Peter Kirby

See, if not understand, this new web site:

A statistical approach to the synoptic problem

I've actually contemplated undertaking something similar at some point, but I'm glad that someone has done a lot of the hard work already. I look forward to checking the methods when I delve into stylometry at some point in the (perhaps distant) future. The combination of computers and antiquities is fascinating to me. If the data and the procedure stand up as sound, this would be a convincing argument that deserves publication in a scholarly journal.

best,
Peter Kirby

GentDave

Hi,
I put up the website in question, and I'd be glad to try to answer questions. It might help improve the site.

The most important section to understand is the data.
Once you've got that, you're half way there.

Dave

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hello, Dave,

Long time no talk...

Remember, we used to discuss these things a few years back, before they kicked me out from the Synoptic-L? (I guess too much scepticism can be a dangerous thing in NT studies? )

In any case, I've followed some of your research over the years, but I have one basic problem with it. Namely, how do you deal with all these hundreds of Anti-Markan Agreements (also known as "the Minor Agreements")?

Don't they invalidate the 2ST right from the word go? What more statistical data might there be necessary to see that 2ST is a dud?

Regards,

Yuri.

GentDave

Hello again. I was wondering what the connection was to this site.

I tend to have a problem with the minor argeements too.
I think the study fairly strongly suggests that Luke used Matthew, and leads me to support the 3ST, but I don't want to overstate the case, either.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Dave,

I'm well familiar with your study, and how it was set up, because I've been reading the Synoptic-L while you were first presenting your results there (this was all based originally on your school project).

I'm saying that your whole study is fundamentally flawed. You should have eliminated the 2SH right from the beginning, based on the Anti-Markan Agreements alone -- *before* you even started your statistical analysis.

What Anti-Markan Agreements really mean is that there are 1000 good arguments against the 2SH. In the real world (as opposed to the Synoptic Studies World) this is usually called a dud.

If you included 2SH into your statistical analysis, you might as well have included the Tooth Fairy Hypothesis (TFH) in there as well on equal footing...

For example, you say on your webpage,

http://www.davegentile.com/synoptics/main

"I do not believe the 2 Source Hypothesis can be eliminated by this study."

If your study even cannot eliminate the 2SH, what good is it at all, one may wonder? There's a problem there, Dave...

What I'm saying is that, by all rights, the 2SH should have been eliminated even *before* your study...

Regards,

Yuri.

GentDave

I didn't eliminate any hypothesis aprior.
The order could have turned up to be Luke => Matthew => Mark
But it turned out to suggest Mark => Matthew => Luke
So, I disagree that I should have not considered the 2SH apriori. It may well be that based on evidence, other than my study, various hypotheses may be rejected, but I did not address that.

I do think that my study can add evidence to the case against the 2SH. But can it prove it?
Let's look at it this way, if the minor agreements, by themselves don't disprove the 2SH, why would we expect my study to do that?

GentDave

P.S.

This page has more elaborate conclusions.

http://www.davegentile.com/synoptics...pretation.html

ending with:

It is possible, maybe even probable, that the true solution is more complicated than the ones considered here. For example, there could have been more than one version of Mark or Matthew. The problem is that as the number of hypothetical documents grows, the number of possible solutions grows exponentially, and the data that can be used to separate them is spread that much more thinly. Personally, I doubt enough data exists to come to any conclusions beyond the basic outline of what happened, with any real confidence.

So, in conclusion, based on this study and other more traditional forms of evidence, not presented here, I believe the 3SH, or some variation of it is most likely the correct solution. The study also provides almost as much support for the FH, and I do not believe the 2SH can be eliminated by this study. However, solutions that do not involve Markian priority have another hurdle to overcome, based on these results, and I think it becomes more difficult to argue that Luke did not use Matthew at all.

Vorkosigan

Hi GentDave! A great piece of work. I like the 3SH myself. I think the key piece of evidence lies in your brief discussion of the minor agreements -- that the evidence points to Luke editing them from Matt. What did Mark Goodacre say about this?

Vorkosigan

GentDave

Mark Goodacre was very positive about the study. We were working toward getting it included in an upcoming book, but that fell through, because of the work involved in turning it into a publishable piece. That's when I decided to put it on a webpage, so at least it would be available.

GentDave

In addition to the minor agreements, the other piece of evidence that points to Luke using Matthew, is that Sondergut Matthew looks similar to the common Matthew/Luke text in "Q".

So material that must be Q on the 2SH, looks like stuff that appears only in Matthew. (Category 202 looks like 200)