The first week of Alpha was as gripping as I expected it to be, the discussion was titled 'Who was Jesus' basically discussing his background and where he came from and then we were invited to ask questions on anything about the discussion or otherwise.

One visitor to the course questioned the names of the Gospels and how could they have such 'English names' if they originated in Judeah

So here goes

MATTHEW

English form or Matthaios which was Greek form of the Hebrew name Mattityahu meaning 'gift of Yahweh' (Jewish) meaning Jehovah- and was also known as Levi. The name Matthew has been used since the middle ages.

MARK

English and Russian form of Marcus originating from 1st century BC Roman (Marcus Antonius) - Marks account was probably written for Romans

LUKE

From the Greek origin Loukas meaing Lucania - from Italy. Luke was a Greek travelled Dr and the only non-jewish testament writer.

JOHN

Latin form of Greek - Joannes derived from Hebrew name Yochanen meaning 'Yahweh' or Jehovah. Yahweh is gracious

12 Apostles were re-named by Roman translators when edited and re-copied.

So that is my extensive research- it doesn't look much, but I put a lot of time into the research and I half expected to come up with those kind of answers because generally when you hear those names, they are more often than not referred to as biblical names.......what do you think?