Is Markan Priority Wrong?

[Furrowed Brow]

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 let’s 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 don’t 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? Let’s 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?

[Furrowed Brow]

OK I came up with an idealised way of making my central point regarding Markan priority.

In the notebook game you are asked to guess who copied who. You are introduced to three fellahs by the name of Matt, Mark and Luke and told they have written their favourite colours in their notebooks. It is suspected someone has copied someone, but it is not known who or how many of the three copied who or who they copied.

• RULES
  1/ anyone copying will only copy a colour they agree they like
  2/ no one has to like a colour
  3/ if someone has copied then everything in their note book has been copied from at least one other person or more.
  4/ copying goes one way only so that once x copies y, y does not copy x.
  5/ a copyist must offer and explanation for each colour they like in the notebook they copy, and an explanation for each colours they do not copy. The caveat is that any colour already explained does not need to be explained again.
  6/ you are allowed to assume another notebook. Additional notebooks count as assumptions.
  7/ you can think up any answer you like.

[center]NOTEBOOKS
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet]
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Violet][/center]

What is the least problematic answer for who copied who?

[The least problematic answer is the answer based on least number of assumptions and explanations. Count your assumptions and count your explanations and grade answers with least number of assumptions first, and then distinguish answers with equal number of assumption by the least number of explanations.]

[ThatGirlAgain]

OK I came up with an idealised way of making my central point regarding Markan priority.

In the notebook game you are asked to guess who copied who. You are introduced to three fellahs by the name of Matt, Mark and Luke and told they have written their favourite colours in their notebooks. It is suspected someone has copied someone, but it is not known who or how many of the three copied who or who they copied.

• RULES
  1/ anyone copying will only copy a colour they agree they like
  2/ no one has to like a colour
  3/ if someone has copied then everything in their note book has been copied from at least one other person or more.
  4/ copying goes one way only so that once x copies y, y does not copy x.
  5/ a copyist must offer and explanation for each colour they like in the notebook they copy, and an explanation for each colours they do not copy. The caveat is that any colour already explained does not need to be explained again.
  6/ you are allowed to assume another notebook. Additional notebooks count as assumptions.
  7/ you can think up any answer you like.

[center]NOTEBOOKS
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet]
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Violet][/center]

What is the least problematic answer for who copied who?

[The least problematic answer is the answer based on least number of assumptions and explanations. Count your assumptions and count your explanations and grade answers with least number of assumptions first, and then distinguish answers with equal number of assumption by the least number of explanations.]

It is really more like this:
[center]NOTEBOOKS
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet, Purple]
(Matt happens to have a Purple loving audience)
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Orange, Anti-Purple]
(Luke’s audience has read Matt but is upset by Purple)
[/center]
There are no other notebooks. Matt and Luke are being inventive for their respective audiences.

What assumptions can make Mark a composite of Matt and Luke? What would his audience be like that he would leave out colors?

[Mithrae]

In the notebook game you are asked to guess who copied who. You are introduced to three fellahs by the name of Matt, Mark and Luke and told they have written their favourite colours in their notebooks. It is suspected someone has copied someone, but it is not known who or how many of the three copied who or who they copied.

• RULES
  3/ if someone has copied then everything in their note book has been copied from at least one other person or more.

[center]NOTEBOOKS
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet]
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Violet][/center]
What is the least problematic answer for who copied who?

Hi Furrowed, and thanks for the interesting topic.

Could I ask what's the rationale behind rule 3? Surely an author could both copy and invent material? As ThatGirl pointed out in her Wiki quote, there are some snippets in Mark which aren't found in Matthew or Luke. You didn't reply to that point, but as your game rules suggest it may well be critical to your argument. Of the three 'additions' listed (not sure if they're the only ones), two fit into your theory that Mark was deliberately portraying a more human Jesus; but why did he insert the nude fellow in the garden?

