USE OF A COMMON DOCUMENT BY MATTHEW AND LUKE

The document used by Matthew and Luke as the source of their common non-Marcan material was for some time generally identified with the “Logia” which Papias says Matthew, the disciple of the Lord, wrote in Hebrew, undoubtedly meaning Aramaic. Until some sufficient justification for this identification has been given, it seems better to refer to the common non-Marcan source of Matthew and Luke under the more colorless symbol Q.

The common non-Marcan tradition of Matthew and Luke consists almost exclusively of logian material. It contains a few parables, brief, and dealing usually with the “kingdom of heaven,” and one or two sections (such as that concerning the centurion from Capernaum, and the Temptation) which may quite properly be regarded as narrative, but which also contain large logian content and may have been introduced for the sake of the sayings.

The proof that the source of the common non-Marcan material of Matthew and Luke was a document and not an oral tradition lies in the extent and character of the agreements between the two Gospels; it cannot be summarized in a paragraph, but comes out only in a detailed examination of the double tradition such as is undertaken in the following pages.

Before the theory of a common documentary source for the non-Marcan material in Matthew and Luke can be accepted, it must defend itself against two apparently simpler hypotheses, viz., that Matthew copied from Luke or Luke from Matthew.

Did Matthew copy from Luke? His genealogical tree does not agree with Luke’s.[69] He betrays in his story of the birth at Bethlehem no knowledge of the fact that Joseph’s home was originally at Nazareth. This latter place he first mentions in ii, 23, as the place to which Joseph went upon his return from Egypt. Matthew has a greater interest in John the Baptist than has Luke, as is indicated by his fuller treatment of the fact and circumstances of his death, contrasted with Luke’s leaving him in prison undisposed of. Yet Matthew does not employ the material concerning the preaching of John, which Luke has embodied in his iii, 10-14. Matthew makes a specialty of the sayings of Jesus, yet omits many that Luke contains. In short, the reason for denying that Matthew copied from Luke is the impossibility, upon that hypothesis, of explaining the omissions of Lucan material from Matthew’s Gospel, and the very great divergences between the two Gospels where such divergences would not be expected with either one using the other as an exemplar.

The same argument which refutes Matthew’s use of Luke refutes Luke’s use of Matthew.

But it may be added, that upon either of these hypotheses it becomes impossible to explain the changes which appear to have been made by both Matthew and Luke in the material common to them, both in its wording and its order. If Matthew copied from Luke, he would naturally have followed his order, which he does not do. Or, deviating from that order for obvious reasons, he would naturally return to it when those reasons no longer prevailed, which he does not do. Or if Luke copied from Matthew, he could hardly have inserted a genealogical tree which is at variance with Matthew’s, in the unnatural place where it now is, as against the natural place in which he found it in Matthew. Nor could he, when he had the Sermon on the Mount before him in the form in which Matthew gives it, break it up into little pieces and scatter it up and down thruout his Gospel. Moreover, in the sayings common to Matthew and Luke it is now one and now the other who preserves what we must consider the most original reading; as when Matthew says, “Cleanse first the inside of the cup,” and Luke in place of this says, “Give alms of that which is within.” But again it is not Matthew but Luke who gives the more original form of a saying; as when Luke says “Blessed are ye poor,” and Matthew says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”

The phenomena of peculiar words, ninety-five characteristic of Matthew and one hundred and fifty-one characteristic of Luke, is also impossible of explanation upon the theory that either writer copied from the other. If either one were copying from the other, they would certainly agree against Mark in some really important matter, and not merely in an occasional word or phrase. If Luke were copying from Matthew, he would certainly have incorporated some one of those numerous additions which Matthew makes to the narratives of Mark.[70]

In addition to any of the more general considerations which have suggested the possible use of Matthew by Luke, a recent writer has evolved an ingenious and somewhat elaborate proof for this use, which it may be well to consider in some detail.

A RECENT ATTEMPT TO PROVE MATTHEW A SOURCE FOR LUKE

Mr. Robinson Smith[71] attempts to dispose both of Ur-Marcus and Q by maintaining that Luke copied from Matthew. His argument rests upon the deviations which Matthew and Luke make, respectively, in their common abbreviations of certain of Mark’s narratives. “Where a choice from two or more Marcan expressions has been made, the first choice falls to Matthew and the second to Luke.”

As examples of these first choices by Matthew and second choices by Luke, Mr. Smith instances (with the parallel passages in Matthew and Luke) Mk i, 32; iii, 7, 8; x, 29, 33, 34; xii, 3; xiv, 1, 12, 65; xv, 42. The argument seems to be that Luke having both Mark and Matthew before him, and seeing that in each of these instances Matthew has chosen a certain part of Mark’s phrase and rejected the rest, himself avoids using that part of the phrase which Matthew has chosen, restricting himself to the part which Matthew has left unused. We will take up first the particular instances, and see whether other, perhaps simpler, reasons suggest themselves for these deviations; after that we will consider the general argument.

