Peter Kirby

What are you taking about? Does an interpolator require permission? Since when?

I am talking about your hypothesis that the title of the Gospel of Luke was an addition of the late second century. You haven't attempted to present an argument from the internal evidence for that conclusion; you have just assumed that the title is secondary (and yet you strongly condemn me with "you have nothing"). And the external evidence is uniformly in favor of the title. Normally the hypothesis of an interpolation or addition has a burden of proof. In my response to Toto, I presented good reasons for rejecting the titles to Matthew and Mark (the real titles are in the first lines) and John (the name of the beloved disciple is avoided in the text). But I have not seen any similarly good reason for rejecting the title of the Gospel of Luke as an addition. So I am wondering if you can adduce anything to support the anonymous hypothesis over against the hypothesis that the author gave his work a title. The idea that the title of the third Gospel was "the Gospel of Luke" is not mere musing; hundreds of works from antiquity bear their real titles, so why not this one? If I can find a decent reason against, as I have for the other three, I will indicate that on my web page.

There are a lot of speculations here. And that's no evidence for me in favor of Luke.

Justin Martyr is not my witness. I was only establishing "reasonable doubt" about your conclusion on the basis of Justin Martyr's references to the memoirs of the apostles.

Good point, but the most sacred ancient scriptures, the Pentateuch, did not come with the title "the books according to Moses". Moses, as the author, had to be stuck on these books later. Actually, it is clear that the initial authors did not even pretend to be writing in the name of Moses and the books were written a long time after Moses (if he existed). They were just anonymous "histories" just like the anonymous gospels. Here is a good parallel.

The first five books of the Old Testament do not pretend to be written in the time of Moses. This would be a good parallel if it were not for your theory that 'Acts' was presented as being written before 64. Such a theory makes it very probable that our forger, attempting to give his work antiquity, had both a fictional recipient and a fictional author, a worthy to imbue the work with credibility, per your idea. This would be pseudonymity instead of anonymity.

As I said to Toto, I think that pseudonymity is the next best thing, but I want somebody to carry through the idea with some detail and reasoning, as everybody seems to favor anonymity and after that authenticity. I hope that Toto rejoins us--or anyone else who wants to add their thoughts.

best,
Peter Kirby

Bernard Muller

Peter wrote:
I am talking about your hypothesis that the title of the Gospel of Luke was an addition of the late second century. You haven't attempted to present an argument from the internal evidence for that conclusion; you have just assumed that the title is secondary (and yet you strongly condemn me with "you have nothing"). And the external evidence is uniformly in favor of the title.

The so-called external evidence is from the end of the 2nd century, nothing before.
John and Mark pop up before that as author of gospel (and Matthew for logias), but NOT Luke (even if then, according to you, Matthew, Mark, John never were in any title of the other gospels)
But, for you, "Gospel of Luke" appeared on very early copies of the third gospel, even if Luke is never mentioned like Mark or John before 170. How brilliant!

The reason the title appeared afterwards is because of Irenaeus, Moratorian canon, Clement of Alexandria, etc. But then, by that time, the other gospels started to be titled with the name of their alleged author. So there was nothing special for GLuke.

Internal evidence? If that's what you want, I concede: there is nothing written in GLuke where the author declares he is not Luke. So you win: that means "Gospel of Luke" appeared in the most ancient copies (according to your reasonning, of course!)

In my response to Toto, I presented good reasons for rejecting the titles to Matthew and Mark (the real titles are in the first lines)

There is NO evidence whatsoever these so-called (real!) titles of yours were used before or after Irenaeus, but who cares. I am quite sure you'll find arguments to explain this lack of testimonies is actually preponderant evidence.

The idea that the title of the third Gospel was "the Gospel of Luke" is not mere musing; hundreds of works from antiquity bear their real titles, so why not this one? If I can find a decent reason against, as I have for the other three, I will indicate that on my web page.

The problem with that one is we have no internal or external evidence the third gospel was attributed to Luke before 170. So if you claim otherwise, it has to be musing. Period.

Best regards, Bernard

Peter Kirby

Since we are retreading old ground, and I would like our discussion not to become too entrenched or hostile, I think it is time to wind down this Great Title Debate. I will make one clarification of what I have been saying, which is not that Luke-Acts got its present title very long before the others. Although dating the gospels involves some degree of speculation as Andrew Bernhard would be happy to point out, permissible dates are 70-73 for "The Beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ," 80-100 for "A Book of the Origin of Jesus Christ," 80-100 for the Gospel of Luke, and close to 100 for the publication of the fourth gospel under the name "the Gospel of John" (as well as the epistles of the same name, by the same redactor as N. Perrin maintains in his NT intro). Papias is dated either around 100-110 (R. H. Gundry) or around 130 (E. P. Sanders) and knows of the gospel being attributed to Mark. I have said that the "Gospel of Luke" and "Gospel of John" had their titles from the time of wider dissemination around 100, while I would say that the "Gospel of Mark" acquired its second title before Papias. The reason for the uniformity of title format for all four is the placing of the books together in a codex, either in the first half or the second half of the second century. Either way, it is no problem that Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus of Lyons, and the Muratorian Canon know of all four under their present names and not just Luke, since they knew the four as an anthology (although the non-catholics continued to use single gospels, while Syrians had a harmony).

