Jesus

====Authorship, date, and reliability====

The canonical gospels are four accounts, each by a different author. The authors of the Gospels are pseudonymous, attributed by tradition to the [[four evangelists]], each with close ties to Jesus:{{sfn|Funk|Hoover|The Jesus Seminar|1993|p=3}} Mark by [[John Mark]], an associate of [[Saint Peter|Peter]];<ref name="May Metzger Mark" /> [[Matthew the Apostle|Matthew]] by one of Jesus' disciples;{{sfn|Funk|Hoover|The Jesus Seminar|1993|p=3}} [[Luke the Evangelist|Luke]] by a companion of [[Paul the Apostle|Paul]] mentioned in a few epistles;{{sfn|Funk|Hoover|The Jesus Seminar|1993|p=3}} and John by another of Jesus' disciples,{{sfn|Funk|Hoover|The Jesus Seminar|1993|p=3}} the "[[beloved disciple]]".{{sfn|Cross|Livingstone|2005|loc=John, St.}}

According to the [[Marcan priority]], the first to be written was the Gospel of Mark (written AD 60–75), followed by the Gospel of Matthew (AD 65–85), the Gospel of Luke (AD 65–95), and the Gospel of John (AD 75–100).<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l2sloGWzzV8C&pg=PA58 | title=Can We Trust the Gospels?: Investigating the Reliability of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John | publisher=Crossway | year=2007 | page=58 | isbn=978-1-4335-1978-9 | first=Mark D. | last=Roberts | access-date=14 August 2015 | archive-date=7 September 2015 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150907174109/https://books.google.com/books?id=l2sloGWzzV8C&pg=PA58 | url-status=live }}</ref> Most scholars agree that the authors of Matthew and Luke used Mark as a source for their gospels. Since Matthew and Luke also share some content not found in Mark, many scholars assume that they used another source (commonly called the "[[Q source]]") in addition to Mark.{{sfn|Licona|2010|pp=210–21}}

One important aspect of the study of the Gospels is the [[literary genre]] under which they fall. Genre "is a key convention guiding both the composition and the interpretation of writings".<ref>Burridge, R. A. (2006). Gospels. In J. W. Rogerson & Judith M. Lieu (Eds.) ''The Oxford Handbook of Biblical Studies''. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. p. 433.</ref> Whether the gospel authors set out to write novels, myths, histories, or biographies has a tremendous impact on how they ought to be interpreted. Some recent studies suggest that the genre of the Gospels ought to be situated within the realm of ancient biography.<ref>Talbert, C. H. (1977). ''What is a Gospel? The Genre of the Canonical Gospels''. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Fortress Press.</ref><ref>Wills, L. M. (1997). ''The Quest of the Historical Gospel: Mark, John and the Origins of the Gospel Genre''. London, England: Routledge. p. 10.</ref><ref>Burridge, R. A. (2004). ''What are the Gospels? A Comparison with Graeco-Roman Biography''. revised updated edn. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans.</ref> Although not without critics,<ref>e.g. Vines, M. E. (2002). ''The Problem of the Markan Genre: The Gospel of Mark and the Jewish Novel''. Atlanta, Georgia: Society of Biblical Literature. pp. 161–162.</ref> the position that the Gospels are a type of ancient biography is the consensus among scholars today.<ref>{{cite book |author=Stanton |first=Graham N. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A7wNGMrAiD0C |title=Jesus and Gospel |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-521-00802-0 |page=192 |language=en |access-date=22 August 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226005236/https://books.google.com/books?id=A7wNGMrAiD0C |archive-date=26 February 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Rogerson |first1=J. W. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eKZYMifS1fAC |title=The Oxford Handbook of Biblical Studies |last2=Lieu |first2=Judith M. |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-19-925425-5 |page=437 |language=en |access-date=22 August 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191225204746/https://books.google.com/books?id=eKZYMifS1fAC |archive-date=25 December 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref>

Concerning the accuracy of the accounts, viewpoints run the gamut from considering them [[Biblical inerrancy|inerrant]] descriptions of Jesus' life,{{sfn|Grudem|1994|pp=90–91}} to doubting whether they are historically reliable on a number of points,{{sfn|Sanders|1993|p=3}} to considering them to provide very little historical information about his life beyond the basics.{{sfn|Köstenberger|Kellum|Quarles|2009|pp=117–25}}{{sfn|Ehrman|1999|pp=22–23}} According to a broad scholarly consensus, the [[Synoptic Gospels]] (the first three—Matthew, Mark, and Luke) are the most reliable sources of information about Jesus.{{sfn|Sanders|1993|p=71}}{{sfn|Theissen|Merz|1998|pp=17–62}}<ref name="Britannica" />