I thought Q was supposed to represent a source for the elements common to Matthew and Luke that are not found in Mark.
I misremembered: the early testimony is from Papias not Polycarp.
According to Wikipedia Schleiermacher was the first to take Papias' claim that Matthew wrote a collection of sayings rather than a narrative gospel at face value, and then a scholar named Weisse formulated the two source (Mark and the sayings) hypothesis for Matthew and Luke based on Schleiermacher's theory. The sayings source was named Q when sceptical scholars wanted to disassociate the theory from reliance on Papias.
There may be something in the assertion of overcompensation, but theologising is always best when it demonstrates an open analytical process. If folks make it clear what they think they’ve found and why, I don’t have a problem with that. Whether I’m convinced or not.
I misremembered: the early testimony is from Papias not Polycarp.
According to Wikipedia Schleiermacher was the first to take Papias' claim that Matthew wrote a collection of sayings rather than a narrative gospel at face value, and then a scholar named Weisse formulated the two source (Mark and the sayings) hypothesis for Matthew and Luke based on Schleiermacher's theory. The sayings source was named Q when sceptical scholars wanted to disassociate the theory from reliance on Papias.
Aren't the works of Papias yet another text that is lost, so that any references to him are based only on what other people say that he said?
That seems to me to put any references to him as in the 'likely' sense, not as used in normal speech, but in the sense in which it has all too often been used on this thread, i.e. 'likely = a possible suggestion as to how something could perhaps have been that happens best to suit what I want to assert'.
I think I was saying Paul knew some oral traditions as they were developing. He would have known the witness of all the disciples who attended the first council of Jerusalem. He obviously was familiar with many of the early church's hymns, which are a means of carrying on oral traditions.
In relation to the Gospels, I think it's clear that there was an oral transmission of the stories of Jesus for at least 40 years before the Gospels were written down, that transmission could have been the first stages of the development of an oral tradition - except the Gospels were written and that, at best, resulted in a hybrid of oral and written tradition, and certainly by the time of the Fathers an almost entirely written tradition. Paul certainly heard the stories of Jesus spoken rather than read; an example could be 1 Corinthians 15 "what I received I also passed on ... " being almost certainly "what I heard" rather than "what I read". The Epistles are just a small portion of the Apostolic teaching - Paul, Peter etc would have spent the vast majority of their time talking, the Epistles are a necessary second best option when actually visiting people wasn't possible, if there was an issue in a church and they could get there they would go rather than dictate a letter.
For the Old Testament, the arguments for an oral tradition are much stronger, possibly with very little written before the Exile.
About the only thing I would differ with you on is the relationship between Matthew and Luke. I've never been convinced that either of them knew the other. My theory (for what it's worth) is they they developed separately in different places at around the same time. Matthew in Israel, aiming at Jewish Christians; Luke in Europe or Turkey, aiming at Gentile Christians in an urban setting.
One reason (though there are many) for this belief is that their birth narratives are so very different. Although they both have a Virgin Birth in Bethlehem, almost everything else is different. We blithely reconcile the two narratives at Christmas, often failing to see how much they differ and appreciating their distinctiveness.
Luke could have used Matthew if he was building on both Mark and an already‑expanded teaching Gospel. The Farrer view argues Luke smooths Matthew’s Greek, rearranges his sermons, and reshapes shared sayings for his own themes. This removes the need for a hypothetical Q source while still acknowledging that Matthew and Luke share substantial non‑Markan material that must be explained somehow.
While it seems you are saying other than the birth narrative the two Gospels differ widely, I would argue in some ways the differences show commonality. Both have similar forms of the beatitudes. Matthew has Jesus speaking from a mountain/hill; Luke has Jesus speaking from the plain. The difference there has more to do with their theological outlook. Luke seems to improve Matthew's Greek and rough edges. To me, it seems Luke is revising the Matthew story.
Now I could run with the Q theory, but for me the Farrer hypothesis seems more likely.
It's a long long time since I studied this stuff but my impression was that there was no clear sign of Luke amending Matthew or vice versa. In some of their shared material, it looked like Matthew's was the more primitive but in others it looked like Luke's was. The best conclusion I could draw was that they were both amending some common material in differing ways, depending upon their contexts and readership.
In addition, where they both have Markan material, they both seem to adapted it in their own ways. I couldn't see a clear line of "Matthew adapted Mark and then Luke adapted Matthew". If Luke was aware of Matthew, I doubt that he would have gone back to Mark's rather scruffy Greek and worked from that, rather than working from Matthew's better Greek.
But the "Synoptic Question" has always kept biblical scholars on their toes, hasn't it?
I go back to Luke's preamble. He is aware of other written accounts of the life of Jesus and he says he is setting about to write an accurate account. We agree he very likely knew of Mark. There were probably non canonical accounts out there. Could be he is also referring to the Matthew account. Either/or we have two accounts, each with their own perspectives. I enjoy the richness they both have.
