Loading...Can we trust a source such as Papias on the question of whether our Gospel of Matthew was written by the disciple Matthew and that our Gospel of Mark was written by Mark, the companion of the disciple Peter?
It is interesting that Papias tells a story that is recorded in our Matthew but tells it so completely differently that it appears he doesn’t know Matthew’s version. And so when he says Matthew wrote Matthew, is he referring to *our* Matthew, or to some other book? (Recall, the Gospel he refers to is a collection of Jesus’ sayings in Hebrew; the Gospel of Matthew that *we* have is a narrative, not a collection of sayings, and was written in Greek.) If he *is* referring to our Matthew, why doesn’t he see it as an authoritative account?
Here’s the conflicting story. It involves the death of Judas. And it’s quite a story! Here is my translation of it from my edition, The Apostolic Fathers (Loeb Classical Library, vol. 1; 2004).
But Judas went about in this world as a great model of impiety. He became so bloated in the flesh that he could not pass through a place that was easily wide enough for a wagon – not even his swollen head could fit. They say that his eyelids swelled to such an extent that he could not see the light at all; and a doctor could not see his eyes even with an optical device, so deeply sunken they were in the surrounding flesh. And his genitalia appeared more disgusting and greater than all formlessness, and he bore through them from his whole body flowing pus and worms, and to his shame shame, he emitted pus and worms that flowed through his entire body.
And they say that after he suffered numerous torments and punishments, he died on his own land, and that land has been, until now, desolate and uninhabited because of the stench. Indeed, even to this day no one can pass by the place without holding their nose. This was how great an outpouring he made from his flesh on the ground.” [Apollinaris of Laodicea]
You gotta love it. But, well, what does one make of it? Matthew’s Gospel – the one we have in the New Testament – also describes the death of Judas. But it is not like this at all. According to Matthew, Judas hanged himself (Matt. 27:5). If Papias saw Matthew’s Gospel as an eyewitness authority to the life of Jesus and those around him, why didn’t he accept its version of Judas’s death?
Another alternative is
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It is possible, of course, that like other early Christian scholars, Papias thought Matthew was originally composed in Hebrew when it was not. But it is also possible that these later writers thought Matthew was written in Hebrew because they knew about Papias’s comment and thought he was referring to our Gospel. But he appears not to be: Matthew is not simply a collection of Jesus’ sayings; and in the only place that Papias’s comments overlap with (our) Matthew’s account (the death of Judas), he doesn’t appear to know (our) Matthew.
If Papias was not talking about our Matthew, was he talking about our Mark? As Papias’s quotation about Mark that I cited yesterday indicates, he considered “his” Mark to be problematic because of its disorderly arrangement: that’s why he says that the preaching of Peter was not given “in order.” But that somewhat negative remark in itself is odd, because he doesn’t make the same comment about Matthew, even though the narrative outline of our Matthew is pretty much the same as our Mark – with additional materials added in.
Apart from that, Papias indicates that Mark’s Gospel gives an exhaustive account of everything Peter preached and that it gives it without changing a thing. The reality is that there is no way that anyone could think that the Gospel of Mark in our Bibles today gives a full account of Peter’s knowledge of Jesus. Our Gospel of Mark takes about two hours to read. Are we to think that after spending months (years?) with Jesus, Peter had no more than two hours’ worth of memories?
Of course it may be that Papias is exaggerating for effect. But even so, since he does not appear to be referring to the book we call Matthew, why should we think that he is referring to the book we call Mark? And that, therefore (as Papias indicates) Mark’s Gospel is actually a transcription of Peter’s version of what Jesus said and did?
Despite repeated attempts over the centuries by readers to show that Mark’s Gospel is “Peter’s perspective,” the reality is that if you simply read it without any preconceptions, there is nothing about the book that would make you think, “Oh, this is how Peter saw it all.” Quite the contrary – not only does Peter come off as a bumbling, foot-in-the-mouth, and unfaithful follower of Jesus in Mark (see Mark 8:27-32; 9:5-6; 14:27-31), but there are all sorts of stories – the vast majority – that have nothing to do with Peter or that betray anything like a Petrine voice.
