:: wikimiki.org ::

Joseph Of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea, according to the Gospels, was the man who donated his own prepared tomb for the burial of Jesus after his crucifixion. A native of Arimathea, he was apparently a man of wealth, and a member of the Sanhedrin (which is the way bouleutes, literally "senator", is interpreted in Matthew 27:57 and Luke 23:50). Joseph was an "honourable counsellor, who waited (or "was searching" which is not the same thing) for the kingdom of God" (Mark, 15:43). As soon as he heard the news of Jesus' death, he "went in boldly" (literally "having summoned courage, he went") "unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus." Pilate, who was reassured by a centurion that the death had really taken place, allowed Joseph's request. Joseph immediately purchased fine linen (Mark 15:46) and proceeded to Golgotha to take the body down from the cross. There, assisted by Nicodemus, he took the body and wrapped it in the fine linen, sprinkling it with the myrrh and aloes which Nicodemus had brought (John 19:39). The body was then conveyed to a new tomb that had been hewn for Joseph himself out of a rock in his garden nearby. There they laid it, in the presence of Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of Jesus, and other women, and rolled a great stone to the entrance, and departed (Luke 23:53, 55). This was done speedily, "for the Sabbath was drawing on". Thus was fulfilled Isaiah's prediction that the grave of the Messiah would be with a rich man (Isaiah 53:9). The skeptical tradition, which reads the various fulfillments of prophecies in the life of Jesus as inventions designed for that purpose, reads Joseph of Arimathea as a meme created to fulfill this prophecy in Isaiah. With this in mind, it is worth quoting the passage from Isaiah, chapter 53, the "man of sorrows" passage, because so much of the meaningfulness of Joseph of Arimathea hinges upon these prophetic words: :He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. The Greek Septuagint text is not quite the same: :And I will give the wicked for his burial, and the rich for his death; for he practised no iniquity, nor craft with his mouth. In the Qumran community's Great Isaiah Scroll, dated at ca 100 BC the words are not identical to the Masoretic text: :And they gave wicked ones his grave and [a scribbled word, probably accusative sign "eth"] rich ones in his death although he worked no violence neither deceit in his mouth. Is the "Man of Sorrows" assigned a shameful grave with the rich and wicked? Or are the wicked and rich given his grave? The question cannot be resolved simply from the three parallel surviving manuscript traditions.

Historical development

Since the 2nd century a mass of legendary details has accumulated around the figure of Joseph of Arimathea in addition to the New Testament references. Joseph is also referenced in apocryphal and non-canonical accounts such as the Acts of Pilate given the medieval title Gospel of Nicodemus and The Narrative of Joseph. Early church historians such as Irenaeus (AD 125-1890), Hippolytus (AD 170-236), Tertullian (AD 155-222), Eusebius (AD 260-340) added details not in the canonical accounts. Hilary of Poitiers (AD 300-367) enriched the legend. St. John Chrysostom (C.E. 347-407), the Patriarch of Constantinople, wrote in Homilies of St. John Chrysostum on the Gospel of John that Joseph was likely one of the seventy appointed in [http://bible.gospelcom.net/passage/?search=Luke%2010:1-37&version=31 Luke 10]. During the late 12th century, Joseph became connected with the Arthurian cycle as the first keeper of the Holy Grail. This idea first appears in Robert de Boron's Joseph d'Arimathie, in which Joseph receives the Grail from an apparition of Jesus and sends it with his followers to Britain; it is elaborated upon in Boron's sequels and in later Arthurian works. Later retellings of the story contend that Joseph of Arimathea himself travelled to Britain and became the first (or at least an early) bishop of Christianity, and one version, popular during the Romantic period, even claims Joseph had taken Jesus to the island as a boy. This was the inspiration for William Blake's mystical hymn Jerusalem.

Christian interpretations

Joseph's actions are taken by the authors of the Gospel Passion narratives to be a fulfillment of Isaiah's prediction that the grave of the Messiah would be with a rich man (Isaiah 53:9), though sceptics interpret Joseph of Arimathea as a meme created to fulfil this prophetic interpretation of Isaiah 53, the "man of sorrows" passage. Biblical text amplifies both the Characteristics of Joseph, and the involvement he had with the burial of Christ. According to Dwight Moody in Bible Characters (p. 115ff) seldom is anything mentioned by all four Evangelists. If something is mentioned by Matthew and Mark, it is often omitted by Luke and John. However in the case of Joseph of Arimathea, he and his actions are mentioned by all four writers: [http://bible.gospelcom.net/passage/?search=Matthew%2027:57-66;&version=9 Matthew 27:57-60], [http://bible.gospelcom.net/passage/?search=Mark%2015:42-47;&version=9 Mark 15:43-46], [http://bible.gospelcom.net/passage/?search=Luke%2023:50-55;&version=9 Luke 23:50-55] and [http://bible.gospelcom.net/passage/?search=John%2019:38-42;&version=9 John 19:38-42].

Gospel of Nicodemus

The medieval Gospel of Nicodemus provides additional details. After Joseph asked for the body of Christ from Pilate, and prepared the body with Nicodemus' help, Christ's body was delivered to a new tomb, we learn, that Joseph had built for himself. In Gospel of Nicodemus, the Jewish elders are represented as expressing anger at Joseph for burying the body of Christ in the following exchange: :And likewise Joseph also stepped out and said to them: Why are you angry against me because I begged the body of Jesus? Behold, I have put him in my new tomb, wrapping in clean linen; and I have rolled a stone to the door of the tomb. And you have acted not well against the just man, because you have not repented of crucifying him, but also have pierced him with a spear.(Gospel of Nicodemus, Translated by Alexander Walker). The Jewish elders then captured Joseph, and imprisoned him, and placed a seal on the door to his cell after first posting a guard. Joseph warned the elders; :The Son of God whom you hanged upon the cross, is able to deliver me out of your hands. All your wickedness will return upon you.. Once the elders returned to the cell, the seal was still in place, but Joseph was gone. The elders later discover that Joseph had returned to Arimathea. Having a change in heart, the elders desired to have a more civil conversation with Joseph about his actions and sent a letter of apology to him by means of seven of his friends. Joseph travelled back from Arimathea to Jerusalem to meet with the elders, where they questioned by them about his escape. He told them this story; :On the day of the Preparation, about the tenth hour, you shut me in, and I remained there the whole Sabbath in full. And when midnight came, as I was standing and praying, the house where you shut me in was hung up by the four corners, and there was a flashing of light in mine eyes. And I fell to the ground trembling. Then some one lifted me up from the place where I had fallen, and poured over me an abundance of water from the head even to the feet, and put round my nostrils the odour of a wonderful ointment, and rubbed my face with the water itself, as if washing me, and kissed me, and said to me, Joseph, fear not; but open thine eyes, and see who it is that speaks to thee. And looking, I saw Jesus; and being terrified, I thought it was a phantom. And with prayer and the commandments I spoke to him, and he spoke with me. And I said to him: Art thou Rabbi Elias? And he said to me: I am not Elias. And I said: Who art thou, my Lord? And he said to me: I am Jesus, whose body thou didst beg from Pilate, and wrap in clean linen; and thou didst lay a napkin on my face, and didst lay me in thy new tomb, and roll a stone to the door of the tomb. Then I said to him that was speaking to me: Show me, Lord, where I laid thee. And he led me, and showed me the place where I laid him, and the linen which I had put on him, and the napkin which I had wrapped upon his face; and I knew that it was Jesus. And he took hold of me with his hand, and put me in the midst of my house though the gates were shut, and put me in my bed, and said to me: Peace to thee! And he kissed me, and said to me: For forty days go not out of thy house; for, lo, I go to my brethren into Galilee. (Gospel of Nicodemus, Translated by Alexander Walker) According to the Gospel of Nicodemus, Joseph testified to the Jewish elders, and specifically to Chief priest Caiaphas and Annas that Jesus had risen from the dead and ascended to heaven and he indicated that others were raised from the dead at the resurrection of Christ (repeating Matt 27:52-53). He specifically identified the two sons of the high-priest Simeon (again in Luke 2:25-35). The elders Annas, Caiaphas, Nicodemus, and Joseph himself, along with Gamaliel under whom Paul studied, travelled to Arimathea to interview Simeon's sons Charinus and Lenthius.

Other Medieval texts

Medieval interest in Joseph centred around two themes;
- i. Joseph is portrayed as the founder of British Christianity (even before it had taken hold in Rome).
- ii. Joseph is thought to be the original guardian of the Holy Grail.

Legendary Accounts: First Century Evangelist?

