Did Jesus live in India?
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Serutan said:
Seems very unlikely, given that Buddhism was not known in the west in the first century AD.
Traitorfish said:
No, they haven't. Apart from anything else, Nazareth was not part of the Roman empire at this time. Some early Christian writers (such as Justin Martyr, I think) were under the impression that some kind of legal documents existed detailing Jesus' execution and suchlike, but even in the unlikely event that they did, they were certainly lost.
Irish Caesar
Yellow Jacket
SoCalian said:
I guess I meant Jerusalem...
Not that a lot of men named Jesus went on to become religious leaders anywhere.
Adler17
Prussian Feldmarschall
I heard that story a few times before. Once it was connected with the cloth piece of Turin, which shall show Jesus. There it was said, the cloth can be from the time of Jesus death. But a dead body would never make such impressions in the cloths. So the next thesis was made: Jesus lived! It was said the Joseph of Arimathea (sp?) was able to get the permission to bury the dead Jesus, which was only due to his influence, as mostly the victims of crucifications reamined on the place until they were rotted. So it was said, that Jesus became a kind of poison in his drink at the crucification. So he felt in a dead like sleep. He was still alive when he was given over to Jeseph. So he was "buried" but fastly liberated and after his wounds were healed he headed away for India as it was not under Roman control. In Kashmir he started a new life and was buried there. It was also said that this grave is the only one to claim to have Jesus body.
However I don´t know very much on that topic. But this sounded quite logical. Also we should remind the council of Nicaea, in which there were elctions in theological questions. There it was decided to say Jesus was God´s son. Infact before this he was not his son but his servant.
So the real truth of the whole story can´t be revealed any more. But it would be interesting to see a DNA analysis of the body of the grave in Kashmir. If the body is from Israel, and related to the houses of David and Jakob, it is very likely Jesus body is found. But these analysis have to wait as there is no permission to get the DNA.
Adler
However I don´t know very much on that topic. But this sounded quite logical. Also we should remind the council of Nicaea, in which there were elctions in theological questions. There it was decided to say Jesus was God´s son. Infact before this he was not his son but his servant.
So the real truth of the whole story can´t be revealed any more. But it would be interesting to see a DNA analysis of the body of the grave in Kashmir. If the body is from Israel, and related to the houses of David and Jakob, it is very likely Jesus body is found. But these analysis have to wait as there is no permission to get the DNA.
Adler
willemvanoranje
Curitibano
Isn't there still people out there called Jesus? I think in for example Spain the name is still used. Jesus Gil y Gil ring a bell?
Rambuchan
The Funky President
Everyone knows that Jesus went and hung out for a while in Kashmir. A bit of "R&R", as he put it to his audience just before the fish and loaves performance. It was round about the time of the 40 days and 40 nights that he made the little chukka to India. So while many think he was chatting to the Devil out in the desert, he was actually up to something else, quite a few thousand kilometres above sea level. Many contend that he stayed on the very same Kashmiri houseboat that Jim Morrison, Elvis Presley, Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. now reside on. That's clearly a nonsense theory though. Biggie would never share a pad with Jim Morrison. Remember when they were in Africa?
Thorgalaeg
Deity
Yep, the messiah of the corruption.willemvanoranje said:
In fact, Jesus is a very common name in Spain and Hispanoamerica.
Rambuchan
The Funky President
Jesus, as a name, is very popular throughout the Portuguese speaking world too.
[Adler] The Council of Nicaea didn't state that Jesus is the son of God - it stated that the Son *is* God. No-one denied that Jesus was the son of God, but they differed over what this meant.
[Rambuchan] And what's the connection between the ass on which Jesus rode into Jerusalem and Shergar? I think we should be told.
[Rambuchan] And what's the connection between the ass on which Jesus rode into Jerusalem and Shergar? I think we should be told.
