作者：斐林丰 Lanfranco M. Fedrigotti
The Gospel and The Gospels:
The Four Gospels, or The Fourfold Gospel?
The Gospel of ..., or The Gospel According To...?
Introduction
"You cannot see the wood for the trees!" This proverb comes often to mind when reading exegetical literature of the Bible, especially the kind of literature that stems from the historico-critical exegetical tradition. Historico-critical exegesis in its now multicentenarian history has produced a curious mixture of epoch-making exegetical breakthroughs and downright exegetical nonsense. A recent document of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, entitled "The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church", has reaffirmed the enduring value of the historico-critical method, while at the same time warning against an uncritical use of this critical method. In this article I shall try to present in a popularizing fashion some results of this method with regard to the formation of the literature we know as the Four Gospels. In so doing I hope to show how the historico-critical method in itself is not inimical to a positive assessment of the Gospel witness. At the same time I hope to provide an insight into the New Testament ground of the fundamental challenge facing the Church of all times: this challenge is called "evangelization", is called "Gospel", i.e. the presentation of the mystery of Jesus to all human beings, even to all creation (Mark 16:15).
1. "Gospel", a Word with a History: From the One Gospel to the Four Gospels
Nowadays when we hear the word "Gospel" we immediately think of the four Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. But it has not always been so. In the first 100 years of the Church's life, the word "Gospel" did not immediately suggest the thought of a book or of a set of books. What was the meaning of this word then? From about A.D. 30 to about A.D. 130 this word referred not to a book but to a piece of news, a piece of good news that made the round of the then known world transmitted by word of mouth.
A news is a report or announcement regarding a recent event. A good news is an excited report or announcement regarding a recent happy event. So a first century Christian, sharing his faith in Jesus with someone else, would say: "I have a good news to tell you, a news that can fill your life with meaning and joy." The two words "good news" actually translate the single word "Gospel", so that this first century Christian could also be quoted as saying: "I have a Gospel to tell you."
At the beginning of the life of the Church, therefore, the word "Gospel" actually meant a piece of good news, referring to a happy event. Throughout the New Testament (including the Four Gospels) this word has this meaning and only this meaning, with the following three minor variations: (1) 'a' good news, as in Gal 1:6: "I am astonished that you are so quickly [...] turning to a different gospel"; (2) 'the' good news, as in Rom 1:16: "For I am not ashamed of the gospel"; (3) 'the announcement of' the good news, as in Rom 16:25: "God [...] is able to strengthen you according to my gospel"; or as in Mark 8:35: "Those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it." In all three cases what is envisaged is the oral transmission of a piece of news.
It is important to recover this original meaning of the word "Gospel" in order to appreciate the treasure hidden in the four books that we call "Gospels". It is bearing this meaning that this word appears at the head of the Gospel of Mark: "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." Paraphrased, this lapidary phrase could sound as follows: "The happy news, that is, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Christ, Jesus the Son of God. This is how it all began." When Mark wrote the word "Gospel", that is how he understood it. That is also how Matthew, and Luke, and John, and Paul, and Peter understood it. Thus understood, this word has only one referent: the person of Jesus, the mystery hidden in the person of Jesus who was born, died, and rose for us, the mystery of the Immanuel, of the God-with-us, the mystery of the Kingship of God, the mystery of man's radical salvation by the gratuitous initiative of God the Father of Jesus in the Spirit. The word "Gospel", however, refers to this person and this mystery as "announced", as "proclaimed". So the original meaning of the word "Gospel" comes very close to the meaning of the modern and more cumbersome word "evangelization", if by "evangelization" we mean first and foremost the proclamation of the mystery of God in Christ Jesus through the power of the Spirit.
When, then, did our more usual meaning of the word "Gospel" appear? When was this word first used to denote not an oral act of transmission of news but a written text containing this news? When did the word "Gospel" start to mean the four books that record Jesus' words and deeds? Such a use of the word "Gospel" can be first documented starting with St Justin Martyr (c. 100 - c. 165 A.D.). In his Apologia Prima pro Christianis Justin mentions the Apostles and the "Memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels". This seems to be the first time in the history of the Church that the word "Gospel" is used to indicate the books written by the four evangelists. Since then, this meaning has become prevalent, making it difficult for us to give due attention to the original meaning of the word "Gospel". In its original meaning, the word "Gospel" had one single referent, the "One Gospel", the Good News of Jesus passed on by word of mouth from person to person. In its later meaning the word "Gospel" had four different referents, namely the Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. In the letters of St Ignatius of Antioch the former meaning is still evident, as when he writes to the Philadelphians: "I am clinging for refuge to the Gospel message as though to the incarnate Christ, and to the Apostles as the collective ministry of the Church." Yet, a trace of the original "One Gospel" meaning is preserved in the Liturgy of the Mass whenever the deacon starts proclaiming the Gospel by saying: "A reading from the Holy Gospel ACCORDING TO...", and not "A reading from the Holy Gospel OF...". When saying, for example, "the Holy Gospel according to Matthew", we are using the word "Gospel" in a sense that does not refer to the book written by Matthew, but refers instead to the good news contained in that book. In this phrase the word "Matthew" refers to the book. Unfortunately, the true meaning of the phrase "the Holy Gospel according to..." has been obliterated in the Chinese translation of this liturgical text.
What I propose to do in the following sections is this: we shall explore the content of the original oral "Gospel", the One Gospel, and try to show its relationship to the content of the written Gospels, the Four Gospels. In doing so, I hope to help myself and others to see not only the trees but also the wood when reading or listening to the Gospel.
2. The One Gospel: Synchronic Approach to the Original Meaning of "Gospel"
The original oral Gospel can rightly be called the One Gospel because, notwithstanding the variety of emphases on the part of the various Apostles, the word of Paul stands true: "Whether then it was I or they, so we proclaim and so you have come to believe." (1 Cor 15:11)
To begin with, let us first take an overall view of the original content of the One "Gospel", as we can derive from a synthetic look at the whole New Testament, including the Four Gospels. We do this in order to supplement the historico-critical method with concerns which are at once traditional and contemporary. That is, we try to supplement the diachronic method of exegesis with the synchronic method. At this stage, we shall limit ourselves to outline synchronically the overall impression one obtains in contacting the New Testament texts regarding the "One Gospel", the essential core of the Good News. In doing this it will not be necessary to use a strictly chronological approach to the New Testament writings. It will suffice to choose some representative expressions from the Gospels and Acts.
"Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means, 'God is with us'" (Matt 1:23).
"Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29).
"We have found the Messiah" (John 1:41).
"We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth" (John 1:45).
"Never has anyone spoken like this!" (John 7:46).
"Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?"(Mark 4:41).
"You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God" (Matt 16:16).
"Truly this man was God's Son!" (Mark 15:39).
"Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen" (Luke 24:5).
"My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28).
"Therefore let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified" (Acts 2:36).
"No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known" (John 1:18).
2.1 The Gospel is News
Something extraordinary has happened. Something unheard-of. God has broken out of his unphatomable mystery. The unapproachable God has approached us. The Word who was in the beginning, the Word who was with God, the Word who was God, has become flesh and has pitched his tent among us. This is too extraordinary an event for us to remain indifferent to it. This is too unheard-of a fact to be kept secret. This news in its newness and extraordinariness by far surpasses anything that the Old Testament could have led us to expect. "In former generations this mystery was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit" (Eph 3:5). The prophets meant here are the prophets of the New Testament, the bearers ofthe Gospel message. As for the prophets of the Old Testament, they foretold much about the coming salvation. Their expectation took on a plurality of forms: salvation through the promised Messiah-son-of-David, salvation through the promised Prophet, salvation through Elijah, salvation through the promised Coming One, salvation through (or for?) the Suffering Servant... (cf. John 1:21) The nearest approach prophetic revelation made to the actual reality of salvation can be found in the basic message of Deutero-Isaiah and of Daniel, the message of the coming Kingship of God. However, the actual happening of salvation in Jesus Christ went beyond even Deutero-Isaiah's and Daniel's apocalyptic expectation. Paul's word remains true: "In former generations this mystery was not made known to humankind." The salvation given us through Jesus not only fulfils all Old Testament expectations and promises, but it does so in a totally unforseen, wonderfully transcendent, manner. The Good News of Jesus Christ is really "news".
2.2 The Gospel is Good News
The Good News of Jesus Christ is also really a "good" news.
This extraordinary happening, this unheard-of fact is the news that each human heart deep down desires to hear. It is the news that alone can quench the longing of the human heart for communion with the source of its being, God. "For Thou hast made us for Thee and our heart is unquiet till it finds its rest in Thee." (St. Augustine) In the West this famous dictum of St Augustine expresses powerfully humankind's thirst for God. In the East, we may quote Confucius's equally powerful dictum: "If a man in the morning hear the right way, he may die in the evening without regret." The news of Jesus fills man's heart with joy and peace. This news reveals the supremely wonderful ultimate destiny of man: an unimaginably intimate and yet personal union with God. This news overturns from top to bottom humanity's view of life. As Miguel de Unamuno said: "Without Thee, Jesus, we are born only to die. With Thee, we die to be born." This news gives man strength to live up to his or her ultimate destiny in the face of immense trials and untold suffering. "The things that have now been announced to you through those who brought you good news by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven - things into which angels long to look!" (1 Pet 1:12), through these things "you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials [...]" (1 Pet 1:6). The Gospel is the Good News par excellence: "The Good News of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God" (cf. Mark 1:1).
3. The One Gospel: Diachronic Approach to the Original Meaning of "Gospel"
Now we shall approach diachronically the original meaning of the word "Gospel", trying as far as possible to start from the earliest appearances of this word in the New Testament. In doing so we shall be using the historico-critical method to test the validity of the overall synchronic impression outlined above.
The very first time this word appears (in 1 Thess 1:5), it means the One Gospel, simply the Good News as proclaimed by the Twelve, by Paul and by the other apostles.
The word Gospel is extremely frequent in the Letters of Paul. It occurs 60 times. It is possible that it is Paul that made this word become a key expression of the faith of the primitive Church. Adding up all other occurrences of this word in the New Testament, we obtain the meagre total of 16. "Gospel" is a Pauline word. Before him Peter and the other apostles probably simply spoke of "news" (aggelion) or "announcement" (kerygma) without adding the qualifier "good" (eu-aggelion). Where Peter used to say: "I have a news to share with you", Paul would say: "I have a GOOD news to share with you."
Most of the time, Paul uses the word "Gospel" absolutely, without adding any qualification. Sometimes, however, Paul also refers to it as "the Good News of God" or "the Good News of Jesus Christ". The OF of "the Good News of God" is a subjective genitive. That is to say, by "the Good News of God" Paul means that this good news originates from God. It is a gift of God to humankind. The OF of "the Good News of Jesus Christ" is an objective genitive. That is to say, by "the Good News of Jesus Christ" Paul means that the content of this good news is Jesus himself. Sometimes Paul speaks of "my Gospel" or "our Gospel" meaning: the Good News which I announce. Without exception Paul uses this word to mean the Christ event and its transcendent significance for mankind as proclaimed by the Apostles.
3.1 The Essential Core of the One Gospel in 1 Cor 15:1
It is a well-known fact that most of the literary activity of the primitive Church can be classified under the following three headings: kerygmatic literature, didactic literature, and parakletic literature. Kerygma is the announcement of the Good News. Didache is the explanation of the Good News. Paraklesis is the exhortation of the Good News. Paul's letters are mainly didactic and parakletic in character, and so only indirectly relevant to the topic we are discussing. This notwithstanding, there are many short kerygmatic references to the One Gospel in Paul's letters. Usually Paul just refers to the content of the One Gospel without expressly stating that this is the original announcement of the Good News. In at least one instance, however, Paul at the same time mentions the Good News and describes the basic content of this Good News. I am thinking of the key passage in 1 Cor 15:1-5: "Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand, through which also you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you - unless you have come to believe in vain. For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he has been raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve."
Many biblical scholars agree that the last five clauses of this passage reproduce an extremely early profession of faith of the Aramaic-speaking Christian Church in Jerusalem or in Damascus. Paul has not composed these five clauses out of his head, but on the contrary has quoted from memory a faith formula current in the primitive Church. However, it is probably Paul's original contribution to describe the content of these five clauses as a "good news", as a Gospel. For us sinful people, Jesus' atoning death is good news indeed. For us mortal people, Jesus' burial and resurrection are good news indeed. But why should the death and resurrection of the man Jesus Christ be so crucial for the whole humankind?