There is, though, a still further and even more compelling reason for doubting that we can trust Papias on the authorship of the Gospels. It is that that we cannot really trust him on much of anything. That may sound harsh, but remember that even the early Christians did not appreciate his work very much and the one comment we have about him personally from an educated church father is that he was remarkably unintelligent.
It is striking that some modern authors want to latch on to Papias for his claims that Matthew and Mark wrote Gospels, assuming, as Bauckham does, that he must be historically accurate, when they completely overlook the other things that Papias says, things that even these authors admit are not and cannot be accurate. If Papias is not reliable about anything else he says, why does anyone think he is reliable about our Gospels of Matthew and Mark? The reason is obvious. It is because readers want him to be accurate about Matthew and Mark, even though they know that otherwise you can’t rely on him for a second.
Does anyone think that Judas really bloated up larger than a house, emitted worms from his genitals, and then burst on his own land, creating a stench that lasted a century? No, not really. But it’s one of the two Gospel traditions that Papias narrates. Here is the only other one. This is the only saying of Jesus that is preserved from the writing of Papias. Papias claims that it comes from those who knew the elders who knew what the disciple John the Son of Zebedee said that Jesus taught:
Thus the elders who saw John, the disciple of the Lord, remembered hearing him say how the Lord used to teach about those times, saying:
The days are coming when vines will come forth, each with ten thousand boughs; and on a single bough will be ten thousand branches. And indeed, on a single branch will be ten thousand shoots and on every shoot ten thousand clusters; and in ever cluster will be ten thousand grapes, and every grape, when pressed, will yield twenty-five measures of wine. And when any of the saints grabs hold of a cluster, another will cry out, ‘I am better, take me, bless the lord through me.” (Eusebius, Church History, 3.39.1)
Really? Jesus taught that? Does anyone really think so? No one I know. Does Papias think Jesus said this? Yes, he absolutely does. Here is what Papias himself says about the traditions of Jesus he records in his five-volume book, in Bauckham’s own translation:
I will not hesitate to set down for you along with my interpretations everything I carefully learned from the elders and carefully remembered, guaranteeing their truth.”
So, can we rest assured about the truth of what Papias says, since he can provide guarantees based on his careful memory? It doesn’t look like it. The only traditions about Jesus we have from his pen are clearly not accurate. Why should we think that what he says about Matthew and Mark are accurate? My hunch is that the only reason readers have done so is because they would like him to be accurate when he says things they agree with, even when they know he is not accurate when he says things they disagree with.
However one evaluates the overall trustworthiness of Papias, in my view he does not provide us with clear evidence that the books that eventually became the first two Gospels of the New Testament were called Matthew and Mark in his time.
[1] That is obvious If Matthew was based in large part on the Gospel of Mark, as is almost everywhere conceded. Matthew agrees with the Greek text of Mark verbatim throughout his account. The only way that would be possible is if he was copying the Greek text into his Greek text.
Whoa. Eusebius hated Papias as a heretic and chiliast. All we have from Papias is a handful of selective quotations… it is probably no accident none of his 5 books survive. Imagine if in the future one of your critics selectively quoted you, with none of your actual books surviving, then a future scholar asked “can we really trust him though?” The idea of asking if we can trust Papias when he was suppressed and selectively quoted is too much.
His description of Judas reads like the sort of over-the-top figurative language used for a villain… his head was too swollen to get through the door, he dripped pus from his unit (like guys with gonorrhea literally do), he spewed worms from his butt (like people with intestinal worms can) and his bloated body burst open and stank in an open field after death (like a literal decomposing body in the sun).
Is it possible that Papias had M?
If our earliest complete manuscripts date to the early 300s, in light of what Celsus claims about edits, can anyone know if our copies of Mark, Matthew, etc are not significantly different revisions than existed in the year 100?
Finding Papias’ 5books would be huge.
