seems to tells us that this is the way God intends it to be (despite what the modern Christian Fundamentalist Apologetics program tells us otherwise ...) For more on this kind of thinking, check out Myron Bradley Penner's book, The End of Apologetics.

 

[ananda]

Sure. I don't disagree with your point on a general level. However, when we say that we need to have some knowledge about "what" to believe, there is no specific delineator, delimitor, or even published disclaimor that guides us to know, in no uncertain terms, just what and to what extent we HAVE to have such and such theological content within our perceptions and understanding about Jesus of Nazareth in order to believe. Besides, as I've said before, the Epistemic Indicia within the Bible, or even the New Testament alone, indicate that God has His hand on at least one of several dials that control our ability to believe. It's not simply a matter of "Here's some stuff. Read it. Believe it." There's more to Christianity than just the bible. There's the actual existential living out and working out of our understanding of the contents of a non-comprehensive, and not always so clear, holy book ...

The catch-22 is that the epistemology within the N.T. seems to tells us that this is the way God intends it to be (despite what the modern Christian Fundamentalist Apologetics program tells us otherwise ...) For more on this kind of thinking, check out Myron Bradley Penner's book, The End of Apologetics.

Thanks for sharing. So - for you - Christianity is less about "belief", and more about "belief plus living out/works"?

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Thanks for sharing. So - for you - Christianity is less about "belief", and more about "belief plus living out/works"?

Kind of like that, but I'd say that belief is living out or working out one's understanding of Jesus as an integral aspect of the whole enterprise of personal Christian faith in existential daily life. I don't think Christianity was meant to be given to us in whole-cloth, nor that our introduction to the faith is supposed to instill within us an encounter with a plenary understanding about Jesus that automatically (magically?) buoys us up and on to spiritual success, enlightenment, confident living and/or to having some ongoing, indefatigable or undefeatable outlook-on-life.

I know, we all wish Christianity would provide that for us, and we often can find preachers who seem to promote a "one can't lose if one has real faith" approach to Christianity. But, I think that is patently false and just causes people who are trying to appropriate some significance in their lives through Christian faith to stumble, particularly since we all know the little secret ................................ "life hurts; and it can be quite confusing."

 

[mindlight]

Because, assuming that the story was inspired by real world events, those events would inevitably be distorted in the making of the mythology. That's not the same thing as an "eyewitness account". You can't have it both ways unless you are playing fast and loose with these concepts.

I personally think it more likely than not that it's mythology all the way down, but I'm not claiming that only that is possible. Sure, it could be a mythology based loosely on real world events, much like a movie about a Presidential assassination that doesn't explicitly tie the story to a specific President could be loosely based on knowledge of one or more previous real world assassinations.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Jesus himself used Chiasm for example : " The Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath" - so why should his disciples do otherwise. In some cases like the above this is a direct quote.

 

[Uber Genius]

In a recent discussion an atheist raised the view that a great many modern scholars do not consider the gospels to be eyewitness testimony.

In the words of bhsmte:

"The gospels, don't claim to be eye witness accounts and they were penned by anonymous authors, decades after the supposed events they describe."

Jane_the_Bane said:

"As to the historicity of Jesus: the gospels, as religious literature written by fervent believers decades after the fact, are as unreliable a source as Mormon accounts of Joseph Smith's supposed miraculous abilities in translating golden tablets with a seeing stone (just to mention a single example)."

The settled view of the church and the one which accompanied the choosing of the canon was that the authority of these documents rests on the fact that they were direct apostolic testimony to Jesus. So this is quite a serious accusation.

Are the gospels eyewitness testimonies to the life of Jesus?

These claims are a complete joke. Even the atheist scholars like Bart Erhman don't make this claim. The overwhelming number of scholars who are paid to research, teach, and publish on the New Testament whether they are theist or not are almost universally in agreement that authors were either eyewitnesses or recording eyewitnesses. Further the liberal scholars who reject this inference don't publish their findings in peer-reviewed journals, because (and they openly admit to this fact) their peers are claiming their research is unsubstantiated!!

The Jesus Seminar is the center-piece of junk publications. By that I mean Not Supported by The Evidence!

However if one goes to a liberal seminar one will see these professors holding high positions, and basing their findings on work and presuppositions that were discredited 60-70 years ago.

Don"t be sucked in by the spurious "Zeightgeistesque" claims of the New Atheists and their followers name by the OP.

Falsifying the data shows how desperate the New Atheists are to win the debate at the cost of intellectual integrity!

 

[mindlight]

As a Buddhist, I don't testify to the life of Buddha as a point of faith, because He - and a relationship with Him - is not the basis or requirement for my practice, or for my "salvation" (nibbana).

If the Buddha as described never existed then of what value are his teachings or accounts of attaining Nirvana. They describe things that never happened and of which noone can directly testify. Christians can refute such a lack of correspondence to reality by referring to a gospel that describes real people and events and thereby affirms what is taught as demonstrated in history. They can also refer to a direct personal relationship to the Saviour described in scripture. On both counts Jesus being a real person matters.

 

[mindlight]

Personally, I'm not even sure WHY it matters whether the Gospels are, in and of themselves, eye-witness accounts. For me it's enough to consider that they CONTAIN some kind of actual information of the past, a past that took place not too long before they were written. Considering things more from within a coherence framework rather than in a correspondence framework, it's just as feasible to me to believe that Jesus was who He said He was and did what He said He would do through the writings of those who knew somebody who knew somebody who knew the actual personage of Jesus. I'm not in need of the psychological succor that might come from being able to hold aloft in my petty little hands some gospel account that I can claim is an "eye-witness testimony"--------------as if that would just make everything super hunky-dory if it was.

Besides, even if the Gospels were in and of themselves eyewitness accounts, not many people would actually give a 'rip' (despite all the lip-service that seems to imply they would ...). Even now, we see the lack of positive reaction to what Paul says about his own "eyewitness" experiences, and a lot of people don't believe him, so I have a hard time thinking people would care that much more for a Matthew or John who also claimed to have seen "Him RISE AGAIN!!!"

A lot of twentieth century doubt, scepticism and unbelief is founded on the liberal notion of distance. The idea is that the New Testament is concocted rather than descriptive and can be ignored with the same gusto as one would an advertiser or Hollywood film producer with a dubious message. The essential nearness of the testimony to the reality it described compares with the output of apocalyptic literature in the day and today with a media and news industry that has lost its moral anchor and which is no longer honest to God.

But yes there were direct witnesses and even recipients of miracles who never grasped who was healing them ( eg the account of the 10 lepers). So even having established the authenticity of the testimony to Christ - people will still ignore it.