Which gospel came first?

[tortoise1956]

After I posted in an earlier thread concerning the gospel of Luke, I became interested in finding out more about the gospels. I started surfing the internet, using various search parameters.

The first thing I learned during this is that there are approximately as many theories regarding the authorship of the gospels as there are biblical scholars... I did, however, come away from my efforts with much more information than when I started. One area was having to do with the dates of each gospel. As far as I can see, there is a substantial base of scholars who subscribe to the Markian Priority school of thought, while Matthew and Luke are next in line. However, Matthew seems to be the second choice for earliest book. I also read some articles that stated that there is some evidence pointing towards Luke being written by the man of that name (a companion of Paul), although this is not a generally accepted theory.

Which gospel do you think was the first? Please explain your reasoning for my education, as I have become fascinated with the subject and would love to learn from those with more knowledge.

[pennylane100]

1. Matthew, Mark ,Luke and John,

Bless the bed that I lay on.

Matthew appears to come first.

Sorry to sound so trivial, but that is all I remember from my catholic school upbringing.

[Rowdyboy]

2. What's left out of the bible is often as interesting as what was allowed in ....

The Gospel of Thomas probably dates to 60-100AD and offers some decidedly non-traditional perspectives.

[OHdem10]

4. What has been left out would send people especially some

Republicans jumping out of windows. Some very explicit
directions on dealing with the poor and less fortunate.

If one is hungry(and cannot afford food) they can go
into a neighbors and eat something. Take only what
you can eat. This gives the flavor I hope.

I saw a program on the Hx Channel I believe.

[tortoise1956]

7. ah - the gnostic gospels!

After reading them, it's easy to see why they weren't included in the official bible, since they said over and over that there was no need for a church hierarchy to attain salvation. Also, their view of God was definitely different than that espoused by early church leaders.
I personally believe that the gnostic writings probably reflected the teachings of Jesus more faithfully than those that became the canons of the Catholic church. Too bad - a whole lot of lives might have been saved if the church had been less regimented, and not as militant about spreading their version as the ONLY true one...

[msongs]

3. sunset = death, sunrise = resurrection. that's the first gospel nt

[checks-n-balances]

5. Always wondered if there would be a chance to discuss this kind of thing

thing on DU, since I attended theological school 35 years ago! Wish I had more time, but I think Wikipedia does a fairly good job hitting the highlights with more links at the bottom if you're interested:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel#Origin_of_the_canonical_gospels

What I learned was that the writers of Matthew and Luke drew from Mark, which was an earlier written source, because it was more of a bare-bones narrative. Those three are very similar, and the Gospel of John is very different - more abstract and other-worldly, and sometimes more easily misunderstood by preachers who aren't well-educated, or more willing or able to study it more carefully.

I love the Gospel of Luke, because the Parable of the Good Samaritan, The Rich Man and Lazarus, and other parables of Jesus are found there; also, there is The Sermon on The Plain, which is similar to the Sermon on the Mount, but more blunt and earthbound. Example: Matthew says, "Blessed are the poor in spirit" vs. Luke's "Blessed are the poor." Luke's writer appeared to have interest in showing that Jesus helped and talked to women, children, and vulnerable/downtrodden people in time when they were generally treated like crap or at least regarded almost as invisible. You won't hear fundamentalist preachers using Luke for a whole lot of their sermons. Also, Luke and Acts are considered to be one continuous book, but they were divided into two when all the writings of the Christian scriptures were decided upon and put together.