I've seen some Christians suggest that the young man was Mark himself; not impossible and a reasonable explanation, though without evidence and a little dubious since the poor geographical knowledge displayed in the gospel suggests a non-Judean author. (Would be interested in others' thoughts on that.) But as far as your theory goes, it seems to my mind that Mark's author having been a companion of Jesus (however briefly), or indeed even a disciple of Peter, would make him more likely to use some of his own privileged information in writing a gospel, not merely parroting others with a little revision.

So I'd suggest that since they're notable exceptions to the logical basis for your argument, your theory must first offer genuine explanations for the 'additional' material in Mark.


Secondly, and let me know if I've simply missed your answer to this, but if Mark was looking in large part for reliable information based on commonalities in Matthew and Luke, then why is there so much 'Q' material which he didn't use? (For convenience, this is the Q source based on Luke; also here's a useful hyperlinked parallel columns version of the synoptic gospels.) A lot of the Q material consists of sayings, teachings and parables of Jesus, which obviously wouldn't conflict with the more human Jesus theory you've advanced. You might argue that the scant miraculous content in Q conflicts with a more human Jesus, but that barely scratches the surface of the issue and in any case there were plenty of other miracles Mark did include.

It seems to me that to account for all this common Q material which Mark didn't include, you'll have to include a significant assumption in your argument; a theological agenda which would account for their omission, in addition to the obvious human Jesus idea.


And thirdly, again correct me if I've missed it, but I don't think you've said anything about the relationship between Matthew and Luke. I'm guessing that you don't think that they managed to write all their common Mark material independently, almost word-for-word identical in many cases - which means presumably Luke had access to Matthew. But while that eliminates the need for Q, we're still left with the Mark material which Luke has but Matthew doesn't (blue in your game), plus all the specifically Lukan material (orange, as ThatGirl pointed out).

In any reasonable hypothesis for the synoptic gospels' commonalities, we'll have to recognise that there was copying, revision and either significant amounts of invention or else other, non-extant sources. A theory which (almost) eliminates invention/other sources for Mark hasn't made the scenario simpler if it just means some extra invention/sources from Luke and a lot of extra invention/sources from Matthew.

---------

I'll throw in some more general comments if I may, since it bears on the topic and discussion of gospel origins, historicity, early Christianity and the historical Jesus seem to be minority topics in this forum. A few years back (back in the days of MSN groups) I was in a forum which almost specialised in those subjects; but a common perspective was that Jesus never existed at all, and at least one fellow even argued that Paul also was a 'mythic character' invented by the early... well I suppose he called them early Christians, though I'm not sure why

The vast majority of what I've learned or speculated about this subject comes from online research for responses in that forum, or this one, or a couple of others I've been in at times. So as a poorly-read amateur I tend to stick to a few basic rules in forming my views (not that I'd really thought about them before now):

• Most theories rely on informed speculation or educated guesses
  When you've got various folk suggesting Jesus as a cynic sage, as a revolutionary zealot, as a misguided would-be Messiah and as the mythical creation of a 1st century gnostic sect, it's not hard to see where I got this idea from. This very thread illustrates the point; while in some respects it seems more likely that Matthew/Luke enhanced the divinity of Jesus, Furrowed is correct in pointing out that there's no reason it couldn't simply be Mark enhancing his humanity. A great deal of thought on the subject is necessarily based in interpretation of texts, guesses about the writers' circumstances and even assumptions about the development of the early church.
  
  Points of relative certainty are jewels to be treasured
  Relative is the key word there, of course. But given the above, this is obvious. Some of the main points of 'certainty' I myself bring to the table are:
  - The only gospel which makes an eyewitness claim is John - a little off-topic, but given the similarities with Luke, and Matthew being named after a disciple, it's worth noting.
  - Luke was definitely written sometime after 75CE because it shows dependence on Josephus' Jewish Wars (link).
  - Matthew was written c70-74CE for a Jewish audience. Its strong emphasis that Christ will soon return suggests writing soon after the temple's destruction (link), and elements like the Moses/Jesus parallels in the nativity, the "it's said"/"I say" in the sermon on the mount, emphasis on fulfilled 'prophecies' and the temple veil torn at his death all show a distinct appeal to a renewal of Jewish perspective.
  - Papias the bishop of Hierapolis (c120CE) wrote that there was a gospel written by Mark, Peter's interpreter, and also that the disciple Matthew wrote the sayings of Jesus in the Hebrew tongue.
  
