Robert said

Yes, an overstatement, as in a false statement. There is in the surviving fragments of Papias no explicit claim with respect to order (we don’t even know if he was referring to Matthew’s gospel), but they make much better sense as him explaining for his own purposes how Matthew’s collection of oracles supplied what was lacking in Mark’s gospel.

How can you possibly judge the translation to be incorrect when you do not even know Greek? You’re merely imposing your idea of what you would like the text to say onto a text that you cannot read in the original. This is so typical of your frustrating attempt to impose preconceived ideas onto texts without first looking at the evidence and letting it speak for itself.

Part of your misunderstanding of the text here (in addition to trying to criticize a translation of an original you cannot read), is that this portion of the text is NOT speaking of Mark’s account, but of Peter’s preaching, and specifically of Peter creating his teachings in accord with the needs of his hearers, not creating an ordered account of the Lord’s oracles. It is this that Matthew supplies by creating a collection of the oracles.

The point is one can’t separate out an adjective and noun in the translation and interpret the Papias account as Mark created an un-ordered account/compilation/gospel therefore Matthew created and ordered account/compilation/gospel. This interpretation would indeed have causal inference.

However if we take say Steven Carlson’s translation from the blog:

“but not, as it were, making a compilation of the dominical oracles“

“So then Matthew compiled the oracles in the Hebrew language“

the causal inference (regarding gospel writing) is lost. Whatever it was Matthew is said to have done isn’t what Mark was said to have done. Matthew couldn’t be said to be writing a gospel (or compiltation of oracles) in response to Mark’s gospel (or compilation of oracles).

Actually, there is a very good reason for Eusebius to intervene here and make it clear that on the one hand Papias has related (ἱστόρηται) what the elder said about Mark and Peter, but next Papias himself speaks (εἴρηται), giving his own view about how Matthew’s collection of oracles supplies what was lacking in Peter’s preaching and Mark’s gospel. This makes perfect sense in that Papias work is all about his own Exegesis of the Lord’s Oracles, as is clear from the title of his work.

Possibly, but the line “These things are related by Papias concerning Mark” seems hard to fit in to that idea. This suggests the ending of the passage from Papias. Why not just give both the Mark and Matthew account together and finish with “these things are related by Papias concerning Mark and Matthew”?

You’re neglecting the preceding long account of Eusebius about Papias’ work and his interventions in trying to interpret Papias. 

Not neglecting it, the point is the more detail he has about a subject the more he puts it to the fore, the less detail he has the more he leaves it til the end.

Of no importance whatsoever in trying to interpret the fragments of Papias. We cannot even say if Papias statements about Matthew’s Aramaic/Hebrew collection of oracles is referring to the what we know of today as the Greek gospel of Mark.   

The relevance is that Eusebius thinks Matthew comes first and he doesnt appear to see any contradiction between Papias’s claims and Clement’s

Robert said

These subjective views have no real bearing on source-critical evaluations of the gospels. You should look at what constitutes a scholarly discussion of the real issues.  

All views contain some subjective and some objective elements. The objectivity here is provided by that fact that two first century greek authors, Luke and John, place the introduction of Barabbas where we in the 21st century would subjectively expect it to be. 

Mark’s subjectively early introduction can be explained if we assume he’s editing Matthew who places his introduction where we would subjectively expect it to be.

Matthew, Luke and John all have the introduction where we would expect it to be, Mark doesn’t.

Robert said

brenmcg said

The greek in Mark cannot always be said to be of a poorer standard. Just on occasion. 

OK, what are your specific counter-examples of Mark improving upon Matthew’s poor Greek? 

I’m not saying the greek in Mark is ever better than Matthew’s. I’m saying the greek in Mark is not always of a poorer standard than the greek in Matthew. Sometime’s Mark’s greek doesnt need improving.

brenmcg said

Exactly what you’d expect if a poorer writer was editing a better one.  

How so? This seems to contradict your earlier statement that Mark’s Greek is not consistently poorer than Matthew’s.

Because if the poorer writer only makes occasional edits into his own less sophisticated greek, his version will also contain unedited examples of the better writers greek.

Actually, these arguments are extremely helpful. Matthew is constantly polishing and emending Mark’s text in ways that one would expect. Not just poor grammar, but also maladroit, awkward expressions, even very minor things like word order. Oftentimes the polishing is the type of minor improvements that a writer would make in a second or third draft of one’s own writing. Not only because the first writer had poor grammar and the second writer had better grammar, but because any text can be improved upon and polished by an editor with a second set of eyes to make it clearer.  

Yes certainly, but knowing one writer has better greek than another isnt helpful. Whether the second is improving the greek of the first or the second is weakening the greek of the first would be impossible to say.