One major difference between the Fourth Gospel and the Gospels of Matthew and Luke; is that the Fourth Gospel account is one of Jesus finishing his job after his resurrection and ascension.
We are told that Jesus has completed his work. Nothing more needs to be done - except for each person to choose whether or not to follow Jesus.
Whereas Matthew and Luke, with their assertion of a second coming, assert that the ascended Jesus had done only half the job.
The job would be finished only with the second coming of Christ.
Furthermore, the Acts of the Apostles (continuing Luke), and Paul's Epistles also assert that the efforts of Men - by teaching and organising, are needed in order to complete the work of Jesus.
By my understanding, both cannot be correct.
(Note: I believe that the Fourth Gospel is the correct teaching.)
8 comments:
I like Mark, who presents the whole business as a mystery. Some young chap in white (signifying what?) makes a prediction, the women scurry away, and it's Stumps. (Though you do have to know that the last few verses are counterfeit, added later.)
I can't read Matt and Luke because of the nativity rubbish.
Would it be worth my while to glance at John come Xmas?
@d - I'm not sure I understand the link to Xmas. John has nothing specifically related to Christmas, as such; although the first verses ("In the beginning...") usually features in "Nine lessons and carols" Xmas services.
Oh, it's just that several Xmasses ago I took it into my head to lay off the bah humbuggery, and have a look at the NT. I started with Mark. I thought well of it; look up which bits are bogus, discard them, and what's left is a pretty good yarn. I know that nobody knows who wrote it, or where, or when, or for whom, or under what circs, or based on what evidence, but I still think it reads well.
Mind you, I did try to read the Koran a few decades ago so it's not surprising that Mark reads well. After the Koran even Henry James or D H Lawrence would read well. Or Iris Murdoch.
@d You could not spend your time and energy any better way than reading 'John'.
Dearieme, Christmas is a Matthew/Luke thing. You won’t find anything about it in the other two gospels.
We shall find out one day, as sure as death and taxes.
Oh, Wm Jas, I suspect Xmas is an invented-by-pagans-and-Christians-as-a-compromise thing.
Re the Christian contribution: I wrote earlier "I can't read Matt and Luke because of the nativity rubbish". I wonder whether it was the aforesaid rubbish that turned me sceptical about Christianity when I was a boy. Or was it the evident nonsense in the OT? A couple of million people and their beasts living in a little patch of desert for forty years? Pull the other one! Noah's Ark? Adam'n'Eve? Pah!
It just crosses my mind: did I decide that God must be baloney when I realised that Santa didn't exist? If people had been making it up about Santa what else had they made up? If so, is Santa the Devil's work?
@d - We live in a world where it is mandatory to believe that men and women can change sex, back and forth; denial of which is punishable by sacking and public vilification. Quibbles over details in historical documents are small beer by comparison.
I don't know where you got the idea that Santa doesn't exist - https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2014/05/is-hobbes-really-alive-or-is-it-just.html - he is alive and thriving in my house.
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