What is a "Gospel"? Why were Gospels written?

Gospel 

Assignment: Define the term “Gospel.” Discuss the etymology and meaning of the word. What are the characteristics of the literary genre “Gospel”? Why were such texts written? Why were they not written sooner? 

The author of the Gospel according to Mark was probably the inventor of the literary genre of the Gospel. His book is the only one in the New Testament that appears to be designated specifically by that term, and even that is not certain, as the superscription in Mark 1:1 is more oriented to the content of the book than to the literary type. 

The Greek term euanggelion (singular form), which we translate as “Gospel,” comes from classical Greek. In the works of Homer and Plutarch this word denoted the reward given to a messenger for his message; in the plural (euanggelia) it denoted the thank offerings that a person presented to the gods for a message of good news. In a wider sense, in the plays of Aristophanes, for example, it took the meaning of the message itself, and then the contents of the message, the good news within the message. But the word eventually came to be used above all to announce a victory, or other great events in the life of the reigning Roman Emperor. 

An inscription from the year 9 BCE found at Priene in Asia Minor (modern Turkey), celebrates in this way the birthday of Caesar Augustus: 

It seemed good (cf. Luke 1:3) to the Greeks of Asia, in the opinion of the high priest Apollonius of Menophilus Azanitus: “Since Providence, which has ordered all things and is deeply interested in our life, has set in most perfect order by giving us Augustus, whom she filled with virtue that he might benefit humankind, sending him as a savior (Greek: soter), both for us and for our descendants (cf. Luke 2:10), that he might end war and arrange all things, and since he, Caesar, by his appearance (Greek: epiphaneia) [excelled even our anticipations], surpassing all previous benefactors, and not even leaving to posterity any hope of surpassing what he has done, and since the birthday of the god (Greek: theos) Augustus was the beginning (Greek arche) of the good tidings (Greek: euanggelia, plural form of euanggelion) (cf. Mark 1:1) for the world (Greek: kosmos) that came by reason of him, which Asia resolved in Smyrna . . . ”. 

This inscription is the fullest example of two documents known also from several other provincial cities of the Roman province of Asia. They contain the earliest and most striking instances of the term “Gospel,” or “Good tidings,” (euangelia) used for Augustus in Roman imperial theology. And they contain in detail why exactly their content is understood as good news for all creation. 

The texts given below are composite scholarly reconstructions integrating the Priene version with fragments discovered in four other Asian cities, for example, in Apamea, where it was dug out of a garden in the mid-1920s. The first part records how Paulus Fabius Maximus, Roman Governor of Asia, proposed to the Asian League of cities that they change their calendar so that Augustus’ birthday would be henceforth New Year’s Day. Here are some key lines from his letter: 

. . . [It is a question whether] the birthday of the most divine Caesar is more pleasant or more advantageous, the day which we might justly set on a par with the beginning (Greek arche) of everything, in practical terms at least, in that he restored order when everything was disintegrating and falling into chaos and gave a new look to the whole world (Greek: kosmos), a world (kosmos) which would have met destruction with the utmost pleasure if Caesar had not been born as a common blessing to all. For that reason one might justly take this to be the beginning (Greek arche) of life and living, the end of regret at one’s birth . . . It is my view that all the communities should have one and the same New Year's Day, the birthday of the most divine Caesar, and that on that day, 23rd September, all should enter their term of office. 

The second part records the enthusiastic response and official decree establishing that calendrical change for everyone, but especially for the start of all civic magistracies. You can easily imagine the competitive public celebrations that all those simultaneous inceptions necessitated. Here again are some key lines: 

Since the providence that has divinely ordered our existence has applied her energy and zeal and has brought to life the most perfect good in Augustus, whom she filled with virtues for the benefit of humankind, bestowing him upon us and our descendants as a savior (Greek: soter)– he who put an end to war and will order peace (Greek: eirene), Caesar, who by his epiphany (Greek: epiphaneia) exceeded the hopes of those who anticipated good tidings (Greek: euanggelia, plural form of euanggelion), not only outdoing benefactors of the past, but also allowing no hope of greater benefactions in the future; and since the birthday of the god (Greek: theos) first (Greek: arche) brought to the world the good tidings (euanggelia) residing in him . . . For that reason, with good fortune and safety, the Greeks of Asia have decided that the New Year in all the cities should begin on 23rd September, the birthday of Augustus . . . and that the letter of the proconsul and the decree of Asia should be inscribed on a pillar of white marble, which is to be placed in the sacred precinct of Rome and Augustus. (SEG 4.490; translation from Braund, 122) 238-240 

The vocabulary of these inscriptions is remarkable in that they correspond so closely to the vocabulary found in the introductions to the Christian Gospels. For example: 

Mark 1:1 The beginning (Greek: arche) of the good news (Greek: euanggelion) of Jesus Christ, the Son of God (Greek: theos) . . . 

