The Gospels

If you read Luke 1:2-3, you will learn, as I did, that Luke (who was not one of the 12 disciples and never met Jesus) said that he himself was not an eyewitness, and the knowledge he gathered was from eyewitnesses, and not as words inspired by God. Incidentally, why does every "Gospel" begin with the introduction According to. Why "according to?" the reason for this is because not a single one of the gospels carries its original author’s autograph! Even the internal evidence of Matthew 9:9 proves that Matthew was not the author of the first Gospel which bears his name:
"And as Jesus passed forth thence, He (Jesus) saw a man, named Matthew, sitting at the receipt of custom: and He (Jesus) saith unto Him (Matthew), follow me (Jesus). And he (Matthew) arose, and followed Him (Jesus)."

Without any stretch of the imagination, one can see that the He’s and the Him’s of the above narration do not refer to Jesus or Matthew as its author, but a third person writing what he saw or heard - a hearsay account and not words inspired by God.

It is worth noting, and well known throughout the religious world, that the choice of the present four "gospels" of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) were imposed in the Council of Nicea 325 CE for political purposes under the auspices of the pagan Emperor Constantine, and not by Jesus. Constantine’s mind had not been enlightened either by study or by inspiration. He was a pagan, a tyrant and criminal who murdered his son, his wife and thousands of innocent individuals because of his lust for political power. Constantine ratified other decisions in the Nicene Creed such as the decision to call Christ "the Son of God, only begotten of the father."

Literally, hundreds of gospels and religious writings were hidden from the people. Some of those writings were written by Jesus’ disciples, and many of them were eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ actions. The Nicea Council decided to destroy all gospels written in Hebrew, which resulted in the burning of nearly three hundred accounts. If these writings were not more authentic than the four present gospels, they were of equal authenticity. Some of them are still available such as the Gospel of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas which agree with the Quran. The Gospel of Barnabas, until now, is the only eyewitness account of the life and mission of Jesus. Even today, the whole of the Protestant word, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists and other sects and denominations condemn the Roman Catholic version of the Bible because it contains seven "extra" books. The Protestant have bravely expunged seven whole books from their word of God. A few of the outcasts are the Books of Judith, Tobnias, Baruch and Esther.

Concerning Jesus’ teachings of the Gospel (Injeel), the Gospel writers frequently mentioned Jesus preaching the Gospel: Matthew 9:35, Mark 8:35, and Luke 20:1. The word "gospel" is recurrently used in the Bible. However, in the New Testament Greek edition the word Evangeline is used in place of the word gospel, which is translated to mean good news. My question was: what Gospel did Jesus preach? Of the 27 books of the New Testament, only a small fraction can be accepted as the words of Jesus, and only of the 27 books are known to be attributed as the Gospel of Jesus. The remaining 23 were supposedly written by Paul. Muslims do believe that Jesus was given God’s "Good News." However, they do not recognized the present four Gospels as the utterances of Jesus.

The earliest Gospel is that of Mark’s which was written about 60-75 AD. Mark was the son of Barnabas’s sister. Matthew was a tax collector, a minor official who did not travel around with Jesus. Luke’s Gospel was written much later, and in fact, drawn from the same sources as Mark’s and Matthew’s. Luke was Paul’s physician, and like Paul, never met Jesus. By the way, did you know that the names Marks and Luke were not included in the 12 appointed disciples of Jesus as mentioned in Matthew 10:2-4?

Now the names of the twelve apostles are these; the first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother; Philip, and Bartholomew; Thomas, and Matthew the publican; James the son of Alphaeus, and Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus; Simon the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.

John’s Gospel is from a different source, and was written in about 100 AD. He (John) should not be confused with John, the disciple, who was beheaded by Agrippa I in the year 44 CE long before this gospel was written. It should be accepted as a reliable account of the life of Jesus, and whether it should be included in the scriptures.

Christians, as I once did, boast about the Gospels according to Matthew, according to Mark, according to Luke and according to John. However, if we think about it, there is not a single Gospel according to Jesus himself. According to the preface of the KJV (King James Version) new open Bible study edition, the word "Gospel" was added (see below) to the original titles, "According to John, according to Matthew, according to Luke and according to Mark."

The permission to call "According to" writings the Gospel was not given by Jesus nor by any other divine guidance. These writings; Matthew, Luke, Mark and John, were never originally to be the Gospel. Therefore, Mark 1:1 can not be a true statement that his writing is the gospel of Jesus.

It should be mentioned that Muslims must believe in all Divine scriptures in their original form, their Prophets and making no distinction between them: The Suhuf (Abraham); Torah (Moses); Psalms (David); Gospel - or the Injeel (Jesus); and the Quran (Muhammad sallallahu 'alaihi wassalam). It is clearly stated in the Quran 3:3 that Allah sent down the Torah and the Gospel. However, none of these scriptures remains in its original form now, except the Quran, which was sent for all mankind everywhere and for all times.

In addition to other reasons why the Quran was sent to mankind, as mentioned in 18:4-5 it was sent to warn the Christians of a terrible punishment from God if they cease not in saying:

"Allah has begotten a son."

Muslims sincerely believe that everything Jesus (May the peace and blessing of Allah be upon him) preached was from God; the Gospel (Injeel): The "good news" and the guidance of God for the Children of Israel. There is no place mentioned in the present four Gospels that Jesus wrote a single word of his Gospel, nor is it mentioned that Jesus instructed anyone to do so. What passes off, as the "Gospels" today are the works of third party human hands. The Quran 2:79 says:

"And woe to those who write the book with their own hands and they say: "This is from Allah (God)." To traffic with it for a miserable price! So woe to them for what their hands do write, and woe to them for what they earn thereby!"