Of the two 'legends' surrounding Joseph, the idea that he founded the Celtic Church had more support from early church writers, though most modern scholars are sceptical. Tertullian (AD 155-222) wrote in [http://www.tertullian.org/anf/anf03/anf03-19.htm#P2021_691723 Adversus Judaeos] that Britain had already received and accepted the Gospel in his life time, writing; :..all the limits of the Spains, and the diverse nations of the Gauls, and the haunts of the Britons--inaccessible to the Romans, but subjugated to Christ. Tertullian doesn't say how the Gospel came to Britain before AD 222. However Eusebius, (C.E. 260-340) Bishop of Caesarea and father of Ecclesiastical History wrote in [http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/eusebius_de_05_book3.htm Demonstratio Evangelica Bk. 3]; :The Apostles passed beyond the ocean to the isles called the Britannic Isles. [http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF2-09/Npnf2-09-03.htm St. Hilary of Pottiers] (C.E. 300-376) also wrote (Tract XIV, Ps 8) that the Apostles had built churches and that the Gospel had passed into Britain and this claim is echoed by [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08452b.htm St. John] Chrysostom (C.E. 347-407), the Patriarch of Constantinople in Chrysostomo Orat. O Theos Xristos; :The British Isles which are beyond the sea, and which lie in the ocean, have received virtue of the Word. Churches are there found and altars erected ... Though thou shouldst go to the ocean, to the British Isles, there though shouldst hear all men everywhere discoursing matters out of the scriptures, with another voice indeed, but not another faith, with a different tongue, but the same judgement. [http://www.ccel.org/ccel/wace/biodict.h.html?term=hippolytus+romanus Hippolytus] (AD 170-236), considered to have been one of the most learned Christian historians, identifies the seventy whom Jesus sent in Luke 10, and includes Aristobulus listed in Romans 16:10 with Joseph and states that he ended up becoming a Pastor in Britain. This is further argued by St. Hilary of Pottiers in Tract XIV, Ps 8. These earliest references to Christianity’s arrival in Britain resulted in interest and later research by Medieval writers who wanted to explain these references. [http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/encyc09.rabanus_hrabanus_rhabanus_maurus.html Rabanus Maurus] (AD 766-856), Archbishop of Mayence states in Life of Mary Magdalene that Joseph of Arimathea was sent to Britain, and he goes on to detail who travelled with him as far as France, claiming that he was accompanied by; :the two Bethany sisters, Mary and Martha, Lazarus (who was raised from the dead), St. Eutropius, St. Salome, St. Cleon, St. Saturnius, St. Mary Magdalen, Marcella (the maid of the Bethany sisters), St. Maxium or Maximin, St. Martial, and St. Trophimus or Restitutus. An authentic copy of the Maurus text is housed in the Bodeian Library of Oxford University. [http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/medieval/mss/laud.htm manuscripts] [http://cfp.english.upenn.edu/archive/Medieval/0183.html MSS Laud 108 of the Bodleian]. Maurus describes their voyage to Britain; :Leaving the shores of Asia and favoured by an east wind, they went round about, down the Tyrrhenian Sea, between Europe and Africa, leaving the city of Rome and all the land to the right. Then happily turning their course to the right, they came near to the city of Marseilles, in the Viennoise province of the Gauls, where the river Rhone is received by the sea. There, having called upon God, the great King of all the world, they parted; each company going to the province where the Holy Spirit directed them; presently preaching everywhere ... His claim is that Joseph, Mary and others followed the well-known Phoenician trade route to Britain as described by Diodorus Siculus. [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02304b.htm] Cardinal Caesar Baronius (C.E. 1538-1609), Vatican Librarian and historian, recorded this voyage by Joseph of Arimathea, Lazarus, Mary Magdalene, Martha, Marcella and others in his Annales Ecclesiatici, volume 1, section 35. Many of the details repeated by medieval writers were originally recorded in Historia de Rebus Brittannicis by a 6th century Welsh bard, Maelgwn (aka Melkin or Melchinus). Maelgwn's work was well known to Medieval writers but was destroyed when the Abbey at Glastonbury burned in 1184 AD.
Legendary Accounts: The Holy Grail
According to legend it was Joseph who, was given responsibility over the Holy Grail, the cup into which the blood of Jesus flowed during his Crucifixion. This association Joseph had with the Grail is not the same as the 'modern' Grail of Arthurian legends, as the earliest writers who mention Joseph do not mention “King Arthur”, rather the association that Joseph had with the Grail was based upon the tradition that when Joseph came to Britain he brought with him a wooden cup used in the Last Supper, and two cruets, one holding the blood of Christ, and the other sweat from Jesus, washed from his wounded body on the Cross. This legend is the source of the Grail claim by the [http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/arthur/nanteos.html Nanteous cup] on display in the museum in Aberystwyth, however it should be noted that there is no references to this tradition in ancient or medieval text. The significance of the tradition that Joseph brought the Gospel to Britain, is that it gave rise to the claim that he also brought with him 'Holy Relics'. Therefore, this tradition explains his association with the Holy Grail, and therefore helps also to explain how he became connected to the legendary figure Arthur. John of Glastonbury (AD 1393-1464) claims King Arthur was descended from Joseph, listing the following imaginative pedigree through King Arthur's mother; :Helaius, Nepos Joseph, Genuit Josus, Josue Genuit Aminadab, Aminadab Genuit Filium, qui Genuit Ygernam, de qua Rex Pen-Dragon, Genuit Nobilem et Famosum Regum Arthurum, per Quod Patet, Quod Rex Arthurus de Stirpe Joseph descendit. It should also be noted that by 1393, when John of Glastonbury was writing, Grail and Aurthurian legends were already fairly developed and Arthur already a popular figure, and so this lineage may have resulted from an attempt to connect the two, and it can be found in no other source. Regardless, the implication was not lost on later writers who picked up on the suggested connection and developed the theme; by right of descent, a relic of importance claimed to have been brought by Joseph to Britain, fell into the hands of King Arthur though inheritance. No sources earlier than John of Glastonbury's chronicles provide this same lineage but the connection between King Arthur and Grail persists.
Legendary Accounts: The flowering staff
The mytheme of the staff that Joseph of Arimathea set in the ground at Galstonbury, which broke into leaf and flower as the Glastonbury Thorn is a common miracle in hagiography. Such a miracle is told of the Anglo-Saxon saint Etheldreda: :"Continuing her flight to Ely, Etheldreda halted for some days at Alfham, near Wintringham, where she founded a church; and near this place occurred the "miracle of her staff." Wearied with her journey, she one day slept by the wayside, having fixed her staff in the ground at her head. On waking she found the dry staff had burst into leaf; it became an ash tree, the "greatest tree in all that country;" and the place of her rest, where a church was afterwards built, became known as 'Etheldredestow.'" (King 1862)
- Richard John King, 1862. Handbook of the Cathedrals of England (Oxford) ([http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Great_Britain/England/_Topics/churches/_Texts/KINCAT
- /Ely/2.html On-line text])
Arimathea
:Main article: Arimathea. Arimathea itself is not otherwise documented, though it was "a city of Judea" according to Luke (xxiii, 51). Arimathea is usually identified with either Ramleh or Ramathaim-Zophim, where David came to Samuel (1 Samuel chapter 19). The fortunate appearance of this man coming from Arimathea, a place that was all but lost in history, would have been deeply impressive to the 1st century listeners hearing the story of the Crucifixion. To find a parallel resonance in the English-speaking tradition, it would be somewhat as if a helper in need turned up who was from Camelot. The Catholic Encyclopedia asserts that "the additional details which are found concerning him in the apocryphal Acta Pilati, are unworthy of credence." (For details on this source for the expanded Joseph of Arimathea legend, see Acts of Pilate.) "Likewise fabulous is the legend" continues the Catholic Encyclopedia that Joseph of Arimathea was the uncle of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and a merchant involved in the tin trade with Britain who took Jesus to England at some time in his life. After the Crucifixion, around the year AD 63, he was said to have returned to England as one of the first Christian missionaries to visit the country. He carried the Holy Grail with him, concealing it somewhere in the vicinity of Glastonbury Tor for safekeeping when he established the first church in the British Isles, which developed into Glastonbury Abbey. When Joseph set his walking staff on the ground to sleep, it miraculously took root, leafed out, and blossomed as the "Glastonbury thorn". There is little historical substance for any of this legend, but its retelling did encourage the pilgrimage trade at Glastonbury until the Abbey was dissolved in 1539, at the English Reformation. More information about the debate about the suggested connection of Joseph of Arimathea with Britain can be found in Celtic Christianity. Author [http://www.ancientmanuscripts.com/ Glenn Kimball] further links the arrival, in Britain, of Joseph of Arimathea by 63 AD to the revolt of Boudica in England at nearly precisely that time (61 AD).
References

- Moody, Dwight Lyman. 1997. Moody’s Bible Characters Come Alive. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books. 115 p. ISBN 0520043928
External links

