This is for discussion regarding points brought to the fore by Holding in one of his essays concerning the dates and authorship of the Gospels.

I’ve skipped some portions in Holding’s essay that go into greater detail than what I’ve outlined here, so if you’re interested, you can see the essay upon which this post is based here: http://tektonics.org/tekton_02_02_02.html

First, the essay on the dates/authorship of the Gospels:

-2 NECESSARY PRE-REQUISITES: First, authorship/date are not as important as determining whether a particular Gospel provides us with truth: correspondence with reality. If determined to be true, eyewitnesses are either responsible for the gospel itself or providing an author with needed data. Implication: A successful argument refuting traditional dates/authorship doesn’t matter. Example: Muhammad is known through a document 212 years after his death, which got its information from another document 100 years after Muhammad’s death. Second, new arguments against traditional authorship/dates are extinct; the same arguments are brought up time and time again. Critics are curiously silent on responding to traditional arguments.

-ARE THE GOSPELS ANONYMOUS: First, if this is a problem, one should consistently apply such criticism to secular works of antiquity whose authorship/date aren’t questioned, but are just as anonymous as the Gospels. Example: Tacitus’ ANNALS do not mention Tacitus by name in his work; a characteristic pointed out in the Gospels, which is supposed to prove anonymity. Moreover, there are cases of ancient works dated around the NT times that have their earliest external attributions in the 5th and 6th centuries, but no one questions their authorship. Furthermore, if secular works were treated like the NT, then our knowledge of historical antiquity would be toned down to an extreme agnosticism.
Second, author’s names are found in titles, not in the text. Objection: The author’s name was tacked on later. 1. There is no textual evidence for this; you would need to do the following: First, find a copy of a work with no authorial attribution. Second, make sure the copy is early enough to prevent the absent authorial attribution from being a late accidental exclusion. 2. It’s equally possible that Tacitus’ name was tacked on later, but this is never mentioned.
Third, the external evidence supporting Tacitean authorship is not as good as that supporting the Gospels, but the former is seldom, if ever, questioned.
Fourth, there are multiple patristic attestations to the authorship of the gospels.
Fifth, the absence of an author’s name doesn’t necessitate anonymity; works were identified by a tag hanging on the ‘outside’ of the scroll containing the relevant text, which was needed for the practical reason of it needing to be known by groups of people. Implication: What is needed is a copy of Matthew attributed to someone other than Matthew; however, authorial concurrence is unanimous from external attestations/attributions to the Gospels. Again, this unanimity is not present with other secular works, whose authorship is not questioned.
Sixth, there are no traditions one can point to that point to another writer for the Gospels; external evidence is unanimous. This unanimity necessitates an early giving of titles to the Gospels; otherwise, unanimity would vanish, since there would be inevitable speculating as to who the authors were (i.e. the apocrypha). It’s extremely improbable that the gospels floated about for 50-70 years as anonymous documents and succeeded in convincing the church to unanimously attribute them to the four traditional authors.
Seventh, , the authors chosen are unlikely candidates. 1. Luke’s presence in the NT is minuscule. 2. Mark seems immature and prone to outlandish actions, such as his abandonment of Paul (Acts 15). 3. Matthew was a tax collector and not a very prominent apostle. 4. John is the only one who makes sense. Thus, conspiratorial strategies involving the purposeful choice of picking unpopular candidates for the authorship of the gospels in order to deceive later generations of their authenticity is ridiculous.
Eighth, knowledge of genuine authorship was a necessary condition for the church to designate a gospel with authority. 1. Gospels were unlikely to gain prominence if the author’s credentials and/or identity were unknown. 2. It is implicitly presupposed that the church was gullible. 3. Title designation must have occurred early.
Ninth, production of the gospel, an effort to convince an authority of it being the work of another, an explanation for how one (the one attempting to convince an authority of the gospel’s authority) came to be in possession of the gospel, an explanation for why the gospel has been hitherto unknown, and a cogent case for convincing the local churches and the Roman Empire to accept it as genuine are needed for an anonymous gospel to be recognized with any authority. Moreover, there is nothing like this with ancient secular works of antiquity (an authoritative group successfully deceived by anonymous forgeries of the original documents over a significant span of time and a variety of different places).
Tenth, ‘Matthew’ and ‘Luke’ using ‘Mark’ independently show Mark’s prior recognized authority; M and L wouldn’t use Mark anonymously, so Mark’s authority must be established via knowledge of its origin. Thus, it is unlikely that Mark was anonymous (assuming the Q/Marcan priority thesis).
Eleventh, , the dawning of the 2nd century would include 1st century Christians who were able to vindicate/remember messages from the apostles and, thus, pass such info on to 2nd century Christians. 1. Papias (110-130) recorded Matthew and Mark to be the authors of the gospels attributed to them (It is absurd to think Papias just made this up out of thin air). 2. Given 1st and 2nd century Christians being able to confirm or repudiate the accuracy of Papias’ statements, it is unlikely that Papias’ attributions would gain any credibility.

-HOW IS AUTHORSHIP DETERMINED- Internal evidence: First, the subject matter and style of the work should match the style of the author and subject matter the author would be interested in. Second, relative to the high education of the writer, the writing would not have spelling/grammatical errors. Third, relative to the author’s occupation, the writing must show knowledge of key nuances related to his occupation, or even his position in society. Fourth, relative to the social position, the author is expected to use expected sophisticated language unique to that position and display an attitude characteristic of that position.
External evidence: First, , authorship referred to by others and being mentioned in other works provides data on who wrote what. Second, data involving people denouncing a particular person being an author or an example of someone attributing something from one alleged author to someone else are relevant for determining authorship.

-IS THE CHURCH RESPONSIBLE FOR THE NT (FICTIONS)- No. First, it is unlikely that the Church would ‘create’ such a hard faith to follow. 1. It could have included verses making it permissible to sacrifice to Rome’s emperor. 2. It could have made clearer certain passages that are difficult to comprehend.
Second, there is a conspicuous absence of verses dealing with Church issues (circumcision).
Third, passages claimed by skeptics to be late are plainly early. 1. Matthew’s use of ‘church’ (Matt 16:18; 18:17) wasn’t added after Jesus, since ekklesia was used to connote meeting places involving people from Israel: just a plain ole’ worship center, such as the Synagogue. 2. It is assumed that Jesus’ purpose was not to begin a new movement.
Fourth, the content of the gospels doesn’t seem to be the work of a community, such as a Church. Quote from authority (Davies):The New Testament witnesses to virile, expanding Christian communities, it is true, but also to confused and immature ones. It is more likely that the thrust, the creativity, the originality which lies behind the Gospel tradition of the works and words of Jesus should be credited to him rather than to the body of Christians. The kind of penetrating insight preserved in the Gospels points not to communities - mired and often muddled in their thinking - but to a supreme source in a single person, Jesus.
Fifth, , the eyewitnesses of Jesus wouldn’t allow the Church to take creative, fictional liberties with the Gospels. 1. There were eyewitnesses/apostolic authorities that checked and monitored the development of the tradition. 2. A community (i.e. Church), fraught with imaginative inventiveness, is not a possible candidate for the construction of a consistent tradition; moreover, this consistent tradition shows that the Church examined the veracity of the eyewitnesses’ testimony. 3. It basically seems to hinge on the supposition that the apostles didn’t exercise control over the tradition. 4. A multitude of people existed, which exercised control over how the early Church utilized certain testimony. 5. A. The Church’s leaders and location was known. B. Social interaction/mingling occurred along with Church expansion (into Samaria, Antioch). C. Church issues brought about the appointment of qualified church leaders to leave the local church, arrive at the main Church (Jerusalem), and discuss the issues there (The Church council was at Jerusalem). D. Paul accepted the Church council. E. Paul went to Jerusalem after each missionary journey. F. Contact occurred between a variety of churches and apostolic leaders/evangelists. G. Interaction occurred between various churches. Therefore, attempts at distorting facts were frustrated by the vast amount of information exchange occurring via sub-churches and the main Church in Jerusalem. Objection: (Mack) A practice utilized by Hellenists called “speech-in-character” provides reason to think that sayings were attributed to what people ‘would have’ said (consistent with the person’s character), rather than what they actually did say. 1. Hellenism wasn’t that influential on Jesus or the Gospels. The understanding of Jesus as a Greek, cynic sage ignores the Jewishness of Jesus, his mission, and his teachings. 2. Mack illicitly labels the early Church/communities as being imaginative. A. Mack has no proof of this. B. It is absurd to think a second-generation person successfully changed the facts of Jesus and His life (circulating throughout at the time) by completely making up a fair tale, whilst the Church ‘suffered from collective amnesia’ (Blomberg) when accepting it as authentic. C. There is no parallel of this happening anywhere in secular works of antiquity. D. Q is preferred to eyewitness testimony, based on the thesis that has the absurd consequences as B describes.

mattd

Thanks JP for another informative article.

bump

These are some very good arguments for the authenticity of the canonical Gospels. In the near future, I'd like to write up an extensive essay on Gospel authorship, going over the reasons for concluding anonymity as opposed to authenticity. But I need to do more research first. (I'd be interested in doing a debate with JP on this some day, if he has the time, but again, I need to do more research first.)

I generally tend to lean towards the scholarly consensus here, and I think it is quite probable that some or all of the canonical Gospels are anonymous. However, I am not as dogmatic about it as most skeptics. I believe it is possible that John, for example, may have really been written by an apostle named John, due to some compelling internal evidence. I am also open to the possibility that the author of Luke/Acts was a companion of Paul, and possibly even Luke the doctor. However, I don’t think it is by any means obvious. And I believe, in the case of the other Gospels, it is more likely that they were written anonymously.