I think we need to give greater emphasis to their different perspectives and styles. Too often, in my experience, people treat them as being interchangeable.
Yeah sure, a miracle, but what Chromosomes/alleles/genomes did the god-man have in his cells, and where did he get them from? The Orthodox view, and I think the Catholic view, is that he got 100% of his humanity from his mother. How does that work? I mean we can throw up our hands and say "goddidit" but then why bother having a SOF at all? I think Alan alluded to this.
Does humanity solely reside in genes? Would miraculous gene editing to turn an X into a Y (or merely activate the SRY gene) and fuse two eggs to make an embryo make the genetics other than human? Heck, would divine creation of an embryo to be implanted make the resulting baby non-human? Surely humanity also resides in being nurtured in the womb, nursed and raised, growing and learning as human? Even limiting it to biology, does not the building of the body in the womb from the mother's blood, flesh and bone not make the resulting baby fully human?
If that ever happened and there was a live birth, they wouldn't survive. Human genetics is particularly resistant to genetic mutations of this kind (for which there is a name that I don't remember) unlike for example strawberries.
If we're already positing miraculous genetic modification, doing the GM right is hardly a stretch. Heck, Mary could have had a mosaic condition that gave her some functioning male gonadal tissue and she self-impregnated. Biology is weird AF when it comes to edge cases. Theoretical possibility indicated here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28282768/
All that does is potentially eliminate anything miraculous about Jesus' birth. Biology, however rare, is still Biology.
It’s true that some things thought to be miraculous in earlier times do turn out to have a natural explanation in the light of more modern scientific awareness.
But I’m pretty sure that the Virgin Birth isn’t one of those.
There's also a massive question to answer: does "miraculous" mean "without natural explanation"? Can't something be a sign from God with a simple natural explanation?
Yeah sure, a miracle, but what Chromosomes/alleles/genomes did the god-man have in his cells, and where did he get them from? The Orthodox view, and I think the Catholic view, is that he got 100% of his humanity from his mother. How does that work? I mean we can throw up our hands and say "goddidit" but then why bother having a SOF at all? I think Alan alluded to this.
Does humanity solely reside in genes? Would miraculous gene editing to turn an X into a Y (or merely activate the SRY gene) and fuse two eggs to make an embryo make the genetics other than human? Heck, would divine creation of an embryo to be implanted make the resulting baby non-human? Surely humanity also resides in being nurtured in the womb, nursed and raised, growing and learning as human? Even limiting it to biology, does not the building of the body in the womb from the mother's blood, flesh and bone not make the resulting baby fully human?
If that ever happened and there was a live birth, they wouldn't survive. Human genetics is particularly resistant to genetic mutations of this kind (for which there is a name that I don't remember) unlike for example strawberries.
If we're already positing miraculous genetic modification, doing the GM right is hardly a stretch. Heck, Mary could have had a mosaic condition that gave her some functioning male gonadal tissue and she self-impregnated. Biology is weird AF when it comes to edge cases. Theoretical possibility indicated here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28282768/
All that does is potentially eliminate anything miraculous about Jesus' birth. Biology, however rare, is still Biology.
[Yes, I'm late getting back to this thread]
Eliminate as necessity, perhaps, but such an occurence happening by chance for a baby who grew up to claim what Jesus did leaves divine providence vs serendipity wide open.
I don't see how a baby conceived by such fat-fetched but non-miraculous means would ever come to know about it (in pre-modern times). I mean, Mom might say "I was a virgin," but without anything to back that statement up (such as a visit from an angel), well...
There's also a massive question to answer: does "miraculous" mean "without natural explanation"? Can't something be a sign from God with a simple natural explanation?
Indeed. Healing by medical intervention is still healing.
Also Ive personally seen a few cases of healing which have not been explicable in medical terms, even following helpful medical intervention. In one case the person was expected either to die or have a severely impaired brain function. His healing and more or less immediate full recovery of mental faculties was inexplicable to the surgeons who treated him, such was the damage to his brain. I met him at home after his surgery and admit frankly that I was knocked out by how much he was still himself. I knew how massive the damage was.
Some things are beyond purely natural explanations.
I don't see how a baby conceived by such fat-fetched but non-miraculous means would ever come to know about it (in pre-modern times). I mean, Mom might say "I was a virgin," but without anything to back that statement up (such as a visit from an angel), well...
I think people might be just as likely to say "yeah, sure!" over the angelic visit claim as they would over the virgin pregnancy claim, to be honest.
I don't see how a baby conceived by such fat-fetched but non-miraculous means would ever come to know about it (in pre-modern times). I mean, Mom might say "I was a virgin," but without anything to back that statement up (such as a visit from an angel), well...