You might also like these sites:
http://www.religion-online.org/showchapter.asp?title=1116&C=1230 (btw, Religion Online is a good site)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/story/luke.html

A favorite paraphrased version of some biblical books are also very entertaining and imaginative. The Cotton Patch versions were written by a Georgia farmer with a PhD in Greek who translated into everyday Southern English and set the gospels in the 20th century south, in which he dealt with racism and poverty. A great musical play called "Cotton Patch Gospel" was based on these writings. Dr. Clarence Jordan not only wrote these books, but he and his wife lived on a cooperative interracial farm in S. Georgia from the 1940's to the 1960's under fire, and he also came up with the whole idea of the Fund for Humanity (building affordable housing), which inspired Millard Fuller to develop it into Habitat for Humanity. He was one of my heroes:
http://www.amazon.com/Cotton-Patch-Version-Luke-Acts/dp/0832911739/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310621773&sr=1-1

I hope I didn't get too much off on the one gospel of Luke. Mark is my other favorite one because I believe it came first and it's so important, and my child is named for that book/person!

[dimbear]

6. It's a practical certainty that of the canonicals, Mark is first. But:

it's likely that the first ever gospel is one no one has heard tell of since the first century. There were many, many gospels circulating about, including the very oldest one we have the smallest scrap of, which is otherwise completely unknown. Check the Egerton papyri.

And like it says upthread, GThom may be very old, altho that's not generally accepted. Other strong comers: Gospel of the Ebionites, Gospel of the Nazoreans, the supposed Aramaic original behind Matthew, and so on, all lost. We don't even know if that's three things or one, but they're mentioned in antiquity.

Then there are the completely hypothetical ones: Gospel of Signs, Q, and so on. If there really was a Gospel of Signs, it might well have been the first.

[Peacetrain]

8. Mark.. it is the shortest and most brutal of the gospels..

The closest to the time of the death of Jesus..

[okasha]

9. Dated to between 65 and 70 CE

It's believed to be based on several earlier written sources (not including "Q"). Both it and its sources would fall within the lifetime of at least younger persons who knew Jesus, and probably some of his own generation as well.

[Peacetrain]

11. Yep..the closest to the life of Jesus.

John with it flowery beauty and mystical person is a whole different ball of wax.. how many years later than Mark.. a 100 years after the death of Jesus? maybe 120..

[okasha]

13. Probably no later than 100, at least in one form,

given that there's a papyrus fragment with text from John from about that date.

There may, however, be some very early eyewitness material incorporated into that gospel, specifically the narrative concerning the beloved disciple, who clearly is not John Zebedee. (Nor "John the Elder," either, the author of the epistles of John and Revelations.) Hugh Schonfeld makes a good case that this disciple was a Jewish priest who was one of Jesus' adherents.

[laconicsax]

12. There are two tenuous assumptions there:

1) That Jesus lived during the early 1st century AD
2) That Jesus was a real historical figure at all.

[tortoise1956]

21. I don't think they are tenuous

I do believe that there was an actual historical figure, and that he was a very charismatic person. My reasoning is thus:

Consider the speed of information flow in that period. It could literally take months or years for news to reach even the major Mediterranean sea ports. When it did, the odds were very high that specific individuals were only mentioned if they had some degree of fame, such as kings and emperors. An itinerant preacher from a backwater of the Roman sphere of influence would not attract much attention to himself especially given the short time frame that he was actually in the public eye. That helps to explain why none of the Roman historians of the day made mention of him.

However, within 80 years of the time of his supposed death, there was a movement across the entire eastern Mediterranean seaboard, based on his teachings. Those same teachings were used to found a religion that grew at an exponential rate. SOMEBODY, whoever, influenced the early church leaders so powerfully that they devoted their lives, sometimes at great personal risk, to passing on that information. I can't think of a similar case in history, where this was accomplished without the use of force. I don't count the inquisition as force, since I'm mainly talking about the first 3 hundred years C.E. I also don't count Islam, as much of the early proselytizing involved war and conquest. (Ironically, the religion of peace ended up destroying countless lives over time)

So yeah, I do think there is a real person behind the stories. Do I believe all the stories? No. I'm sure there many embellishments as time went by, because that is human nature. But somewhere behind the legend is a kernel of truth.

