Is Markan Priority Wrong?

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In forming a reply to ThatGirlAgain I took a look at Markan Priority and the accepted idea that the authors of Matthew and Luke had access to Mark. I am beginning to convince myself it was the author of Mark that had access to Matthew and Luke. Here is one argument I gave ThattheGirl

But lets look at the kind of thinking that leads to Markan Priority to test just how firm it really is and give you an idea of the kind of thing I am on about. Here is an argument given in favour of Markan priority I plucked from wiki

• 1/ the shortness of Mark and way it omits content that is in Matt and Luke. So Matt and Luke include stuff Mark leaves out which some argue is unlikely.
  2/ Most of Mark is found in Matthew or Luke. If mark was editing Matt and Luke he adds little.
  3/ What little Mark adds seems strange and ripe for editing out if Matt and Luke were editing Mark.

Seems logical and it supports the notion of the less elaborate Mark came first. OK as I write this I admit my ignorance and dont actually know how much of Mark is in Matt and how much is in Luke. But play along with me for a moment. What would be needed to make it plausible Mark was editing Matt and Luke? Lets assume the author of Mark has Luke and Matt in front of him. He samples some of each but not all. If Mark is using them as sources and they are largely his only source then it is guaranteed most of Mark will be found in Matt or Luke. We need no additional assumptions like Q and we get most of Mark in Matt and Luke without further effort. This scenario is logically simpler than a scenario that has to invent Q. Now go the next step. What if most of Mark is found in Matt and the most of Mark found in Luke. If that were true it would mean Mark was trying to form a synthesis of the two and note all the common elements. That is the only additional assumption you need. Moreover it has a compelling motivation. Mark was trying to find out what he could with confidence say was most likely true given his two sources. That is not much of an assumption.

Now go back to Markan priority. If Matt and Luke are editing Mark, to get most of Mark across both Matt and Luke they would have to have colluded to ensure the coverage or this is accidental, or far more likely one had access to the other. Say it is Luke that had had access to Matthew as you suggested earlier, then Luke edited Mark and Matthew, and Matthew edited Mark. If Q is on his desk as well that is another additional complication to the story. But it means for some reason Luke was less impressed with Matt or less willing to use Matt as a source as he was keen to use Mark. We have no clear motivation for this, and still the logically simplest solution is let Mark edit Matt and Luke

Question: Is Markan Priority wrong?

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Sorry ThatGirlAgain. I have been typing furiously and cutting and pasting and somewhere along the line tranposed you name. Please accept my apology.

Lest the audience at home forget, Proposition B is:
B/ There are very few passages in Mark that are found in neither Matthew nor Luke, That did not form any part of my argument.

Excellent. But B did echo an earlier point in the other thread you were working with regarding giving priority to less elaborate accounts and you used Markan Priority to support your claim, which brought me to B and now we are discussing Markan Priority. So it worries me that is a muddle in your thinking you are yet to resolve.

Rather my concern in this area is that there is so much in Matthew and Luke that is NOT in Mark although a contemporary audience would wonder why.

OK I have since given what I think is probably the simplest formulation of my point to Mithrae. Let us look at that first.

It does not matter what Mark drew from Luke and Matt. He could have copied them verbatim or cherry picked the bits he liked, and we dont even need to explain why he liked them, what we do know is that if Mark followed Matt and Luke and these were his only sources then all of Mark will be in Matt and Luke. That is not quite true as you point out, but the reasoning goes that the closer we are to all Mark being in Matt and Luke the more likely it is he accessed them . Yes we have to explain the differences, but that explanation requires less explaining of how most of Mark ended up in Matt and Luke. If Mark has priority this fact is accidental or we have to explain why (Luke probably) deliberately covered the stuff Matt left out. Why was Luke so focused? We get there with much less effort and obvious warrant if Mark accessed Matt and Luke.

The principle is that closer proximity to all of Mark contained in Matt and Luke the more likely Mark accessed Matt and Luke. Moreover if most of Mark is in Luke whilst the differences have to be explained if someone wants to argue for Markan Priority they are going to need to support their rationalising much harder than if B were false. So you should be worried. Worried for Markan Priority.

My explanation was that the big issue in Matthew, the appearance of rabbinic Judaism and its spread to Syria, did not yet happen in Marks time. Mark did not leave anything out. There was nothing more for him to include.