I don't see how a baby conceived by such fat-fetched but non-miraculous means would ever come to know about it (in pre-modern times). I mean, Mom might say "I was a virgin," but without anything to back that statement up (such as a visit from an angel), well...
There is no indication Mary ever made the claim she was a virgin when she conceived Jesus. It appears Matthew developed that idea and was picked up by Luke. Either that or it developed through a Q source; moreover, at least two major Christian communities will argue she remained a perpetual virgin.
That does require the statement attributed to Mary in Luke 2
How can this be since I know not a man?
has to be part of Luke’s construction of the birth narrative being a matter of theology not history.
In short, Mary didn’t say it.
Doesn’t that require an assumption that the whole of the birth narrative is non-historical? That there was nothing in the oral tradition or the memories of those living that Mary said that?
It might be better to say “there is this indication in the text, but I think it’s more likely to be a necessary part of Luke’s construction/theological reflection than a reference to something which actually happened”.
That’s what I think you actually believe. And it’s difficult to deny that there are aspects of Luke’s accounts which seem more like story telling e.g the historicity of the census and the need for Mary and Joseph to go. But I think that argument can be taken too far.
Comments
According to Wikipedia Schleiermacher was the first to take Papias' claim that Matthew wrote a collection of sayings rather than a narrative gospel at face value, and then a scholar named Weisse formulated the two source (Mark and the sayings) hypothesis for Matthew and Luke based on Schleiermacher's theory. The sayings source was named Q when sceptical scholars wanted to disassociate the theory from reliance on Papias.
For the Old Testament, the arguments for an oral tradition are much stronger, possibly with very little written before the Exile.
Luke could have used Matthew if he was building on both Mark and an already‑expanded teaching Gospel. The Farrer view argues Luke smooths Matthew’s Greek, rearranges his sermons, and reshapes shared sayings for his own themes. This removes the need for a hypothetical Q source while still acknowledging that Matthew and Luke share substantial non‑Markan material that must be explained somehow.
While it seems you are saying other than the birth narrative the two Gospels differ widely, I would argue in some ways the differences show commonality. Both have similar forms of the beatitudes. Matthew has Jesus speaking from a mountain/hill; Luke has Jesus speaking from the plain. The difference there has more to do with their theological outlook. Luke seems to improve Matthew's Greek and rough edges. To me, it seems Luke is revising the Matthew story.
Now I could run with the Q theory, but for me the Farrer hypothesis seems more likely.
In addition, where they both have Markan material, they both seem to adapted it in their own ways. I couldn't see a clear line of "Matthew adapted Mark and then Luke adapted Matthew". If Luke was aware of Matthew, I doubt that he would have gone back to Mark's rather scruffy Greek and worked from that, rather than working from Matthew's better Greek.
But the "Synoptic Question" has always kept biblical scholars on their toes, hasn't it?
All that does is potentially eliminate anything miraculous about Jesus' birth. Biology, however rare, is still Biology.
[Yes, I'm late getting back to this thread]
It’s true that some things thought to be miraculous in earlier times do turn out to have a natural explanation in the light of more modern scientific awareness.
But I’m pretty sure that the Virgin Birth isn’t one of those.
Eliminate as necessity, perhaps, but such an occurence happening by chance for a baby who grew up to claim what Jesus did leaves divine providence vs serendipity wide open.
Also Ive personally seen a few cases of healing which have not been explicable in medical terms, even following helpful medical intervention. In one case the person was expected either to die or have a severely impaired brain function. His healing and more or less immediate full recovery of mental faculties was inexplicable to the surgeons who treated him, such was the damage to his brain. I met him at home after his surgery and admit frankly that I was knocked out by how much he was still himself. I knew how massive the damage was.
Some things are beyond purely natural explanations.
I think people might be just as likely to say "yeah, sure!" over the angelic visit claim as they would over the virgin pregnancy claim, to be honest.
There is no indication Mary ever made the claim she was a virgin when she conceived Jesus. It appears Matthew developed that idea and was picked up by Luke. Either that or it developed through a Q source; moreover, at least two major Christian communities will argue she remained a perpetual virgin.
“There is no indication”?
That does require the statement attributed to Mary in Luke 2
has to be part of Luke’s construction of the birth narrative being a matter of theology not history.
In short, Mary didn’t say it.
Doesn’t that require an assumption that the whole of the birth narrative is non-historical? That there was nothing in the oral tradition or the memories of those living that Mary said that?
It might be better to say “there is this indication in the text, but I think it’s more likely to be a necessary part of Luke’s construction/theological reflection than a reference to something which actually happened”.
That’s what I think you actually believe. And it’s difficult to deny that there are aspects of Luke’s accounts which seem more like story telling e.g the historicity of the census and the need for Mary and Joseph to go. But I think that argument can be taken too far.