Are the 4 Evangelists historians?

[marco]

We occasionally get comments about the historical treatment of the gospels. Some people take exception to them not being considered as "real history."

Would you consider Matthew, Mark, Luke and John as historians?

Are there any differences between the gospel writers and say, Livy, Tacitus or Josephus or indeed any known historian?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 1 by marco]

A HISTORIAN

1: a student or writer of history

2: a writer or compiler of a chronicle*

source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/historian

* A chronicle
1: a historical account of events arranged in order of time usually without analysis or interpretation

If we accept a chronicle to be usually ie "not always" without interpretation, then I would say from the definition above yes.




JW

“Classical� Historians—How Dependable?
https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1969247

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[marco]

A chronicle
1: a historical account of events arranged in order of time usually without analysis or interpretation


If we accept a chronicle to be usually ie "not always" without interpretation, then I would say from the definition above yes.

The "Chronos", time, in chronicle is important. Events are set to a background of passage of time from a given date to a given date, say. The gospels are just a report of the wanderings of Jesus, and his sayings, that have the semblance of being historical but on examination we cannot identify when the subject was born or when he died. The purpose seems not to be to write history, but to write a eulogy of the subject, with reported speeches to back up the eulogy.

It is possible to take the unintentional bits of history from the gospels and find out what people did then and how they worked. In other words we can use the writing to extract some detail of history just as we can use a monk's prayer sheet or a person's poem. Juvenal wasn't writing history in his satires, but we can use his work to get information about Rome's plebeians. The intention of the gospel writers was to glorify a man, and in that respect the authors achieved their aim.

[Zzyzx]

.

Would you consider Matthew, Mark, Luke and John as historians?

I consider the writers of said gospels (whoever they may have been) to be religion promoters with vested interest in furthering the splinter group religion -- not recording events that actually happened in the real world -- perhaps comparable to Joseph Smith (another non-historian).

[JehovahsWitness]

...on examination we cannot identify when the subject was born or when he died.

I have to wonder if every historical document (especially when dealing with ancient history) allows us to identfy the protagonists' exact date of birth, but in any case, Luke gives us more than enough precision to be able to identify the year (if not the month and day) of Jesus birth. Notably by means of the precisions he presents when introducing Jesus baptism at 30 years of age

LUKE 3: 1-2

In the 15th year of the reign of Tibeʹrius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Ju·deʹa, Herod was district ruler of Galʹi·lee, Philip his brother was district ruler of the country of Ituraeʹa and Trach·o·niʹtis, and Ly·saʹni·as was district ruler of Abileʹne, in the days of chief priest Annas and of Caʹia·phas

All four gospels record the month, day, time and location of death with John's gospel allowing us calculate the length of Jesus ministry and thus the year of his execution.




JW



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[marco]

...on examination we cannot identify when the subject was born or when he died.

I have to wonder if every historical document (especially when dealing with ancient history) allows us to identfy the protagonists' exact date of birth, but in any case, Luke gives us more than enough precision to be able to identify the year (if not the month and day) of Jesus birth.

We don't have enough to identify the important date of the so called Incarnation. It is fine to be nebulous in incidental histories; when the subject is a divine messenger it smacks of carelessness not to identify the date properly. We cannot possibly identify the year - we can speculate.

A historical account of an individual would be expected to describe him and give some information that "chronicles" his progress through life, or through a particular time period. Instead we have conversational pieces but nothing that pins Christ down. Ironically, when some particular figure is mentioned from whom we might get information, we discover there are problems, as with the census details. I know we can explain these problems away, but the writers should have circumvented that necessity. But if they were not historians, but eulogists, there would be no need for that.

I am not denying Christ existed. Tacitus confirms his criminality. But it seems that those who chose to write about him were not interested in history but in the goodness of the man. Fair enough.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 6 by marco]

See edit above. The gospels taken as a whole provide more than enough detail for us to pinpoint exactly where and when Jesus lived, his progress through the "particular time period" of his ministry and when, where and how he died.

[Zzyzx]

.

Luke gives us more than enough precision to be able to identify the year (if not the month and day) of Jesus birth. Notably by means of the precisions he presents when introducing Jesus baptism at 30 years of age

Matthew gives us a DIFFERENT 'precision':

Both Luke and Matthew associate Jesus' birth with the time of Herod the Great. Matthew 2:1 states that "Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king". He also implies that Jesus could have been as much as two years old at the time of the visit of the Magi, because Herod ordered the murder of all boys up to the age of two years, "in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi". Matthew 2:16 Most scholars agree that Herod died in 4 BC, although a case has also been made that Herod died only in 1 BC.

Luke 1:5 mentions the reign of Herod shortly before the birth of Jesus, but places the birth during the Census of Quirinius, which only took place ten years later in AD 6 as described by the Jewish historian Josephus. He, in his Antiquities of the Jews (c. AD 93), indicates that Cyrenius/Quirinius' governorship of Syria began in AD 6, and Josephus mentions a census sometime between AD 6–7.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_of_birth_of_Jesus

Tangled webs?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 8 by Zzyzx]

There is no contradictoon between Matthew and Lukes accounts. Is that what you are suggesting?

[Zzyzx]

.

There is no contradictoon between Matthew and Lukes accounts. Is that what you are suggesting?

No contradiction between 4 BCE and 6 CE?

Perhaps not in Bible speak.