Gospels

I find it very encouraging to understand that, in Paul's letters, generally the Greeks philosophers rejected the idea of resurrection and the Jews considered the cross as the failure of Jesus in the New Testament. The Greeks could not believe anyone who would want to be resurrected bodily in their Platonic beliefs and I think neither could they logically conclude this was possible. They could stoically accept that Jesus died bravely at the cross in defence of his belief and purpose but they could not accept the idea of resurrection. The Jewish religious institutions on the other hand could accept that the saintly ones could be resurrected by God but they would never accept a dead Messiah who was shamefully crucified by the enemy, the ruling powers of that time, the Romans. Even Jesus' disciples could believe he was the Messiah but could not believe that he would be killed by the Romans on the cross. These are deep stumbling blocks for the Greeks and Jews during the New Testament time. So, it makes us wonder why this was recorded at all and more than that, as the pinnacles of the gospel narratives. All the events and actions led to the cross and the resurrection.

The reason for saying that this is encouraging because it gives good evidence that the gospel writers did not try to modify their eyewitness accounts of the historical Jesus. It gives reasons to believe that they were faithful to what they have seen and heard and even touch. They could have easily avoided these two stumbling blocks to make the gospel more believable and accepted for all. This would I think make the task for the witnesses in the first century easier which is what an author would do if he/she wants to make his book a best seller, to appeal to the crowd and the favoured position of the day.

I am glad they didn't and this allows me to conclude that the only reason why they did not remove these obvious obstacles, the Cross and the Resurrection, was this was in fact what had happened and what they had witnessed.