choir singing the Angel Gabriel was sent from god to a city of galilee named. Narrator every sunday, in every corner of the world. The virgin, betrothed to a man whose name. Narrator . People gather to hear a story. And the virgins name was mary. Narrator for more than 2,000 years, that story has been told and retold. And to bear a son. Narrator along the way, each generation has found in its telling its own meaning and interpretation. . You shall call his name jesus. narrator that story, of a man called jesus of nazareth, a man who became jesus christ, was originally told by his first followers. . And be called the son of the most high. narrator and then retold in accounts by later believers in the gospels. The gospel according to st. Luke. Narrator so began the building of a religion. In the first two parts, with the help of scholars and historians, we tried to reconstruct his times, and how, after his death, a small jewish sect began to spread the word. Tonight, how that story was told, and how a faith overcame an empire. music playing narrator Jewish Resistance was not completely snuffed out after the sack of jerusalem. Rebel fighters held out for four more years. The jewish historian josephus, who had taken part in the war, recounted the story there was a fortress of very great strength not far from jerusalem which had been built by our ancient kings. It is called masada. The rock of masada, one of the most glorious places in all israel, became the major refuge point for some of the most extremist elements opposing rome. The zealots, and their most ardent supporters, fled right in the middle of the war to masada. dramatized here had been stored a mass of corn amply sufficient to last for years, an abundance of wine and oil. There was also found a mass of arms of every description hoarded up by the king and sufficient for 10,000 men. Narrator from the heights of masada, the defenders could see the roman Army Surrounding them. The outlines of their camps and siege works are still visible from the air. If you were a roman soldier approaching masada, i think your heart would sink because you know that you would have to. First, to spend a lot of time building a lot of ramps, massive ramps, to move the army up the sides in order to breach the walls. But you would know in the process that you were on a suicide mission, because all the while, the fortifiers and guardians of masada would have been pelting you with any number of lethal objects at, no doubt great losses to the army. Narrator josephus described the siege and its aftermath dramatized the romans expected to make an assault upon the fortress, which they did. But they saw nobodt a terrible solitude on every side, as well as a perfect silence. The irony, of course, is that when the soldiers breached the wall, finally, it was not they who had been subject to the suicide attack, it was those who had been guarding masada who had committed suicide. Narrator according to josephus, the defenders had killed themselves rather than submit to the romans. But modern archeologists have found little evidence of mass suicide among the ruins. What really happened there remains a mystery. But josephus version of the story turned masada into the powerful symbol of a noble failure. The failure of the first revolt really was a traumatic event for everyone living in the jewish homeland, jews and christians alike. As a result, they had to start rethinking some of their own assumptions. When jerusalem was destroyed, a whole new series of questions had to be asked. What do we do without the temple . Where is the source of our faith and our authority . What does god want us to do . This era was an age of definition, not just for christianity, but also for judaism. It marks the emergence, for the first time, into the light of history of a new group and a new culture, and a new literature and a new way of thinking and writing. Narrator without the temple, the priesthood that had presided over its rituals lost its power. There emerged new leaders, the pharisees, rabbis who would lead the jewish people in a new direction. And the rabbis represent for us a new age of definition. It is the rabbis who now emerge as a new kind of judaism, and it is this judaism which will endure from the second century of our era down to our own age. music playing narrator the failure of the first revolt also created a crisis for early christians who were still a part of judaism. The kingdom had not come; the messiah had not arrived. The followers of jesus coped by telling stories about the man they had expected would deliver the new kingdom on earth. We have to remember that jesus died around 30. For 40 years theres no written gospel of his life, until after the revolt. During that time, we have very little in the way of written records within christianity. Our first writer in the new testament is paul, and his first letter is dated around 50 to 52; so still a good 20 years after jesus himself. But it appears that in between the death of jesus and the writing of the first gospel, mark, that they clearly are telling stories. Theyre passing on the tradition of what happened to jesus what he stood for and what he did orally, by telling it and retelling it. Narrator meeting in each others homes, early christians told stories of jesus parables and miracles, and of his suffering and death. These were not historical accounts, but shared memories shaped by a common past. Legend and myth and hymn and prayer are the vehicles in which oral traditions develop. One could, for example, imagine that the oldest way in which the early christians told about jesus suffering and death was the hymn that paul quotes in philippians 2 dramatized and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Paul quotes this hymn in the early 50s of the first century. He quotes this as a hymn that probably was sung in the Christian Communities, ten or 20 years earlier. That is the way in which you first tell the story, and that you tell the story in the form of a hymn also shows that the telling of the story is anchored in the worship life of the community. So here is really the beginning of the oral tradition. It seems that, over time, some of these stories came to be written down, and. Or what came to be thought of as the gospel, the good news, the story of jesus. dramatized the beginning of the good news of jesus christ, the