Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Neglected Evidence For The Gospels

Some of the earliest and best evidence for the gospels is often underestimated or even ignored. See here.

"The Presbyter used to say…" (Papias, cited in Eusebius, Church History, 3:39)

"Many of them [Christians just after the time of the apostles]…took up the work of evangelists, eager to preach the message of faith to those who had never heard it and to provide them the inspired Gospels in writing." (Eusebius, Church History, 3:37)

"Clement [of Alexandria] gives the tradition of the earliest presbyters, as to the order of the Gospels" (Eusebius, Church History, 6:14)

"Marcion, on the other hand, you must know, ascribes no author to his Gospel, as if it could not be allowed him to affix a title to that from which it was no crime (in his eyes) to subvert the very body. And here I might now make a stand, and contend that a work ought not to be recognised, which holds not its head erect, which exhibits no consistency, which gives no promise of credibility from the fulness of its title and the just profession of its author." (Tertullian, Against Marcion, 4:2)

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