- [http://www.britannia.com/history/biographies/joseph.html A Biography of Joseph of Arimathea]
- [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08520a.htm Catholic Encyclopedia 1908: "Joseph of Arimathea"]
- [http://www.ao.net/~fmoeller/qa-tran.htm#c44 Qumran text of Isaiah 53] Category:Saints

Gospels
:For the genre of Christian-themed music, see gospel music. In Christianity, gospel means "good news". The word gospel derives from the Old English word for "good news", a translation of the Greek word ευαγγέλιον, evangelion. Gospel has generally been used in three ways: #To denote the proclamation of God's saving activity in Jesus of Nazareth or to denote the message proclaimed by Jesus of Nazareth. This is the original New Testament usage (see Romans 1.1 or Mark 1.1). #More popularly to refer to the four canonical gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) and sometimes other non-canonical works (eg. Gospel of Thomas), that offer a narrative of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Some modern scholars have used the term to denote a hypothetical genre of Early Christian literature (cf. Peter Stuhlmacher, ed., Das Evangelium und die Evangelien, Tůbingen 1983, also in English: The Gospel and the Gospels). The expression "gospel" was used by Paul before the literary Gospels of the New Testament canon had been produced, when he reminded the men of the church at Corinth "of the gospel I preached to you" (1 Corinthians 15.1) through which, Paul averred, they were being saved, and he characterized it in the simplest terms, emphasizing Christ's appearances after the Resurrection (15.3 – 8): :"...that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the [Hebrew] scriptures; that he was buried; that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures; that he appeared to Kephas, then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at once, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. After that he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one born abnormally, he appeared to me." The use of gospel (or its Greek equivalent evangelion) to denote a particular genre of writing dates to the 2nd century. It was clearly used to denote a genre in Justin Martyr (c. 155) and more ambiguously so earlier in Ignatius of Antioch (c. 117).
Canonical Gospels
Of the many gospels written in antiquity, exactly four gospels came to be accepted as part of the New Testament, or canonical. An insistence upon a canonical four, and no others, was a central theme of Irenaeus of Lyons, c. 185. In his central work, Adversus Haereses Irenaeus denounced various Christian groups that used only one gospel, such as Aramaic Matthew, as well as groups that embraced the texts of new revelations, such as the Valentinians (A.H. 1.11.9). Irenaeus declared that the four he espoused were the four pillars of the Church: "it is not possible that there can be either more or fewer than four" he stated, presenting as logic the analogy of the four corners of the earth and the four winds (1.11.8). His image, taken from Ezekiel 1, of God's throne borne by four creatures with four faces—"the four had the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side: and the four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face of an eagle"— equivalent to the "four-formed" gospel, is the origin of the conventional symbols of the Evangelists: lion, bull, eagle, man. Irenaeus was successful in declaring that the four gospels collectively, and exclusively these four, contained the truth. By reading each gospel in light of the others, Irenaeus made of John a lens through which to read Matthew, Mark and Luke.
- Gospel according to Matthew
- Gospel according to Mark
- Gospel according to Luke
- Gospel according to John
Origin of the canonical Gospels
:Main discussion: Synoptic problem. Among the canonical Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke include many of the same passages in the life of Jesus and sometimes use identical or very similar wording. John expresses itself in a different style and relates the same incidents in a different way— even in a revised narrative order— and is often full of more encompassing theological and philosophical messages than the first three canonical Gospel accounts. It is John that explicitly introduces Jesus as God incarnate. (The non-canonical Gospel of Peter reports much of the same material as canonical Matthew, Mark and Luke; and the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas reports many of the same sayings of Jesus.) The parallels among the first three Gospel accounts are so telling that many scholars have investigated the relationship between them. In order to study them more closely, German scholar JJ Griesbach (1776) arranged the first three Gospel accounts in a three-column table called a synopsis. As a result, Matthew, Mark, and Luke have come to be known as the synoptic Gospels; and the question of the reason for this similarity, and the relationship between these Gospel accounts more generally, is known as the Synoptic Problem. The understanding found among early Christian writers and scholars has been that the first account of the Gospel to be committed to writing was that according to Matthew, the second Luke, followed by Mark and the final one John; and this order is defended today by proponents of the "Two-Gospel Hypothesis". However, since the Enlightenment scholars have been proposing also many other solutions to the Synoptic Problem; and the dominant view today is that Mark is the first Gospel, with Matthew and Luke borrowing passages both from that Gospel and from at least one other common source, lost to history, termed by scholars 'Q' (from German: Quelle, meaning source. This view is known as the "Two Source Hypothesis". The related "Four Source Hypothesis" maintains that Matthew and Luke also had independent sources, termed by scholars M and L. Another theory which addresses the synoptic problem is the Farrer Hypothesis. This theory maintains Markan priority (that Mark was written first) and dispenses with the need for a theoretical document Q. What Austin Farrer has argued is that Luke used Matthew as a source as well as Mark, explaining the similarities between them without having to refer to a hypothetical document. Estimates for the dates when the canonical Gospel accounts were written vary significantly; and the evidence for any of the dates is scanty. Conservative scholars tend to date earlier than others. The following are mostly the date ranges given by the late Raymond E. Brown, in his book An Introduction to the New Testament, as representing the general scholarly consensus in 1996:
- Matthew: c. 70–100 as the majority view, with conservative scholars arguing for a pre-70 date, particularly if they do not accept Mark as the first gospel written.
- Mark: c. 68–73
- Luke: c. 80–100, with most arguing for somewhere around 85
- John: c. 90–110. Brown does not give a consensus view for John, but these are dates as propounded by C K Barrett, among others. The majority view is that it was written in stages, so there was no one date of composition. The general consensus among biblical scholars is that all four canonical Gospels were originally written in Greek, the lingua franca of the Roman Orient. On the strength of an early commentator it has been suggested that Matthew may have originally been written in Aramaic, and was known to Church fathers as the Gospel of the Hebrews, or that it was translated from Aramaic to Greek with corrections based on Mark. Regardless, no Aramaic original texts of the Gospel accounts have ever been found, only later translations from the Greek (see Peshitta).
Non-canonical gospels
:Main article: New Testament apocrypha. In addition to the four canonical gospels there have been other gospels that were not accepted into the canon. Some of these works appear to be later compositions than the canonical gospels, and as such were only ever accepted by small portions of the early Christian community. Some of the content of these non-canonical gospels (as much as it deviates from accepted theological norms) is considered heretical by the leadership of mainstream churches, including the Vatican. The two earliest non-canonical gospels are the sayings Gospel of Thomas and the narrative Gospel of Peter. A genre of "Infancy gospels" (Greek: protoevangelion) arose in the 2nd century, such as the Gospel of James, which introduces the concept of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary, and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas (not to be confused with the sayings Gospel of Thomas), both of which related many miraculous incidents from the life of Mary and the childhood of Jesus that are not included in the canonical gospels, but which have passed into Christian lore. Another genre that has been suppressed is that of gospel harmonies, in which the apparent discrepancies in the canonical four gospels were selectively recast to present a harmoniously consistent narrative text. Very few fragments of harmonies survived. The Diatessaron was such a harmonization, compiled by Tatian around AD 175. It was popular for at least two centuries in Syria, but eventually it fell into disuse, and no copies of it have survived, except indirectly in some medieval Gospel harmonies that can be considered its descendants. Marcion of Sinope, c. AD 150, produced his own edition of the Gospel of Luke in accordance with his dualistic belief in two different gods, the compassionate God of Christ and the cruel God of the Old Testament. Specifically, he removed those parts of Luke that he considered too "Jewish". He also rejected all other gospels. The existence of private knowledge, briefly referred to in the canon, is part of the contention surrounding the Secret Gospel of Mark.
List of non-canonical ("apocryphal") Gospels
Some Gospels that were not eventually included in the canon are similar in style and content to the canonical Gospels. Others are "sayings gospels", as lost Q is supposed to have been. Still others are Gnostic in style and content, presenting a very different view of Jesus' teaching. Gospels that were not accepted, which form part of the New Testament Apocrypha, include:
- Gospel of Thomas
- Gospel of Philip
- Gospel of Peter
- Gospel of Mary
- Gospel of the Egyptians
- Gospel of the Hebrews
- Gospel of James
- Gospel of Judas
- See also the mistaken "Gospel of Hermes". Other works claiming to be gospels have surfaced in later periods. The Gospel of Barnabas originated in the medieval period. Works from the modern period (sometimes called modern apocrypha) include the Aquarian Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Life of Issa. Parts of the Book of Mormon can also be considered to be a gospel, since they purport to tell of Jesus' appearances on the American continent. There also works that do not purport to be revealed but are titled "gospel" anyway:
- The Gospel According to Jesus Christ by José Saramago
Liturgical usage
In many Christian churches, all Christians present stand when a passage from one of the Gospels is read publicly, and sit when a passage from a different part of the Bible is read. The reading of the Gospels, often contained in a liturgical edition containing only the four Gospels, is traditionally done by a minister or priest, and in many traditions is brought into the midst of the congregation to be read.
Usage in Eastern Orthodoxy liturgy
liturgy The Gospel book, usually decorated in an elaborate metal cover, is normally kept in a central place on the altar. The only things that are permitted to occupy this place on the altar are the chalice and discos for the celebration of the Eucharist or, on certain feasts, a Cross. During the Little Entrance, the Gospel is carried from the altar, through the nave of the church, and back into the altar. For the Gospel reading itself, the Gospel is brought from the altar to the ambo, and afterwards returned to its place. A Gospel passage is read in the Divine Liturgy on every Sunday or feast, and at daily services during the week. The reading is determined according to the annual liturgical calendar. (If a feast falls on a Sunday, the reading for that feast will often be included after or in place of the Sunday reading.) The cycle of readings begins with Pascha and the Pentecostarion (between Pascha and Pentecost), continues with the Sundays after Pentecost, and concludes with the Lenten Triodion and Holy Week. The number of Sundays from one Pascha to the next varies from year to year; in some years, not all the passages for Sundays after Pentecost will be read, while in others, some weeks will have to be repeated. The entirity of the four Gospels is read in the course of the liturgical year, beginning with John 1:1-17 at the Paschal Matins Resurrection Service. The readings from John end on the Sunday of Pentecost, followed on Holy Spirit Monday by Matthew, starting in Chapter 4 (the Genealogy of Christ through the Nativity is read during the services for Christmas). From the 12th Monday through the 17th Friday after Pentecost, the readings are from the Gospel of St. Mark, with readings from Matt. Ch. 25 on Saturday and Sunday of the 17th week. The 18th Monday after Pentecost begins the readings from Luke, ending on the 29th Sunday. During the remaining weeks, 30-32, the weekday reading are from Mark, the weekend from Luke. This same pattern continues throughout the preparatory weeks from the Lenten Triodion, the Orthodox service book containing texts for the services of Great Lent and Holy Week. Holy Week (1561).]] Once Great Lent begins (during the service of Vespers on Forgivness Sunday), there are no Gospel readings on weekdays; instead, three Old Testament reading are appointed, one each from Genesis, Isaiah, and Proverbs (note: the Lenten services are structured differently to allow this arrangement of reading without the Gospel; see Presanctified Liturgy). On Saturdays and Sundays, a Gospel is read with a message applicable to what the theme of that Sunday is (e.g. St. Mary of Egypt, the Cross, Holy Icons). This practice continues through Holy Week, with the exception of Matins of Great and Holy Friday, during which the 12 Passion Gosples are read, and the service culminates with a prossesion with a large wodden replica of the Cross, borne by the Priest to the ambo, and Christ is symbolically crucified on it. There are no other Gospel readings until Vesperal Liturgy of Holy Saturday, and then the Ressurectional Gospel at Midnight, Pascha Morning. At the Divine Liturgy the Gospel is publicly read by a deacon after he receives a blessing from the celebrating priest or bishop. If there is no deacon present, the priest will read the Gospel himself. As in many other churches, all stand while the Gospel is being read. In the Sunday Matins service the Gospel is always read by the celebrant. Afterward, the faithful venerate the Book of Gospels and then receive the celebrant's blessing.
Heraldry
In heraldry the Gospel is a "charge", shown as a sort of book.
See also

