I find Smith's article quite frustrating. He comments on a number of issues, often quite superficially, and sometimes disjointedly, yet on a few occasions goes into specifics to make a point that appeals to tradition.
BeDuhn provides 3-4 pages of discussion on Q in his 2013
'The First New Testament: Marcion's Scriptural Canon' (pp. 93-6
inclusive) and it seems that has prompted Smith to both kind of rehash it and to riff off it. But Q is largely a red-herring if or given a proposed path of the dependence of Mark on 'MLk'^ as subsequently* outlined by Klinghardt as Smith alludes to earlier
(pp. 146-7 of Smith's article).
* ie. subsequently as in Klinghardt's 2015
'Das älteste Evangelium...' being later than BeDuhn's 2013
'The First New Testament.
^ MLK = Smith's designation for Marcion's Evangelion.
Smith previously noted that "Klinghardt offers four redaction-critical arguments in support of the dependence of Mark on 'MLk'," going on to say "none of which is really convincing as to the direction of literary dependence." But the examples that Smith discusses to try to dismiss Klinghardt on the dependence of Mark on 'MLk' are
mostly things
in or not in Luke(!) (pp. 145 of Smith's article.)
Smith previously admitted that Klinghardt "concludes that the differences between MLk and Mark show “die ordnende und planvoll gestaltende Hand von Mk”." ["the orderly and well-planned hand of Mk".]
(pp. 144-5 of Smith's article)
Smith admits "Klinghardt thinks that Mark’s ending is more developed than the “recht uneinheitlich” ending of MLk'' (p. 146), but then "Klinghardt’s “working hypothesis” about the dependence of Mark on MLk is examined in connection with a detailed study of the parallel empty tomb narratives", despite noting "Mark 16:1–8 is an abrupt conclusion", and by
again referring to g.Luke!!; err, I mean 'CLk' (and Matthew, and that "Epiphanius’s texts [of 'MLk] shows an influence from the text of CLk").
Smith notes that
in verse 6 the absence of οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε, ἀλλ᾿ ἠγέρθη (despite the attestation for ἠγέρθη) in MLk provides the starting point for a linear development:
MLk 24:6
[null] |
Mark 16:6
ἠγέρθη,
οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε |
Matt 28:6
οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε,
ἠγέρθη γάρ |
Matt 28:6
οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε,
ἠγέρθη γάρ |
Luke 24:6
οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε,
ἀλλ᾿ ἠγέρθη |
Mark reacted to MLk, Matthew revised Mark, and Luke followed Matthew.
Shortly after Smith wrote
Nevertheless, in my opinion, certain narrative and stylistic elements of the Markan presentation still suggest, when compared with the parallel presentation in MLk, that the latter seems to be a later improvement of the former. Mark’s
characteristic paratactic style can be seen throughout the passage (Mark 16:1–5, 8), and there are several instances of the historical present (vv. 2, 4, 6). MLk by contrast (on Klinghardt’s reconstruction) shows no uses of the historical
present, except in verse 12, which probably was not part of Marcion’s Gospel and which certainly cannot derive from Mark; however, καί as a conjunction linking sentences is found a couple of times (MLk 24:8–9; also v. 4, in a καὶ ἐγένετο construction). [pp. 149-50]
That seems both unnecessarily specific, and overall contradictory to me.
To then attempt to discuss Q in relation to proposed Marcion's Gospel text/s, and mainly in relation to BeDuhn's discussion of Q seems weird, and it is telling that the heading of Smith's section 5 is "On Not Dispensing with Any of Q'.
Smith's conclusion is also telling -
It is not difficult to imagine – but it would be impossible to prove – a scenario to explain all the phenomena examined in this paper ...
Such an imaginative attempt runs somewhat as follows. First, an author 'acquires' copies of a narrative biography about Jesus (Mark) and a collection of his sayings (Q), and combines them in a new composition together with other material of his own free composition. Our author may have ... [blah, blah, blah....]
In my view, this [Smithian but not Smithsonian Road-to-Damascus] 'scenario' explains the data we have when we compare the newly reconstructed MLk with the Synoptics, and it is, again in my view, less problematic than BeDuhn’s proposal, which categorically excludes Marcion as an editor, but also much more realistic than 'the imaginative reconstruction' of the origin of the gospels proposed by Vinzent and Klinghardt.
.
Smith had the gall to then say "Like their reconstruction (sic), mine also is impossible to prove." In a conclusion!
He highlights his article is essentially gish-gallop only covering a number of aspects of Marcion scholarship superficially.