OK you have an explanation. Now you have to decide was most of Mark showing itself in Matt and Luke a fluke running against the probabilities, or did say Luke actively try to ensure he covered the aspects of Mark Matt failed to address. Fluke weighs against your argument. So You really need a good reason why Luke ensures a near comprehensive coverage of Mark. You dont just have to explain why Matt and Luke left a few bits out, you have to explain why Luke worked to ensure such a comprehensive coverage. If you have an excellent answer to that then you are on a roll. Here is a bad answer: Luke saw his Gospel as a companion to Matt, and wanted to ensure between them they covered the material in Mark. This is a circular rationalisation. That should be obvious to you, but you need to be careful and look for a reason within the historical context, not within say Lukes head.

[ThatGirlAgain]

Lest the audience at home forget, Proposition B is:
B/ There are very few passages in Mark that are found in neither Matthew nor Luke, That did not form any part of my argument.

Excellent. But B did echo an earlier point in the other thread you were working with regarding giving priority to less elaborate accounts and you used Markan Priority to support your claim, which brought me to B and now we are discussing Markan Priority. So it worries me that is a muddle in your thinking you are yet to resolve.

Now I see what you are saying. I was using the widely accepted Markan Priority idea as an example of the elaborate generally being later than the simple. But I was not using it to prove Markan Priority. That discussion had not happened yet. No muddle. Simply the elaborate happening after the simple even in this discussion.

Rather my concern in this area is that there is so much in Matthew and Luke that is NOT in Mark although a contemporary audience would wonder why.

OK I have since given what I think is probably the simplest formulation of my point to Mithrae. Let us look at that first.

It does not matter what Mark drew from Luke and Matt. He could have copied them verbatim or cherry picked the bits he liked, and we dont even need to explain why he liked them, what we do know is that if Mark followed Matt and Luke and these were his only sources then all of Mark will be in Matt and Luke. That is not quite true as you point out, but the reasoning goes that the closer we are to all Mark being in Matt and Luke the more likely it is he accessed them . Yes we have to explain the differences, but that explanation requires less explaining of how most of Mark ended up in Matt and Luke. If Mark has priority this fact is accidental or we have to explain why (Luke probably) deliberately covered the stuff Matt left out. Why was Luke so focused? We get there with much less effort and obvious warrant if Mark accessed Matt and Luke.

The principle is that closer proximity to all of Mark contained in Matt and Luke the more likely Mark accessed Matt and Luke. Moreover if most of Mark is in Luke whilst the differences have to be explained if someone wants to argue for Markan Priority they are going to need to support their rationalising much harder than if B were false. So you should be worried. Worried for Markan Priority.

Not worried at all. Only 1% of Luke is material that is found in Mark but not in Matthew. Only 10% of Matthew is material found in Mark but not in Luke. (See chart in link below.)

The Mark-Matthew material, shared between Mark and Matthew, includes the story of the death of John the Baptist, several miracles (including one of the two occurrences of feeding the multitude), the expanded version of the ban on divorce (Mt. 19:1-8), and the depiction of the death of Jesus (Mk. 15:34-41).

The Mark-Luke material is limited to a single incident in Capernaum involving exorcism (Mk. 1:21-28).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synoptic_problem

Luke goes from the baptism of Jesus into the genealogy of Jesus. John himself vanishes from the story at that point but is sometimes referred to indirectly. One such indirect reference is:
Luke 16:16 The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John.

Luke wanted to have a transition from John, the last of traditional Judaism, to a universal Jesus. So John is no longer on stage as soon as Jesus gets baptized and starts his ministry.

Luke may have felt that the two feedings of the multitudes (that Matthew does use) was awkward. Both times the Apostles are astonished. Why were they so astonished the second time around? In any case Matthew reports an extensive ministry in Galilee before the rejection at Nazareth, emphasizing the Jewish nature of Jesus. Luke moves the rejection at Nazareth up near the beginning and has Jesus make a beeline to Jerusalem. Some material got left out.

One truly significant difference between Mark/Matthew and Luke in the death scene of Jesus is that Luke leaves out the Eloi Eloi words of Jesus. These would have made less sense to Lukes gentile audience.

Matthew and Luke not corresponding exactly to Mark is not an issue. They would have had reasons for doing just what they did.

My explanation was that the big issue in Matthew, the appearance of rabbinic Judaism and its spread to Syria, did not yet happen in Marks time. Mark did not leave anything out. There was nothing more for him to include.

