Was This Original Start of the Gospel Behind Luke?

[Stephan Huller]

I have always been interested in Clement's supposed citation of the third and fourth chapters of Luke. Of course this is what appears on the page. But there is something strange here - and indeed throughout the surviving manuscripts of Clement. Clement is not citing Luke in any form that we possess or know from ancient witnesses. Let's look at how the citation begins:

And in the fifteenth year, in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zacharias

ἔτει δὲ πεντεκαιδεκάτῳ ἐπὶ Τιβερίου Καίσαρος ἐγένετο ῥῆμα κυρίου ἐπὶ Ἰωάννην τὸν Ζαχαρίου υἱόν

compare Luke 3:1

Ἐν ἔτει δὲ πεντεκαιδεκάτῳ τῆς ἡγεμονίας Τιβερίου Καίσαρος, ἡγεμονεύοντος Ποντίου Πιλάτου τῆς Ἰουδαίας, καὶ τετρααρχοῦντος τῆς Γαλιλαίας Ἡρῴδου, Φιλίππου δὲ τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ αὐτοῦ τετρααρχοῦντος τῆς Ἰτουραίας καὶ Τραχωνίτιδος χώρας, καὶ Λυσανίου τῆς Ἀβιληνῆς τετρααρχοῦντος, 2 ἐπὶ ἀρχιερέως Ἅννα* καὶ Καϊάφα, ἐγένετο ῥῆμα Θεοῦ ἐπὶ Ἰωάννην* τὸν Ζαχαρίου υἱὸν ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ.

Then Clement immediately goes on to say:

And again in the same book

καὶ πάλιν ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ·

"And Jesus was coming to his baptism, year 30,"

ἦν δὲ Ἰησοῦς ἐρχόμενος ἐπὶ τὸ βάπτισμα ὡς ἐτῶν λʹ

compare that to Luke 3:23:

Καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν Ἰησοῦς ἀρχόμενος ὡσεὶ ἐτῶν τριάκοντα,

And continuing where we left off in Clement:

And that it was necessary for Him to preach only a year, this also is written:

καὶ ὅτι ἐνιαυτὸν μόνον ἔδει αὐτὸν κηρῦξαι, καὶ τοῦτο γέγραπται οὕτως·

"He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."

ἐνιαυτὸν δεκτὸν κυρίου κηρῦξαι ἀπέστειλέν με.

compare this to the lengthy section at the end of chapter 4:

Καὶ ὑπέστρεψεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐν τῇ δυνάμει τοῦ Πνεύματος εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν· καὶ φήμη ἐξῆλθεν καθ’ ὅλης τῆς περιχώρου περὶ αὐτοῦ. 15 καὶ αὐτὸς ἐδίδασκεν ἐν ταῖς συναγωγαῖς αὐτῶν, δοξαζόμενος ὑπὸ πάντων. Καὶ ἦλθεν εἰς Ναζαρά, οὗ ἦν τεθραμμένος, καὶ εἰσῆλθεν κατὰ τὸ εἰωθὸς αὐτῷ ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῶν σαββάτων εἰς τὴν συναγωγήν, καὶ ἀνέστη ἀναγνῶναι. 17 καὶ ἐπεδόθη αὐτῷ βιβλίον τοῦ προφήτου Ἠσαΐου*, καὶ ἀναπτύξας* τὸ βιβλίον εὗρεν τὸν τόπον οὗ ἦν γεγραμμένον Πνεῦμα Κυρίου ἐπ’ ἐμέ, οὗ εἵνεκεν ἔχρισέν με εὐαγγελίσασθαι πτωχοῖς, ἀπέσταλκέν με ⧼ἰάσασθαι τοὺς συντετριμμένους τὴν καρδίαν⧽, κηρῦξαι αἰχμαλώτοις ἄφεσιν καὶ τυφλοῖς ἀνάβλεψιν, ἀποστεῖλαι τεθραυσμένους ἐν ἀφέσει, κηρῦξαι ἐνιαυτὸν Κυρίου δεκτόν. 20 καὶ πτύξας τὸ βιβλίον ἀποδοὺς τῷ ὑπηρέτῃ ἐκάθισεν· καὶ πάντων οἱ ὀφθαλμοὶ ἐν τῇ συναγωγῇ ἦσαν ἀτενίζοντες αὐτῷ.

In my estimation the only way any of this makes any sense is if the three sections cited by Clement appeared one after another almost or exactly in succession i.e:

And in the fifteenth year, in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zacharias, there was Jesus coming to his baptism [saying] "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."

