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The Fourfold Gospel: A Theological Reading of the New Testament Portraits of Jesus
This groundbreaking approach to the study of the fourfold gospel offers a challenging alternative to prevailing assumptions about the creation of the gospels and their portraits of Jesus. How and why does it matter that we have these four gospels? Why were they placed alongside one another as four parallel yet diverse retellings of the same story?
Francis Watson, widely regarded as one of the foremost New Testament scholars of our time, explains that the four gospels were chosen to give a portrait of Jesus. He explores the significance of the fourfold gospel's plural form for those who constructed it and for later Christian communities, showing that in its plurality it bears definitive witness to what God has done in Jesus Christ. Watson focuses on reading the gospels as a group rather than in isolation and explains that the fourfold gospel is greater than, and other than, the sum of its individual parts. Interweaving historical, exegetical, and theological perspectives, this book is accessibly written for students and pastors but is also of interest to professors and scholars.
Francis Watson, widely regarded as one of the foremost New Testament scholars of our time, explains that the four gospels were chosen to give a portrait of Jesus. He explores the significance of the fourfold gospel's plural form for those who constructed it and for later Christian communities, showing that in its plurality it bears definitive witness to what God has done in Jesus Christ. Watson focuses on reading the gospels as a group rather than in isolation and explains that the fourfold gospel is greater than, and other than, the sum of its individual parts. Interweaving historical, exegetical, and theological perspectives, this book is accessibly written for students and pastors but is also of interest to professors and scholars.
224 pages, Paperback
First published April 19, 2016
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July 22, 2016
A few years ago, Francis Watson penned Gospel Writing, a mammoth-sized piece of scholarship that investigated the origins of how the canonical gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) became a fourfold collection placed at the head of the New Testament. In The Fourfold Gospel, therefore, Watson chooses to dwell not so much on the origin of the fourfold gospel as on its theological “form and significance” (p.viii).
The gospel narratives have long been considered by Christians to be both four individually distinctive accounts and yet also one unified whole. In other words, Watson explains, Christians can both speak of four gospel accounts and “of a singular ‘gospel according to…’ in four different versions” (p.vii). What is the significance of this? And what, theologically, does it mean to affirm that these gospels speak most truly of Jesus when read canonically, in conversation with each other? These are the kinds of questions Watson explores throughout The Fourfold Gospel.
Origins of the Fourfold Gospel
Even though the story of the fourfold gospel’s formation isn’t the main subject of the book, Watson begins by briefly summarizing how he thinks these texts came to form the “foundation stone” of the New Testament. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were gathered together into a canonical collection through a process of ecclesial judgment that wasn’t spontaneous. Some figures wanted to include more than four texts. These other documents, often termed “apocryphal” gospels, included texts like the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Nicodemus (p.3). On the other end of the spectrum, there were also those who didn’t think that it was really necessary to preserve four distinct narrative accounts. Tatian, a student of Justin Martyr, attempted to replace them by producing a harmonized text (the Diatessaron) that incorporated materials from all four canonical gospels, along with extra details from other apocryphal texts into a single, hybrid document (p.65). Eventually though, Tatian’s “super gospel” was also found to be unsatisfactory.
According to Watson, the production of the gospel canon was very much a product of the early communities of Jesus followers, “especially the many unknown individuals who made the crucial decisions about which gospel books should be used and read in their own local communities” (p.16). From a Christian perspective, it’s perfectly reasonable to affirm that these innumerable choices, messy though they may have been, were providentially guided by the Spirit. Eventually, these small-seeming decisions “gradually coalesced into an international consensus accepted by the churches of the East and the West” (p.16). The Evangelists themselves may not necessarily have fully imagined the extent to which their accounts would become fourfold collection. Nevertheless, Watson asserts:
It is only within a fourfold gospel that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John can and must be seen as complementary, their differences enhancing and enriching the truth of the message rather than undermining it. The fourfold gospel is greater than the sum of its parts. (p.103)
Having briefly looked at Watson’s perspective on the formation of the gospels as part of the New Testament canon, we can now delve into a few of his reflections on the theological significance of this collection. First, he highlights the importance of early Christian figures like Irenaeus and Jerome and their use of the throne visions in Ezekiel and Revelation to help think more deeply about how the gospels relate to one another.
