Gospel truth? - Graham Stanton

Christmas 1994: German biblical scholar claims that a fragment of a gospel was a contemporaneous record of Christ's life. Graham Stanton's essay puts this claim to the test.In 1994, German biblical scholar Carsten Thiede announced that one of the oldest surviving fragments of a gospel (held in Britain) was even older than had previously been claimed. He stated that it was contemporaneous with Christ, an eye-witness account rather than a second-century retrospective. The Times picked up the story and Thiede has published his thesis under the title The Jesus Papyrus (Weidenfeld and Nicholson).Graham Stanton was the first top scholar to call the new thesis into question, claiming that the original dating of the fragments was correct.Gospel Truth is his brilliant essay on the whole question of the dating of the New Testament texts, and the claim that a fragment of Mark's Gospel has been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. With a comprehensive survey of available evidence for the origin and purpose of the gospels, this book has profound implications for our understanding of the significance of Christ.