Is the Sermon on the Mount historical?

[unknown soldier]

Did Christ really preach the Sermon on the Mount? I can think of some reasons to doubt the Sermon's historicity. Consider the fact that it appears only in Matthew. Mark, Luke, and John omit it. There are at least three reasons why the Sermon appears only in Matthew:

1. Mark, Luke, and John never heard of the Sermon on the Mount.
2. Mark, Luke, and John knew about the Sermon, but they didn't bother to include it in their gospels perhaps thinking it was unimportant.
3. Matthew made up the Sermon on the Mount.

I think that if Christ really preached the Sermon on the Mount, then 1 and 2 are very unlikely. Eliminating those two possibilities, we are left with 3; Matthew fabricated the Sermon which explains very well why only his gospel includes it. If we want to conclude that the Sermon is historical, then we are left with no good idea why Mark, Luke, and John don't include it.

Maintaining a historical view of the Christ story is laden with difficulties like this. If we see the gospels as works of fiction, by contrast, we can much more easily explain their many peculiarities.

[Mithrae]

The gospels say that he wandered around preaching his 'good news,' suggesting that he probably taught fairly similar things in a lot of different locations. Luke's sermon on the plain (Luke 6) obviously has a lot in common with the sermon on the mount, and other features of Matthew's version can be found scattered elsewhere in Mark and Luke. That's pretty much what we'd expect given a few decades of oral tradition based on a real ministry.

I agree that Matthew combined bits and pieces of doctrines attributed to Christ into one, whole sermon. As you say he no doubt got some of those "bits and pieces" from Mark. However, earlier works like Mark would have been more than adequate for that purpose, and no real ministry led by Christ is needed to explain the content of the Sermon on the Mount.

That's debatable, but even if true we could say with similar merit that no real revolutionaries are needed to explain the content of the Declaration of Independence. The content of those documents could both exist with or without their respective historical contexts, but they are highly consistent with their historical contexts and there's no compelling alternative or reason to think otherwise. But the reason why a real ministry of Christ might be required to explain Matthew's Sermon on the Mount is because in those first seven chapters of his gospel it seems that 'Matthew' is addressing a problem he perceived - the tension or contradiction between the Torah and the gospel - which seems more likely to have developed from a real Jewish Jesus rather than originating with the author of Mark. Early in his gospel Mark has Jesus pretty blatantly violating or at least sidelining two of the ten commandments, proclaiming that the Sabbath was made for man and himself the "lord of the Sabbath" (Mark 2:23-28) and dishonouring his mother by all but publicly disowning her (3:31-35), along with contradicting Moses on what makes a person 'unclean' (7:15) and later suggesting that obedience to all these commandments was not enough to attain eternal life (10:17-22). But if this gospel were addressed to gentiles and not based at least vaguely on real Jesus traditions, there's no obvious reason why Mark would have created those contradictions in the first place (particularly dishonouring his mother); they only make sense coming out of an originally Jewish teaching which nevertheless didn't sit entirely well with a heavy emphasis on the Torah.

Matthew tries to resolve those contradictions firstly by portraying Jesus as the second Moses with the legitimate authority to set things straight, and secondly by laying out a pattern in which Jesus doesn't undo or nullify the Torah but rather goes beyond it or "fulfills" it as 5:17 says; Moses said don't kill, but Jesus says don't even indulge the feelings which tempt us to violence; Moses said don't commit adultery, but Jesus says don't even indulge lustful thoughts; Moses said provide documentation for a divorced wife, but Jesus says don't even send her away at all; Moses said to limit vengeance proportional to the injury, but Jesus says don't retaliate at all. Hence when he eventually gets to the stories which Mark places near the beginning of his gospel, the inference would be that in Matthew's view not just the Sabbath but all days are to be treated as holy - so Christians should not work for money on any day but work for God always (6:24) - and not just parents but all people (or all good people) to be honoured alike. The problem being addressed by 'Matthew' in his Sermon on the Mount is obviously one which he didn't create himself and seems incompatible with the view of Mark as a fiction for gentiles, but rather has its roots in an earlier Jewish teaching which was likely the ministry of Jesus himself.

'Matthew' locates his sermon on a mountain because Moses gave his laws from a mountain. After building up the Moses/Jesus parallel in his early chapters (both threatened as infants, both coming out of Egypt etc.), Matthew's sermon is his version of Moses' holiness code (Ex. 20-23). It's introduced with a series of short blessings, rather than commandments, and explicitly compares/contrasts Jesus with Mosaic and other traditions in the "You have heard it said... but I say to you..." section. So there's also excellent reason to suppose that the author took some creative liberties with his material.

Yes, the Christ figure in the gospels does resemble Moses in a lot of ways. It's very possible that Moses along with other figures from the Old Testament form a basis for what the gospel writers and Paul wanted Christ to be.

A lot of ways, from all the gospels? And Paul resembles Moses too, you said in another post? And of course some mythicists insist that Jesus is just like Horus and Mithras etc. etc. too Occasionally such comparisons have merit of course, but it's also worth bearing in mind that people can sometimes read a little more into the stories than is actually there. The first and main reason for examining the early chapters of Matthew a little closer for allegory or symbolism is simply the question "Did the author consider this fact or fiction?" Often there's no clear answer to that, but the fantastic and contradictory nature of the two nativity stories and their absence, despite profound significance if either were true, from the other two gospels would strongly lead us to consider what reasons there might be for Matthew's probable fiction.

Interestingly, to a lesser extent I think the same applies in the expanded story of Jesus' temptation in Matthew 4; what symbolism might there be in Matthew's eleven verses which isn't found in Mark's two? After the forty days in the wilderness Matthew records three specific temptations of Jesus which Mark does not. Difflugia has mentioned that Moses spent forty days and nights on a mountain... but Elijah spent forty days in the wilderness without eating, and upon reaching Horeb encountered three false starts: "Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence" (1 Kings 19). In that comparison, Matthew's 'temptation' story looks like Jesus' search to find God's purpose for him; to satisfy physical needs as with turning stones to bread, to do marvelous works, to rule with great power... or something else, something more subtle? I think it's quite profound, but for the purposes of our discussion it's interesting because it interrupts (and arguably contrasts against) the magnificent Moses theme which otherwise mostly dominates those first seven chapters of Matthew, so I don't think that this temptation story was invented by him but was based on the earlier Q source.

