First Accounts
Critical scholars generally agree on several early sayings, collections, and accounts preceding the "canonical" gospels. The dedicatory preface of the Gospel of Luke testifies already to the existence of several "accounts" of the life of Jesus by the time of its composition. The term Luke uses (διήγησις diēgēsis) is a term used in classical Greek for any historical narrative. The term "gospel" is not used in the New Testament text for any of the canonical Gospels, though in later centuries a traditional reading of 2 Corinthians 8:18 "the brother whose praise is the Gospel" was to sometimes identify this with Luke, and consequently Gospel of Luke.
Read more about this topic: Gospel
Famous quotes containing the word accounts:
“Friendship is friendship, but accounts must be kept.”
—Chinese proverb.
“No common-place is ever effectually got rid of, except by essentially emptying one’s self of it into a book; for once trapped in a book, then the book can be put into the fire, and all will be well. But they are not always put into the fire; and this accounts for the vast majority of miserable books over those of positive merit.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)