Matt, Mark, Luke and John

[zz912]

In the case of the synoptics, there are far too many similarities for me to believe that the apostles wrote those gospels which carry their names, unless they were shameless plagiarisers.

cresourcei.org/synoptic.html

There was some sort of document or documents involved, from which the Gospel writers copied or borrowed at least some of the text.

We had a teaching session back in July presented by our Archbishop, which is rare, as he’s normally too busy for day and a half seminars. He also has a doctorate in Luke.

He made the comment that no-one knows who wrote Luke, and that scholars have spilled oceans of ink trying to pin him down. In his opinion, God doesn’t want us getting all tied up in the authorship as He wants our attention on Christ, not a bunfight about who wrote what.

He also pointed out that at least one (if not more) of the Gospels was written in what might be called “Schoolboy Greek”. Luke is not, being written in more advanced Greek. He gave us a personal example, stating that he himself spoke fluent Italian (and then burst into a couple of Italian sentences to prove the point), saying he had lived in Rome for a few years.

But he said he wrote in schoolboy Italian, never having had the formal training to write more cultured Italian. In a similar way, the author of Mark (and probably Matthew) also wrote in what might be called “Schoolboy” Greek. Which indicates that Greek was probably not the first language of those two Gospel writes, but quite possibly was for the author of Luke (and Acts).

I’ve long accepted the Gospels as coming with the designation (“according to” - Mark, Matthew or whoever), but not necessarily having been written by those Apostles, or apostolic groupies, if you’ll pardon the term.

The trouble for Protestants is that they have to prove everything fits into the “Bible”. Well, it doesn’t. God’s bigger than that.

Well of course Luke is written in more advanced Greek. Luke was from Antioch, a Greek city in Ancient Syria. It was probably his native language. And the same would explain Matthew and Mark, as Aramaic would have been their first language. I fail to see how that weakens the argument for their authorship.

And again, internal evidence indicates an earlier dating to the Gospels, which was my original point.

 

[Abu]

The assumption that the Gospels were written originally in Greek has nothing to support it…

As Claude Tresmontant, who taught medieval philosophy at the Sorbonne and was awarded the Maximilian Kolbe prize in 1975 for his work, gives the evidence and concludes in *The Hebrew Christ *(Translated by Kenneth D Whitehead, Franciscan Herald Press, 1989, p319) – “all four of the Gospels….were evidently translations into Greek from earlier texts originally composed in Hebrew.”

In 1982, Dom Bernard Orchard, O.S.B., alerted Catholics to the dangers of false Catholic scholarship, as English scholar John Beaumont has recalled in an article (“Kulturkampf and the Gospel”) in “Culture Wars”, Dec 1996:
"Since 1946, the majority of Catholic professors of the New Testament have given their support to the hypothesis of the priority of the Gospel of St. Mark, on grounds . . . of internal evidence alone.

“In practice, this has meant that they deny that the Apostle St. Matthew could have published his own Gospel; and this, in turn, amounts to saying that all the Church Fathers and early Councils erred on a matter of fact in saying St. Matthew wrote his own Gospel. In other words, the modern biblical ‘authorities’ are committed to denying that the Church has accurately transmitted the true tradition regarding the authorship of the Gospels.”

It is generally accepted by scholars that Luke and Matthew used the works of Mark and Q as sources for their gospels. Likewise, it is generally accepted that all three gospels were written originally in Greek, with the possibility of Aramaic as well. The authors of the book Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus, in their research, show that those positions may not be right.

Bivin and Blizzard relate research by Dr. Robert L. Lindsey as to the history of the synoptic gospels. Within five years after the death of Jesus, a biographer (believed to be Matthew) recorded the story of Jesus in Hebrew. At once, there was a demand in the Greek-speaking churches for a translation of the biography into Greek. A very literal translation was made. A few years later, stories and parts of stories were removed and arranged topically. Shortly after, a Greek author tried to reconstruct the story. Luke used the latter two of these records as his sources. Mark used Luke’s work and the topically-arranged Greek as his sources. Matthew used Mark’s work and the topically-arranged Greek as his sources. The current gospel may have been written by someone other than the Matthew who is believed to have written the original biography.

