NIV, Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible CBSB_Digital Sampler | Page 22

Hearing the Gospels as
First-Century Hearers Heard Them
Bible readers who come to the four accounts of J ­ esus’ life typically have multiple questions about
these different works. This essay seeks to address a few of the more pertinent questions that
may be raised by readers based on the culturally relevant goals of this study Bible: How would
the Gospels’ first audience have understood these writings, historically and theologically? How
reliable are their sources? Are there any other gospels besides the four in the Bible? How were the
Gospels first published? In this essay, we’ll examine the principles behind each of these founda-
tional questions in turn.
The Gospels as Ancient Biographies About J ­ esus
As a category of literature, the Gospels are unique in the sense that they tell us the story of Some-
one unique. In many respects, however, they follow a form that ancient hearers and readers would
have recognized. In the ancient world, a book about a recent historical person was called a bios,
or in English, a “biography.”
Modern readers should keep in mind that ancient biographies differed from typical modern
biographies. First, they were shorter than most modern biographies. They varied in length, but
could easily be as short as Mark’s Gospel or expand to roughly double that length: as long as
Matthew or Luke. Second, ancient biographies did not always start with the person’s childhood
(as in Matthew and Luke), but sometimes opened with a person’s public activity or career (as in
Mark and, after the prologue, John).
Moreover, whereas modern biographies are usually arranged chronologically, ancient biogra-
phers often arranged their material topically. Thus we should not be surprised when, for example,
Matthew has some material in a different sequence than do Mark or Luke. That was expected
in ancient biography, and the church fathers recognized this point. (Already in the early second
century, Papias observed that Mark did not write everything in chronological order.)
Writers often paraphrased material in their own words. Thus, finding slightly different word-
ing in different Gospels (e.g., Matthew’s usual “kingdom of heaven” versus Mark’s “kingdom of
God”) should not surprise us. Presumably to increase understanding, Luke even adapts the style
of roof mentioned in Mk 2:4 to fit the style of roofs in the northern Mediterranean world where
his primary audience lived (Lk 5:19).
Nevertheless, then as today, biographies were a form of historical writing. Biographers liked
to teach moral lessons through the accounts that they wrote, but like other historians, they did
so in a special way that differed from fictional sorts of writing. They could offer lessons, but they
were expected to make their points by using genuine information, not by composing fiction.
When writing about characters of centuries past, sometimes historians and biographers admitted
that some of the information available to them might be merely legendary. When writing about
characters of the past two generations, however — ​within living memory of eyewitnesses — ​they
generally had very substantial information. Comparing such “recent” biographies by different
writers concerning the same characters quickly reveals that ancient biographers depended on
information, not free imagination, when they wrote their works.
The Point of the Gospels
The Gospels communicate historical information, but this does not mean — ​as some modern read-
ers have supposed — ​that the Gospels do not also teach theology. The modern contrast between
history and theology misunderstands how history was written in the ancient world.
Ancient historians wrote with a sense of moral responsibility: they communicated the events
of the past so that readers in the present could learn positive examples to follow and negative