"Matthew" Makes A Whole Ass Out Himself. Matthean Doubling, Editing Or Copying of GMark?

[JoeWallack]

JennyAnyDonks

JW:
This Thread is partially a response to my brother Benjamin's Thread:

Matthew 21.1-11, the jenny, and the colt.

Regarding Carlson's related apologetic attempt I'm mainly surprised that he is again writing in public after The Secret Mark Debacle. I see Carlson as an Apologist in general and specifically here. While I likewise applaud Ben's general and specific willingness here to consider the other side of the argument, as always, attempts to defend "Matthew" here are more developed than Mahmoud Abbas' retirement villa in Qatar, and attempts to criticize "Matthew" are more underdeveloped than Trump's plan to exit The White House.

"Matthew" gives the explicit quote from Zechariah:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... rsion=NRSV

"“Tell the daughter of Zion,
Look, your king is coming to you,
humble, and mounted on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”

And, identification of related smaller errors, are not defense against the larger error, they are evidence of the larger error. Except apparently to Carlson. Personally I think the Matthean version makes some sense as the combination of Jesus' lack of interest in women and overeating explains how Jesus was able to sit on both of the donkeys at the same time. By an Act of Providence he was the exact same size as the donkey(s), a 53 Medium. This also provides some evidence for HJ as it would explain why Christianity did not want to preserve any pictures of HJ and instead manufactured pictures of a blonde, blue-eyed Jesus tall enough to play Center on the Knicks.

More important to me is the Matthean style of doubling. It's well known that "Matthew" doubles the pleasure of healing a few times but not at all well known is Matthew's use of doubling in general. So here:

A Donkey and the Colt of a Donkey: the Problem of Doubling in the Gospel of Matthew -or- Why Matthew Has Two Asses

The purpose of this Thread will be to argue that the source of "Matthew" doubling is not editing of GMark, but rather copying of GMark. More specifically, the copying of GMark's general style of doubling.

As this issue is on the complicated side, only Skeptics with top level security clearance will be allowed to post here.


Joseph

Skeptical Textual Criticism

[davidmartin]

shouldn't Matthew be treated as a work that is based on another work? A derivative
so attempts to trace back the origins of Christianity from a work based on another work seems non-sensical to me

[mlinssen]

I'm halfway and have peed my pants already, and choked in my drink twice.
It's not often that I find such clever and quick writing in combination with such humour. And that from someone on the inside!

By the way, try shoving Q back down the Rock it crawled from, and pretend that the gospel of Thomas is your lost source. Humour me - and then look at the doubling

I suggest a proper translation btw, not as legible as most but at least it's correct:

https://www.academia.edu/42110001/Inter ... normalised

And I'll admit that it has always escaped me that Matthew uses any doubling. Then again he's not really my favourite study object - but still

[mlinssen]

"What then did you go out to see?: - logion 78
"nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered" - logion 7, among others
"and nothing secret that will not become known" - logion 5, among others
"What I say to you in the dark, tell in the light;" - self-invented, and indeed inspired by / based on:
"and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops" - logion 33

And perhaps you can see how the first one is rather different from the others, which are more or less verbatim copies or simple variants. The John B creation, however, must have taken several hours from the very first thought to the very last redaction. I label it all as part of "Project Elijah", which started with Mark and, let's be honest, ended (with) getting sunk by John Presbyter

I see also that you present other "Q material", by the way (cough):
old and new wine (and garment) - logion 47
"master of a household who brings out of his treasure" - self-invented, based on logion 21 respectively 45

The alternative theories by others that you present - well, they're not too bad really, given the material that they had (zilch).
Shall I give you a fine theme?

"Make the two one"

[Ben C. Smith]

There is something to bear in mind with arguments based on an author's purported tendency to double things up. Take this doubling, for example:

Matthew 20.29-34: 29 As they were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed Him. 30 And two blind men sitting by the road, hearing that Jesus was passing by, cried out, “Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!” 31 The crowd sternly told them to be quiet, but they cried out all the more, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!” 32 And Jesus stopped and called them, and said, “What do you want Me to do for you?” 33 They say to Him, “Lord, we want our eyes to be opened.” 34 Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes; and immediately they regained their sight and followed Him.

Okay, so Mark 10.46-52 and Luke 18.35-43 each have only one blind man, named Bartimaeus, who is healed in this episode. Well, a Matthean desire to double things up would explain why Matthew has two blind men; but what would explain the floral Hawaiian shirt that the second blind man is wearing?