The reasons you provide here for authenticity are interesting, but I think you should try and directly address some of the more common critical arguments. In the case of Gospel authenticity, the external evidence seems a lot more convincing than the internal evidence. But it is the internal evidence which has led most scholars to conclude anonymity. Probably, one of the most compelling reasons for this is Matthew's usage of Mark. It seems odd that an eyewitness to the events would simply weave together other sources into his own manual of Christian teaching, rather than recount the events from his point of view. There is no precedent for such a thing. And yet Mark, traditionally not an eyewitness, seems to be a source for Matthew.

Another one of the compelling reasons behind the conclusion of anonymity is Christian/Jewish literary tradition. Most historical Jewish writings were anonymous by discipline, e.g. Kings, Chronicles, etc. Later on, in the Hellenistic period, the tradition became to ascribe a work to a recognized figure to lend it authority, e.g. the Book of Enoch or the Psalms of Solomon. (And the authorship of many canonical books is questioned on this basis as well, e.g. Daniel, Psalms, etc.) Indeed, many of the early Christian writings are ascribed to earlier figures in order to lend them authority, such as the Gospel of Peter, the Epistle of Barnabas, etc. Now, this general literary practice takes a lot of force away from any external evidence. For example, the external evidence unanimously points to the Epistle of Barnabas as being actually written by the apostle Barnabas. All the earliest manuscripts of the epistle, including the Codex Sinaiticus ascribe it to Barnabas. Clement of Alexandria also confirms it is written by Barnabas, and seems to quote it as scripture. And yet, now, it is rejected by conservatives and critical scholars alike as pseudepigraphical, because it did not make the cut at later church councils. Now, if it is not pseudepigraphical, it is apostolic, and there should be no reason to not include it in the canon. Thus, given the similarity between the external evidences for both the canonical writings and many pseudepigraphical writings, the argument for Gospel authenticity more or less reduces to "this Gospel was approved of by later church councils for reasons not entirely known to us, therefore it must be authentic."

So, as you can see, in the particular historical context wherein early Jewish and Christian writings came to be written, external evidence is hardly as useful as internal evidence. Thus, it does not take much evidence on the part of a critic to declare something most probably anonymous, since the external evidence has little value, and since the literary tradition of false ascription to an earlier figure in order to lend authority to a document was so widespread. Thus, in this case, internal evidence is always weightier than external evidence. And in the case of Matthew at least, the internal evidence suggests someone other than an eyewitness.

The usual response to this is to take a secular work and show how, if the same standards were applied, anything could be declared anonymous. (For some reason, everyone always chooses Tacitus as an example.) The problem is, in the case of Greek and Roman writings, there is no need to use the same standards. The reason is because the literary tradition of falsely ascribing a document to another author was relatively rare in the Roman and Greek world. Secondly, there is no motivation for an anonymous author to ascribe his work to what would have been a hitherto unknown man named Herodotus, Tacitus or Thucydides. Whereas, in the early church, or with early Jewish writers, there is an obvious motivation to attribute a document to a recognized figure. The motivation would be to lend the document authority, and in the case of the early Christians, to lend the writing apostolic support. But we don't see any later Greek authors writing documents which claim to be written by Herodotus or Homer, nor would there really be any reason for anyone to do such a thing.

You might respond that Matthew, Mark and Luke do not seem as likely candidates for an anonymous author to ascribe his work to, but there are many seemingly unlikely figures to whom pseudepigrapha was later ascribed. For example, Baruch, Shadrach, Eldad and Modad, Philip, etc. Indeed, in the case of early Christian writings, any person from the apostolic age would be sufficient to lend a writing authority. Matthew would be just as good as Thaddeus or Thomas. Luke would be just as good as Barnabas or Silas.

Again, in the literary tradition of the Jews, historical or biographical writings were anonymous by default, e.g. Samuel, Kings, Chronicles. Then, after the exile, the tradition developed to ascribe authorship to a previous figure such as Solomon, Enoch, Ezra, etc. In fact, between the time of Ezra and the later Rabbis, there are no Jewish religious/scriptural writings that are not pseudonymous. (With the exception, I think, of Ecclesiasticus and 1 & 2 Maccabees.) This tradition was such a common literary technique for both the Jews and the early Christians that it is ridiculous to claim that critics apply unfair standards to Jewish/Christian writings in particular. There is no similar literary tradition among Greek or Roman writings that would require critics to apply such a standard to Tacitus or Herodotus. (However, even so, there are some passages in Greco-Roman writings which are thought to be interpolations due to compelling internal evidence.)

Thus, the standards based on internal evidence used to conclude anonymity in the case of the Gospels are justified given the literary traditions of early Jewish and Christian writings, i.e. the ubiquitous tendency for documents to be ascribed to an earlier writer in order to lend them authority. Because of this, we should always be skeptical of any early Christian writings which are ascribed to important figures. In fact, there should be good, positive evidence to demonstrate that a writing is authentic, and not the other way around. But in reality, many times the only real indication we have that a document might be authentic is the fact that it was approved of by a church council centuries after it was written, while similarly well-attested documents were rejected.

Originally posted by chsalvia

(I'd be interested in doing a debate with JP on this some day, if he has the time, but again, I need to do more research first.)

I'd be happy to participate if I'm still sane after listening to Johnny Skeptic.

The reasons you provide here for authenticity are interesting, but I think you should try and directly address some of the more common critical arguments.

I do, actually, but there was not room here for matt to post all of it. He posted a part of my core essay; in it there are links to articles on each Gospel. I address your point about Matt using Mark....and I also have a huge series on the Marcan priority hypothesis elsewhere.

Another one of the compelling reasons behind the conclusion of anonymity is Christian/Jewish literary tradition. Most historical Jewish writings were anonymous by discipline, e.g. Kings, Chronicles, etc.

Hmmm, "most"? By numbers, how many?

Later on, in the Hellenistic period, the tradition became to ascribe a work to a recognized figure to lend it authority, e.g. the Book of Enoch or the Psalms of Solomon.

Now that said, what indication is there that 1) anyone really thought these books were by the persons named? 2) that this can authentically carry over from Judaism to Christianity?

Indeed, many of the early Christian writings are ascribed to earlier figures in order to lend them authority, such as the Gospel of Peter, the Epistle of Barnabas, etc.

Same question applies: How many of these were widely accepted as authentic? I'd ring in here with Miller's article on pseudonymity if that tack were taken. I would have to check into arguments about Barnabas, though.

The problem is, in the case of Greek and Roman writings, there is no need to use the same standards. The reason is because the literary tradition of falsely ascribing a document to another author was relatively rare in the Roman and Greek world.

Hmm. Pseudo-Philo? Material falsely ascribed to Socrates? I also just checked Glenn Miller's article on this, and he offers some substantial disagreement. It was enough of a problem that there were Greek authorities who educated themselves in BS detection.

Secondly, there is no motivation for an anonymous author to ascribe his work to what would have been a hitherto unknown man named Herodotus, Tacitus or Thucydides.

Of course there is: Just as with the Gospels, it would lend immediate credence to a work to have it ascribed to one of these chaps. The reason we see so little is because it is so hard to get away with.

Indeed, in the case of early Christian writings, any person from the apostolic age would be sufficient to lend a writing authority. Matthew would be just as good as Thaddeus or Thomas. Luke would be just as good as Barnabas or Silas.

I would seriously doubt that. The later examples seem to represent that all the good names had already been taken. Moreover, Thomas in particular was taken by heretics. Is that good as an example for you?

Well, we can discuss it in more depth.

Thanks you for your erudite response. I just checked in to see how the thread was doing before I left for work, so I can't offer a sufficiently informed inquiry as of yet. However, either when I return from work or later on in the week, I'll either provide such a response, or post my summary outline of J.P.'s article on Luke, which I'm putting the finishing touches on (what I do when I read Holding's articles is order his points in outline form, so I can locate information faster and more efficiently. I also try to re-word Holding's witty sentences into my words (plain, boring, dry exposition), so as to understand his points quicker.).

I'd love to see you and J.P. discuss the authorship and dates of gospels. It would be such a breathe of fresh air to read a debate where both participants are honest with the data and sufficiently intelligent for civil discourse (basically, the polar opposite of J.P.'s conversation with Johnny Skeptic).

Thanks for the great post, which reminds me; I'm sorry I sort of bowed out of our discussion regarding cosmological models for the origin of the universe. School is, once again, my excuse!

Take care man.
mattd

Originally posted by mattbballman19

Thanks you for your erudite response. I just checked in to see how the thread was doing before I left for work, so I can't offer a sufficiently informed inquiry as of yet. However, either when I return from work or later on in the week, I'll either provide such a response, or post my summary outline of J.P.'s article on Luke, which I'm putting the finishing touches on (what I do when I read Holding's articles is order his points in outline form, so I can locate information faster and more efficiently. I also try to re-word Holding's witty sentences into my words (plain, boring, dry exposition), so as to understand his points quicker.).

I'd love to see you and J.P. discuss the authorship and dates of gospels. It would be such a breathe of fresh air to read a debate where both participants are honest with the data and sufficiently intelligent for civil discourse (basically, the polar opposite of J.P.'s conversation with Johnny Skeptic).

Thanks for the kind words. Gospel authorship is an important subject, and I'd love to do a formal debate on it. But, I need to do research the attestation of various early christian documents first, so I'll be better prepared.

Thanks for the great post, which reminds me; I'm sorry I sort of bowed out of our discussion regarding cosmological models for the origin of the universe. School is, once again, my excuse!

That's okay. Your time is probably better spent at school than discussing metaphysical vagaries with me.

Originally posted by jpholding

I do, actually, but there was not room here for matt to post all of it. He posted a part of my core essay; in it there are links to articles on each Gospel. I address your point about Matt using Mark....and I also have a huge series on the Marcan priority hypothesis elsewhere.