[laconicsax]

22. They most certainly are tenuous.

To start, the Biblical accounts of Jesus are inconsistent, contradictory, contain factual errors, and in some cases seem to be describing an allegorical character. While it's true that there were Christians in the 1st century, it isn't clear if they regarded Jesus as a real person or even a contemporary of theirs. There's reference in the Talmud to a Jesus ben Pandera, who fits the description of Jesus of Nazereth, except he lived in the neighborhood of 100 years earlier than the Gospels have Jesus living and dying.

Considering that there are no contemporary historical sources that corroborate Jesus' personhood, the Biblical accounts are so inconsistent, contradictory, riddled with factual errors, and at least one author of the New Testament likely regarded Jesus as an allegorical character rather than a real person, the idea that Jesus of Nazareth was a real historical character who lived in the 1st century is most definitely a tenuous assumption.

Now, if you look at things from the perspective that he was never more than an allegorical figure; an imaginary character playing a literary role to the early Christians, the inconsistencies and contradictions don't matter. The fact that in the course of the Gospels being written, Jesus was promoted from man to demigod then again from demigod to god doesn't matter. The seeming ignorance of Roman and Jewish customs as well as flat-out historical errors don't matter either. Each Gospel becomes a near independent source for early Christian attitudes and the existence of additional gospels with still-different portrayals of Jesus gains important context.

[okasha]

23. Problems with your "tenuousness".

There are in fact two contradictory narratives in the Talmud about a figure referred to as Yeshu. One is placed about a century before the Jesus of the Gospels, in the reign of John Hyrcanus; one after, around the time of Rabbi Akiva. They also date considerably later than the gospels, to the 3rd-4th centuries CE. There seems to be a scholarly consensus that these narratives, if they refer to Jesus of Nazareth at all, are parodies of the gospels and are evidence of inter-sectarian rivalry between Judaism and Palestinian Christianity. (See Peter Schaffer, Jesus in the Talmud, Princeton, 2007) One appears to confuse Mary the mother of Jesus with Mary Magdalene, and identifies her, rather charmingly, as a hairdresser.

History is a modern discipline. Where we have even contemporary accounts of ancient persons, there are frequently highly contradictory narratives about their actions, their motives and their importance, e.g., Akhenaten, Hatshepsut, Nero (there's a revisionist movement underway that argues he wasn't such a bad sort, after all), Cleopatra etc.. This nebulousness extends to more recent figures, too. Just what was going on with Joan of Arc? I could make a pretty credible case, if I were so disposed, that Joan was an allegorical figure representing the Spirit of France, and that her trial record and other accounts were ex post facto inventions. Was Mary, Queen of Scots a ditz or an astute politician? A shameless adulteress or an innocent martyr? Was Anne Boleyn a "goggle-eyed whore" with a sixth finger on one hand, or a sincere religious reformer? Given that the gospels were written in widely separated geographical locations, for widely different audiences, using different sources, it's not surprising that there are differences. We still get such contradictions in accounts of far more recent events.

What "ignorance of Roman and Jewish customs" are you referring to? Mark and Matthew both go to great lengths to explain Jewish customs and scripture to a non-Jewish audience. The accounts of Jesus' encounter with the centurion are consistent with what we know from other sources of non-Jewish "god-fearers" who followed Jewish practices without full conversion. The crucifixion narratives are also consistent with what is known to be known from both archaeology and historical narrative.

[laconicsax]

24. The crucifixion is most certainly not consistent.

Tell me, how is the crucifixion consistent in any way other than it's something the Romans did? How often did the Romans take the body of the crucified down and entomb it immediately after death? How often did the Romans require people to travel to a different city be taxed?

How often did the Jews not employ a patronymic in naming male children?

The historical problems are not a simple matter of minor details. The central events in Jesus' life never happened. Herod never ordered the slaughter in Matthew, Augustus never ordered the census/global taxation in Luke, there's no record of Pilate granting a Passover pardon, there's no record of an earthquake, graves opening, or corpses walkin the streets when Matthew places it, etc. These are significant events and there's no record of them. The Romans were meticulous record-keepers. Surely these events would have been noted.