Four Creatures Around the Throne
In the first verses of the Book of Ezekiel, readers encounter a strange and rather surreal vision. Ezekiel gives a vivid description of the Lord’s chariot-throne, surrounded by four living creatures (p.21). These creatures “possess four wings, four faces, and four sides” (p.44). For Irenaeus and other early Christian readers, the most significant thing about this passage in regards to thinking about the fourfold gospel was that these creatures, in addition to having human faces, possessed, “the faces of a lion and a calf to the right and left and an eagle’s face behind” (p.44).
When Ezekiel extends his gaze upward from the four creatures to the throne itself, he sees that “high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man” (Ezek. 1:26, NRSV). Of course, passages Exodus 33:20 say that God Himself cannot be seen. Therefore, Watson comments, “For the early Christian reader, a visible manifestation of God could only be a prefiguring of Christ, the one in whom the hidden God is presented to human view” (p.45). This leads to an analogy between the four creatures surrounding the throne and the nature of the gospels:
Just as the prophet beholds the exalted Christ only by focusing first on the four living creatures, so we behold him only by attending to the four gospels… the differences between Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were seen to be mirrored in the differences between the living creatures’ four faces: one human, the others those of a lion, calf, and an eagle. (p.45)
Watson notes that, “For both the prophet and the church, the fourfold form is as it is because God willed it to be so” (p.46). In the same way that God was glad to make a creation filled with various creatures, from humans and lions to eagles, the early Church believed that God was pleased to use a diverse collection of gospel accounts to testify to Himself. In Irenaeus’ version of this evangelist symbol tradition, Matthew is associated with the human face, the calf with Luke, the lion with John, and lastly the eagle with Mark (p.92). However, as the Western father Jerome contemplated the meaning of these four symbolic figures when they are again described in Revelation 4, he wondered if the eagle really was such a good fit for Mark, and likewise if it might be too difficult to identify a lion’s roar with John’s “‘the Word was God'” (p.92). Jerome therefore reversed this pairing, associating Mark with a lion crying out in the wilderness and John with a soaring eagle contemplating the Word of God (p.92).
Augustine found this symbolic Johannine eagle to be a helpful means for explaining why John seemed so different from the other three gospel narratives. For Augustine, the first three gospels are concerned primarily with actions of Jesus and “what he instructs us to do by his teaching and example” (p.93). While the Johannine Evangelist also describes the actions of Jesus, he also expands the scope of his gospel narrative even further, looking explicitly beyond the earthly life of Jesus to contemplate “the eternal Word’s life with God” (p.94). Like all dichotomies, this one falls short after a certain point, but it’s intriguing to see that for important figures in early Christianity, the individuality of each gospel account enhanced rather than detracted from their fourfold witness to Christ. As Watson puts it, “they [the gospels] present not four Christs but one Christ seen through four different pairs of eyes” (p.104).
We can now delve into a second reflection made by Watson on the significance of the fourfold gospel. In addition to discussing the development of the evangelist symbol tradition, he also takes some time to explore the work of the venerable 4th century scholar Eusebius of Ceasaria, who developed one of the first cross-referencing systems for the canonical gospels (p.105).
