# Micah 5:2 Messianic Prophecy? and Who wrote the Gospels? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 7, 2004, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434 "2004-11-07T01:39:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![widdleytinks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a4c791/32.png) [@widdleytinks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/widdleytinks)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/41 "2004-11-12T05:10:40Z")
> [@Captain Amazing](#): > > At the beginning of 1 Chronicles, somebody named Ephrath is mentioned as the wife of Caleb, who was a grandson of Judah. A lot of the people in the bible are eponymous. So, all of the people of Israel are (supposedly) descended from Israel, all of the Ammonites are descended from Ben-Ammi, the tribe of Judah is decended from Judah, etc. Each tribal grouping is named after it’s founder. So, to follow that idea, the people of Ephratha were supposedly descended from Caleb and his second wife Ephrath. > > And based on the eponymous relationships, you can see how the people at the time viewed themselves. Our hypothetical Bethlehemite considers himself descended from Ephrath, so he’s part of the sub-clan of Ephratha. Ephraph is the second wife of Caleb, so he’s of the Calebite clan. Caleb was one of the grandsons of Judah, so he’s part of the tribe of Judah. Judah was the son of Israel, so he’s an Israelite, and Israel was a decendant of Eber, so he’s a Hebrew. > > When you real all the X begat Y in the bible, you’re seeing the way the tribes viewed their relationships with each other. Thanks, Captain. Much appreciated as are all the replies on this thread. widdley ---
**Author:** ![widdleytinks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a4c791/32.png) [@widdleytinks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/widdleytinks)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/42 "2004-11-12T05:14:33Z")
> [@C K Dexter Haven](#): > > Look, this discussion is interesting but is kinda gone off from the original Micah quote. I’m therefore changing the thread title, assuming that’s OK with y’all. > > And no one has as yet mentioned [Who wrote the Gospels?](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mbible4.html) I assume you’re a mod. Changing the title of the OP would have been okay with me if only I hadn’t attempted to get the thread back on topic just a few posts earlier …and successfully so. widdley ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/43 "2004-11-12T13:19:51Z")
::: blush ::: Oh, well. I did change the title to include an “and”, since there was so much interesting stuff on who wrote the bible. ---
**Author:** ![FriendRob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecc23a/32.png) [@FriendRob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriendRob)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/44 "2004-11-12T21:07:35Z")
Tho I agree with most of what **Diogenes** says, I think he sometimes overstates the case. **Date of Mark** - It’s certainly not true that all scholars date Mark after 70 AD. (I’m not sure, but Raymond Brown may be a counterexample. I don’t have his Intoduction to the NT in front of me.) Mark 13 is not really conclusive evidence that the author knew the Temple had been destroyed. **Markan Priority** - I think it’s fair to say that this is a majority opinion, but by no means universal. Certainly it went unnoticed for almost 2000 years, so it can’t be quite as obvious as **Diogenes** tries to make out. It might help to suggest some books that make the case. Crossan’s _The Birth of Christianity_ is one that comes to mind, tho Mark is not the main focus here. It’s important to look at how oral traditions actually work in order to separate the oral tradition option from the “Luke copied Mark” option. Crossan is one scholar who has actually done this, rather than just asserting “the wording is too close to be oral transmission”. **Q Document Hypothesis** - That Q is written, not oral, is part of the hypothesis. Here the major work is Kloppenborg. **John** - The main reason I know to think that it wasn’t written by a disciple of Jesus is that it, too, was a reworking of an earler text. The main evidence is that the author used the “Signs Source” - the “signs” are given out of order in the Gospel of John, suggesting it is a rearrangement of some other writing. As is the case of Matthew, it’s very hard to see why someone who was an eyewitness would copy some other writing, rather than relying on his own memory. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/45 "2004-11-12T22:14:45Z")
John also anachronistically places the expulsion from the synagogues during the life of Jesus. This incidentally gives us a dating in the very late 1st century but also reveals that it could not have been written by a contemporary of Jesus. **FriendRob** is also correct that Canonical John is a layered work which consists of later material added onto an earlier “signs” gospel. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2004, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434/46 "2004-11-12T22:18:43Z")
One more thing, though. John does contain a few scattered pericopes (and a different Temple incident) which could have come from a strand of authentic oral tradition which arose independently of the Markan and Q communities. The Johannite community might have had a real apostle somewhere in its very early history but no apostle wrote John’s gospel. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/micah-5-2-messianic-prophecy-and-who-wrote-the-gospels/273434.md?page=2)