Hi
As a non scholar and newcomer to this material I wanted to ask a question that has been going around in my head. Apologies if it has been answered elsewhere. My understanding is that the original gospels were written in Greek, and that the earliest extant manuscripts we have of e.g. Mark are from around 150-200 CE, presumably also in Greek. If the oldest surviving documents are from a much later period how can we be so sure that the original gospels were written in Greek as opposed to another language i.e. Aramaic?
Many thanks,
Graham
We can’t be sure there were no earlier gospels, if by that you mean texts dealing with some part of Jesus’ life and teachings. Almost all NT scholars believe there were earlier written sources we don’t have, though what was in them and what language they were written in is a matter of some dispute.
However, there is strong consensus that the four surviving gospels were all originally written in Greek. Which was at the time the gospels first appeared, the language the largest number of people spread across the Empire could read and understand. Greek was the best language to reach the already-varied and widespread Christian community, and to make new converts. Perhaps some parts of the gospels were borrowed and translated (certainly elements of the Torah, in Hebrew, that were quoted in the gospels, were translations–sometimes bad ones–from the Septuagint, the Greek translation of key OT texts), but the gospels overall are original Greek compositions. The fact that Paul chose to write in Greek, decades earlier, shows us that it very quickly became the lingua franca of Christianity.
Aramaic was also a lingua franca, but it was in general decline by the time the gospels were written. Which could explain why whatever Christian writings might have existed in that language didn’t survive–people stopped copying them.
Robert will probably provide more and better details (and quibble with mine), but that’s the gist of it.
Matthew 13:8 “Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown”
seems like an incorrect way of writing it: either build up to “a hundred” with “thirty, sixty or a hundred” or if you are going to start with “a hundred” dont bother telling anyone about the “sixty” and “thirty”.
Mark and Luke chose 1 of the 2 options to correct Matthew.
Luke 8:8 “Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown”
Mark 4:8 “Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times”.
The version in Matthew requires an explanation. One option is that Matthew was originally written in Aramaic, which being written right to left would mean 100, 60, 30 is the correct order originally but gets incorrectly translated in the left to right writing of greek.
This would be consistent with the claim of Papias that “Matthew wrote the oracles in the Hebrew language, and every one interpreted them as he was able.”
So, finally, that leaves us with the gospel of Mark. The single most disciplined attempt to retrieve Aramaic original texts underlying parts of our current Greek text of Mark has been produced by ** you do not have permission to see this link **. Personally, I love this book as well as his work on the Aramaic substratum of Q, as disciplined experiments in retro-translation, but I only know of one legitimate scholar who seriously defends the whole of Casey’s view and he is one of his former students. That is not to say that there are not many places in which one is frequently tempted to consider an earlier Aramaic substratum of many expressions in the Greek gospels, but there is no convincing case than any of our four canonical gospels were not written in Greek.
An important distinction. Mark is writing in Greek but he got his “Aramaisms” somewhere. I’ve always been at least somewhat sympathetic to the idea that Mark was a Hellenized diaspora Jew writing to a mixed audience of converts. It would explain a lot (like why he shows so much interest in Jewish conceptions of the Messiah) and his iffiness on Palestinian particulars might just be because he was born and grew up somewhere else. I know children of Indian immigrants who grew up here who have no more detailed knowledge of Indian geography than I do. (And their mother always told them not to speak Hindi because of their bad American accents!)
Robert said
At first, it was the idea that the author of Greek Matthew would have constantly darted his eyes back and forth to read each word of the earlier Hebrew/Aramaic text correctly from right to left at the level of each word but incorrectly, from left to right, with respect to the larger phrase. Sounds like thins might cause something like self-induced repetitive pattern-reversal epileptic seizures. Horizontal davening?
But you do accept that constant darting of the eyes back and forth can produce scribal errors? And you do accept that sometimes larger phrases will be translated as a block and sometimes individual words?
Next I laughed at your apparent belief that Mark purposefully but unintentionally arrived at the more original Hebrew/Aramaic formulation while editing Greek Matthew. Then, finally, I laughed that you might (also or instead) believe Mark heard the original Aramaic parable from Peter and therefore was not dependent on either Matthew’s or Luke’s gospels for this parable.
It may not have been unintentional – he may have intentionally known what the earlier correct version was (he may have had both the greek and aramaic to work with).
The point is that it is more likely for Mark to edit “100, 60, 30” to “30, 60, 100” than for Matthew to edit the other way round.
The argument works whether or not there was an original aramaic.
You add in Luke’s version and now you have 2 edits to account for. Both explainable in terms of Matthean priority and neither explainable in terms of Markan priority.
If you can’t think of a reason for Matthew editing Mark here, but can think of a reason Mark editing Matthew, the conclusion must be that this particular passage supports Matthean priority.
We must also conclude that Luke also thought the original needed editing (whether he’s editing Matthew or Mark). Again only Matthew’s version looks like it needs editing. It’s the fact that the original version gets edited twice in the later synoptics that’s so damaging to Markan priority.
The downward progression in Mt 25 and Lk 19 isn’t comparable to Mt 13. In the parable of the talents is about the diminishing returns of the servants, in the parabale of the sower it is about the increasing strength or growth of the word of God.
Yes if Matthew is editing Mark he may be displaying a preference for the reverse order; but if we’re attempting to establish priority we can’t assume Matthew has this preference. (Mt 25 is not comparable).
If its agree that “30, 60, 100” is objectively the correct way to write and the observation is three versions in the three synoptics
“100, 60, 30”
“30, 60, 100”
“100”
then only the change from “100, 60, 30” to the other two make sense.
If we’re discussing priority we can’t make any assumptions of the existence of Q; the discussion must only consist of the three synoptics.
We’re aware of a reason to change/preference to change “100, 60, 30” we arent aware of one to change “30, 60, 100”.
Bren obviously reads a lot–and does his own thing with what he reads. He even knows some Greek. What makes you think going through your recommended reading list is going to change anything?
It’s kind of a crutch, because people who read the same books can come to very different conclusions (as Bart came to different conclusions than Bruce Metzger, while still holding him in high regard–and Jesus probably came to some different conclusions than his teacher, after covering pretty much the same material).
It’s a way of dismissing people–also a nifty way to get out of having to make an argument. I’ve read books you haven’t, but I didn’t say “Go read that crucifixion book by John Granger Cook, that even Bart Ehrman hasn’t read yet, and then we’ll talk.” Nobody can read everything. The legend at the the top of my grad school reading list said “There are too many books. There is not enough time.”
My point is, you’re acting like you and Bart are on the same team. There is no team. You happen to agree with Bart on this subject, but you’ve disagreed with him on others, even though he has unquestionably read far more than you, because that’s his job. If reading more books means you’re win the argument, you should be deferring to him on everything.
You treat this forum like it’s your classroom. And we’re your students. I spent several years studying with real historians, and none of them were even a tenth as overbearing–they actually cared what their students thought. And when you questioned them, they didn’t say “Go read this book and you’ll see how wrong you are.”
Bren wants to prove Matthew wrote first. You want to prove–what? Oh, I get it–
But at least he’s honest about it. And yes, I have my own frustrated internal pedant. But a sense of humor to go with him. 😉
BDEhrman
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Robert
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