Eusebius’s Canons
Watson believes that, “It was the achievement of Eusebius… to show, through his canon tables, how the apparent chaos of the four different tellings of the same story can be reduced to rational and harmonious order” (p.115). Eusebius, working from an earlier cross-referencing system created by Ammonius of Alexandria, looked at gospel passages and noticed that some of them are paralleled in all four accounts, while others are found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but not John, and still others only appear in two of the gospels, or even in just one of them (p.118). Therefore, Eusebius produced a set of tables that systematically showed which passages could be found in which gospels, using ten organizational categories. “In Eusebian terms, the core of the story belongs to canon I, in which passages common to all four evangelists are listed” (p.128). Cannon II lists passages found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, while canon V organizes the passages found only in Matthew and Luke, and so on (pp.128-129). The end result is an impressively systematic framework for reading through the gospels in comparison with one another. For Watson, Eusebius’s canon tables played an important role in demonstrating the usefulness of having all four gospels in a single codex (p.122). Doing so allowed the interrelated nature of the fourfold gospel to become more easily apparent:
Without the Eusebian apparatus, a four-gospel codex would be experienced by its users as no more than the sum of the four individual volumes… With Eusebius’s tables and section enumerations in place, however, around four hundred invisible lines are threaded through the volume, linking almost every page with one, two, or three pages from the other gospels, binding them tightly together in an intricate network and demonstrating that the single set of covers around the four distinct books is more than just a matter of convenience. (pp.122-123)
Thanks to the advent of Eusebius’s cross-referencing system, along with the creation of later ones, readers of the gospels are invited to not only work “through the text,” from beginning to end, but also “across the text,” studying the similarities and differences in how the gospel writers recount incidents in the life and ministry of Jesus, thereby opening up fruitful opportunities for meaningful exegesis and highlighting “not only its [the fourfold gospel’s] diversity but also its coherence” (p.123).
Conclusion
The question of truth is raised implicitly throughout The Fourfold Gospel. It’s one thing to demonstrate the unity of the four gospel accounts in the midst of their diversity. Pondering how they disclose the truth about Christ is a deeper matter. Therefore, Watson ends the book by briefly contemplating what it means to call the gospel accounts true:
The truth of the gospel is not some inert correspondence between text and referent. Its capacity to transform must constantly be rediscovered as the gospels are read, interpreted, heard, prayed, and lived. (p.172).
It seems safe to suggest that Christian readers of the gospels should cultivate an awareness of the fact that they are called to read the text not only for information but also for formation. At this point, Watson’s perspective makes me think of Kevin Vanhoozer’s words in Pictures at a Theological Exhibition, “God uses the Bible both to present Christ and to form Christ in us” (p.80).
In the end, thinking alongside Watson about the theological significance of the fourfold gospel makes for a very enjoyable read. Watson has raised some valuable questions about what it means to read the gospels in canonical perspective, and he has admirably highlighted a too-frequently-forgotten side of Church history: the roles played by Irenaeus, Jerome, Eusebius, and others in establishing the fourfold gospel as a unified collection. It’s an interesting little book.
*Disclosure: I received this book free from Baker Academic Publishing for review purposes. The opinions I have expressed are my own, and I was not required to write a positive review.
**More theology book reviews can be found at Tabletalktheology.com
The gospel narratives have long been considered by Christians to be both four individually distinctive accounts and yet also one unified whole. In other words, Watson explains, Christians can both speak of four gospel accounts and “of a singular ‘gospel according to…’ in four different versions” (p.vii). What is the significance of this? And what, theologically, does it mean to affirm that these gospels speak most truly of Jesus when read canonically, in conversation with each other? These are the kinds of questions Watson explores throughout The Fourfold Gospel.
Origins of the Fourfold Gospel
Even though the story of the fourfold gospel’s formation isn’t the main subject of the book, Watson begins by briefly summarizing how he thinks these texts came to form the “foundation stone” of the New Testament. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were gathered together into a canonical collection through a process of ecclesial judgment that wasn’t spontaneous. Some figures wanted to include more than four texts. These other documents, often termed “apocryphal” gospels, included texts like the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Nicodemus (p.3). On the other end of the spectrum, there were also those who didn’t think that it was really necessary to preserve four distinct narrative accounts. Tatian, a student of Justin Martyr, attempted to replace them by producing a harmonized text (the Diatessaron) that incorporated materials from all four canonical gospels, along with extra details from other apocryphal texts into a single, hybrid document (p.65). Eventually though, Tatian’s “super gospel” was also found to be unsatisfactory.
