E
Erich
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There is no actual
Q text, Q is only a hypothesis. There is not the slightest historical evidence, or even a hint, that Q or its author ever existed. If Q had existed, it would have been the most precious scroll of Christianity during the first 50-70 years of the new religion. According to the Markans we owe the preservation of The Our Father and The Beatitudes to Q. Mark did not bother to record them. If Q had been the key document containing the sayings of Christ, it would have been treasured, copied and passed from hand to hand and read at Services.Matthew’s Gospel was written first (his was an eyewitness account), then Luke’s “orderly account”, then Mark’s – which was published before Luke’s, then John’s.
From The Authors of the Gospels,
CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA (c 150-215) was a pupil of Pantoris, the first great Christian teacher at Alexandria in Egypt. Clement records that he himself had travelled widely, meeting and listening to
truly notable men from all over the Roman Empire ((EH 5, 11)). While Rome was the administrative heart of the Church, her intellectual centre was at Alexandria. The town had long possessed a famous Pagan university. The earlier presence of Philo had also made it the centre of Jewish studies, and it was here the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament had been made. In his Adumbrationes in Epistolas Canonicas, Clement commented on 1 Peter 5, 13. As Eusebius did not copy the full quotation, we are using here the Latin translation by Cassiodorus: Mark, the follower of Peter, while Peter was publicly preaching the Gospel at Rome in the presence of some of Caesars knights and uttering many testimonies of Christ, [Mark] being begged by them that they should be able to record what was said, wrote the Gospel which is called the Gospel of Mark, from the things said by Peter; just as Luke is recognized as the pen that wrote the Acts of the Apostles and as the translator of the Letter of Paul to the Hebrews. ((RDCA and RO 131)). The words Caesars knights brings to mind the letter of Paul to the Philippians:…so that it has become known throughout the whole praetorium and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ. And, All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesars household ` (Phil.1: 13 and 4:22).
Code:
The next quotations are of particular importance with regard to the subject of this booklet. They are quoted by Eusebius from Clement`s books.
"So greatly then did the brightness of true religion light up the minds of Peter`s hearers that they were not satisfied to have a once-for-all hearing nor with the unwritten teaching of the divine proclamation, but with appeals of every kind begged Mark, the follower of Peter, whose gospel we have, to leave them too a memorial in writing of the teaching given them by word of mouth. Nor did they cease until they had persuaded the man, and in this way became the cause of the written gospel according to Mark. And it is said that the Apostle, when the fact became known to him through the revelation of the Spirit, was pleased with the eagerness of the men and approved [or ratified] the writing for use in the churches.
Clement relates the anecdote in the sixth book of: `The Outlines` [Hypotyposes], and Papias, bishop of Hierapolis, also bears witness to it and to Peter mentioning Mark in his earlier letter. Indeed they say that he composed it at Rome itself, and that he indicates this when referring figuratively to the city as Babylon in these words: `The elect [the church] that is in Babylon greets you and so does my son Mark` ((EH 2. 15, 1-2 and RO 166)).
`And again in the same books, Clement states a tradition of the **very earliest presbyters** about the order of the gospels; and it had this form. **He used to say that the first written** of the gospels **were those having the genealogies**. And that the Gospel of Mark had this formation. **While Peter was publicly preaching** the Word in Rome and proclaiming the gospel by the spirit, **the audience**, which was numerous, **begged Mark**, as one who had followed him for a long time and remembered what had been said, **to write down the things he had said**.
And he did so, handing over the Gospel to those who had asked for it. And when Peter got to know about it, he exerted no pressure either to forbid it or to promote it … But John, last of all, being conscious that the exterior facts had been set forth in the [other] Gospels, after he had been urged by his friends and divinely moved by the Spirit, composed a spiritual Gospel`. ((EH 6:14, 5-7 and RO 166r)).
In this last paragraph above, Clement of Alexandria clearly sets down which two gospels were the first to be written - Matthew and Luke. He is the only early historian to specifically write concerning the chronology of the Gospels. He said he was quoting the very earliest presbyters [note in the plural]. Other writers did not dispute his evidence.