Placement of the Gospels by the editor

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rgprice
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Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by rgprice »

I've been asking myself, why the Gospels were identified as they were by the editor of the NT and why they were arranged in the order that they were. I think I have an answer to this.

Firstly, why are two Gospels attributed to disciples of Jesus and two attributed to associates?

We start with the fact that Marcion's Gospel was unattributed but was linked to the Pauline letters. Luke is the direct counterpoint to Marcion's Gospel. But that Gospel and Acts of the Apostles couldn't be directly attribute to Paul, so it was instead attributed to a companion of Paul's. This is someone who could be seen as a more reliable conveyer of what "really happened according to Paul" than Marcion's unnamed Gospel. So attributing Luke to an associate of Paul was a key first step. But the goal of the NT project was to subordinate Paul, so other witnesses were needed who could precede Paul.

Direct eyewitnesses were needed. Thus two of the Gospels were attributed to disciples. Why the Gospels of Matthew and John? Matthew was in many ways the most important orthodox Gospel because it was the most coherent and fully developed response to Marcionism, and Gnosticism more generally. While Luke crudely appropriates Marcion's Gospel, Matthew is a total re-write of it that also provides commentary on how to interpret the Gospel of Mark, also included in the collection. Matthew essentially shows how to interpret Marcion's Gospel in the light of Mark. So Matthew prepares the reader for how to read Mark. Matthew is certainly the most orthodox of the Gospels.

Why was John identified as having been authored by a disciple? John is the least orthodox of the Gospels. John essentially sets the maximal boundary of Gnosticism to be allowed within the orthodoxy. John clearly contains Gnostic concepts, so by including it and attributing it to a disciple the editor was defining the outer limit of what was acceptable. And by including this semi-gnostic Gospel, the editor was enlarging the tent to accommodate the biggest possible audience.

Mark then was identified in relation to the others. Since Luke was attributed to an associate of Paul, there needed to be a Gospel similarly associated with Peter. At this point in the tradition Paul and Peter were being presented as mirror images of one another. This is seen throughout Acts and is reflected in the letters of 1 and 2 Peter, which appropriate Paulisms. The legends of Paul and Peter are developed along very similar paths, both being martyred in Rome, etc. So since we have a Gospel attributed to an associate of Paul we needed a Gospel attributed to an associate of Peter as well.

But why the arrangement? Why not put the Gospels attributed to Matthew and John first, followed by Mark and Luke? Because Mark and Luke are encompassed by Matthew and John, which was meant to indicate that though Mark and Luke were not written by disciples, they were nevertheless contemporary with the disciples. If they had been placed after John they could be considered later writings that were not valid.

We also have the fact that each pair of Gospels, the pair authored by disciples and the paid authored by associates, contain an account with a birth narrative and one without. The alteration of birth narratives helped to draw distinction away from their presence and to diminish their significance. That way the birth narratives were less likely to be seen as either legitimizing or delegitimizing attributes, ensuring that all four Gospels were given authority.

But certainly, I think attributing the last of the four Gospels to a disciple was meant to support the validity of Mark and Luke. We could be assured that Mark and Luke were early writings, produced by associates of the disciples and Paul, because they were written before John was written, as Eusebius states.
lsayre
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by lsayre »

What if the Gospel of John came first, yet was intentionally placed last within the NT, such that by the time one reads the Gospel of John their mind is adequately and appropriately preconditioned whereby to gloss right over (and/or dismiss) its Gnosticism.
Stuart
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by Stuart »

The Western order competed with the final Canonical order, and is endorsed by many of the fathers.That order put the apostles (the twelve) prior to those of their disciples (sometimes said to be the seventy). So Matthew and John then Luke (a disciple of Paul) and Mark (a disciple of Peter) was the order. This is not a heretical order at all but very Catholic.

A few manuscripts and Eusubian Canon support this order as well as P45 (maybe, Peter Head thinks so, but admits it's not certain) D, d and W. Off the top of my head I can't think of which fathers, but I know at least three mention the order, although some say it as "John and Matthew before Mark and Luke." There is logic in the western order. The canonical order is less obvious and is not not defended by early fathers. So we speculate. I have my own theory, but it's speculation like everyone else's.

I'm not sure why one order was preferred over another. It might have been theological, it might have been a random accident by a publisher. But obviously it was unimportant until the four gospels were bound in a single collection. IMHO this did not occur until after the Decian persecution and (very) maybe not until after the Diocletian, when it was necessary to reproduce surviving manuscripts and distribute them out to churches around the empire. A production process would have been underway, especially once there was a modicum of state support (funding). Before organized publishing and distribution you would expect production of gospels to have been individual, not bound, as each church or sect would have had a preferred gospel. What we have going on in the binding and the worry about order is a standardization effort in the church, one with considerable funding. It's difficult for me to see this as early at all, or as even second century (binding did start here, with the Pauline letters for certain). Binding only makes sense with a large order. The aftermaths of the great persecution seems to me the most likely market pressure to create such an environment.
Roger Pearse
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by Roger Pearse »

The high capacity parchment codex is invented perhaps around 300. Would a papyrus codex be large enough to contain all four gospels? I cannot recall if we have any examples.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by neilgodfrey »

rgprice wrote: Wed Oct 13, 2021 5:37 am I've been asking myself, why the Gospels were identified as they were by the editor of the NT and why they were arranged in the order that they were.
The question is also asked and answered by the classicist George A. Kennedy in New Testament Interpretation through Rhetorical Criticism: Available at https://archive.org/details/newtestamentinte0000kenn
andrewcriddle
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by andrewcriddle »

Roger Pearse wrote: Sat Oct 23, 2021 5:09 am The high capacity parchment codex is invented perhaps around 300. Would a papyrus codex be large enough to contain all four gospels? I cannot recall if we have any examples.
P45 usually dated 200-250 originally contained all 4 Gospels and Acts (It survives in a fragmentary condition but has portions of all 5 books).

Andrew Criddle
Roger Pearse
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by Roger Pearse »

Thank you! I couldn't recall.
Stuart
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Re: Placement of the Gospels by the editor

Post by Stuart »

P45 is dated paleographically to the mid-3rd century. However this method is unreliable and can be off by well over a century. It could well date into the mid 4th century or even later. I was very surprised to see the age range of various studies on P52 gives ranges from essentially early 1st century to 5th century with examples of the Hadrianic text type in documents.

The tendency in scholarship of this field is to take the oldest possible age in the range, or shorten the range to the oldest portion of the range and then declaring it that old.

I'm not discounting a possible 3rd century origin, but I advise a great deal more caution in accepting such a date than is often exercised. If the dating is later, then theories based on such early dating fall apart.
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