If the Q hypothesis is correct, then by my rough estimate it would seem that two-thirds or more of the Sermon as recorded by 'Matthew' is also Q material... and therefore not invented by the canonical author (the Q source itself may have been the "sayings of Jesus" which Papias said the apostle Matthew recorded, but I suppose that's another discussion). We have good reasons for thinking that 'Matthew' took some creative liberties with his material, as I said, but if much of the Sermon was based on an earlier and less narrative-driven record it would imply a more credible source and leave us with few if any of those reasons for suspecting fictitious content. It would still be hard to imagine that Jesus' words were recollected verbatim even in the Q source, let alone in the two canonical adaptations of it, but we would have much better reasons for supposing that the content and ideas found in the Sermon on the Mount are indeed based on Jesus' historical preaching.

I think Mith has been affected by reading my posts! LOL

I do try to keep reminding myself that one of my main reasons for debate is to learn and challenge my own ideas... though sometimes that ideal can become lost a little in discussions with folk who adopt a combative style of discourse against "apologists" and regularly label me as such. One would hope that you have learned a thing or two from my posts also

[Difflugia]

I have two quick comments:

The problem being addressed by 'Matthew' in his Sermon on the Mount is obviously one which he didn't create himself and seems incompatible with the view of Mark as a fiction for gentiles, but rather has its roots in an earlier Jewish teaching which was likely the ministry of Jesus himself.

In this particular vein, I think Matthew's guard at the tomb falls into the category of problems that Matthew addressed, but didn't create. The only reason to include a guard would be to address claims that the body of Jesus was stolen by the disciples. The question (for me, anyway) is if the claim of a stolen body came before Mark, i.e. was there an empty tomb tradition prior to Mark and a corresponding refutation claim of a stolen body (which Mark chose not to address), or were claims of a stolen body a response to Mark's Gospel itself?

If the Q hypothesis is correct, then by my rough estimate it would seem that two-thirds or more of the Sermon as recorded by 'Matthew' is also Q material... and therefore not invented by the canonical author (the Q source itself may have been the "sayings of Jesus" which Papias said the apostle Matthew recorded, but I suppose that's another discussion).

An interesting take on the subject is Dennis R. MacDonald's Two Shipwrecked Gospels. He claims that what Papias calls Matthew's Logoi of Jesus is the Q document (or, rather, is the document that fulfills the role assigned to Q, but MacDonald reconstructs it differently than traditional Q theorists):

This book attempts to reconstruct two lost Gospels, one of which probably was the earliest of all, what scholars conventionally call Q, probably from the German word Quelle, "source." Tragically, no manuscript of this document exists, and there is no uncontested external witness to it, but, as we shall see, it is highly likely that the Synoptic Evangelists (unknown authors we have come to call Matthew, Mark, and Luke) all relied on a document that no longer exists. Although scholars have published several speculative reconstructions of Q on the basis of Matthew-Luke agreements against Mark, this volume proposes an alternative methodology for recovering the lost Gospel and produces a text nearly twice as long. To distinguish my reconstruction from others, I refer to it as Q+ or as the Logoi of Jesus, its most likely original title.

The second Gospel reconstructed in this volume survives exclusively in citations by later authors. The Exposition of Logia about the Lord, a five-volume work by Papias, bishop of Hierapolis (in Asia Minor), apparently was a running commentary on three earlier Gospels: those that we know as Mark and Matthew and a third with affinities with Matthew. I will propose that this third Gospel was none other than the lost Gospel, the Logoi of Jesus. Papias did not restrict himself to information derived from these books; he supplemented them with lore provided by people who had spoken with Jesus followers. Although publications of the Papian fragments are readily available elsewhere, to my knowledge no one has rearranged them into their most likely sequence and speculated systematically concerning content that is missing in the gaps between them. Papiass first four books apparently followed the narrative sequence of the Gospel of Matthew; the fifth regaled activities of Jesus followers up to his own day, circa 110 C.E. One therefore may consider his oeuvre as an extended Gospel with running commentary.

Edit: I just noticed that there's a brief Wikipedia page about MacDonald's book and theory.

[unknown soldier]

I agree that Matthew combined bits and pieces of doctrines attributed to Christ into one, whole sermon. As you say he no doubt got some of those "bits and pieces" from Mark. However, earlier works like Mark would have been more than adequate for that purpose, and no real ministry led by Christ is needed to explain the content of the Sermon on the Mount.

That's debatable, but even if true we could say with similar merit that no real revolutionaries are needed to explain the content of the Declaration of Independence. The content of those documents could both exist with or without their respective historical contexts, but they are highly consistent with their historical contexts and there's no compelling alternative or reason to think otherwise.

Works of fiction can be and often are "highly consistent with their historical contexts," so recognizing that a story is set in a situation we know to be historical doesn't help us much in determining if it is a true story. We really don't know that real revolutionaries penned the Declaration of Independence because its contents appear to fit a historical era we know some things about but because we have a lot of evidence, much of which is solid and/or independent evidence, that those revolutionaries existed. The evidence for the gospel story, by contrast, is no where near as good as that for the Declaration. We have no solid evidence at all for any gospel character and little if any truly independent evidence for any of them and that includes Christ.

But the reason why a real ministry of Christ might be required to explain Matthew's Sermon on the Mount is because in those first seven chapters of his gospel it seems that 'Matthew' is addressing a problem he perceived - the tension or contradiction between the Torah and the gospel - which seems more likely to have developed from a real Jewish Jesus rather than originating with the author of Mark.

I'm not sure why Matthew or any other gospel writer could not have had beliefs like those attributed to Christ without a real Christ. There's no reason to insert Christ when you have other people we know existed who could easily have had those kinds of unorthodox ideas.

Early in his gospel Mark has Jesus pretty blatantly violating or at least sidelining two of the ten commandments, proclaiming that the Sabbath was made for man and himself the "lord of the Sabbath" (Mark 2:23-28) and dishonouring his mother by all but publicly disowning her (3:31-35), along with contradicting Moses on what makes a person 'unclean' (7:15) and later suggesting that obedience to all these commandments was not enough to attain eternal life (10:17-22). But if this gospel were addressed to gentiles and not based at least vaguely on real Jesus traditions, there's no obvious reason why Mark would have created those contradictions in the first place (particularly dishonouring his mother); they only make sense coming out of an originally Jewish teaching which nevertheless didn't sit entirely well with a heavy emphasis on the Torah.

Uh, Mith, if Mark's gospel is addressing Jewish beliefs, then is that not good evidence that Mark's gospel isn't meant for Gentiles only but Jews too? If your assumption that Mark is addressed to Gentiles is confounded by the evidence you yourself have cited, then why not conclude that the Markan Gentile-reader hypothesis is wrong? If you make that very obvious and logical conclusion, then there is no need to insert a historical Christ into the mix.