Luke 1:3 . . . it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, . . . 2:10 But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news (Greek: euanggelizomai, a verb form) of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior (Greek: soter), Who is the Messiah (Greek: christos), the Lord (Greek: kurios). 

John 1:1-4 In the beginning (Greek: arche) was the Word (Greek: logos), and the Word was with God (Greek: theos), and the Word was God. 2 It was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through It, and without It not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in It was Life, and the Life was the light of all people. 

Many Biblical interpreters have suggested that Mark 1:1, and perhaps also the account of Jesus’ birth in Luke 2:1-11, might actually have been influenced in their presentation of Jesus by such inscriptions, which were no doubt common. Certainly it is clear that with the reign of the Emperor Augustus, the so-called Pax Romana, “Roman Peace,” following a century of turmoil in the Roman world, people of the Eastern Mediterranean began to see Augustus as a kind of “Savior” and actually began to worship him as a god. In Rome itself Caesar officially discouraged such worship, but in the East it appears that he made no attempts to discourage it. Thus, when Jesus was born, not only the Jewish hopes for a “Messiah” were “in the air,” but also the vocabulary and concepts of “salvation” and “saviors” and of human beings being deified, were quite familiar. Such was the soil out of which Christianity grew. 

Indeed, among the early Christians the euanggelion was first of all the good news of salvation, which they understood was brought about in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The announcement in Mark 1:1 is somewhat ambiguous. In the first place, does it refer to the beginning of a book, or to the beginning of a proclamation about good news? In the second place, is it the good news about the “Kingdom of God” that Jesus was described as preaching, or is it the good news about Jesus Himself to which the writer is referring? 

It should be noted that Mark never uses the term “Gospel” to refer to the preaching of John the Baptizer, but only to the preaching of Jesus (Mark 1:14-15). For Jesus Himself, the “Gospel” is the Good News of the coming (and to some extent already present, or at least on the horizon) Kingdom (kingly rule) of God in the hearts of human beings. 

But it becomes clear in Mark that, eventually, the One Who proclaimed the Good News becomes the content of the Good News that other people proclaimed. (Recall the line in the rock-opera, Jesus Christ, Superstar, in which Judas chides Jesus, “You've begun to matter more than the things You say!”) By the end of the Gospel according to Mark the Proclaimer has become the Proclaimed. And so it is that in the Early Church’s proclamation as we encounter it in the remainder of the New Testament, the “Gospel” is the Good News of what God has done for humanity in the coming of Jesus Christ. 

Indeed, the term “Gospel” becomes a technical term for that message very early, so that even in the letters of Paul, it can be used in such a way as to indicate that the readers already understand what the Gospel is (Philippians 1:5), although there can still be such a thing as a “different” Gospel (Galatians 1:6-7). 

But it is significant that, in the New Testament as a whole, with the possible exception of Mark 1:1, the term does not appear to be used with the sense of a book about Jesus. Our earliest New Testament writer, Paul, centers his attention primarily in the death and resurrection of Jesus. Though he is aware that Jesus had an earthly life, it seems to have little significance in itself for him. 

The Gospel according to Mark, which we usually assume to be the earliest, still gives major attention to the events of the crucifixion and resurrection (almost half of the book’s content—so much so that some writers refer to Mark as “a Passion Narrative with an extended introduction”), but it proclaims the beginning of the Gospel (Mark 1:1) with a narrative account of John’s preaching and of Jesus’ public ministry, understood in the light of the aspirations of the Hebrew prophets. 

The next two Gospels, those according to Matthew and Luke, go further back to include stories of Jesus’ birth. And when we come to the Gospel according to John, we find that the interest has extended all the way back to the idea of Jesus’ pre-existence “in the beginning,” of creation, so that Jesus is understood in John 1:1 as pre-existent Word [Greek: logos] of God, active even in the very creation of the universe. 