  If in doubt, better assume scholars are right than assume you are
  A common-sense principle with any number of dubious applications. 'til this thread I'd never actually learned much of the reasons why most scholars favour the idea of Markan priority; mostly I took it on authority, since no-one disputed it. I tentatively accept the Q hypothesis in part because a small majority of scholars accept it (and in part because I suspect it's a good candidate for the sayings gospel Papias attributes to the disciple Matthew); I'm looking forward to ThatGirl's comments on Matthew/Luke. On the other hand, I'm unpersuaded by a scholarly majority that GJohn's eyewitness claim (and confirmation by the appendix's author) is false, because I've yet to see any strong evidence on that point.

Coming somewhat back to the thread topic, I'd suggest that there's nothing against (or in favour of) Markan priority coming from my second 'rule.' On the other hand, I suspect that there's a fairly significant majority of scholars who favour Markan priority - as I say, I've never even really seen it disputed before now. Thoughts and discussion on the topic are always interesting and informative, however.

[Furrowed Brow]

It is really more like this:

Yes of course we can tweak and play with the conditions but so far I’m not hearing back an appreciation of the point being made regarding economy of explanation, and this is leading me to labour the same point ad nauseum. I’m sure I must be boring you by now. Once we can agree there is a principle of economy of explanation to consider then we can decide which answer is in broad strokes the most economical regarding extra assumptions , additional explanations called on, and appeals to accidental occurrences etc. For example, and to continue to repeat the same basic point, if Markan priority is the preferred theory then the theory has to explain why Matt and Luke cover most of the material in Mark or if no explanation isoffered this is put down as an accident, whilst if Mark sourced Matt and Luke it is inevitable most of the material in Mark appears in Matt and Luke. In this respect the evidence put forward (proposition B) to support the Markan priority better supports the inverse priority. This I’d say this a major flaw in the argument.

NOTEBOOKS
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet, Purple]
(Matt happens to have a Purple loving audience)
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Orange, Anti-Purple]
(Luke’s audience has read Matt but is upset by Purple)

There are no other notebooks. Matt and Luke are being inventive for their respective audiences.

You know I’m not against Purple/anti purple caveat. But you did not play the game. I count:

TTG Theory: 2 assumption and14 colours that need to be explained

Assumption: Matt copies =1
Assumption: Luke copies = 1
Luke Explanations: Red, Green, Blue, Amber, Orange, Anti-purple =7
Matt Explanations: Red, Green, Blue, Amber, Violet, Purple = 7

FB’s Theory: 1 assumption and 7 colours need to be explained.
Assumption: Mark copies =1
Mark explanations: Red, Greed, Blue, Amber, Orange, Anti-Purple, Purple = 7

Conclusion FB’s theory is a more economical rationalisation of who copied who.

What assumptions can make Mark a composite of Matt and Luke? What would his audience be like that he would leave out colors?

I can make assumptions, and have given them in previous post as to Mark preferring a more realistic Jesus and looking for agreements in Matt and Luke that are more problematic to a commonsense and worldly viewpoint. In this view the assumption is that Mark is trying to keep closer proximity to common sense reality whilst preserving mains thrusts of the story. However, whilst it is interesting to speculate and you may see major weaknesses in my speculations, this does not detract from the misuse of Proposition B when deployed to support Markan Priority.

[ThatGirlAgain]

It is really more like this:

Yes of course we can tweak and play with the conditions but so far I’m not hearing back an appreciation of the point being made regarding economy of explanation, and this is leading me to labour the same point ad nauseum. I’m sure I must be boring you by now. Once we can agree there is a principle of economy of explanation to consider then we can decide which answer is in broad strokes the most economical regarding extra assumptions , additional explanations called on, and appeals to accidental occurrences etc. For example, and to continue to repeat the same basic point, if Markan priority is the preferred theory then the theory has to explain why Matt and Luke cover most of the material in Mark or if no explanation is offered this is put down as an accident, whilst if Mark sourced Matt and Luke it is inevitable most of the material in Mark appears in Matt and Luke. In this respect the evidence put forward (proposition B) to support the Markan priority better supports the inverse priority. This I’d say this a major flaw in the argument.

