I love A.T. Robertson’s ‘Harmony of the Gospels For Students of the Life of Christ’. For anyone who doesn’t know what a harmony of the Gospels is, it contains within it all of the Gospel narratives, untouched, placing them in order according to the chronological sequence of Luke, who uniquely claims to arrange his material in chronological sequence for his readers, and according to chronological sequence derived from information in the other Gospels. So the Gospel narratives are represented in order, where sometimes three or even four columns appear side by side when all of the Gospel narratives touch on the same event. This makes it very easy to compare the synoptic accounts and to see differences in accounts at a glance, as well as to fit everything into it’s proper sequence of occurrence. Where only one Gospel writer records an event, that section follows in its proper chronological sequence.
I can’t recommend highly enough reading the Gospels like this in parallel and in chronological sequence. In itself, it does a lot for shedding light on the life and work of Christ.
Apart from this, A.T. Robertson’s Harmony also contains very helpful notes and paragraph headings that help shed further light on the life of Christ. He notes, for example, when six successive paragraphs all occur on the same day, a fact that had escaped my attention in years of reading and re-reading the Gospel narratives. Robertson notes that this, the ‘Busy Day’ is just one of many such in the Savior’s earthly ministry. This day encompasses all of the events from the casting out of a mute demon, to the healing of the demoniac in Gerasa and the Lord’s return to the other side of the Sea.
Arnold Fruchtenbaum points out that the Jews themselves cast out demons at the time using the method of asking the demon their name and then commanding them to leave. Casting out a dumb demon with whom no vocal communication could be established, was specifically listed among the Jews as a miracle that the Messiah would perform. Hence the question among the people after Jesus cast out a dumb demon, ‘Is this the son of David?’ Mark notes that a delegation of scribes from Jerusalem, when presented with this miracle that should have caused them to declare Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, gave the explanation, ‘By the prince of the devils casteth he out the devils.’
Robertson shows that it was on the same day, after this event, that Christ’s mother and brothers came to Him, perhaps with the intention of taking Him home, as Robertson suggests. Following the harmony, we see that immediately afterward Christ delivered His first ‘great group of parables’ – the first of three such groups, Robertson notes – with the intent of making His teaching obscure to the people lest they should repent and be healed. We understand that the parabolic teaching (“and without a parable spake he not unto them: but privately to His disciples He expounded all things” Mark 4.34) was a direct result of that very determined and final Pharisaic rejection of His proof of Messiahship by casting out a dumb demon. On the same day, toward evening, Christ crosses the Lake of Galilee with His disciples and falls asleep in the boat while a storm rages around them. Jesus calms the storm. The same day, the Lord healed the two Garasene demoniacs and cast the legion of demons into a herd of swine. I found it most interesting that on the day when the Jewish rejection of the Lord seemed so final and the ministry of parabolic teaching was started among the Jewish crowds, the Lord already ministered in the Gentile region of Gerasa. Jesus instructed the healed demoniac to tell everyone in his region what God had done for him. This we see that he did and had a successful ministry, for the next time Jesus set foot in the area, in Mark 6.53-56, the people ‘knew Him’ and congregated to Him from all the surrounding villages and countryside, bringing Him their sick to heal. So on the day of the Messianic miracle and the Jewish rejection, a ministry was begun among the Gentiles. I would not have noticed this but for reading this harmony.
Some reading of events in their chronological sequence can help to dispel myths, superstition and misunderstanding. As you read of the anointing of Christ’s feet in Simon’s house, in it’s proper context as part of Christ’s tour in Galilee, the reader can easily distinguish this event from the anointing at Bethany by Mary, the sister of Lazarus, which happened near Jerusalem over a year later, Robertson points out. Robertson also dispels the myth that this sinful woman at Simon’s house is the same as Mary Magdalene, pointing out that Luke introduces Mary Magdalene as a new figure in the history just after this event. I found comments like these very helpful.
Many paragraph headings are useful to the reader. As an example, the section of Matt 5.21-48 is titled, “Christ’s Ethical Teaching Superior to that of the Scribes (both the Old Testament and the Oral Law) in Six Items or ILlustrations (Murder, Adultery, Divorce, Oaths, Retaliation, Love of Enemies.)”
Robertson’s ‘Notes on Special Points’ are also very illuminating. He lists, for example, the names of the apostles as listed in Mark, Matthew, Luke and Acts, pointing out that there are three obvious groups of four, headed by Simon Peter, Phillip and James the Son of Alpheus respectively. Quoting Robertson, “The great variety in the arrangement of the other names makes this uniformity significant. It seems clear that there are three recognized groups among the apostles (Bengel, Broadus, Clark).”
A.T. Robertson’s harmony is based on the Broadus Harmony of the Gospels. I can’t agree more with Robertson’s own statement, “…all who read the Gospels intelligently must have a modern harmony of the Gospels. One who has never read a harmony will be amazed at the flood of light that flashes from the parallel and progressive records of the life of Jesus Christ.” Robertson was Chair of New Testament Interpretation in the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.
