| Often what is "common knowledge" among biblical | | | | if they are truly astute, may consider that their |
| scholars and what is "common knowledge" among | | | | truth is not to be sought for in the outward and |
| ordinary Christians is not the same thing. | | | | material letter. Either we abandon the Gospels |
| Somewhere from the university to the Sunday | | | | because they are not historically accurate or we |
| school, the four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, | | | | discover that history is not the message. |
| and John) seem to be unconsciously combined to | | | | Apparent contradictions in Scripture can always be |
| greater or lesser degrees into a kind of | | | | resolved in this way, by appealing to some higher, |
| mish-mash or harmony to produce a single | | | | more sublime level, and what is more: if those |
| cohesive history. The Gospels are thus altogether | | | | more sublime levels are never reached then |
| portrayed, or at least received, not so much as | | | | surely the full potential of the Gospels' message is |
| theology but as a singular historical account. | | | | also never reached. |
| Potential theology, then, the Gospels' most | | | | The contemporary New Testament scholar |
| valuable asset, is lost. | | | | "seizes gleefully on discrepancies among the four |
| Young people from religious backgrounds often | | | | Gospels...[because such] discrepancies, far from |
| arrive at their universities and find themselves | | | | closing the door to understanding, are instead the |
| thrown into existential crises proportional to the | | | | keys that he or she hopes to use to unlock the |
| Conservatism of their catechism when they | | | | particular theological viewpoint of each evangelist" |
| discover that what they thought was true about | | | | (Janice Capel Anderson & Stephen D. Moore, "The |
| the story of Jesus is actually not exactly | | | | Lives of Mark", in Janice Capel Anderson, & |
| "historical." There is much more to the history of | | | | Stephen D. Moore, ed., Mark & Method: New |
| Jesus than they were taught in Sunday school. | | | | Approaches in Biblical Studies, Minneapolis, Fortress |
| Biblical scholar Janice Anderson points out that to | | | | Press: 2008). It is because of the disharmonious, |
| understand that the Gospels cannot be read as | | | | yet "synoptic" episodes in the Gospels that we |
| histories, one need only read straight through the | | | | can gaze as though through a window at the |
| four Gospels, one right after the other. Only in | | | | worlds in which the individual texts were written. |
| reading the four Gospels straight through do | | | | Their incongruence helps us to see something in |
| discrepancies pop out between them to show | | | | the Gospels that is more "human" than "Holy |
| that something else other than history must be | | | | Spirit," more "of-the-world" than "otherworldly," |
| going on. Ironic as it may seem, it is really only | | | | which does not diminish the Holy Spirit so much as |
| then that the figure of Jesus can more clearly be | | | | it increases the human. To learn that the authors |
| seen. Only short passages are read aloud in | | | | are more like us than we imagined helps us to |
| church services and then expounded in sermons | | | | bring home Jesus' message and the reality |
| or Sunday school lessons, so on the whole | | | | "behind, of, and before the text" (Sandra M. |
| students tend not realize that each of the four | | | | Schneiders, Written That You May Believe: |
| evangelists (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) is a | | | | Encountering Jesus in the Fourth Gospel, New |
| full-fledged author in his own right. In their own | | | | York, Crossroad Publishing Company: 2003). |
| ways each "full-fledged author" paints a unique | | | | The ability to look beyond discrepancies in the |
| portrait of Jesus; but we cannot say, "Each...paints | | | | Gospels is a good thing. The traditional "good |
| a unique history of Jesus," because then we | | | | Christian" tends neither to know nor care about |
| diminish the theological potential of the Gospels | | | | them anyway. Not caring about them is the |
| and we surely would not be able to account for | | | | function of a deep faith on the one hand; on the |
| discrepancies between them. | | | | other, being able to identify the ways in which the |
| Thus young Scripture students who are taught | | | | Gospel accounts are different, and then knowingly |
| that the Gospels are historical accounts, staggered | | | | to move beyond them, yields a much deeper |
| at finding discrepancies between them, often | | | | faith indeed. |
| abandon or renounce the Bible altogether, or, only | | | | |