Thus, if this is correct, the original writing was composed in Hebrew, not Greek, or even Aramaic. The authors, throughout their book, present evidence to support their position. Statistics are quoted to show that over 90% of the Bible, including Old Testament quotes in the New Testament, was written in Hebrew, with about 1% in Aramaic, and the rest in Greek. If Bivin and Blizzard are right, there needs to be a change in thinking about the origin of the synoptic gospels and the resultant translations. They quote from Eusebius in Ecclesiastical History, giving evidence that it was known in his day that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew. Eusebius himself had quoted other writers, Papias (Book III, Chapter 39, page 127), Irenæus (Book V, Chapter 8, page 187), Origen (Book VI, Chapter 25, page 245), and Eusebius himself (Book III, Chapter 24, page 108).
ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/NEWBOOK.TXT

The val;ue of EWTN as a resource needs to be appreciated.

 

[Thorolfr]

The assumption that the Gospels were written originally in Greek has nothing to support it…

As Claude Tresmontant, who taught medieval philosophy at the Sorbonne and was awarded the Maximilian Kolbe prize in 1975 for his work, gives the evidence and concludes in *The Hebrew Christ *(Translated by Kenneth D Whitehead, Franciscan Herald Press, 1989, p319) – “all four of the Gospels….were evidently translations into Greek from earlier texts originally composed in Hebrew.”

Considering that we have no original Hebrew versions of these texts, it is also nothing more than conjecture to say that they were originally written in Hebrew. And why should we assume that they were written in Hebrew? Paul wrote in Greek and was supposedly a Roman citizen and a contemporary of the other apostles. Many Jews were undoubtedly bilingual. And what evidence do we have that Jews in Palestine spoke Hebrew instead of Aramaic?

 

[irenaeuslyons]

So here are some arguments I have heard for ordering Mark first and the responses i did on an atheist blog. There arguments were based on Mark Goodacre’s book The Synoptic Problem: A Way Through the Maze

Editorial Fatigue.
Editorial fatigue is a widely-known phenomenon that occurs when an existing chunk of text is adapted into a new context. There’s a strong tendency for changes to be made near the start of the copied text (to make it consistent with the new preceding context) but for these changes not to be sustained through the passage, so that by the end, the original text is being copied verbatim despite the inconsistency.

An example of this is in Mk 1:40-45 / Mt 8:1-4, in which a leper is healed; Matthew starts the story with Jesus being followed by a crowd, who are presumably watching the event, but Matthew still ends the story the same way as Mark, with an instruction for the leper to tell no one. Crowds following Jesus are common in Matthew, and secrecy is a common theme in Mark, but Matthew’s version is inexplicable as an original composition (why have crowds if you’re going to do a secret miracle?) and only makes sense as a copy of Mark. Goodacre lists a number of other similar examples in both Matthew and Luke.

Mark does not have a crowd, but if Mark came first, why would they add the crowd in Matthew? If you have editorial fatigue you would have most likely make an error of subtraction, not addition. This impugns Markan priority not the other way around. The crowd is not a mistake, it is a fact not captured in Mark because Mark is basically a shorter Gospel for the Gentiles. Shorter not for the purpose of being short, but as a result of who the audience was, and what material was better to evangelize Gentiles.

As to the point on secrecy. These lepers did not walk the streets, they were tucked away in colonies as outcasts. If one came up to Jesus its because he walked into one of their colonies with the crowd at a long distance for this particular miracle. How close does a crowd have to be to a person covered in scabs to be recognized? Secrecy is perfectly consistent unless you think the crowd was insane. So the conjecture offered as editorial fatigue is no proof at all.

Harder readings in Mark.
When a biblical text is copied manually, there’s a known tendency for the copyist to “correct” readings that seem to be incomprehensible or theologically difficult. So when Mark says that Jesus could not do any “mighty works” in his hometown, and Matthew says that he did not do any, this looks like a correction of a hard reading (why would Jesus be unable to do anything?) to an easier one (clearly he could choose not to). It seems much less likely that the change would be made the other way.

This is for the same reason that Mark explains what the word Rabbi means and Matthew does not. It was to a different audience. Mark was written for Gentiles. Matthew was written to the Jews and quotes prophecy more than any other gospel. Matthew says he “did not” because the Jewish reader already knew that a Messiah could not if he was a true Messiah. A gentile would have no such previous knowledge about prophecy, so it was written as “could not” in Mark.

Mark 3:4-6, Mt 12:10-14, Lk14:1-6
Mark is the only one depicting Jesus as angry.