Thus, by the etymology of the term “Gospel,” and by the nature of the contents of the Gospels (developed in a variety of ways), we may conclude that the term “Gospel” eventually came to refer to a written work that expresses the “Gospel” as the Good News that is the proclamation of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and that interprets Jesus as a redeeming act of God in behalf of humanity. The writers of the Gospels according to Matthew, Luke, and John do not call their works “Gospels,” but obviously they are all basically the same kind of work as Mark, and eventually the term was applied to them all. 

The Gospels form a literary genre in their own right, one that does not exactly resemble other works in the literature of their time. Their biographical appearance must not mislead the reader. They are not meant to be biographies in the strict sense of the word, but rather they are the testimony of different individuals, and of the communities of faith to which they belong, to their experiences and understanding of Jesus and His significance for them. They are indeed a form of “propaganda,” designed to propagate the faith that those communities held. The Gospels are not so much black-and-white photographs of Jesus’ life as they are color portraits, painted by people who loved Him. 

But why did it take so long for Gospels to be written, and why were they finally set down in writing? Jesus had died about the year 30 CE, but the first Gospel was not written until about 65-70 CE. 

1. The earliest Christians were not a literary, nor even, for the most part, an educated group of people. They lived in a non-literary culture. The writing of books was not the common kind of activity it is now. It was customary in the earliest (Palestinian) Church that religious teaching was transmitted and preserved in oral form. The motives for setting these matters down in writing did not emerge early. Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, in Asia Minor, during the first half of the second century CE, told how he would collect every scrap of information about the early days: 

And whenever anyone came who had been a follower of the elders, I enquired into the words of the elders, what Andrew or Peter had said, or Philip or Thomas or James or John or Matthew, or any other disciple of the Lord, and what Aristion and the elder John, disciples of the Lord, were still saying. For I did not imagine that things out of books would help me so much as the utterances of a living and abiding voice. (quoted in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History III:39:4). 

2. The cost of writing materials, perhaps not prohibitive for the ordinary person, was certainly so for the penniless, and this the earliest Christians were. The New Testament writings in the early days would have had to be copied one book at a time. A copy of the four Gospels, if it had been available, would have cost probably six weeks’ wages at the going rates of the time. 

3. The prevalent expectation of the parousia, the “coming” of Jesus, was a factor in the delay in writing the Gospels. If, as those early Christians believed, the “End of all things” was near, if any day might be the last, then those who held such views would be in no frame of mind to write records of the past. In a situation thought to be as “temporary” as that, books were simply irrelevant. 

4. There was also the difficulty of collecting the data. By the time the need for written records began to be apparent, as the earliest eyewitnesses died out, the Church was scattered abroad. It required time for the need to be felt, and time for qualified individuals to undertake and complete the task of gathering the materials. The strange thing, then, is not that our Gospel records are so incomplete; the wonder is that we have any at all! 

But what were the motives for writing the Gospels? We can list a good many: 

a. The death of the original apostles and other eyewitnesses was a factor. The written Gospel became the necessary substitute for the living voice of the apostles. But beyond that, 

b. There was the need for teaching new converts to the faith, and also, 

c. There was the need to promote the practice of worship in the Church. 

d. The delay of the parousia removed the inhibition upon writing, and also made necessary both the conservation of Jesus’ teachings and the narratives about His life, and perhaps also some re-interpretation of His actual words to fit new situations. 

e. There were also controversies with both Jews and with so-called “heretical” Christian groups to be dealt with, and it was essential to have some agreed version of Jesus’ teachings. 

f. There was also the need for “apologetic” materials, to set Christianity in the right light in the eyes of the governing classes, and of Roman officialdom generally. This interest is especially apparent in the Gospel according to Luke. 

g. The Gospels also aided in missionary proclamation, the propagation of the faith in new areas of the Roman Empire and elsewhere, and in philosophical apologetic, to show to the world that Christianity could be considered equal to or superior to other religions and philosophies of the time. 

h. The Gospels also provided for the Church a kind of incipient “canon law” to deal with matters of Christian life and discipline of church members, in which the example and commands and teaching of Jesus would be helpful. The Gospel according to Matthew especially seems to have this as one of its purposes. 

i. Although not the most important reason, there were also the purely biographical interests, to show that the Christian faith was grounded in actual historical events, and finally, 

j. There were just purely literary interests, too, in the telling of a beautiful and interesting story.