3680 — Questions of the Resurrection and the Bible
By Editor
What about the contradictory accounts of the resurrection as given by Matthew and John? Are they not entirely different stories? J. W. B. It is impossible, in the great number of questions we have to answer in this small department, to enter at any length upon the different accounts of the resurrection of Jesus. They are different stories, told by different persons, each of them impressed to tell some particulars concerning the resurrection which others did not tell. The real question regarding all these differences in the Gospels is not as to whether the story is different or not, but, Is the story contradictory? Now John tells some things that Matthew does not, and Matthew some things that John does not. One story, for instance, will pass over what might be considered important items of interest, and events clearly brought out in another story of the evangelists, but these are not necessarily contradictory. It is simply that one omits some events and mentions others. If this critic, or student, will take some good harmony of the Gospels, one of which can be found in the Oxford Bible helps, he will see that all these various statements by the four evangelists are accounted for. Now Luke, it is thought by some, wrote first. He himself did not witness the events. He evidently received them from the Lord through Peter. Mark did not witness all of them, altho he may have witnessed some of them. He was a young man at that time. But John and Matthew were among the witnesses, among the twelve disciples. Luke probably wrote first; then Matthew or Mark, and later John. Each one of these doubtless saw just what the others had written, but each one of them wrote out, as the Spirit of God dictated, events which would touch some hearts out in the great world from that time on. They made no effort to harmonize their statements. Each of them stated that which was true, stated some things which the others did not state, left out some things which the others did state; but this does not imply contradiction. We regret that we have no more space to enter into the examination of the stories by detail, but this is impossible.