Q 01/05

Matthew's Gospel never counts the Magi, so the traditional three comes from the number of what?

A) Stars

B) Gifts

C) Kingdoms

D) Prophecies

Answer · why

B) Gifts

Gifts set the number: gold, frankincense and myrrh made three, so tradition settled on three visitors. In Syriac Christianity the Magi often number tw...

Q 02/05

The word 'gospel' comes from the Old English 'godspel', a translation of a term meaning what?

A) Good news

B) Holy writing

C) True witness

D) Sacred law

Answer · why

A) Good news

Good news is the literal sense, from 'god' (good) and 'spel' (story, message). The term first meant the Christian message itself and only later the bo...

Q 03/05

Apart from the resurrection, which miracle of Jesus is the only one recorded in all four Gospels?

A) Walking on the water

B) Healing the blind Bartimaeus

C) Feeding the five thousand

D) Turning water into wine

Answer · why

C) Feeding the five thousand

Feeding the five thousand with five loaves and two fish is told by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John alike. Only John says the food was supplied by a boy i...

Q 04/05

Which teaching form, used constantly by Jesus in Matthew, Mark and Luke, is all but absent from John?

A) Fables

B) Proverbs

C) Riddles

D) Parables

Answer · why

D) Parables

Parables make up about a third of Jesus's recorded teaching, yet most scholars find none in John. That Gospel gives him long speeches about himself in...

Q 05/05

Venice's winged emblem is the traditional symbol of the Gospel writer Mark, shown as which animal?

A) Eagle

B) Lion

C) Ox

D) Horse

Answer · why

B) Lion

Lion, usually winged, is Mark's emblem, and Venice took it up after carrying off the saint's remains from Alexandria in 828. Matthew is shown as a man...