An Introduction to the Gospels
Written over the course of almost a century after Jesus' death, the four gospels of the
New Testament, though they tell the same story, reflect very different ideas and
concerns.
by Marilyn Mellowes
A period of forty years separates the death of Jesus from the writing of the first gospel.
History offers us little direct evidence about the events of this period, but it does suggest
that the early Christians were engaged in one of the most basic of human activities:
story-telling. In the words of Mike White, "It appears that between the death of Jesus and
the writing of the first gospel, Mark, that they clearly are telling stories. They're passing
on the tradition of what happened to Jesus, what he stood for and what he did, orally, by
telling it and retelling it. And in the process they are defining Jesus for themselves."
These shared memories, passed along by word of mouth, are known as "oral tradition."
They included stories of Jesus' miracles and healings, his parables and teachings, and
his death. Eventually some stories were written down. The first written documents
probably included an account of the death of Jesus and a collection of sayings attributed
to him.
Then, in about the year 70, the evangelist known as Mark wrote the first "gospel" -- the
words mean "good news" about Jesus. We will never know the writer's real identity, or
even if his name was Mark, since it was common practice in the ancient world to
attribute written works to famous people. But we do know that it was Mark's genius to
first to commit the story of Jesus to writing, and thereby inaugurated the gospel tradition.
"The gospels are very peculiar types of literature. They're not biographies," says Prof.
Paula Fredriksen, "they are a kind of religious advertisement. What they do is proclaim
their individual author's interpretation of the Christian message through the device of
using Jesus of Nazareth as a spokesperson for the evangelists' position."
About 15 years after Mark, in about the year 85 CE, the author known as Matthew
composed his work, drawing on a variety of sources, including Mark and from a
collection of sayings that scholars later called "Q", for Quelle, meaning source. The
Gospel of Luke was written about fifteen years later, between 85 and 95. Scholars refer
to these three gospels as the "synoptic gospels", because they "see" things in the same
way. The Gospel of John, sometimes called "the spiritual gospel," was probably
composed between 90 and 100 CE. Its style and presentation clearly set it apart from
the other three.
Each of the four gospels depicts Jesus in a different way. These characterizations reflect
the past experiences and the particular circumstances of their authors' communities. The
historical evidence suggests that Mark wrote for a community deeply affected by the
failure of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome. Matthew wrote for a Jewish community
in conflict with the Pharisaic Judaism that dominated Jewish life in the postwar period.
Luke wrote for a predominately Gentile audience eager to demonstrate that Christian
beliefs in no way conflicted with their ability to serve as a good citizen of the Empire.
Despite these differences, all four gospels contain the "passion narrative," the central
story of Jesus' suffering and death. That story is directly connected to the Christian ritual
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of the Eucharist. As Helmut Koester has observed, the ritual cannot "live" without the
story.
While the gospels tell a story about Jesus, they also reflect the growing tensions
between Christians and Jews. By the time Luke composed his work, tension was
breaking into open hostility. By the time John was written, the conflict had become an
open rift, reflected in the vituperative invective of the evangelist's language. In the words
of Prof. Eric Meyers, "Most of the gospels reflect a period of disagreement, of theological
disagreement. And the New Testament tells a story of a broken relationship, and that's
part of the sad story that evolves between Jews and Christians, because it is a story that
has such awful repercussions in later times."
The Gospel of Mark
The first attempt to tell the story of the life and the death of Jesus, this narrative began
the gospel tradition.
The gospel of Mark is the second to appear in the New
Testament, but most scholars now agree that it was composed
first. While the work is attributed to "Mark," we will probably
never know the author's true identity, for it was common
practice in the ancient world to enhance the importance of
written works by attributing them to famous people. Whoever
he was, Mark's gospel was the first to attempt to tell the story of
the life and the death of Jesus. He probably drew on written
collections of miracle stories, on parables, and perhaps on a
written account of Jesus' death. Mark combined these
disparate elements with other traditions passed on by word-ofmouth to create a new narrative that began the gospel tradition.
Whether Mark himself was a gentile or a Jew remains a subject
of scholarly debate. So, too, does the place of his composition;
some scholars think that he wrote his work in Rome, others that
he wrote in Alexandria, still others suggest Syria. The way Mark
tells the story suggests that his audience lived outside the
homeland, spoke Greek rather than Aramaic, and was not
familiar with Jewish customs. While there is disagreement
about where Mark wrote, there is a consensus about when he
wrote: he probably composed his work in or about the year 70
CE, after the failure of the First Jewish Revolt and the
destruction of the Jerusalem Temple at the hands of the Romans. That destruction
shapes how Mark tells his story.
Many Christians thought that the Revolt would inaugurate the eschatological event that
would establish the new Kingdom on earth and herald the triumphant return of the
Messiah. Jesus himself was remembered for proclaiming that the Kingdom would come,
maybe within their lifetimes: "Some of you standing here will not taste death until you
see the Kingdom come with power." (MK 9:1.20). But these expectations were not
fulfilled. And the author of Mark seems to want to recast traditional images of Jesus to
make sense of the events that occurred, or did not occur, after he died.