So the authors claim that Mark’s depiction of Jesus as looking “angry” is a “hard” saying.

First of all, this is not a “hard” saying, a later Gospel in John admits Jesus made a weapon out of cords and whipped people out of the temple. If Jesus with an “angry” look was problematic, how problematic is an “angry” Jesus that whips people? They would have never included the cleansing of the Temple if the author’s claim is true.

Second of all, a calm and serene Jesus would not call people “Hypocrites!” (Mt 15:7,Lk 12:56), or “Ye Fools!” (Lk 11:40), or “You serpents!”(Mt 23:33),etc,etc,etc as He did in the other gospels.

Furthermore, anger has never been a difficult attribute to reconcile with Jesus Christ. However, sin would be. But they are both different as Ephesians 4:26 says, “Even if you are angry, do not sin…”

The hardest saying in the bible is that God dies on the Cross, and yet it is in all the Gospels

 

[steve53]

I would agree that Mark could well possibly be the first written gospel.

If you look at Mark in the historical aspects of the times, the secrecy and crowds make a lot of sense.

One historian derived that Mark’s gospel took place in the year before Jesus’ crucifixion, which was in A.D. 36. At that time, early in A.D. 35 John the Baptist had been shockingly executed by Herod Antipas in the southern stronghold fort of Macherus.

In Macherus, Herod Antipas was preparing to invade Nabotea, and was out of the Galilee.

But his invasion was a disaster, and he then returned to the Galilee, which put Jesus and his disciples on edge. Would Herod Antipas arrest Jesus and all of his disciples, and kill them all? For that reason Jesus kept to the eastern part of the Galilee- the Decapolis- where the crowds meant he had to travel about by boat.

So Jesus was certainly on edge. His short temper was understandable. He knew that if he returned to Jerusalem for the upcoming Passover of A.D. 36, there would be trouble.

If you want to make sense of the Gospels and the NT, spend time and know the history of that time- from Tacitus, Josephus, Philo, and a few others.

 

[Bob_Crowley]

Considering that we have no original Hebrew versions of these texts, it is also nothing more than conjecture to say that they were originally written in Hebrew. And why should we assume that they were written in Hebrew? Paul wrote in Greek and was supposedly a Roman citizen and a contemporary of the other apostles. Many Jews were undoubtedly bilingual. And what evidence do we have that Jews in Palestine spoke Hebrew instead of Aramaic?

In addition by the time the Gospels were being written, there were probably far more Gentile Christians than Jewish. So who would they have been written for - a minority Jewish audience, or a majority Gentile audience?

 

[irenaeuslyons]

 

[Abu]

Thorolfr #23
Considering that we have no original Hebrew versions of these texts, it is also nothing more than conjecture to say that they were originally written in Hebrew.

The reality is that there is no evidence contrary to the facts stated, and the naked supposition that EWTN supports mere “conjecture” is false.

Bivin and Blizzard quote from Eusebius in* Ecclesiastical History*, giving evidence that it was known in his day that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew. Eusebius himself had quoted other writers, Papias (Book III, Chapter 39, page 127), Irenæus (Book V, Chapter 8, page 187), Origen (Book VI, Chapter 25, page 245), and Eusebius himself (Book III, Chapter 24, page 108).
ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/NEWBOOK.TXT

The faithful *Catholic Culture *website is run by knowledgeable faithful Catholics Dr Jeff Mirus and Phil Lawler. This website faces the reality of the Gospels.

The reality:
**The Gospels — Direct Testimonies or Late Writings?
by Marie-Christine Ceruti-Cendrier **
Extract:
“Let’s be straightforward: I believe the Gospels to be direct testimonies that tell real and non-mythic or symbolic facts. I do not believe it by fideism — not because of my faith — but because I have rational, scientific, carefully researched reasons to do so. Indeed, **we who affirm the absolute historicity of the Gospels are now only a small minority. Although this truth of the faith was strongly asserted by the Second Vatican Council and has been believed by millions of Catholics throughout the centuries of Christianity, we nowadays seem to be considered as outsiders. **Let’s examine here the different aspects of this situation.

