I tend to think of it the other way round -- that the synoptic gospels are collections of other people's recollections of what Jesus said and did, where very often what got preserved was the punch line of a longer discourse, whereas John adds more personal memories of waht he had witnessed.

Much NT scholarship seems to be based on a priori reasoning. "This couldn't have happened like this, so something else must have happened."

Hope you had a good holiday!
Steve Hayes | Homepage | 11.04.08 - 2:54 pm | #

Steve,

What bothers me is that the following view is always adopted.

'There is truth in here somewhere, we just have to figure out what it is'

Always overlooked is the far more simplistic view
'This couldn't have happened like this, so maybe its just bullshit'
The Celtic Chimp | Homepage | 16.04.08 - 2:19 pm | #