Of course in order to justify this reconstruction you have to drop the ἐτῶν λʹ = 'year 30' but does it make any sense there without a verb or anything connecting it to baptism reference before it? In our Luke there is no connection between the 'thirty years old' reference and baptism. It is as if an editor has come along and added the reference to the text.

My assumption would be that the original gospel said Jesus came to John's baptism directly from heaven (he was in the water with John?).

[Clive]

Are we reading GMark with trinitarian eyes? Could the Dove be Jesus?

[Stephan Huller]

Another interesting thing I noticed about the difference between Clement's text of the gospel and Luke is that subtle changes have been made to the text. Notice for instance that ὡς (= his) has been transformed into 'as if' (= ὡς εἰ), the reference to baptism has been removed and ἔρχομαι (= to set out, come, go) has been changed to ἀρχόμενος (= beginning). The gospel of Luke has clearly reshaped the sense of the original gospel known to Luke:

ἦν δὲ Ἰησοῦς ἐρχόμενος ἐπὶ τὸ βάπτισμα ὡς ἐτῶν λʹ (Clement's gospel)

there was Jesus coming to his baptism (year 30)

Καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν Ἰησοῦς ἀρχόμενος ὡσεὶ ἐτῶν τριάκοντα, (Luke 3.1)

And himself was Jesus beginning about years thirty (being son as was supposed of Joseph of Heli of Mattat etc)

The fact that the genealogy comes after these words is extremely odd but not so odd if we suppose that Clement cites them here as the very beginning of the narrative. In other words, if the gospel began with Jesus coming down to heaven (either on the fifteenth of Tiberius or the fifteenth of Tybi) directly to John's baptism saying "He (the Father) hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord" the genealogy then preceded the development of the birth narrative. In other words, the editor of Luke added the fact that Jesus was presumed to be the son of Joseph (genealogy follows) in order to further clarify he wasn't an angel.

[Stephan Huller]

Another implication would clearly be that (a) there was no 'John the Baptist' (something which emerges from other Marcionite sources) and (b) the 'baptism' here must have been an ordinary mikvah developed for John. The words "the law and the prophets were until John since that time the kingdom of God is preached" (Lk 16:16) clearly apply to that incident - i.e. that from 15 Kislev 20 CE it was the beginning of the end of the Jewish religion (15 Kislev being the date Antiochus Epiphanes defiled the temple according to 1 Maccabees). Perhaps it would be better to say the end of the law was confirmed given the defiled status of the altar since 167 BCE. I would assume all that follows (i.e. Jesus entering a Jewish gathering and teaching a 'surprising' doctrine fits the context of the ritual immersion. In other words, Jesus stopped the baptism and basically said Judaism sucks leading to the congregants to try and push him off a cliff but they don't realize he has no flesh so they pass through him (or he flies) leading them to their doom (a symbolic prefiguring of the destruction of the Jews owing to Jesus in another sabbatical cycle = 70 CE).

Remember Ephrem identifies the locale here as 'Bethsaida' not 'Capernaum.' Anyone care to identify 'Bethsaida' on an ancient map? I suppose it is some sort of code for Jerusalem or a synagogue ('house of demons').

[Stephan Huller]

And in the fifteenth year, in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zacharias; there was Jesus coming to his baptism [saying] "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."

The 'acceptable year' (= the Jubilee) is here linked to the end of any obligations to the Law (and thus proselytes no longer need to be ritually immersed). In other words, 'the gospel' (= the announcement of the Jubilee) is from its very beginning virulently anti-Jewish. Hence the Jewish hatred of Jesus and Christianity in spite of efforts of recent efforts of American evangelism to change that.

[Stephan Huller]

Another related point which is quite significant. When Jesus originally announced in the gospel "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord" (remember this has been corrupted in Luke to Jesus going into a synagogue and reading the Isaiah scroll which makes reference to 'the year of favor' = Isaiah 61) the implication was that the 'year of favor' i.e. the Jubilee was upon them (= 21 CE was almost here). This ties in with the theme of 'freedom from the Law' by means of the peculiar Christian interpretation of the fall of Jericho (obviously developed into a prophecy of the destruction of the walls of Jerusalem in Origen and other early sources).

Tertullian tells us 'against Marcion' or against the Marcionite interpretation that:

So also in the rest of his acts you accuse him (God) of inconsequence and inconsistency, alleging that his instructions are in contradiction with one another: he forbids labour on sabbath days, and yet at the storming of the city of Jericho he commands the ark to be carried round during eight days which include the sabbath.