The answer to this question is only indirectly expressed in the ancient faith formula of 1 Cor 15:3b-5. This formula refers to Jesus by means of the title "Christ", that is, Messiah, the Anointed One. This title expresses well Jesus' significance for the people of Israel, while it is insufficient to express Jesus' significance for all other peoples. Jesus' significance for all peoples is grounded in his being the transcendent only-begotten Son of God. This title is present in another most ancient kerygmatic formula of the primitive Aramaic-speaking Palestinian Church, the formula with which Paul opens his Letter to the Romans. This formula starts and concludes with a reference to Jesus as the Son of God. An attentive reading of this formula shows that in the opening reference Jesus is referred to as the-Son-of-God-in-himself, while in the closing reference Jesus is referred to as the Son-of-God-for-us: "the Gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord..." Rom 1:3-4). Jesus is significant not only for Israel, but for man as such because he is not only a man but he is also the transcendent Son of God. As such, insofar as his eternal being transcends all time and space, he is intimately related to each human being and to the whole of human history: "in him all things in heaven and on earth were created [...], all things have been created through him and for him" (Col 1:16). The kerygmatic formula of 1 Cor 15:3b-5 does not state expressly the transcendent nature of Jesus' person. However, in the context of chapter 15 of 1 Cor it is clear that the "Christ" mentioned in 15:3 is "the Son of God" mentioned in the other kerygmatic formula of Romans. This is borne out by what Paul says in the same chapter of 1 Corinthians (1 Cor 15:28): "When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who put all things in subjection under him, so that God may be all in all". Because Jesus is "the Son himself", he to whom "God has put all things in subjection" (1 Cor 15:27), his death and resurrection have decisive salvific significance for each and all human beings. Each human being comes into existence, continues in existence, and fulfills one's own existence from, in, and for the Incarnate Son of God Jesus Christ our Lord. Within this good news which is Jesus-the-Christ, Jesus-the-Son-himself, we can "stand", we can build our lives without fear of ever being reduced to shame.
3.2 The Full Content of the One Gospel in the Pre-Pauline Kerygmatic Formulas.
1 Cor 15:3b-5 and Rom 1:3-4 are not the only places where Paul quotes from memory kerygmatic faith profession formulas deriving from the Aramaic-speaking primitive Church. Limiting our enquiry to Paul's early and major letters, there are at least the following instances of pre-Pauline kerygmatic material included by Paul into his letters. In chronological order: 1 Thess 1:9b-10; 4:14; 1 Cor 15:3b-5; Phil 2:5b-11; 2 Cor 5:10; Gal 1:1b, 4; 4:4a; Rom 1:1b-4; 10,8b-9; 14:9, 10b. If we collect carefully all the data present in these earliest Christian professions of faith, we obtain a fairly detailed presentation of the full content of the One Gospel.
The good news (Gospel!) from God (Rom 1:1)
the good news which we proclaim (1 Cor 15:1)
the word of faith which we proclaim (Rom 10:8b)
which God promised beforehand
through his prophets in the holy scriptures (Rom 1:2)
regarding God's Son (1 Thess 1:10; Rom 1:3; Gal 4:4a)
who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality
with God, as something to be exploited (Phil 2:6)
sent by God when the fullness of time had come (Gal 4:4a)
according to the flesh a descendant of David (Rom 1:3)
born of a woman (Gal 4:4a)
emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness (Phil 2:7a)
Jesus (1 Thess 1:10; Phil 2:10)
Christ (1 Cor 15:3)
Jesus Christ (Phil 2:11; Gal 1:1, 3; Rom 1:4)
Christ Jesus (Phil 2:5b)
who died (1 Thess 4:14; 1 Cor 15:3; Rom 14:9; implicitly in 1 Thess 1:10; Gal 1:1; Rom 1:4; 10:9)
who gave himself up (Gal 1:4)
being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death - even death on a cross (Phil 2:7b-8)
for our sins (1 Cor 15:3; Gal 1:4)
in order to deliver us from the present evil age (Gal 1:4)
according to the will of our God and Father (Gal 1:4)
according to the scriptures (1 Cor 15:4)
who was buried (1 Cor 15:4)
who on the third day (1 Cor 15:4)
according to the scriptures (1 Cor 15:4)
has been raised up (1 Cor 15:4)
was raised up
by the living and true (1 Thess 1:9-10) God (Gal 1:1)
by the Father (Gal 1:1)
rose up (1 Thess 4:14)
lived again (Rom 14:9)
from the dead (1 Thess 1:10; Gal 1:1; Rom 1:4)
God highly exalted him (Phil 2:9)
and gave him the name that is above every name (Phil 2:9)
Lord (Phil 2:11; Rom 10:9)
Our Lord (Rom 1:4)
Lord of the living and of the dead (Rom 14:9)
according to the Spirit of holiness (Rom 1:4)
declared the Son of God in power (Rom 1:4)
who rescues us from the wrath that is coming (1 Thess 1:10)
who appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve (1 Cor 15:5)
who will come from heaven (1 Thess 1:10)
before whose judgment seat
seat of God (Rom 14:10)
seat of Christ (2 Cor 5:10)
all of us must appear (2 Cor 5:10)
must stand (Rom 14:10)
so that each one may receive good or evil,
according to what he has done in the body (2 Cor 5:10),
so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord
to the glory of God the Father (Phil 2,10-11)
Therefore, you turned to God from idols (1 Thess 1:9b)
If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord
and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,
you will be saved. (Rom 10:9)
The analysis of the pre-Pauline kerygmatic fragments present in Paul's letters offers us an extremely rich presentation of the basic content of the One Gospel, the original Good News. This content can be summed up (to use a later terminology) in the Mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God become Son of man and the Paschal Mystery of his Passover. Our analysis is the fruit of the careful critical work of many exegetes who have been able to detect these early kerygmatic formulas. By adding up these formulas we have reconstructed the earliest Creed of the Church. In it the Apostolic Creed used in our contemporary catechesis and liturgy is already visible. It would be uncritical, therefore, as well as untrue, to think that the fundamental Christian faith profession of Jesus as Incarnate Son of God and Dead-Risen Paschal Son of man is a later development. The earliest New Testament literary data bear witness to this faith profession as the earliest Christian self-understanding in faith. This Christian self-understanding is ultimately based on the fact of Jesus' own self-understanding as the only-begotten Son of God and Son of man.
3.3 Three Characteristics of the One Gospel Which Are Relevant to the Four Gospels
3.3.1 The Unhesitating Affirmation of the Divinity of Jesus
It should be emphasized that the affirmation of the divinity of Jesus is an integral part of this earliest expression of the Christian faith. Christ who is from all eternity the Son-of-God-himself becomes the Son-of-God-for-us through his Incarnation-Passion-Death-Resurrection-Exaltation. There has been no time when the Christian faith did not unhesitatingly assert the divinity of Jesus, just as there has been no time when Christian faith did not unhesitatingly assert Jesus' humanity. Words like "nature" and "person" may be later developments. But the mysterious reality which these words try to express with precision is not a later development. The wonder of the Good News lies precisely in this unheard-of paradox: the eternal Son of God has emptied himself to become the temporal Son of man, to become the Immanuel, the "God-with-us". He has emptied himself in taking upon himself our finite human nature. He has emptied himself in taking upon himself our death, even death on a cross! But this self-emptying of his has become our fullness, a fullness stronger than sin and death, a fullness that carries man within the very fullness of God's most intimate life. This is the One Gospel, this is the Good News!