OK you have an explanation. Now you have to decide was most of Mark showing itself in Matt and Luke a fluke running against the probabilities, or did say Luke actively try to ensure he covered the aspects of Mark Matt failed to address. Fluke weighs against your argument. So You really need a good reason why Luke ensures a near comprehensive coverage of Mark. You dont just have to explain why Matt and Luke left a few bits out, you have to explain why Luke worked to ensure such a comprehensive coverage. If you have an excellent answer to that then you are on a roll. Here is a bad answer: Luke saw his Gospel as a companion to Matt, and wanted to ensure between them they covered the material in Mark. This is a circular rationalisation. That should be obvious to you, but you need to be careful and look for a reason within the historical context, not within say Lukes head.

See above discussion. Also the chart referenced shows that only 3% of Mark is unique to Luke whereas 18% of Mark is unique to Matthew. Luke leaves out more of Mark than Matthew does. This extra material in Matthew is mainly in the Galilean mission that Luke leaves out to de-emphasize the Jewish character of Jesus.

Class is about to start and my weekends are generally dedicated to other purposes. Be back when I can.

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Quit simply, Mark's poorer Greek.

Although it isn't evident in English translations, on numerous occasions Mark uses the incorrect form of the verb or noun.

These errors are corrected in the parallel verses in Matthew / Luke.

Counter: Matt and Luke have good Greek grammar. Marks Greek grammar is less so good and he made a mistake. If Mark makes a mistake whether he is copying Matt and Luke or whether he is not, it is just his bad grammar kicking in. If Matt and Luke correct Mark that requires two people taking two affirmative actions unilaterally. Mistakes are easier to make than make corrections especially in Greek Grammar. It is as least as likely true that Mark is mangling grammar than both Mark and Luke correcting it. This alternative requires less people to do less.

Answer this riddle. Bill and Ted and Ned are asked by their teacher to write him a story about their favourite super hero Jeff. Teds story is long and his spelling is fine. Neds story is just as long and contain similar material but also some other ideas about Jeff. Bills story is short, and nearly everything Bill writes about can be found in Teds and Neds paper, except Bill is not a good speller and his paper contains a dozen spelling mistakes not in Ned and Teds paper. Please explain to the teacher why he needs to give Ned and Ted detention for copying Bill.

If Mark copied from either Matthew or Luke you must explain why Mark chose to use worse grammar than his sources.

He aint as good at Greek.

Why didn't Mark slavishly copy Matthew / Luke rather than producing his own incorrect text?

Because he is Papias Mark. He is an interpreter. Not a great one by the looks of it. But that was his role under Peter. This Mark is disciple of a disciple and a junior player. He is not trying to write a Gospel he is reconciling what is in Matt and Luke with what he has learnt from Peter.

Was Mark so incompetent that he couldn't see the difference between his own poor Greek and the good Greek of his sources?

Mark had the level of competency/ incompetency the number of mistakes he makes in Greek Grammar show him to have. He probably learnt his Greek by copying others. This is the limit of his skill and level of copying Greek text. He is an interpreter (probably speaks Aramaic, Hebrew, Latin, sufficent at Greek).

Or did Mark deliberately set out to "degrade" the grammar of his sources, and if so, why?

No that is silly. Mark just not so good with Greek grammar.

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scrubbed.

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One truly significant difference between Mark/Matthew and Luke in the death scene of Jesus is that Luke leaves out the Eloi Eloi words of Jesus. These would have made less sense to Lukes gentile audience.

And if Mark is accessing Matt and Luke and he either heard this from Peter or on reading Matt he can reconcile this with what Peter told him then Mark would put this in. Mark don't care about making sense to gentile audiences he wants to get a straight record and he thinks Matt's version is closer to what he understands from Peter.

[ThatGirlAgain]

One truly significant difference between Mark/Matthew and Luke in the death scene of Jesus is that Luke leaves out the Eloi Eloi words of Jesus. These would have made less sense to Lukes gentile audience.

And if Mark is accessing Matt and Luke and he either heard this from Peter or on reading Matt he can reconcile this with what Peter told him then Mark would put this in. Mark don't care about making sense to gentile audiences he wants to get a straight record and he thinks Matt's version is closer to what he understands from Peter.

Mark is always explaining Jewish customs. He is talking to an audience that includes gentiles. But the virulent rancor that Matthew has against Pharisees is not there in Mark. That experience is not in Mark's source. Neither does he feel the need to include Luke's absolving the Jesus movement of the stain of the Revolt.

