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The gospel of matthew essay
Relationship between synoptic gospels
Relationship between synoptic gospels
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Saint Matthew
The name Matthew comes from the Greek Maththaios, which is derived from the Hebrew or Aramaic Mattiyah. His name means “gift of Yahweh” or simply “gift of God.” Saint Matthew was one of the twelve apostles and he wrote the Gospel according to Matthew. Although he was a publican, it is said the Saint Matthew was a Jew. Before his conversion, he was a publican, which was a tax collector, by profession. Not much is really known about Matthew later on in his life. His beginning of apostolic activity started in the communities of Palestine. He wrote for his countrymen in Palestine and composed his Gospel in his native Aramaic. This is refereed to as the “Hebrew tongue” which is mentioned in the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. It was written to convince Jewish readers that their anticipated Messiah had come in the person of Jesus. His death was uncertain. It is not known weather he died of natural causes or was martyred. There is a disagreement as to the place of St. Matthew's
Martyrdom and the kind of torture inflicted on him, therefore it is not known whether he was burned, stoned, or beheaded. He is the patron of bankers and his feast day is September 21st. St. Matthew is represented under the symbol of a winged man, carrying in his hand a lance as a characteristic emblem.
II. Structure and Content of Matthew’s Gospel
Early Christian writers believed that the book of Matthew was the earliest of the synoptic Gospels. They believed that he wrote the Gospel in Palestine, just before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Although this opinion is still held by some, most scholars consider the Gospel According to Mark the earliest Gospel. They believe, based on both external and...
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...eaders and scribes. He believed Peter to be at God’s right hand and at the top of the line below God. Matthew believed and was convicted that one could find explanations of the puzzling aspects of Jesus’ story like his death on the cross and because of this, tensions arose. This is why many scholars tried to find a scheme of salvation history to resolve some of its tensions. There is a threefold scheme of salvation history in Matthew’s Gospel. The threefold scheme is: A period of Israel from Abraham to Jbap, the time of Jesus’ own life, and the time of the church from Jesus’ Resurrection to the end of the world.
Bibliography:
Wallace, Susan Helen. Saints: Second Edition, Vol. 2. Boston: Pauline Books and Media,
1995.
Hoever, Rev, Hugo. Lives of the Saints. New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1977.
“It was a different place when Damien came there and made his great renunciation, and slept that first night under a tree amidst his rotting brethren: alone with pestilence; and looking forward (with what courage, with what pitiful sinkings of dread, God only knows) to a lifetime of dressing sores and stumps.” (Bunson, 250)
In the Bible’s New Testaments the book of Matthew is of Gospels genre. In the Old Testament God appointed the people who we know as prophets. They were the ones to describe Jesus life and work. What they wrote, those things did happen during Jesus life on earth. The book of Matthew explains to everyone who doesn’t believe it that Jesus is Christ. It means that Christ is God’s King. People were told by the prophets that they will be saved by the Christ from punishment for their evil deeds. This is the book about Jesus life. It teaches what Matthew wrote in this book about what Jesus taught. It even included the speech by Jesus called “The Sermon on the Mount” in chapters 5-7. It even went on to say that many ill people were cured by Jesus, blind people were able to see again, deaf people were able to hear again and Jesus even freed people who were possessed by evil spirits. There were some people who happen to hate Jesus. Jesus was killed by those who hated him on a cross. According to the prophets they had already written that Jesus would die (Isaiah 53; Matthew 12:40). Jesus was the one to suffer all the punishment from other people’s evil deeds after his death (Matthew 20:28, Matthew 26:28).
The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are the origin of nearly everything the Christian Church teaches about Jesus. The Gospels, in turn, serve as the scale or test of truth and authenticity of everything the church teaches about Jesus. It is said that the Gospels are the link between Jesus of Nazareth and the people of every age throughout history who have claimed to be his followers. Although the Gospels teach us about Jesus’ life they may not provide concrete evidence that what they speak of is true there are several other sources.
One can also say that the story shows the kingship of Christ. The theme of Matthew is the kingship of Christ. It would make total sense f...
Saint Augustine (354-430 AD), also known as Augustine of Hippo created an image of himself through his writings and teachings. He was born in Tagaste, a town in North Africa, on November 13, 354 AD. He was born into a middle class family. Patricius, his father, was a pagan, but later converted to Christianity because of his wife, Monica, was a devout Christian. Augustine’s mother, who was devoted to the Roman Catholic church, constantly tried for her son's conversion.
The Gospel of Matthew exhibits the plan of atonement and salvation for all people and the beginning of a new era. The Kingdom has come. Matthew’s Gospel is eschatological. Through the direct use of and allusions to the Hebrew scriptures, as well as fulfillment citations Matthew clearly connects Jesus’ life and ministry with Israel’s traditions and promised history.4...
It has been written that "since the day of Aristotle, probably no one man has exercised such a powerful influence on the thinking world as did St Thomas Aquinas." Thomas Aquinas was born in 1225 in Italy of a noble family, thus separated by 900 years to Aristotle. He received his first education at the Abbey of Monte Cassino, going on from there to the University of Naples. In 1243, he joined the Dominican monastic order at Cologin. His most influential teacher was another Dominican, Albertus Magnis, a German who wrote extensively on theological matters and questions of national science, especially biology. Thomas was also a highly successful lecturer, and travelled widely across Europe, particularly on the business of his order and the church.