Your economy of explanation idea is operating in a vacuum. Looked at in historical context it is clear why Matthew and Luke would invent new sections. No assumptions necessary except known factors in the social environment. In particular Luke invents anti-Matthew sections, quite possibly his reason for writing his Gospel in the first place.

Here is my take on how the Gospels got written.

[****OPINION ALERT****]

With the disastrous First Revolt, Jewish messianic movements get a bad reputation. With the destruction of the Temple, Judaism has its heart torn out. Mark sees an opportunity and writes his Gospel to offer an alternative to a damaged Temple-centric Judaism and simultaneously to distinguish the Jesus movement from the violent form of messianism. Two major themes in Mark are Jesus concealing his status as Messiah from the public and the Apostles constantly misunderstanding what Jesus is saying. Mark is saying that anyone who thinks the recent messianic flavored Revolt had anything to do with the Jesus movement is mistaken.

Meanwhile, the liberal Hillel school of Pharisees, no longer suppressed by the dominant Shammai school, creates rabbinic Judaism as its alternative to traditional Temple-centric Judaism. This new form of Judaism migrates out of warn-torn Judea north to Syria where Matthew’s community lives. Matthew takes the existing Mark and adds new sections to justify Jesus as the true inheritor of Judaic tradition. Among other things, Matthew elevates the status of Jesus well above the rather human Jesus Mark presents because he wants more authority against the competition. We may note that Matthew hates the guts of the Pharisees, who are his rivals. Luke repeats this sentiment, being after all based on Matthew. Why is Mark so much more mild mannered toward the Pharisees? The rift between Jesus followers and mainstream Judaism would have been even greater if Mark wrote last.

Luke, whose community is mainly gentle converts, is concerned that Matthew is re-associating the Jesus movement too closely with traditional Judaism and invoking the specter of violent messianism, partially undoing Mark’s work. He takes Matthew (and a bit more of Mark) and writes a more gentile oriented Gospel to remove the stain of the Revolt from the Jesus movement. Luke takes several sections of Matthew (the genealogy, the nativity) and rewrites them completely to give them an entirely different and more gentile oriented flavor.

Can you provide an explanation of why Matthew and Luke wrote in the first place if Mark did not yet exist? And why Mark would want to write such an abbreviated work compared to Matthew and Luke? His audience would wonder why he left out the whole Matthew/Luke controversy as well as downgrading the status of Jesus. If Mark did not originate the ‘hidden Messiah’ idea, why would Matthew or Luke do so? Matthew especially would want to have Jesus shout it from the rooftops as part of his OT justification program. Having Matthew and Luke inherit the idea form mark, who has a reason for it, makes sense. The other way around does not.

Much of the above content can be found in:


The “Luke copied Matthew� idea is from Farrer. Why Luke copied Matthew is as far as I know my own. If anyone knows an existing source on this, I would be delighted to see it.

NOTEBOOKS
Mark [Red, Green, Blue]
Matt [Red, Green, Amber, Violet, Purple]
(Matt happens to have a Purple loving audience)
Luke [Blue, Green, Amber, Orange, Anti-Purple]
(Luke’s audience has read Matt but is upset by Purple)

There are no other notebooks. Matt and Luke are being inventive for their respective audiences.

You know I’m not against Purple/anti purple caveat. But you did not play the game.

That is right. Your game is rigged by leaving out historical context. Provide a realistic alternative to my take on how the Gospels were written that does not have Mark write first.

[joncash]

Hi all,

I'm not sure what it really matters which of these Gospels were first, as far as the search for Truth goes. All four canonized Gospels were either written by or heavily redacted by (changing the entire meaning of it in the process) the Roman Empire, infusing it with their Babylonian pagan belief in human sacrifice.

