Who Wrote the Gospels? (Ben Witherington III)

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Who wrote the Gospels? Higher criticism of the Bible challenges the traditional attributions of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In this Seven Minute Seminary, Ben Witherington explains how authority and authorship worked in the ancient world and how this relates to the four Gospels.
// Study the Gospel of Matthew with Ben Witherington: my.seedbed.com/product/the-go...
// Study the Gospel of John with Ben Witherington: my.seedbed.com/product/the-go...
// Study the Letter to the Romans with Ben Witherington: my.seedbed.com/product/the-le...

[@Elijah.19]

I love the scholars that give their humble opinions in the comment sections across the seven minute seminary videos.

[@JCInverso]

Thank you for another insightful video.

[@understandingthebible427]

food for thought....interesting insight into this....

[@freddiereadie30]

Many conclusions mentioned on this video, were merely based on assumptions. The bottomline is, if Jesus came down to Earth to proclaim important messages to mankind, why didn't he took the time and effort to have his preaching documented himself, or perhaps he could have appointed somebody to be his personal secretary? Jesus had so much power, he was able to raise Lazarus from the dead, so perhaps preserving his words in their pristine condition would have been a very easy task to do. But look at what happened after 2,000 years - we are all debating on the authenticity of the Gospels, because all the originals had crumbled to dust because they were written in papyrus.

[@MAMoreno]

I blame low-church, individualistic American theology for an objection such as this. Were the Gospels ever meant to be objective, carefully-documented historical records by 21st century standards? Were they ever supposed to be treated as a separate entity from the tradition that has passed them down for 2000 years, much like blood removed from the body to which it provides life? Must the authors have been moved to write in such a way that would check the boxes of modern post-Christian Western skeptics, regardless of how useless that approach would make them to their original Jewish and Greco-Roman audience?

[@Steven_Rowe]

Itis interesting he states John wrote Revelation as many bible historians such as Robert Beckford who is a pentecostal refute it.

[@SugoiEnglish1]

I would be careful about using the word refute. You mean Beckford offered a different view?

[@Jeremiah6071]

Atheists who like to try and debunk the bible love the topic of authorship, but it really has no relevance to the truth of the gospel accounts themselves. They could have been written by a random person on the street listening to the testimony of a disciple. There are many ways to determine whether a gospel account can be considered legitimate, but authorship is not one of them.

[@Elvengem]

Matthew,mark ,:Luke and John

[@joehinman1026]

Your position of BD and Elder John as redactor i have come up with on my own

[@doncamp1150]

Since the Gospel of John was attributed to John and was never assigned to another author and since in the late first century John was known personally by men such and Polycarp and very likely Papias, the assignment of the Gospel to John seems pretty secure. Ben's implication of a Judean disciple because of the Gospel's emphasis on the Judean portion of Jesus' ministry makes some sense. But that theory does not explain the absence of any reference to John or James in the Gospel or the oblique reference to the sons of Zebedee in the last chapter. It also does not explain the common themes and motifs as well as similar language in 1st John and the Gospel. Did Lazarus write both. It does not seem so. 1st John comes from a theologian and pastor who has care for the church. Or the complete absence of any reference to Lazarus anywhere else on the New Testament. Lazarus is an intriguing idea, but the one place where he is called one whom Jesus loved (John 11:36) does not seal the deal in my mind. That remark was a simple observation about Jesus' affection and grief. It is not at all like the several places where "the disciple whom Jesus loved" becomes a substitute for a name.

[@tomasrocha6139]

The Apostle John was illiterate (Acts 4:13)

[@doncamp1150]

Acts 4:13 does not actually mean that. Almost every Jewish kid went to synagogue school and knew how to read and write. But even if he was, that would not have prevented someone writing what he spoke. That was fairly common. Illiterate does not mean dumb. @@tomasrocha6139

[@geraldjohnson8871]

It's Not who wrote these Gospels it is who is reading and with the Help of God (Holy Spirit) and understands by Faith that their need be no doubt about the Gospels at All. AMEN BY Faith are ye saved and doubt has Know place w/ Faith. AMEN.

[@crossroadschurchofthenazar1836]

Matthew says that "the twelve" were at the last supper. Lazarus was NOT one of the Twelve. Luke says that Jesus ate the last supper with "the apostles". Lazarus was NOT one of the apostles. So ... I wonder how Lazarus could have been the disciple in John who reclined against Jesus. Just thinking ...

[@crossroadschurchofthenazar1836]

Also ... the apostle John is NEVER mentioned in the Gospel of John but he is mentioned numerous times in all three of the other gospels. When it comes to understanding the Bible I am but a grain of sand in comparison to Ben Witherington. But it seems to me that it does not take a lot of comparative research between the Gospels to determine that it was actually John who wrote the fourth Gospel. Basing the opinion on two phrases about Jesus' love for Lazarus seems to be woefully inadequate to me. Please forgive my presumptuousness.