son of god, as it is written in the prophet isaiah. Prepare the way of the lord. Make his path straight. Narrator the gospel of mark is the oldest in the new testament. It was written soon after the failure of the first revolt for a community that was struggling to reconcile its expectations of jesus with the loss of the temple. We know a little bit about Marks Community from some things in the gospel itself. Marks audience reads greek and not aramaic. Mark always has to explain the aramaic phrases that jesus uses. dramatized taking her by the hand, he said to her talitha cumi, which means, little girl, i say to you arise. Mark is written for a jewish christian audience living somewhere outside the homeland and thus reflecting on the events of the first revolt, from that vantage point. Narrator marks audience may have watched roman soldiers parading through the streets bearing plunder stolen from the temple. They would certainly have seen even been forced to use, the coins that depicted the terrible defeat. Mark is clearly reflecting on the destruction of the temple as part of his understanding of the significance of the life and death of jesus. Narrator in marks story jesus predicts that the temple will be destroyed because it has been desecrated. Jesus is standing against the temple in marks gospel. And mark wants us to understand that thats significant to why he must die and why jerusalem will be destroyed. dramatized do you see these great buildings . Not one stone will be left here upon another. All will be thrown down the gospel of mark is extraordinary and strange, the story, if you read it apart from the others. Its a story of this country teacher coming from nowhere, with incredible power descending upon him, healing people exorcising people, speaking stoh 9 things, and startling everyone. dramatized he said to them, why are you afraid, have you no faith . And they were filled with awe, and they said to one another who is this, then, that the wind and sea obey him . Narrator mark was the first to write the story of the life of jesus. He took disparate elements of oral tradition and a few early written sources and wove them together to create a new narrative. Aq rnw0 mark seems to have a knowledge of at least one and maybe two or three different collections of miracle stories. The fact that mark takes these early sources of jesus miracle stories suggests that, in fact one of the earliest ways of understanding jesus is as a miracle worker. But miracle workers are a dime a dozen in the ancient world. We hear about all sorts of people who can perform miracles, so that doesnt really seem to set him apart. Narrator in mark, what does set jesus apart is that he is a peculiar kind of miracle worker. In one case, he has to attempt the miracle twice to get it right, and at another time, he cant perform miracles at all. It seems to be one of the points of marks gospel to say hes not just a miracle worker; hes more. Narrator jesus emerges from marks gospel as a strange and somewhat enigmatic figure. Jesus is mysterious. Jesus intentionally keeps people from understanding who he really is at times. dramatized he said to them, for those outside everything comes in parables in order that they may, indeed, look but not perceive, and may indeed, listen but not understand. Narrator the jesus in marks gospel both reveals and conceals his true identity a paradox scholars call the messianic secret. It seems to me that the messianic secret is indeed that the true messiahship of jesus cannot be recognized in his miracles, and that the messianic secret of jesus is that he is the son of man who has come to suffer, and not the messiah who is going to do great miracles. And that that will become clear only at the very end of the story of jesus. The suffering and death of jesus reveals the secret. Narrator since the destruction of the temple, Marks Community has come to see the death of jesus in a new light. Mark is challenging the prewar image of jesus as an apocalyptic figure. Mark, coming out of the experience of the first great war with rome, after the destruction of the temple, mark sees jesus, like many of the christians that mark knew all about in his own community, as gods persecuted one dying almost feeling abandoned. Its a very unromantic jesus. Its a terrifying image, because thats what their experience was. dramatized when it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until 3 00 in the afternoon. At 3 00, jesus cried out with a loud voice, my god, my god, why hast thou forsaken me . Mark tells us that jesus died being mocked and in agony. And i think mark is writing for the experience of people in the 70s who are dying like that and who need the consolation that jesus had died that way before feeling abandoned by god. Narrator in marks original gospel, jesus dies and his body is placed in a tomb. When the tomb is discovered, jesus is gone. Mark ends with an empty tomb and a waiting for the return of jesus. He ends, almost, with an absent jesus, because thats what his community has experienced in persecution, an absent jesus. Now, nobody after mark is going to accept that. Matthew will change it. Luke will change it. John will change it. The scribes will even change the gospel of mark to put other endings there. Mark creates the empty tomb, as far as i can see, as his way of ending the story. And the last words of the original gospel are, and they were terrified. It would be very bad news if it werent that underneath this rather dark story is an enormous hope that this very unpromising story and its terrible anguished ending is, nevertheless, not the ending; that theres a mystery in it, a divine mystery of gods revelation that will happen yet. And i think its that sense of hope that is deeply appealing. Narrator mark began the gospel tradition with his dramatic story of the life and death of jesus. The later gospel writers would continue the tradition by drawing on the story told by mark. Matthew and luke both used mark as the core, sort of the basic story line that they tell, because mark is completely incorporated, 16 chapters, into both matthew and luke. Matthew and luke depend on mark, which is why those three gospels matthew, mark, and luke are called the synoptic gospels, because they can be understood together. Once scholars had decided that marks gospel was used by matthew and luke, it was possible