- logia agrapha are the collections of phrases attributed to Jesus Christ that are not found in the canonical gospels.
- Godspell is a musical based on the gospels of Jesus Christ. Godspel is archaic English for Gospel.
External links

- Read Matthew's Gospel at the [http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&passage=matthew&version=ESV Bible Gateway].
- Read Mark's Gospel at the [http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&passage=mark&version=ESV Bible Gateway].
- Read Luke's Gospel at the [http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&passage=luke&version=ESV Bible Gateway].
- Read John's Gospel at the [http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&passage=john&version=ESV Bible Gateway].
- [http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/TCG/index.html A detailed discussion of the textual variants in the Gospels] — covering about 1200 variants on 2000 pages.
- [http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/GNT/books.html Greek New Testament] — the Greek text of the New Testament: specifically the Westcott-Hort text from 1881, combined with the NA26/27 variants.
- [http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/topic/gospel.html Essays on Gospel] — from a conservative Calvinist standpoint.
- [http://www.westarinstitute.org/Polebridge/Title/Complete/IntroComplete/introcomplete.html Introduction to The Complete Gospels] — an excerpt and information about this compilation of canonical and non-canonical gospels in translation.
- [http://dubitando.no.sapo.pt/quattuor-evangeliorum-consonantia.htm Quattuor Evangeliorum Consonantia] - The latin harmony of the Gospels (1)
- [http://dubitando.no.sapo.pt/quattuor-evangeliorum-consonantia-n.htm Quattuor Evangeliorum Consonantia] - The latin harmony of the Gospels (2)
- [http://koti.phnet.fi/elohim/Bible_and_the_history.html The Bible and history] - The Bible and history
- [http://www.radioblack.com/gospel_webcast.html Gospel radio stations] Category:Christian texts ko:복음서 ja:福音

Jesus

Jesus, also known as Jesus of Nazareth, is the central figure of Christianity, in which context he is known as Jesus Christ (from the Greek Ιησούς Χριστός ; transliteration: "Iesous Christos"; "Christ" not being a surname, but rather a title). He is also considered an important prophet in Islam. Jesus is accepted to have been a historical person, by both followers of the Christian tradition and most academics, who lived from about 8-4 BC/BCE to AD 29-36 CE. The primary sources regarding his life and teachings, which took written form some time after his death, are the four canonical Gospels from the New Testament of the Bible, which depict him – among many other things – as a Jewish Galilean preacher and healer who was often at odds with Jewish religious authorities, and who was crucified outside of Jerusalem during the rule of the Roman prefect Pontius Pilate. After his death, numerous followers spread his teachings, and within a few centuries Christianity emerged as a major religion distinct from Judaism. Beyond the historical information accepted by most secular scholars, the gospels make various additional claims about Jesus: that Jesus was the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament (or Hebrew Bible); that he was the son of God; that his mother Mary conceived Christ while a virgin; and that after his crucifixion he rose from the dead, and then ascended into heaven. Most Christians hold that the Gospels also attribute divinity to Jesus; however, others hold that the Gospels are equivocal on the subject. Many Christians and some scholars believe that the accounts in the New Testament are historical facts, though others maintain that different parts have different degrees of accuracy, and a few scholars hold Jesus did not exist at all. In Islam, Jesus (called Isa) is considered one of God's most beloved and important prophets, a bringer of divine scripture, and also the messiah; although Muslims attach a different meaning to this term than Christians as they do not share the Christian belief in the divinity of Jesus. The Qur'an, Islam's holy book, states unambiguously that Jesus neither died nor was crucified. The same passage, however, admits of multiple interpretations on his status after that event; the majority interpretation is that the Qur'an states that he was raised to heaven by God. (An alternate, and minority, interpretation, is that he was exalted among human beings.) Based on sayings attributed to Muhammad, Muslims believe Jesus will return to earth once it has become full of sin and injustice. Other religions also have different perspectives on Jesus, but do not place significant importance on his life and teachings.

Life and teachings, based upon the Gospels

Chronology

The most detailed accounts of Jesus' birth are contained in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke. There is considerable debate about the details of Jesus' birth even among Christian scholars, and few scholars claim to know either the year or the date of his birth or of his death. Based on the accounts in the gospels of the shepherds' activities, the time of year depicted for Jesus' birth could be spring or summer. However, as early as 354, Roman Christians celebrated it following the December solstice in an attempt to replace the Roman festival of Saturnalia. Before then, Jesus' birth was generally celebrated on January 6 as part of the feast of Theophany, also known as Epiphany, which commemorated not only Jesus' birth but also his baptism by John in the Jordan River and possibly additional events in Jesus' life. In the 248th year of the Diocletian Era (based on Diocletian's ascension to the Roman throne), Dionysius Exiguus attempted to pinpoint the number of years since Jesus' birth, arriving at a figure of 753 years after the founding of Rome. Dionysius then set Jesus' birth as being December 25 1 ACN (for "Ante Christum Natum", or "before the birth of Christ"), and assigned AD 1 to the following year—thereby establishing the system of numbering years from the birth of Jesus: Anno Domini (which translates as "in the year of the Lord"). This system made the then current year 532, and almost two centuries later it won acceptance and became the established calendar in Western civilization due to its championing by the Venerable Bede. However, based on a lunar eclipse that Josephus reports shortly before the death of Herod the Great, the birth of Christ would have been some time before the year 4 BC/BCE. This estimate itself relies on the historicity of the story in the Gospel of Matthew of the Massacre of the Innocents under the orders of Herod — an event mentioned nowhere else in contemporaneous accounts. Having fewer sources and being further removed in time from the authors of the New Testament, establishing a reliable birth date now is particularly difficult. The exact date of Jesus' death is also unclear. The Gospel of John depicts the crucifixion just before the Passover festival on Friday 14 Nisan, called the Quartodeciman, whereas the synoptic gospels describe the Last Supper, immediately before Jesus' arrest, as the Passover meal on Friday 15 Nisan. Further, the Jews followed a lunisolar calendar with phases of the moon as dates, complicating calculations of any exact date in a solar calendar. According to John P. Meier's A Marginal Jew, allowing for the time of the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate and the dates of the Passover in those years, his death can be placed most probably on April 7, 30 or April 3, 33.

