Gospel Sources Partly Written and Contemporary with witnesses?

[Longfellow]

Well I believe He did, because I accept the testimonies of the disciples and the evangelists. To me, it's their experience of meeting and walking with Christ (and that includes Paul).

I accept the evangelists are anonymous, and perhaps writing at a one-step remove. I accept that they added and embellished, their their narratives follow the pattern of mythic narratives of the day, they they sit comfortably in GrecoRoman literature. That Paul was deeply influenced by Jewish Merkabah Mysticism. But I see no reason to assume that diminishes the Message, or that he, or they, got it wrong.

They all got it differently, but they're all essentially right.

I'm not against you, I'm just trying to point out that while your thesis is credible, it lacks credibility and, based on the fact that there's no evidence to support it, there's no reason why anyone should entertain it as anything other than your version of what could have happened.

Again, I'm thinking that I might have grievously miscommunicated to you what this discussion is all about for me. See my latest post in Non-Christian Follower of Jesus.

 

[Thomas]

Hi Longfellow —

Trying to narrow in on the broader issue.

... that disciples in the time of Jesus wrote notes, and that those were copied into collections that were faithfully recopied until they were used as sources for the gospels, is an imaginary scenario with very little documentation for it ...

There's no firm evidence that supports it, so scholarship cannot really make a claim based on 'what could have been'. Generally, the view is, in the absence of evidence, it remains an open question.

Imagining that gospels were copied from each other, with or without some parts from a lost source, is also an imaginary scenario, with zero documentation for it, and requiring endlessly changing convoluted explanations for the contradictions that it generates.

No, that's not the case, really. The claims rest on the 'internal evidence' of the Gospels, there's nothing convoluted about it.

Even if working from notes taken down at the time, the same 'contradictions' and 'convolutions' would be there.

 

[Longfellow]

I made a mistake mixing up the question of when and how the gospels were written with the question of how much in them is witness testimony.

People were calling Jesus a master teacher, his followers were calling themselves disciples, and people were comparing them to disciples of other teachers. The burden of proof is on anyone who claims that the disciples of Jesus did not write notes, recopy them, and use them in the same ways that disciples of other teachers did. Over a year or more, Jesus would have repeated his public talks and private lessons more than once. There would be notes from different disciples writing about the same occasions and about different occasions. For example, Jesus might have given the same talk once on a hill and once not on a hill, with exactly the same similarities and differences that we see in the gospels. He would have repeated the same parables many times, in different ways, with exactly the same similarities and differences that we see in the gospels. Whenever and however the gospels were written, each one would have copied from a different collection of notes. That would explain all the similarities and differences that scholars have tried to explain as parts of one gospel being copied from another.

 

[Thomas]

The burden of proof is on anyone who claims that the disciples of Jesus did not write notes, recopy them, and use them in the same ways that disciples of other teachers did.

No, the burden of proof is on you to produce evidence to support your thesis.

Criticising other theories is not proof of your own.

There would be notes from different disciples writing about the same occasions and about different occasions.

I hate to keep beating the same drum, but repeating a supposition enough times does not make it a fact.

The source-theory hypotheses rest on interpretations of the evidence.

Your notes hypothesis rests on an assumption.

Scholarship can't proceed on the basis of assumptions – if that were the case, we'd all believe that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were the actual authors of their Gospels, and the first and fourth were eye-witness disciples, two of the Twelve.

For example, Jesus might have given the same talk once on a hill and once not on a hill, with exactly the same similarities and differences that we see in the gospels.

I'm sure He did.

Whenever and however the gospels were written, each one would have copied from a different collection of notes. That would explain all the similarities and differences that scholars have tried to explain as parts of one gospel being copied from another.

No, it really doesn't, old friend. Sorry, but there it is.

 

[Longfellow]

In case anyone is wondering, I haven’t finished with this, and I have some new thoughts about it after reading what the fathers said about it and thinking about it some more. I’m taking break for a week.

I changed my mind about the burden of proof being on anyone who claims that the disciples didn’t write notes. There isn’t as much documentation as I thought for disciples of other teachers in that place and time writing notes.