But in the parallel text of Against the Jews we read:

In short, so true is it that it is not in the exemption from work of the sabbath--that is, of the seventh day--that the celebration of this solemnity is to consist, that Joshua the son of Nun, at the time that he was reducing the city Jericho by war. stated that he had received from God a precept to order the People that priests should carry the ark of the testament of God seven days, making the circuit of the city; and thus, when the seventh day's circuit had been performed, the walls of the city would spontaneously fall.69 [9] Which was so done; and when the space of the seventh day was finished, just as was predicted, down fell the walls of the city. Whence it is manifestly shown, that in the number of the seven days there intervened a sabbath-day. For seven days, whencesoever they may have commenced, must necessarily include within them a sabbath-day; on which day not only must the priests have worked, but the city must have been made a prey by the edge of the sword by all the people of Israel.

Justin interestingly says that Jesus came to Joshua just before the siege of Jericho:

But this Offspring, which was truly brought forth from the Father, was with the Father before all the creatures, and the Father communed with Him; even as the Scripture by Solomon has made clear, that He whom Solomon calls Wisdom, was begotten as a Beginning before all His creatures and as Offspring by God, who has also declared this same thing in the revelation made by Joshua the son of Nave(Nun). Listen, therefore, to the following from the book of Joshua, that what I say may become manifest to you; it is this: 'And it came to pass, when Joshua was near Jericho, he lifted up his eyes, and sees a man standing over against him. And Joshua approached to Him, and said, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries? And He said to him, I am Captain of the Lord's host: now have I come. And Joshua fell on his face on the ground, and said to Him, Lord, what commandest Thou Thy servant? And the Lord's Captain says to Joshua, Loose the shoes off thy feet; for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. And Jericho was shut up and fortified, and no one went out of it. And the Lord said to Joshua, Behold, I give into thine hand Jericho, and its king,[and] its mighty men.'"

Now we see that the gospel originally had Jesus come down in the year 20 CE announcing the Jubilee in the next year. But remember as Whiston notes from the account of Josephus, the fall of Jericho occurred in a Jubilee:

By that in the history of the Old Testament I mean the very first year of jubilee of all, the year when Moses died, and Joshua introduced the Israelites into the land of Canaan, and took its firstfruits, the city of Jericho. We know that, by the law of Moses, every year of jubilee was still to be proclaimed by a very loud and joyful sound, or by what is peculiarly styled the trumpet of jubilee, Leviticus 25:8, etc. And certainly, as this was the very first year when a jubilee could possibly be proclaimed in Judea; so was no one other year of jubilee so remarkably proclaimed by these trumpets of Jobel or Jobelim as this was.

Now let's return to the Marcionite interest in this story. Why did they care so much about this story? Because the example of the Jews ignoring the Sabbath law in a year of Jubilee explained Jesus's actions in the gospel. In other words, this was a 'year of favor' i.e. a Jubilee. But clearly the gospel author thinks there is something greater at work here. The Jubilee law and the pattern of Joshua was associated also with the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of Judaism.

[Stephan Huller]

The editor of our New Testament seems to like to start his text with 'arche'

Ἀρχὴ τοῦ εὐαγγελίου Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ Υἱοῦ Θεοῦ. [Mark 1:1]

Καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν Ἰησοῦς ἀρχόμενος ὡσεὶ ἐτῶν τριάκοντα, [Luke 3.1]

I've always been puzzled by the strange beginning of Mark. It is syntactically independent, since it is neither a sentence nor a main clause (it lacks both a verb and a predicate) and probably functions as a title. But why the Ἀρχὴ? Even as a title it is ambiguous. The genitive phrase “of Jesus Christ" is ambiguous. a double entendre which the reader can construe as both subjective genitive (Jesus Christ as the proclaimer of good news) and as an objective genitive (Jesus Christ as the one proclaimed in the good news).

Matthew and Luke don't appropriate the name 'gospel' to describe themselves which is odd if they were using Mark. Matthew describes itself as "the book of the genesis or origin of Jesus Christ son of David etc"). The nouns 'arche' and 'genesews' are roughly equivalent meaning 'origin, beginning.' Again if Luke 3:1 was the beginning of the gospel the emphasis on 'origin, beginning' in all three gospels can hardly be accidental. It was purposed by the same hand. But why?