Non-adherents to the Christian faith have long pointed out the disparity of character between Jesus Christ and his self-proclaimed followers. It is not difficult to understand why. Many Christians seem to have been taught to cling to the nonsense of the miracles and the God-sponsored murder of Jesus, ignoring what he actually taught.

[Furrowed Brow]

3/ if someone has copied then everything in their note book has been copied from at least one other person or more.

Could I ask what's the rationale behind rule 3? Surely an author could both copy and invent material?

Yes agreed. The game was an idealisation and 3 was the simplest formulation that I thunked up last night around 1.00 AM in bed. In the light of day 3 could be simplified.

• Revised: 3/ if someone has copied then they copied from at least one other person or more.

I don’t think this makes much difference to the final count.

As ThatGirl pointed out in her Wiki quote, there are some snippets in Mark which aren't found in Matthew or Luke. You didn't reply to that point, but as your game rules suggest it may well be critical to your argument. Of the three 'additions' listed (not sure if they're the only ones), two fit into your theory that Mark was deliberately portraying a more human Jesus;

As I say the game is an idealisation to draw out the logic of what it means for “most� of Mark to appear in Matt and Luke. We can make the game more complicated but, remember I am not qualified to build my own theory, I hardly know the text enough for that, and so in this instance I am responding to the argument marshalled to support Markean Priority regarding Proposition B. It is the logic that concerns me as I have explained in the previous post to ThatTheGirl. So yes the other verses in Mark do need to be explained, but that is still quantitatively less explanation than needed for Markan priority. I did not make the game more complicated to include this scenario because I wanted to get the basic point across and make sure it is understood. Qualitatively the explanation I attempted is the inverse argument for insisting Matt and Luke prefer a more divine Jesus: Matt and Luke go in one direction, Mark goes in other. We could flesh out those basic observations with further speculations but the point comes down to the logic and economy of explanation.

but why did he insert the nude fellow in the garden?

Presently I have no idea. So I can only shrug my shoulders and class it as unknown, which I also have to count, but let’s say with some further attention to this point I can think up a reason that fits the “closer to an eye-witness� model then I would not count that as an extra explanation, but if was to invent a whole new reason and motivation for its inclusion then that would be a whole new reason to added to the list.

But as far as your theory goes, it seems to my mind that Mark's author having been a companion of Jesus (however briefly), or indeed even a disciple of Peter, would make him more likely to use some of his own privileged information in writing a gospel, not merely parroting others with a little revision.

Well as far as my untutored speculations go I think you are right the author of Mark would be likely to do just that and what would explain him best is that he is trying to give an account that he can reconcile with any privileged information and what he can reconcile in Matt and Luke.

However this author of Mark is not an eye witness. If he were he would probably have more to say. He might even want to out and out contradict points in Matt and Luke rather than fail to include them. This Mark is more cautious, more academic, maybe more junior in station, not so well recognised, hence less to no early surviving copies of his text. However he rightly or wrongly feels he was closer to one than the authors of Matt and Luke. This author of Mark is kind of looking like the disciple of a disciple.

So I'd suggest that since they're notable exceptions to the logical basis for your argument, your theory must first offer genuine explanations for the 'additional' material in Mark.

Well sure. As long as we a priori understand that incompetence on my part when forming my own theory don’t mitigate against misuse of logic on behalf of Markan Priority.

Secondly, and let me know if I've simply missed your answer to this, but if Mark was looking in large part for reliable information based on commonalities in Matthew and Luke, then why is there so much 'Q' material which he didn't use?

This would be the stuff he could not reconcile with privileged knowledge or that he could attest to its provenance. So this Mark did not trust the Q information sufficiently enough to include it. This version of Mark is not prepared to state Q belongs to the earliest versions of the narrative of which he is aware.

It seems to me that to account for all this common Q material which Mark didn't include, you'll have to include a significant assumption in your argument; a theological agenda which would account for their omission, in addition to the obvious human Jesus idea.

