It looks like we have a lot of very good comments in this thread but one thing conspicuously absent is a discussion of Q, the theorized precedent to the first three Gospels.
I’m not sure if there is an official CC position on Q theory but the idea muddies the concept of authorship.
It sure does! Q becomes “necessary” only if one subscribes to the theory (and that’s all it is, a theory which first appeared sometime in the 19th century) that Mark’s gospel was written first and then used as a source for the gospels of Matthew and Luke. However, occasions where Luke and Matthew agree with each other against Mark suggest that Luke and Matthew were not independent of each other, and thus argue
against the two-source hypothesis.
For 2000 years the Church has taught that two Apostles, who had lived with Christ wrote gospels and two men, who knew some of the Apostles, wrote another two… and that all four should be treated as reliable historical documents.
In 1965, the Second Vatican Council issued
Dei Verbum as a
Dogmatic Constitution. In this the Church restated her teaching, as may be seen from reading an extract from Section 7:
“This commission was faithfully fulfilled by the Apostles who, by their oral preaching, by example, and by ordinances, handed on what
they had received from the lips of Christ, from living with Him, and from what He did, or what they had learned through the prompting of the Holy Spirit. The commission was fulfilled, too,
by those Apostles and apostolic men
who under the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit
committed the message of salvation to writing”.
The Pontifical Biblical Commission was a teaching organ of the Church – with binding authority – from 1902 to 1971, during which time it consistently and firmly opposed the Markan priority theory (i.e. no Q). In 1971 the PBC became merely a consultative body. There are those who will try to put forth the claim that the Church now officially accepts Q (and Markan priority), but that claim is as false today as it was prior to 1971.
In May 1996 Cardinal Ratzinger, at a meeting with CELAM in Mexico, observed that ‘Relativism has thus become in fact the fundamental problem for faith in our time
. He identified the underlying source of this faith–dissolving relativism as a combination of Kantian Philosophy and powerful trends in modern biblical exegesis
. ((LT Jan 1997)). And the 1998 Encyclical: Faith and Reason
, section 55, warned Scripture scholars: ‘Moreover, one should not underestimate the danger inherent in seeking to derive the truth of Sacred Scripture from the use of one method alone, ignoring the need for a more comprehensive exegesis which enables the exegete, together with the whole Church, to arrive at the full sense of the texts. Those who devote themselves to the study of Sacred Scripture should always remember that the various hermeneutical [interpretive] approaches have their own philosophical underpinnings, which need to be carefully evaluated before they are applied to the sacred texts. In the same section we read a warning against fideism: ((JPFR)).
The Catholic Encyclopaedia explains that: `Fideism owes its origin to distrust in human reason and follows from the logical sequence of such an attitude as scepticism. It is often based on the separation of reason and belief, between science and religion. Fideism is rejected by the Catholic Church, which upholds both reason and belief. ((CE fideism)).
Having attended high school post-1971, I was taught Markan priority… but
here’s what should have been taught.