Actually, in my case it happens all the time, and I haven’t even died yet.
these three posts on Papius was excellent! very thought provoking and informative.. that’s wild that he said the account of Judas and the vine or accurate and true… I wonder if that whole episode concerning Judas according to Papius Is a souped up version of Acts1:18🤔 side question here: thoughts on Lk 4:18 modern translations don’t have the line ” bind up the broken hearted” but the KJV does and is found in ISA 61:1-2 & in the Lxx . my guess is that it’s not in the older manuscripts of the NT…. and the addition is a later scribble work but it is in the Old Testament so I’m wondering why it’s not in some of our older Greek manuscripts ? do you think it was originally part of Luke or?…. I hope my question makes sense
Yes, the swords are not found in most of our earliest and best manuscripts; they are indeed taken from Isa 61, and are in lots of the later manuscripts, including those beying the King James.
I’m not sure why Papias’ purported teaching of Jesus (ten thousand boughs with ten thousand branches, etc.) is so troubling. To me it sounds like simple exaggeration to make a point, not necessarily a teaching to be taken literally. Both the prophets Amos and Joel use similar descriptions (“the mountains shall drip sweet wine”) to make points about the future. So why would it be hard to believe that Jesus taught something along these lines?
Mainly because he doesn’t teach anything with that level of exaggeration in the surviving materials that are usually considered authentic, whereas this kind of descriptive excess does become a major feature of other apocalyptic writings, both Jewish (it’s very similar to what is in 2 Baruch) and Christian. Of course Jesus *could* have taught it. But I’d say there’s very little argument in its favor.
I don’t think Papias considered Mark to be problematic because it was disorderly, he is defending it against criticism that the gospels left things out. “For of one thing he took special care, not to omit anything he had heard, and not to put anything fictitious into the statements.”
So Papias is claiming Mark didn’t intentionally decide to leave anything out (birth narrative, sermon on the mount etc) but only put in what he heard Peter say. Wouldn’t that fit well with our versions of Matthew and Mark?
Why do you think that he points out that he didn’t present them “in order” and that he did not “arrange an orderly composition” so that “he did nothing wrong” when he proceeded this way? It sounds like he’s defending the Gospel against a charge. (Why else would he bring it up twice and say that there’s nothing wrong with it being out of order?)
An orderly account need not necessarily mean an account in chronological order. It could just mean one which does not have each narrative follow necessarily from a previous one.
So if Mark has Jesus suddenly appear at age 30 with no birth narrative it could be said that he didn’t want to produce an “ordered” account, but only what he heard Peter say and nothing more.
Yup, could be. It could just be disorderly in other ways. Your second paragraph doesnt match your first, btw (in addition, mark says nothing about Jesus being 30)
“The reality is that there is no way that anyone could think that the Gospel of Mark in our Bibles today gives a full account of Peter’s knowledge of Jesus.”
So are you claiming Bart that there was a ‘gospel’, accessible to Papias and his readership, that did “give a full account of Peter’s knowledge of Jesus”. If so, what happened to it; and in particular, how come our Matthew and Luke appear not to have used it? Because, for their narratives of what Jesus said and did – as distinct from what he taught – canonical Matthew and Luke rely almost entirely on canonical Mark.
But if there is no evidence for Peter’s ‘full account’ having existed; your argument above is a straw man. Otherwise Papias-Mark (which certainly did exist) cannot have had the character of a ‘full account’
The key question being; “does any surviving or known Christian ‘gospel’ correspond as closely to Papias-Mark or Papias-Matthew as do the canonical gospels with these names?”. For Papias-Matthew the answer is clearly ‘yes, most do’; but I do not know of any established text that corresponds better with Papias-Mark, than does canonical-Mark.
Do you?
No, I’m not claiming that. I’m claiming that Papias either knew or had heard of an account of the life and teachings of Jesus that some readers did not appreciate fully because it was thought to be a disorderly account. I don’t know if it was our Gospel of Mark or not, but nothing Papias says about it would make anyone think that it was our Mark, except for the fact that our Mark is called that because some decades after Papias people started calling our Mark Mark. I’m not saying it was a full account of Peter’s teachigns/sayings. That is Papias’s apologetic claim about it, and it can’t be true for a Gospel that is this length, unless Peter had a very bad memory. In a number of the other fragments, Papias also says things that aren’t true and (not “or”) are highly exaggerated. As to any surviving Gospel, I’d say that the Gospels of Luke, John, and Peter fit just as well as Mark and Matthew, and that the Gospel of Thomas fits his description of Matthew much better (just sayings, and some have even argued it was written in Syriac! = Hebrew)
Thanks Bart.