I joke, of course. If Matthew is imagining one of the blind men as wearing such a shirt, he has not told us so. But, if Matthew did describe one of his two blind men as wearing something like that, would a tendency to double things up explain it? No, of course not. A desire to double things explains exactly what it says on the tin: the doubling up. But additions which are not part of or required by the doubling are separate, and require separate handling. (Maybe Matthew happens to like Hawaiian shirts, and maybe we can prove it from other details in his gospel; maybe Matthew was actually there, and that just happens to be what one of the guys was wearing; and so on.)

In the case of the two donkeys, then, we can go ahead and find instances of doubling all we want across the pages of the Matthean gospel. That kind of effort may well explain presenting two donkeys instead of only one. But what would explain the second donkey being, specifically, the mother of the first? A desire to double things up does not explain that; nor does it explain how the two donkeys in Hebraic parallel in Zechariah 9.9 would suggest one of the two being the mother. So researchers have reached for other explanations: maybe historically that is just what happened, and there were really two donkeys when Jesus came into Jerusalem; maybe Matthew likes picturesque details; maybe Matthew knew that the best way to keep a colt being ridden for the first time calm was to have its mother nearby, and thus turned the second donkey into his mother for verisimilitude. None of these attempts to explain the presence of the mother has ever landed well with me. For Carlson to turn to exactly the verse which Matthew is openly quoting and point out that there is a jenny sitting right there in print, then, strikes me as an important observation. For me, right now, the hypothesis to beat is that Matthew got the idea for the jenny — precisely as a jenny, the mother of the colt — from the text of Zechariah 9.9. If anyone has a better offering, I am all ears.

But doubling by itself will not do it.

[JoeWallack]

There is something to bear in mind with arguments based on an author's purported tendency to double things up. Take this doubling, for example:

Matthew 20.29-34: 29 As they were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed Him. 30 And two blind men sitting by the road, hearing that Jesus was passing by, cried out, “Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!” 31 The crowd sternly told them to be quiet, but they cried out all the more, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!” 32 And Jesus stopped and called them, and said, “What do you want Me to do for you?” 33 They say to Him, “Lord, we want our eyes to be opened.” 34 Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes; and immediately they regained their sight and followed Him.

Okay, so Mark 10.46-52 and Luke 18.35-43 each have only one blind man, named Bartimaeus, who is healed in this episode. Well, a Matthean desire to double things up would explain why Matthew has two blind men; but what would explain the floral Hawaiian shirt that the second blind man is wearing?

I joke, of course. If Matthew is imagining one of the blind men as wearing such a shirt, he has not told us so. But, if Matthew did describe one of his two blind men as wearing something like that, would a tendency to double things up explain it? No, of course not. A desire to double things explains exactly what it says on the tin: the doubling up. But additions which are not part of or required by the doubling are separate, and require separate handling. (Maybe Matthew happens to like Hawaiian shirts, and maybe we can prove it from other details in his gospel; maybe Matthew was actually there, and that just happens to be what one of the guys was wearing; and so on.)

In the case of the two donkeys, then, we can go ahead and find instances of doubling all we want across the pages of the Matthean gospel. That kind of effort may well explain presenting two donkeys instead of only one. But what would explain the second donkey being, specifically, the mother of the first? A desire to double things up does not explain that; nor does it explain how the two donkeys in Hebraic parallel in Zechariah 9.9 would suggest one of the two being the mother. So researchers have reached for other explanations: maybe historically that is just what happened, and there were really two donkeys when Jesus came into Jerusalem; maybe Matthew likes picturesque details; maybe Matthew knew that the best way to keep a colt being ridden for the first time calm was to have its mother nearby, and thus turned the second donkey into his mother for verisimilitude. None of these attempts to explain the presence of the mother has ever landed well with me. For Carlson to turn to exactly the verse which Matthew is openly quoting and point out that there is a jenny sitting right there in print, then, strikes me as an important observation. For me, right now, the hypothesis to beat is that Matthew got the idea for the jenny — precisely as a jenny, the mother of the colt — from the text of Zechariah 9.9. If anyone has a better offering, I am all ears.