While Henry VIII may have never called Anne of Cleaves "a Flanders mare," the two were married and later divorced.

Oh, and it's one hell of a way to ridicule an opponent by basically saying "oh yeah, that Jesus guy was real, they just have the date and some details wrong." Doesn't Schaffer mention how Christians edited the Talmud in the 16th century, or am I confusing him with someone else?

The problem is that for millenia, the Bible was uncritically regarded as a historical document and now that modern research has failed to corroborate the majority of it, you seem to have been caught up in the desperate attempts of Christians to excuse the lack of historical veracity in their book of fables. The problems with the Bible would be beyond problematic were it not for the traditional views of it as divine, sacrosanct, etc. If we were to step back and look at things objectively, rather than with a traditional affinity, it would be far easier to make a fair evaluation.

[okasha]

25. Okay. In order, such as it is.

1. How often did the Romans take the body of the crucified down and entomb it immediately after death?
Never, as far as we know. But that's not what the gospels say. The gospels say that the friends and followers of Jesus removed the body from the cross and buried it in haste before sunset of the same day in accordance with Jewish custom. We do know that some victims of crucifixion were accorded burial because of the discovery of a young man's heelbone in first-century Jewish ossuary, with the nail and the olive-wood "washer" still in place.

2. How often did the Romans require people to travel to a different city be taxed?
You're right on this one.


3. How often did the Jews not employ a patronymic in naming male children?
This is more complex than it looks. On the one hand, Jesus is referred to in the gospels as both "the son of Mary" and "the workman's son," as well as "being, as was supposed, the son of Joseph." I am inclined to think that there was something unusual about his birth, something that may have brought his legitimacy into question. The stories in the Talmud assign him not one but two illegitimate fathers, one "Stada" and the better-known "Panthera." On the other hand, the three gospels which ascribe divine paternity to Jesus may simply have ignored the patronymic, since for them the proper one would have been "Yehoshua ben Yahweh."

4. The central events in Jesus' life never happened. Herod never ordered the slaughter in Matthew, Augustus never ordered the census/global taxation in Luke, there's no record of Pilate granting a Passover pardon, there's no record of an earthquake, graves opening, or corpses walkin the streets when Matthew places it, etc. These are significant events and there's no record of them. The Romans were meticulous record-keepers. Surely these events would have been noted.
I'm a bit puzzled why you term these "central events in Jesus' life." If the slaughter of the innocents had occurred, he would have been less than two years old and completely oblivious of it. Following Luke, he would have been a fetus/newborn at the time of the alleged census--again, probably not paying a whole lot of attention to anything but his next meal. The Passover pardon would have been a central event for Barabbas, not Jesus, had it occurred. And the supernatural manifestations that supposedly coincided with the crucifixion happened after his death.
Here's what I would take to be "central events" in the life of Jesus: the early loss of his father, Joseph; his meeting with John the Baptizer, his time as a disciple of John and their later joint ministry; his development of an independent ministry, with his own body of disciples; the implied break with his family; John's judicial assassination; the visits to Jerusalem, including the occupation of the Temple for a day; his time on the run and in hiding thereafter; the return to Jerusalem, which may have included assumption of the title of "Son of David," that resulted in his arrest and execution.

5. Oh, and it's one hell of a way to ridicule an opponent by basically saying "oh yeah, that Jesus guy was real, they just have the date and some details wrong." Doesn't Schaffer mention how Christians edited the Talmud in the 16th century, or am I confusing him with someone else?
Eh? Let me get this straight. You think it was 16th century Christians who interpolated the Yeshu stories? Or if you're referring to the censorship of those stories, they were removed during the middle ages by medieval Jews, who maintained that they had nothing to do with the Christians' Jesus. Let me repeat: Schaffer regards these two narratives as parodies of the canonical gospels already in circulation at the time they were included in the Talmud. It's not a matter of "getting the date and some details wrong," it's a matter of creating a pair of satires on the founder of a rival movement.

