Canonical Gospels
<p>A <b>gospel</b> is an account describing the life, death, and resurrection of <a title="Jesus" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus">Jesus</a> of <a title="Nazareth" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazareth">Nazareth</a>. The most widely known examples are the four <a title="Biblical canon" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_canon">canonical</a> gospels of <a title="Gospel of Matthew" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Matthew">Matthew</a>, <a title="Gospel of Mark" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Mark">Mark</a>, <a title="Gospel of Luke" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Luke">Luke</a>, and <a title="Gospel of John" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_John">John</a>, but the term is also used to refer to <a title="Apocryphal gospels" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocryphal_gospels">apocryphal gospels</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#Non-canonical_gospels">non-canonical gospels</a>, <a title="Jewish-Christian gospels" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish-Christian_gospels">Jewish-Christian gospels</a>, and <a title="Gnostic gospels" class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnostic_gospels">gnostic gospels</a>.
<a title="Christianity" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity">Christianity</a> traditionally places a high value on the four canonical gospels, which it considers to be a revelation from <a title="God in Christianity" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Christianity">God</a> and central to its belief system.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-1"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-1">[1]</a></sup> Christians teach that the four canonical gospels are an accurate and authoritative representation of the life of Jesus,<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-2"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-2">[2]</a></sup> but many scholars believe that not everything contained in the gospels is historically reliable.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-TheMyth_3-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-TheMyth-3">[3]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-CraigEvans_4-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-CraigEvans-4">[4]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Charles_5-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-Charles-5">[5]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-TheHistorical_6-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-TheHistorical-6">[6]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Fireof_7-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-Fireof-7">[7]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-religion-online_8-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-religion-online-8">[8]</a></sup><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-church_9-0"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_gospels#cite_note-church-9">[9]</a></sup> For example, according to <a title="Linda Woodhead" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Woodhead">Linda Woodhead</a>, "the gospels’ birth and resurrection narratives can be explained as attempts to fit Jesus’ life into the logic of Jewish expectation</p>