I would still like your comments on this: "The first five books of the Old Testament do not pretend to be written in the time of Moses. This would be a good parallel if it were not for your theory that 'Acts' was presented as being written before 64. Such a theory makes it very probable that our forger, attempting to give his work antiquity, had both a fictional recipient and a fictional author, a worthy to imbue the work with credibility, per your idea. This would be pseudonymity instead of anonymity." And I would welcome anyone else who would like to interject their thoughts.

best,
Peter Kirby

Bernard Muller

Hi Peter,
I am suffering insomnia, so I may as well comment on your latest post, more so I'll be busy in the outdoors this weekend.
First I think your position on these titles is arbitrary and unfounded, but you know that already. I wonder what kind of methodology you used on that.
However your dating is much better than before (except for 1John), certainly close to mine, as you can see on my page on gospels:
http://www.concentric.net/~Mullerb/gospels.shtml

One thing which may influence you is the true identity of "Luke", as I found it THROUGH PILES OF EVIDENCE, that is "Luke" was a woman from Philippi.
I am not the only one to propose Philippi and woman.
I exposed my arguments and evidence here:
http://www.concentric.net/~Mullerb/appf.shtml#lk

As far as anonymous Christian writings there are quite a few:
To the Hebrews, 1John, 2John, 3John and of course the gospels & Acts (not incorporating your theories) for the canonicals.
And then we also have 1Clement, Barnabas, the Didache, likely other gospels as 'to the Egyptians', 'of the Hebrews', 'of the Ebionites', 'of the Nazoreans'. I do not think the fathers mentioned an alleged author for each of those. Marcion's gospel was also anonymous (even if it is likely Marcion wrote it).

Time to go back to bed, Bernard

Bernard Muller

Peter Kirby wrote:
The reason for the uniformity of title format for all four is the placing of the books together in a codex, either in the first half or the second half of the second century.

How do you know that?
You do not even know if it is 1st or 2nd half of 2nd century.
If it it the later, how late? Do we have any evidence of 2nd century Codex which included the 4 canonical gospels together?

You guessed by now I decided to stay home after a sleepless night.
Best regards, Bernard

Peter Kirby

I thank you heartily for your stimulating discussion, Bernard. There were two lines in the original post on the subject of the last two pages of this thread, but now I have learned so much more. And I've learned of that which I do not know.

Recall that I made these arguments (to which I will provide my own response):

1. The author needed a title to distinguish his account from all these others.
2. The author labored over the work and would want control over what it's called.
3. There is no "second title" and differing manuscripts or traditions.
4. A document naming a recipient usually indicates an author's name.

The Gospel of Matthew shows the first three arguments to have problems, so long as we think of the title of GMatthew as secondary--and we should, the text of GMatthew doesn't pretend to have been written by this apostle, who is described scantly and in the third person (and there are the other well-known arguments regarding the logia of Papias and the use of Mark).

Here's why. The suggestion was that the title was "A Book of the Origin of Jesus Christ the Son of David the Son of Abraham." But:

1. That is way too long to be a reasonable title, which would stop at "Jesus Christ." But giving two different ancestors in a title doesn't make sense.

2. The idea of telling the origin of Jesus is not suitable as a title for the whole gospel, which tells a lot about the doings and death and resurrection of Jesus.

3. But likely the YLT has it right, "A roll of the birth of Jesus Christ, son of David, son of Abraham." That is, it's a reference to a genealogical document, encompassing in the mind of the evangelist Mt 1:2-16 or the whole infancy narrative.

4. The rabbis took it in the latter sense, when we find in m. Yebam. 4.13, "Rabbi Shim'on ben 'Azzai said, 'I have found a scroll of genealogies in Jerusalem; thereon was written: "That so-and-so is a bastard born of an adulteress"; to confirm the words of Rabbi Yehoshua.'" This playful barb could be derived from a hermeneutic of suspicion applied to Mt 1:19. Even if it were the words of R. Simeon, he was active 110-135 CE, so this would cause no revision to our date of the gospel.

So, the same points apply--"The author needed a title to distinguish his account from all these others" (e.g. Mark) and "The author labored over the work and would want control over what it's called" and "There is no 'second title' and differing manuscripts or traditions"--yet the first Gospel is apparently anonymous.

As to the fourth point? Consider this:

"Since I see, most excellent Diognetus, that thou
art exceedingly anxious to understand the religion of
the Christians, and that thy enquiries respecting them
are distinctly and carefully made, as to what God they
trust and how they worship Him, that they all
disregard the world and despise death, and take no
account of those who are regarded as gods by the
Greeks, neither observe the superstition of the Jews,
and as to the nature of the affection which they
entertain one to another, and of this new development
or interest, which has entered into men's lives now
and not before: I gladly welcome this zeal in thee,
and I ask of God, Who supplieth both the speaking and
the hearing to us, that it may be granted to myself to
speak in such a way that thou mayest be made better by
the hearing, and to thee that thou mayest so listen
that I the speaker may not be disappointed."

We call this the "Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus" because the author calls himself a disciple (mathetes) in 11:1. The author is truly anonymous, even in the title, but "most excellent Diognetus" is named.

So I retract the claim about the title of GLuke being original as being based on insufficient evidence.

Bernard, if you have the time, could you tell us what you think about this title business regarding the four gospels?

best,
Peter Kirby

Bernard Muller

Peter Kirby wrote:
I thank you heartily for your stimulating discussion, Bernard.

Peter, what got into you? You make me almost cry.

I read the rest of your post carefully, and I agree with all of it.

Best regards, Bernard