[@crossroadschurchofthenazar1836]

And, IF, Lazarus wrote the Gospel of John it is curious that he would have either ... 1) left John completely out of one of the Gospels, or ... 2) referred to John as "the disciple Jesus loved."

[@jonathanmcculloughhedberg3749]

I agree that the Beloved Disciple wasn't Lazarus, but I still think that more people than the twelve were present at the Last Supper. The Synoptic Evangelists never claim that ONLY the Twelve were there.

[@crossroadschurchofthenazar1836]

@@jonathanmcculloughhedberg3749 Eisegesis? We can "suppose" that others were there but proof cannot be found in what is NOT there.

[@jonathanmcculloughhedberg3749]

@@crossroadschurchofthenazar1836 isn't that the same problem, though, as with Bart Ehrman's claim that the Gospels are inconsistent with the number of women at the tomb? I mean, they don't state that ONLY the mentioned women were there and so on. Richard Bauckham argues (persuasively imo) that the Beloved Disciple is John the Elder, both in The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple and in Jesus and the Eyewitnesses. The Gospels never say that ONLY the Twelve were there, and it's not justified to believe that since they don't mention anyone else, there wasn't anyone else present.

[@m77ast]

Sorry why do you say that they were later appended to the gospels. The gospels have always had these labels. Was Genesis later appended to the book of Genesis?

[@gamesbok]

You may have noticed that Genesis is not a Hebrew name.

[@Awurabena1]

Apostle JESUS loved was John not Judas. Note JESUS asked if he wants John to live forever what is his business he was talking about John!

[@Thomasw540]

Revelation 13 is a portrait of the centurion in Mark 15:39. It is sort of literary cubism. Rome was, first of all, a sea power and Leviathon, the beast that comes out of the sea, is symbolic of Rome. The Legions are Behemoth, beast of land and rivers. The centurion is a creature of the Roman secular rule of law. The centurion is a sociological innovaton that emerges from the Praetorian Guards of the Roman Republic. Unlike the armies they faced, which were the climax phase of Real Warfare and were tribal confederations, the Legions were put together like lego blocks and reflect Latin, which is also put together like Lego blocks. The centurion is the direct ancestor of the modern Non-Commissioned Officer and the leading edge of the Industrial Revolution. He is an Archetype of True Warfare at the apex of the military organization. He reflects the Ethos of the social organization of Rome, in contrast to the Aesthetic of the social organization of Israel, which represents the apex of a military organization of Real Warfare in Joshua, Gideon and David, and the Samurai is an example of the warrior Archetype at the apex of the military organization. In Vietnam, after Tet '68, the only thing that prevented the US Army from blowing up in a general mutiny like the Battleship Potemkin was the centuriate, which never blinked. It was just another day in Paradise. In the sociology of the modern military organization, they represent an organic gyroscopic flywheel. Strictly speaking, the centurion was a warrant rank: the vine staff he carried reapresented his authority in the same way the warrant card of the British police carry a warrant card. The centurion in Mark 15:39 was in charge of this execution detail and had the authority of his warrant to fulfill the requirements of the death warrants of each of these men. The number of the beast is the serial number on Jesus' death warrant. I, personally, like the added embellishment of the gematria assigning the numer ological value of "NERO etc" as emerging as 666 and I like 616 for different reasons, but the significance of the number is that Jesus was "numbered with transgressors" in a line, Mark 15:28, that was added by the same editor that added the parenthetical phrase in Mark 7:19 and added editor's note at the end of Mark 16:9 - 20. This editor is John Mark, who was the naked young man in Gethsemane and becomes the founder of the Christian publishing house in Alexandria that produced 90% of the manuscripts published before the 4th Century. Cornelius is the author of the Gospel of Mark. He is not the centurion in Mark 15:39, but the centurion in Acts 10 and the senior centurion in the 10th Legion that occupied the Mount of Olives during the investment of Jerusalem. More important than that, Cornelius was Pilate's Chief of Staff. They are both creatures of the Praetorian Guards, Pilate in the same diplomatic career path Jules Caesar pursued, while Cornelius was on a centurion career path. There is a triagulation between Pilate, Cornelius and Theophilus which is being universally ignored in the battle to establish Paul as the essential element in the emergence of Christianity and the context of it's theology, but Theophilus is the author of Hebrews and his theology is the synthesis of the secular humanism of Jesus and the secular rule of law of Rome and its republican administrative structures. The verse structure of Revelation is identical to the verse structure of the first 18 lines of Matthew 13 and Mark 4. In fact, the 9th verse in all three translates nearly identically. Ὃς ἔχει ὦτα ἀκούειν ἀκουέτω. ὁ ἔχων ὦτα ἀκουέτω Εἴ τις ἔχει οὖς, ἀκουσάτω. I can't read Greek, but this is an anchor in a code the Holy Ghost has created to unlock the sources of the canon in the fullness of time. Dr. Witherington's understanding of number as a figure of speech is, well, elementary, but he is less cluttered, epistemologically, than most Protestants constrained by the post modern dialectic deconstruction of conventional wisdom . Revelation was writted at about the same time as Hebrews, that is, after the fire in Rome and the beginning of Nero's persecutions. Revelation is a portrait of the processes that were set into motion in the spiritual realm by the death of Jesus, especially after Revelation 4:2, which is a "through the looking glass moment" of the literary conceit of the balance of the narrative. I had exactly this vision of The One in 1977. The thing I don't understand is why committed Christian scholars refuse insist on connecting the dots between Book V of Tertullian's Apology that describes Tiberius's attempt to elevate Christianity to a legal religion, to wit: >>>>>>>Tiberius accordingly, in whose days the Christian name made its entry into the world, having himself received intelligence from Palestine of events which had clearly shown the truth of Christ's divinity, brought the matter before the senate, with his own decision in favour of Christ. The senate, because it had not given the approval itself, rejected his proposal. Caesar held to his opinion, threatening wrath against all accusers of the Christians.