According to Watson, the production of the gospel canon was very much a product of the early communities of Jesus followers, “especially the many unknown individuals who made the crucial decisions about which gospel books should be used and read in their own local communities” (p.16). From a Christian perspective, it’s perfectly reasonable to affirm that these innumerable choices, messy though they may have been, were providentially guided by the Spirit. Eventually, these small-seeming decisions “gradually coalesced into an international consensus accepted by the churches of the East and the West” (p.16). The Evangelists themselves may not necessarily have fully imagined the extent to which their accounts would become fourfold collection. Nevertheless, Watson asserts:
It is only within a fourfold gospel that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John can and must be seen as complementary, their differences enhancing and enriching the truth of the message rather than undermining it. The fourfold gospel is greater than the sum of its parts. (p.103)
Having briefly looked at Watson’s perspective on the formation of the gospels as part of the New Testament canon, we can now delve into a few of his reflections on the theological significance of this collection. First, he highlights the importance of early Christian figures like Irenaeus and Jerome and their use of the throne visions in Ezekiel and Revelation to help think more deeply about how the gospels relate to one another.
Four Creatures Around the Throne
In the first verses of the Book of Ezekiel, readers encounter a strange and rather surreal vision. Ezekiel gives a vivid description of the Lord’s chariot-throne, surrounded by four living creatures (p.21). These creatures “possess four wings, four faces, and four sides” (p.44). For Irenaeus and other early Christian readers, the most significant thing about this passage in regards to thinking about the fourfold gospel was that these creatures, in addition to having human faces, possessed, “the faces of a lion and a calf to the right and left and an eagle’s face behind” (p.44).
When Ezekiel extends his gaze upward from the four creatures to the throne itself, he sees that “high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man” (Ezek. 1:26, NRSV). Of course, passages Exodus 33:20 say that God Himself cannot be seen. Therefore, Watson comments, “For the early Christian reader, a visible manifestation of God could only be a prefiguring of Christ, the one in whom the hidden God is presented to human view” (p.45). This leads to an analogy between the four creatures surrounding the throne and the nature of the gospels:
Just as the prophet beholds the exalted Christ only by focusing first on the four living creatures, so we behold him only by attending to the four gospels… the differences between Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were seen to be mirrored in the differences between the living creatures’ four faces: one human, the others those of a lion, calf, and an eagle. (p.45)
Watson notes that, “For both the prophet and the church, the fourfold form is as it is because God willed it to be so” (p.46). In the same way that God was glad to make a creation filled with various creatures, from humans and lions to eagles, the early Church believed that God was pleased to use a diverse collection of gospel accounts to testify to Himself. In Irenaeus’ version of this evangelist symbol tradition, Matthew is associated with the human face, the calf with Luke, the lion with John, and lastly the eagle with Mark (p.92). However, as the Western father Jerome contemplated the meaning of these four symbolic figures when they are again described in Revelation 4, he wondered if the eagle really was such a good fit for Mark, and likewise if it might be too difficult to identify a lion’s roar with John’s “‘the Word was God'” (p.92). Jerome therefore reversed this pairing, associating Mark with a lion crying out in the wilderness and John with a soaring eagle contemplating the Word of God (p.92).
Augustine found this symbolic Johannine eagle to be a helpful means for explaining why John seemed so different from the other three gospel narratives. For Augustine, the first three gospels are concerned primarily with actions of Jesus and “what he instructs us to do by his teaching and example” (p.93). While the Johannine Evangelist also describes the actions of Jesus, he also expands the scope of his gospel narrative even further, looking explicitly beyond the earthly life of Jesus to contemplate “the eternal Word’s life with God” (p.94). Like all dichotomies, this one falls short after a certain point, but it’s intriguing to see that for important figures in early Christianity, the individuality of each gospel account enhanced rather than detracted from their fourfold witness to Christ. As Watson puts it, “they [the gospels] present not four Christs but one Christ seen through four different pairs of eyes” (p.104).