Let's stick to the assumptions:

• 1/ Mark is sticking to what he knows or is sure of or that which he can reconcile with what he knows
  2/ Mark accessed both Matt and Luke.

And thirdly, again correct me if I've missed it, but I don't think you've said anything about the relationship between Matthew and Luke. I'm guessing that you don't think that they managed to write all their common Mark material independently, almost word-for-word identical in many cases - which means presumably Luke had access to Matthew.

Presently I suspect Luke accesses Matt, and Mark accesses Luke and Matt.

But while that eliminates the need for Q, we're still left with the Mark material which Luke has but Matthew doesn't (blue in your game), plus all the specifically Luke and material (orange, as ThatGirl pointed out).

Yes it does, that is the whole point of looking at the logic of what it means to access or copy two sources. 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 don’t 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.

I don’t think it is a heavy burden to assume Mark closer to an eye-witness than the authors of Matt and Luke. I also think it is minimal to assume he is not prepared to underwrite what he knows was not what he was told, or maybe even contrary to what he was told. If Matt’s Jesus had been in development and ideas like the virgin birth floating around the early Christian community gaining currency through Matt and Mark’s eye witness had quipped with a wry smile over supper one evening �Mary was never a virgin� and then pulled this face , Mark can’t then underwrite the claim she was a virgin in his account. What we get in Mark is filtered through his privileged knowledge and he is only prepared to add stuff that allows him to preserve his integrity. On this view if Matt or Luke say something major and Mark leaves it out then it is likely Mark strongly feels he cannot include it. Just because Mark mentions certain miracles, does not mean he is going to sign up to every embellishment and later fabrication. This author of Mark is trying to protect what he thinks is the real heritage. He’s a conservative, and he has integrity. My Mark sound like this fellah:

Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered. It was not, however, in exact order that he related the sayings or deeds of Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor accompanied Him. But afterwards, as I said, he accompanied Peter, who accommodated his instructions to the necessities [of his hearers], but with no intention of giving a regular narrative of the Lord's sayings. Wherefore Mark made no mistake in thus writing some things as he remembered them. For of one thing he took especial care, not to omit anything he had heard, and not to put anything fictitious into the statements. Matthew put together the oracles [of the Lord] in the Hebrew language, and each one interpreted them as best he could [wiki]

Presently I ain’t got a date for the death of Papias’ Mark but if he died close to Peter that puts the Gospel of Mark before roughly 67 C.E, or if Mark outlived Peter it could be later, but it still puts the content of Mark inside the first century. We also can be more than reasonably assured that what Mark says is what Peter said and taught and not full of later 2nd or 3rd century embellishments. It also puts much of the content of Matthew (Luke too) inside the 1st century because Mark is responding to them. However we do not know if what we now know as Matt and Luke contain everthing Mark was responding to. So we can't with certainty place all Matt and Luke inside the 1st century. We can still leaveopen the possibilities for later interpolations within Matt and Luke, and as they were likley more widely distributed (as the record of survivng Papyrus bears out) there is far greater chance of interpolations within the Matt tradition passed off as original by the time we get to even the 2nd century than there is for Mark which we can now be far more sure is much closer to how Mark wrote it 1st century. The strongest candidates for later interpolations might be the kind of stuff we find in Luke but not Matt and certainly nothing found in Mark.

In any reasonable hypothesis for the synoptic gospels' commonalities, we'll have to recognise that there was copying, revision and either significant amounts of invention or else other, non-extant sources. A theory which (almost) eliminates invention/other sources for Mark hasn't made the scenario simpler if it just means some extra invention/sources from Luke and a lot of extra invention/sources from Matthew.