6. you seem to have been caught up in the desperate attempts of Christians to excuse the lack of historical veracity in their book of fables
Whatever. You seem to have been caught up in the desperate attempts of a number of pseudo-scholars to "prove" that a first-century religious figure never existed, using special pleadings and arguments about peripheral details (See your "central events.") Why this is so important to the people who follow Doherty or "S. Acharya" and suchlike charlatans escapes me.

[laconicsax]

28. I find it incredible that you regard the Gospels as reliable historical documents.

We know that there were many gospels circulating among the early Christians and the ones selected for inclusion were done so by committee vote based, in part, on which were most prevalent at the time. The other gospels, which were then deemed heretical and largely destroyed, vary greatly in content and history.

To regard the four texts which were preserved for being most advantageous to the perpetuation of newly agreed-upon doctrine as historical documents rather than the biased propaganda they are is incredible.

There is no extra-Biblical evidence that Jesus of Nazareth was a real person who lived in the 1st century, yet you doggedly cling to religious propaganda as a reputable historical source and dismiss challenges to their legitimacy as "special pleading and arguments about peripheral details." Sorry to break it to you, but those "peripheral details" speak to the integrity of the source.

Here's how the "research" into the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth goes:

-People uncritically assume that Jesus was a real person whose life and teachings is accurately described in the Bible.
-Later, people look for evidence to support that assumption.
-Circumstantial evidence is accepted as true while contradictory evidence is disregarded.

This is not how to conduct honest research. That you accept it as such speaks volumes. An honest review of the facts shows that the hypothesis that Jesus was a real person whose life and teachings is accurately described in the Bible is not supported. The Gospels are not reliable historical documents, and without them, there's nothing.

Do you regard the Aeneid as a reliable history of Rome, Carthage, and the survivors of Troy?

[okasha]

29. Your argument is based on an out-of-hand

dismissal of the gospels as possible historical sources. I regard them as highly mythologized accounts that probably contain a substantial measure of historical fact,some of it more or less deliberately obscured. This position is pretty much consistent with modern scholarship and research on the subject. To dismiss the large body of work that's been done by legitimate scholars as "dishonest" is simply special pleading--and ignorance. It's the same argument that's made by creationists against evolution. I don't like it; it upsets my applecart; it's not true.

The Aeneid is a foundation epic. As such, it's far more comparable to the Exodus/Conquest sections of the OT than it is to the gospels. I notice you avoid mention of the Iliad, which does have demonstrable historical referents.

[laconicsax]

30. A substantial measure of historical fact?

Wow.

My argument is hardly based on "an out-of-hand dismissal of the gospels as possible historical sources." Rather, it is based on an objective appraisal of the available evidence (or lack-thereof) corroborating their claims. They contain as much historical fact as a typical work of historical fiction. To borrow a cliche, the Civil War happened, Atlanta exists, but that does not mean that Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler were real people whose lives are accurately depicted in Gone With the Wind. Is Harry Potter to be regarded as a real historical character on the basis that London is a real city in 20th-century England? Or, perhaps are these two examples "special cases?"

I'm glad to hear that creationism upsets you. It's a promising sign.

[okasha]

31. Okay, let's take a parallel case.

Do you regard Augustus Caesar as a fictional character because he claimed to have been begotten by Apollo? How about Alexander? His mother claimed his father was Zeus, and there's some indication that Alex believed her. What about Hatshepsut's divine nativity?

What does not seem to get through to you is that almost all of ancient history is to some degree historical fiction. Ancient writers did not make the distinctions that we do and saw nothing wrong with inventing divine geneologies for their protagonists or with creating imaginary incidents and set speeches for them. The trick is to sort out what's history and what's invention. Fortunately, we have a greater array of critical tools than we once did, so that we do not need to choose between complete credulousness and facile dismissal.

[laconicsax]

32. LOL! Good one!

The amount of documentary evidence for Jesus of Nazareth isn't even close to the amount of documentary evidence for Augustus Caesar. That you regard the two figures as equivalent is hilarious.