Well, I guess that’s a whole different debate entirely. But, I did read one of your articles on the Mark/Q hypothesis, and you do bring up some good points.

Originally posted by jpholding

Originally posted by chsalvia

Another one of the compelling reasons behind the conclusion of anonymity is Christian/Jewish literary tradition. Most historical Jewish writings were anonymous by discipline, e.g. Kings, Chronicles, etc.

Hmmm, "most"? By numbers, how many?

I would say that the Pentateuch, and any documents it may be comprised of (J, E, P, D, Edomite genealogies, Book of the wars of Yahweh, etc.) are all anonymous, and all books contained within the Deuteronomistic narrative are anonymous – Joshua through 2 Kings. The Chronicler is anonymous, and so is Esther, Ecclesiastes, Job, Song of Songs, Proverbs, etc. Therefore, the non-anonymous books are the prophets, and the memoirs of Ezra/Nehemiah. Now, I realize you might contest a lot of this, but I think we can agree that at least the major historical portions, i.e. the books in the Deuteronomistic narrative (Joshua through 2 Kings) are anonymous, as is the Chronicler. (Even if you might have reasons to suspect a particular author, the books are still anonymous – i.e. the author does not identify himself.)

So, the prevailing Jewish tradition when it comes to historical narrative seems to be anonymity. (A major exception being 2 Maccabees.) Now, the other major tradition was pseudonymity. This is something I think it will be easier to agree on. In the Hellenistic/Roman period, the vast majority of Jewish writings are either anonymous, or pseudonymous. Now, I know you’re not fond of vague assertions, so I’ll actually do a count. Between the 3rd century B.C. and 4th century A.D., there are 68 Jewish religious writings, including the apocrypha. All of these are either pseudepigraphical or anonymous. There seem to be only 5 Jewish writers who are not anonymous, and that would be Jesus ben Sirach, Aristobolus, Jason of Cyrene (the author of 2 Maccabees) and of course, Philo and Josephus. (But the works of Josephus probably shouldn’t count as religious documents anyway.)

This does not include the later Rabbis who contributed to the Talmud, which is a different literary tradition entirely, and it also does not include the documents from Qumran. Although, the Qumran documents only help my case, since they consist of over 50 pseudonymous or anonymous documents. There is not a single known author from Qumran.

Thus, not counting the Qumran documents, which are all pseudonymous/anonymous, over 93% of Jewish writings from the Hellenistic and Roman periods were pseudonymous/anonymous.

So, it should be clear that anonymity or pseudonymity was the prevailing literary tradition among the Jews of that time period. (Mainly because, according to tradition, prophecy had ceased, and so new religious writings could only be lent support if they were ascribed to religious figures who lived during or before Ezra.)

Now that said, what indication is there that 1) anyone really thought these books were by the persons named? 2) that this can authentically carry over from Judaism to Christianity?

Well, the first point you bring up is really the key issue I suppose. But let me address the second point first. I’m not sure what you mean here, since it seems self-evident that the literary tradition of pseudonymity did indeed carry over to Christianity. Just like with the Jewish writings of the Hellenistic period, the prevailing literary tradition within the early Christian church was also pseudonymity. There are 92 Christian writings from the 1st century A.D. to the early 3rd century A.D. which are either anonymous or pseudonymous. These are in the form of pseudepigraphical Gospels, epistles, Acts, etc. There are 27 canonical writings, some of which have disputed authorship. But there seems to be less than 20 non-anonymous Christian authors, such as Origen, Irenaeus, Aristides, etc.

Thus, it is clear that the Jewish literary tradition of pseudonymity carried over strongly into Christianity. Even if we assume that the New Testament is completely non-pseudonymous/anonymous, (with the exception I suppose of the epistle to the Hebrews) then over 66% of Christian writings from the first century to the early third century are pseudonymous or anonymous. (Mostly pseudonymous.)

Now as for your second point “did anyone really think these books were by the persons named?” - what I’d like to do is to examine the attestation of some pseudepigraphical works, and see how well attested they are in comparison with canonical works. It seems, from the research I’ve done so far, that many of the pseudonymous writings were indeed taken as authentic by some figures in the early church. The example I gave before was the Epistle of Barnabas. Clement of Alexandria says, in Stromata, Book 2, Chapter 6 : “And, in truth, faith is discovered, by us, to be the first movement towards salvation; after which fear, and hope, and repentance, advancing in company with temperance and patience, lead us to love and knowledge. Rightly, therefore, the Apostle Barnabas says, "From the portion I have received I have done my diligence to send by little and little to you; that along with your faith you may also have perfect knowledge.”

This is a quote from the Epistle of Barnabas 1:5. There is no real differentiation here between how Clement quotes this Epistle, and scripture. Indeed, arguments used to support the authenticity of the canonical Gospels are often in this form – finding a church father who quotes them as scripture.

But, I’d like to do more research into a lot of the other pseudepigraphical writings, and see how well their attestation stacks up compared with the canonicals. However, as a temporary answer to your objection, there is at least some indication that some of these writings were viewed as authentic.

Hmm. Pseudo-Philo? Material falsely ascribed to Socrates? I also just checked Glenn Miller's article on this, and he offers some substantial disagreement. It was enough of a problem that there were Greek authorities who educated themselves in BS detection.

Well, I did say that pseudonymous writings among non-Christian Greeks and Romans were relatively rare, but not non-existent. There are some letters written in Plato’s name which are thought to be pseudonymous and apparently the various philosophical schools, i.e. the Platonists, Cynics, Stoics, etc. had problems with forgeries. (It should be noted however that this approaches a similar religious motivation.) Sometimes plays were forged as well in the name of earlier great playwrights. But there is no reason to suspect that the singular writings of certain figures like Herodotus or Thucydides are pseudonymous, because Herodotus and Thucydides were not great figures of the past, but hitherto unknown people until they actually wrote something. However, in Jewish and Christian literature, documents are ascribed to figures who were traditionally very important, e.g. Enoch, Solomon, Jeremiah, and in the case of Christianity, Peter, or anyone from the apostolic age. Besides, the vast majority of extant Greco-Roman literature is not pseudonymous, unlike early Jewish/Christian literature.

Of course there is: Just as with the Gospels, it would lend immediate credence to a work to have it ascribed to one of these chaps.

That’s true.

The reason we see so little is because it is so hard to get away with.

Well, that’s the point I’m trying to make I suppose. There are substantially less pseudonymous documents (percentage wise) from the Greco-Roman world than there are pseudonymous documents from Jewish/Christian tradition. It may have been difficult to get away with this sort of thing among the Greeks and Romans, but apparently, it wasn’t so difficult in the early church or with the Hellenistic/Roman Jews.

I would seriously doubt that. The later examples seem to represent that all the good names had already been taken. Moreover, Thomas in particular was taken by heretics. Is that good as an example for you?

I’m not sure how significant this comment is. Different pseudonymous works were applied to the same figure many times, i.e. the Gospel of Peter, the Acts of Peter, etc. It wasn’t as if a certain figure could be “used up.”

Howdy,

I would say that the Pentateuch, and any documents it may be comprised of (J, E, P, D, Edomite genealogies, Book of the wars of Yahweh, etc.)


Ummm. I can see this would be a cause for discussion by itself. Obviously I would call it stacking the deck to separate J, E, P and D into four; the book of the wars is not extant, which makes it hard to argue for anonymity; Joshua thru 2 Kings is after the model of annals, and would not be expected to be ascribed an author; I do not agree that all are strictly anonymous...well, you get the idea. I don't think this is able to speak to an "anonymous tradition" per se, as if to say that writers had in mind to purposely leave their names off.

Between the 3rd century B.C. and 4th century A.D., there are 68 Jewish religious writings, including the apocrypha. All of these are either pseudepigraphical or anonymous.

Is there a figure for how many of these were intended to be understood as by the persons ascribed to them, versus being out out with the understanding that they were "speech in character" deals?

(I'm also sensing a repeat of our Daniel discussion -- viz arguing "guilt by associaton" ) I'm also wondering how many of these are in the genre of the Gospels -- Greco-Roman bioi.

I’m not sure what you mean here, since it seems self-evident that the literary tradition of pseudonymity did indeed carry over to Christianity.

I am asking if you can show a direct cause-effect relationship for the carryover. It seems to me that this is a much broader phenomenon that has nothing to do with Judaism influencing Christianity per se. (My same questions as above apply to the 92 NT era writings.)


It seems, from the research I’ve done so far, that many of the pseudonymous writings were indeed taken as authentic by some figures in the early church.

This is where I'd again have to rely on Miller's work. I do expect an odd person to recognize an odd work as valid; what I am looking for is a case where the church as a whole was fooled (aside from the assumed examples of the present NT). You noted Clement of Alexadria's idea...well, he's not really tops on the critical list in the first place, eh? I also have to wonder if there lies in his comment a background assumption that the author is not really "the apostle Barnabas" but whether the reference is merely a convenience (as scholars will even say that they call an author of something "Matthew" or "Paul" and add a footnote saying that this is not a statement for authorship by those figures, but a convenience). Does Clement actually anywhere discuss the authorship of Barnabas directly?


Well, I did say that pseudonymous writings among non-Christian Greeks and Romans were relatively rare, but not non-existent.

Could that be merely a symptom of the loss of almost all classical works as a whole rather than that there were too few of them to cauase a problem? I'd expect thatr in such cases, there was little interest in copying such works among those who safeguarded them.

You speak of Herodotus, et al an not important, but from what perspective are you speaking? Aren't they important people at later dates in antiquity?

