Saturday, July 14, 2007

"The Gospels -- Direct testimony or late writings ?"

The debate on dating the Gospels is still open ...

Adapted from Marie - Christine Ceruti - Cendrier's article in the homiletic & pastoral review, Jnauary 2005.

"Nearly every day new clues are found indicating that the Gospels were originally written close to the time of Jesus.

"Let's be straightforward: I believe the Gospels to be direct testimonies that tell real and non - mythic or symbolic facts.

"I do not believe it by fideism -- not because of my faith -- but because I have rational, scientific, carefully researched reasons to do so.

"Indeed, we who affirm the absolute historicity of the Gospels are now only a small minority.

"Although this truth of the faith was strongly asserted by the Second Vatican Council and has been believed by millions of Catholics throughout the centuries of Christianity, we nowadays seem to be considered as outsiders.

"Let's examine here the different aspects of the situation..."

And so, she does ! And we do, too!

Thus she tells us:

"Nearly every day new clues are found indicating that the Gospels were originally written close to the time of Jesus.

"As noted above, based largely on speculation, many exegetes continue to assert that the Gospels were written after A.D. 70 by authors who never knew Jesus, any of the Apostles or any other eyewitnesses to Jesus.

Later on she adds:

"Here we reach the biggest mystery of today's Christian exegesis -- with the exception of Orthodox exegesis:

"All these discoveries testify that our faith is not in vain, that it rests upon real historic facts and should be welcomed with a relevant enthusiasm; instead, they are met with silence or worse."

Marie - Christine Ceruti - Cendrier is a professor in the Department of Theology of the European Humanities University, Minsk, Belarus. She and her husband Gianni, an Italian diplomat, reside in Rome. This is her first article in HPR.

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