ellauri094.html on line 92: Kari Syreeni argues that the gospel is a heavily reworked edition of an earlier Johannine work, and that the original did not include Jesus' passion. Syreeni theorizes that the original gospel ended at Chapter 12, with the notion of Jesus' disappearance from the world, and that the passion narrative was incorporated by a later editor freely using the existing gospels of Mark and Matthew.
ellauri094.html on line 94: Syreeni suggests that the letters of John - written after the predecessor gospels but before the final edition - reveal a schism in the Johannine community that was caused by the majority faction's acceptance of Jesus' death and resurrection, as it was then recorded in the new gospel. By exploring the gospel's different means of legitimizing the passion story, such as the creation of the 'Beloved Disciple' to witness Jesus' passion, and the foreshadowing of the resurrection of Jesus in the miracle of Lazarus, Syreeni provides a bold and provocative case for a new understanding of John.
ellauri111.html on line 381: To get into heaven, you have to REPENT of your sins and BELIEVE the gospel of Jesus Christ (ref. Mark 1:15). You have to REPENT of your sins--that means turn from them and BELIEVE that Jesus died for your sins, was buried, and rose again on the third day. Having done these things, you will be born again and the Lord Jesus Christ will help you to walk uprightly. You will read the word (the Authorized King James Bible) and follow the teachings of Jesus. The word of God will wash your mind and your desires will actually change as you obey what you read. [Beware of church buildings and the internet--there are many false gospels in the world today. Read the Bible for yourself. There is a sound Overview of the Bible at this link.]
ellauri111.html on line 630: Read the Bible. You need to start reading the Authorized (King James) Bible of 1611 daily. You can read it online or download it at this link--begin with the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and the New Testament. THESE ARE THE END TIMES AND BIBLE PUBLISHERS WHICH WERE ONCE TRUSTWORTHY NO LONGER ARE. I ENCOURAGE YOU TO DOWNLOAD AND PRINT OUT AND BIND YOUR OWN AUTHORIZED KING JAMES BIBLES. THERE IS A GREAT, ACCURATE, FREE DOWNLOAD AT THIS LINK. EACH CHRISTIAN AND EACH CHURCH SHOULD DO THIS WHILE THERE IS STILL TIME. Go to this link for a sound Overview of the Bible.
ellauri163.html on line 893: But now comes something rather suspect: There are no gospels which are immortal, but neither is there any reason for believing that humanity is incapable of inventing new ones (1954, pp. 475-476).
ellauri171.html on line 404: They were a sort of protected species, like a court jester in medieval Europe. They could say something critical to the ruler and get away with it, where no-one else could. There were many such men in the Old Testament (Elijah springs to mind), and several in the gospels (Jesus and John were both called prophets).
ellauri171.html on line 409: It was a dangerous thing to do. He might have got away with it with Antipas, who was indolent and indecisive, but Herodias was another matter. She engineered a situation that led to John’s death, silencing him forever. Did Herodias do it alone? Probably not. It is more likely that all three (Antipas, Herodias and Salome) planned the charade beforehand, to provide an excuse for getting rid of John and silencing him. In any case John, already in prison, was quickly beheaded. Another political problem was solved. Were it not for the fact that the gospels recorded this deed, John’s name and the horror of his death would have been lost forever.
ellauri184.html on line 239: This may at first blush sound like interesting background material that is not especially helpful for reading and interpreting the gospels. But Mark and Matthew have structured their narratives around a geographical framework dividing the north and the south, culminating in the confrontation of this prophet from Galilee and the religious establishment of Jerusalem.
ellauri184.html on line 346: The town is cited in all four gospels (Matthew 4:13, 8:5, 11:23, 17:24, Mark 1:21, 2:1, 9:33, Luke 4:23, 31,7:1, 10:15, John 2:12, 4:46, 6:17, 24, 59) where it was reported to have been the hometown of the tax collector Matthew (aka Leevi, eri kuin evankelista), and located not far from Bethsaida, the hometown of the apostles Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John. Some readers take Mark 2:1 as evidence that Jesus may have owned a home in the town, but it is more likely that he stayed in the house of one of his followers here. He certainly spent time teaching and healing there. One Sabbath, Jesus taught in the synagogue in Capernaum and healed a man who was possessed by an unclean spirit (Luke 4:31–36 and Mark 1:21–28). This story is notable as the only one that is common to the gospels of Mark and Luke, but not contained in the Gospel of Matthew (see Synoptic Gospels for more literary comparison between the gospels). Afterward, Jesus healed Simon Peter´s mother-in-law of a fever (Luke 4:38–39). According to Luke 7:1–10 and Matthew 8:5, this is also the place where Jesus healed the boyfriend of a Roman centurion who had asked for his help. Capernaum is also the location of the healing of the paralytic lowered by friends through the roof to reach Jesus, as reported in Mark 2:1–12 and Luke 5:17–26.