[oi]I’m not sure how significant this comment is. Different pseudonymous works were applied to the same figure many times, i.e. the Gospel of Peter, the Acts of Peter, etc. It wasn’t as if a certain figure could be “used up.”[/i]

But you will note that one is a gospel, one is an acts, and so on. How many times could a gospel be ascribed to Peter?

This is much nicer than johnny. Bleah. tongue:

I think it is quite probable that some or all of the canonical Gospels are anonymous.

Is this really the scholarly consensus? This happens to be my weakness (not having knowledge of specific scholarly opinion on various issues), since I’m not old enough to actually say I’ve ‘grappled’ with the issues of opposing scholarly viewpoints.

However, I don’t think it is by any means obvious.

I would assume no more obvious than authorial evidence available for secular works of antiquity.

The reasons you provide here for authenticity are interesting, but I think you should try and directly address some of the more common critical arguments.

First, my intentions were not to exhaust existing arguments in favor of Gospel authenticity, but merely to summarize the main points Holding recapitulated in his essay (the link for which is given in the opening post). Second, Holding deals more specifically within his mini-articles dedicated to each of the four Gospels (the links for which are given in the article I linked to in the opening post). After this post, I'll post a summarized elucidation of Holding’s views (in concurrence with Scholars) regarding the Gospel of Luke.

It seems odd that an eyewitness to the events would simply weave together other sources into his own manual of Christian teaching, rather than recount the events from his point of view.

First, since the eminent apostle Peter (who was above Matthew, being apart of the intimate, ‘inner 3’) was behind the writing of Mark, Matthew seems to be utilizing the authority of Peter's teaching. Second, Matthew may not have personally seen all that he recorded (transfiguration). Craig Blomberg states: "Even though Matthew did observe much that Mark described, it is surely conceivable that he would be curious to see how a Gospel based on Peter's preaching would look. Matthew scarcely depends on Mark slavishly and feels free to add much of his own material." Third, the objection assumes the Q/Marcan priority thesis. Socially, it’s more likely to attribute oral tradition to the overlap with Mark and Matthew. Moreover, it might be absurd to expect Christian Jews to designate the foundational gospel message on a writing from Rome.

Another one of the compelling reasons behind the conclusion of anonymity is Christian/Jewish literary tradition. Most historical Jewish writings were anonymous by discipline, e.g. Kings, Chronicles, etc. Later on, in the Hellenistic period, the tradition became to ascribe a work to a recognized figure to lend it authority, e.g. the Book of Enoch or the Psalms of Solomon.

This is all beyond my scope for now, so I’ll cautiously accede to your points.

Now, this general literary practice takes a lot of force away from any external evidence.

Maybe, but I don’t see how it trumps it entirely.

it is rejected by conservatives and critical scholars alike as pseudepigraphical, because it did not make the cut at later church councils.

Why didn't it make the cut at later church councils? What criteria did the church councils use?

the argument for Gospel authenticity more or less reduces to "this Gospel was approved of by later church councils for reasons not entirely known to us, therefore it must be authentic."

But is the criteria utilized by the church councils known to us? If so, can we conclude why church councils dubbed the epistle of Barnabas pseudepigraphical? Can we infer that because church councils, on the basis of their criteria, eventually accepted the canon as we have it today and rejected some candidates as pseudepigraphical, that it is possible to understand how this lends creedence to the position of 'non-anonymity' (in conjunction with the external evidence).

So, as you can see, in the particular historical context wherein early Jewish and Christian writings came to be written, external evidence is hardly as useful as internal evidence.

It doesn’t seem you were utilizing internal evidence at all. Would not the decisions of church councils be considered additional external evidence? As I stated in the original post (with regard to internal evidence): Internal evidence: First, the subject matter and style of the work should match the style of the author and subject matter the author would be interested in. Second, relative to the high education of the writer, the writing would not have spelling/grammatical errors. Third, relative to the author’s occupation, the writing must show knowledge of key nuances related to his occupation, or even his position in society. Fourth, relative to the social position, the author is expected to use expected sophisticated language unique to that position and display an attitude characteristic of that position. So, the decisions of church councils doesn’t seems to apply here.

And in the case of Matthew at least, the internal evidence suggests someone other than an eyewitness.

I guess I don't see it. Characteristics of what we know of Matthew are found in his Gospel. 1. His inclusion of the story of the fish and the coin would have been of interest to a tax collector. 2. His attention to monetary amounts and terms. There is implicit self-identification. 1. When called to be a disciple Mark and Luke call Matthew ‘Levi’, whereas in Matthew, he is called Matthew. 2. Similarly, Mark and Luke deem Matthew’s home ‘his house’, but Matthew designates it as ‘the house’: 3rd person point of view. Fourth, his Gospel’s content matches what we would think the life experiences of a tax collector might consist of. 1. Being a Pharisee, he would be skilled/experienced in temple service. From this, Matthew shows signs of religious scholarship: his use of typology, OT quotations, and attention to religious issues. 2. Pharisee employment in the temple being filled, Matthew most likely had to find a job doing something else: tax collecting (gaining hostility from his Pharisaic cohorts). 3. Matthew’s inclusion of Pharisaic controversies may reflect his personal sentiments, being himself a Pharisee. 4. Matthew exemplifies characteristics of being a Hellenized Jew (comfortable in Roman world and impressive Greek writing style.) So, this coupled with the fact that Papias confirms Matthew’s authorship, by admitting that ‘oracles’ (in Hebrew) had been written by him, turn me away from anonymity.

The reason is because the literary tradition of falsely ascribing a document to another author was relatively rare in the Roman and Greek world.

This is interesting. Again, I’m ill equipped to have knowledge of this, but I’ll take your word for it. My under-cutting defeater to this is my point that ‘literary tradition’ doesn’t lend as much credence to anonymity as you want it to. Since, I don’t see why additional external evidences can’t trump probable conclusions wrought by a glance at literary traditional alone.

Secondly, there is no motivation for an anonymous author to ascribe his work to what would have been a hitherto unknown man named Herodotus, Tacitus or Thucydides.

How do you know this? Also, why not? I'm also suspicious of this due to a Glenn Miller article I've read recently. In sum, however, I'll withhold comments, since I'm uneducated in this realm of inquiry. I'll just watch how you and Holding flesh this out.

Matthew would be just as good as Thaddeus or Thomas. Luke would be just as good as Barnabas or Silas.

Maybe, but, again, why not seal the deal by ascribing the Gospel to one of the 'inner-3'?

while similarly well-attested documents were rejected

What documents and how do you know they were well-attested? If they were, can you provide such attestation?

Thanks again for your thoughtful response.

mattd

Just in case it is missed, there is a post to you, chsalvia, above this one.

This post's purpose is merely to provide a sneak peak into some of the issues Holding deals with in his essay on Luke. Again, Holding is much more specific in the actual article (providing documentation from qualified authorities, explaining reasons deeper, etc), so all you have to do is visit the link I provided in the opening post and visit the links (about 3 quarters of the way down) to investigate issues dealing with specific gospels.

WHEN WAS ACTS WRITTEN?
(Early 60’s): ). Luke’s date is related to the date of Acts, since Acts is a sequel to Luke.

When was Acts written? Firstly, Acts stops suddenly at the trial of Paul (62 A.D.). Since Luke records Stephen’s (Acts 7:57-9), John’s brother, James (Acts 12:2) martyrdom, it seems likely that Luke would have written on Paul’s martyrdom a couple years from Stephen and James. Moreover, the martyrdoms of Peter and James, the brother of Jesus are not in Acts, which points to an early 60’s date. Objection: The martyrdoms weren’t mentioned because the Romans would be offended. It doesn’t work with James, since the Sanhedrin martyred him. Objection: The abrupt ending of Acts is Luke’s intention; to show the gospel being preached, fulfilling Jesus’ commission at the beginning of Acts. Showing the gospel reaching Rome satisfies Luke’s purpose perfectly, which makes the mention of apostolic martyrdoms superfluous. 1. A secondary theme in Acts is Paul’s apostolic equality with Peter; their martyrdom in Rome would be perfect for Luke in this regard. 2. If Luke’s audience knew of Paul’s death, to end Acts thusly is counterproductive if desiring to instill confidence and devotion to the gospel. In other words, concluding positively (without mention of Paul’s martyrdom), when the negative fact of Paul’s execution was known, would instill unwanted sentiments. Furthermore, confidence and devotion in the gospel would likely be communicated in light of mentioning the honorable martyrdom (Reason: People would not want to devote and be confident in being dedicated to the cause of the gospel if it meant death; it maybe interpreted as propaganda).
Secondly, Acts has a relatively immature theology; terms like ‘breaking of the bread’, ‘the first day of the week’, calling Jews ‘the people’ point to an early dating. Phrases like ‘Jesus the Nazarene’ and ‘thy holy Child Jesus’ are used. Moreover, the idea of redemption is primitive: Jesus saves Israel as a nation (moreland). If a late date (after 70 or 85-90) were posited, a gentile audience would need further explanation of the above ‘terms’.
Thirdly, Acts is silent on the destruction of Jerusalem (70 A.D.), the Jewish War (66 A.D.), the gradual decay of Roman/Jewish relations, and the persecution of Nero (late 60’s).
Fourthly, Acts mentions various controversies involving the Temple (imply a Jewish context involving the temple period), the Sadducees’ prominent reputation, groups of varying people the Holy Spirit fell upon, the Palestinian/Hellenistic distinction involving the Jews, the Temple/Pharisees seen in a positive light, procedures for Gentiles entering the Church, attention given to how Gentiles and Jews live together, the notability of being a citizen of Rome, and the organizational structure of Paul’s trials: not to mention Luke’s accuracy in geography, politics, and history.
Fifthly, Paul quotes Luke’s Gospel in 1 Timothy; moreover, 2 Corinthians 8:18 was understood by the earliest writers to be referring to Luke.
Sixth, inappropriate optimism if written post 70 AD; Jerusalem was destroyed and Nero was persecuting Christians.
Seventh, speeches in Acts 1-12 easily translate into Aramaic, which is expected if speeches were actually given in Christianity’s early years.
Eighth, the ‘vocabulary, tone, style, and theology’ (moreland) is unique in the sense that those factors point to an existence prior to Acts itself.
Ninth, 1 Peter, Mark, and speeches given by Peter in Acts are the same in style, language, and emphasis (moreland); this points to Peter being the actual speaker of the speeches in Acts.
Tenth, Luke’s ‘alleged’ ignorance of Paul’s letters, which points toward Luke’s early date. Why mention Paul, if he’s still alive and able to be heard in person.