The destruction of Jerusalem and the demons into swine story that appear in all three Synoptics do have the feel of an eyewitness account of the Revolt. Might that eyewitness be Peter talking to Mark in Rome as tradition has it? Or do we need another source who provided information to both Matthew and Luke? (Not necessarily verbally of course.) Implicating 'Peter' (or whoever it might really be) points to Mark as being the original Gospel.

[fredonly]

I have not personally researched ThatGirlAgain's hypothesis about Luke's using both Mark and Matthew, but I did find the following statement in a book on the subject:

...Michael Goulder...has penned a massive two-volume introduction and source-critical commentary on Luke arguing...arguing that Luke did depend on Mark ...[and]depended on Matthew...[the volumes] are not written with a comparative format, arguing for the greater plausibility of Luke's use of Matthew than of his use of Q and/or L. Instead, they almost always present speculation as to what Luke might have done if he depended don Matthew and Mark but no one else. And the speculations consistently defy credibility: Luke jumps all over the place in drawing on his sources, is inconsistent in his redactional practices because he gows weary, omits entire passages becauses he knows he will later substitute a small portion of them in entirely different contexts (or has already done so), and so on. F. G. Downing has subjected Goulder's hypothesis to intense scrutiny, stressing among other things that the sheer mechanics of copying from scrolls in antiquity weigh strongly against any author jumping around in the use of sources in such a hodge-podge fashion.
--Rethinking the Synoptic Problem.

[Mithrae]

Answer this riddle. Bill and Ted and Ned are asked by their teacher to write him a story about their favourite super hero Jeff. Teds story is long and his spelling is fine. Neds story is just as long and contain similar material but also some other ideas about Jeff. Bills story is short, and nearly everything Bill writes about can be found in Teds and Neds paper, except Bill is not a good speller and his paper contains a dozen spelling mistakes not in Ned and Teds paper. Please explain to the teacher why he needs to give Ned and Ted detention for copying Bill.

That's a more accessible example than the notebook game, though it requires some modification (using gospel names for simplicity).

It's true that most of what Mark writes in his story can be found in Matt and Luke's papers also. But the teacher's gonna notice that about a quarter of Luke's story is similar to Matt's also; the two of them share about two-thirds of their story in common (thanks to ThatGirl for the Wiki chart), less than half of which is similar to Mark's story. So the teacher knows that either Luke has copied from Matt, or that both of them have copied from Quentin (who's ill, and hasn't handed his paper in ). If she assumes/theorizes that Luke copied from Matt, the real question becomes whether Matt copied Mark or Mark copied Matt. Is it likely that Mark copied less than half of Matt's paper, leaving out a lot of fun stories, somehow managing to screw up Matt's good grammar in the process and make the stories about their superhero less exciting? Or is it more likely that Matt copied nearly all of Mark's paper (94% of it!), fixed up his grammar, gave Jeff some cool new powers and added a bunch of other stories too?

Quit simply, Mark's poorer Greek.

Although it isn't evident in English translations, on numerous occasions Mark uses the incorrect form of the verb or noun.

These errors are corrected in the parallel verses in Matthew / Luke.

Counter: Matt and Luke have good Greek grammar. Marks Greek grammar is less so good and he made a mistake. If Mark makes a mistake whether he is copying Matt and Luke or whether he is not, it is just his bad grammar kicking in. If Matt and Luke correct Mark that requires two people taking two affirmative actions unilaterally. Mistakes are easier to make than make corrections especially in Greek Grammar. It is as least as likely true that Mark is mangling grammar than both Mark and Luke correcting it. This alternative requires less people to do less.

Unfortunately, your entire theory is that Mark was a rather careful writer; "This Mark is more cautious, more academic," "a conservative, and he has integrity" with a "temperament for rigour" (post 17, response to Mithrae). This is a fellow who supposedly checked what was written by Matthew, double-checked it against Luke and then triple-checked it against what he remembered from Peter, striving for the highest levels of accuracy in his story. You're saying that this person copied various passages from Matthew or Luke almost word-for-word, but somehow managed to screw up their grammar in the process?

Student's point has merit on its own, but against the specific theory you've advanced I suspect that it borders on devastating.

Going to broader theories, as ThatGirl has pointed out Luke's exclusive use of Mark is almost insignificant compared to Matthew's (1-3% vs 10-18%). And including Luke as a source for Mark raises (as I've mentioned) the tricky question of the Q material Mark omitted. You'd be much better off suggesting that Mark copied only from Matthew - and in fairness, that's a theory with a long history. I'm not saying it's the best theory, but from a purely logical position it's a lot simpler than what you've argued so far. It slightly weakens your central premise (that Markan material is best explained by copy/revising), but as we've seen from the garden nudist, that premise isn't quite sound in any case - and removing Lukan material also is quite minor compared with Matt/Mark material or explaining the Matt/Luke material.

