Markan priority and the synoptic gospels

This might be a question for Leolaia, but I noticed in researching the gospel of Mark this week that the dates the WTBTS gives for the writing of the other synoptic gospels does not seem to agree with most New Testament scholars.

The All Scripture book gives the following dates:

Matthew: Writing Completed: c. 41 C.E.
Mark: Writing Completed: c. 60–65 C.E.
Luke: Writing Completed: c. 56–58 C.E.

This would put Mark as the last of the three synoptic gospels to be written, and therefore the WTBTS does not adhere to the Markan priority hypothesis.

Wikipedia states that: "t he theory of Markan priority is today accepted by the majority of New Testament scholars".

Is there a good reason why the WTBTS dates the synoptic gospels in that order?

How can they date Matthew and Luke so early?

Is it merely because the WTBTS rejects the possibility of a "Q" source, and possibly even the idea of collusion between the writers altogether?

Or is it because many scholars put the writings of Luke and Matthew after the destruction of Jerusalem, meaning the "prophecies" of destruction became historical accounts of past events by the time they were written?

Interestingly Mark is unaware of any resurrection. The resurrection in 16:8+ only appears in the additions. How exactly Mark is not aware of the greate event in the life of Jesus on earth is one of lifes gret mysteries.

I think placing Matthew first before Mark in the order is to give this very illusion that Matt predates Mark, when common sense shows that Mt is a copy of Mk plus additions. Theres no point of including a Mk a cut down version of Matt unless its the original. The gospels were written after Pauls writing again we see the ordering seems to make us think the gospels were written before the Pauline texts but the opposite is almost always true.

Well, Mark is not unaware of the resurrection, though you are correct insofar as you note the account in Mark is quite cursory.

As for the OP, I think those are good questions. It is important to note that the JWs are extremely poor students of the gospel acocunts -- even the smart JWs are unaware of the theological and other differences between John and the synoptics. I suspect a general opposition to Q has something to do with it, as you suggest. But I don't know the precise reasons for those dates -- even conservative scholars don't set them that early.

sulla:

Thats absolutely unreasonable. Are we to believe if the same events happened today, biographers(lets call them that) would forget to write about some dude coming back from the dead. I think its safe to assume 99/100 would write about it if they saw or knew it happened. Surely the ressurrection is more important than the other lesser narratives in Mk.

Mark is not cursory about the resurrection, he mentions nothing about it in the "original text". Somebody later on had to "add" the text with teh ressurrection which is absurd.

I think Watchtower are just taking the line that other fundementalist religions do: that the Gospels were virtually eyewitness accounts written almost 'as it happened', and therefore factual. Thinking that the Scriptures aren't absolutely 'inspired' is verboten .

I'm adding this brief biography of NT scholar, James Dunn, so that its possible to appreciate that he just may know something about the NT, not that it would make any difference to Yahweh's 'know-all' people.

James Dunn (theologian)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Dunn_(theologian) )

James D. G. ("Jimmy") Dunn (born 1939) is a leading British New Testament scholar who was for many years the Lightfoot Professor of Divinity in the Department of Theology at the University of Durham. Since his retirement he has been made Emeritus Lightfoot Professor. He has worked broadly from within the Protestant tradition. Dunn is especially associated with the New Perspective on Paul, along with N. T. (Tom) Wright and E. P. Sanders. He is credited with coining this phrase during his 1982 Manson Memorial Lecture. [citation needed]

Dunn has an MA and BD from the University of Glasgow and a PhD and DD from the University of Cambridge. For 2002, Dunn was the President of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas, the leading international body for New Testament study. Only three other British scholars had been made President in the preceding 25 years. In 2006 he became a Fellow of the British Academy.

In 2005 a festschrift was published dedicated to Dunn, comprising articles by 27 New Testament scholars, examining early Christian communities and their beliefs about theHoly Spirit. (edited by Graham N. Stanton, Bruce W. Longenecker & Stephen Barton (2004). The Holy Spirit and Christian origins: essays in honor of James D. G. Dunn. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. ISBN 0-8028-2822-1.)

Dunn has taken up E. P. Sanders' project of redefining Palestinian Judaism in order to correct the Christian view of Judaism as a religion of works-righteousness. One of the most important differences to Sanders is that Dunn perceives a fundamental coherence and consistency to Paul's thought. He furthermore criticizes Sanders' understanding of the term "justification", arguing that Sanders' understanding suffers from an "individualizing exegesis".