ellauri184.html on line 348: In Matthew 9:1 the town is referred to only as "his own city", and the narrative in Matthew 9:2–7 does not mention the paralytic being lowered through the roof. Most traditional biblical commentators (e.g. Bengel, Benson and the Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary) assume that in Matthew 9:1–7 "his own city" means Capernaum, because of the details that are common to the three synoptic gospels.
ellauri184.html on line 682: The custom of releasing prisoners in Jerusalem at Passover is known to theologians as the Paschal Pardon, but this custom (whether at Passover or any other time) is not recorded in any historical document other than the gospels, leading some scholars to question its historicity and suspect that such a custom was a mere narrative invention of the Bible´s writers like so much else in the fake good news.
ellauri334.html on line 267: In the synoptic gospels, which are considered more historically reliable than the very theological gJohn, and especially the first, Mark, Jesus's public ministry is largely focused on his apocalyptic message, with a bit of faith healing and exorcism thrown in for good measure. His remarks about himself, and the notion that he was the messiah, was perhaps something… (more)
ellauri408.html on line 340: The Bible is full of badly-told fairy tales. For instance, the book of Acts says Jesus flew into the clouds like Superman before a Jerusalem crowd, with angels preaching a sermon and prophesying that he would return “the same way.” But we know that didn’t happen because no other author of the New Testament mentioned the most miraculous thing human eyes ever witnessed. The four gospels and Acts all disagree on what Jesus said and did after the alleged resurrection. But if you were hearing the words of the resurrected God, wouldn’t you be sure to remember and communicate them faithfully? Clearly five different authors made up five different accounts of what happened post-alleged-resurrection because no one knew what really happened after the empty grave was discovered. Acts says Jesus taught the mysteries of the Kingdom of God for 40 days in Jerusalem, but no one bothered to record a single word he said. Can anyone really believe that is possible?
ellauri408.html on line 418: There is no contemporary evidence outside the Bible that Jesus was a real person, and certainly not a person of any consequence. But there are parts of the gospels that sound like a real person. If I had to guess, I would say that Jesus was an unconventional rabbi who had table fellowship with prostitutes and rogues (a “sin” in the eyes of the hypocritical Pharisees), and went around ministering to the sick and the poor. When he died there may have been an empty grave and some sort of NDE (which are not uncommon) in which he saw something like heaven. That could account for the genesis of the Christian religion. Paul might have communicated with Jesus, or sincerely thought he did, such things are not all that uncommon. But the virgin birth, the massacre of the innocents, walking on water, the transfiguration and ascension, were all obviously made up and added later, since Paul knew nothing about such things and the four gospels and Acts do not agree on such “super miracles.”
ellauri412.html on line 657: How do you know the canonical gospel authors weren’t simply creating fictions about Jesus to make him sound more like the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 than he really was? Of course you will tout the historical reliability of the gospels, but I would provide scholarly resistance to that conclusion every step of the way. The question is not whether YOU can be reasonable to see Jesus as the Isaiah 53 servant but whether skeptics can  reasonably deny this allegation.
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 762: dangerous powers, rather like Harry Potter. His words can have harsh consequences when he is angered or insulted, as when he shrivels up one boy for a quite insignificant act and strikes another dead for merely bumping into him. It is hard not to feel distaste at such stories, which seem so far removed from the Jesus of the canonical gospels, and one can even detect a degree of unease on the part of the author as he narrates them: while attempting to absolve Jesus from the blame, he more than once records the great offense which Jesus’ behavior caused, as well as the efforts of his parents to restrain him, as when Joseph asks Jesus: “Why do you do such things that these people must suffer and hate us and persecute us?” On another occasion Joseph tells Mary: “Do not let him go outside the door, for all those who provoke him die."
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 764: The Christ-child is presented as one that does not grow in wisdom and understanding but yields his sharp omnipotence at a whim on unsuspecting people and his parents. Though widely influential in Christian imagination and art, the infancy gospels were never close to canonization. They were not discussed or considered because they were known to be fictitious fables. F.F. Bruce discussing the nature of the infancy gospels remarked that
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 766: “the embellishments with which the ‘infancy gospels’ fill out the sparse details of the birth stories in Matthew and Luke are all fabricated out of whole cloth, they are not traditions of more or less dimly remembered facts; but they generated tenacious traditions of a new kind.”
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 769: seriously the infancy gospels as valid, historical sources.
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 771: The infancy stories do not bear resemblance to the Jesus of the gospels and were never thought to even be remotely historical. Rather, they existed much like Christian fiction does today, to create enjoyment in speculative discourse that is full of biblical metaphor, idioms, and themes.
xxx/ellauri186.html on line 805: b) Furthermore, this objection ignores the history behind the Infancy Gospels themselves and the intentions behind their creation. The Christians penning the gospels knew they were creating stories that were not meant to be read as truth or contain actual, correct historiography. How do we know? Because of 1)-5). And above all, because 6) OUR God said so (to the patriarchs (p.c.), and they should know).
21