to compare them and to realize that there was also material with a common sequence and a common content that wasnt in mark. Scholars observed that theres a part of the sayings in matthew that are exactly identical with sayings in luke. In fact, theyre identical in greek, sayings of jesus. Now, think jesus spoke aramaic. So if you were translating aramaic and if i were translating aramaic, theyd come out different, these translations. So you would only have identical. You would only have jesus speaking identical sayings in greek if you had a written translation in greek of his sayings. And so scholars suggested that there must have been, besides mark, Something Else written down that would have been a list of the sayings of jesus translated into greek. And they called that quelle which means source in german and they call it, for short, q. Nobody ever has found this source written. We can reconstruct it because we guess that there was such a written source. Narrator q was composed before the war. It would have presented jesus as an apocalyptic figure, the very image of the messiah that mark felt compelled to change. dramatized there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see abraham, isaac, and jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of god, and you yourself thrown out. Narrator but this is also a complex jesus who sometimes speaks words of wisdom. dramatized consider the lilies and how they grow. They neither toil nor spin, yet i tell you even solomon. Narrator q does not tell the stories of the life and death of jesus. It contains only his sayings, so it reveals a different way of understanding jesus. Whoever collected the sayings of q wasnt interested in the death of jesus, wasnt interested in the resurrection of jesus, thought the importance of jesus was what he said, what he preached. Now, other people thought, its not enough to have the sayings of jesus. You have to tell about his. About his death, and his crucifixion, and his resurrection. Thats the important thing. Now, somebody put that all together, and we call it matthew, and we call it luke. dramatized blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of god. Blessed are you that hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Narrator q was probably composed in the jewish homeland of palestine. Scholars do not agree on the location of mark, matthew, luke or john. They were separated not only by geography, but also by time. Writing decades apart, they composed their gospels for tiny communities that were developing their own ideas about jesus, independently of each other. dramatized blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Narrator about 15 years after mark, matthew wrote his gospel for a community caught up in the transformation of judaism after the fall of the temple. Matthews gospel is clearly written for a jewishchristian audience living within the immediate proximity of the homeland itself. Matthews is the most jewish of all the gospels. Narrator Matthews Community lived in villages in the upper galilee, or lower syria. After the war, many who had been forced out of jerusalem moved north and settled in these villages. New leadership was evolving here with the pharisees, the rabbis who gave fresh interpretation to the ancient jewish traditions. Matthews Community Felt threatened by these changes. The followers of jesus were certainly very much on the fringe of the jewish community. Obviously, the early preachers had hoped that they would convert the whole majority of their people. But they were bitterly disappointed to find that only a very few accepted their rather improbable stories. And they remained very much on the fringe of the jewish communities. dramatized the gospel of matthew is concerned with the position of these early Christian Churches within israel. And its very important that jesus, for matthew, is fully a man from israel. Therefore, matthew begins his gospel by taking, probably, all the genealogy of jesus and now traces this back to abraham. For matthew, jesus is a son of abraham. That is, he is truly a man from israel. The way matew then tells the story of jesus draws on a lot of symbols from jewish tradition. Jesus goes up onto a mountain to teach and there talks about the law. He looks like moses. dramatized when jesus saw the crowds, he went up to the mountain and began to speak and taught them, saying, you are the light of the world. Jesus delivers five different sermons of this sort, just like the five books of torah. Think not that i have come to abolish the law and the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. In matthew, jesus is a proponent of torah piety, just like the pharisees. dramatized whoever breaks one of these commandments will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. For i tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Narrator the jesus of matthew singles out the pharisees for a bitter attack. dramatized woe to you scribes and pharisees, hypocrites. For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside look beautiful, but inside, they are full of the bones of the dead and all kinds of filth. Now, in jesus own times, the pharisees werent that prominent a group. Why does matthew tell the story this way, so that a group that was less consequential during jesus own lifetime now becomes the main opponent . Its precisely because thats whats going on in the life of matthews communy after the war. The pharisees are becoming their opponents, and were watching two jewish groups matthews christianjewish group and the local pharisaic groups in tension over what would be the future of judaism. Narrator in matthew, we see a debate between two jewish groups. Tensions created by this debate will eventually fracture judaism and lead to the split with christianity. Most of the gospels reflect a period of disagreement, of theological disagreement. And the new narrative history that evolves in the form of. Of the new. New testament tells a story of a broken relationship, and thats part of the sad story that evolves between jews and christians, because it is a story that had such awful repercussions in lar times. Narrator by the time matthew was writing, the trauma of the war was receding. Now his followers and the pharisees were competing for the hearts and minds of the jewish villagers over the future direction of judaism. This may