“Concerning the philological research (B), two specialists thoroughly analyzed the language of the Gospels: Fr. Jean Carmignac, one of the greatest experts in biblical studies in the world, and recognized as foremost in the knowledge of the Qumran Hebrew (of Jesus’ times), and Claude Tresmontant, lecturer for the Institut de France who taught for a long time in the Sorbonne University. Tresmontant is the author of an Old Testament Hebrew-to-Greek (Septuagint) dictionary. (The Septuagint was translated in the third — second century B.C.) They both demonstrated that the Greek language used in the Gospels (all four of them for Tresmontant, the three Synoptic ones for Carmignac who did not consider St. John’s) was translated from Hebrew or Aramaic. They both consider the whole of the Gospels (excluding the Preface to St. Luke’s) and not just fragments introduced into a Greek text. They both provide tens (may be hundreds) of proofs. Fr. Carmignac, in La Naissance des Evangiles Synoptiques, points out semitisms of thought, vocabulary, syntax, style, composition, transmission, translation and even multiple semitisms.” Homiletic & Pastoral Review, January 2005].
catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=6336

Marie-Christine Ceruti-Cendrier is a professor in the Department of Theology of the European Humanities University, Minsk, Belarus. This article originally appeared in Les Dossiers d’Archeologie, No. 249 (special issue on Jesus). It was translated into English by Agnes Souto and Moura-Ausser and edited by Jerome D. Gilmartin. Professor Ceruti-Cendrier is Administrator of the Paris-based Association Jean Carmignac (for the safeguarding of the historicity of the Gospels) and head of the editorial staff of its bulletin. She and her husband Gianni, an Italian diplomat, reside in Rome. This is her first article in HPR.

 

[StrawberryJam]

I don’t think it would be difficult at all for scholars to accept that the names on the gospels were the true authors–even though, as we know, those four names were not attached to the gospels until much, much later.

But the facts do not back up this theory. And scholars do not like to believe “the most likely theory” if it means ignoring facts.

.

Can I quote you on this?

 

[irenaeuslyons]

Also, we know that the gospels were first written in Greek. Why would the authors of that book say Hebrew?

“Now Matthew published also a book of the Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching the gospel in Rome and founding the Church.”
St. Irenaeus of Lyons ~AD 180

“Matthew compiled the sayings in the Hebrew language, and everyone translated them as well he could.”"
St. Papias ~AD 100

Also Origen, Eusebius, Epiphanius and Jerome all agree that the original Matthew was written in Hebrew. In fact, Jerome found a copy of it in Caesarea and translated a portion in a letter to Pope Damasus.

 

[Abu]

DaddyGirl #29
The Gospel called John is estimated to have been written at least 60 years after Jesus died, if not a bit later. John the Apostle died well before then, didn’t he?
Also, we know that the gospels were first written in Greek. Why would the authors of that book say Hebrew? The earliest copies/fragments of the gospel to exist are in Greek.
If I’m reading your info correctly, the books you are taking information from were written in 1907 and 1911.
They seem to be very out of date in information.

See posts #22 and 28.

Clearly stated are the facts that:

1. Fr. Jean Carmignac is one of the greatest experts in biblical studies in the world, and recognized as foremost in the knowledge of the Qumran Hebrew (of Jesus’ times), and Claude Tresmontant, lecturer for the Institut de France taught for a long time in the Sorbonne University.
2. They both demonstrated that the Greek language used in the Gospels (all four of them for Tresmontant, the three Synoptic ones for Carmignac who did not consider St. John’s) was translated from Hebrew or Aramaic.
3. Bivin and Blizzard quote from Eusebius in Ecclesiastical History, giving evidence that it was known in his day that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew. Eusebius himself had quoted other writers, Papias (Book III, Chapter 39, page 127), Irenæus (Book V, Chapter 8, page 187), Origen (Book VI, Chapter 25, page 245), and Eusebius himself (Book III, Chapter 24, page 108).
   ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/NEWBOOK.TXT
4. The faithful Catholic Culture website is run by knowledgeable faithful Catholics Dr Jeff Mirus and Phil Lawler. This website faces the reality of the Gospels. [The date of the Homiletic & Pastoral Review article is January, 2005].
   SEE: catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=6336
5. “…the Pontifical Biblical Commission was formally established by Pope Leo XIII in 1902, and in 1907, in Praestantia Sacrae Scripturae, Pope Pius X declared its decisions to be binding.” It should be noted that Pope St. Pius X made the rulings of the Commission a part of the Magisterium, the supreme teaching authority of the Church.