Yes, the Christ figure in the gospels does resemble Moses in a lot of ways. It's very possible that Moses along with other figures from the Old Testament form a basis for what the gospel writers and Paul wanted Christ to be.

A lot of ways, from all the gospels? And Paul resembles Moses too, you said in another post?

It's very common for the Bible writers to base their stories on earlier stories. Christ (as well as Paul) like Moses, was a Jewish religious leader appointed by God to lead his people into a "promised land." Both had magical powers they used to demonstrate that they truly were sent by God. These similarities are unlikely to be coincidental.

...the fantastic and contradictory nature of the two nativity stories and their absence, despite profound significance if either were true, from the other two gospels would strongly lead us to consider what reasons there might be for Matthew's probable fiction.

That demonstrates that Matthew was not above making stuff up.

We have good reasons for thinking that 'Matthew' took some creative liberties with his material...

What did Matthew lie about regarding the Sermon on the Mount?

...if much of the Sermon was based on an earlier and less narrative-driven record it would imply a more credible source and leave us with few if any of those reasons for suspecting fictitious content.

Maybe the Sermon on the Mount wasn't based on any source except Matthew's creative fiction-writing skills. Even if he did base the sermon on earlier sources, those sources could be as fictional as anything Matthew could make up. Fiction can be fiction no matter when it's written.

[Mithrae]

But the reason why a real ministry of Christ might be required to explain Matthew's Sermon on the Mount is because in those first seven chapters of his gospel it seems that 'Matthew' is addressing a problem he perceived - the tension or contradiction between the Torah and the gospel - which seems more likely to have developed from a real Jewish Jesus rather than originating with the author of Mark.

I'm not sure why Matthew or any other gospel writer could not have had beliefs like those attributed to Christ without a real Christ. There's no reason to insert Christ when you have other people we know existed who could easily have had those kinds of unorthodox ideas.

Early in his gospel Mark has Jesus pretty blatantly violating or at least sidelining two of the ten commandments, proclaiming that the Sabbath was made for man and himself the "lord of the Sabbath" (Mark 2:23-28) and dishonouring his mother by all but publicly disowning her (3:31-35), along with contradicting Moses on what makes a person 'unclean' (7:15) and later suggesting that obedience to all these commandments was not enough to attain eternal life (10:17-22). But if this gospel were addressed to gentiles and not based at least vaguely on real Jesus traditions, there's no obvious reason why Mark would have created those contradictions in the first place (particularly dishonouring his mother); they only make sense coming out of an originally Jewish teaching which nevertheless didn't sit entirely well with a heavy emphasis on the Torah.

Uh, Mith, if Mark's gospel is addressing Jewish beliefs, then is that not good evidence that Mark's gospel isn't meant for Gentiles only but Jews too? If your assumption that Mark is addressed to Gentiles is confounded by the evidence you yourself have cited, then why not conclude that the Markan Gentile-reader hypothesis is wrong? If you make that very obvious and logical conclusion, then there is no need to insert a historical Christ into the mix.

As with so many of your threads, your interest seems to be focused almost exclusively on whether or not you can force a crowbar into the possibility that the available evidence might be explained without the existence of Jesus and make that possibility out to be the best conclusion. A constant refrain of "inserting" a historical Christ into the mix - rather than reading the source texts for what they plainly say about the man - makes this intention clear. You're certainly welcome to speculate that the author of Mark invented the genre of historical fiction (or even more unusually, historical fiction to be believed and taken seriously) rather than merely recording and building on stories and legends of a revered figure as found in so many other cases like Alexander, Augustus, Hillel and so on. You can insert those ideas into the mix if you are determined to, and if you ever find any evidence to support that speculation we might even have grounds to take it seriously.

Asking "does the Sermon on the Mount prove the existence of Jesus?" would be a little asinine, but that's the angle you are using by arguing that "no real ministry led by Christ is needed to explain the content of the Sermon on the Mount" and "there is no need to insert a historical Christ into the mix," which would obviously be a strawman victory at best. Of course, as I've argued, the fact that the Sermon appears to address a particular problem which preceded it does indirectly lend further weight to the historical context and ministry directly outlined by Mark and Matthew, so it's not all that much of a victory. We can happily recognize the bare truth in your comment that there is no need, no absolute necessity to conclude Jesus' existence based solely on these considerations you have raised... it just happens to be the more plausible conclusion to be reached, even from examining your chosen target of straw

[unknown soldier]

As with so many of your threads, your interest seems to be focused almost exclusively on whether or not you can force a crowbar into the possibility that the available evidence might be explained without the existence of Jesus and make that possibility out to be the best conclusion.

Well, maybe that is the best conclusion. Why is the nonexistence of Christ such a problem for you? Without him, there is no salvation, and if he didn't exist many people would then be very upset. I've noticed people get very upset over even the suggestion that Christ didn't exist. I hope that kind of emotion does not cloud our judgment as we consider issues regarding the historical Christ.

A constant refrain of "inserting" a historical Christ into the mix - rather than reading the source texts for what they plainly say about the man - makes this intention clear.

I've read a lot of the sources for Christ including the New Testament, of course, as well as Josephus and Tacitus. These texts in some ways tell us a historical Jesus existed. Am I obligated to believe them?

You're certainly welcome to speculate that the author of Mark invented the genre of historical fiction (or even more unusually, historical fiction to be believed and taken seriously) rather than merely recording and building on stories and legends of a revered figure as found in so many other cases like Alexander, Augustus, Hillel and so on.

Actually, Mark probably did rely on older stories when he wrote his gospel. Do those Christ stories need to be true?

Asking "does the Sermon on the Mount prove the existence of Jesus?" would be a little asinine, but that's the angle you are using by arguing that "no real ministry led by Christ is needed to explain the content of the Sermon on the Mount" and "there is no need to insert a historical Christ into the mix," which would obviously be a strawman victory at best.

Why do we need a historical Christ to explain the Sermon on the Mount? Matthew could have made it up and/or relied on older fiction written by other people when he wrote the Sermon. And I never asked if the Sermon on the Mount proves the existence of Jesus. It obviously does not prove a historical Christ.

Of course, as I've argued, the fact that the Sermon appears to address a particular problem which preceded it does indirectly lend further weight to the historical context and ministry directly outlined by Mark and Matthew, so it's not all that much of a victory.

Why would any kind of theological problem with Judaism presumably addressed by the Sermon on the Mount make the historicity of Christ more probable? Any influential member of the emerging Christian sect may have come up with doctrine that Matthew thought needed to be smoothed over. That member need not be Christ.