The study of the Gospel of John can be viewed as distinct and separate from the study of any of the previous three synoptic gospels. The Fourth Gospel contains language and conceptions so distinct from the synoptics that scholars are often faced with the question of its historical origins. Originally, scholars believed the main source for the Gospel of John to be Jewish wisdom literature, Philo, the Hermetic books and the Mandaean writings, leading to the idea that John was the most Greek of the Gospels. However, with the discovery of the scrolls, scholars were now faced with source materials, remarkably similar to the concepts and language found in John, illuminating the literature as not only Jewish but Palestinian in origin. The discovery of the manuscripts opened up an entirely new interpretation of the gospel of John and a progressive understanding of its proper place within biblical scripture.
The birth narrative of Matthew begins with a long genealogy of Jesus, which basically shows how Jesus is son of Abraham who is the father of the nation of Israel, and David the King of the Jews. This may not seem important but this genealogy shows how Jesus is connected to the Davidic line. Then we have Mary, who just found out she was pregnant and Joseph decides it is best to divorce her because he wanted to break his union with someone who is pregnant, by someone else. But behold the angel comes down and reassures Joseph that Mary was pregnant by the Holy Spirit and that he should take her back into his house. The angel also said to name the child Emmanuel. When Jesus was born in Bethlehem, and King Herod heard of this new newborn king of the Jews and he ordered that all boys under the age of 2 be killed. The magi gave Jesus the gifts and left. In a dream, the angel of the lord told Joseph to take the child and go to Egypt and hide, Herod then died, and Jesus was safe.
The book of Matthew is said to have taken place around AD 80 to 100. Matthew constructed the book to recount his account of Jesus' life on earth. Matthew used detail to describe Jesus' life from birth to resurrection. The book emphasizes the fact that Jesus' life events were all orchestrated by God and for God. Matthew introduces Jesus as the world's one true Savior. The book of Matthew displays the fact that God's love is for all of His people.
The reason that the Gospel of Matthew is in the first place among the four Gospels is due to the early church tradition that Matthew was the earliest one who recorded Lord’s word and Jesus stories. In the fifth century, Augustine of Hippo claimed that "the canonical order of the four Gospels was the chronological order." In the late-eighteenth century, J. J. Griesbach stated that The Gospel of Mark was a short version of the combination of the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke. In the nineteenth century, German scholars concluded that the Gospel of Matthew was preceded by the Gospel of Mark and Matthew used the Gospel of Mark as his primary source. No matter which theory that most New Testament scholars accept, Matthew did not simply copy sources from other Gospels, but also included his own ideas and quoted verses from the Old Testament. So the question of readers should rise is "How strong relationship did the Gospel of Matthew have with the Old Testament?" or "How accurately did Matthew use the Old Testament?
This work is also said to be anonymous, and believed to have been produced in Syria within a large Jewish and Jewish-Christian community. It is apparent from a number of shared accounts, and overlapping stories of Jesus that the author of Matthew’s Gospel used Mark as a source. Although many of the stories are expanded upon, and carry different connotations, the same basic stories are found in all of the synoptic gospels, and because Mark was the first written, scholars assume it was a source used by both Matthew and Luke. It should also be noted that many of Jesus’ teachings in Matthew were not found in Mark. This led scholars to search for a second source, which resulted in the Q document. Although not available as a feasible document, Q designates a compilation of Jesus’ parables and sayings from about 50 to 70 CE, which are present in Matthew (Harris p.156). Throughout the gospel, Matthew uses formula quotations, meaning he quotes from the Old Testament. This strong relationship with the Hebrew Bible helps scholars determine that Matthew wanted to emphasize his Jewish position. This is important because his interpretations of Jesus throughout the gospel are not agreed upon by all Jews, in fact only a small fraction. Although it is obvious to the readers than John and Matthew carry very different stories of Jesus’ life, it is interesting to
Throughout the human history there have been many saints who have lived among us. They followed Jesus’ principles and they did God’s will. One of the earliest saints was St. John, and he lived during the times of Jesus. His childhood and his date of birth are unknown, but it is well known that he was one of the best followers and students of Jesus.
Matthew writes his gospel account to give us the view of Jesus as the King:
St Ignatius of Loyola is an inspiring person and has touched the lives of many people even now centuries after his death. Loyola has affected the lives of an uncountable number of people, either directly or indirectly. He started as an extremely brave and tough soldier and turned into the founder of a powerful religious order. He was born in 1491 in Spain and founded the Jesuits in 1540 at the age of 49.The Jesuits today are still a devoted religious order. Everything they do is in God’s name, hence their motto AD MAIOREM DEI GLORIAM this literally means “for the greater glory of God”. (Linten, Seven Things) Many Jesuits (and even non Jesuits like Pope John Paul II) sign their documents with amdg at the end to show that they do their work for God and not solely for themselves. (Linten, Seven Things) The Jesuits have survived multiple persecutions and yet have still remained a major influence in the church and in universities around the world. If it were not for an unfortunate cannonball shattering a soldier’s leg then none of this may have happened.