We can now delve into a second reflection made by Watson on the significance of the fourfold gospel. In addition to discussing the development of the evangelist symbol tradition, he also takes some time to explore the work of the venerable 4th century scholar Eusebius of Ceasaria, who developed one of the first cross-referencing systems for the canonical gospels (p.105).
Eusebius’s Canons
Watson believes that, “It was the achievement of Eusebius… to show, through his canon tables, how the apparent chaos of the four different tellings of the same story can be reduced to rational and harmonious order” (p.115). Eusebius, working from an earlier cross-referencing system created by Ammonius of Alexandria, looked at gospel passages and noticed that some of them are paralleled in all four accounts, while others are found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but not John, and still others only appear in two of the gospels, or even in just one of them (p.118). Therefore, Eusebius produced a set of tables that systematically showed which passages could be found in which gospels, using ten organizational categories. “In Eusebian terms, the core of the story belongs to canon I, in which passages common to all four evangelists are listed” (p.128). Cannon II lists passages found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, while canon V organizes the passages found only in Matthew and Luke, and so on (pp.128-129). The end result is an impressively systematic framework for reading through the gospels in comparison with one another. For Watson, Eusebius’s canon tables played an important role in demonstrating the usefulness of having all four gospels in a single codex (p.122). Doing so allowed the interrelated nature of the fourfold gospel to become more easily apparent:
Without the Eusebian apparatus, a four-gospel codex would be experienced by its users as no more than the sum of the four individual volumes… With Eusebius’s tables and section enumerations in place, however, around four hundred invisible lines are threaded through the volume, linking almost every page with one, two, or three pages from the other gospels, binding them tightly together in an intricate network and demonstrating that the single set of covers around the four distinct books is more than just a matter of convenience. (pp.122-123)
Thanks to the advent of Eusebius’s cross-referencing system, along with the creation of later ones, readers of the gospels are invited to not only work “through the text,” from beginning to end, but also “across the text,” studying the similarities and differences in how the gospel writers recount incidents in the life and ministry of Jesus, thereby opening up fruitful opportunities for meaningful exegesis and highlighting “not only its [the fourfold gospel’s] diversity but also its coherence” (p.123).
Conclusion
The question of truth is raised implicitly throughout The Fourfold Gospel. It’s one thing to demonstrate the unity of the four gospel accounts in the midst of their diversity. Pondering how they disclose the truth about Christ is a deeper matter. Therefore, Watson ends the book by briefly contemplating what it means to call the gospel accounts true:
The truth of the gospel is not some inert correspondence between text and referent. Its capacity to transform must constantly be rediscovered as the gospels are read, interpreted, heard, prayed, and lived. (p.172).
It seems safe to suggest that Christian readers of the gospels should cultivate an awareness of the fact that they are called to read the text not only for information but also for formation. At this point, Watson’s perspective makes me think of Kevin Vanhoozer’s words in Pictures at a Theological Exhibition, “God uses the Bible both to present Christ and to form Christ in us” (p.80).
In the end, thinking alongside Watson about the theological significance of the fourfold gospel makes for a very enjoyable read. Watson has raised some valuable questions about what it means to read the gospels in canonical perspective, and he has admirably highlighted a too-frequently-forgotten side of Church history: the roles played by Irenaeus, Jerome, Eusebius, and others in establishing the fourfold gospel as a unified collection. It’s an interesting little book.
*Disclosure: I received this book free from Baker Academic Publishing for review purposes. The opinions I have expressed are my own, and I was not required to write a positive review.
**More theology book reviews can be found at Tabletalktheology.com
November 28, 2018
Francis Watson has written a readable introduction to the significance of the fourfold Gospel by engaging the earliest Christian writers on the topic. In other words, his conversation partners are Irenaeus and Eusebius not modern scholarship.