Having Jesus go to India accomplishes a couple of things. First it fills in time that is missing from the gospels and second it provides a nice link between the Hindu notion of god manifesting in human form and christianity. For all practical purposes, putting Jesus in India makes him a qutub or sadguru.
I do find it odd that none of the gospels provide any details of Jesus' life prior to his ministry. One possibility is that they didn't know and at the time of their writing, no one alive and nearby knew. Second, it could have been deemed unnecessary and deliberately left out. I wonder if other 1st C biographies skip the early years also.
The fact that the gospels really don't offer up much at all of two years worth of ministry is telling. What was Jesus doing for those two years? You could easily string the gospel events into a few months of activity. What about the rest of his time? Something seems amiss. Matthew and company missed 90% of Jesus' ministerial life. Why? Had the oral tradition already been lost? How different would the NT have been if 90% had been written down rather than 10%?
It's these kinds of gaps that lead people to speculate and look for answers in India and Egypt. If jesus was the son of god and he knew that he was, two questions come to mind: When did he find out/first learn who he was? And, if he found out who he was at a young age (teens?) would he have had any reasons to travel outside of Nazareth? How would a fully god/fully human teenage boy spend his time?
I do find it odd that none of the gospels provide any details of Jesus' life prior to his ministry. One possibility is that they didn't know and at the time of their writing, no one alive and nearby knew. Second, it could have been deemed unnecessary and deliberately left out. I wonder if other 1st C biographies skip the early years also.
The fact that the gospels really don't offer up much at all of two years worth of ministry is telling. What was Jesus doing for those two years? You could easily string the gospel events into a few months of activity. What about the rest of his time? Something seems amiss. Matthew and company missed 90% of Jesus' ministerial life. Why? Had the oral tradition already been lost? How different would the NT have been if 90% had been written down rather than 10%?
It's these kinds of gaps that lead people to speculate and look for answers in India and Egypt. If jesus was the son of god and he knew that he was, two questions come to mind: When did he find out/first learn who he was? And, if he found out who he was at a young age (teens?) would he have had any reasons to travel outside of Nazareth? How would a fully god/fully human teenage boy spend his time?
SoCalian
Deity
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Keep in mind, that Jesus was a RabaiBirdjaguar said:
(in fact he was refered to as such many times). Most Rabais(sp?) did not begin their teachings until about age 30 or so. I'm not sure if other biographies of 1st century Rabais also left out the early years. I wouldn't be suprised if they didn't, because most rabais went though relatively similar training to become rabais. Also, given the importance of commentary to the Torah in the Jewish faith, I should think that biographies would concentrate more on a rabbai's teachings than on his early life. The Authors of the gosples may have thought that what details they did give on Jesus' early life was enough to diferentiate him from other rabbais at the time. All other Rabbais went through rigerous lifelong training and discipline to get where they were, and to have the knowledge and wisdom that they did. Jesus didn't do that, He grew up in Nazareth and trained under his earthly father to become a carpenter. this is such a huge distinction, that is lost on us today. The audience at the time would have understood that this Man must be special to be so wise, perhaps even divinely inspired like the prophets of old. IMHO, a lot of important context is lost on us today, because we simply don't live in the first century Jewish world, or have the same backgroud and education in scripture that they all did. So, details that would have been compleatly obvious and full of meaning to them befudle us. I would apreciate it if some one else, more knowlegeble than myself, would go into greater detail about First century Jewish life. I think background is very important in understanding Jesus.
Birdjaguar said:
So, there was obviously a lot more that He did that what was told, so most likely the authours of the gospels focused on the most important parts, which cam at the end, the climax of his life and teachings, where the movement he starts becomes poised to change the world. So no, I don't find it odd at all. How many biographies of Abraham Linclon hit heavily on his time as President durring the Cival War? probably a lot, I know our history books in school do. It looks like the same thing for Jesus. The most importnat stuff came at the end, so that's what was writen down.John 21:25 said:
So could a person become a "real" rabbai without formal training? Or was he called rabbai because he was a "teacher"?SoCalian said:
IIRC the gospels give one event of Jesus' boyhood: when he told the priests that he was in his father's house. That's not much to separate him from anyone else.