From the first day of the Gospel proclamation, Christian faith never detached the affirmation of Jesus' messiahship from the affirmation of his divine sonship. The original Christian proclamation is not "Jesus is the Messiah!", but "Jesus is Lord!" (1 Cor 12:3; Phil 2:11). To say that Jesus is the Messiah is not to say the most important thing about him. "Messiah" is only a functional term. It expresses one aspect of the mission entrusted by God to Jesus, the aspect that fulfils one kind of Old Testament expectation. The title "Lord", instead, says much more than "Messiah". "Lord" includes "Messiah", while "Messiah" does not include "Lord". "Lord" is also a functional title, but a functional title based on an identity title. The most important thing about Jesus is his identity. Jesus' identity is connoted by the title "Son". The functional title that corresponds to the identity title "Son" is the title "Lord" (kyrios). "Lord" is a divine name. "Lord" is the standard Septuagint translation for the Hebrew divine name YHWH. But while YHWH is the proper name of the God of Israel, "Lord" adds to this proper-name-meaning a functional shade. That is, by calling God "Lord" we assert his kingship over nature and over history. Hence, the title "Lord" is both an identity title and a functional title. In both cases this title includes a divine connotation. Now the earliest strata of the New Testament attribute this divine title to a historical man, Jesus of Nazareth.
In Acts, an alternative form of proclamation combines "Lord" and "Messiah", thus expressing Jesus significance both for Israel and for man as such: "Therefore let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified." (Acts 2:36). A third form of proclamation combines the titles "Messiah" and "Son of God": "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name" (John 20:30-31). Also in the Gospel of John, a fourth form of proclamation appears: "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28). This last form is not essentially different from the other three. In fact, the title "Lord" includes the title "Messiah", and the title "God" means Jesus' unique divine sonship. (Cf. John 1:1)
The above emphasis is important today when the exegesis of the four Gospels sometimes seems to obscure this basic fact, namely, that the four Gospels bear unhesitating witness to the divinity of Jesus. By obscuring this fact, some contemporary exegetes undermine the most important dimension of the One Gospel, of the original Good News. It is not the four Gospels that have added the recognition of Jesus' divinity onto the original Good News. On the contrary, it is the original Good News that has transmitted this essential content to the four Gospels. When the Gospel of John says: "And the Word was God" (John 1:1), John is not distancing himself from the original Good News. On the contrary, he is drawing water from the well of the original Good News. The pre-Pauline Christological hymn of Philippians had already said that much in different words. The primitive Jerusalem Church was persecuted by the Jewish authorities not because this Church proclaimed the messiahship of Jesus, but because it proclaimed the divine sonship of Jesus as revealed by his death and resurrection! The much vaunted development of New Testament Christology has often been badly misunderstood. New Testament Christology develops not in its essential content (Jesus' divinity and humanity) but in its meeting new challenges and new needs as the Gospel proclamation progressively engulfs different cultures and traditions.
Given Jesus' divinity, it is easy to understand how the "Good News of the Kingdom of God" (Matt 4:23) and the "Good News of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God" (Mark 1:1) are actually one and the same thing. The former expression indicates the main content of Jesus preaching in the Synoptic Gospels. The latter expression indicates the content of Jesus' preaching in the Gospel of John and the content of the Apostles' preaching in Acts and in the Letters. Because of his divine and human nature, Jesus is the kingdom of God among us (Origen). It would be unreasonable, therefore, to postulate a contradiction between the Good News as preached by Jesus in the Synoptics, on the one hand, and in John, on the other. Or between the Good News as preached by Jesus himself, on the one hand, and by the Apostles, on the other. The One Gospel is essentially the same, whether on Jesus' lips or the Apostles', whether on Paul's or Peter's lips.
3.3.2 The Centrality of the Paschal Mystery
It will have been noticed that the One Gospel concentrates heavily on the paschal event of Jesus' passion-death-resurrection-exaltation. This feature of the One Gospel helps us to understand another major feature of the four Gospels, namely, the immense disproportion with which the various events in the life of Jesus are narrated. The first 30 years of Jesus' life are dealt with briefly in only two chapters of Matthew and Luke (non ein Mark and John). The 3 years of public ministry are dealt with somewhat more at length. But the lion's share of attention is given to the last 3 days of Jesus' life on earth: the days of his passion-death-resurrection. Why should the four Gospels focus their attention so unevenly? The answer lies in the nature of the One Gospel, of the original Good News, which concentrated its attention on the Paschal Event of the Son of God and Son of man at the end of Jesus' life.
This exceptional focussing brought to bear upon the paschal mystery was aptly expressed by Martin Kaehler when he described the four Gospels as "passion narratives with extended introductions" Of course, this can be better expressed by saying: "The Gospels are PASCHAL narratives with extended introductions". There never existed a passion narrative without a resurrection narrative as its conclusion. Mark 16:1-8 is the only natural conclusion of chapters 14-15. Without this conclusion, chapters 14-15 become meaningless, and so does the whole Gospel. The wonder of the Good News lies precisely here: the Son of God, the source of life, has undergone death, insolidarity with mortal man; but in the process, thanks to this divine solidarity, death has been swallowed up by life. (cf. 1Cor 15:54; 2 Cor 5:4) Divine life defeats human death. This is the essence of the Good News. The earliest kerygmatic fragments in the New Testament do not disconnect the fact of the resurrection from the fact of the passion and death. Consequently, it must be stressed that the culmination of the four Gospels is not a passion narrative but a paschal narrative, beginning with the anointing at Bethany and ending with the account of the empty-tomb, the resurrection announcement and at least one appearance narrative (or a hint of such an appearance, as in Mark 16:1-8). Now what God has united, let no man separate.
This One Gospel’s second characteristic (the centrality of the paschal mystery) has an inner connexion with the first characteristic (the unhesitating affirmation of the divinity of Jesus). In fact, the divinity of Jesus is revealed to the Twelve and the women precisely through the paschal experience of Jesus. Within this paschal experience a) Jesus bears solemn witness to his human-divine identity before the highest Jewish anthority (the high priest and the sanhedrin) during the most important night of the Jewish year (Passover night) in the most holy Jewish place (the holy city of Jerusalem); b) Jesus is condemned to death precisely for this solemn witness to his own identity, judged as blasphemous by the high priest and the sanhedrin; c) Jesus dies as a blasphemer before the eyes of all Israel; d) God by the resurrection of Jesus proves Jesus' solemn witness to his own human-divine identity as true, and therefore worthy of belief; e) the Twelve and the women, faced with the reality of the risen Jesus, see in it the God-given sign of the truth of Jesus' self-witness and so believe in his divine-human identity: "My Lord and my God".