Family and early life

33 According to the Gospels, Jesus was born in Bethlehem to Mary, a virgin, via the Holy Spirit. The Gospel of Luke gives an account of the angel Gabriel visiting Mary to tell her that she was chosen to bear the son of God ([http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%201:26-28&version=31 Luke 1:26-28]). Catholics call this the Annunciation. Joseph, Mary's betrothed husband, appears only in stories of Jesus' childhood; this is generally taken to mean that he was dead by the time of Jesus' ministry. Mark 6:3 (and analogous passages in Matthew and Luke) reports that Jesus was "Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon," and also states that Jesus had sisters. The 1st-century Jewish historian Josephus and the Christian historian Eusebius (who wrote in the 4th century but quoted much earlier sources that are now lost) refer to James the Just as Jesus' brother (See Desposyni). However, Jerome argued that they were Jesus' cousins, which the Greek word for "brother" used in the gospels would allow. This was based on the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox tradition that Mary remained a perpetual virgin, thus having no biological children before or after Jesus. Luke's gospel records that Mary was a relative of Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist (Luke 1:36). The Bible, however, does not reveal exactly how Mary and Elizabeth were related. Jesus' childhood home is represented as Nazareth in Galilee. Aside from a flight to Egypt in infancy to escape Herod's Massacre of the Innocents, all other events in the Gospels are set in ancient Israel. Only one incident between his infancy and his adult life, the Finding in the Temple, is mentioned in the canonical gospels, although New Testament apocrypha go into these details, some quite extensively. For most Christians, only the virgin birth and the Incarnation itself are major articles of faith for this period of time before Jesus begins his ministry. Muslims also believe in the virgin birth, but aside from that, few non-Christians believe in either, and look upon stories of the virgin birth as mythological or indicating that Jesus was conceived out of wedlock.

Later life

Incarnation.]] According to Christian belief, just after he was baptized by his kinsman John the Baptist Jesus began his public teaching. According to the Gospel of Luke, he was about thirty years old at the time. Jesus used a variety of methods in his teaching, such as parables and metaphors. He frequently taught, "Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand." Some of his most famous teachings are in the Sermon on the Mount, which also contains the beatitudes. His parables (or stories with a deep or metaphorical meaning) include the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son. Jesus had a number of disciples. His closest followers were twelve apostles. According to the New Testament, Jesus also performed various miracles in the course of his ministry, including healings, exorcisms, and raising Lazarus from the dead. Jesus frequently put himself in opposition to the Jewish religious leaders including the Pharisees and Sadducees. His teaching castigated the Pharisees primarily for their legalism and hypocrisy, although he also had followers among the religious leaders such as Nicodemus. Jesus was also known as a social reformer, and because of the controversial view that he was the Jewish Messiah Jesus' preachings included the forgiveness of sin, life after death, and resurrection of the body. Jesus also preached the imminent end of the current era of history, or even the literal end of the world; in this sense he was an apocalyptic preacher. Some interpretations of the Gospels, particularly amongst Protestants, suggest that Jesus opposed stringent interpretations of Jewish law, supporting the spirit more than the letter of the law. It is commonly thought that Jesus preached for a period of three years, but this is never mentioned explicitly in any of the four gospels, and some interpretations of the Synoptic Gospels suggest a span of only one year; to achieve consistency with the Gospel of John, one theory suggests Jesus' public ministry took approximately one year. Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem at the end of his ministry is usually associated with the Passover Feast, but some scholars point out that details of the entry, such as the Hosanna shout, the waving of palm fronds, and the proclamation of a king, are more consistent with the Feast of Tabernacles, or Sukkoth, than with Passover.This is likely because although the triumphal entry occurred around the time of Passover, the people reacted to it as if it were Sukkoth to celebrating the coming of a political messiah, as they had for Judah Macabee. Such celebration would be wiewed by Rome as an act of defiance, because it was associated with an earlier rebellion against the Greeks. Jesus however staged no such political rebellion, regardless of people's expectations.

Arrest, trial and execution

Judah Macabee]] Christian belief holds that Jesus came with his followers to Jerusalem during the Passover festival, and created a disturbance at the Temple by overturning the tables of the moneychangers there. He was subsequently arrested on the orders of the Sanhedrin and the high priest, Joseph Caiaphas for blasphemy, because he claimed to be God. He was identified to the guards by one of his apostles, Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus by a kiss in the Garden of Gethsemane, after which another apostle, Peter, used a sword to attack one of the captors. After his arrest, Jesus' apostles went into hiding. Jesus was condemned for blasphemy by the Sanhedrin and turned over to the Romans for execution, on the charge of sedition, the usual penalty for which was a humiliating death by crucifixion. According to the gospels, the Roman governor Pontius Pilate ruled that Jesus was not guilty of any civil crime and then, following what the Bible says was a Passover tradition, offered the crowd a choice of which prisoner to free — Jesus of Nazareth, or an insurrectionist named Jesus Barabbas. To his chagrin, the crowd chose to free Barabbas. According to all four gospels, Pilate then ordered Jesus to be crucified with a charge placed atop the cross (called the titulus crucis) which read "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews". (The titulus crucis is often written as INRI, the Latin acronym.) The gospels further state that after Jesus died on the cross, his followers were allowed to take his body down and place it in a tomb

Resurrection and Ascension

Latin by Matthias Grünewald.]] In accordance with the four canonical gospel accounts Christians believe that Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day after his crucifixion. This article of faith is referred to in Christian terminology as the Resurrection of Jesus Christ; and each year at Easter (on a Sunday) it is commemorated and celebrated by most groups who consider themselves Christians. No one was a witness to the resurrection. However, the women who had witnessed the entombment and the closure of the tomb with a great stone, found it empty when they arrived on the third day to anoint the body. The synoptic gospel accounts further state that an angel was waiting at the tomb to explain to them that Jesus had been resurrected, though the Gospel according to John makes no mention of this encounter. The sight of the same angel had apparently left the guards unconscious (cf. Matt 28:2–4) that, according to Matthew 27:62–66, the high priests and Pharisees, with Pilate's permission, had posted in front of the tomb to prevent the body from being stolen by Jesus' disciples. Mark 16:9 says that Mary Magdalene was the first to whom Jesus appeared very early that morning. John 20:11–18 states that when Mary looked into the tomb, two angels asked her why she was crying; and as she turned round she initially failed to recognize Jesus—even by his voice—until he called her by her name. The Gospel accounts and the Acts of the Apostles tell of several appearances of Jesus to various people in various places over a period of forty days before he ascended into heaven. Just hours after his resurrection he appeared to two travelers on the road to Emmaus. To his assembled disciples he showed himself on the evening after his resurrection, but Thomas was absent, though he was present when Jesus repeated his visit to them a week later. Thereafter he went to Galilee and showed himself to several of his disciples by the lake and on the mountain; and they were present when he returned to Bethany and was lifted up to heaven and a cloud concealed him from their sight. The resurrection of Jesus is almost universally denied by those who do not follow the Christian religion. Most Christians—even those who do not hold to the literal truth of everything in the canonical gospel accounts—accept the New Testament presentation of the Resurrection as a historical account of an actual event central to their faith. Therefore, belief in the resurrection is one of the most distinctive elements of Christian faith; and defending the historicity of the resurrection is usually a central issue of Christian apologetics. However, some liberal Christians do not accept that Jesus was raised bodily from the dead, or that he still lives bodily (e.g., John Shelby Spong, Tom Harpur). What is more interesting to note in context of the resurrection story was the manner in which the desciples died years later under the Roman Empire. Some were roasted, had their flesh flayed or even were mauled by wild beasts. None relented, even unto death, their claim that Christ was indeed resurrected and who he claimed to be. Either they were all mad men plagued by demented twisted ideals or they had found a truth so real they were prepared to die quite violently and painfully for.

