In what way do the gospels differ from history?

marco · Post by **marco** » Sat Sep 14, 2019 7:37 am

From time to time we have a poster saying that the tales of Christ, his birth, resurrection and ascension into heaven are history. Others deny this. Obviously there are useful facts we can extract from the gospel writings, given their age.

In what ways - if any - do the gospels differ from other historical writings such as Livy's history of Rome, Gibbon's treatise on the Roman Empire or Churchill's account of World War ii?

Willum · Post by **Willum** » Sun Sep 15, 2019 12:33 pm

Then their is actually looking up the history of the regions that the Bible claims to have recorded.
why are there no dates in the Bible? Why are there no mentions of the might Hebrew empire? At least that canâ€™t be confused with real nations? Where is the Seleucid Empire? Alexander and so on in this work?
Nowhere... either they didnâ€™t exist or these Hebrew didnâ€™t. Take your pick.

marco · Post by **marco** » Mon Sep 16, 2019 5:18 am

Willum wrote: Then their is actually looking up the history of the regions that the Bible claims to have recorded.
why are there no dates in the Bible? Why are there no mentions of the might Hebrew empire? At least that canâ€™t be confused with real nations? Where is the Seleucid Empire? Alexander and so on in this work?
Nowhere... either they didnâ€™t exist or these Hebrew didnâ€™t. Take your pick.

Out of nowhere a man of thirty appears, chooses some simple souls and then talks platitudes. Moral advice was already given, possibly in more learned form, by other humans. The big question is why did this man attract such a following in later centuries? Was it his own doing (I'll be back very soon; I'm going to the sky to tidy up some rooms) or the grand opus of powerful institutions?

The gospels have the single aim of presenting Christ as a god, linked essentially to the Hebrew God in some mystical union. Were they mere history, Christ might have died and been forgotten. They are the religious equivalent of Einstein's relativity theory: they relate Jesus to Yahweh and propose a new world order, a unifying theory joining people of all nations. If only Yahweh were true!