We can happily recognize the bare truth in your comment that there is no need, no absolute necessity to conclude Jesus' existence based solely on these considerations you have raised... it just happens to be the more plausible conclusion to be reached, even from examining your chosen target of straw...

I don't get your logic at all. If Christ isn't necessary to explain the evidence we have, then why insist we include Christ in our assumptions? I don't agree that assuming Christ existed makes anything more plausible. You need to demonstrate that your position is more plausible, not assert it and then complain that I don't agree with it.

[Mithrae]

As with so many of your threads, your interest seems to be focused almost exclusively on whether or not you can force a crowbar into the possibility that the available evidence might be explained without the existence of Jesus and make that possibility out to be the best conclusion.

Well, maybe that is the best conclusion. Why is the nonexistence of Christ such a problem for you?

Why is the probable historicity of Jesus such a problem for you? I'm not the one starting thread after thread on the topic I responded to your question about the Sermon on the Mount only to find (admittedly unsurprisingly, and pretty strongly hinted already in the OP) that it was just another strawman regarding Jesus' historicity. Feel free to let us know if you ever actually find a good reason for suspecting that Paul, Josephus, Mark, Tacitus etc. were all wrong about even the bare fact of his existence.

[unknown soldier]

Well, maybe that is the best conclusion. Why is the nonexistence of Christ such a problem for you?

Why is the probable historicity of Jesus such a problem for you?

It's terrible discourse to answer a question with a question. Please answer my question: Why is the nonexistence of Christ such a problem for you?

I'm not the one starting thread after thread on the topic...

That must be very difficult for you. All that scrutiny over Christ's existence just looms like the Sword of Damocles.

I responded to your question about the Sermon on the Mount only to find (admittedly unsurprisingly, and pretty strongly hinted already in the OP) that it was just another strawman regarding Jesus' historicity.

How is anything I've posted "just another strawman regarding Jesus' historicity"? I think the historicity of the Sermon on the Mount is very germane to Christian apologetics. In case you haven't noticed, that's what this forum is meant for--debating Christian apologetics.

Feel free to let us know if you ever actually find a good reason for suspecting that Paul, Josephus, Mark, Tacitus etc. were all wrong about even the bare fact of his existence.

I never said they were all wrong about Christ's existence. Do I have a burden to prove them wrong?

Anyway, Mith, now that you've blown off some steam over doubting Christ's existence, may we get back to the issue of the historicity of the Sermon on the Mount? If it makes you feel any better, even if the Sermon never happened, a Jesus might still have existed. Your hopes for salvation are not then forlorn.

[Goose]

Thats quite badly overstating the argument to say, "all of the details of his life have been pressed into that mould." Thats a patently untenable assertion. Frankly, I cant imagine why one would even assert such a thing.

If you can't imagine such a thing, then you're in the position of claiming that allegorical fiction isn't a thing (or at least not a Jewish thing)...

Youre missing the point entirely. Your assertion, "Matthew's Jesus is the new Moses and all of the details of his life have been pressed into that mould," is patently untenable. One needs merely a cursory knowledge of the lives of each character to know there are numerous details about the life of Jesus that do not fit a Mosaic pattern. So when I say I cant imagine why one would assert such a thing, I mean I cant imagine why one who has even a beginner level knowledge of the lives of both characters would make such a badly overstated assertion.

I would agree that Matthew seems to frame Jesus as a kind of new Moses at certain points. Nothing particularly controversial about that. Even conservative scholars have argued for the premise. Matthew was writing to a Jewish audience with an intent to show how Jesus is the fulfillment of scripture. So if one wants to argue something like Matthew framed Jesus as a new Moses giving him a Mosaic flavor whenever the opportunity presented itself, I think something like that kind argument could be made from the evidence. But if you want to argue something along the lines that Matthews Jesus was just a rehashing of the life of Moses, then, uh, no.

It's good that I didn't claim it's "just a rehashing," then. Jesus was cast as a new Moses character with enough winks from Matthew to the audience to pull us into the story. The fictional Jesus of the Gospels may be the recasting of a historical Jesus, but unfortunately, whether such a Jesus actually existed is lost to us. Since not all fiction (even with partially realistic characters) is based on true stories, the fictional Jesus may not be, either.

When you say "such a Jesus" you are referring to an historical Jesus the Gospels are based on, right? If you are, the existence of an historical Jesus isnt lost to us anymore than the existence of an historical Pontius Plate or Gamaliel the Elder. Like the details of Pilates life the details of Jesus life may be a bit blurry on some points such as exactly what he said during sermon on the mount or the cross. But not whether or not there was an historical Jesus that gave sermons and died by crucifixion. Thats another untenable position that doesnt follow from Matthews Jesus being cast as the new Moses.

Prove its fictional.

All four Gospels, Acts, the Pauline epistles, and Revelation include details that cannot be true in a historical sense. The Jesus of history wasn't born of a virgin, didn't turn water into wine, wither a fig tree with his mind, walk on water, have a literal conversation with Moses and Elijah, come back from the dead, mysteriously appear inside of a locked room, levitate to heaven, nor did he speak to anyone from beyond the grave.

Thats your proof the sermon on the mount was fictional? Pointing to stuff you dont believe happened? With that kind of logic I can point to the crucifixions, something we know can and did happen, therefore the sermon on the mount is historical. Not to mention using your reasoning Caesars entrance into the senate house prior to his assassination was fictional because the narratives from Nicolaus of Damascus, Plutarch, and Suetonius include details such as omens, apparitions, and supernatural events.

Those stories include elements that could be historical by simple virtue of not being impossible, but separating historical bits out of a narrative that's fictional overall isn't as simple as dividing between possible and impossible. If so, then we should think that the inspiration for the fictional Count Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, fed on blood (possible) even though we know he wasn't undead (impossible).

Youre royally Begging the Question here by assuming the Jesus narrative is fictional overall. As for the analogy to Dracula. That analogy fails because we know Bram Stokers Dracula was a fictional novel. We know it was meant as fiction because we have 1) Bram Stokers notes showing how he created the characters, 2) the original publishers publication notices placing it in a fictional genre, 3) reviews from readers at the time of publication which understood it was fiction, and 3) it falls into the fictional genre of horror and gothic horror fiction.

I may also be making a genre mistake in describing as "fiction" hallucinations that are sincerely recounted. In that case, I'm perhaps incorrectly defining Shirley MacLaine's various books as "fiction." If any of your assertions rely on exactly where Out on a Limb falls on the fiction-nonfiction scale, we can discuss it.

Its not my assertion, but wikipedia classes Out on a Limb as falling into a non-fiction category. So, yeah, it looks like you are making a genre mistake.