POSSIBLE OBJECTIONS:
Objection 1: Theophilus (the recipient of Luke’s works) is claimed to be the bishop of Antioch (169-177 AD), or so says the Catholic Encyclopedi
First, this is probably not found in the Catholic Encyclopedia.
Second, a bishop does not need to know ‘the certainty those things, wherein thou hast been instructed’.
Third, Theophilus was a popular name, so it is a begged question to assume this Theophilus is identical to the bishop.

Objection 2: Marcion’s version of Luke is more original, so it must be dated at 175 AD; Luke is merely a compilation of sayings.
First, this has no substantiation from textual criticism.
Second, Marcion had a bias towards things not being included in his version.

Objection 3: Luke put a different spin on Mark 13 (not the destruction of the Temple and discussion of the anti-Christ, but the destruction of Jerusalem); this has Luke writing Acts by looking ‘back’ to the events of 70 AD.
First, this denies the possibility of prophecy.
Second, there is no ‘spin’ since the destruction of the temple implies the destruction of Jerusalem.
Third, Luke fails to make mention of Jerusalem/Temple’s destruction where it could have been appropriate (Acts 6-7, 21-23), making Luke a liar or implying the Temple’s existence.
Fourth, Mark 13 (also, Matt 24 and Luke 21) resemble OT prophecies, which means it is mistaken to think that the Gospel writers exclusively meant something ‘going to happen’ in the future.

Objection 4: Acts’ remorseful tone directed to Rome indicates a time when Christians attempted to alleviate tension with Rome: 81-96 AD (the reign of Emperor Domitian).
First, this equally could mean a time prior to the persecution of Nero, which was a time of relative peace w/ Rome.
Second, Luke may be appealing directly to Nero himself.
Third, since the Gospels treat the Pharisees in contempt, it’s not characteristic of the early church to want to alleviate tension with anyone.

Objection 5: Luke 1 makes mention of existing gospels in circulation, which may imply a later date.
First, Luke early 60’s date is not incompatible with this.
Second, it is not ‘gospels’, but ‘accounts’ that Luke mentions.
Third, some scholars think the relevant verse a mere rhetorical device, and so shouldn’t be taken literally.

Objection 6: Luke is dependent upon Mark.
First, this depends on a particular interpretation of the Synoptic Problem.
Second, Luke’s lateness isn’t necessitated to be long after Mark; it could have been written soon after Mark.
Third, Acts tells us that Mark and Luke were both in the social circle of Paul.
Fourth, Colossians 4:10-14 shows Mark and Luke to be with Paul simultaneously.

AUTHORSHIP: Luke, the physician.
-First, medical language is used. This is in concurrence with a criterion used for authorship: a work written in a style that the author would write in.
Second, statements in Acts consisting of the word ‘we’ point to Luke by default. Objection: ‘We’ statements were the way ancients documented sea voyages in the first-person and so does not necessarily indicate a companion of Paul. Overstated:
First, ‘we’ statements occur in land journeys and in only 3 out of the 10 sea journeys documented in Acts.
Second, Luke’s style would prevent him from adopting such a literary technique.
Third, external attributions proclaim Luke the author of his gospel.
Fourth, data inferred from Luke/Acts perfectly match with our picture of Luke, the physician. First, he is culturally polished: knowledge of Greco-Roman rhetorical techniques and Greek (being the most sophisticated in the NT). Second, he is not a Jew, since his knowledge of Hebrew and Aramaic is insufficient. Third, the free time needed to compose Luke/Acts hints at authorial independence or a reporter for an important personage (Theophilus).

POSSIBLE OBJECTIONS:
Objection 1: Luke is ignorant of Paul’s letters.
First, this is an argument from silence.
Second, no reason is given as to why Luke needed/wanted to refer to Paul.
Third, there would still be the same problem with whoever else is posited as the author of Luke/Acts.
Fourth, audience familiarity with issues covered by Paul renders references superfluous.
Fifth, space constraints (30 pages give or take) required Luke’s description of church history to be such that his references to Paul’s letters would be naught.

Objection 2: The theology of Paul in his epistles is different from the theology of Paul in Acts.
First, it is assumed that Luke robotically regurgitated Paul’s words verbatim, which required identical perspectives.
Second, it assumes that Luke and Paul were always in perfect agreement on concerns of Christianity in general, and the early church in particular.
Third, the above reasons do not do justice to how complex the issue is, but, for now, it’ll be sufficient.

Objection 3: Papias does not make mention of Luke, as he did with Matthew and Mark.
First, this is hypocritical, since skeptics think Papias to be unreliable when dealing with Matthew/Mark.
Second, this fails to account for the reason why Papias mentions Matthew/Mark; he was concerned with Mark’s authority, which means that his silence on Luke meant Luke’s authority was not an issue.

(***Points mainly made by Holding, with some also by J.P. Moreland***)

mattd

Originally posted by mattbballman19

Is this really the scholarly consensus? This happens to be my weakness (not having knowledge of specific scholarly opinion on various issues), since I’m not old enough to actually say I’ve ‘grappled’ with the issues of opposing scholarly viewpoints.

Well, the scholarly consensus doesn’t really matter much for the purpose of our discussion – but, it just so happens that in this case, it seems the scholarly consensus does favor my position. This doesn’t mean I’m right, and the scholarly consensus has been wrong in the past.

But basically, the “mainstream view” does seem to view all or most of the canonical Gospels as anonymous. A useful way to gauge the “mainstream view” is to simply take a look at what the majority of university-press references, commentaries and Bible translations and encyclopedias have to say. For example, the Oxford Annotated Bible says about Matthew’s Gospel: “The Gospel is anonymous. The unknown Christian teacher who prepared it during the last third of the first century…”

Of course, this doesn’t mean that all scholars believe the Gospels are anonymous. Martin Hengel for one, maintains the traditional authorship of the Gospels, and he is probably one of the top New Testament scholars around. Obviously, the issue is debatable, and any consensus among scholars is never definitive.

I would assume no more obvious than authorial evidence available for secular works of antiquity.

Depends on the work. But one of my main points here is that pseudonymity was not as widely practiced as an overall literary tradition of the Greco-Roman world than it was within the Jewish/Christian community.

Furthermore, I don’t think the authorial evidence available for the Gospel of Mark is that much more convincing than the authorial evidence available for the pseudepigraphical Epistle of Barnbas. We have, for Mark, the attestation of Papias from Eusebius, and we have for Barnabas the attestation of Clement of Alexandria.

First, my intentions were not to exhaust existing arguments in favor of Gospel authenticity, but merely to summarize the main points Holding recapitulated in his essay (the link for which is given in the opening post). Second, Holding deals more specifically within his mini-articles dedicated to each of the four Gospels (the links for which are given in the article I linked to in the opening post). After this post, I'll post a summarized elucidation of Holding’s views (in concurrence with Scholars) regarding the Gospel of Luke.

I understand you’re intent was not to be exhaustive. I was just pointing out some of the more common critical objections.

First, since the eminent apostle Peter (who was above Matthew, being apart of the intimate, ‘inner 3’) was behind the writing of Mark, Matthew seems to be utilizing the authority of Peter's teaching.

Yes, well, here I find another opportunity to illustrate my point. The idea that Peter was behind the writing of Mark is mainly from Eusebius, quoting Papias, who says “Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered. It was not, however, in exact order that he related the sayings or deeds of Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor accompanied Him. But afterwards, as I said, he accompanied Peter, who accommodated his instructions to the necessities [of his hearers], but with no intention of giving a regular narrative of the Lord's sayings. Wherefore Mark made no mistake in thus writing some things as he remembered them.” – Eusebius, Church History Book 3, Chapter 39

Peter is also associated with Mark in 1 Peter 5:13.

But my point is that the strength of this attestation is no more potent, textually speaking, than the attestation of Barnabas, or any other strange tradition that is recorded by Eusebius, or found among the extent fragments of Papias. For example, Eusebius also records that Papias taught strange doctrines about Paradise – doctrines which really have no basis in scripture. See Church History, Book 3, Chapter 39.

Second, Matthew may not have personally seen all that he recorded (transfiguration). Craig Blomberg states: "Even though Matthew did observe much that Mark described, it is surely conceivable that he would be curious to see how a Gospel based on Peter's preaching would look. Matthew scarcely depends on Mark slavishly and feels free to add much of his own material."

Well, speculations about Matthew’s curiosity aren’t very useful. And I wouldn’t say that Matthew “slavishly” depends on Mark – he obviously has other sources as well. But, there are few pericopes in Matthew that are unique. One example would be the incident where Peter finds the coin in a fish. But then again, since this incident centers on Peter, perhaps we’d expect it to be found in Mark, rather than Matthew, if Papias was correct?

Third, the objection assumes the Q/Marcan priority thesis. Socially, it’s more likely to attribute oral tradition to the overlap with Mark and Matthew.