But, since you probably will seek to contest this obvious difference, I'll spell it out for you:

For Jesus of Nazareth, we have a collection of contradictory myths and religious propaganda, some of which were possibly written by authors who didn't regard Jesus as a real person, but as an allegorical character. Even taken as literal, we know very little about his life.

For Augustus Caesar, we know his exact birthdate, where he was born, who his parents and extended family were, what their occupations were, and our knowledge of his life only increases from there. He may have claimed divine ancestry, but we know better.

But nah, I'm sure they're really equivalent and I'm just full of shit. :eyes:

[okasha]

34. You're

half right. :)

[tortoise1956]

35. Hey! Easy on Harry Potter!

"I know a friend whose brother's cousin's buddy's sister went to Hogwarts.."

Seriously, a good argument can be made that there is a kernel of truth at the core of the Jesus stories. It's just hard to sort through the embellishments and fanciful additions to get to the real beginnings. It's too bad that the Church went out of it's way to destroy so many ancient texts in a desire to control the message. They probably destroyed documentary evidence that could have been used to better demonstrate the real truth.

[laconicsax]

38. That same argument can be made of most myths.

Myths tend to have a kernel of truth to them. With the Jesus myth, that kernel of truth isnt necessarily Jesus' existence. It's entirely likely that early Christians created Jesus as a way to attach a narrative to their philosophy.

[tortoise1956]

33. I don't think you read my post before answering...

I stated that in my opinion, there was an actual person who influenced a large number of people to the point that they risked death to spread his teachings. That takes more than an allegorical figure. Pardon me, but I fail to find a persuasive argument that would explain the overwhelming acceptance of a set of beliefs without some basis in fact. However, if you read closely you will find that I didn't say that the stories in the gospels are, well, gospel.

In my post I challenged someone to produce an historical analogy to the church - namely, an enduring peaceful movement that reached across tribal and State boundaries. I had forgotten about Buddhism, which would seem to fit the bill. Of course, Buddhism does have an actual historical figure at its core. I believe that the historical figure that morphed into the Jesus of the Bible is similar in may ways to Siddhartha Gautama.

And once again I repeat my contention that it's not unusual that contemporary historians didn't write about the teacher in Judea. After all, that whole region was famous for spawning false messiahs on a regular basis. Now, if you had a teacher who DIDN'T claim to be a messiah, what would interest a contemporary historian to chronicle his life?

There is also something else to keep in mind. The gnostic papers present a path to salvation that is based on individual striving, not a hierarchy of priests and formal rituals. It's pretty obvious, to me at least, that if a teacher espoused the belief system embodied in the gnostic documents, he would be considered a threat to the established religions. Thus, there would be a tendency toward destroying not only the teacher, but any mention of him at all lest his beliefs contaminate others. That is in line with the persecution of the early Christians, since they were seen as a threat to the power of the State. It is also similar to what the early Church did when they chose what documents would be part of the official Bible, and did their best to destroy the rest.

The true irony is that the original teachings of personal salvation were perverted into a regimented organization that claimed the only way to salvation was through their intercession. It is, however, not hard to believe, given human nature...

[laconicsax]

39. The "acceptance of a set of beliefs without some basis in fact." is called "religious faith."

Look at Young Earth Creationists--they uncritically accept absolute bullshit that's so easily refuted by the most basic understanding of nature without needing an actual person behind the myth, or even the barest shred of truth.

[dimbear]

26. "I can't think of a similar case in history,"

Sign of the times. Look at the explosive growth of Mithraism in the same time period, which in the first century likely far exceeded the growth of Christianity. We tend to forget how tiny the Christian church was by say 100 CE. Just a few thousand individuals. Mithraism, invented at most just a few decades earlier, had more followers and wider geographic spread.

Mithras? Completely imaginary rethinking of an earlier legend, the Persian god Mitra. A reconfiguration of an earlier legend, restructured to please the empire. Familiar pattern?