3.3.3 The Integration of History and Faith.
The third characteristic of the One Gospel is that its essential content is made up of mutually integrating historical facts and theological facts, historical statements and faith statements, reports framed by spatio-temporal indications and interpretations spanning the total mystery of God and man.
List of the historical facts
Promised beforehand through the prophets
in the scriptures,
a descendant of David,
born of a woman,
Jesus,
who died,
who was buried,
who on the third day was raised up,
who appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve,
who will come again.
List of the theological facts
God's Son,
Christ,
(who died) for our sins,
according to the scriptures,
who has been raised up by the living and true God from the dead,
thus being designated the Son of God in power,
liberating us from the wrath to come,
who will come from heaven,
before whose judgment seat we must all appear.
If you confess and believe,
you will be saved.
Clearly, then, the One Gospel is made up of historically grounded faith statements or, conversely, of theologically meaningful historical and trans-historical events. Two sentences appear in both lists, the sentences expressing the resurrection and the second coming. These two events are both historical and meta-historical. They are both within history and beyond history. They are actually the limit of history. Because of this peculiar nature of theirs they appear in both lists. The union of the title Son of God with the personal name Jesus reveals that the identity of Jesus of Nazareth also has both an historical and a trans-historical, a temporal-human and eternal-divine dimension.
This double historical-theological character of the One Gospel is shared by the Four Gospels. It has been customary through the Christian centuries to call the Four Gospels "histories". It has been fashionable in the last 100 years to deny that the Four Gospels are "histories" and to state that they are mainly theological compositions. From our analysis it is clear that both the traditional and the modern way of speaking are defective. The true nature of the One Gospel and of the Four Gospels is best expressed by the following combination of terms: theological histories, historical theologies. No member of this binomial can be renounced. On the one hand, the Christian faith is firmly rooted in historical facts. Without this root it is not Christian faith. "The Word became flesh" (John 1:14a). On the other hand, Gospel history is transfigured by faith, because in history the Christian faith sees the Lord of history at work. "We have seen his glory, the glory as of the Father's only Son, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14b)
Also this third characteristic of the One Gospel has an inner connexion with the first and second characteristics. The One Gospel is both historical and theological because Jesus is both God and man, as revealed in his paschal event.
Given this threefold coincidence between the One Gospel and the Four Gospels, it is clear that the One Gospel is faithfully preserved in all four written Gospels. There is more continuity than discontinuity between the One Gospel and the Four Gospels. It is to stress this all-pervading underlying continuity that the Fathers of the Church preferred to speak of the "Fourfold Gospel" rather than of the "Four Gospels". The Fourfold Gospel: this is a very apt way of expressing the relationship between the One Gospel and the Four Gospels, a relationship characterized by a wonderful basic unity, a unity perceived by faith, and by reason open to faith. Contemporary exegesis, somewhat inebriated by its advances in form criticism and redaction criticism, should be more careful not to be blind to this essential unity of the Gospels.
3.4 A Confirmation of the Pre-Pauline One Gospel from Acts.
In the book of Acts Luke has recorded 7 great kerygmatic discourses: 1. Acts 2:14-36; 2. Acts 3:12-26; 3. Acts 4:,8-12; 4. Acts 5:29-32; 5. Acts 10:34-43; 6. Acts 13:23-41; 7. Acts 17:22-31. These seven discourses recorded by Luke have been aptly described by Martin Dibelius as "summaries of summaries" of the actual discourses pronounced by Peter and Paul.
The first five discourses are spoken by Peter, the last two by Paul. Peter and Paul are also the only two persons in Acts recorded by Luke as making use of the word "Gospel". Peter uses this word at the Jerusalem Council: "My brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that I should be the one through whom the Gentiles would hear the message of the good news and become believers." (Acts 15:7). Paul uses the word "Gospel" in his farewell discourse to the Ephesian presbyters: "I do not count my life of any value to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the good news of God's grace." (Acts 20:24) "The good news of God's grace": what a wonderful expression of the One Gospel!
If we compare these discourses of Peter and Paul in Acts with the pre-Pauline kerygmatic formulas found in the letters of Paul, we realize that the content of the discourses in Acts is essentially the same as the content of the kerygmatic formulas. There is the same unhesitating assertion of Jesus' divinity, the same concentration on the Paschal Event of the Son of God and Son of man, the same integration of historical and theological facts, the same convergence of concrete data and vast interpretations. We may try to summarize the content of these seven kerygmatic discourses as follows:
1. The age of fulfillment foretold by the prophets has dawned, the Messianic Age, the Last Age, the Decisive Age of Salvation (Acts 2:16-23, 25-31; 3:22-26; 10:43; 13:32-37).
2. The coming of the Last Age has been brought about by THE MINISTRY, the death, the burial, the resurrection and exaltation of Jesus of Nazareth, the Holy One of God, the Child of God, the Servant of God, the Son of God (Acts 2:22-24; 3:13, 21; 4:11; 5:31; 10:36; 13:23).
3. Peter and the Twelve and Paul are eye-witnesses that the crucified Jesus of Nazareth is risen (Acts 2:32; 3:15; 5:32; 10:39-41; 13:31).
4. By virtue of his paschal exaltation Jesus of Nazareth is at the right hand of God both Lord and Messiah, i.e. Divine-Human Head of the Israel of the New Covenant which includes the whole of mankind (Acts 2:32-36; 10:40).
5. The Holy Spirit in the Church (the Israel of the New Covenant) is the sign of the presence and power of Jesus Christ in the world (Acts 2:33; 5:32).
6. The Last Age will reach its final fulfillment with the return of the Lord Jesus Christ to judge the living and the dead (Acts 3:20).
7. Only through faith in Jesus and repentance of one's sins, salvation is obtained in the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:37-41; 3:19; 4:12; 5:31; 10:43; 13:38-41).
The fundamental concordance of Luke's recording of the primitive kerygma with the pre-Pauline kerygmatic formulas in Paul's letters is clear. This concordance confirms the basic historicity of Luke's reports. There is only one major variation, which I have highlighted: the mention of the public ministry of Jesus. This mention is made very discreetly in Discourse Number 1, more fully in Discourses 5 and 6. This is how Discourse 5 presents Jesus' public ministry: "You know the message [God] sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ - he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem." (Acts 10:36-39).