For the most part, the book illumines our understanding of how four Gospel books came to be viewed as an edition, provides ample historical insight, and points to the theological significance of the for Gospel books.
Watson will likely seem too conservative for some Gospel scholars, while he will seem not conservative enough for traditional Christian faith. Know that Watson takes a critical approach to the Gospels that relies critically upon early Christian readers without accepting everything they believe.
I'd recommend it as a short introduction to the fourfold Gospel historically and perhaps theologically.
For the most part, the book illumines our understanding of how four Gospel books came to be viewed as an edition, provides ample historical insight, and points to the theological significance of the for Gospel books.
Watson will likely seem too conservative for some Gospel scholars, while he will seem not conservative enough for traditional Christian faith. Know that Watson takes a critical approach to the Gospels that relies critically upon early Christian readers without accepting everything they believe.
I'd recommend it as a short introduction to the fourfold Gospel historically and perhaps theologically.
December 18, 2025
More accurately, 3.5 stars. It’s solid, especially as an introductory text, and its premise is interesting and important. But it doesn’t really blow my socks off. Personally, I find Brevard Childs more illuminating on the issue of the fourfold gospel.
December 9, 2023
At its best, this book reminded me of Dr Spellman's Synoptics class, which I did not appreciate enough when I took it, though it has aged like a fine wine in my memory. This book is a great meditation on the significance of having four so-called Gospels. We may not ask that question, but having four parallel accounts is not something to be taken for granted. Are they competitors, replacements, corrections, complementary accounts? Watson is helpful in taking that question seriously.
This book has a lot of insights, but is also a little more comfortable with critical biblical studies than I am. Some of his comments had me scratching my head. I'd recommend it overall.
This book has a lot of insights, but is also a little more comfortable with critical biblical studies than I am. Some of his comments had me scratching my head. I'd recommend it overall.
April 30, 2020
Watson offers a fascinating theological reading guided by Eusebius' synopsis of the Gospels and the patristic connection of the Gospels to the four-headed cherubim of Ezekiel. He writes lucidly and there are gems of insight found throughout. Though it wouldn't be the best first theological reading of the Gospels for one to read given his unique approach, for the more seasoned reader, the benefits will prove worth the read.
January 29, 2024
Five stars for the fourfold Gospel stuff. Two for the critical scholarship stuff. Overall, a solid book. The theological reading and thoughtfulness of how to appreciate each witness to Jesus was excellent but tangents probing into theoretical history or disagreements between the Gospels must be balanced/supplemented/corrected a fair amount of the time
February 18, 2024
This book, written by a New Testament scholar, looks at the four Gospels and how they carry forth the same "Gospel" message. He also looks somewhat at the histories of the different texts. The book is fairly short, but was so packed with information (much of it unfamiliar to me) that I would recommend reading it more than once. Still, an excellent introduction to a fascinating topic.
September 15, 2017
Good book, lots of good information on the openings of the 4 Gospels and the historical interpretation of the fourfold Gospel book, but the book at times seems scattered and unclear. Sometimes the author leaves you in the relative-dark about what his opinion is concerning controversial topics.
September 11, 2017
Overall I agreed with the foundational arguments in this book, however I found it very hard to follow some of the line of reasoning and structure in the book.
April 30, 2018
Very good intro to a canonical-theological reading of the gospels. His historical-critical sensibilities still come through, but mores in service of his project, and not at odds with it.
June 28, 2016
The Fourfold Gospel: A Theological Reading of the New Testament Portraits of Jesus by Francis Watson is a similarly exciting, and yet abbreviated exploration of Watson’s previous tome, Gospel Writing: A Canonical Perspective (Eerdmans, 2013). According to Watson, “The present attempt at a theological reading focuses throughout on the texts within that boundary [previously established in Gospel Writing] and on the theological questions they put to their interpreter, both individually and in their relation to one another” (p. viii). Much of this groundwork is established and revisited in the Prolegomena section that opens the book. It is here that the reader becomes thoroughly equipped for the fascinating journey ahead.