I disagree. Textually, it's much more likely that Matthew used Mark. The wording (and order) is often almost identical. It would be difficult to attribute this to a common oral source. I realize that oral transmission was much more efficient in the ancient world, but when an ancient writer quotes Scripture at length, (Paul for example), it is rarely word for word or exact. Thus, it is would be highly unlikely that the overlaps between Mark, Matthew and Luke are so close textually if they were based only on common oral tradition. It is more likely that there is a common textual source.

Moreover, it might be absurd to expect Christian Jews to designate the foundational gospel message on a writing from Rome.

Why? There was a church in Rome as early as 50 A.D. Anyway, the tradition that Mark wrote the Gospel in Rome comes from Clement of Alexandria, (not directly, but through Eusebius, as is often the case) in Church History Book 4, Chapter 14 – the same Clement of Alexandria who quotes Barnabas as scripture, and who, according to Eusebius, even seemed to believe that Cephas and Peter were different people. So, again, I’ll bring up my key point. Why do you automatically assume that one tradition is valid, but not another?

Originally posted by mattbballman19

Originally posted by chsalvia

Now, this general literary practice takes a lot of force away from any external evidence.

Maybe, but I don’t see how it trumps it entirely.

Well, no – it doesn’t invalidate it entirely. I wouldn’t say that. But, the point is, it makes it a lot less useful, and makes the internal evidence seem more useful.

Why didn't it make the cut at later church councils? What criteria did the church councils use?

Good question. I don’t think anyone really knows. I’m sure doctrinal issues had a lot to do with it though.

But is the criteria utilized by the church councils known to us? If so, can we conclude why church councils dubbed the epistle of Barnabas pseudepigraphical? Can we infer that because church councils, on the basis of their criteria, eventually accepted the canon as we have it today and rejected some candidates as pseudepigraphical, that it is possible to understand how this lends creedence to the position of 'non-anonymity' (in conjunction with the external evidence).

I’m actually in the process of studying this right now. We don’t really have much information about how the Church councils made their decision – but, what we can do is look through the Ante-Nicene fathers and see how well the canonicals are attested compared with various pseudonymous documents.

It doesn’t seem you were utilizing internal evidence at all. Would not the decisions of church councils be considered additional external evidence?

Well, I wasn’t using the church councils at all for anything – I just mentioned how obscure they were as part of my polemic here. The internal evidence I mentioned in passing was Matthew’s usage of Mark, and I would also refer to all the other traditional scholarly arguments for Marcan priority. Although, that would take us somewhat off topic I suppose.

As I stated in the original post (with regard to internal evidence): Internal evidence: First, the subject matter and style of the work should match the style of the author and subject matter the author would be interested in.

That’s a highly subjective criterion there. How do you know what the author would be interested in? I find, for example, that the references to things that a doctor might find interesting as support for the authorship of Luke to be very unconvincing.

Second, relative to the high education of the writer, the writing would not have spelling/grammatical errors.

This criterion is also rather useless. We don’t have the work of the original author. We have copies from scribes. Scribes would often correct spelling/grammatical errors, or make some of their own. Different manuscripts of any given NT document have different spelling mistakes.

Third, relative to the author’s occupation, the writing must show knowledge of key nuances related to his occupation, or even his position in society.

Okay, that’s a good criterion I think.

Fourth, relative to the social position, the author is expected to use expected sophisticated language unique to that position and display an attitude characteristic of that position.

Also a good criterion.

So, the decisions of church councils doesn’t seems to apply here.

I wasn’t appealing to the decisions of church councils as positive support for my claims. I mentioned them in passing not as external evidence, but as an argument against traditional authorship – i.e. showing how the only real unique evidence for the authenticity of the canonical Gospels, as opposed to pseudonymous documents, comes from the fact that they were approved of by later church councils.

I guess I don't see it.

Well, do you believe Matthew utilized Mark and other sources, rather than composed his own eyewitness account? If he did, this seems rather strange – and it seems he did. There are very few unique Matthean pericopes, which means that Matthew utilized Mark and some other source – unless you are going to claim that the non-Marcan material in Matthew actually represents Matthew’s personal memoirs – memoirs which were subsequently copied by Luke. But, there are many problems with this idea, especially if you also want to use the conservative date for Luke/Acts. I’ll wait to see what you say before elaborating further.

Characteristics of what we know of Matthew are found in his Gospel. 1. His inclusion of the story of the fish and the coin would have been of interest to a tax collector.

Okay – I accept that as positive evidence. Although, again – this is one of the only pericopes in Matthew that is unique. Is this the only event that Matthew decided to base on personal recollection as an eye-witness? Why did he rely on other sources for the rest of his Gospel?

2. His attention to monetary amounts and terms. There is implicit self-identification.

I don’t agree with that. What specifically do you mean here? If anything, Luke is more attentive to monetary amounts. He uses the term “mina” rather than “talent” in the parable of the talents. Furthermore, both Luke and Matthew use the term “drachma.” How is Matthew more specifically attentive to monetary amounts and terms than Luke – or Mark for that matter? In the incident with the poor widow who donates two small coins to the Temple treasury, Mark uses the technical terms “lepta” and “kodrantes.” Thus, I don’t see how Matthew is anything special here in this regard.

1. When called to be a disciple Mark and Luke call Matthew ‘Levi’, whereas in Matthew, he is called Matthew.

Okay – I accept this as positive evidence also. But again, is it really any more speculative to assume that this might be the very reason why this Gospel was assigned to Matthew by tradition?

2. Similarly, Mark and Luke deem Matthew’s home ‘his house’, but Matthew designates it as ‘the house’: 3rd person point of view.

Yes, but it seems that Matthew just copied this pericope from Mark. So basically what you’re arguing here is that Matthew really was an eyewitness, but rather than give us any unique accounts from his point of view (with the exception, maybe, of the fish incident) he simply edited Marcan pericopes from time to time, and sometimes his edits indirectly betray the fact that he was an eyewitness. This doesn’t seem very convincing to me.

Again, I could refer to equally inductive evidence that is contrary to traditional theories of authorship. We should expect Mark’s Gospel to be more focused on Peter, no? And yet, Matthew’s Gospel is the one where Peter walks on water, fetches the coin from the fish, and receives the authority to found the church.

Fourth, his Gospel’s content matches what we would think the life experiences of a tax collector might consist of. 1. Being a Pharisee, he would be skilled/experienced in temple service. From this, Matthew shows signs of religious scholarship: his use of typology, OT quotations, and attention to religious issues.

Well, how do you know he was a Pharisee? Anyway, I admit that Matthew does cite the Old Testament more often, and he does engage in midrashic interpretations, but all this really shows is that he was Jewish. It’s not completely surprising that one or more Gospels would be written by a Jew. What is surprising is that an eyewitness would rely on external documents or sources to compose an account of events which he should have been able to personally recount himself.

2. Pharisee employment in the temple being filled, Matthew most likely had to find a job doing something else: tax collecting (gaining hostility from his Pharisaic
cohorts).

I’m not sure where you’re going with this. How do you know Matthew was a Pharisee?

3. Matthew’s inclusion of Pharisaic controversies may reflect his personal sentiments, being himself a Pharisee.

Which controversies? The Sabbath controversies? The fasting controversy? The cleanliness controversy? The “son of David” controversy? The controversy over the resurrection? All of these are included by Mark and Luke as well. There's nothing specifically Matthean about any of these pericopes.

4. Matthew exemplifies characteristics of being a Hellenized Jew (comfortable in Roman world and impressive Greek writing style.) So, this coupled with the fact that Papias confirms Matthew’s authorship, by admitting that ‘oracles’ (in Hebrew) had been written by him, turn me away from anonymity.

Well, I already addressed external evidence such as Papias. As to Matthew’s writing style, I’ll remind you that Papias claims Matthew wrote it in Hebrew, so the Greek writing style is indicative only of the translator, if you’re going to take Papias at his word.

This is interesting. Again, I’m ill equipped to have knowledge of this, but I’ll take your word for it. My under-cutting defeater to this is my point that ‘literary tradition’ doesn’t lend as much credence to anonymity as you want it to. Since, I don’t see why additional external evidences can’t trump probable conclusions wrought by a glance at literary traditional alone.

Well, because the external evidence for the authorship of certain pseudonymous documents is just as convincing. Again, I appeal to the example of the Epistle of Barnabas. This document is now widely held by conservatives and liberals alike to be pseudepigraphical. And yet, if you can point to Papias who authenticates Matthew, I can point to Clement of Alexandria who authenticates Barnabas.

Thus, the point is that the ubiquitous literary tradition of pseudonymity makes any early Christian document ascribed to an apostolic figure suspect, and the fact that certain pseudonymous documents were taken as authentic makes external evidence for the canonicals much weaker.

But see my above post to JP where I provided some actual figures. I went over every Jewish/Christian religious document from the 3rd century B.C. to about the early 3rd century A.D., and I found that 93% of all Jewish documents are either anonymous or pseudonymous (with only 5 non-anonymous authors! – not counting Qumran!), and that over 66% of all early Christian writings are anonymous/pseudonymous, even if we grant conservative views on New Testament authorship. Now, the key to my argument, however, is to show that a lot of these pseudonymous documents were believed to be authentic by the early church – just like the canonicals were believed to be authentic by the early church. I need to do more research, but so far, I can point to the pseudepigraphical Epistle of Barnabas, which has excellent manuscript attestation, i.e. there are no manuscripts of Barnabas that are not attributed to the apostle Barnabas, (the Codex Sinaiticus, a very early NT manuscript includes Barnabas), and Clement of Alexandria seems to confirm that the Epistle of Barnabas was written by the Apostle Barnabas. With external evidence as good as this confirming a document that is known to be pseudepigraphical, you can see why I don’t put much confidence into the external attestations for the canonicals.

