anthony93

In The Jesus Puzzle, Doherty talks at length about Q and goes into a lot of detail regarding the supposed strata, or layers, of the theoretical Source. One of the issues I have with the entire discussion is the presumption of a "Community" behind Q. Why should there be single source, so the speak, for the Source? I realize that this can be somewhat addressed by falling back on the layers theory, though I really wonder how much justification the whole strata scheme really has. Is it simply based on grouping the supposed sayings of Q based on content? Seems to be. That is a problem, to me anyway. The larger question is just how literally should we take Q? Is it really held that there was a single document, a proto-gospel if you like, passed around the Jesus Movement community? This seems to contradict another assertion (one which I find more compelling anyway) concerning the writings early apologists like Anathegoras. Whether or not the earliest material in Q mentioned the crucifixion, it had to predate Anathegoras by decades and it seems a bit of a stretch to suppose sayings were collected, sayings by a man who was not believed (at this point in the Communities development) to have actually existed.

The real question I have, though, is concerning the presumptions about Q material that can be identified in the Gospels. The example I am thinking of is the discussion of Q2 and the saying that ends up in Luke regarding the murder of the prophets. Dohery gives the text, which is very close, if not identical to 11:49-51. I kept the preceding and trailing verses to point out there is no ambiguity about who is saying this:

Luke: 11 : 46 And he said, Woe unto you lawyers also! for ye load men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.
Luke: 11 : 47 Woe unto you! for ye build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.
Luke: 11 : 48 So ye are witnesses and consent unto the works of your fathers: for they killed them, and ye build `their tombs`.
Luke: 11 : 49 Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send unto them prophets and apostles; and `some` of them they shall kill and persecute;
Luke: 11 : 50 that the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation;
Luke: 11 : 51 from the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zachariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary: yea, I say unto you, it shall be required of this generation.
Luke: 11 : 52 Woe unto you lawyers! for ye took away the key of knowledge: ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered.
New Testament- American Standard Version
Luke Chapter: 11

Concernng this passage Doherty says :
"(Jesus) would have been the ultimate example of the alleged ancient phenomenon of the killing of the prophets sent from God. Yet the concept never appears anywhere in Q" Jesus Puzzle, 149

Stipulating the origination of the passage as coming from Q, the refutation of this seems obvious, and can be one or both of the following

1. Jesus is speaking, so he is still alive. It would be awkward in this instance for a living man to place himself in the company of Martyrs. Sure, Jesus foreshadows his own death several times, but here he is speaking to a crowd who would not have gotten his meaning had he put himself in the same list as Abel and Zachariah.

2. The passage could be read as a foreshadowing anyway, just obliquely. Jesus, the Son of Man, greater than all the prophets is here and as the Prophets before him were killed, even (especially?) he will be likewise killed.

Actually, it seems too obvious, what am I not getting? I have no problem with Q as an abstraction, a (or the) Source for the Gospels. As a real document that existed seems a lot more tenuous. And anyway, considering Q to have been an actual document lets the apologist-types of the hook. You get this sort of thing:http://www.gotquestions.org/Q-Gospel.html
(None of this evidence is presented however)

Funny how physical evidence becomes the standard for proof when the literalists want to argue against something

Sorry if this has been beaten to death, I did a search of the Archives and didn't get much concerning Q.

aChristian

I think your points are valid. The whole Q as well as the whole documetary hypothesis is hokey to me. No documents, just 1) make up history and then 2) pull the complete document that we do have apart to try and make it fit your pretend history. The people who were alive then who wrote down the history (church fathers who knew the apostles as quoted by other reliable historians, (mostly Eusebius)) just report the traditional story as we know it. You can deny the traditional history, but you have to impugn the character of those who lived then in order to get rid of the factual account. Such attempts fail miserably in my opinion. The traditional history holds up to critical scrutiny simply because it is true.

pharoah

Note that Papias says that Mark wrote down the "sayings and deeds" of Christ, whereas Matthew only wrote down the "oracles". In other words, The Matthew gospel that was known to Papias was a sayings gospel. There are several possibilities that might be drawn from this, none particularly favorable to anti-Q fundamentalists.

Eusebius concocted the whole thing. That of course would contradict your claim of him being a reliable historian.

Papias concocted the whole thing. That's problematic also, because he's probably the closest extra-Biblical person to the "eyewitnesses".

Papias believed what he wrote but was just wrong. That again calls his reliability into question.

Matthew wrote two gospels, a sayings gospel and the canonical gospel. Possible, but rather preposterous. It would make far more sense to edit the original sayings gospel than to write another gospel that included the sayings.

Papias was ignorant of canonical Matthew. This is actually the most puzzling point, because if Matthew was written in the 1st century (as the vast majority of scholars believe), then how could he not be aware of it?