Taking your points in reverse:
– certainly Thomas (and other texts) correspond better with Papias-Matthew
– none of the ‘incredibilities’ you quote of Papias are from Papias-Mark; this then is an ‘argument from analogy’: ‘..if Bart supports a lousy team, his scholarship must be lousy too’. Such arguments are sometimes advanced – when no stronger case can be made – but can never be conclusive. Crucially, an argument from analogy depend on the prior establishment of the analogical subjects as being ‘similar’ in respect of the point at issue. Which I’m afraid is absent in this instance; as one of the few things we know about Papias-Mark and Papias-Matthew is that they were *not* similar.
– I see no reason why canonical Mark cannot have been thought a full account of Peter’s teachings on Jesus deeds and words. I know of several clerics whose full repertoire of sermon contents is a lot shorter than Mark.; I suspect you do too. We know that Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria and possibly Justin Martyr held similar views. Papias (however unreliable) was not alone in this.
For my particular perspective, I propose the following:
– that the absence of named citations of evangelists in apostolic traditions other than Papias, was likely a matter of convention; and should not be taken as indicating that these texts ever circulated without known authorial names. Their focus was Jesus, not his chroniclers. As a model perhaps, Luke 1:2 cites “eyewitness” accounts as his sources; these are unnamed, but by implication could have been. John 21:24 cites a disciple as eyewitness support and clearly could have named him, but avoids doing so.
– specifically for the Gospel of Mark, its separate survival is a puzzle; since almost all its narrative is repeated (slightly shortened) in Matthew. It is rarely cited in the early centuries, and appears to have been copied much less. Had it circulated wholly anonymously, it is difficult to see how it would have survived as a separate Gospel. The most likely reason it did so, was the widespead identification of its author ‘Mark’ as translating Peter’s memoirs; but that it turn looks to have been dependent on a prior tradition of it’s having been written by a ‘Mark’.
Do you believe that Papias thought the supposed Jesus saying was meant to be taken literally? If so based on what? Because if he thought it was a metaphor I don’t see how that supports that Papias is not trustworthy. I may be missing something here. As for the rest of your argument, it makes sense to me. Thanks in advance.
The later readers of Papias all appear to have thought he meant it literally, and I assume that is in part because of what he says elsewhere in his extensive writings (probably similar things, I should suppose). No one ever indicates that the various things he says that later writers thought were a bit wild were actually meant to be metaphorical. So it’s possible that he meant it all metaphorically, but even if so, it isn’t the kind of metaphor Jesus was known to use. His exaggerations were things like “the mustard seed is the smallest of all seeds” and some seed can increase a hundred fold.
What are our earliest witnesses of the NT Mark?
Matthew and Luke; scholars say were written about 80 AD and more than 95% of our Mark is present in Matthew or Luke.
If Papias books were written about half a century later, what are the chances that the Mark referred to by Papias was different from what Mathew and Luke used?
Did Mark change in the years 80 through 130 and changed again to our NT Mark?
There were two gospels known as Mark, one used by Matthew and Luke and another referred to by Papias?
Even so , the oddities in Papias statements about Mark and Matthew have to be explained.
Maybe the first Matthew version did not contain Mark, it was only “a collection of sayings” as Papias reported, in this case it could even predate Mark.
Then after Papias wrote his books somebody took Matthew’s “”collection of sayings” and by adding a good share of Mark’s gospel produced “our” NT Matthew.
Somebody read it and did no like the nativity stories nor Jesus’s genealogy and many other things, so he made his own version , that’s “Luke”.
So with “John”, its author did not like the “messianic secret” nor a “parable teller” Jesus.
Mystery solved: Maybe Papias’ collection of Jesus’ saying in Hebrew is Q!!!!!