How do you know this? Also, why not? I'm also suspicious of this due to a Glenn Miller article I've read recently. In sum, however, I'll withhold comments, since I'm uneducated in this realm of inquiry. I'll just watch how you and Holding flesh this out.

What I mean is that Herodotus only became an important figure precisely because he wrote something important. It was not as if he already was an important figure, thus giving a later author some motivation to ascribe a document to him. There would be no motivation to ascribe the Histories to a hithero unknown man named Herodotus. However, there clearly would be motivation for a Christian author of the late first century to ascribe a document to any apostolic figure.

Maybe, but, again, why not seal the deal by ascribing the Gospel to one of the 'inner-3'?

I don’t know. Why don’t you ask that question to the pseudonymous author(s) who wrote the Gospel of Philip, or the Epistle of Barnabas, or the Gospel of Thomas? Why not just ascribe these documents to one of the inner-three? Pseudepigrapha was not always ascribed to the most important figures. This is especially evident with Jewish writings, were figures as insignificant as Baruch, Shadrach, Eldad and Modad were used by pseudonymous authors.

What documents and how do you know they were well-attested? If they were, can you provide such attestation?

Well, in my first response to you, and in my response to JP, I went over the Epistle of Barnabas, which is very well-attested. I suspect that many other non-canonical documents may be well-attested also. I need to do some more research into this. But for now, consider the epistle of Barnabas. I’ll paste my comments from the above post to you here:

For example, the external evidence unanimously points to the Epistle of Barnabas as being actually written by the apostle Barnabas. All the earliest manuscripts of the epistle, including the Codex Sinaiticus ascribe it to Barnabas. Clement of Alexandria also confirms it is written by Barnabas, and seems to quote it as scripture. And yet, now, it is rejected by conservatives and critical scholars alike as pseudepigraphical, because it did not make the cut at later church councils. Now, if it is not pseudepigraphical, it is apostolic, and there should be no reason to not include it in the canon.

Thanks again for your thoughtful response.

And thank you for having this discussion with me.

Originally posted by chsalvia

Well, do you believe Matthew utilized Mark and other sources, rather than composed his own eyewitness account? If he did, this seems rather strange – and it seems he did. There are very few unique Matthean pericopes, which means that Matthew utilized Mark and some other source – unless you are going to claim that the non-Marcan material in Matthew actually represents Matthew’s personal memoirs – memoirs which were subsequently copied by Luke. But, there are many problems with this idea, especially if you also want to use the conservative date for Luke/Acts. I’ll wait to see what you say before elaborating further.

Well, how do you know he was a Pharisee? Anyway, I admit that Matthew does cite the Old Testament more often, and he does engage in midrashic interpretations, but all this really shows is that he was Jewish. It’s not completely surprising that one or more Gospels would be written by a Jew. What is surprising is that an eyewitness would rely on external documents or sources to compose an account of events which he should have been able to personally recount himself.

That's a question I've asked myself- why would an eyewitness apostle like Matthew need to rely on another source in composing his gospel? The question is made more urgent by what appears (to me at least) to be the use of the Marcan chronology by both Matthew and Luke. Mark seems to serve as the "backbone" of the Synoptic narrative in the other two. I'd puzzled over this for a while until I came across this quote from Papias in the Second Century:

Originally posted by Papias

Matthew made an arrangement of the oracles in the Hebrew language, and each translated them as he was able...

"Oracles" suggests to me oral sayings, rather than a full narrative gospel. My theory: Matthew the apostle originally wrote down some of the sayings of Jesus. In short, I'm suggesting that Matthew was the author of the hypothetical Q, and that Luke used both Mark's narrative and Matthew's oral sayings gospel in composing his gospel. The gospel that we now call Matthew was composed by another Jewish Christian, in much the same manner as Luke composed his gospel. Anyway, that's my theory and I'm stickin' to it!

Originally posted by Amazing Rando

"Oracles" suggests to me oral sayings, rather than a full narrative gospel. My theory: Matthew the apostle originally wrote down some of the sayings of Jesus. In short, I'm suggesting that Matthew was the author of the hypothetical Q, and that Luke used both Mark's narrative and Matthew's oral sayings gospel in composing his gospel. The gospel that we now call Matthew was composed by another Jewish Christian, in much the same manner as Luke composed his gospel. Anyway, that's my theory and I'm stickin' to it!

That's definitely a possibility. However, in that case, the Gospel in the form we have today is technically anonymous, even though it is based on a core "sayings" Gospel compiled by Matthew the Apostle. But the solution you present is definitely a plausible compromise between traditional authorship and critical analysis.

Originally posted by chsalvia

That's definitely a possibility. However, in that case, the Gospel in the form we have today is technically anonymous, even though it is based on a core "sayings" Gospel compiled by Matthew the Apostle. But the solution you present is definitely a plausible compromise between traditional authorship and critical analysis.

That's been a little "pet theory" of mine for quite some time. I haven't seen it suggested or fleshed out anywhere else though.

Hey chsalvia,

How about a formal debate tentatively scheduled for the last half of May? If that's OK I'll wait until then to say more. My plate is pretty full until the second week of May.

But basically, the “mainstream view” does seem to view all or most of the canonical Gospels as anonymous.

I’m beginning to see this, I think. And again, I’m saying this from a very limited exposure to such issues. I recently made a trip to Barnes n’ Noble and flipped open some Bible Dictionaries and commentaries and almost all of them designated the Gospels to be anonymous. I’m still skeptical of this, however, as you already know.

A useful way to gauge the “mainstream view” is to simply take a look at what the majority of university-press references, commentaries and Bible translations and encyclopedias have to say.

I paged to the Introduction to Matthew in ‘The Oxford Bible Commentary’ and Dale C. Allison, Jr. writes: “Most, however, doubt the tradition.” The tradition being the assumption of Matthean authorship; so, your point is well taken.

pseudonymity was not as widely practiced as an overall literary tradition of the Greco-Roman world than it was within the Jewish/Christian community.

This is an interesting point. You say it isn’t a ‘widely’ used practice Rome. When it was used, however rarely, do you know of any particular cases? Do you think these particular cases merit a stance that regards Greco-Roman pseudonymity as possible, which is all I was really stressing for: possible utilization of Tacitus.

I don’t think the authorial evidence available for the Gospel of Mark is that much more convincing than the authorial evidence available for the pseudepigraphical Epistle of Barnbas.

You bring up the Epistle of Barnabas as a sort of key-stone counter-example for the potency of the external evidence provided for the Gospels. First, the Harper Collins Bible Dictionary states: “Likewise, the Epistle of Barnabas is attributed to him, although it actually comes from the second century.” No reason is provided for why this is, but it’s hard to imagine them throwing this in arbitrarily. Second, J.P. Holding states: “If this book was truly by the companion of Paul, then there might be reason to consider it for the canon. But there is insufficient proof of this, and its late date (c. 90-130) makes it unlikely to have been written by Barnabas [MacD.FormCB, 146] (http://tektonics.org/tekton_02_01_01.html#seven). Third, Glenn Miller gives reason to think that Church councils would be careful in watching out for various pseudepigrapha (http://www.christian-thinktank.com/pseudox.html). So, I don’t think it’s likely Barnabas authored the epistle attributed to him and I believe the Church successfully weeded out its inclusion in the Canon based on this, among other, factors.

the attestation of Papias from Eusebius, and we have for Barnabas the attestation of Clement of Alexandria.

I’ve read, “its attribution to a Clement who was an early Pope is uncertain” (P.J.A., Bible Dictionary). J.P. Holding adds: “It comes as no surprise that the works of Clement (or works allegedly by him - 2 Clement's authenticity is questionable) were considered by some as worthwhile, for he was a disciple of Peter. Hence, under the criterion of apostolic authority, his works could have entered the canon under the same principles as Luke and Mark did, but he is disqualified by other criteria. In particular, 1 Clement refers to a phoenix as an actual living creature!” So, authorship is probably granted, but non-canonicity is grounded. Judging from this, we have reason to doubt Clement as reliable with regard to Barnabas.

But my point is that the strength of this attestation is no more potent, textually speaking, than the attestation of Barnabas, or any other strange tradition that is recorded by Eusebius, or found among the extent fragments of Papias.

Eusebius recording strange traditions isn’t a problem, for isn’t he merely acknowledging their existence? Moreover, due to conclusions placing the Epistle of Barnabas in the 2nd century, we have external reasons to doubt Clement’s reliability on this issue in particular.

Eusebius also records that Papias taught strange doctrines about Paradise – doctrines which really have no basis in scripture.

I don’t see how this is a problem. Strange theological stances don’t prevent one from faithfully recording historical facts.

Well, speculations about Matthew’s curiosity aren’t very useful.

I guess I just disagree. I think Matthew would be very interested in attaining information gleaned from a follower of a disciple who was much more inimate in Christ’s life than Matthew was.

Textually, it's much more likely that Matthew used Mark.

I thought this was an aspect of Q/Marcan priority (Q -> Mark -> Matthew -> Luke -> John (roughly)).

when an ancient writer quotes Scripture at length, (Paul for example), it is rarely word for word or exact.

How does this dis-count oral tradition being ‘word-for-word’ method of passing on tradition entirely? Read the points Holding stresses in his essay here: http://tektonics.org/tekton_03_01_01.html#jsteach . How do you know Paul’s intentions are to actually ‘quote’ scripture? Are ancient methods of quoting any different from today’s quoting methods?

is would be highly unlikely that the overlaps between Mark, Matthew and Luke are so close textually if they were based only on common oral tradition.

Again, what is the difference between getting information from a common oral tradition (words about a state of affairs) and the act of writing it down (words about a state of affairs)? They both are words about a state of affairs and thus will be just as indentical if but into writing or left to oral communication.

There was a church in Rome as early as 50 A.D.