Legacy

Tom Harpurd Jesus of Nazareth to the people of Jerusalem]] According to most Christian interpretations of the Bible, the theme of Jesus' preaching was that of repentance and grace. During his public ministry Jesus extensively trained twelve Apostles to continue after his departure his leadership of the many who had begun to follow him mainly in the towns and villages throughout Galilee, Samaria, and the Decapolis. Most Christians hold that Jesus' miracles were literally true, not allegory, and that the Apostles gained the power to perform similar miracles and healings on Jews and Gentiles alike after they had been empowered by the Holy Spirit of Truth (to pneuma tēs alētheias, John 14:17, 26; Luke 24:49, Acts 1:8, 2:4) that Jesus had promised the Father would send them after his departure—a promise that according to Acts 2:4 was fulfilled at Pentecost, the Jewish feast that, in addition to other Scriptural events, commemorates the giving of the Law to Moses. For Christians, the legacy Jesus left was one of sacrifice; they believe that Jesus was sent by God to die as a sacrifice in place of all humanity. Christians hold that this sacrifice had to take place because all man is born into a nature of sin (they claim, based on scripture, that God's penalty for sin is death and separation from God) so God sent his Son to die in their place. Christians believe Jesus' body was resurrected and ascended into heaven, so they believe that none of Jesus' body is on earth. The only body that remains of Christ on earth is figurative and embodied in the Church. The church is often referred to as the "body of Christ". Non-Christians generally reject these claims. Ironically (given Jesus's Jewish identity, and profession of love), for some the legacy of Jesus was a long history of Christian anti-Semitism (of course, always with exceptions), although in the wake of the Holocaust many Christian groups have gone to considerable lengths to reconcile with Jews and to promote inter-faith dialogue and mutual respect. This was more prevalent during the medieval reign of the Roman Catholic Church and in modern times considered to be the view of and extremely small minority. For others, Christianity has often been linked to European colonialism (see British Empire, Portuguese Empire, Spanish Empire, French colonial empire, Dutch colonial empire); conversely, Christians have often found themselves as oppressed minorities outside of Europe and the Americas. Other legacies include the religions of Christianity and their churches, the adoption of the cross as a symbol, the doctrine of the Trinity, the Anno Domini method of reckoning years, and celebrations at Christmas and Easter.

Religious perspectives

Jesus has an important role in the two largest world religions, Christianity and Islam. Most other religions, however, do not consider Jesus to have been a supernatural or holy being. Some of these religions, like Buddhism, do not take any official stance on Jesus' life, while others, such as those practicing Jesus's own religion at the time of his death, Judaism, generally reject claims of Jesus's divinity and regard him as a false prophet.

Christian views

Judaism depiction of Saviour Not Made by Hands, the most popular iconography of Jesus in Eastern Orthodoxy.]] Christians believe in and follow what they believe to be the teachings of Jesus. However, Christianity quite naturally has a more specific and involved meaning, as most Christians hold similar beliefs regarding Jesus and his life that are largely rejected by non-Christians. Generally speaking, most Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God, part of a trinity of three persons of God, and the Messiah, who came to earth to save mankind from sin and death through his proxy sacrifice. Most believe Jesus lived a perfect life and that is why his death on a cross, called the crucifixion, counts as a sacrifice for mankind. According to Christian tradition the disobeying of God's command by the first man Adam caused all mankind to suffer the consequences of sin entering the world. Scriptures often refer to death as "seperation from God" and to sin being something that God the Father cannot tolerate. As a result of the perfect sacrifice of Jesus, all mankind who believe in Jesus being God's only son and in his resurrection, may have eternal life. Most believe that after Jesus's death he rose from the grave on the third day and forty days after that ascended to Heaven. There are many differing views within Christian groups as to whether or not Jesus ever claimed divinity. The majority of Christian laypeople, theologians, and clergy hold that the Bible clearly states Jesus both to be divine and to claim divinity in many passages. Most also believe that Jesus's resurrection is additional proof that he is God. However, some people (both Christian and non-Christian) maintain that there are passages in the New Testament that clearly have Jesus stating that he was not equal with God, and that other passages are ambiguous about such claims. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints maintains that Jesus is the very same as Jehovah or Yahweh of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible but is distinct from God the Father; that he is the Creator of the Universe; that he spent the interval between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection organizing a Mission in the Spirit World for the righteous spirits to teach the gospel to those in darkness; and that he visited both the inhabitants of the ancient Americas and other locations throughout the world after his Resurrection.

Islamic views

In Islam, Jesus is known as Isa, and is one of God's highest-ranked and most-beloved prophets. Like Christian writings, the Qur'an holds that Jesus was born without a biological father by the will of God, that he could perform miracles, and that he will one day return to the world to rid it of evil. However, unlike Christians, Muslims do not consider Jesus to have been the son of God, and do not believe that he died on the cross. Instead, the Qur'an states that his death was only an illusion (done by God) to deceive his enemies, and that Jesus ascended bodily to heaven. Muslims believe he will return to the world in the flesh with Imam Mahdi to defeat the Dajjal (Antichrist-like figure, translated as "Deceiver") once the world has become filled with sin, deception and injustice, and then live out the rest of his natural life. Muslims also believe that Jesus received a gospel from God (called the Injeel) that corresponds to the Christian New Testament, but that it and the Old Testament have both been changed by mankind over time as such that they no longer accurately represent God's original message to mankind. In Muslim traditions, Jesus lived a perfect life of nonviolence, showing kindness to humans and animals (similar to the other Islamic prophets), without material possessions and abstaining totally from alcohol and from the flesh of animals. The Ahmadiyya Movement in Islam believes that Jesus survived the crucifixion and later travelled to India, where he lived and died as a prophet under the name of Yuz Asaf.

Jewish views

Judaism rejects both the Christian belief that Jesus was the Messiah and the Muslim belief that he was a prophet. Judaism states that there were no prophets after the prophet Malachi, and still awaits the coming of the Messiah. Jewish belief does not completely reject all of the historical information contained in Gospels, but does reject all of the confessions by early Christian adherents, especially Paul.

Eastern religions

Hindu beliefs in Jesus vary from those who consider him to have been just a normal man, or even purely a fable, to those who believe that he was an avatar of God. A large number of Hindus consider Jesus to have been a wise guru or yogi, some even suggesting that he spent his "lost years" learning various Hindu beliefs in India. The Hindutva historian P.N. Oak has even claimed that Jesus was in fact Krishna, and that Christianity originated as a form of his worship. Many in the Surat Shabd Yoga tradition regard Jesus as a Satguru. Mahatma Gandhi considered Jesus one of his main teachers and inspirations for Nonviolent Resistance. Although Buddhism in general attributes no spiritual significance to Jesus, some Buddhists believe that Jesus may have been a Bodhisattva, one who has dedicated his or her future to the happiness of all beings. Some Buddhists also interpret Jesus through Zen Buddhism, sometimes basing their perspective on the Gospel of Thomas. The Bahá'í Faith considers Jesus to be one of many "Manifestations" (or prophets) of God, with both human and divine stations.

Negative views

Some religions consider Jesus to be a false prophet. Mandaeanism regards Jesus as a deceiving prophet of the false Jewish god Adunay, and an opponent of the good prophet John the Baptist—whom they nonetheless believe to have baptized him. Some Satanists consider Jesus to have been the son or a follower of Satan, or Satan himself, but most do not hold any spiritual beliefs regarding Jesus.

Other Views

The Ebionites believed that Jesus was a great prophet and the Messiah, but not divine. They rejected the Epistles of Paul, and asserted that Jesus did not consider the Biblical laws to be abrogated, but instead wanted his followers to abide by them. Some Ebionites claimed the leadership of Saint James, the Brother of Jesus, but no historical connection between James and the sect has been substantiated. The New Age movement entertains a wide variety of views on Jesus. with some representatives (such as A Course In Miracles) going so far as to trance-channel him. Many recognize him as a "great teacher" (or "Ascended Master") similar to Buddha, and teach that Christhood is something that all may attain. At the same time, many New Age teachings, such as reincarnation, appear to reflect a certain discomfort with traditional Christianity. Numerous New Age subgroups claim Jesus as a supporter, often incorporating contrasts with or protests against the Christian mainstream. Thus, for example, Theosophy and its offshoots have Jesus studying esotericism in the Himalayas or Egypt during his "lost years".

Historicity

Egypt image of Jesus is one of many in which a sun cross halo is used. Such depictions are characteristic of Eastern Orthodox iconography.]] Most modern scholars hold that the works describing Jesus were initially communicated by oral tradition, and were not committed to writing until several decades after Jesus' crucifixion. The earliest extant texts which refer to Jesus are Paul's letters, which are usually dated from the mid-1st century. Paul saw Jesus only in visions, but he claimed that they were divine revelations and hence authoritative (1 Galatians 11-12). The earliest extant texts describing Jesus in any detail were the four New Testament Gospels. These texts, being part of the Biblical canon, have received much more analysis and acceptance from Christian sources than other possible sources for information on Jesus. Many apocryphal texts have also surfaced detailing events in Jesus' life and teachings, chief among them the Gospel of Thomas, a "sayings gospel" or logia consisting primarily of phrases attributed to Jesus. Other New Testament apocrypha, generally considered less important, include the Gospel of the Hebrews, the Gospel of Mary, the Infancy Gospels, the Gospel of Peter, the Unknown Berlin Gospel, the Naassene Fragment, the Secret Gospel of Mark, the Egerton Gospel, the Oxyrhynchus Gospels and the Fayyum Fragment.