[Solo]

The editor of our New Testament seems to like to start his text with 'arche'

Ἀρχὴ τοῦ εὐαγγελίου Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ Υἱοῦ Θεοῦ. [Mark 1:1]

Καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν Ἰησοῦς ἀρχόμενος ὡσεὶ ἐτῶν τριάκοντα, [Luke 3.1]

I've always been puzzled by the strange beginning of Mark. It is syntactically independent, since it is neither a sentence nor a main clause (it lacks both a verb and a predicate) and probably functions as a title. But why the Ἀρχὴ? Even as a title it is ambiguous. The genitive phrase “of Jesus Christ" is ambiguous. a double entendre which the reader can construe as both subjective genitive (Jesus Christ as the proclaimer of good news) and as an objective genitive (Jesus Christ as the one proclaimed in the good news).

Matthew and Luke don't appropriate the name 'gospel' to describe themselves which is odd if they were using Mark. Matthew describes itself as "the book of the genesis or origin of Jesus Christ son of David etc"). The nouns 'arche' and 'genesews' are roughly equivalent meaning 'origin, beginning.' Again if Luke 3:1 was the beginning of the gospel the emphasis on 'origin, beginning' in all three gospels can hardly be accidental. It was purposed by the same hand. But why?

My take on this, FWIW: Mark uses the word 'gospel' as incipit to signal that the writing is one based in Paul's teachings. By all appearances it was Paul who created the new meaning of the word. There was no other 'gospel' than Paul's in Mark's time as is clear from what the Mark says that the disciples did not know either the cross as messianic symbol nor resurrection as preached by Paul. Incidentally 'αρχε του ευαγγελιου' is a phrase Paul uses in Phl 4:15.

Matt's use of 'gospel of the kingdom' (4:23, 9:35, 24:14) seems to wish to supply a new meaning to Paul's tradition, specifically one that would tie Paul's 'gospel of Jesus Christ' with the 'kingdom come' of the Jerusalem Jesus tradition. Luke does not know the phrase, which falls into the pattern of his recension of Matthew (which he knew), in wishing to reduce Matthew's upset of Mark's plan of the narrative.

As for the emphasis on the 'origin or beginning' it is interesting ( it actually extends to John' gospel as well) but frankly I did not note its presence beyond its strangely self-referencing headline function in Mark.

Best,
Jiri

[Stephan Huller]

As little interest as people seem to have in my observation, I will note once again that there was a pre-existing concept of 'gospel' which at once was understood as an 'oral' announcement which I think was at the heart of these references. We see in the Samaritan Arabic commentary on the Torah, on Leviticus 25:9. Slightly condensed and slightly re-arranged translation from my life long friend it seems Ruaridh Boid formerly of Monash University:

The High Priest and the King acting together are to send heralds out on the Day of Atonement (i.e. the tenth of the seventh month) to go into all countries over the next six months blowing the shofar in every land and region [not just Canaan] with the announcement [= bashâ’ir, plural of bashîrah] of the information of the approach of the Jubilee Year and the release of captives so that it reaches the whole nation”.

I think this is absolutely key to understand why the gospel is called 'the gospel.' The Arabic bashîrah = the Hebrew bassorah = Greek euangelion. The person doing the announcing of the Jubilee is the evangelist (= Arabic mubashshir = Hebrew mevasser or the bashîr). Again, notice carefully that the bashîrah is not the information, but the announcement of it. This I believe was the connotation of the Greek euangelion. The meaning of only becomes clear and sharp in the context of the Samaritan halachah.

With respect to Jiri's point, I am not sure that Matthew redefines the Pauline concept or merely draws from this tradition to link the announcement of the Jubilee to the 'kingdom' that will emerge from the messianic Jubilee (cf. the coins from the various Jewish revolts proclaiming 'the redemption' associated with the revolutionary activity). There seems to be a Jewish concept at the heart of 'the gospel' which was being interpreted this way and that way.

With respect to the argument that Jesus speaks of an 'oral gospel' (and similarly that Paul ONLY knew of an oral gospel rather than - as the Marcionites claimed - wrote the written gospel) the concept makes sense if, as I suggest, 'the gospel' is the pronouncement of the Jubilee. So therefore Jesus was, in 20 CE announcing that the next year was the Jubilee and in the same way Paul or Mark was referencing a written text summarizing or making an account of Jesus 'evangelizing' the oral gospel which was itself called 'the gospel' because of its contents.

[MrMacSon]

When Jesus originally announced in the gospel "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord" (remember this has been corrupted in Luke to Jesus going into a synagogue and reading the Isaiah scroll which makes reference to 'the year of favor' = Isaiah 61)

Where does Jesus say "He hath sent Me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord"?