But on a different note I'd further point out that while you seem to place some value in Papias' comments on a gospel by Peter's disciple, you don't seem to do the same for a sayings collection by Jesus' disciple Matthew. Wouldn't it be fair to say that the hypothesised contents of the sayings source 'Q' (link in my earlier post) are even more human/less divine than what's found in Mark? Wouldn't this even better fit your theory of being closer to a source/eyewitness account than Mark does?



It's past 2am, and I've largely skimmed over many posts; I'm sure I've missed important points, so let me know

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The destruction of Jerusalem and the demons into swine story that appear in all three Synoptics do have the feel of an eyewitness account of the Revolt. Might that eyewitness be Peter talking to Mark in Rome as tradition has it? Or do we need another source who provided information to both Matthew and Luke? (Not necessarily verbally of course.) Implicating 'Peter' (or whoever it might really be) points to Mark as being the original Gospel.

I didn't reply to your comments on the demon/swine story in the other thread; you said you had a lot to reply to, so I figured I'd give you the chance (and eventually I forgot ). For now I'll say I find it unpersuasive. Furthermore, as I mentioned there's little in Mark 13 (and by implication Matthew 24) which couldn't be gleaned from general fear of repercussions against Jewish zealotry combined with biblical prophecy. And it's worth noting that Luke's omission of the 'abomination of desolation' (ch21) suggests an implicit rejection of eschatological expectations which Matthew clearly emphasises.

I don't agree with the reasoning that Mark 13, Matt 24 or Luke 21 imply an eyewitness source regarding the revolt. And from what I gather our best information about Peter has him dying in Rome c64CE, so that doesn't really help with authenticity of a post-70 gospel by Mark.

Peter as a source for Mark is a vague matter of extrapolation from historical evidence; but a (possibly additional) source from Judea during the revolt not only disturbs the parsimony, but also further calls into question why Mark's geography seems so shaky.

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One truly significant difference between Mark/Matthew and Luke in the death scene of Jesus is that Luke leaves out the Eloi Eloi words of Jesus. These would have made less sense to Lukes gentile audience.

And if Mark is accessing Matt and Luke and he either heard this from Peter or on reading Matt he can reconcile this with what Peter told him then Mark would put this in. Mark don't care about making sense to gentile audiences he wants to get a straight record and he thinks Matt's version is closer to what he understands from Peter.

Mark is always explaining Jewish customs.

Well if Mark is the mark of Papias as I suggested then Mark is is explaining nothing. He is just the record keeper. You will be hearing Peter's explanations through Mark.

The destruction of Jerusalem and the demons into swine story that appear in all three Synoptics do have the feel of an eyewitness account of the Revolt. Might that eyewitness be Peter talking to Mark in Rome as tradition has it?

Presently that is what I'm arguing (until I change my mind again).

Or do we need another source who provided information to both Matthew and Luke? (Not necessarily verbally of course.) Implicating 'Peter' (or whoever it might really be) points to Mark as being the original Gospel.

I am about to post a longer analysis of the data you linked that begins to look at this question.

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OK I want too look at the stats thank ThatGirlAgain kindly links and I want to present them as if Mark accesses because they change my mind on priority

• 97% of Mark covered in Matt and Luke
  94% of Mark is like Matts
  18% of Mark is uniquely like Matt
  79% of Mark is like Luke
  3% in Mark is uniquely like Luke.
  3% of Mark is unique.
  55% of Matt is like Mark
  64% of Luke is like Matt and Mark
  35% of Luke still needs to be explained.

I was obviously working under a wrong impression regarding Luke and I withdraw my point about Luke being focused on ensuring coverage. SoThatGirlAgain scores a homerun there. What I did not realise was how little there was uniquely Luke in Mark. Just 3% and as TGA points out it is the passage Mk. 1:21-28 where Jesus announces his authority, is called the Holy one, exorcises a demon.

As a result of the above data I now favour something like the Augustinian hypothesis It is interesting that this hypotheses does not lends itself to textual criticism and is drawn on historical testimony. As I have noted the priority means we have to see Mark as some kind of abridgment of Matt. I suggest the above data supports the Augustinian hypothesis best. So lets take a look.

