16 December 2009

Q source, who source?

there's this idea that some New Testament text critics have that goes like this:
The four gospels are so similar that they had to have written from an earlier manuscript that we don't have. they call this source q-source. The idea is that it's a list of the sayings of Jesus so that it could be distributed around to the new church of Jerusalem and then the gospel writers took it and made the stories that we have today from that list...

i find this to be a load of crap, sure you can believe it, but i don't think it has any clout whatsoever. first off, there's no document or reference to a document for these sources, second, they're jewish, in the first century jewish culture stories and tales are not only how to you instruct your children (and disciples) but they're also how you relate the scriptures and the practices of the faithful. there's reasons the old testament talks directly about leaving markers in order to tell the story to their children.

so there you have it, two solid reasons, BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!!! the greek used in the four gospels is so dramatically different that i don't believe they could have borrowed the sayings of Jesus from one source, and secondly, there's places where the sayings show discrepancies, now, i'm not saying that Jesus didn't actually say those things, but i am saying that he taught the same lessons so often when he went places that it would be easy to quote him from different teachings... also, Jesus was a Jew (if you disagree with this, go read a book) and in being a Jew he taught in the traditional rabbinic way - telling stories with meanings, these stories are often called parables... either way, it's simply amazing!

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