Task: Sentiment Analysis
Input (English): Excellent answer to the question of the Gospels' genre . I have heard claims that the Gospels are "metaphor" or that they were never meant to be taken as biographical (and therefore don't have much or any historical data).  This book ably debunks such claims.    The intent of this book is not to prove the historicity of Gospels, but to prove their genre.  By establishing their genre, then we can better understand the intent of the authors.    The well reasoned conclusion in Burridge's book is: the Gospels fit the ancient genre of biography.    In doing so he discusses a lot about genre and analysis (this section was a bit tedious for me, but it was thorough).  In all of the discussion and examples we learn how the ancient biographies are much different from modern ones.  This is a key point, because I think much of the debates and criticisms of the gospels are done from the perspective of a modern biographical viewpoint.  The ancients wrote biographies differently than those that are written today.  But this does not make them more or less true.  It is a matter of emphasis.  Today we want to know the details about dates, eye color, and a year by year accounting of events.  The ancients were more selective in their biographies, and often focused on character not a chronological "play by play" of a person's life.  The ancient biographers did not just write to catalogue facts about a person, they often wrote to demonstrate why or why not we should emulate their subject.  Moderns too have such motives, and even biases, but they are often less up front about them.  In many ways the ancients are superior in this regard, because it makes it easier to distinguish between data and commentary.    In the end, Burridge gives several examples of biography from the ancient world, and demonstrates that the Gospels very clearly match their pattern.  Though there is variety between each of the biographies and the Gospels, they are clearly demonstrated to be part of the same family of literature.  This then establishes how the Gospel writers understood their own works to be - biographies of Jesus
Output (English): POS