Whether it's a retelling of an old story or creation of a brand-new one is an interesting question for historians and New Testament scholars, but almost immaterial to understanding each Gospel itself.

Its not immaterial to the question being asked though. Which is explicitly an historical one Is the Sermon on the Mount historical?

With that statement, I was addressing (as I explicitly quoted) the advice to "understand the focus of the Gospel and the intended audience." If that's what we're doing, then we've moved on to the theological message. The sermon's place in the story Matthew wrote isn't dependent on whether an actual Jesus performed the sermon or not. Just as the various versions of the Mosaic covenant described in Exodus and Deuteronomy are important to Judaism whether Moses (and thus the presentation of the covenant) was fictional, so, too, was the oration delivered from the mount, one from "a level place," one shared myth via oral tradition, or one from Matthew's imagination.

Well the statement from bjs you had responded to was made by him in regards to a chain of exchanges tracing back to where he was answering the OP question which is an historical one. For some odd reason you took his statement to imply "we've moved on to the theological message." Virtually dismissing the historical question in the process in order to move us into what seems to be some pet arguments. So your attempt to move the debate away from an historical one to a theological one seems to be Red Herring.

But instead, what I will do is grant this for the sake of argument. Lets say none of these happened. Lets say Matthew just made all these bits up.

...

The sermon on the mount is exactly what we would expect of the new Moses.

But I think what you want to argue is something like exactly what we would expect of the new Moses if Matthew was recasting his Jesus in the life of Moses. If something like that were the case couldnt we also expect Matthew to explicitly say Jesus was the new Moses?

We could, but that raises two questions. First, is your assertion correct and second, is that universal (or even common) in allegorical fiction?

The first one's easy; Matthew does explicitly equate Jesus with Moses in 2:14-15:

And he arose, took the young child and his mother by night, departed into Egypt, and was there until the death of Herod that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, "Out of Egypt did I call my son."

How is this an explicit equating of Jesus with Moses? Moses isnt even mentioned. If Matthew is equating Jesus at all, hes equating Jesus with the national of Israel. The quote from Matthew here is taken from Hosea 11:1.

"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son."

At the very least, if Matthew was recasting Jesus as the new Moses, we would expect Matthew to have Jesus born in Egypt and leave Egypt as a grown man. Matthew doesnt do that. Matthews story line for Jesus here doesnt have much in common with the story line of Moses aside from them both leaving Egypt. Which can be easily explained, if one cant bring oneself to holding that Jesus flight to Egypt was historical, by Matthews agenda of seeing Jesus fulfill the scriptures through, in this case, aligning Jesus as a typology with Israel.

The second question can be addressed with at least one other Moses example from the Bible itself. The "two witnesses" of Revelation 11 are described as having the superpowers of Moses, Elijah, and Elisha. Since superpowers are fictional to begin with, there's not much question that they are intentional references to Moses (as were the powers of Elijah and Elisha in the first place), but the only reference to Moses in Revelation is a single mention of his "song" in 15:3.

Like I said, an explicit mention isnt needed its just something we might expect which is why I said as much and posed it as a question, not an assertion. What I had in mind was some kind of explicit reference to Jesus being the new Moses or perhaps the last Moses. Something like what Paul does with the "last Adam" reference to Jesus in 1 Cor 15:45.

And youve not addressed the argument regarding the number of explicit mentions of the name Moses in Mathew being the least of the Gospels. Appealing to Revelations doesnt help because we already have the precedent set in the Gospels for numerous mentions of Moses. So we can expect this in Matthew especially since its argued Matthew used Mark who mentions Moses explicitly eight times.

In Matthew, Moses name doesnt even appear for the first time until chapter eight whereas Moses name appears for the first time in the first chapter of Mark, the second chapter of Luke (ten times in total, nineteen more in Acts), and the first chapter of John (twelve times in total). I suppose it could be argued Matthews first explicit mention of Moses by name doesnt come until chapter eight (the story of the cleansing of the leper 8:4) because hes following Mark and thats where Mark first mentions Moses (1:44). But surely we could expect Matthew to at least drop the name Moses somewhere earlier if he is casting Jesus as the new Moses? It just seems to run against expectations that Matthews Gospel would seem to be the least laden with explicit mentions of Moses by name if it is the Gospel which is recasting its central figure as the new Moses.

If the sermon on the mount is exactly what we would expect of the new Moses wouldnt we expect the new Moses to also ascend the mountain, receive a revelation from God, descend the mountain, and then deliver the teaching to the people as Moses did in Exodus (19:21, 25)? Matthew seems to imply the inverse where Jesus ascends, the people follow, and Jesus teaches the people up on the mountain (5:1-2, 28-29).

If Matthew were a hack, then you're right, we would. Perhaps he wasn't, though.

Perhaps, huh? Using your two premise argument here, you can go one of two ways now.

You can commit the fallacy of Denying the Antecedent in order to infer Im wrong.

1. If Matthew were a hack, then Goose is right, we would expect that.
2. Matthew was not a hack, though.
3. Therefore, Goose is wrong, we would not expect that. (invalid argument, fallacy of denying the antecedent)

Or you can make a valid argument and concede Im right.

1. If Matthew was a hack, then Goose is right, we would expect that.
2. Matthew was a hack.
3. Therefore, Goose is right, we would expect that. (via Modus Ponens)

Thereby leading to the obliteration of your argument.

1. If Matthew was casting Jesus as the new Moses, then Jesus would ascend the mountain, receive a revelation from God, descend the mountain, and then deliver the teaching to the people as Moses did in Exodus.
2. Jesus does not ascend the mountain, receive a revelation from God, descend the mountain, and then deliver the teaching to the people as Moses did in Exodus.
3. Therefore, Matthew was not casting Jesus as the new Moses. (via Modus Tollens)

Ill let you pick your poison.

On the other hand, the corollary to your assertion is that the similarities to Moses (though unattributed anywhere else, including in the other Gospels) are mere historical coincidences.

Well so far, theres been very little in the way of actual similarities to Moses so Im good with coincidence as an explanation.

In a story that already contains a number of elements that cannot be nonfiction, how coincidental are otherwise plausible elements allowed to be before your historical method marks them as suspect?