But doubling by itself will not do it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4ZQ3kgE8wI

[mlinssen]

For me, right now, the hypothesis to beat is that Matthew got the idea for the jenny — precisely as a jenny, the mother of the colt — from the text of Zechariah 9.9. If anyone has a better offering, I am all ears.

But doubling by itself will not do it.

Nope, no takers. Matthew got it from Zechariah 9:9, that is sure enough. Unsure whether that was supposed to say what it says in some translations (and instead of even, suggesting there were two instead of one) but it's more than Sie enough that Matthew applied it as such

And no, you're correct, this ain't doubling Matthew-style. There is a small chance that he liked the idea because of his preference for doubling, but this isn't the latter, it's a new variant at best

I really enjoyed Carlson's article, save for the surprising conclusion. I was always taught that the conclusion is a mere summary, and can never introduce something new

But, case closed AFAIC. Matthew doesn't give a rat's ass about the plausibility of his so-called prophecies, nor their trustworthiness, so I don't really see an issue from Matthew's point of view.
Anyone willing to argue that Matthew was meticulous in any way with his prophecies? I'll whip out the popcorn if so

[JoeWallack]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlTe_nnewIY

JW:

Mark 16:8

Strong's	Transliteration	Greek	English	Morphology	Commentary
2532 [e]	kai	καὶ	And	Conj	The first evidence of doubling in what is the most important sentence in the history of Christianity. And why wouldn't it be since it is likely the ending of the original Gospel narrative. The sentence (so to speak) begins and ends with a conjunction.
1831 [e]	exelthousai	ἐξελθοῦσαι	having gone out,	V-APA-NFP	The second instance of doubling, this time a clear one. The context indicates these are both negative and one of them is clearly unnecessary ("gone out").
5343 [e]	ephygon	ἔφυγον	they fled	V-AIA-3P	-
575 [e]	apo	ἀπὸ	from	Prep	-
3588 [e]	tou	τοῦ	the	Art-GNS	-
3419 [e]	mnēmeiou	μνημείου,	tomb.	N-GNS	-
2192 [e]	eichen	εἶχεν	possessed	V-IIA-3S	The third instance of doubling. "Possession" here and "fear" at the end, both with the amplifier "γάρ". Again, the context indicates both are negatives.
1063 [e]	gar	γὰρ	indeed	Conj	-
846 [e]	autas	αὐτὰς	them	PPro-AF3P	-
5156 [e]	tromos	τρόμος	trembling	N-NMS	The fourth instance of doubling and both negative by context.
2532 [e]	kai	καὶ	and	Conj	-
1611 [e]	ekstasis	ἔκστασις·	amazement,	N-NFS	-
2532 [e]	kai	καὶ	and	Conj	-
3762 [e]	oudeni	οὐδενὶ	to none	Adj-DMS	The fifth and final complete doubling and this time a literal double negative. I have faith that after reading this Carlson will now argue that the literal double negative is exactly what "Mark" intended, which literally is a positive and that "Matthew" correctly understood this as a positive. Equivalent to they told everyone everything.
3762 [e]	ouden	οὐδὲν	nothing	Adj-ANS	-
3004 [e]	eipan	εἶπαν·	they spoke;	V-AIA-3P	-
5399 [e]	ephobounto	ἐφοβοῦντο	they were afraid	V-IIM/P-3P	-
1063 [e]	gar	γάρ.	indeed.	Conj	-

Note that there is no use of "Mark's" strange/bizarre/macabre favored Tripling in the above as that would break the Doubling style. Next up, how does "Matthew" handle this style?

Bonus material for Solo = it's commonly thought that the big change in Christianity came between the Synoptics and GJohn but it actually came long before that, between GMark and GMatthew. Where was that edit? Hint - look above.


Joseph

The New Porphyry

[Ben C. Smith]

I see your double negative and raise you a triple negative:

Mark 5.3b: 3b καὶ οὐδὲ ἁλύσει οὐκέτι οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο αὐτὸν δῆσαι. / 3b And no one was able to bind him anymore, not even with a chain.

[JoeWallack]

I see your double negative and raise you a triple negative:

Mark 5.3b: 3b καὶ οὐδὲ ἁλύσει οὐκέτι οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο αὐτὸν δῆσαι. / 3b And no one was able to bind him anymore, not even with a chain.

JW:
Ben, it's generally thought that double negatives of the time were an acceptable idiom but wouldn't it more likely have been thought of as bad grammar?


Joseph