And of course there are (many) more. Isis. Real person?

[okasha]

27. Mithraism is a special case

because it was so popular with the Roman legions and spread along with the armies. Since it was "a guy thing" it would have been useful in maintaining cohesion and morale.

The cult of Isis, on the other hand, encountered the Roman state's resistance to 'Oriental cults' that encompassed not only the Egyptian deities but Judaism, early Christianity and the worship of Cybele, among others.

[tortoise1956]

36. Ok, ok, good points...

However, the historical records for both of these cases do not show the passion (fanaticism, if you like) that the early Christians displayed in spreading their teachings. Granted, that could be due to the fact that very little documentation exists that can be dated to the beginning of either religion. In any case, I agree that they do fall in line with my statements in that post.

Once again, I still believe that the Jesus of the bible is based on a real teacher who inspired others with his words and actions. I don't expect others to agree, and I will not attempt to impose my beliefs on others.

[dimbear]

40. I believe there was a real Jesus also. The intellectual position

that there was not is, however, completely defensible. It is a question of negligible evidence, and the chain of custody of that small evidence. This is an area where there have been a lot of extravagant claims, but there is some scholarly assertion for 'no real Jesus.'

The minimal bits of written evidence from the Mithraists consists mainly of grave inscriptions. Many are touching. Those from the early years are humble, as might be expected, and then in the later years more fitting the upper classes as Mithraism receded and had to hide itself.

There's even a bit of humor. One chap in Spain dedicated an altar specifically from the money he won in a dice game.

There are a couple of rosters of memberships, remembrances of members who have passed on, and so on. They read rather like what you might see on the wall plaques in a rural church in the US.

It is very regrettable indeed that the written literature of the Mithraists was destroyed. It would have been a fascinating read. Certainly in light of the way it came to be destroyed, its lack shouldn't prejudice any fair person against the sincerity and passion of the Mithraists.

[struggle4progress]

10. There seem to be good textual arguments for a lost protogospel, now called Q, which can be

partially reconstructed by comparing the existing canonical texts

I would guess the arguments, for the priority of Mark among existing canonical texts, are good. Mark is surprisingly unelaborated: it begins with John's baptism of Jesus, and some manuscripts end with women fleeing in terror from the corpseless tomb

[Leontius]

14. I'm not completely sold on the Q text argument

it seems to be an answer in search of a question. It is just as probable that the writers of all three texts were in contact with people who lived during the time of Jesus' life and observed what took place and recorded their recollections of events. The similarities as well as the differences in the three texts are just as likely to happen because of the use of some of the same sources for all three.

[okasha]

15. Whether it's called Q or something else,

there's clearly a non-Markan written source that was used by both Matthew and Luke. The similarities are too close to assume a purely oral transmission of the common matter. Otherwise, Matthew and Luke each has a unique source, "M" and "L" respectively, that may well have been exactly what you describe.

[Leontius]

16. Oral traditions are remarkably stable even thru hundreds of years

of transmission and we are only talking about 30 to 50 years in this instance so I don't think that it is that remarkable there is a close parallel in the two Gospels, Luke and Matthew.

[struggle4progress]

17. The issue is not mere "similarities" but the fact that Luke and Matthew agree word-for-word

in many places, and very nearly word-for-word in others

If one merely copied from the other, one might expect much more of one to appear in the other: in fact, they seem to represent different traditions with some word-for-word overlaps

As the gospels aren't great poetry, something other than a common core of carefully-memorized oral tradition is plausibly at stake

[okasha]

18. Exactly.

Oral transmission seems to work word-for-word only when what's being transmitted is a composition, eg., the Zuni creation chants, or, to a lesser degree of accuracy, something like the Iliad. Clearly there was a source from which Matthew and Luke simply copied certain passages.