This peculiarity of Acts' kerygmatic Discourses 1, 5 and 6 is precious because it points out the source of the "introductions" to the "paschal narrative" which make up the bulk of the Four Gospels. Not only the paschal narratives (the accounts of the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus) are rooted in the primitive Good News, but also most of the text of the Four Gospels. Starting from the ministry of John the Baptist, what the evangelists report is based on the primitive kerygmatic preaching of Peter and the Twelve.
This is true especially of the three Synoptic Gospels. In the basic structure of these three Gospels we can still recognize the basic structure used by Peter to report Jesus' sayings and doings during the public ministry. This basic structure is a combination of time-space coordinates, resulting in a four stages development:
Stage One: The Preaching and Baptizing of John the Baptist.
Stage Two: The Preaching and Doing of Jesus in Galilee.
Stage Three: The Journeying of Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem.
Stage Four: The Preaching and Doing of Jesus in Jerusalem.
It is evident that this is a simplified presentation of the time-space coordinates involved in Jesus' ministry. So, for example, during his public ministry, Jesus went up many times from Galilee to Jerusalem to attend the great festivals, while in this structure only one such going up is recorded. This simplification was the work of Peter, as the book of Acts bears witness. It was a catechetically motivated simplification, intended to make it easier for the listeners to grasp the essential significance of the Jesus Event. It was also a theologically motivated simplification, intended to strengthen the concentration of the Good News on the Pascal Event. The Synoptics, being all directly or indirectly dependent on the witness of Peter, all accepted this simplification as normative. Only John, which relies on an independent eye-witness as good as Peter, could do without this spatio-temporal simplification and arrange the gospel material in his own independent way, a way probably closer to the actual run of events.
3.5 The Pauline Usage of the Word "Gospel" in Mark.
Among the four Gospels, the shortest, Mark, is the Gospel that has the most numerous occurrences of the word "Gospel". This word appears 8 times in Mark (only 4 times in the much longer Gospel according Matthew, never in Luke and John!) We have seen already how Mark begins his Gospel: "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God" (Mark 1:1) When Mark starts to present Jesus' preaching, he uses this word again twice: "Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the Gospel of God, and saying, The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the Gospel." (Mark 1:14-15). "The Gospel of God", as we have seen, means "the Good News that comes from God". The absolute use of "Gospel" in verse 15 refers to the content of the Good News, the content fully and concisely expressed in the chiastically correspondent verse 1: "the Good News which is Jesus Christ, the Son of God".
This usage of the word "Gospel" is very similar to Paul's usage. The fact that Luke never records Jesus using the word "Gospel" may allow us to see in the wording of "Repent and believe in the Gospel" a touch of Marcan redaction. Jesus' own wording must have been something like this: "Repent and believe what I say", or "Repent and believe what I announce", or "Repent and believe me". The word "Gospel" is Mark's way (derived from Paul, of whom Mark was a disciple) to stress that what Jesus announces is tremendous good news for us.
The other five instances in which the word "Gospel" appears in the Gospel according to Mark also bear signs of Marcan redaction. In all these instances the word "Gospel" means "the announcement of the Good News of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God". Let us take, for example, Mark 8:35: "Those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it." This sentence is recorded also by Matthew and Luke. But the word "Gospel" does not appear in Matthew and Luke. Probably, therefore, this word has been added by Mark. Why? To emphasize that to lose one's life for the announcement of the Good News is to lose one's life for Jesus himself. Thus Mark establishes here the same equivalence he established in the opening line of his Gospel: Jesus himself is the Good News. But the stress here seems to have shifted somewhat. This shift of stress could be expressed thus: the Good News is Jesus himself. That is, the announcement of the Good News makes Jesus present again in history. The announcement of the Good News is a new form of incarnation for Jesus. Through the announcement of the Good News man comes again in contact with Jesus. Consequently, to die for the spreading of the Gospel message is to die for Jesus himself. In these delicate redactional touches by Mark we have the first theology of evangelization.
3.6 The Gospel of Mark and the Infancy Gospels of Matthew and Luke
Before leaving Mark, the Gospel of the " One Gospel", we may deal with the problem of the Infancy Gospels (this is the right way to call them) in Matthew and Luke. The Infancy Gospel is conspicuously absent from Mark (and John). Why? Because the material recorded in the Infancy Gospels according to Matthew and Luke were not present in the One Gospel as announced by Peter and Paul. Does this mean that the material of the Infancy Gospels is less reliable historically and theologically than the material in the rest of the Gospel? Not at all. It only means that this material derives from other sources than the announcement of the Good News made by Peter, by the Twelve, by Paul.
Where does the Infancy Gospel according to Matthew come from? It comes from the "Joseph Circle" of the primitive Church in Jerusalem. This Joseph circle was made up by the relatives of Jesus on the side of Joseph the carpenter of Nazareth. We know the names of four of them: James, Joses (= little Joseph, to distinguish him from Joseph the carpenter, the foster-father of Jesus), Judas and Simon. We know also that the first, James, succeeded Peter in the leadership of the Jerusalem Church after Peter was compelled to leave Jerusalem (Acts 12). It was this circle of Jesus' "brothers" who kept the memories of Jesus' childhood as seen through the eyes of Joseph his foster-father. Now Matthew is the Gospel of the Jerusalem community. This Church was led by the brothers of Jesus. So it is only natural that this community should preface the announcement of the Good News with Joseph's memories of Jesus' childhood.
As for Luke's Infancy Gospel, it originates from the "Women Circle" of the primitive Jerusalem community (Acts 1:14). At the centre of this circle was Mary of Nazareth. The "we passages" in Acts let us know that Luke (that is, the author of the Gospel of Luke and of Acts) was in Jerusalem around 58 A.D. In Jerusalem Luke came in contact with the circle of women who preserved the memories of Jesus' childhood as seen through the eyes of Mary, Jesus' virgin mother (Luke 2:19, 51). We must be for ever grateful to Luke for having prefaced his record of the Good News with these memories of Mary.
