Does everyone here completely subscribe to Markan priority and the 2 source hypothesis?

As I look at the evidence for myself, I'm beginning to lean toward Matthean priority.

I believe the majority of early church fathers believe Matthew wrote the first gospel in Hebrew (Jerome even said that the Hebrew copy still existed in the Cesarean library during his time). They mostly seem to believe that Mark wrote second relying on Peter's teachings in Rome and that he didn't write the events of Jesus life down in order. They also seem to think that Luke was written last, though I don't think many scholars would disagree with this anyway.

I realize the early church fathers may not be right, but they were certainly closer to the events.

Also, I need to check my sources again to make absolutely sure, but we don't seem to have as many extant manuscripts of Mark as we do of Matthew. I think the earliest manuscripts of Matthew date before the earliest we have of Mark.

There are also agreements of Matthew and Luke against Mark which appear to contradict the 2 source hypothesis.

Anyway, these are just my "preliminary" findings.

What do you think? Was Mark first and everybody expanded upon his work? Or was Matthew truly first and Mark borrowed what he wanted for his short gospel?

Ish

[This message has been edited by Ish (edited March 01, 2001).]

Hmm... this is interesting Ish. My discussion on why I believe in Marcan priory is outlined in the Redating the Books of the New Testament thread, but I am definitely interested in hearing your ideas on this topic.

At least up to Augustine in the 5th Century we have Matthean priority as being accepted by the Early Fathers. But the problem is we don't have any physical evidence of an Aramaic Gospel, and without one we don't really know what it would have looked like.

Some have postulated that it contained the "Q" sayings. Others that it is a near complete version of the Greek GMatt. My own feelings are that there may well have been an early Aramaic Gospel, but that it would be more accurate (at least from content) to call it Ur-Mark rather than Matthew. In it we would find some miracles (almost certainly the ones found in Mark, but also possibly some of those in "M" and/or "L"), some of the sayings (including parables, and the probably some form of the Sermon on the Mount), and an early Passion Narrative.

The problem, of course, is all of this remains highly speculative since we don't have any copies of such an ur-Gospel in existence today. Rebuilding it becomes at least as tricky as coming up with a complete "Q" sayings Gospel, and will be hotly contested by someone somewhere on every point.

The fact that genuine Semitic idioms and sayings can be found within the Gospels (the Synoptics and John) gives at least some credence to the idea of an early Aramaic tradition, and that it was written down. That it might have been abandoned after the Christian Church was almost completely Hellenized in the 2nd and 3rd Centuries is also very possible. But the mere testimony of the Fathers without ANY MSS evidence makes this a very hard case to prove. In my opinion this is extremely unfortunate, since such a document would answer a lot of the questions that otherwise might never be known with any certainty.

We have no copies of Mark that were not written on a codex (unless you want to count the speculative 7Q5 of the DSS). But I wouldn't put a lot of stock in this particular argument in any event, since the total amount of extant copies of ANYTHING from the NT is pretty limited.

Could you elaborate on this argument please.

I still think the argument for Marcan priority is pretty overwhelming, but that the case for an earlier Aramaic text (or at least oral tradition that was well preserved in the 1st Century) is very strong. The idea that Mark was dependent on Matthew, however, does not look as good, although I would like to see the evidence you do have.

Thanks, and I look forward to the discussion.

Nomad

P.S. Would you be willing to email me directly? I have a couple of questions I would like to ask offline. If not, no worries, but if that is cool with you, you can find my email address in my profile. Be well.

[QUOTE]Also, I need to check my sources again to make absolutely sure, but we don't seem to have as many extant manuscripts of Mark as we do of Matthew. I think the earliest manuscripts of Matthew date before the earliest we have of Mark.

I am not sure what you you are getting at in the above paragraph. The earliest undisputed manuscript is generally regarded to be p75 (John Rylands fragment) which is a fragment of John's Gospel. But I am not aware of anyone these days who would argue that John is the earliest gospel. Perhaps your logic is, "the ealier a gospel is written, the more time there is for it to be copied => there would be more copies of it". I wouldn't find this very convincing, because the history of the transmission of the new testament is rather more complicated than that.

[Quote]There are also agreements of Matthew and Luke against Mark which appear to contradict the 2 source hypothesis.

This is certainly the strongest argument that is used by proponents of Markan priority. But the small number of such agreements are addressed by supporters of the 2DH. Do you have anything to add to this debate?

Nick

[QUOTE]The earliest undisputed manuscript is generally regarded to be p75 (John Rylands fragment) which is a fragment of John's Gospel.

Oops! I'm getting my papyrii mixed up. That should be p52. My apologies.

Nick

We pesherist know that John was written first.

Do you mean John in its present form, or some sort of proto-John which was later redacted once or twice?

John was written first and edited last.

I agree with you here. I cannot understand why so much emphasis is placed on working it out from the text, rather than believing those who are in a position to give a correct answer.
The Church fathers unanamiously assert that Matthew was the first Gospel. Why would they lie? Why wouldn't they know the truth? Unless some significant doubt can be placed on their ability to ascertain or convey correctly what really happened, then there is no reason to disbelieve them.

They all agree that Matthew was the first Gospels, and state he wrote first for the Hebrews in their own tongue. There seems to be some confusion as to which order Mark and Luke came in. Clement of Alexandria (155-220AD) places Luke before Mark, while Origen (185-254AD) says that Mark was before Luke. The answer may like in Irenaeus' (120-200AD) writing which implies that Mark and Luke were written pretty much at the same time. Eusebius (260-340AD) also groups Mark and Luke together whereas he makes it clear that Matthew was first and John last.
There is also the possibility that both they and we are confusing the actual writing with the public distribution. Clement of Alexandria implies that Mark distributed his Gospel privately after writing it. This could possibly explain the last 12 verses of Mark: They were added by Mark in a later public version but not the initial private ones.

Luke's similarity to Mark is also well explained by the idea that both Mark and Luke travelled with Peter and Paul and so heard similar things.

All the Church fathers agree that John came last. Plausible reasons are also given for the difference of John from the other Gospels. Clement of Alexandria:
'Last of all John, conscious that the outward facts had been set forth in the Gospels, was urged on by his disciples; and, divinely moved by the Spirit, composed a spiritual Gospel.'
Eusebius writes:
'After Mark and Luke had published their Gospels... John was asked to relate in his own Gospel the period passed over in silence by the former evangelists.'

It seems quite possible for Mark and Luke to have a copy of Matthew's Hebrew Gospel or to have encountered it before in their travels. It is difficult to say whether this Hebrew Gospel was the same as Matthew's Gospel as we have it, or whether Matthew added bits when he wrote the Greek version (assuming he wrote a separate Greek version and that the Greek we have is not a straight translation of his Hebrew one). But the proto-Matthew in my opinion, would most likely have been very similar to one of: Current Matthew, current Mark, or current Mark + Q. Or there may well have been multiple different versions floating around similar to each of the above, and when Matthew was written in Greek the most complete version was used.

I feel that the writings of the early church are often treated too lightly by the Scholars examining the order of writing of the Gospels. The writers have no reason to lie, and every reason to be knowledgable about their subject, and yet their opinion is often taken with a grain of salt.

[This message has been edited by Tercel (edited March 09, 2001).]

All of the gospels were completed a couple of decades before the Jewish War. The original John was completed before 37 CE and the last editing done shortly after 50 CE by John's replacement who was also called John (for that very reason).

This is an un-evidenced assertion. How about citing some serious scholarly sources to back up your claim?

rodahi