JK 🙂
I’m in Irenaeus’s camp tossing out the criticizm of Eusebius even though I share in Eisebius’s preterist viewpoint. I am convinced that there were many Hebrew and Aramaic writings prior to the Greek gospels. I believe that those were “lost” on purpose beginning after the church in Jeruselem changed from Jewish followers of Jesus (till early 2nd century) to the Helenic (greek) believes taking it over. Certainly, the first century Jewish followers (apostles) would have written about their witness of Jesus in the Hebrew and/or Aramaic language. Thus find it highy probable of a hebrew account of what Peter would have told “Mark” totally different from a Greek gospel later written in Greek that is much abbreviated. Probably a “cherry picking” from the Hebrew accounts to provide the message the author wanted to give. Papias does not say that his “Mark” is in hebrew, but it does not prohibit it from being in hebrew.
Since those who witnessed Jesus were certainly Hebrews, and Papias made a point to get witness 1st/2nd person testimony, then he would put hebrew testimony over greek. There had to be plenty of “sayings” written in Hebrew or Aramaic in 1st century Judea
(cont)
Seeing as its Eusebius quoting Papias, cant we take it that Eusebius himself believes Papias is talking about “the” Mark and Matthew? (and Eusebius would have more information that we do to back that belief up).
Yes, Eusebius definitely believes that.
I think it is very possible that a collection of Jesus sayings, without narrative, written in Aramaic and attributed to Matthew by Papias, existed. As soon a scribe become a Jesus follower, he would want to do just that. Once translated to Greek and circulated, it would be what scholars call Q.
The NT Gospel attributed to Matthew is written much later, using primitive Matthew as a base, adding narrative, references to the Scriptures (no matter how absurd), and constructed stories, like the virgin birth, according to new beliefs in vogue at the time.
NT Matthew is the most “Jewish” Gospel. Most Jesus sayings that are probably said by Jesus, are in Matthew. It even contradicts itself. In 10:5 “Do not go among the Gentiles”, in 28:19 “go and make disciples of all nations”. Maybe Jesus changed his mind, but seems like putting together different traditions, one of them being the primitive Matthew.
I just listened to your podcast episode on Mark and was wondering what you thought Mark’s message to the reader was about how to act. If he told parables so people wouldn’t understand him and didn’t want those who heard him to be saved, why was Jesus preaching and what was Mark saying that Jesus wanted of those who heard him? If different, what did Mark want of his readers?
Jesus explained his parables to those who asked, and so he appears to want people to ask. Mark though isn’t written for outsiders; it is directed to insiders who already believe in Jesus in order to explain something important about him — he was widely misunderstood by everyoe in his own day….
Thanks Dr. Ehrman, I think your analysis of Papias’ “Matthew” is definitive. There’s no way Papias is talking about the Gospel of Matthew! But then comparing Papias’ relative comments on Mark’s and Matthew’s orderliness is not too helpful since we know he’s not comparing it to gMatthew. Is there anything in the text of gMark that makes us think it’s ” not orderly”? I suppose it’s hard to know since Mark is the major source for Matthew and Luke and thus we don’t have much to compare Mark’s order against. (As an aside it’s interesting that apologists would have to argue the Mark’s order is jumbled to defend its traditional authorship!)
Overall my impression is that while Papias’ Matthew cannot be the apostle Matthew, Papias’ Mark could possibly be Mark but the likelihood will just depend on how much you credence you give Papias.
My point is that if we know we can’t trust him on one of the two he mentions, what would make us think we could trust him on the other? He may have been referring to our Mark. But I don’t see how we could know, since nothing that he says about Mark is obviolusy true of our Mark, and the not-obviously true things he says about Matthew are definitely wrong about our Matthew.
An additional possible textual argument against Papias’ attribution to Mark: Papias claims that Mark was recording the teachings of Peter. If you accept the short ending of Mark (near scholarly consensus) then isn’t this discordant with what we know of Peter’s teaching. Acts 2 records Peter’s speech at Penecost (focused on the resurrection) and 1 Corinthians 15 makes Christ’s resurrection appearance to Peter a bedrock of early Church belief. It would then be beyond credulity to think that Mark recorded Peter’s teachings and left the resurrection appearances out?
Interesting point. But you’d have to show that Acts gives an *accurate* understanding of Peter’s views and that’s a bit problematic. The point about 1 Cor. is a good ‘un… If Mark was giving *everything* Peter said, then you’d think seeing jesus would be in there….