Gospels are only variations of the same theme, a fourfold representation of one and the same gospel,
animated by the same spirit.^872 They are not full biographies,^873 but only memoirs or a selection of
characteristic features of Christ’s life and work as they struck each Evangelist and best suited his
purpose and his class of readers.^874 They are not photographs which give only the momentary image
in a single attitude, but living pictures from repeated sittings, and reproduce the varied expressions
and aspects of Christ’s person.
The style is natural, unadorned, straightforward, and objective. Their artless and naïve
simplicity resembles the earliest historic records in the Old Testament, and has its peculiar and
abiding charm for all classes of people and all degrees of culture. The authors, in noble modesty
and self-forgetfulness, suppress their personal views and feelings, retire in worshipful silence before
their great subject, and strive to set it forth in all its own unaided power.
The first and fourth Gospels were composed by apostles and eye-witnesses, Matthew and
John; the second and third, under the influence of Peter and Paul, and by their disciples Mark and
Luke, so as to be indirectly likewise of apostolic origin and canonical authority. Hence Mark is
often called the Gospel of Peter, and Luke the Gospel of Paul.
The common practical aim of the Evangelists is to lead the reader to a saving faith in Jesus
of Nazareth as the promised Messiah and Redeemer of the world.^875
Common Origin.
The Gospels have their common source in the personal intercourse of two of the writers
with Christ, and in the oral tradition of the apostles and other eye-witnesses. Plain fishermen of
Galilee could not have drawn such a portrait of Jesus if he had not sat for it. It would take more
than a Jesus to invent a Jesus. They did not create the divine original, but they faithfully preserved
and reproduced it.
The gospel story, being constantly repeated in public preaching and in private circles,
assumed a fixed, stereotyped form; the more readily, on account of the reverence of the first disciples
for every word of their divine Master. Hence the striking agreement of the first three, or synoptical
Gospels, which, in matter and form, are only variations of the same theme. Luke used, according
to his own statement, besides the oral tradition, written documents on certain parts of the life of
Jesus, which doubtless appeared early among the first disciples. The Gospel of Mark, the confidant
of Peter, is a faithful copy of the gospel preached and otherwise communicated by this apostle;
with the use, perhaps, of Hebrew records which Peter may have made from time to time under the
fresh impression of the events themselves.
Individual Characteristics.of Christ and his salvation (so in the New Test.); 4th, the record of these glad tidings (so in the headings of the Gospels and in
ecclesiastical usage). The Saxon "gospel," i.e., God’s spell or good spell (from spellian, to tell), is the nearest idiomatic equivalent
for εὐαγγέλιον.(^872) Irenaeus very properly calls them τετράμορφον τὸ εὐαγγέλιον, ἑνι πνεύματι συνεχόμενον, quadriforme evangelium quod
uno spiritu continetur. Adv. Haer. III. 11, § 8.
(^873) This is expressly disclaimed in John 20:30; comp. 21:25
(^874) Hence Justin Martyr, in his two "Apologies" (written about 146), calls the Gospels "Memoirs" or "Memorabilia"
(Ἀπομνημονεύματα) of Christ or of the Apostles, in imitation no doubt of the Memorabilia of Socrates by Xenophon. That Justin
means no other books but our canonical Gospels by theme "Memoirs," which he says were read in public worship on Sunday,
there can be no reasonable doubt. See especially Dr. Abbot’s Authorship of the Fourth Gospel, 1880.
(^875) John 20:30, 31:ταῦτα δὲ γέγραπται ἵνα πιστεύητε ὂτι Ἰησοῦς ἐστὶν Χριστός , ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ, καὶ ἵνα πιστεύοντες ζεὴν
ἔχητε ἐν τῷ ὀνόματι αύτοῦ.
A.D. 1-100.