[Leontius]

19. Sorry just not buying it . I know I'm not an expert in literature and

language but it still seems to be an answer that is searching for a question. Mark is generally given to be the written recollection of Peter an eyewitness to the events, a Disciple of Jesus, as told to Mark a follower of Peter. Matthew is generally given to be the written recollection of Matthew, an eyewitness to the events, a Disciple of Jesus. Why is it necessary for Matthew to have used Mark as a source other than to compare his recollection with that of a fellow disciple Peter, he was there as it happened too. It just does not make sense that his work is dependent on Mark. Luke is somewhat different in that it is based solely on what he was told by whatever sources he used oral or written and as the dates of authorship are in the timeframe of 60 to 80 AD he may well have had personal contact with Matthew, Peter, Mark and even John while compiling his Gospel and Acts. I will just end with this the supposed Q is also a possible early writing of Matthew according to a few scholars although this seems to be doubtful according to many, you guys seem more informed and have done more study on this I have so I will admit your view may be right but I remain unconvinced for now that it is.

[okasha]

20. It is extremely unlikely that any of the gospels was written

by the person whose name appears on them. They were in circulation for some time--decades in some cases--before authorship was ascribed to them. In this context, "Matthew" is shorthand for "the author of the gospel of Matthew," not a reference to the actual apostle, "Mark," "Luke" and "John" likewise.

That said, I think it may be quite possible that Q was the document early references describe as "a gospel of Matthew in Aramaic." It is also at least possible that this was written by, or derived from the recollections of, the apostle Matthew. As a tax farmer, he would more likely have been literate than say, John Zebedee the fisherman, and contemporaneity, and/or geographical separation, could explain why Mark doesn't share this source with Matthew and Luke.

[Deep13]

37. Mark, Matt and Luke, then John is last.

You can tell by the increasing degree of embellishment. Matt and Luke are preceded by another document called simply "Q" and is lost to history. We know this because parts of both are copied from the same source. John is the most acid-trippy and frankly least Jewish of the four. Acts should be called "Luke, Part II."

[snooper2]

41. 2001, A Space Odyssey

[struggle4progress]

42. Mark 1-8 (Joel Marcus | Anchor Bible Series, Doubleday | 2000), chapter "Gospel Relationships,"

section "The Synoptic Problem," examines several hypotheses and explains Marcus' own thinking on Markan priority

The principal hypotheses, considered there, are:

(1) that Matthew and Luke both drew from Mark and Q;
(2) that Luke drew from Matthew, and Mark from both Luke and Matthew;
(3) that Mark was written, later augmented, and later produced in its current canonical form, Luke drawing from the original Mark, Matthew drawing from the augmented Mark, with the current canonical text and another known text drawn from an intermediate (now lost) text derived from the augmented Mark

Marcus gives a number of reasons for accepting Markan priority, including:

"... It is easier to explain .. Matthew/Luke's expansion of Mark than .. to explain .. Mark's abbreviation of Matthew/Luke ... It is easier to explain Matthew/Luke's rearrangement of Mark than to explain Mark's abbreviation of Matthew/Luke ... One can understand why Matthew and Luke would have left out the few Markan passages they both omitted ..."

In favor of the theory, that Matthew and Luke both drew from Mark and Q, there are also certain known "doublets," where Matthew and/or Luke contain two versions of a saying, apparently drawn from different sources. At least four doublets occur in both Matthew and Luke, with one of the sayings in each case matching Mark and the other attributed to the hypothetical Q. For at least five doublets in both Matthew, one of the sayings matches Mark and the other matches Luke so is attributed to the hypothetical Q

I am naturally abbreviating Marcus' discussion

[On the Road]

43. It Depends Partly on Whether You're Asking About the Current Forms

We don't know how much was added or subtracted.

Stories like the woman taken in adultery were clearly not part of the original texts. Same with much of the post-resurrection material in the synoptics. The nativity stories may have been added in the 2nd century in an attempt to counter the gnostic idea that Jesus was incorporeal. The Gospel of Matthew is thought by some to be a modified form of the Gospel of the Hebrews.

I have always felt that Mark was first just because it seems more primitive and less doctrinal. But it might be Matthew.