As far as sources go this creates no new problem and resolves who Mark was most likely was and who was his source. In this hypothesis Mark the author and Mark the Gospel is explained, and Mark is underwriting the provenance of chunks of Matt and Luke, the same chunks that the Markan Priority say came from Mark. We now we have greater assurance these aspects are closer to an original witness Peter. The rest of Matt and Luke identified as Q still needs explaining as before, but however they came by Q info we are now more sure it is not original stuff because Mark won’t use it – or at least we know it is not what Peter taught - and maybe he can't use some of it if it was not in his copies of Matt and Luke. Exactly where Matt and Luke get Q info is interesting, and still needs explaining, we know it ain’t Peter, but the problem just became less urgent unless the project is to justify the provenance of Q info. But that is its own problem. I'll go with the hints given by Papias and say Matthew was a collater of sayings and interpreter. This Matthew does not have direct access to an eye-witness like Mark. but Matt is being distributed amongst the early Christian community. To a fellah with Mark's temperament for rigour and proximity to Peter this would be enough to draw down his eye on what was being passed around in Matt's name. And if we is going to look at Mark he might as well do Luke at the same time.

Let's call this [strike]The Mark Corrective Theory[/strike]....changed my mind let's call this The Mark Approval theory.

1/ It is supported by the lack of early surviving Mark documents
2/ It agrees with Papias
3/ It operates within the bound of logic and is more economical with its explanation and is a far more logical explantion of why most of Mark is in Matt and Luke. (Please note ThatThe Girl)

So Question: With what data does The Mark Approval Theory disagree?


Thanks Mithrae for the remainder of your post which I shall digest.

[Furrowed Brow]

Your economy of explanation idea is operating in a vacuum.

Yes. That was the point. So you could get a clearer look at the logic and understand the principle.

So how are you analysing the historical context? What principles and axioms are you using? My point from the start is Proposition B is a terrible argument to support Markan Priority. The author of that argument is frankly a poor logician. It is a bad argument and does not support Markan Priority. There may be other arguments that are convincing but B is just a mistake. I am running out of ways to illuminate why this is so?

Looked at in historical context it is clear why Matthew and Luke would invent new sections.

Great you have motivated them. That is a rationalisation for sure. You indeed may be right and the facts of the matter are close to the picture you draw. But that does not make Proposition B an argument to support Markan Priority and I worry for any analysis that used B as a premise to support that priority.

No assumptions necessary

Wrong. Just wrong. That is the point of the game.

That is right. Your game is rigged by leaving out historical context.

You really need to reflect on what this means. Is math rigged because we can’t give it a historical context? If you keep your logic straight that is the best antidote to letting interpretation of historical context skew the analysis of the data.

[Student]

So Question: With what data does The Mark Corrective Theory disagree?

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.

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

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

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

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

[ThatGirlAgain]

Your economy of explanation idea is operating in a vacuum.

Yes. That was the point. So you could get a clearer look at the logic and understand the principle.

So how are you analysing the historical context? What principles and axioms are you using? My point from the start is Proposition B is a terrible argument to support Markan Priority. The author of that argument is frankly a poor logician. It is a bad argument and does not support Markan Priority. There may be other arguments that are convincing but B is just a mistake. I am running out of ways to illuminate why this is so?

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

Looked at in historical context it is clear why Matthew and Luke would invent new sections.

Great you have motivated them. That is a rationalisation for sure. You indeed may be right and the facts of the matter are close to the picture you draw. But that does not make Proposition B an argument to support Markan Priority and I worry for any analysis that used B as a premise to support that priority.

Is not saying that Mark wanted to present a more human Jesus a rationalization? The motivations I ascribe to Matthew and Luke are grounded in the historical realities of the era. Why motivation would Mark have?

No assumptions necessary

Wrong. Just wrong. That is the point of the game.

If Matthew and Luke wrote before Mark, what assumptions are needed to justify what they wrote, what they have in common and what they have different? You need the missing Q document plus the M source and the L source and various other assumptions.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Document_Hypothesis

That is right. Your game is rigged by leaving out historical context.

You really need to reflect on what this means. Is math rigged because we can’t give it a historical context? If you keep your logic straight that is the best antidote to letting interpretation of historical context skew the analysis of the data.

History is not math. Else prophecy would be easy. Can you reference me any period in history that developed in a purely logical fashion? If you allow historical context – and why in heaven would you not? – the number of assumptions drops, being replaced by actualities that require no assuming.