Quotes about Eyewitnesses

A major part of our inquiry, then, must be to look at the emerging Christian movement and to ask: what caused it? Even if our eyewitnesses disagree in detail, something must have happened.

The Gospels are also anonymous, and the names attached to them come to us from early church tradition. Likely none was an eyewitness. The writers relied on stories of Jesus that were circulating orally, perhaps (or probably) going back to what eyewitnesses had seen.

just as they were handed down to us by the initial eyewitnesses and servants of the word.

All historians agree that the gospels were written down and circulated during the first generation after the events, while the eyewitnesses were still alive. In order for the gospels to be legendary at their core, more generations would be needed between the events they record and the date of their composition.