Christ’s Historical Claim: Understanding Through the Gospels
Understanding Christ’s Historical Claim
The Gospels: More Than Mere Records
There is a historical fact that claims to be precisely the realization of the hypothesis presented. We possess a historical document that has reached us, showing how the problem first arose: the Gospels. These Gospels are not (one cannot know an object through the objective method that requires it to be addressed) mere, unrelated transcripts of what Christ said, nor a report on His activities as a police officer might compile.
We are, rather, dealing with a document linked, like others, with memory, and profoundly original, with the intention of an announcement, shaped by the way the document is presented for this purpose. Their historical value can only be received if what characterizes them is understood: that they recount the memory of an exceptional individual, transmitted by someone who considers it vital to publicize to others. It is not a mere transcript, a record, or an essay prompted by the concern of strictly fulfilling the role of a chronicler. To understand, we must face the fact as it is shown to us: as memory and an announcement.
Conviction is always something that proves itself. This type of proof serves our creations or conventions, rather than objective reality. The demonstration we are discussing is given to us in the clear encounter with an event. There may be no contact if we are unwilling to let the entirety of that fact be brought to us. This is a criterion available to anyone. A fact can be known; a fact one can encounter, always being able to see how. How, then, do we grasp the fact of Christ in order to assess His claim?
Grasping Christ’s Fact: A Methodical Approach
By starting to go through the memory and make the announcement that those who have been captivated by Him—a requirement of method: the method is a reasonable description of the path in relation to the subject. One must pick the right reasons with which to take the steps in the knowledge of the object’s position. This is important. The subject, in tune with the item they want to know, forms a living arrangement that develops over time, in coexistence (time spent).
To embrace this prerogative is certainly a qualitative moral act. This attunement (tuning) is how the subject finds reality. It demands effort and work from the subject who wishes to attain it, plus a starting position that is not hindered a priori. The understanding of signs, a path from certainty, reveals that the more power we have as a person, the more capable we are of wounding the certainties of others based on little evidence. Conversely, the more capable one is of trust, the more one can discern the right reasons to believe in others.
This may be unreasonable if there are no adequate reasons, and reasonable if there are. If the only reason is immediate evidence or personal demonstration, humanity could not progress, because everyone would have to redo all processes from the beginning. Although humanity naturally possesses this capacity for fundamental survival, this minimum comprehension capability also needs time and space to evolve. It is a gift that can weaken, and Jesus’s claim requires it to be understood. What the Master of the New Testament calls us to do is not to humiliate our reason, but to open and understand.
An intelligence that detects signs to find the existence of what is fundamental to its own existence is an intelligence much more open than one that denies a priori its ability to do so.
Jesus’s Entry into History
Starting Point: The mystery chose to enter human history with a life identical to that of any person, seamlessly, without anyone being able to observe and record it. At one point, He was discovered, and this was the biggest moment of His life and of all history. John was an exceptional witness, who wanted to remember the first time Jesus’s presence became the supreme question.
Jesus was a common boy, who listened to John the Baptist (a great popular prophet). People stood before a person different from others. Those who came into contact with Him were attracted by His unique personality. (See John 1:35-50 for the beginning of Jesus’s public ministry).