Earlier texts?

Some texts with even earlier historical or mythological information on Jesus are speculated to have existed prior to the Gospels, though none are extant. Based on the unusual similarities and differences (see synoptic problem) between the Synoptic Gospels — Matthew, Mark and Luke, the first three canonical gospels—many Biblical scholars have suggested that oral tradition and logia (such as the Gospel of Thomas and the theoretical Q document) probably played a strong role in initially passing down stories of Jesus, and may have inspired some of the Synoptic Gospels. Specifically, many scholars believe that the Q document and the Gospel of Mark were the two sources used for the gospels of Matthew and Luke; however, other theories, such as the older Augustinian hypothesis, continue to hold sway with some Biblical scholars. Another theoretical document is the Signs Gospel, believed to have been a source for the Gospel of John. There is little consensus concerning how and when any of these documents were circulated, if they were at all. The ecumenical council meetings in the 4th century that discussed which works should and should not be included in the canon were largely unconcerned with modern historical sensibilities, utilizing few techniques of objective textual analysis. Instead, their discussions generally tended to center upon theology, rather than upon historicity. However, noted scholars F.F. Bruce, Bruce Metzger and others argue that some historical details were taken into consideration regarding the New Testament canon. It may be surmised that the early church leaders took for granted that historicity was not an issue to be debated, any more than debating the historicity of the Articles of Confederation or the Constitution would be major issues today. In addition, Bible scholar Bruce Metzger wrote regarding the formation of the canonical New Testament: :"Although the fringes of the emerging canon remained unsettled for generations, a high degree of unanimity concerning the greater part of the New Testament was attained among the very diverse and scattered congregations of believers not only throughout the Mediterranean world, but also over an area extending from Britain to Mesopotamia."

Questions of reliability

As a result of the many-decade time gap between the writing of the Gospels and the events they describe the accuracy of all early texts claiming the existence of Jesus or details of Jesus' life have been disputed by various parties. The authors of the gospels are traditionally thought to have been witnesses to the events included. After the original oral stories were written down, they were transcribed, and later translated into other languages. However, several Biblical historians have responded to claims of the unreliability of the gospel accounts by pointing out that historical documentation is often biased and second-hand, and frequently dates from several decades after the events described. Even among those who believe that Jesus existed, however, there are still numerous divisions over the historical accuracy of the canonical gospels. Some say that the Gospel accounts are neither objective nor accurate, since they were written or compiled by his followers and seem to exclusively portray a positive, idealized view of Jesus. Those who have a naturalistic view of history, as a general rule, do not believe in divine intervention or miracles, such as the resurrection of Jesus mentioned by the Gospels. One method used to estimate the factual accuracy of stories in the gospels is known as the "criterion of embarrassment", which holds that stories about events with embarrassing aspects (such as the denial of Jesus by Peter) would likely not have been included if not true.

External influences on gospel development

A minority of scholars believe that the gospel accounts of Jesus have little or no historical basis. At least in part, this is because there are many similarities between stories about Jesus and contemporary myths of pagan godmen such as Mithras, Apollo, Attis, Horus and Osiris-Dionysus, leading to conjectures that the pagan myths were adopted by some authors of early accounts of Jesus to form a syncretism with Christianity. Some Christian authors, such as C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, believed that such myths were created by ancient pagans with vague and imprecise foreknowledge of the Gospels. While these connections are disputed by many, it is nevertheless true that many elements of Jesus' story as told in the Gospels have parallels in pagan mythology, where miracles such as virgin birth were well-known. Scholars such as A. N. Sherwin-White, FF Bruce, John Wenham, Gary Habermas and others argue for a high degree of historical reliability of the key New Testament events or the New Testament as a whole (see: Resurrection of Jesus for details). Prominent liberal scholar John A.T. Robinson argued for early dates of the entire New Testament and ascribed many of the key New Testament texts to their traditional authors.

Notes

# The Gospels of the Bible, [http://www.biblegateway.com/ BibleGateway.com]. # Daniel Gaztambide (2005), [http://www.aramaicnt.org/site/index.php?mode=article&entry=28 "So Sayeth The Lord... According to Who?"]. # Stephen Voorwinde, [http://www.pastornet.net.au/rtc/canon.htm "The formation of the New Testament"], Patornet. Accessed October 25, 2005. # F. F. Bruce, New Testament Documents: Are they reliable?, [http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/ffbruce/ntdocrli/ntdocc03.htm "Chapter 3: The Canon of the New Testament"] (June, 1982), ISBN 087784691X, Inter-Varsity Press. # Coey Keating (December 11, 2005), [http://www.ntgreek.org/SeminaryPapers/ChurchHistory/Criteria%20for%20Development%20of%20the%20NT%20Canon%20in%20First%20Four%20Centuries.pdf "Criteria for development of the New Testament canon in the first four centuries of the Christian Church"], Fuller Theological Seminary. # Bruce Metzger (1987), The New Testament Canon, page 254. # Josh McDowell (1992), [http://www.leaderu.com/everystudent/easter/articles/josh2.html "Evidence for the Resurrection"]. # F.F. Bruce (1959), [http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/ffbruce/ntdocrli/ntdocont.htm "THE NEW TESTAMENT DOCUMENTS Are they Reliable?"]. # Gary Habermas (2001), [http://www.apologetics.com/default.jsp?bodycontent=/articles/historical_apologetics/habermas-nt.html "Why I Believe The New Testament Is Historically Reliable"]. # John Robinson

External links

Religious views
- [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08374c.htm Jesus Christ Catholic Encyclopedia article]
- [http://www.LatinVulgate.com/christverse.aspx Complete Sayings of Jesus Christ] - The complete sayings of Jesus Christ in parallel English and Latin
- [http://www.islamfrominside.com/Pages/Articles/Jesus%20-%20An%20Islamic%20Perspective.html An Islamic perspective on Jesus]
- [http://www.watchtower.org/library/w/2001/11/15/article_02.htm Jehovah's Witnesses' perspective]
- [http://www.mormon.org/learn/0,8672,810-1,00.html Latter-day Saint (Mormon) beliefs about Jesus]
- [http://library.lds.org/nxt/gateway.dll/Magazines/Ensign/1988.htm/ensign%20november%201988.htm/what%20think%20ye%20of%20christ.htm What think ye of Christ?] (Mormon)
- [http://www.uua.org/pamphlet/3040.html Unitarian Universalist Views of Jesus]: prophet; dissident; one of many Christs
- [http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/topic/christ.html The Historic & Reformation View of Jesus Christ]: Solus Christus, Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Sola Scriptura, Soli Deo Gloria
- [http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/mead.htm Jesus in the Jewish tradition]
- [http://www.christnotes.org/dictionary.php?dict=sbd&id=2398 Jesus Christ] - Smith's Bible Dictionary article Historical and skeptical views
- [http://www.religionfacts.com/christianity/history/jesus.htm Overview of the Life of Jesus] A summary of New Testament accounts.
- [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/ From Jesus to Christ] -- A Frontline documentary on Jesus and early Christianity.
- [http://www.Jesus-Institute.org The Words and Life of Historical Jesus] by Jesus Institute
- [http://www.uncc.edu/jdtabor/index.html The Jewish Roman World of Jesus]
- [http://theologytoday.ptsem.edu/oct1993/v50-3-article8.htm Historical context of Jesus' time]
- [http://www.sullivan-county.com/news/mine/jesus.htm Jewish sects during Jesus' time]
- [http://www.vatican.va/jubilee_2000/magazine/documents/ju_mag_01031997_p-29_en.html Christ and the Other Religions]
- [http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/jhcjp.htm The Jesus Puzzle]
- [http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/jesus.html Skeptic's Guide to Jesus]
- [http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/jesus.htm Who Was the Real Jesus?] Seemingly unique compilation from a theosophical point of view. Category:1st century BC births ko:예수 그리스도 ms:Yesus Kristus ja:イエス・キリスト simple:Jesus th:เยซู คริสต์ zh-cn:耶穌基督 zh-tw:耶穌基督

Arimathea

Arimathea, according to the gospel of Luke, was "a city of Judea". It was the home town of Joseph of Arimathea, who is known for having donated his new tomb outside of Jerusalem for the body of Jesus. Arimathea is often held to be another name for Ramathaim-Zophim in Ephraim, the birth-place of Samuel. (1 Sam. 1:1, 19) Others identify it with Ramleh in Dan, or Ramah in Benjamin. (Matt. 2:18) Category:New Testament places

Gospel of Luke

The Gospel of Luke is the third of the four canonical Gospels of the New Testament, which tell the story of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. Although the text does not name its author, the modern consensus follows the traditional view that this gospel and the Acts of the Apostles were written by the same author. The traditional view is that this author is the Luke named in the Epistle to Philemon 24, a follower of Paul. The main characteristic of this Gospel, as Farrar (Cambridge Bible, Luke, Introd.) remarks, is expressed in the motto, "Who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil" (Acts [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=51&chapter=10&version=31 10:38]; compare with Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=4&version=31 4:18]). Luke wrote for the "Hellenic world."