Mk i, 32 (Mt viii, 16; Lk iv, 40): Mark’s phrase runs ???a? d? ?e??????, ?te ?d? ? ?????. Of this phrase, Matthew takes the first three words as they stand. Luke appropriates the remainder, changing into ?????t?? d? t?? ?????. Mark’s phrase is here redundant, and Matthew and Luke (as usual) both reduce the redundancy. But Matthew has omitted the point of Mark’s phrase, since in Matthew’s account the events described did not happen on the Sabbath. Luke has retained the essential part of the phrase.[72]

Mk iii, 7, 8 (Mt iv, 25; Lk vi, 17): “Mark gives in order and by name six districts from which the multitudes came. Matthew mentions all save the last, Tyre and Sidon. Luke omits the first, fourth, and fifth, but does mention the last, Tyre and Sidon.” The changes in these lists seem to be more various than Mr. Smith suggests. Matthew adds Decapolis and omits Idumaea.[73] The thing hard to account for in Luke’s list is his omission of Galilee, not his inclusion of Tyre and Sidon. These latter regions would interest him especially, with his universalistic tendency; we should hardly have been surprised to find him adding them if he had not found them in Mark. A simple explanation of the changes made by both Matthew and Luke may perhaps be seen in Matthew’s Judaistic tendency, which led him to omit Tyre and Sidon, and in Luke’s universalistic tendency which made him include them. To make Mr. Smith’s argument hold in this case, Luke should certainly have come much closer than he does, to preserving the parts which Matthew rejects, and rejecting the parts which he retains. It appears that Luke has no great knowledge of nor interest in Palestinian geography, but Tyre and Sidon suited his purpose.

Mk x, 29 (Mt xix, 29; Lk xviii, 29): Mark here has ??e?e? ??? ?a? ??e?e? t?? e?a??e????. Matthew has ??e?a t?? ??? ???at??, and Luke e??e?e? t?? as??e?a? t?? ?e??. But Matthew’s “my name’s sake” is not the same as Mark’s “my sake,” and seems to bespeak Matthew’s later date of writing. Luke’s “for the sake of the kingdom of God” has a more primitive sound than the latter part of Mark’s phrase. It probably represents the original words of Jesus which Matthew has everywhere changed into the “kingdom of heaven.” Since all the passages in Mark where the word e?a??????? occurs are on independent grounds suspected of being later additions, it seems probable that the reading of Mark which Matthew and Luke had before them here was merely ??e?e? ???, that both Matthew and Luke changed this phrase as they would, and that the ??e?e? t?? e?a??e???? of Mark is later than either Matthew or Luke. At all events, it does not seem to be true in this instance that Matthew takes the first part of Mark’s phrase and Luke the last.

Mk xii, 3 (Mt xxi, 35; Lk xx, 10): Matthew’s account here is quite different from Mark’s (which is followed much more closely by Luke). According to Mark, only one servant was sent, whom the vineyard-keepers “caught and beat and sent away empty.” According to Matthew several servants were sent; the vineyard-keepers caught them, beat one, killed one, and stoned another. This form of the story indicates the times of persecution in which it was worked over by Matthew—when more than one man had suffered more than one kind of indignity. Luke sticks close to the story of Mark, and merely omits the ?a??te? which Matthew retains. Perhaps Luke had reflected that the servant had to be caught if he was to be beaten, and so regarded the item as superfluous. It does happen to come before the items that Luke retains, but there is no reason to suppose Luke would have had any greater antipathy to omitting it if it had stood last or if Matthew had also omitted it. It is not only hard to detect any influence of Matthew upon Luke here, but much harder to see, if Luke were copying Matthew, why he should not have preferred his several servants to Mark’s one. Later in the same story, Luke again omits Mark’s ?a??te? where Matthew retains it (Mk xii, 8), tho here both Matthew and Luke change the order of the incidents in the verse, probably to make them conform more exactly to the experience of Jesus. The omission of the participle by Luke and its inclusion by Matthew is most simply explained by Luke’s greater interest in stylistic improvement. The instance seems to be barren for Mr. Smith’s purpose.

Mk xiv, 1 (Mt xxvi, 2; Lk xxii, 1): Matthew’s account is here very different from Mark’s. He introduces it with the words, “And it came to pass when he had ended these sayings.” This is a formula which Matthew uses five times,[74] and which is found in Matthew alone. Since the construction ????et? followed by a finite verb is found in these five passages alone in Matthew, the formula appears to have stood (once, at least, if not in all five instances) in Q.[75] It also seems to be used by Matthew to mark his transition from one of his sources to the other.[76] The remark which Mark here makes about the approach of the passover, Matthew puts into the mouth of Jesus as a part of the speech which Mark does not have. Luke follows Mark in making the statement a part of his narrative and in omitting the speech which Matthew gives. These facts would seem to indicate that Matthew is here following Q, while Luke follows Mark. Luke’s looser statement (omitting the et? d?? ???a?, and substituting his own favorite ?????e?,[77] and adding his ? ?e????? p?s?a) would seem to go back to his desire not to trouble his Greek reader with too exact details, and yet to supply him with a little information about the Jewish feast. Here again, as in the last instance, it seems especially strange to suggest Matthew as a source of Luke where he shows such an absence of any influence from him.