That Mark is 94% Matts material clearly indicates Mark was concentration on Matt to the near exclusion of other sources. We hardly need Luke except for one passage. What I think explains this best is if Mathew wrote first (50 AD or earlier), was accessed by Mark (70-75 C.E) after destruction of Temple), and the Matt and Mark are accessed by Luke (90 C.E). So the priority goes Matthew prior to Mark prior to Luke with roughly 50 years span between them and Mark in the middle and author of a later Gospel having access to what has gone before and not working in isolation. Thus the other 6% of Mark not in Matt are now all accepted as Marks additions. This explain why they are not in Matt. The 55% of Matt with which Mark reconciles with his privileged knowledge of Peter is supplemented with additional material Mark thinks should not be omitted. This would contain a picture of Jesus handed down from Peter, i.e. what is called the weakened Jesus, and maybe Peters favourite story about the exorcism incident in Capernaum. What we then get in the 6% not Matt is Peters voice coming through. This material can be singled out in as that which we can be most sure in the Gnostic Gospels reflects the unique voice of a single eye-witness. The remaining 45% of Matt material Mark does not trust. This ironically includes Matthews account of Peter walking on water which indicates Peter did not claim this for himself. If we stick to the Papias tradition which is demanded by this reading then we see Matts more elaborate account of Jesus reduced by Mark the one person who we might expect to preserve Matt where he included details about Peter. If Luke comes last in priority and accesses both Mark and Matt then we have explained 64% of Luke, leaving 36% of additional Luke material still to explain. However we can say that as Luke is 64% Matt/Mark the Matt/Mark tradition is more important to Luke than his other sources. A point which supports the idea Matt/Mark have a priority over the Lukes other sources.

I want to compare Augustinian hypothesis to The Markan Priority that Mark is accessed by Matt and Mark is accessed by Luke. We do not assume Luke copied Matt. If Matt accessed Mark then he extensively accessed Mark, to a comprehensive degree i.e. 94% of Mark. It was Matt who was really focused on Mark and the preservation of Mark material is by the dint of Matt achieving 94% coverage of clear importance to Matt. This creates the question of why not the rest. Markan Priority indeed provides and explanation for half of what Matt leaves out. Some of this stuff is awkward and weakens Jesus but not the other half. It does not explain why Matt leaves out the material covered by Mk. 1:21-28. This too needs to be explained. So there is an additional concern here. There is then a further 45% of Matt passages not taken from mark needing further explanation. If we turn to Luke we find Luke uses 42% of Mark. A much lower figure than Matt. So if Luke leaves stuff out an explanation is not so pressing because Mark is clearly not so important to Luke as a source? However there is now 58% of Luke in need of further explanation. As this is the larger part of Luke this implies it is the missing sources for the 58% that have a slight but still greater importance to Luke as judged by the amount of space he favours them over Mark. The Markan Priority leaves more material open to question than the Augustinian hypothesis priority with its explanatory power less, and it actually creates more questions than the Augustinian hypothesis with respect to Matt leaving out Mk. 1:21-28, which can be hardly be said to weaken Jesus or be an awkward passage, and why does Luke keep it in if Matt wont? The omission is unmotivated and otherwise is itself awkward given Matts preoccupation with preserving Mark. It also introduces other sources more important to Luke than Mark, just when Markan Priority says Mark has priority. There are further motivations behinds Luke account that need to be explained to explain why Luke is pulling in another direction.

Now lets compare TGAs preference drawn from Farrer that Luke copies Matt. We now assume Mark came first and is accessed by Matt and that Luke accesses both Mark and Matt. The same issues with the 94% coverage of Mark by Matt remain. It is still important to Matt that he preserves Mark. And we are still left with the other material that makes up 45% of Matt. However if Luke accesses Matt we just reduced unknown sources in Luke to35% and the need for Q goes. So this model is more efficient than the standard Markan Priority but it is still way less efficient that the Augustinian hypothesis.

So the problems surrounding the general rejection of the Augustinian hypothesis are to do with Textual Criticisms. But I have already done a lot of work on this thread to show that for at least two of the main arguments that support Markan Priority the logic that goes into an anti Augustinian hypothesis position and the data put forward as evidence can be turned around the other way with an inverse logic that is at least equally valid. Proposition B for example, and Students example of Marks poor grammar are not successful arguments

So what arguments are there in favour of Markan Priority or the Farrer hypothesis that remain and that make a solid blow for Mark being the first Gospel.