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2 - Jesus and the Prophets

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

David L. Tiede
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Summary

The Facts of History and the Truth of the Gospels

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name.

(Jn 20:30–1)

But there are also many other things which Jesus did; were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

(Jn 21:25)

The first book in this series is entitled What Can We Know about Jesus? What those who want to “understand Jesus today,” want to know is often factual. What did Jesus actually say and do? Our sources do convey a great deal of such data, but they fail to relate many things we would like to know. The gospel writers were less interested in simply compiling the record, probably because they had heard so many things about Jesus, as the preceding quotes from John indicate (see also Lk 1:1–4).

That is not the only reason. What the gospel writers wanted the reader to know about Jesus was more theological than factual. That is, they wanted the reader to understand that Jesus is the agent and presence of God's will and reign in the world. This is at least a different kind of “fact.”

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Jesus and the Future , pp. 32 - 56
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1990

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