Was this redactional decision of Matthew and Luke related to the One Gospel, to the announcement of the Good News? Of course it was. As they stand now in the Gospels, the Infancy Gospels according to Matthew and Luke are both a "Gospel-in-a-nut-shell". Both Infancy Gospels are wonderfully complete presentations of the total mystery of Christ, his incarnation-passion-death-resurrection-exaltation. Of course, this presentation is done not directly by using words like incarnation, death and resurrection. It is done indirectly by recording the memories of Mary and Joseph, while at the same time underlining their divine and paschal significance. Concrete historical details of the Infancy Gospels assume a paschal significance in light of the completed Christ event: the manger of the child Jesus recalls the cross of the adult Jesus; the sword that pierces Mary's heart gives us a vision of the stabat Mater dolorosa juxta crucem; the Herod of Jesus' birth is not too dissimilar from the Herod of Jesus' passion; and the exodus to and from Egypt is an image of the exodus Jesus will accomplish on Passover Day in Jerusalem. In Luke the divinity of Jesus is most explicitly expressed in chapters 1 and 2, while in the rest of the Gospel Jesus' prophetic-messianic mission is stressed. In Matthew 1 and 2, instead, it is the suffering humanity of Jesus which is particularly expressed, while in the rest of the Gospel there shines forth Jesus' divine authority. Consequently, we could say that we have not four but six different presentations of the One Gospel: the Gospel according to Mark, the Gospel according to John, the Gospel according to Matthew 3-28, the Gospel according to Luke 3-24, the Infancy Gospel according to Matthew 1-2 (or better, the Infancy Gospel according to Joseph of Nazareth), the Infancy Gospel according to Luke 1-2 (or better, the Infancy Gospel according to Mary of Nazareth).
4. The Four Gospels from the One Gospel
When did the One Gospel begin to be put into writing? Nobody knows. As Pope John Paul II in one of his weekly catecheses says, "scholars fix the composition of the Gospels in the second half of the first century" (General Audience of May 22nd, 1985). But we can surmise the reasons for putting the One Gospel traditions into writing. One reason could be this: even though oral tradition was a perfectly safe way of transmitting the Good News (oral tradition was an institution with very strict requirements, not the rough-and-tumble affair that is sometimes imagined), the words and deeds of Jesus were felt to be too extraordinary not to enlist also the service of the pen to ensure their preservation. This need of the pen must have been felt especially when the first eyewitnesses started to be mowed down by persecution, as in the case of James the son of Zebedee (Acts 12:1-5). The year A.D. 42 may be fixed as a possible terminus a quo of the writing down of the Gospel traditions.
Scholars have done a lot of detective work regarding the writing and editing of the four Gospels. But all their good-will notwithstanding, what we really know about the process of Gospel-writing is really very little. The words of A. Plummer regarding the Prologue of Luke's Gospel (Luke 1:1-4) are still valid today: "This prologue contains all that we really 'know' respecting the composition of early narratives of the life of Christ. Luke's Prologue is the test by which theories as to the origin of our Gospels must be judged. No hypothesis is likely to be right which does not harmonize with what is told us here." What does Luke's Prologue tell us? He tells us the following things:
1. Many writers have preceded him in writing.
2. The subject matter of their writing was "the events that have been fulfilled among us".
3. Their writing was based on the oral preaching of the Twelve, "those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word".
4. Luke decides to do the same thing.
5. Luke has investigated everything carefully from the very first.
6. Luke intends to write an orderly account.
7. Luke's purpose in writing is to convince the reader that the things about which he has been instructed are based on fact.
The most important things here seem to me to be two. Firstly, Luke tells us that his Gospel is a writing down of the oral preaching of the Twelve. This is as good a description of the four Gospels as can be had. Secondly, Luke tells us that reading the Gospel will convince one of the historical reliability (this is the meaning, in modern terms, of the word asphaleia used by Luke) of the contents of Christian instruction. This is also as good a purpose for reading the Gospels as can be thought of. Unfortunately, this purpose is largely neglected today, but to our own disadvantage.
At the beginning of Acts, Luke refers back to his Gospel as the account of "all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when he was taken up to heaven" (Acts 1:1-2a). This, again, is as good a definition of a written Gospel as can be had.
Some additional information as to why the four Gospels were written may be gleaned from the two conclusions of the Gospel of John. The first conclusion tells us: "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name" (John 20:30-31) The second conclusion chooses to stress a) the reliability of the apostolic witness in writing, and b) the incompleteness of the written Gospel account. "This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true. But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written." (John 21:24-25). What a wonderful hyperbole this last sentence is! A hyperbole that shows that the written four Gospels share the respect for Jesus' mystery that we have seen characterize the original unwritten oral One Gospel.
5. Why Two, Three, Four Written Gospels?
5.1 Why Two Written Gospels?
In the last paragraphs above I think I have explained why there are written Gospels at all. Now we have to explain why there are more than one written Gospels. Firstly, we have to ask why there are two basically different written Gospels. These two Gospels are those according to Matthew and Luke. The reason why the early Church produced these two different Gospels was that the early Church was composed of two totally different kinds of people, namely Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians. These two kinds of people had very different sensibilities, customs, frames of mind, ways of thinking and behaving. The two Gospels according to Matthew and Luke reflect the two great families that made up the early Church. Matthew wrote down the One Gospel primarily for Jewish Christians, drawing upon the oral tradition stemming from the primitive Jerusalem Church. Luke wrote down the One Gospel for Gentile readers, relying on Jewish traditions with an eye to the needs of the Gentile world. Different readers, different written Gospels. But all readers were, at least potentially, Christians. Hence different written Gospels, but containing the same One Gospel of tradition.
The Gospel according to Matthew, or at least part of it, is said by the early Church tradition to have been written originally in Aramaic. The Matthew now we have in hand is written in Greek, and very good Greek at that. The content, though, is still very Jewish. It is reasonable to hold that our Matthew is a very good Greek translation or even re-edition of the original Aramaic Matthew. Be that as it may, one fact is evidenced by the vigour of the Jewish concerns present in this Gospel and by the frequent hints at an oppressed Jewish Christian community: while Greek Matthew may originate in Antioch of Syria, the material contained in this Gospel originates from the primitive Jerusalem Church. Whether Matthew is the Matthew-Levi called by Jesus to be an apostle is disputed but possible. In any case, the designation of a Jewish scribe (publicans were all too secular scribes!) as the author of this Gospel is extremely apt. Matthew, therefore, is the Gospel of Jewish Christianity. Whatever the date of its final edition, this Gospel preserves the Gospel tradition of the Jerusalem Mother-Church which was led first by Peter and then by James the brother of the Lord.
The Gospel according to Luke can be said to be a Pauline reading of the One Gospel, that is, it is a recording of the Gospel traditions (originally stemming from the Jerusalem and Palestinian communities) done in a non-Jewish context (but not necessarily non-Semitic context!). Luke is the Gospel of the non-Jewish Gentile Church. When compared with Matthew, we can see that Luke has added a lot of traditional material which he had painstakingly collected and which is not present in Matthew. It is probable that the Church behind the Gospel of Luke is the Church of Antioch of Syria, the first not-exclusively-Jewish Christian Church. Luke himself may well have been an Antiochean Syrian. This would explain both his mastery of Greek and his deeply Semitic thinking. Luke's Greek is better than that of the other three Gospels, but at the same time he shows an appreciation for semitisms which only a Semite would be capable of. Syrians are Semites and Syriac is a Semitic language very close to Aramaic. The author of the Gospel of Luke is certainly also the author of Acts. Is this author the Luke mentioned by Paul? It is very possible. The "we passages" in Acts confirm this possibility.