So you think the authors knew more than they told? I don't buy that. If you are writing the life of the son of god who died and was resurrected, why would you tell so little of the story? The gospels don't really read like summaries; more like assembled fragments of stories. I think they didn't know any more than they wrote and they included some filler to round out the story.SoCalian said:
Plotinus: Do you or other scholars know anything about the oral tradtions of the very early church (30-70 AD)? Do we know anything about how they worshipped? How do you think Jesus' story was carried forward from 30 AD to the end of the century?
If John was the disciple of Jesus, then he should know. His gospel is the least story like and more spiritual. For him Jesus would have been a more "mystical" event and I would guess he would be less concerned about daily events and he would try to convey his "experience and knowledge". The other authors, lacking personal experience with Jesus, would have focused on things they understoood: events and people from what sources were available.John 21:25 said:
Adler17
Prussian Feldmarschall
If we want to know more about the life of Jesus we have to seperate us from the Bible. As the Bible has only 4 direct sources about Jesus, all were selected out of about 70 or so evangelians (sp?). So we have to seperate myth from reality.
1. Jesus lived. IIRC there is one source out of the Bible and other Christian books a few years after his death mentioning Jesus. So he wans´t "invented".
2. Jesus was born from Mary, who was pregnant for nine month. That she was a virgin is myth. Many reasons are mentioned why it became a "virgin" birth. So it is said Jesus´ real father was a Roman legionary. Or some translation mistakes. However God was not the biological father of Jesus body.
3. The theological sources are all written with a certain background and a certain aim. So there is no real historical objective source from that time. So there are over 70 evangelians. Only 4 of them were chosen in Nicaea. There was a reason why to choose them. Jesus should become equal with god. The christianity was on the way up also in the power and so it was easier for some to put the person Jesus in the foreground and not his message. Also to get and secure power. The Bible was written by men and not God. And to different times.
But even if we read all of the evangelians existing, we have still problems in seperating myth from reality.
From the theological point of view this should be not so important to know about every detail in his life, but his message. I don´t mean that every aspect of the Bible should or can be implemented as it is nonsense that Earth is just a few thousand years old. But the core of the story. So like any other holy book.
Adler
1. Jesus lived. IIRC there is one source out of the Bible and other Christian books a few years after his death mentioning Jesus. So he wans´t "invented".
2. Jesus was born from Mary, who was pregnant for nine month. That she was a virgin is myth. Many reasons are mentioned why it became a "virgin" birth. So it is said Jesus´ real father was a Roman legionary. Or some translation mistakes. However God was not the biological father of Jesus body.
3. The theological sources are all written with a certain background and a certain aim. So there is no real historical objective source from that time. So there are over 70 evangelians. Only 4 of them were chosen in Nicaea. There was a reason why to choose them. Jesus should become equal with god. The christianity was on the way up also in the power and so it was easier for some to put the person Jesus in the foreground and not his message. Also to get and secure power. The Bible was written by men and not God. And to different times.
But even if we read all of the evangelians existing, we have still problems in seperating myth from reality.
From the theological point of view this should be not so important to know about every detail in his life, but his message. I don´t mean that every aspect of the Bible should or can be implemented as it is nonsense that Earth is just a few thousand years old. But the core of the story. So like any other holy book.
Adler
So much to say, so little time...
First, the Gospels weren't "chosen" at Nicaea. I don't know where people get this idea that Nicaea had anything to do with establishing the canon of the New Testament. In fact that was "officially" done in the 390s, but to all intents and purposes the mainstream churches all agreed in using what would become the four canonical Gospels in the second century (apart from the Syriac-speaking churches, which for some centuries would use a synthesis of these Gospels written by Tatian the Syrian).
