Why are there only 4 gospels in the Bible?
Matthew 1:1 - 25
KJV - 1 The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. 2 Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren.
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I would say that it would be a combination of the following: -- the degree of use of each gospel by the early church (dating from a time when there would still have been eyewitnesses available to verify them); -- the guidance of the Holy Spirit with regard to the various councils and ecclesiastical bodies that determined the inspired canon of Scripture over the years; -- the authority and knowledge of the purported writer of each gospel; -- the gospel's consistency with the remainder of the writings that the church accepted as inspired; -- the comprehensvieness of the groups to which each gospel was primarily directed (Matthew to Jews; Mark to Romans; Luke to Greeks; and John to a general audience); and -- the desire to achieve a balance between comprehensiveness of the gospel accounts and the number of gospels. (In passing, I also believe that this identical question has been previously asked and addressed on ebible.com.)
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