Papias was aware of canonical Matthew, but it had yet to be accepted by the Christian community. Possible, but there's no evidence of this.

Canonical Matthew is actually a heavily modified version of the gospel that Papias was familiar with. This also seems to be unlikely, and is certainly unacceptable to fundamentalists.

The gospel that Papias was familiar with was either Q, modified Q, or based on Q. This seems to be a quite reasonable conclusion to draw.

Evan

There is a common misconception that those who embrace the existence of Q are open-minded, rational, and scientifically oriented. Conversely, the anti-Q fundamentalists are narrow-minded conservatives whose reason is clouded by the desire to defend the traditional interpretations of the scriptures and their origins. This notion needs to be put to rest. I, for one, consider myself to be a rational, liberal, scientific thinker who does not care in the least to defend the traditional interpretation of the scriptures. Nevertheless, my studies have led me to a certainty that there is no chance that Q as conventionally reconstructed by scholars could have existed. I have written a book on this subject, The Myth of the Lost Gospel (or via: amazon.co.uk), which is available on Amazon.

The arguments which illustrate the non-existence of Q are too extensive to reproduce on a forum posting. However, it can be shown that the double tradition material in Matthew and Luke, which is the material alleged to have been drawn from Q, exists due to a direct copying of the materials from Luke by the author of Matthew. The proposition that Mark > Luke > Matthew represents the true chronological sequence of the Synoptic Gospels, and that each author was dependent upon the prior work(s), is not presently a popular concept in contemporary academics. However, based upon the statistical and textual evidence I have compiled in my book, I believe Matthean posteriority will become recognized in time as the most comprehensive solution to the Synoptic Problem. The Q theory is destined to go the way of Piltdown Man and other missing link theories of the past.

Evan

TedM

Why is that unlikely? Why couldn't Matthew have written down sayings around which the Gospel of Matthew was written? While fundamentalists will likely find that unacceptable, many Christians--I imagine--would not.

What about this scenario?:

The book of Matthew was originally Matthew's sayings (thus the tradition of authorship), which was subsequently heavily modified by an author or community to incorporate material from Mark and oral traditions.

Hi Evan..does my scenario above pass the test--is this what you are concluding?

Also, I'm not 'up' on Q research, but is it not possible that what people call "Q" was actually Matthew's 'sayings' that Papias talks about?

ted

pharoah

I don't think I implied that people who don't believe in Q are narrow-minded, but if you inferred that I apologize. My statement was directed towards a narrow sect of Christianity, fundamentalists who are anti-Q. I didn't even say that they are narrow-minded about Q because frankly there's no reason that the mere possible existence of Q should be at odds with conservative doctrine.
Here's the link for your book (or via: amazon.co.uk) . Perhaps one of the mods will be kind enough to fix it up.

I should point out that I'm still undecided on the existence or need for Q. As you point out, one writer drawing from another makes at least as much sense, although I've always thought it more likely to be Luke from Matthew. I just may buy your book for the dating evidence alone.

pharoah

It's actually a pretty good scenario, although I'm skeptical about the Matthew authorship tradition. The more I think about it, the less likely it is that Papias was familiar with canonical Matthew. Judas getting squished by a chariot?

Evan

Thank you kindly. No, I did not infer that you in particular thought anti-Q theorists were narrow-minded, and certainly no apology is warranted. Having studied the debates on this issue for quite a while, my impression is that many (but certainly not all) conservative theorists who object to the Q theory are motivated in part by ecclesiastical concerns. The defense of the Church's traditional position on the priority of Matthew is sometimes a subtle subtext in the debate. Thus, for some, the phrase "anti-Q fundamentalists" may carry with it a connotation that those who do not subscribe to the Q theory have a rigid and implicitly conservative mindset.

One of the features of the Gospel of Matthew is that a number of its pericopae are conflations of elements found in Mark and Luke. Conversely, it is nearly impossible to find a text in Luke that is composed of elements from Mark and Matthew. The Q theory has no way to explain this phenomenon. This is one of many textual patterns which suggest that Matthew was the last of the three, and that the author must have been using both Mark and Luke as sources.

Thanks very much for the link to my book. I am new to this forum, and did not know either how to do that, or if there might have been a rule against posting such links.

Evan

robto

Hi, Anthony;

You might want to check out this recent thread.

From your link:
??? This author presents an argument against Q and then admits that it possibly existed? What kind of sense is that supposed to make?

TedM

I argued recently that while the Judas tradition is problematic for Papias' reliability, one needs to take into account he subject being discussed. I think it is much more likely--assuming there was a Matthew and a Judas--that Papias would be accurate about a Matthew writings tradition than a Judas' death tradition. Why? Because Matthew would have been known to the early community of Christians, and the authorship of the writings likely would have been also. Judas would have long been dead. Even Papais' tradition has some similarities to the other traditions.

ted