[@user-hl1kf2xi8y]

This seems like a very weak criterium to determine authorship.

[@nigeltuffnel7669]

προπαππούς The gospels have superior evidence for their authorship in comparison to all other writings of antiquity, and the authorship of those are assumed by the people who work in the area of those writings to be relatively accurate, even without as much support for their authorship as the four gospels.

[@TorianTammas]

+Nigel Tuffnei - We have 2 books from Gaius Julius Caesar, we have theater plays like the Bacchae written by Euripides 5th century BC. We have letter and even books written by Cicero. So whoever told you this did obviously lack a well founded knowledge of antiquity.

[@thejanayexperience2.072]

TorianTammas And how far removed are the copies from the originals, if there are any?.....Exactly

[@m77ast]

This man is using words like probably or it appears that and at the same time he is making bold statements. Every single Papyrus / writing discovered have GOSPEL ACCORDING TO - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Are you saying that these titles are not part of the text even though they come with the text or are you stating that you have a copy of a Papyrus that does not contain these titles or that contains another title? If not then please be silent because you are talking nonsense. All 1st and 2nd century scholars - one of whom knew John the apostle personally agrees that these gospels were written by these individuals. So except you are 2000 years old or more - you have to keep your mouth shut and stop trying to pass YOUR IDEAS to people disguising them behind PROBABLY or IT APPEARS THAT.

[@syampusat]

Is there any posibility of him that 'he is a liar'?

[@tomasrocha6139]

John the Apostle did not write the 4th Gospel as he was an illiterate and uneducated (Acts 4:13) fisherman from the countryside. Luke the physician did not write Luke-Acts as Acts flagrantly contradicts Paul's letters. Matthew did not write Matthew as most of Matthew is copied from Mark.

[@m77ast]

@@tomasrocha6139 I guess Jesus had to go to Harvard to learn to raise the dead back to life. 🤦🏾‍♂️🤦🏾‍♂️🤦🏾‍♂️ ignoramus.

[@summertea545]

No one really knows who wrote any of the gospels that's enough to take the Bible as fiction.

[@3r2w1c]

Yes Lazarus, he was "the disciple whom Jesus loved". A book by the same name makes an argument that is hard to dispute. Lazarus becoming famous overnight knew the people who let Peter into the temple where he would deny Jesus 3 times. He was the first to believe at the times when he saw the napkin folded to the side. He had been there himself. Please look up this book and consider it as evidence of Lazarus being the author of John. When you know what Jesus showed me this year it all comes into perfect clarity. Isaac's spirit, just as Elijah's spirit came back as John the Baptist Isaac's Spirit came back as Lazarus. His last incarnation was Smith WIGGLESWORTH and today he is Andrew Wommack. One day you will know yourself as you are known. Casting the many crowns before the throne. Our robes will be the righteousness of saints, plural. How is that possible? God can do anything he plans to accomplish. I w lifetime is not enough to prepare a soul to hold the Glory of God.

[@neill392]

John was written in the mid 2nd century!

[@pleaseenteraname1103]

Definitely not.

[@TheCackles68]

its believed mark was the first book written it has jesus quiet as he goes to his death then crying out my GOD my GOD why have you forsaken me. then he dies ,,,,,the oldest versions of mark never had the resurection story it ended with the women fleeing the empty tomb and saying nothing.,,and people say peter past this story to mark bah humbug ..... matthew and luke both copied from mark and added other things by the time we get to john jesus has become GOD .john 1;1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God . jesus has come along way from being the defeated man on the cross in mark to being the creator of the universe in john ...........

[@stealth6176]

phil cowbreath Mark appears to have at least two major sources: a source for the non-chronological ministry stories; and an older passion narrative that probably was well known in Judea, and known to Paul.