John's Gospel was not written by John the apostle. Like all the Gospels, it is anonymous, and the attribution was made a century later. Virtually all scholars agree that none of the Gospels had anything to do with anyone who actually knew Jesus.
Jesus was not a rabbi. He was an eschatological preacher who did miracles. Rabbis as such did not exist in Jesus' day - they really came into being at the end of the first century, after the destruction of the Temple. Hence we talk about "rabbinical Judaism" as a later development. When Jesus is addressed as "rabbi" in the Gospels, this is something of an anachronism, reflecting the period when the Gospels were written rather than the period supposedly described in them. Even if rabbis had been around then (and it is common to use the word anachronistically to refer to leading Pharisees), Jesus wasn't one. He was not a learned Pharisee but a popular preacher. You must remember that Judaism in Jesus' day was an extremely varied and fragmented religion, even within the Holy Land (and there were more Jews outside it than in, mainly in Persia). There were Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and all the rest. This means there was no "standard" background for a Jewish preacher, for who was to say what the "standard" would be? In fact there seem to have been quite a lot of people like Jesus, popular preachers who talked about the coming Kingdom of God or were even hailed as a Messiah. John the Baptist fits into this category, and was probably more popular and well known than Jesus was, at the time.
Don't assume that Jesus' ministry lasted two years. The traditional duration is three years, because John's Gospel mentions three Passovers. In fact, of course, that would still give two since one comes at the start and one at the end. But why should we assume that this is historical? In fact, the vast majority of scholars regard John's Gospel as far less historical than the others. John arranges his material in a way determined by theology, not history, and he writes in a way to make events happen at what he regards as significant times. Thus there is no reason to suppose that Jesus' ministry took as long as he indicates. And it is true that if you read one of the other Gospels through, you get the impression of a few hectic months rather than years. This is likely to be closer to what really happened.
Bear in mind that the Gospels were written at least thirty years after Jesus' death, and probably quite a bit more. They were based upon stories about Jesus that had been passed on for at least a couple of generations. Scholars have studied the stories that make up the Gospels in enormous depth, and have attempted to reconstruct the history of their transmission. That's partly to get to the "original", that is, to reconstruct what Jesus himself was like; it's also to learn more about the early Christians who were telling and re-telling this stuff. Whilst many of the stories probably do have historical roots in Jesus' life, they have been shaped - to varying degrees - by the circumstances of the people who told them. We don't really know a great deal about the early church, other than the information in Acts (which should be taken with a pinch of salt) and what can be gleaned from Paul's letters, especially 1 Corinthians - and these only apply to certain churches, rather than all of them. But scholars detect plenty of different concerns in the various Gospels to distinguish clearly between what was going on in the communities that produced them. I've even seen attempts to reconstruct the community that produced Q, which itself is a hypothetical document supposedly used independently by Matthew and Luke, and which must be reconstructed from their Gospels. I think that's going a bit too far, basing a reconstruction upon a reconstruction.
All of this means that the structure of the Gospels - that is, the order in which the Gospel writers chose to place these stories - is largely their own invention (or that of earlier compilers). The stories were passed on as separate units, rather like jokes or urban legends are passed on today. Clearly the Gospel writers would have no idea what order they should go in (other than obvious things like having Jesus' baptism at the start and his death at the end). So you can't really hope to reconstruct the course of Jesus' ministry from this. And indeed we have two distinct models - the Synoptics have Jesus doing all his ministry in Galilee, then going on a single, fateful journey to Jerusalem, where he teaches for a week and then gets executed. According to John, Jesus travelled all over the Holy Land throughout his ministry, making many trips to Jerusalem. Do the Synoptics preserve a genuine historical tradition about the shape of Jesus' ministry which John ignores? Or vice versa? Or are they all just ordering the material according to their own theological agendas? Remember that the Synoptics are textually dependent upon each other - probably Matthew and Luke both based their work, partly, upon Mark, which means that basically we have to choose between the scheme offered by Mark and that offered by John. Or reject them both.