 

[Carlos]

Nothing else besides what we see in the NT and other early writings, if that's what you mean. To spell it out a little more, I'm thinking that in Capernaum where he lived, and among the many other disciples besides the twelve, and in the crowds that came to hear him, there would have been people taking notes and writing letters and teaching aids, just like in any other teaching network. Those would have survived long enough to be the Q, L, M and other sources that scholars are imagining. If you have some reasons for thinking that didn't happen, I'm interested.

Let's live his life for a minute.

He is from the tribe of Benjamin and a pharisee when is about belief.

He, as assumed, assisted to the Temple or a synagogue on Sabbath.

The "service" was the reading of portions of the scriptures. No preaching.

Suddenly, the synagogue started to be visited by lots of gentiles. And the number of them was increasing each following week.

This increase of new visitors to the synagogues was caused because the advise of the Apostles. It happened that Jews who became followers of Jesus teaching started to tell the gentiles that they must get circumcised because otherwise they won't be considered to be inside the promises. Discrepancies increased because the argument made about circumcision and both sides went to the apostles to hear what they have to say about it.

The apostles weren't the new priests, their mission wasn't to read the Torah portion every Sabbath, they were told to announce the good news, that's all. Just look Peter trying to read the Torah when he was just an illiterate fisherman.

So, after having a meeting, they came out with a sure solution: to tell them to abstain of idolatry and other rules, but for the new converters to visit the synagogues on Sabbath to listen and learn the Law. (The bible says " listen Moses" but implies the Law).

And the converted gentiles started visiting the synagogues to learn the origin of that religion, the books of Genesis and more, because there weren't available libraries, books and similar to learn the Torah but going to the specified centers of meeting.

Then, synagogues started to be full of converted Jews and gentiles who were interchanging their views and learning about the scriptures and what Jesus said, the good news.

Lots of Jews weren't happy to see those new converters to the good news inside their synagogues.

Here is when Saul decided to make the first Crusade registered in history. He wanted synagogues to be free of new converters. The priests gave green light to persecute and kill those new converted, specially the Jews ones. For them a clean up was necessary.

But this was not pure fanaticism.

Saul had to learn what the new converters believed. In other words, Saul learned a lot about the new religious tendency that -according to him- infiltrated inside the synagogues. This is very common, to know well the enemy.

Then, Saul wasn't persecuting converted Jews and gentiles in the streets but in synagogues.

This is the Saul before his conversion.

By the way, this is my point of view, if you read the same educated guess scenario from above in another place, it must be a copy of this point of view written by me here but some decades ago online.

 

[Longfellow]

I was overreacting to the possibility that what Jesus says and does in the gospels is mostly what some disciples thought they saw and heard, almost as if in their own words. I was forgetting the limitations of written communication, and how much can be lost in translation. What matters the most for spiritual purposes can’t be transmitted only in writing.

Random thoughts:

- There isn't as much documentation as I thought for disciples of Jewish teachers at the beginning of the first century writing notes. For Jesus, we only have the word of a few church leaders about Mark writing notes about the teachings of Peter, and Matthew writing a list of sayings. Nothing about any notes being used for Luke or John.

- Some kinds of oral transmission are more accurate than others, and different kinds are accurate in different ways. There might be some good documentation for Pharisees at the beginning of the first century practicing an accurate kind of oral transmission. People thought of Jesus as being the same kind of teacher as the Pharisees had, so he would have attracted at least a few people who would practice that kind of oral transmission.

- The best reasons for thinking that disciples wrote notes might be in the writings of Michael Bird. One point that he makes is that the most accurate kinds of oral transmission include written memory aids whenever that ws possible.

- Taking some statements of early church leaders at their word, it looks like this to me: Matthew wrote a list of sayings during the time when Peter and Mark were teaching in Rome. Mark started writing notes during that time, and used those to write and distribute a story after Peter died. Luke's investigation would have included reading Matthew's list and possibly even Mark's notes, and maybe both gospels. All the reasons for late dating the gospels look fallacious to me. I was favoring late dating because I mistakenly thought that there were actual reasons for it. I still think that there were always written notebooks from the beginning, but that has little or no relevance to how much in the gospels is what some disciples in the time of Jesus thought they saw and heard.