There is so much I could say here it probably deserves a thread of its own. As for your question you may as well be asking me how spooky does a movie have to be before it makes the hairs on the back of my head stand up. Coincidence is a term we assign to events occurring that we perceive to be improbable and appear to not have a casual relationship. But we know coincidences happen, even highly improbable ones. Given enough time and events coincidences, even highly improbable ones, are inevitable. There is truth in the saying that history tends to repeat itself. Allowing our perception of coincidence to be any kind of a reliable threshold for falsity is highly problematic for numerous reasons. 1) Coincidence is subjective. What one person finds coincidental another person may not. 2) Coincidence, as we commonly understand and use it, is most often an intuitional inference based on little more than an our own limited experiences. When we here the assertion "thats too coincidental" or "thats unlikely" or "that probably happened" rarely has there been any rigorous probability assessment done. Its almost always an assertion of probability based on personal intuition. 3) People are notoriously poor at estimating probabilities. Human intuition often irrationally contradicts what the laws of probability suggest.

Consider the example in Daniel Kahnemans Thinking, Fast and Slow.

Steve is randomly selected. "He is very shy and withdrawn, invariably helpful but with very little interest in people or in the world of reality. A meek and tidy soul, he has a need for order and structure, and a passion for detail. Is Steve more likely to be a librarian or a farmer?"

Most people will answer a librarian because their intuition associates the traits given with a librarian and they fail to take into account the fact that, statistically, there are far more farmers than librarians. When that very relevant fact is taken into account Steve is more likely to be a farmer.

Aside from the verbiage used by Matthew at 5:1 being the same as that used in the Septuagint to describe Moses (Exodus 19:3) there doesnt seem to be anything concrete to make the link.

So, nothing concrete aside from the phrase appearing verbatim (twice! Exodus 24:18, too) in reference to Moses and nowhere else. Got it.

Got what? You certainly dont have anything concrete here. Exodus 24:13 applies to Joshua as well with the same verbiage. Although Exodus 19:12 is a warning to not go up into the mountain, its the same verbiage and applies to the people which implies they could go up the mountain like Moses.

Similar verbiage is found elsewhere applying to characters other than Moses and Jesus. As well to Moses in context to where it's not Sinai.

Moses spies Numbers 13:17

Moses up mountain of Abarim Numbers 27:12

Spies from each tribe Deut 1:24

Warriors Deut 1:43

Moses up mountain of Abrahim Deut 32:49

One who is clean Psalm 24:3

All the nations Isaiah 2:3

Many nations Micah 4:2

Elizabeth and John Gospel according to James 22 (although it uses which is from .

And a similar structure in Judith
- Judith 7:13

This verbiage structure with 1. / 2. a preposition of either or / 3. the definite article / 4. seems to have been used often enough in a variety contexts with different people that it seems to be just another way to say someone went up the mountain. Indeed it was even used in context to all the people going up the mountain.

I will say this, though. I do think there is some merit to the argument that has some significance and very well could be a nod to Moses. But I think you are pressing this argument far too hard. Its just not that strong an argument and hardly concrete.

Note also, that 24:18 also puts Moses in the mountain for "forty days and forty nights," which is also the exact duration that Jesus fasted in the wilderness in 4:2. How concrete would you rate that? Coincidence, perhaps?

The duration the rain fell during the flood was "forty days and forty nights" (Genesis 7:4,12). Elijah went without eating or drinking for "forty days and forty nights" (1 Kings 19:8). So not coincidence, rather a euphemism.

Perhaps Jesus enhancements to the Mosaic law (Matthew 5:21-48) is what we would expect from a new Moses. But I dont see how that is a necessary expectation. We might also expect the new Moses to simply affirm the Mosaic law at this point.

Unless Matthew wants the new Moses to introduce a (to coin a phrase) new covenant.

That doesnt follow. Matthew could have had his new Moses simply affirm the law (rather than enhance it) and still introduce a new covenant. So again, this is not a necessary expectation.

And before we read too much into Matthews use of at 5:1 lets keep in mind Matthew also uses very similar verbiage elsewhere (Matthew 14:23, 15:29).

Both of which refer to Jesus in exactly the same way.

What? In Matthew 14:23 Jesus goes up the mountain to pray. In Matthew 15:29 Jesus departed the region and went up the mountain. No discernible parallels to Moses in either use. So, although these usages of are in context to Jesus, they are rather common usages undermining this notion that the verbiage is a concrete signal for introducing the new Moses.

Conversely, Matthew does not use the verbiage when we would expect him to if he were recasting his Jesus in the life of Moses. The most notable is at the transfiguration of Jesus (17:1) where Matthew doesnt use the verbiage. Matthew uses following Mark verbatim (Mark 9:2) even though Exodus uses for Moses ascent up the mountain prior to his transfiguration (Exodus 34:4). If Matthew were recasting his Jesus in the life of Moses then we would expect Matthews transfiguration of Jesus to use the verbiage of Moses transfiguration in Exodus (34:29ff). Especially since its being argued Matthew used Exodus at 5:1 to introduce the sermon on the mount. But Matthew doesnt use Exodus here for the transfiguration, he uses Mark. Matthews addition to Mark of at 17:2 could be another nod to Moses (34:29) for the benefit of his Jewish audience. However, if we apply this verbatim argument, then its difficult to maintain the argument Matthew is giving a nod to Moses since Exodus reads .

Another place we might expect Matthew to use or something similar, if Matthew is expected to always use this kind verbiage in relation to Jesus, is Jesus temptation on the mountain at 4:8. But Matthew doesnt use the verbiage there either.

Luke does, but only in the pericopes that he took (or replicated by sheer coincidence) from Matthew, one of which he changed in a way that makes his Jesus both less like Moses and more plausible, both of which are (coincidentally, I'm sure) characteristics of the other ways Luke changed Matthew.

I guess Luke just missed that one at 9:28 even though he was meticulous enough to notice and change the others.

Even Mark used similar verbiage (3:13).

Which may or may not have been a Mosaic reference (Mark's references were consistently more subtle than Matthew's), but let's assume it's not. Mark using similar, but not identical wording isn't exactly evidence that Matthew's exact selection of verb tense and word order is coincidence. One might instead conclude that it's evidence of the opposite.

Sure, if one were arguing in a circle. Mark 3:13 is evidence the verbiage was used in relatively common circumstances having no discernible parallel to Moses. If the counter argument is along the lines of verb tense, Exodus 19:13 uses in the future tense with the same verbiage as 19:3. The future tense appears again at Exodus 24:3. Moreover, Exodus 19:20, 24:15, and 34:2 all deviate from verbiage structure of 19:3 and 24:18.

You are pressing this verbatim argument too hard. The reality is, there were a number of ways to say someone went up the mountain. Even in Exodus itself, when applied to Moses, the verbiage differs at points.

Was there an actual sermon that Matthew adapted to his story of the new Moses? Maybe, but there are few reasons to think that there really was.