It should also be made clear that scholars agree that the material found in Matthew and Luke (there is none in the other two) about Jesus' life before his public ministry is almost certainly entirely legendary. This includes the birth narratives and the story in Luke about the boy Jesus getting lost at the Temple. In fact nothing is known about Jesus' life before his ministry, other than that he seems to have come from an artisan family in Nazareth.
Note, also, that the four canonical Gospels are the only ones which seem to preserve anything historical about Jesus *at all*. There are, perhaps, one or two sayings in the Gospel of Thomas and elsewhere which might go back to him, but on the whole scholars agree that if we want to find out about the historical Jesus we have to read the four canonical Gospels (and probably focus on the Synoptics, not John). So when the early church chose those four and rejected all the others, they were actually doing a pretty good job, and one that was not based upon a theological agenda (if they had really been choosing them on the basis of which ones glorified Jesus, they would have chosen all those weird Gnostic ones which make him a celestial Saviour, not the Synoptics which have him hungry, angry, and in pain).
It's also worth pointing out that there are no real parallels to the Christian Gospels in other ancient literature. Probably the closest is the Life of Apollonius of Tyana, which I think was from the third century AD, but really it's not much like the Gospels. The Gospels were not biographies, but highly redacted collections of orally transmitted memories, edited into a coherent narrative, and the genre appears to have been "invented" by the author of the Gospel of Mark.
First, the Gospels weren't "chosen" at Nicaea. I don't know where people get this idea that Nicaea had anything to do with establishing the canon of the New Testament. In fact that was "officially" done in the 390s, but to all intents and purposes the mainstream churches all agreed in using what would become the four canonical Gospels in the second century (apart from the Syriac-speaking churches, which for some centuries would use a synthesis of these Gospels written by Tatian the Syrian).
John's Gospel was not written by John the apostle. Like all the Gospels, it is anonymous, and the attribution was made a century later. Virtually all scholars agree that none of the Gospels had anything to do with anyone who actually knew Jesus.
Jesus was not a rabbi. He was an eschatological preacher who did miracles. Rabbis as such did not exist in Jesus' day - they really came into being at the end of the first century, after the destruction of the Temple. Hence we talk about "rabbinical Judaism" as a later development. When Jesus is addressed as "rabbi" in the Gospels, this is something of an anachronism, reflecting the period when the Gospels were written rather than the period supposedly described in them. Even if rabbis had been around then (and it is common to use the word anachronistically to refer to leading Pharisees), Jesus wasn't one. He was not a learned Pharisee but a popular preacher. You must remember that Judaism in Jesus' day was an extremely varied and fragmented religion, even within the Holy Land (and there were more Jews outside it than in, mainly in Persia). There were Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and all the rest. This means there was no "standard" background for a Jewish preacher, for who was to say what the "standard" would be? In fact there seem to have been quite a lot of people like Jesus, popular preachers who talked about the coming Kingdom of God or were even hailed as a Messiah. John the Baptist fits into this category, and was probably more popular and well known than Jesus was, at the time.
Don't assume that Jesus' ministry lasted two years. The traditional duration is three years, because John's Gospel mentions three Passovers. In fact, of course, that would still give two since one comes at the start and one at the end. But why should we assume that this is historical? In fact, the vast majority of scholars regard John's Gospel as far less historical than the others. John arranges his material in a way determined by theology, not history, and he writes in a way to make events happen at what he regards as significant times. Thus there is no reason to suppose that Jesus' ministry took as long as he indicates. And it is true that if you read one of the other Gospels through, you get the impression of a few hectic months rather than years. This is likely to be closer to what really happened.
