I'm very confident that Mark was first. The way it is written, it cannot have been derived from another Gospel. It's all chiastic, it has hundreds of "hidden" literary references that only work in an original structure. You take something like the Temple cleansing scene, which is based on at least three different scriptures and was foreshadowed using hidden scriptural references in the beginning of the story. Then you look at that same scene in all the other Gospels and you can see that its been totally mutilated. None of the scriptural parallels line up anymore and most of the "hidden" meaning of the scene is lost. The allegorical understanding is shattered and its been historicized.mlinssen wrote: ↑Wed Feb 24, 2021 11:56 pm I've gone through all 72 logia of Thomas and their version in the canonicals - and hadn't even heard of Marcion at that point. But the order clearly is Luke before Matthew in most cases, whereas Matthew (top of my head) could be earlier in some cases.
But, why doesn't anyone hold to the theory that Luke and Matthew were written together, or even by one person?
Take Marcion and turn it into Luke, it will take you a good weekend and a case of beer - it's not that it must have taken great effort. Take the verbatim agreements on top of that, and it's a closed case: if you want to refute Marcion, you take his gospel, wrap it into your context, add a bit to it and write your own to go along with it so they strengthen one another. Make sure they differ and you can say "Hey dudes! I have these two divergent stories here and they tell Da Truth, and look how much Marcion looks like Luke! What a shameless plagiarist he is, tsk tsk"
But, if you like a challenge, please do read viewtopic.php?f=3&t=7707
I've no doubt Mark is first, despite many people now wanting to put Marcion first, which has its appeal, but it just can't be.
Luke has almost certainly been produced in three revisions. Although I'd say there is some possibility that Marcion is actually a revision of a proto-Luke. Luke 3:1-23 is most certainly written by a different person than Luke 1-2 & 24. I'd say its possible that Marcion is derived from Luke 3-23, however the Capernaum issue makes this quite doubtful, but I wouldn't entirely rule it out.
Assuming that Marcion came before any version of Luke, then its Marcion > proto-Luke > canonical Luke. To complicate matters it could well also be that the writer of canonical-Luke also did some final editing to Luke 3-23. I'd say that its possible that the final editor created the Capernaum problem. If that's true, then we are back to the possibility of proto-Luke > Marcion + proto-Luke > canonical Luke.
What I'm confident in is that Luke 1-2 & 24 is a response to Marcion. The body of Luke shows no major sign of being anti-Marcionite, other than the genealogy back to David, while Luke 1-2 & 24 is overloaded with anti-Marcionism. It is very noteworthy that the genealogy in Luke is separate from the birth narrative - coming after Luke 3:1. IMO, this lends support to the possibility that Luke 3-23 came before Matthew, but that Luke 1-2 & 24 was written after Matthew.
Matthew is most certainly by a different person than Luke. Totally different writing style, totally different approach to the material. Matthew is anti-Marcionite throughout. It's clear to me that Matthew is a total rewrite, start to finish. I know you don't like arguments that involve layers, but the evidence is clearly there in Luke to indicate that Luke was written in layers.
I can certainly envision a situation where we start with Mark. Then proto-Luke is derived from Mark. Marcion is a redaction of proto-Luke. Then we get Matthew as a reaction to Marcion, who builds upon Mark and proto-Luke (which of course is very similar to Marcion, but it contains the genealogy that Marcion has removed), then canonical Luke is written which builds upon proto-Luke + Matthew + John.
Oh yeah, and in the mean time, John was written somewhere along the way. John is derived from Marcion with influence from Mark. But John also has two layers as well, the final of which wasn't done until it was put into the collection with all four Gospels, most likely around 150-160. John is a weird blend of Gnosticism and anti-Marcionism. It's still not clear to be that John puts forward a Jesus who was born of a woman. Jesus seems to reject his association with Mary in John.
Anyway, Luke is difficult to understand because it has multiple writers with entirely different perspectives.