I will give you a very good reason. How about the prior probability that a religious teacher would deliver a sermon? By definition thats what a religious teacher does, he/she delivers sermons. We know this happens. It happens weekly, if not daily, all around the world in various religions.

Which is exactly why a fictional religious leader would give a sermon.

Circular reasoning at its finest.

Let's even say that Jesus was totally real. What's the prior probability that someone remembered one of his presumably many sermons and reproduced it forty or so years later, compared to that of fictionalizing a sermon that includes sayings of Jesus built up by forty years of oral tradition?

I have no problem conceding the sermon itself was probably not word for word. But thats irrelevant to whether he gave such a sermon.

If we cast off the parts of the story that are implausible, though, what possible reason is there for thinking that what's left actually happened?

How about the overwhelming evidence that religious teachers deliver sermons?

By that logic, fictional rabbis born of a virgin would, too.

Huh?

One way to determine the overall veracity of a story would be to check the other details.

Sure, but that cuts both ways since theres numerous details in the story that have checked out as historical facts.

How about the evidence we have that Jesus was a religious teacher who delivered sermons?

The Gospels, you mean?

Yep. And other circumstantial evidence scattered throughout the NT as well extra-Biblical such Josephus TF supporting the premise that Jesus was a teacher.

How about the snippets of corroborating evidence in Luke that Jesus gave sermons of similar types at a similar point in the narrative (not long before the healing of the centurions servant) somewhere on or near a mountain (Luke 6:12-20)?

Considering the similarities that extend to exact phrases, it's pretty hard to argue that Matthew and Luke are independent. That's one of the things historians consider, right?

Oh but that reasoning cuts the other way as well. Here Matthew and Luke, at least literarily, are independent.

Even that is a smokescreen, though. Apologists latch onto a the trappings of plausibility in order to slide back in the implausible, or even impossible.

So far youve given nothing that is impossible.

Born of a virgin, water to wine, returned from the dead.

Religious teacher giving a sermon, baptism, crucifixion. I meant impossible about the sermon on the mount. You know, the question for debate?

We arent talking about a supernatural claim here.

Read that part again. I was.

Read the OP question again. It isnt.

[Difflugia]

So when I say I cant imagine why one would assert such a thing, I mean I cant imagine why one who has even a beginner level knowledge of the lives of both characters would make such a badly overstated assertion.

My mistake. I guess I should have recognized that you were addressing hyperbole with hyperbole.

Thats your proof the sermon on the mount was fictional?

Nope. That's the proof that the story of Jesus as a whole is fictional, which is what I was I was talking about when you asked me to "prove it."

Pointing to stuff you dont believe happened? With that kind of logic I can point to the crucifixions, something we know can and did happen, therefore the sermon on the mount is historical.

The barrel of that gun's pointed the wrong way. Stories about ghosts must be fiction. That doesn't mean that stories without ghosts must be nonfiction.

Fictional stories may contain historical events, but if we already know that the author is writing fiction then there's no reason to treat any of the events as historical without independent corroboration.

Not to mention using your reasoning Caesars entrance into the senate house prior to his assassination was fictional because the narratives from Nicolaus of Damascus, Plutarch, and Suetonius include details such as omens, apparitions, and supernatural events.

You seem desperate to have me address Caesar's assassination, so I read the Nicolaus of Damascus account. To be blunt, I don't know why you think that one, at least, helps your case. That particular account has fewer bits of superstitious commentary than many modern works of nonfiction, let alone what I was expecting out of something from the first century B.C. If anything, its way of telling history puts the Gospels in an even harsher light.

Most importantly, Nicolaus gives us as readers an indication of portions of the story that he considered, though interesting enough to include, somewhat dubious. There is a story, for example, that Caesar was given warning of the coming assassination, but he died with the note yet in his hands in a bit of dramatic irony. Neat story, but Nicolaus tempers such a potentially apocryphal, though mundane, story by prefacing it with a "some say."

Hence, though the number of conspirators became so great, no one dared to give information of the fact. Some say, however, that a little before his death, Caesar received a note in which warning of the plot was given, and that he was murdered with it in his hands before he had a chance to read it, and that it was found among other notes after his death.

So, I'm trying to find the "omens, apparitions, and supernatural events." Is the "diadem on the statue" one of them?

Something else, such as it was, took place which especially stirred the conspirators against him. There was a golden statue of him which had been erected on the Rostra by vote of the people. A diadem appeared on it, encircling the head, whereupon the Romans became very suspicious, supposing that it was a symbol of servitude.

It seems that Caesar himself had a rather skeptical view of the affair:

When Caesar discovered what had happened, he convened the senate in the temple of Concordia and arraigned the tribunes, asserting that they themselves had secretly placed the diadem on the statue, so that they might have a chance to insult him openly and thus get credit for doing a brave deed by dishonoring the statue, caring nothing either for him or for the senate.

Here is another example that is the most egregious intrusion that I see of the supernatural into the otherwise sober and measured account:

And fate becomes a still stronger force if indeed one acknowledges her part in these things: on that day his friends, drawing conclusions from certain auguries, tried to prevent him from going to the senate room, as did also his physicians on account of vertigoes to which he was sometimes subject, and from which he was at that time suffering; and especially his wife Calpurnia, who was terrified by a dream that night.

Unless you meant something else that I missed, that's what you claim is competing with the likes of Matthew 14:25-33:

And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking upon the sea. And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, "It is a ghost!" and they cried out for fear. But Jesus immediately spoke to them, saying, "Be of good cheer! It is I. Be not afraid." And Peter answered him and said, "Lord, if it's you, ask me to come to you upon the waters." And he said, "Come." And Peter went down from the boat, and walked on the waters to come to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, "Lord, save me." And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and took hold of him, and said to him, "O one of little faith, why did you doubt?" And when they were gone up into the boat, the wind ceased. And they that were in the boat worshipped him, saying, "Truly, you are the Son of God!"

Youre royally Begging the Question here by assuming the Jesus narrative is fictional overall.

Am I? This is C&A, where magic doesn't get a free pass. I'm not assuming that it's fiction, I'm pointing out that the narrative is fictional because it contains obvious fictional elements. If I were simply claiming that Matthew's fiction because it's in the Bible and we know the Bible's fiction, then you'd be right.

As for the analogy to Dracula. That analogy fails because we know Bram Stokers Dracula was a fictional novel.

That's exactly the analogy that I meant to draw. Since you obviously got it, I was at least that successful. You obviously don't agree that Matthew is fictional, despite containing elements that anywhere else would be considered proof of such. Are you, perhaps, indulging in a bit of begging the question?

