How Did The Gospel Writers Know?
Last updated
Last updated
Are the gospels faithfully reporting firsthand eyewitness history, or did the writers instead take narrative license to create a story? That’s for you to decide for yourself. But consider the poignant perspective of influential early Church father Origen. Origen explains that those who read the Gospels as actual historical narratives are perhaps being naively literal, and that the gospels were constructed as historicized allegory and were not to be taken literally as many have done (note: early Patristic Fathers such as Irenaeus and Papias have similarly challenged a strict literal rendering of gospel narratives in favor of spiritual/parabolic renderings). In his treatise titled Contra Celsus, Origen states that “the historical parts” of the Gospels “were written with an allegorical purpose, being most skillfully adapted not only for the multitude of simple-minded believers, but also for the few who are willing or even able to examine matters intelligently.” He goes on to state that those who approach the text literally “have a veil of ignorance upon them. What other inference can be drawn than that [the gospels] were composed to be understood allegorically as their chief designation?” Origen boils down his point as follows: “the spiritual truth was often preserved, as one might say, in material falsehood.” All that to say, Origen has a point… the totality of evidence is compelling in showing that the New Testament gospels are not reporting firsthand eyewitness accounts of history. And those who nonetheless maintain that the gospels are firsthand eyewitness narratives bear a special burden of proof to justify this insistence. As it happens, early Christianity and New Testament studies is an arena where people tend to engage in theology & tradition and call it history or biography. To paraphrase the esteemed John Dominic Crossan, over the years of scholarly research we have learned that the gospels are not history, though they contain some history. They are not biography, though they may contain some biographical elements. They are gospel narratives, and as we observe from the prototype example of Caesar Augustus, the value in the messages and motifs of these narratives often supercede historical and eyewitness reality.