Mk xiv, 12 (Mt xxvi, 17; Lk xxii, 7): Here, says Mr. Smith, Matthew gives the first and second parts of Mark’s phrase, Luke the second and third parts. The fact seems to be that Matthew here, with his usual habit of condensing Mark’s narrative, omits (what his Jewish readers would know without his stating it) the statement that on the first day of the feast of unleavened bread they “killed the passover.” Luke changes this from a particular to a general statement, so (as above) conveying to his Greek reader some information about the custom of the occasion (?de? ??es?a? t? p?s?a). Luke here shows the influence of Mark and not of Matthew; since he follows Mark (Mk xiv, 13; Lk xxii, 10) in including eleven words which he copies very closely and which Matthew omits. He also agrees with Mark in the ascription of supernatural knowledge to Jesus upon this occasion, whereas Matthew’s narrative does not carry this implication.

Mk xiv, 65 (Mt xxvi, 67, 68; Lk xxii, 63, 64): Mr. Smith finds the influence of Matthew upon Luke in this passage, in the fact that while Mark says that they “spat upon Jesus, blindfolded him and smote him, Matthew records the first and third of these actions, Luke the second and third.”[78] Why Luke omits the spitting, may not be easy (or necessary) to say. But that Luke here shows the reverse of any influence from Matthew is indicated in the fact that whereas Matthew follows Mark in relating, first the examination of Jesus, then the mockery, and third the denials of Peter, Luke rearranges the Marcan narrative to make it run, first the denials, second the mockery, and third the examination. He has received his suggestion for this rearrangement from the fact that Mark, just before he begins the story of the mockery, has mentioned that Peter was outside the hall, warming himself by the fire.[79] It has seemed (quite naturally) to Luke that this is the place where the story of the denials should be related, tho Mark inserts the story of the mockery before he goes on[80] with the denials. In a passage where Luke has so thoroughly rearranged Mark it seems unnecessary to account for his omission of one word, especially by such a remote theory as that of Mr. Smith; and in a passage, too, where his rearrangement of Marcan material contradicts Matthew’s slavish following of it.

Mk xv, 42 (Mt xxvii, 57; Lk xxiii, 54): “Where Mark says, ‘When the even was come because it was the preparation, that is the day before the Sabbath,’ Matthew says, ‘When even was come,’ and Luke ‘the rest.’”[81] But Luke does not quite say “the rest.” He says,[82] “It was the day of preparation, and the Sabbath was dawning.” And this he says, not in the same connection, nor with the same purpose, as Mark (and Matthew). Mark and Matthew use their statement about the evening having come as an introduction to their story about the request of Joseph of Arimathea. Luke tells his story of Joseph without any such introduction, and mentions the time only after he has finished that story, apparently with reference to the story of the women which follows, rather than to that of Joseph which precedes. The argument of the last paragraph will apply here.

It will not be necessary to go with equal care thru the five other instances in which Mr. Smith detects in a similar way the influence of Matthew upon Luke.[83] He admits “two, or three, or at the most four, cases of Marcan expressions” of which (without explanation) it might appear that Luke uses the first part and Matthew the last. His willingness to push his theory to the extreme may be inferred from his general estimate of the character of Luke as a writer: “He blurs, obliterates, blunders, fabricates, falsifies, flattens out, mutilates, murders.”[84]

The secondary interest of the writer would also seem to have influenced his work somewhat too strongly. That interest is indicated in the following statements: “If Acts was written in A.D. 62, ... and Luke was written before Acts, then Matthew, slipping in between Mark and Luke must throw Mark still further back.... We thus would come very close to the resurrection, perhaps to within fifteen years, and the possibility of legendary and controversial elements having entered into the gospel story would accordingly be reduced to a minimum.... With our understanding of Lucan derivations from Matthew, as well as from Mark, the ghost of a chance of existence belonging to postulated common sources, such as an earlier or a later Mark and a Q is frightened away, and we are left with the Gospels Mark, Matthew, Luke, written in that order,” etc.[85]

Passing from the details of Mr. Smith’s statement to the general argument upon which they rest, the present writer can see no cogency in that argument. Even if the use of Matthew by Luke were not contradicted by so many characteristics of both those Gospels, the writer cannot see how the choice by Luke of the second part of a phrase of which Matthew has taken the first part should prove the use of Matthew by Luke. Why should not Luke feel free to take precisely that part of a Marcan phrase which Matthew has taken—if he wanted it? Why should his finding it in Matthew make him feel that he was not at liberty to use it? Why, indeed, if Luke was copying Matthew, should he not have followed him in his quotation of a certain part of a Marcan phrase, instead of putting himself every time to the trouble of going back to his Mark to pick out that part of the phrase which Matthew had left? It does not quite appear why the facts cited by Mr. Smith (so far as analysis of the passages from which they are cited leaves any of them standing) might not just as well be turned against his theory as for it.