Bear in mind that the Gospels were written at least thirty years after Jesus' death, and probably quite a bit more. They were based upon stories about Jesus that had been passed on for at least a couple of generations. Scholars have studied the stories that make up the Gospels in enormous depth, and have attempted to reconstruct the history of their transmission. That's partly to get to the "original", that is, to reconstruct what Jesus himself was like; it's also to learn more about the early Christians who were telling and re-telling this stuff. Whilst many of the stories probably do have historical roots in Jesus' life, they have been shaped - to varying degrees - by the circumstances of the people who told them. We don't really know a great deal about the early church, other than the information in Acts (which should be taken with a pinch of salt) and what can be gleaned from Paul's letters, especially 1 Corinthians - and these only apply to certain churches, rather than all of them. But scholars detect plenty of different concerns in the various Gospels to distinguish clearly between what was going on in the communities that produced them. I've even seen attempts to reconstruct the community that produced Q, which itself is a hypothetical document supposedly used independently by Matthew and Luke, and which must be reconstructed from their Gospels. I think that's going a bit too far, basing a reconstruction upon a reconstruction.
All of this means that the structure of the Gospels - that is, the order in which the Gospel writers chose to place these stories - is largely their own invention (or that of earlier compilers). The stories were passed on as separate units, rather like jokes or urban legends are passed on today. Clearly the Gospel writers would have no idea what order they should go in (other than obvious things like having Jesus' baptism at the start and his death at the end). So you can't really hope to reconstruct the course of Jesus' ministry from this. And indeed we have two distinct models - the Synoptics have Jesus doing all his ministry in Galilee, then going on a single, fateful journey to Jerusalem, where he teaches for a week and then gets executed. According to John, Jesus travelled all over the Holy Land throughout his ministry, making many trips to Jerusalem. Do the Synoptics preserve a genuine historical tradition about the shape of Jesus' ministry which John ignores? Or vice versa? Or are they all just ordering the material according to their own theological agendas? Remember that the Synoptics are textually dependent upon each other - probably Matthew and Luke both based their work, partly, upon Mark, which means that basically we have to choose between the scheme offered by Mark and that offered by John. Or reject them both.
It should also be made clear that scholars agree that the material found in Matthew and Luke (there is none in the other two) about Jesus' life before his public ministry is almost certainly entirely legendary. This includes the birth narratives and the story in Luke about the boy Jesus getting lost at the Temple. In fact nothing is known about Jesus' life before his ministry, other than that he seems to have come from an artisan family in Nazareth.
Note, also, that the four canonical Gospels are the only ones which seem to preserve anything historical about Jesus *at all*. There are, perhaps, one or two sayings in the Gospel of Thomas and elsewhere which might go back to him, but on the whole scholars agree that if we want to find out about the historical Jesus we have to read the four canonical Gospels (and probably focus on the Synoptics, not John). So when the early church chose those four and rejected all the others, they were actually doing a pretty good job, and one that was not based upon a theological agenda (if they had really been choosing them on the basis of which ones glorified Jesus, they would have chosen all those weird Gnostic ones which make him a celestial Saviour, not the Synoptics which have him hungry, angry, and in pain).
It's also worth pointing out that there are no real parallels to the Christian Gospels in other ancient literature. Probably the closest is the Life of Apollonius of Tyana, which I think was from the third century AD, but really it's not much like the Gospels. The Gospels were not biographies, but highly redacted collections of orally transmitted memories, edited into a coherent narrative, and the genre appears to have been "invented" by the author of the Gospel of Mark.
Wow my best troll ever. 
Marla_Singer
United in diversity
Well, it's a common knowledge that according to the Koran Jesus, known as Issa, has been burried in Kashmire. This is far to be a discovery, well at least for muslims it's certainly not.
It should be noticed that the Koran rejects neither the old nor the new testimonies of the Bible. Islam recognized Abraham, Moses, Jesus and several others as prophets. Many pilgrims are visiting every day the tomb of Jesus in Kashmire.
It should be noticed that the Koran rejects neither the old nor the new testimonies of the Bible. Islam recognized Abraham, Moses, Jesus and several others as prophets. Many pilgrims are visiting every day the tomb of Jesus in Kashmire.
