Read-- Donald Senior, Jesus: A Gospel Potrait (Makati: St. Pauls, 1992) pp. 1-45
The Lectures are in my website but they are not arranged according to number.
Announcements
Passing on the Faith
We have come to believe in God's love: in these words the Christian can express the fundamental decision of his life. Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person (Jesus Christ), which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction. DEUS CARITAS EST 1
Benedict XVI
The Focal Point of the Christian Message: Jesus Christ
We have come to believe in God's love: in these words the Christian can express the fundamental decision of his life. Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person (Jesus Christ), which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction. DEUS CARITAS EST 1
Benedict XVI
The Focal Point of the Christian Message: Jesus Christ
We have come to believe in God's love: in these words the Christian can express the fundamental decision of his life. Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person (Jesus Christ), which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction. DEUS CARITAS EST 1
Benedict XVI
The Focal Point of the Christian Message: Jesus Christ
Knowing Jesus
Passing on the Faith: Scripture and Tradition ◦ Knowing Jesus Christ◦ The Main Message: His life, death and resurrection
The main message in Scriptures The Centrality of the Resurrection
◦ The Extraordinary Success of Christianity◦ The Source of Our Stories: The Gospels ◦ Three Stages of Gospel Development
Jesus and his Disciples Disciples and their Community Evangelist (Gospel Writers) and their Community
◦ What are the Gospels? Not Biographies—Faith Testimonies From Faith To Faith A Privileged Source
First Source Normative—Standard
◦ Why do we trust these four Gospels and not the other gospels?:◦ Are the Gospels reliable even if they have internal inconsistencies?◦ Are the Gospels reliable even if they were written two thousand years ago?
New outline for the next two weeks
Analyze and Think!!
..Sometimes it's hard to believe in it because there's no concrete proof..
How do we verify that religion and all this about Christianity isn't a fictional work made by some random person in the past?
The Source of Our Stories: The Gospels
Story
The Source of the Story (the
bible)
Mr. Roncal (together with some kind students) vs the whole class
Class Debate: (Note: “I respectfully challenge you?”)
Debate StatementThe life , death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is a historical fact!
What are the three stages of Gospel development?
Why do we trust these four Gospels and not the other gospels?:
Are the Gospels reliable even if they have internal inconsistencies?
Are the Gospels reliable even if they were written two thousand years ago?
Questions we are answering
They are not Biographies. The Gospels are faith testimonies.◦They are not just a result of divine dictation.
What are the Gospels?
When modern Christians pick up a gospel and read it with a searching faith, they are duplicating the very process by which it came to be written. “From faith” in the sense that it was the faith of the church that maintained the genuine portrait of who Jesus was and what he was about. “To faith” in the sense that the gospels were written so that the belief of Christians might intensify as they came face to face with the words and actions of the risen Lord. Donald Senior, p.24
Faith Testimonies
From Faith
To Faith
Privileged Source
To Faith
Gospels:
First Source
Normative—Standard
“To faith” in the sense that the gospels were written so that the belief of Christians might intensify as they came face to face with the words and actions of the risen Lord. Donald Senior, p.24
What are the Gospels: Faith Testimonies
Knowing Jesus
Three stages of gospel development
Reliable Documetn
AD 30 48 -85
Writings of Paul The Gospels
65-95
Apocryphal Gospels
100++2000++
Time Line of the Gospels
0 AD
30 AD
33AD
65 AD
70 AD
90 AD
Comparison: The Gospel of Mark and the Edsa Revolution
The Gospel of Mark Edsa Revolution
Mar 1:14-15 (14) Now after John
was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God,
(15) and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel."
Pass the Message Problem
Oral
Written Written
Oral
Pass the (written)Message Problem
OralOriginal
Copies
GreekLatin English
Reliability of the Written Message
65 AD
130 AD200 AD 325AD
Identical (w/minor
differences)Original
Reliable(i.e. the copies we have now are accurate copies of the original documents) Document? What to look for?
◦How many handwritten copies (manuscripts) of the source there are,
◦How close these are in time to the original work.
Signs of reliability◦The more copies there are with little
disagreement among them ◦The closer the manuscripts are in time to
the original work
Reliable Documents
Work When written Earliest copy Time span No. of copies
New Testament 40-100 A.D. 130 A.D. 30, 50,
100yrs* over 24,000
Homer (Iliad) 900 B.C. 400 B.C. 500 yrs 643
Demosthenes 383-322 B.C. 1100 A.D. 1,300 yrs 200
Plato (Tetralogies) 427-347 B.C. 900 A.D. 1,200 yrs 7
Caesar 100-44 B.C. 900 A.D. 1,000 yrs 10
Thucydides (History) 460-400 B.C. 900 A.D. 1,300 yrs 8
Herodotus (History) 480-425 B.C. 900 A.D. 1,300 yrs 8
Aristotle 384-322 B.C. 1100 A.D. 1,400 yrs 49
Euripides 480-406 B.C. 1100 A.D. 1,500 yrs 9 (Josh McDowell, Evidence That Demands a Verdict: Historical Evidences for the Christian Faith, 39-64)
Reliable Document The manuscript evidence for the "New Testament
" is also dramatic, with nearly 25,000 ancient manuscripts discovered and archived so far, at least 5,600 of which are copies and fragments in the original Greek. 4 Some manuscript texts date to the early second and third centuries, with the time between the original autographs and our earliest existing fragment being a remarkably short 40-60 years. ( John Ryland's Gospel of John fragment, John Ryland's Library of Manchester, England. ) http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/bible-manuscripts.htm
Why certain books were retained and the others
rejected?
Canon – the closed collection or list of sacred books acknowledged by the Church as the rule of faith and life
Definition of Terms
Sacred Scripture as the book of the Church: Rough History of Bible
450 BC: The Five Books (Pentateuch) was written
33 AD Death of Jesus Christ
60 AD St. Paul writes his first letter and the Gospel of Mark was written, Note: 22-24 books of the Hebrew canon were in use
100 AD All the New Testament books have been written
382-418 AD Latin version of the Bible was written (by St. Jerome)
1539-1610 The Bible was translated into English, 1546-Council of Trent, list of the Canon
0-4BC Jesus is Born
1970 The New American Bible was written
393-405 Council of Hippo, Carthage, Toulouse came out with a list of the NT books
Textbook Analogy
StoryPERSONAL WITNESS
CONFORMITY TO THE STORY
POPULARITY OF THE STORY
Apostolic origin-meaning no more than that an apostle had a traditional connection with a given work. –
Conformity to the Rule of Faith—meaning the writings expressed what the early Christians believed in
Constant Use among the Communities—meaning the writings that were commonly used by all the Churches were eventually accepted as part of the canon
What were the criteria used by the early Christian leaders in determining which books to accept ?
Personal Story: “Jomar’s remarkable ability to love”
Discussion (Knowing Jesus: Having a relationship with Jesus Christ)
Discussion
Is it possible to/Can you know (define first what you mean by “know”) Jesus today?◦ Two Groups: Yes and No◦End Product: Resolved Issues (Things everyone
agreed with) Unresolved Issues (Things not agreed
on)
The End