Chapter 1 Discussion

If you haven't tried the discussion questions on your own for chapter 1 you can scroll down to the previous post. Here are some answers or responses to the questions.

1. If you were on a jury, how important would eyewitness testimony be in helping you make your decision? Eyewitness testimony is crucial. If the prosecution has an eyewitness, the defense knows they only chance they have is to discredit the character and reputation of that witness or to show they are lieing or have a motive for being dishonest.

2. What eyewitnesses do we have for Jesus' life? Paul claimed there were over 500 eyewitnesses still alive when he was writing. The most important ones are the ones we have writings from. I would say that Matthew, John and Peter would rank as most important in the New Testament.

3. How do the author's names on the four Gospel accounts compare with that of apocryphal writings? Apocryphal writings are false writings meaning we know they were not written by the claimed author and usually are written long after that author actually lived. Apocryphal writings usually choose famous and very highly revered people as the author. These include people like Peter, Abraham, Mary, Daniel and Enoch. The Gospels include Matthew who was a tax collector and therefore scum of the earth. Luke was not an eyewitness and was also not Jewish. If there was a cover-up here these names would not have been used.

4. How do the four Gospel accounts differ from modern biographies? The Gospels focus most of there attention on the Passion week. They do not even cover Jesus' childhood very well. This sounds strange to us today but they were not interested in history as much as they were what Jesus did as Son of God and Savior.

5. What the heck is the Q-document? The letter "Q" is used from the German word quelle which means source. It is believed to have been a collection of sayings of Christ, sort of like a book of his best quotes. It is important to realize that we do not possess this document so its contents are highly speculative if it existed at all. Sometimes you will notice that parallel passages in the Gospel accounts have word for word identical quotes of Jesus. Scholars say they have to be either quoting each other or quoting some source document.

6. What are the synoptic Gospels and what makes the Gospel of John so unique? The synoptics are Matthew, Mark and Luke because they track Jesus' ministry in a similar manner. John does not really follow the same pattern and it emphasizes more the divinity of Christ. Scholars call this writing with a higher Christology.

7. If the Gospels were not written until about 30 years after Christ then how can they be trusted? How does this compare with other ancient pieces of literature? If an elderly person wrote memoirs of their life they would be writing about events over 30 years old and we would not question their accuracy. The Jews memorized many things and focused on an oral tradition so when it was written down it was considered to be highly accurate. Most ancient pieces of literature were not written down until centuries later so actually the New Testament is the most authentic work we have.

8. Are there any New Testament books that are older than the Gospels? All of Paul's writings which make up two thirds of the New Testament were written down before the Gospels were.

9. Dan Brown claims in the DaVinci Code that Christians did not worship Christ as God until after 325 AD. How would you respond to that after reading chapter one? The creeds of the Bible such as the one found in 1 Corinthians 15 can be placed to within 5 years of Jesus' crucifixion (about 35-38 AD). Paul's writings are dated in the 50s and there are numerous writings from the second century that refer to Christ as God. Actually, Tertullian developed the doctrine of the Trinity in the late second century.

I hope you are enjoying the material. I'll post some stuff for chapter 2 tomorrow.