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In Mark's story, Jesus is buried in a tomb. Mark's original ending of the gospel does not
contain an account of the resurrection; that ending, now contained in the gospel of the
New Testament, was added by a later author. Mark ended his work on a stark note. Two
women enter the tomb, and they see a young man dressed in white. He explains that
Jesus has been raised, and he instructs the women to tell Peter and the other disciples.
The women flee in terror.
What message did Mark intend to send to his audience? Scholars do not agree. Some
argue that Mark deliberately constructs a bleak and frightening picture because that was
the experience of the people for whom Mark composed his work. Elaine Pagels offers a
different interpretation: "And the last words of the original gospel are 'and they were
terrified.' It would be very bad news if it weren't that underneath this rather dark story is
an enormous hope . . . that this very promising story and its terrible anguished ending is
nevertheless not the ending. That there's a mystery in it, a divine mystery of God's
revelation that will happen yet. And I think it's that sense of hope that is deeply
appealing."
The Gospel of John
The so-called "spiritual gospel" which presents Jesus as the "Stranger from Heaven,"
stands apart from the other three.
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God, and
through him were all things made." These words of the opening
prologue of the fourth gospel provide a clue to the nature of this
work: it stands apart from the three synoptic gospels. It has
often been called the "spiritual gospel" because of the way that
it portrays Jesus.
If Matthew's Jesus resembles Moses and Luke's Jesus
resembles a Greek philosopher or a semi-divine hero, John's
Jesus resembles the Jewish ideal of heavenly Wisdom. Some
Jewish works written several hundred years before John's
gospel portrayed Wisdom as God's heavenly consort. This
Wisdom, pictured as a beautiful woman, lived with God and
participated in creation. Another part of the myth regarding her
was that she descended to earth to impart divine knowledge to
human beings. But she was rejected and so returned to God.
Another interesting feature of John's gospel is that Jesus
speaks in long monologues, rather than pithy statements or
parables. He openly proclaims his divinity and insists that the
only way to the Father is through him. Motifs of light and
darkness are woven throughout the gospel: these are not
simply literary motifs, but devices that give clues about the
community for which John was written.
It was a community under stress. The gospel itself suggests that its members were in
conflict with the followers of John the Baptist and were undergoing a painful separation
from Judaism. The group itself was probably undergoing desertion and internal conflict.
Tradition has credited John, the son of Zebedee and an apostle of Jesus, with the
authorship of the fourth gospel. Most scholars dispute this notion; some speculate that
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the work was actually produced by a group of early Christians somewhat isolated from
other early Christian communities. Tradition also places its composition in or near
Ephesus, although lower Syria or Lebanon are more likely locations. The most likely time
for the completion of this gospel is between 90 and 110 CE.
The central theme of this work is ascent/descent. Jesus is presented as one who travels
freely between the dual realms of heaven and earth. As Wayne Meeks has written, he is
"the Stranger from Heaven." He -- and he alone -- knows the Father; belief in him is the
only way to reach the Father, the only way to salvation. The believers of John's
community can see into this spiritual and redeeming cosmos; their opponents cannot.
The opponents of Jesus are "the Jews", who cannot or will not recognize who he is. The
author of John deliberately creates a story that may be interpreted on two levels. That is,
the story that John tells of Jesus' encounter with the Jews consciously parallels the
tensions between John's community and its contemporary Jewish opponents. His
community is being expelled from the synagogues, because they believe in Jesus as the
Messiah; the Jews in John's gospel simply cannot grasp his true identity. They
constantly ask "Where are you from?" and "Where are you going?" Jesus responds by
saying where he is going they cannot go; they think that he intends to travel abroad.
"Does he intend to go to the Diaspora among the Greeks and teach the Greeks?" In this
gospel, the Jews cannot know because they are from the darkness; Jesus and his
followers are from the light: "You are from below, I am from above; you are of this
cosmos, I am not of this cosmos." (8:23)
These themes of light and dark, knowing and unknowing, converge in the crucifixion of
Jesus. John makes a deliberate pun on the Greek word "to be crucified", which also
means "to be lifted up."
As in the other gospels, the end is not the end. John describes the scene of the empty
tomb and Jesus' appearance among the disciples. Thomas still doubts that the figure
before him is really Jesus. Jesus instructs him to feel the wound at his side, whereupon
Thomas is convinced. Jesus, in a telling reference to those who accept him, says:
"Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe."
Just as Jesus addresses his disciples, the author of John addresses his community. And
he offers them reassurance: "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his
disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come
to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God and that through believing you may
have life in his name." (JN 20:30-31).
As Paula Fredriksen has written, "They could thus see themselves as they saw their
Savior: alone in the darkness, yet the light of the world."
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