As always Plotinus a fabulous post.
So, are you saying that none of the NT was written by a person who had direct contact with Jesus and at best it is second hand? Are any of the books like Peter (1-2), Timothy (1-2), John (1-3) etc. attributed to people who actually knew Jesus?Plotinus said:
That's right. The books that are traditionally believed to have been written by people who actually knew Jesus are:
Matthew
John
1 Peter
2 Peter
1, 2, and 3 John
James
Jude (I think)
Revelation
Of these, only 1 and 2 Peter, James, Jude, and Revelation actually name their authors - the others are all anonymous (the letters of John claim to be from "the elder"). 1 and 2 Peter claim to be by Peter. Revelation claims to be by someone called John, but it is not implied that he is John the apostle (there were lots of people called John at this time, and in fact quite a few are mentioned in the New Testament).
In the second century, it was believed that the Gospel of John was written by "the beloved disciple", a character in that Gospel who is not named. The theory went that this was the author's way of referring to himself, and he was John (not sure why). John was also believed to have preached in Ephesus and to have lived there a very long time, becoming the last apostle to die. 1, 2, and 3 John are written in similar language to John's Gospel, so it was assumed they were by the same author. And the John of Revelation was assumed to be the same person. All fairly reasonable by the standards of ancient scholarship, perhaps.
All wrong, though. There is no reason to suppose that "the beloved disciple" is John, or indeed a real person at all; the letters 1 John, 2 John and 3 John are not by the author of the Gospel; and Revelation is by someone else entirely. Interestingly, some ancient Christian scholars such as Dionysius of Alexandria worked this out for themselves.
Matthew wasn't written by Matthew - I'm not sure what the basis was for supposing that it was. The main reason you can tell it wasn't by Matthew is that it's based on Mark, and if you'd been a personal friend of Jesus you would hardly base your book about him on someone else's book (and one written by someone who *didn't* know Jesus).
Mark is traditionally thought to have been written by John Mark, a disciple of Peter's, and therefore to contain Peter's own reminiscences, though not in his own words. But really there's no reason to suppose that this is true. Similarly, Luke is traditionally thought to have been written by a companion of Paul. This is because Acts is by the same person, and it sometimes slips into the first person plural when describing Paul's journeys. In fact, this can be explained far more simply as a common rhetorical device. Thus, the traditional attributions of the Gospels are almost certainly wrong, and as far as we know they have nothing to do with any direct contact with Jesus. But you could tell that anyway simply from examining their contents and seeing how the stories have been shaped by their oral transmission over the years before being written down. They are clearly folk literature, not personal reminiscences or even "biography" or "history" of the sort done by Greek historians (notwithstanding Luke's preface to his Gospel, which attempts to put it into that sort of genre).
1 Peter is very probably not by Peter, being apparently based in part on the theology of Paul. 2 Peter is certainly not by Peter, being apparently the latest book in the New Testament to be written, probably from the second century and based in part on Jude. Jude is also late, although not quite as late. But they don't tell us anything about the historical Jesus anyway.
The same for James. It's not clear which James is supposed to have written this - James the brother of John, or James the brother of Jesus? The former was a disciple of Jesus, while the latter was not, but became a Christian later on and led the church in Jerusalem. Like the letters attributed to Peter, it seems that this was written by someone who wanted to attach an important name to his work. The book is concerned with opposing Paul's theology, of course, not with telling us anything about the historical Jesus.
The only books of the New Testament that were definitely written within the lifetime of the apostles - that is, of people who had actually known Jesus - are the letters of Paul. These are Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, Philemon, and 1 Thessalonians. They apparently date from about AD 50 to the late 50s (perhaps). The other letters attributed to Paul are either possibly not by him (2 Thessalonians, Colossians) or definitely not by him (1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Ephesians). But of course, Paul did not know Jesus, and again his letters betray relatively little interest in what Jesus did during his lifetime (although they do parallel quite a lot of Jesus' ethical teaching).