By now I think I have explained why there are two different written Gospels, namely, the Gospel according to Matthew and the Gospel according to Luke.
5.3 Why Three Written Gospels?
The Gospels according to Matthew and Luke reflect the two great sections of the primitive Church. Then why should not two written Gospels suffice? Why should there be also Mark? The reason is that the relationship between the two great sections of the primitive Church was far from easy. This relationship was actually the single greatest problem met by the primitive Church. The twofold Gospel according to Matthew-Luke just shows how distinctive these two forms of Christianity were. The problem consisted precisely in how to preserve the unity of two so distinct groups. Each group having its own written Gospel only compounded the problem. Would there not be the danger that each group insist on the differences in their Gospels, instead of highlighting the fundamental unity? How to prevent schisms from happening? These hypothetical questions were not necessarily formulated like this by the 1st century Christians. However, these questions bring out some crucial concerns of 1st century Christians.
The Gospel of Mark fulfills the extremely important and urgent function of grounding the unity of Jewish Christian and Gentile Christianity. How does it fulfil this function? By providing the witness of Peter, the eye-witness par excellence, the Rock on which Jesus founded his Church. The witness of Peter in Mark is preeminently a witness to hard facts. Compared with the witness of Peter, Matthew is proved a very faithful transmitter of the apostolic tradition. Compared with the same witness of Peter, Luke also is revealed as an equally faithful recorder of the One Gospel. In this way, the two apparently so different Gospels are reconciled into a deep underlying unity. But this reconciliation is achieved only through common reference to a third Gospel, the Gospel according to Mark, Peter's Gospel, written in Rome. It is Rome that keeps Jerusalem and Antioch united! It is Peter's witness, as recorded by Mark, that reconciles Jewish Christianity and Gentile Christianity!
Whether Mark precedes Matthew and Luke or whether Mark is preceded by them, is still a disputed question. A majority of contemporary exegetes agree that Mark precedes Matthew and Luke and is used by them. But there is still a minority of exegetes whose arguments against the priority of Mark have never been really adequately answered. They hold that Matthew and Luke precede Mark who uses them. Personally, I think that for our present purpose whether Mark is first or not is not so important. What is important is that Mark acted as the touchstone of authenticity both for Matthew and for Luke. This holds true whether Matthew and Luke had Mark under their eyes while compiling their Gospels, thus recognizing Mark as the common standard reference for a Gospel writer. This also holds true if Mark came after Matthew and Luke and was written with the express purpose of providing a confirmation for the historical and theological accuracy of them both. It is clear, therefore, that whether Mark preceded or followed Matthew and Luke, Mark in any case fulfilled the function of grounding their unity upon the universally recognized witness of the apostle Peter.
It seems to me that we have here a profound answer to the question: why three similar written Gospels and not one only? The answer outlined above can be summarized as follows: these three Gospels arose out of three very specific needs of the primitive Church: 1) the Gospel of Matthew met the needs of Jewish Christianity; 2) the Gospel of Luke met the needs of Gentile Christianity; 3) the Gospel of Mark met the need of keeping these two wings of the primitive Church together. Please notice that all three Gospels met these needs by offering a reliable account of the One Gospel announced by Peter, by the Twelve, by Paul, and by the other apostles.
5.4 Why Four Written Gospels?
We have explained the multiplicity of the Synoptic Gospels. But why should there be a fourth written Gospel besides the Synoptics? What is the purpose of the Gospel according to John?
The Gospel according to John is the testimony of a second universally recognized eye-witness. In some sense, for all their differences, the three Synoptic Gospels constitute one single witness, ultimately Peter's witness. But "a single witness shall not suffice [...]. Only on the evidence of two or three witnesses shall a charge be sustained." (Deut 19:15) The requirement of at least two independent witnesses is basic to all court proceedings and to all historical research. The primitive Church responded to this concern by placing beside the written witness of Peter (Mark-Matthew-Luke) the written witness of John. The historical dimension of the One Gospel demanded such a double written attestation, Synoptic and Johannine.
Besides such a fundamental historical function, the Gospel of John fulfills also a fundamental theological function. The witness of Peter, as I have already mentioned, stresses the factual-historical dimension of the Christ event. The witness of John, on the contrary, stresses the mysteric-theological dimension of the Christ event. In the Synoptic-Johannine duality we have a reflection of the most fundamental twofold dimension of the One Gospel as reflected already in the faith formula of 1 Cor 15:3b-5: history and theology, outward fact and inner mystery. This twofold dimension, on the one hand, is the basic characteristic of each written Gospel. On the other hand, it is also the reason for John's Gospel standing besides the Synoptics. Each of the four Gospels bears witness to the totality of the Good News that is Jesus Christ. But the Synoptics do so stressing the empirical facts in which the mystery of Christ is revealed. John does so, instead, by stressing the mystery revealed in the empirical facts.
Conclusion
At the end of our enquiry, we can say that we have seen both the wood and the trees of that wonderful phenomenon which is the apostolic witness to the mysterious reality of Jesus, Son of God, Son of man, Messiah and Saviour. The wood is the fourfold Gospel, the trees are the four Gospels. The wood is the Gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John; the trees are the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. To conclude, I think, we may pause for one further moment on the basic twofold shade of the One Gospel which we noticed in the last paragraph. This twofold shade is the unified duality of outer and inner vision.
The Gospel of John, and so also the four Gospels, close with a reflection on this duality of outward and inward vision. "Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them[...]. When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, 'Lord, what about him?' Jesus said to him, 'If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!" (John 21:20-22).
Jesus wants John to remain until he comes again. Almost 2000 years have passed since Jesus pronounced these words. Throughout these years Peter and John have remained as the two crown witnesses of the Jesus event. Peter with his outward public proclamation. John with his inward personal contemplation.
While distinguishing between the two apostles, we must not separate them. There is John in Peter, and there is Peter in John. Through them, the One spoken Gospel and the Four written Gospels, or better the Fourfold Gospel, call upon us to become contemplatives in action of the Good News, Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of man. Only by being such contemplatives in action shall we also be good evangelizers. To be such contemplatives in action we must imitate both Peter and John. Imitate Peter's courageous witness to the facts: "We cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard." (Acts 4, 20) Imitate John, the Beloved Disciple, for, as Origen says: "[T]he Gospels are the first fruits of all the Scriptures, but [...] of the Gospels, that of John is the first fruits. No one can apprehend the meaning of it except he have lain on Jesus' breast and received from Jesus Mary to be his mother also."