This is a little complex but Holding says: “Albright and Mann [Alb.Mt, clxxxiv] add that there is an "inherent absurdity" in supposing that Jewish Christians "would have based the first Palestinian gospel on a recent arrival from Rome [Mark]." For a deeper discussion, visit here: http://tektonics.org/tekton_02_02_04.html.

the tradition that Mark wrote the Gospel in Rome comes from Clement of Alexandria,

I don’t dispute Clement’s veracity in this regard.

the same Clement of Alexandria who quotes Barnabas as scripture, and who, according to Eusebius, even seemed to believe that Cephas and Peter were different people.

Hmm. Where in Clement’s writings did he say this? It needs to be pointed out that I’m already suspicious of Clement’s trustworthiness per the above reasons; he seems to be valid external evidence in the cases that agree with other external testimonies and the Gospels themselves. From your more informed position, would this be a good way to go about looking at this?

Why do you automatically assume that one tradition is valid, but not another?

Could you point out a specific instance where I do this? Sorry for the hassle.

Good question. I don’t think anyone really knows. I’m sure doctrinal issues had a lot to do with it though.

It did. A great explanation of the criteria is given by Holding here: http://tektonics.org/tekton_02_01_01.html. Given this criteria, Church councils deemed Clement's writings to not be pseudox! Due to some outrageous doctrinal stances and misplaced facts, it didn’t make the cut.

How do you know what the author would be interested in?

By looking at the occupation and social position of the author, we can roughly determine what someone of that occupation and social position would be interested in his particular work.

the references to things that a doctor might find interesting as support for the authorship of Luke to be very unconvincing.

List an example and tell me why you think its unconvincing.

We don’t have the work of the original author. We have copies from scribes.

These aren’t necessary mutually exclusive. See here for a detailed analysis: http://www.christian-thinktank.com/ynotpeter1.html.

Different manuscripts of any given NT document have different spelling mistakes.

The point is that it is a probabilistic evidence meant to be taken cumulatively with other corraborating internal evidences. Holding reiterates the point by taking Tacitus as an example: “would also expect that Tacitus would write his works like a government official of Rome would write; he would have a high level of education, decent grammar, and a sophisticated tone suitable to the Roman upper-crust.” But the ‘spelling’ point you made is understood.

showing how the only real unique evidence for the authenticity of the canonical Gospels, as opposed to pseudonymous documents, comes from the fact that they were approved of by later church councils.

However, the decisions of the church councils were far from arbitrary, which is explained in detail in the link I gave above dealing with the formation of the NT canon (written by Holding).

Well, do you believe Matthew utilized Mark and other sources, rather than composed his own eyewitness account?

I don’t see how these are mutually exclusive either. Why can’t Matthew compose pieces of his gospel from personal recollection, whilst relying on the testimony of a work whose content is from the testimony of a more intimate sort (Peter)?

There are very few unique Matthean pericopes, which means that Matthew utilized Mark and some other source

Ok, but this isn’t a problem for me and seems to me to be compatible with Matthean authorship. Moreover, ‘borrowing’ wasn’t a problem in that time. For example, our disgraceful sentiments towards plagiarism were not that of the ANE, whose view of plagiarism is honorable, for the tradition being passed on is being preserved. Thus, the spread of the disciple’s tradition had more importance than reaping selfish praise for their original thoughts.

But, there are many problems with this idea, especially if you also want to use the conservative date for Luke/Acts.

This seems interesting. Why would it be a problem to accept Marcan material in Matthew being from Matthew’s personal memory, all the while maintain a conservative date for Luke/Acts?

Is this the only event that Matthew decided to base on personal recollection as an eye-witness?

This line of evidence is helpful, but not conclusive anyway. “ . . . it is not likely we can prove much from this” (Blomberg). This evidence seems to find its meaning subsequent to established external evidence dealing with authorship.

I don’t agree with that. What specifically do you mean here?

Holding elaborates: “Matthew also lays special emphasis on monetary amounts (18:21-35, 25:14-30), although not with what can be called an "insiders" knowledge ([CarMoo.Int, 72]; but see [Heib.Int, 60] - Matthew does use a technical monetary term in 22:15-22 where Mark [12:13-17] and Luke [20:20-6] in parallels use a common one).”

is it really any more speculative to assume that this might be the very reason why this Gospel was assigned to Matthew by tradition?

I think so. ‘That’ internal evidence suggests Matthean authorship seems less speculative as to ‘why’ or ‘how’ tradition utilized internal clues within Matthew for the appearance of this particular ascription in Papias’ testimony. It seems you’d have to prove both ‘that’ tradition did this and ‘that’ the internal evidence utilized by tradition was correctly handled. Moreover, if you prove the latter, would not your proof be reason to believe internal evidence on its own?

So basically what you’re arguing here is that Matthew really was an eyewitness, but rather than give us any unique accounts from his point of view (with the exception, maybe, of the fish incident) he simply edited Marcan pericopes from time to time, and sometimes his edits indirectly betray the fact that he was an eyewitness.

As shown above, editing prior testimony based upon the testimony of a greater apostle wasn’t a problem back then. This also assumes that Matthew’s purpose in writing up an account completely excludes various contents of Mark. Moreover, I believe there are more accounts revealed by Matthew (as opposed to Mark) than merely the ‘fish incident’. If you want specifics, I’ll provide them. Contexually, the external evidence would necessitate making sense of Matthew’s use of Mark, assuming Q/Marcan priority.

We should expect Mark’s Gospel to be more focused on Peter, no?

What do you mean by ‘focused’? I was under the impression that Peter’s ‘stamp’ is evident by the style of writing, rather than its specific contents. Holding is helpful here: “Throughout Mark, Peter is given top billing. He is the first of the disciples to be mentioned; he is portrayed as being in Jesus' inner circle, and there are many instances where Peter is the only individual to stand over and against Jesus. In terms of proportion, Peter in mentioned more times per page in Mark than in Matthew or Luke. He is also the most "true to life" character in the Gospel other than Jesus: Kelber [Kelb.OWG, 68] observes that in Mark, "Auerbach was certainly right in contending that Peter showed a distinct mark of individuality...As an individual he ranks above all other disciples" and is the most fully developed character, other than Jesus. There are also many personal touches reflecting Peter, including the frequent and incidental mention of his house (5 times in Mark); phrases such as "Simon and his companions" (1:36) and Andrew being identified as Simon's brother (1:16); and the direct address to Simon by Jesus (14:37). Many third-person verses, if shifted to first- or second-person, would fit right in the mouth of Peter. (1:29, 5:1, 5:38, 6:53-4, 8:22, 10:32, 11:1, 14:18, etc. - [Mart.NTF, 212])”

And yet, Matthew’s Gospel is the one where Peter walks on water, fetches the coin from the fish, and receives the authority to found the church.

Well, why can’t you accept this as a case where Matthew gives “unique accounts from his point of view” (as you desired above)?

Well, how do you know he was a Pharisee?

Good point. Holding states: “A Levite like Matthew would normally be a Pharisee, and would receive training for Temple service.” So, you’re right; I don’t ‘know’ he’s a Pharisee; though, it is possible, if not probable.

Which controversies?

None specifically. It’s more of a general attitude. Holding posits the following: “It has not been suggested, but I wonder if perhaps Matthew's choosing to feature controversies with the Pharisees might, in this light, reflect a personal interest rather than problems within his supposed "community" with the Pharisees; see below.”

I’ll remind you that Papias claims Matthew wrote it in Hebrew, so the Greek writing style is indicative only of the translator, if you’re going to take Papias at his word.

Well, Papias could either be speaking of the earlier Aramaic version of Matthew or another work composed by him. 1. Based on the 2-source theory (Matthew and Luke contain ‘shared’ material), it is conceivable that an Aramaic work of notes compiled by Matthew was distributed to the apostles. 2. Thus, Matthew’s ‘sayings’ in Aramaic and his subsequent Greek ‘Gospel’ is being posited; therefore, the Greek version would make sense of gleaned from here: 1. His own Aramaic notebook (being a possible solution to the Synoptic Problem). 2. Mark.

I’m basically in agreement with Holding when he says this: “Matthew, as a tax collector, would know Greek. . . . Even if he did not, this would not preclude the current Matthew, or some part of it, as being translated or taken from Matthew's original Aramaic.”

And yet, if you can point to Papias who authenticates Matthew, I can point to Clement of Alexandria who authenticates Barnabas.

Yes, but Barnabas’ pseudox is wrought by external evidences indepenedent of Clement’s testimony, whereas such external evidences are missing in Matthew’s case, thus keeping Papias’ testimony in tact. Moreover, no scholars I know of make Matthew pseudox; they announce its anonymity.

the fact that certain pseudonymous documents were taken as authentic makes external evidence for the canonicals much weaker.

But the Church was on the look-out for pseudonymous works, per the link from the Christian-thinktank. Holding links to Miller’s article while saying this: “Glenn Miller's excellent work on "pseudox" - and note that the church would indeed have been on the lookout for false or pseudonymous works of all types!”

Now, the key to my argument, however, is to show that a lot of these pseudonymous documents were believed to be authentic by the early church – just like the canonicals were believed to be authentic by the early church.

Ok. Let me know when you’ve got the information.

I can point to the pseudepigraphical Epistle of Barnabas, which has excellent manuscript attestation, i.e. there are no manuscripts of Barnabas that are not attributed to the apostle Barnabas,

The problem, though, is that it seems such attributions are pseudox, whereas Matthew is not.

What I mean is that Herodotus only became an important figure precisely because he wrote something important.

What’s wrong with this? What’s to keep someone from attributing a document to Herodotus after it is he gained his reputation?

And thank you for having this discussion with me.

Your welcome. I considerate a priviledge really. I’m learning so much, so thanks for sharing all this with me.

mattd