You can get lots more useful info on all this stuff at http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/ which is a very good site for information on the state of scholarship on these books.
Matthew
John
1 Peter
2 Peter
1, 2, and 3 John
James
Jude (I think)
Revelation
Of these, only 1 and 2 Peter, James, Jude, and Revelation actually name their authors - the others are all anonymous (the letters of John claim to be from "the elder"). 1 and 2 Peter claim to be by Peter. Revelation claims to be by someone called John, but it is not implied that he is John the apostle (there were lots of people called John at this time, and in fact quite a few are mentioned in the New Testament).
In the second century, it was believed that the Gospel of John was written by "the beloved disciple", a character in that Gospel who is not named. The theory went that this was the author's way of referring to himself, and he was John (not sure why). John was also believed to have preached in Ephesus and to have lived there a very long time, becoming the last apostle to die. 1, 2, and 3 John are written in similar language to John's Gospel, so it was assumed they were by the same author. And the John of Revelation was assumed to be the same person. All fairly reasonable by the standards of ancient scholarship, perhaps.
All wrong, though. There is no reason to suppose that "the beloved disciple" is John, or indeed a real person at all; the letters 1 John, 2 John and 3 John are not by the author of the Gospel; and Revelation is by someone else entirely. Interestingly, some ancient Christian scholars such as Dionysius of Alexandria worked this out for themselves.
Matthew wasn't written by Matthew - I'm not sure what the basis was for supposing that it was. The main reason you can tell it wasn't by Matthew is that it's based on Mark, and if you'd been a personal friend of Jesus you would hardly base your book about him on someone else's book (and one written by someone who *didn't* know Jesus).
Mark is traditionally thought to have been written by John Mark, a disciple of Peter's, and therefore to contain Peter's own reminiscences, though not in his own words. But really there's no reason to suppose that this is true. Similarly, Luke is traditionally thought to have been written by a companion of Paul. This is because Acts is by the same person, and it sometimes slips into the first person plural when describing Paul's journeys. In fact, this can be explained far more simply as a common rhetorical device. Thus, the traditional attributions of the Gospels are almost certainly wrong, and as far as we know they have nothing to do with any direct contact with Jesus. But you could tell that anyway simply from examining their contents and seeing how the stories have been shaped by their oral transmission over the years before being written down. They are clearly folk literature, not personal reminiscences or even "biography" or "history" of the sort done by Greek historians (notwithstanding Luke's preface to his Gospel, which attempts to put it into that sort of genre).
1 Peter is very probably not by Peter, being apparently based in part on the theology of Paul. 2 Peter is certainly not by Peter, being apparently the latest book in the New Testament to be written, probably from the second century and based in part on Jude. Jude is also late, although not quite as late. But they don't tell us anything about the historical Jesus anyway.
The same for James. It's not clear which James is supposed to have written this - James the brother of John, or James the brother of Jesus? The former was a disciple of Jesus, while the latter was not, but became a Christian later on and led the church in Jerusalem. Like the letters attributed to Peter, it seems that this was written by someone who wanted to attach an important name to his work. The book is concerned with opposing Paul's theology, of course, not with telling us anything about the historical Jesus.
The only books of the New Testament that were definitely written within the lifetime of the apostles - that is, of people who had actually known Jesus - are the letters of Paul. These are Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, Philemon, and 1 Thessalonians. They apparently date from about AD 50 to the late 50s (perhaps). The other letters attributed to Paul are either possibly not by him (2 Thessalonians, Colossians) or definitely not by him (1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Ephesians). But of course, Paul did not know Jesus, and again his letters betray relatively little interest in what Jesus did during his lifetime (although they do parallel quite a lot of Jesus' ethical teaching).
You can get lots more useful info on all this stuff at http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/ which is a very good site for information on the state of scholarship on these books.
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