The Fourfold Gospel is divided into two major sections. The initial section seeks to establish each of the four Gospel accounts within the portrait of Jesus offered by the author. These turn out to be perspectives that are not only different in nature, but also complementary. Watson’s care and attentiveness to the overall framework of each Gospel is admirable, and without losing focus of the whole, Watson is able to seamlessly equip readers with the proper lenses needed to observe the major convergences discussed in the second section. It is here that Watson applauds the formative work of Eusebius’ Canon Tables in the establishment of a fourfold Gospel book and further delineates his thesis by examining the shared narrative across all four Gospels.
Overall, I found Watson’s work to be extremely beneficial and informative for reading and understanding the canonical gospels. I appreciated the unified approach that Watson embodied as he wrestled with their similarities and differences, as well as the challenges that have been created by a “gospel harmonies” reading of the narratives. As Watson rightly notes, “gospel harmonies created far more problems than they solved. It seems that the fourfold gospel is not intended to provide a singular “life of Jesus” in which each incident and saying is assigned to its original historical context. Its relation to reality is more complex—and more interesting—than that” (p. 88). This observation alone helps reconcile more internal problems than most other attempts traditionally seen combined, and this is only one of many nuggets to be unearthed in this study.
The Fourfold Gospel: A Theological Reading of the New Testament Portraits of Jesus by Francis Watson is a significant contribution to the ongoing exploration of contemporary Gospel Studies. It is a welcome companion, and, in many ways an extended appendix to Watson’s previous book Gospel Writing: A Canonical Perspective. Watson has invited the reader into a world that had been plagued by the displeasure of recurring academic dust and has effectively breathed within it a newfound sense of vibrancy and life. Watson’s undeniable expertise and his ability to communicate to a broad readership had already position this book for success, even prior to its publication. However, what was previously expected now looks petty compared to what Watson actually delivered. The Fourfold Gospel is a book that you will want to read, and do so more than once. It comes highly recommended!!
I received a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.
The Fourfold Gospel is divided into two major sections. The initial section seeks to establish each of the four Gospel accounts within the portrait of Jesus offered by the author. These turn out to be perspectives that are not only different in nature, but also complementary. Watson’s care and attentiveness to the overall framework of each Gospel is admirable, and without losing focus of the whole, Watson is able to seamlessly equip readers with the proper lenses needed to observe the major convergences discussed in the second section. It is here that Watson applauds the formative work of Eusebius’ Canon Tables in the establishment of a fourfold Gospel book and further delineates his thesis by examining the shared narrative across all four Gospels.
Overall, I found Watson’s work to be extremely beneficial and informative for reading and understanding the canonical gospels. I appreciated the unified approach that Watson embodied as he wrestled with their similarities and differences, as well as the challenges that have been created by a “gospel harmonies” reading of the narratives. As Watson rightly notes, “gospel harmonies created far more problems than they solved. It seems that the fourfold gospel is not intended to provide a singular “life of Jesus” in which each incident and saying is assigned to its original historical context. Its relation to reality is more complex—and more interesting—than that” (p. 88). This observation alone helps reconcile more internal problems than most other attempts traditionally seen combined, and this is only one of many nuggets to be unearthed in this study.
The Fourfold Gospel: A Theological Reading of the New Testament Portraits of Jesus by Francis Watson is a significant contribution to the ongoing exploration of contemporary Gospel Studies. It is a welcome companion, and, in many ways an extended appendix to Watson’s previous book Gospel Writing: A Canonical Perspective. Watson has invited the reader into a world that had been plagued by the displeasure of recurring academic dust and has effectively breathed within it a newfound sense of vibrancy and life. Watson’s undeniable expertise and his ability to communicate to a broad readership had already position this book for success, even prior to its publication. However, what was previously expected now looks petty compared to what Watson actually delivered. The Fourfold Gospel is a book that you will want to read, and do so more than once. It comes highly recommended!!
I received a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.
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