Whoever submitted the Wikipedia article on 'Gospel,' ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel ) uses Dunn's dating as follows:

Estimates for the dates when the canonical gospel accounts were written vary significantly; and the evidence for any of the dates is scanty. Because the earliest surviving complete copies of the gospels date to the 4th century and because only fragments and quotations exist before that, scholars use higher criticism to propose likely ranges of dates for the original gospel autographs. Scholars variously assess the majority (though not the consensus [29] ) view as follows:

Mark: c. 68-73, [30] c. 65-70 [31]
Matthew: c. 70-100. [30] c. 80-85. [31]
Luke: c. 80-100, with most arguing for somewhere around 85, [30] c. 80-85 [31]
John: c. 90-100, [31] c. 90-110, [32] The majority view is that it was written in stages, so there was no one date of composition.

The wikipedia entry also quotes the more conventional dating given in the NIV translation (just for your comparison):

88JM:

Thanks for bringing up a very interesting topic (to me at least). I have R. T. France's NITGC Mark commentary and his NICNT Matthew. I'm going to check and see what his view is on these dates. Whether he is right or not, he is usually very thorough.

The "more conventional dating given in the NIV" is closer to what the Society holds to, although they put Matthew definitely in the lead. The "conventional dating" has Matthew and Mark more neck and neck. But as one of the sources above note, often the 'evidence' is very scant so that it often narrows down to an opinion, and probably can never be narrowed down beyond that.

What I dislike about the SI book (even if all its conclusions may not be wrong) is the dismissive nature of its content. Selective facts chosen and any different opinions written off as the work of "critics." And all the "facts" they get right are taken from 'Christendom's' scholars but the work as a whole is attributed to the 'F&DS class,' as if they did any of the leg work in finding out this stuff.

I've been going thru the NICNT Matthew commentary and there are some very interesting comparisons/contrasts between Matthew and the other synoptics. For one, in may of the healing accounts and with the man with the legion, Matthew will have two people, whereas Mark/Luke will have one.

Take Care

Leo seems to be absent from here at present, I hope she finds time to grace us with her presence again before too long, but for now, here is a quote from a post by Leo that is concerned with the date of the writing of the Gospel of Matthew : Speaking of Matthew she writes,

"The book is anonymous, there is no use of the first person (unlike, say, in the Gospel of Peter), and the descriptions of the Temple and its functions are naturally to be expected in a story set during the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate. The allusion to James' martyrdom in Matthew 20:22-23 is muted compared to that in Mark 10:38-39, but this is probably a consequence of Matthew utilizing an earlier edition of Mark. The prophecy of the Temple's destruction in Mark looks rather much like it was written before the fact because it relies mainly on Danielic apocalyptic traditions and doesn't fit too well with the events of AD 70; it is the Lukan version that makes the connection with AD 70 explicit. The author ofMatthew was writing after AD 70 and has clearly interpreted the Markan apocalypse in light of these events; he has thus disentangled the destruction of the Temple from the conclusions of "all things" by modifying the disciples' question in 24:3(whereas in Mark 13:4 the two are closely linked) and the time reference in 24:29, and by introducing the theme of apparent delay in the parousia through the insertion of three parables with delay or a prolonged wait as their central theme. "

Perceptive as usual, Leo obviously concurs with most scholars that "Mark" precedes Matthew, being written in the main before 70C.E (some verses may have been added after) , Matthew was probably written in the 80's and Luke and of course John much later.

Until I read Leo's post it troubled me that Mark's words about the temple seemed to be a prophecy, written before the events of 70 C.E, Leo's understanding of how to read such stuff helped me to see that it was not, and to see how devious is the writing of "Matthew" and Luke, thanks Leo !

I find that my default position that if the WT says something it is probably wrong works well for me, I have never been caught out by it on a matter of importance.

Thanks for your research guys. I'll be interested to hear what Bobcat comes back with.

I see then that the WTBTS is a little closer to the NIV dates, but take it much futher in dating Matthew and Luke far earlier than any other source I've seen. Even the most conservative sources don't seem to date Matthew anything like as early as 41 C.E.

I think too that the only sensible attitude is to take the consensus view of the scholars of today, much progress has been made in recent decades, so older views on dating of Bible books do not carry much weight.

Markan priority and the synoptic gospels

88JM 12 years ago

mP 12 years ago

Sulla 12 years ago

mP 12 years ago

transhuman68 12 years ago

fulltimestudent 12 years ago

James Dunn (theologian)

Bobcat

Phizzy

88JM

Phizzy

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