Authorship and audience

There is substantial evidence to indicate that the author of Luke also wrote the book of Acts. The most direct evidence comes from the prefaces of each book. Both prefaces are addressed to Theophilus, the author's patron, and the preface of Acts explicitly references "my former book" about the life of Jesus. Furthermore, there are linguistic and theological similarities between the two works, suggesting that they have a common author. With the agreement of nearly all scholars, Udo Schnelle writes, "the extensive linguistic and theological agreements and cross-references between the Gospel of Luke and the Acts indicate that both works derive from the same author" (The History and Theology of the New Testament Writings, p. 259). See also Acts of the Apostles -- Authorship. The evangelist does not claim to have been an eyewitness of Jesus's life, but to have investigated everything carefully and to have written an orderly narrative of the facts (Luke 1:1-4). The authors of the other three Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and John, probably used similar sources. According to the two-source hypothesis, the most commonly accepted solution to the synoptic problem, Luke's sources included the Gospel of Mark and another collection of lost sayings known by scholars as Q, the Quelle or "source" document. The general consensus is that Luke was written by a Greek for the gentile Christians. The Gospel is addressed to the author's patron, the "most excellent" Theophilus.

Date of composition

The date of this gospel's composition is uncertain. Estimates range from ca 80 to ca 130 AD.

Traditional views of the date

Traditionally, Christians believe that Luke wrote under the direction, if not at the dictation, of Paul. This would place it as having been written before the Acts, whose date of the composition is generally fixed at about AD 63 or 64. Consequently the tradition is that this Gospel was written about 60 or 63, when Luke may have been at Caesarea in attendance on Paul, who was then a prisoner. If the alternate conjecture is correct, that it was written at Rome during Paul's imprisonment there, then it would date earlier, 40–60. Evangelical Christians tend to favor this view, in keeping with the tradition to date the gospels very early. Luke addressed his gospel to "most excellent Theophilus." Theophilus, which in Greek means "Friend of God", may just be a literary expression. Unfortunately, nowhere in Luke or Acts does it say that the author is Luke, the companion of Paul; this ascription is late second century. Furthermore, the text itself reveals hints that it was not written as a dictation of a single author, but made use of multiple sources.

Critical views of the date

In contrast to the traditional view, many contemporary scholars regard Mark as a source text used by the author(s) of Luke. Since Mark was probably written after the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem, around 70, Luke could not have been written before 70. The Sadducees are another point traditional scholars use to confirm a later date, contrasting Matthew's focus on the tax collecters and Jesus' rebuke of their actions against Luke's hardly mentioning them at all within his gospel, because after the destruction of the Temple, the Sadducees lost their power base. Based on this datum, scholars have suggested dates for Luke from 80 to as late as 150, and Acts shortly thereafter, also between 80 and 150. The de-emphasis of the Parousia and the universalization of the message strongly suggest a much later date than the 60–70 given by the traditional view. Debate continues among non-traditionalists about whether Luke was written before or after the end of the first century. Those who would date it later argue that it was written in response to hetrodoxical movements of the early second century. Those who would date it earlier point out both that Luke lacks knowledge of the episcopal system, which had been developed in the second century, and that an earlier date preserves the traditional connection of the gospel with the Luke who was a follower of Paul.

Manuscripts

The earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of Luke are papyrus fragments from the third century, one containing portions of all four gospels (P⁴⁵) and three others preserving only brief passages (P⁴, P⁶⁹, P⁷⁵). These early copies, as well as the earliest copies of Acts, date after the Gospel was separated from Acts. The Codex Bezae, in the University Library, Cambridge, contains a 5th or 6th century manuscript that is the oldest complete manuscript of Luke, in Greek and Latin versions on facing pages. The Greek version appears to have descended from an offshoot of the main manuscript tradition and departs from familiar readings at many points. Though the text bears many intended corrections, often to bring it into line with the usual readings, the Codex Bezae demonstrates the latitude in manuscripts of scripture that still existed quite late in the tradition. Biblical scholars have minimized the Codex's importance, citing it generally only when it supports the common readings. Verses 22:19b-20 and 22:43-44 are not present in early versions and are generally marked as such in modern translations.

Relationship with other gospels

Most New Testament scholars believe the author of Luke relied on Mark and Q as his primary sources. According to Farrar, "Out of a total of 1151 verses, Luke has 389 in common with Matthew and Mark, 176 in common with Matthew alone, 41 in common with Mark alone, leaving 544 peculiar to himself. In many instances all three use identical language." There are seventeen parables peculiar to this Gospel. Luke also attributes to Jesus seven miracles which are not present in Matthew or Mark. The synoptic Gospels are related to each other after the following scheme. If the contents of each Gospel are numbered at 100, then when compared this result is obtained: Mark has 7 peculiarities, 93 coincidences. Matthew 42 peculiarities, 58 coincidences. Luke 59 peculiarities, 41 coincidences. That is, thirteen-fourteenths of Mark, four-sevenths of Matthew, and two-fifths of Luke describe the same events in similar language. Luke's style is more polished than that of Matthew and Mark with fewer Hebrew idioms. He uses a few Latin words (Luke 7:41, 8:30, 11:33, 12:6, and 19:20), but no Syriac or Hebrew words except sikera, an exciting drink of the nature of wine, but not made of grapes (from Heb. shakar, "he is intoxicated", Leviticus 10:9), probably palm wine. This Gospel contains twenty-eight distinct references to the Old Testament. Many words and phrases are common to the Gospel of Luke and the Letters of Paul; compare:
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=4&version=31 4:22] with Colossians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=58&chapter=4&version=31 4:6].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=4&version=31 4:32] with 1 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=2&version=31 2:4].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=6&version=31 6:36] with 2 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=54&chapter=1&version=31 1:3].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=6&version=31 6:39] with Romans [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=52&chapter=2&version=31 2:19].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=9&version=31 9:56] with 2 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=54&chapter=10&version=31 10:8].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=10&version=31 10:8] with 1 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=10&version=31 10:27].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=11&version=31 11:41] with Titus [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=63&chapter=1&version=31 1:15].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=18&version=31 18:1] with 2 Thessalonians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=60&chapter=1&version=31 1:11].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=21&version=31 21:36] with Ephesians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=56&chapter=6&version=31 6:18].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=22&version=31 22:19-20] with 1 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=11&version=31 11:23-29].
- Luke [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=49&chapter=24&version=31 24:34] with 1 Corinthians [http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=15&version=31 15:5].

Attention to women

Compared to the other canonical gospels, Luke devotes significantly more attention to women. The Gospel of Luke features more female characters, features a female prophet (2:36), and details the experience of pregnancy (1:41-42). Prominent discussion is given to the lives of Elizabeth, John the Baptist's mother (ch. 1), and Mary, the mother of Jesus (ch. 2). This prominence of women through the Luke gospel has led Biblical Scholar Randel McCraw Helms to suggest that the author of Luke may have been female.

Chapters

- Luke 1
- Luke 2
- Luke 3
- Luke 4
- Luke 5
- Luke 6
- Luke 7
- Luke 8

- Luke 9
- Lu

Joseph of Arimathea

Historical development

Christian interpretations

Gospel of Nicodemus

Other Medieval texts

Legendary Accounts: First Century Evangelist?

Legendary Accounts: The Holy Grail

Legendary Accounts: The flowering staff

Arimathea

References

External links

Gospels

Canonical Gospels

Origin of the canonical Gospels

Non-canonical gospels

List of non-canonical ("apocryphal") Gospels

Liturgical usage

Usage in Eastern Orthodoxy liturgy

Heraldry

See also

External links

Jesus

Life and teachings, based upon the Gospels

Chronology

Family and early life

Later life

Arrest, trial and execution

Resurrection and Ascension

Legacy

Religious perspectives

Christian views

Islamic views

Jewish views

Eastern religions

Negative views

Other Views

Historicity

Earlier texts?

Questions of reliability

External influences on gospel development

Notes

Other topics pertaining to Jesus

See also

External links

Arimathea

Gospel of Luke

Authorship and audience

Date of composition

Traditional views of the date

Critical views of the date

Manuscripts

Relationship with other gospels

Attention to women

Chapters