We know it was meant as fiction because we have 1) Bram Stokers notes showing how he created the characters, 2) the original publishers publication notices placing it in a fictional genre, 3) reviews from readers at the time of publication which understood it was fiction, and 3) it falls into the fictional genre of horror and gothic horror fiction.

We do have those, but we don't need them. It's enough (for most people, anyway) to note that the antagonist is an undead nobleman.

I suspect that nobody questions whether A Princess of Mars is fiction, despite the foreword penned by Edgar Rice Burroughs that insists that the manuscript is not his own, but that of a man that travelled supernaturally to Mars. If you'd care to engage your historical method and argue otherwise, however, I'd find that entertaining.

The quote from Matthew here is taken from Hosea 11:1.

You're right. Matthew doesn't make an explicit reference.

At the very least, if Matthew was recasting Jesus as the new Moses, we would expect Matthew to have Jesus born in Egypt and leave Egypt as a grown man.

Why? You keep arguing for some arbitrary amount of literalism in allegorical fiction. Do you have something to support that with?

Matthew doesnt do that.

Matthew also chooses to address the expectation of the Davidic Messiah being born in Bethlehem as well as Nazareth as the explanation for the epithets "Nazarene" and "Nazorean." In Matthew, the Jesus family lives in Bethlehem where Jesus is born, covering the Davidic expectation. They then flee to Egypt to escape the slaughter of Jewish baby boys, paralleling the escape of Moses from a similar literary conflict. Finally, they resettle in Nazareth so he can be a "Nazorean."

Matthews story line for Jesus here doesnt have much in common with the story line of Moses aside from them both leaving Egypt.

Don't forget the "slaughter of innocents."

Which can be easily explained, if one cant bring oneself to holding that Jesus flight to Egypt was historical, by Matthews agenda of seeing Jesus fulfill the scriptures through, in this case, aligning Jesus as a typology with Israel.

Perhaps. That has a bit of a Johannine flavor in which Jesus is himself the covenant, but I could see Matthew intending that in parallel with the Moses allusions.

What I had in mind was some kind of explicit reference to Jesus being the new Moses or perhaps the last Moses. Something like what Paul does with the "last Adam" reference to Jesus in 1 Cor 15:45.

I guess we can disagree, but the implicit parallels are strong enough that a more explicit reference would be a literary weakness. Matthew is certainly less subtle than Mark and adds explicit Old Testament quotes to pericopes from Mark where Mark assume the readers will make the connections themselves, but I honestly don't think one can argue that Matthew's Jesus isn't Mosaic enough without a bit of ax grinding.

And youve not addressed the argument regarding the number of explicit mentions of the name Moses in Mathew being the least of the Gospels.

I haven't addressed it because I don't know why you think it matters.

Appealing to Revelations doesnt help because we already have the precedent set in the Gospels for numerous mentions of Moses. So we can expect this in Matthew especially since its argued Matthew used Mark who mentions Moses explicitly eight times.

What?

If the sermon on the mount is exactly what we would expect of the new Moses wouldnt we expect the new Moses to also ascend the mountain, receive a revelation from God, descend the mountain, and then deliver the teaching to the people as Moses did in Exodus (19:21, 25)? Matthew seems to imply the inverse where Jesus ascends, the people follow, and Jesus teaches the people up on the mountain (5:1-2, 28-29).

If Matthew were a hack, then you're right, we would. Perhaps he wasn't, though.

Perhaps, huh? Using your two premise argument here, you can go one of two ways now.

You can commit the fallacy of Denying the Antecedent in order to infer Im wrong.

Technically, you're right. I thought it was a funny way to answer your repeated and unsupported assertion that allegorical fiction requires a weird, slavish literalism. Instead, I'll just be blunt again and ask you to support your assertion.

In the meantime, perhaps you'd like to consider that, despite no explicit statement otherwise, Steinbeck's turtle had allegorical significance beyond its turtleness.

I will say this, though. I do think there is some merit to the argument that has some significance and very well could be a nod to Moses. But I think you are pressing this argument far too hard. Its just not that strong an argument and hardly concrete.

Considering that you're just asserting that verbatim agreement isn't uncommon enough for you, there's not much refutation required. I think, though, that you're underestimating the amount of variation inherent in written language. I'll assume you have a searchable Bible (Greek or English, it doesn't really matter). Pick a few four-word phrases and try to get a feel for how rarely even short phrases get repeated.

I guess Luke just missed that one at 9:28 even though he was meticulous enough to notice and change the others.

Not an argument, but if you'd like some insight into the ways Luke may have used Matthew (or how one particular textual critic thinks about the subject, anyway), read chapter 6 of Mark Goodacre's The Synoptic Problem: A Way Through the Maze, free to download from archive.org with the blessing of the publisher.

[unknown soldier]

I'm going to chime in here.

Rather, look at the style of each Gospel. Try to understand the focus of the Gospel and the intended audience (something I have already discussed a bit in this thread) and you should be able to see why some things were included an others omitted in the individual Gospels.

Oddly enough, that's exactly what we keep telling you. Matthew's Jesus is the new Moses and all of the details of his life have been pressed into that mould.

Thats quite badly overstating the argument to say, "all of the details of his life have been pressed into that mould." Thats a patently untenable assertion. Frankly, I cant imagine why one would even assert such a thing. I would agree that Matthew seems to frame Jesus as a kind of new Moses at certain points. Nothing particularly controversial about that. Even conservative scholars have argued for the premise. Matthew was writing to a Jewish audience with an intent to show how Jesus is the fulfillment of scripture. So if one wants to argue something like Matthew framed Jesus as a new Moses giving him a Mosaic flavor whenever the opportunity presented itself, I think something like that kind argument could be made from the evidence. But if you want to argue something along the lines that Matthews Jesus was just a rehashing of the life of Moses, then, uh, no.

When it comes to issues like those of considering if the Christ figure was based on earlier figures like Moses, we need to ask: Just how much does Jesus need to be like an earlier figure to say with confidence that he was based on that earlier figure? I hope you agree with me that Christ need not be completely like an earlier figure to be based on that earlier figure. Obviously, there will be at least some differences between the two. If Christ was based on Moses, then he need not be said to have parted the Red Sea or to have led the Israelites from Egypt. To conclude that Christ is based on Moses, we just need to ask ourselves if we can sensibly conclude that the similarities between the two cannot be coincidental. What I find most intriguing is how much within the New Testament Christ supersedes Moses. Moses gave the law, and Christ fulfilled it. It just seems unlikely to me that a historical person could pull that off. Since Moses was a myth, then it is probable that only a myth could one-up him.

Just my 2.