Yes that is admitted by most scholars.
That article I posted did say that all the manuscripts we have do have names attached even if the names vary in the form that is used. BUT the names are consistent. The right name is with the right gospel in all the manuscripts and so it was not just a matter of different people making up names to attach, it was most likely the names that were known by the church to be the actual authors.
That is not what the evidence suggests at all.
"Ignatius (c. 105-115 CE) appears to quote phrases from
Matthew (see
here), and to allude to the star over Bethlehem (
Matthew 2:1-12) in his
Letter to the Ephesians (
19:2); however, Ignatius does not attribute any of this material to the disciple Matthew nor does he refer to a “Gospel according to Matthew.” Polycarp (c. 110-140 CE) likewise appears to quote multiple phrases and verses from
Matthew,
Mark, and
Luke (see
here), and yet he neither attributes any of this material to their traditional authors nor refers to their traditional titles. There is scholarly dispute, however, as to whether Ignatius and Polycarp are quoting written texts, or instead interacting with oral traditions. As such, it is uncertain whether these two authors are directly referencing the Gospels that we possess today.
A stronger case can be made that the
Epistle of Barnabas (80-120 CE) quotes
Matthew (
22:14), particularly because the epistle says “it is written” (
4:14), when referring to the verse “many are invited, but few are chosen”; and yet, the
Epistle of Barnabas does not attribute this verse to a text written by the disciple Matthew. What is further worth noting is that the
Epistle of Barnabas (
4:3) also refers to the
Book of Enoch, and states “as Enoch saith,” showing that the epistle refers to traditional authorship elsewhere, when it was known.
Even more important, however, is when the
Didache (c. 50-120 CE) directly quotes the Lord’s prayer (
8:3-11), which is written in
Matthew 6:9-13. This quotation is important, because the
Didache attributes these verses to “His (Jesus’) Gospel” (ο κυριος εν τω ευαγγελιω αυτου) without referring to a “Gospel according to Matthew.” What the
Didache is probably referring to, therefore, is the original title of the Gospels, before they were attributed to their traditional names. As discussed under the “
Internal Evidence” section above, the Gospels were most likely originally referred to under the title το ευαγγελιον Ιησου Χριστου (“The Gospel of Jesus Christ”); however, when later there were multiple gospels in circulation, the construction κατα (“according to”) was added, in order to distinguish individual gospels by their designated names. The
Didache likely preserves, therefore, a trace of their original titles, which were anonymous.
Justin Martyr (c. 150-160 CE) later makes explicit references and quotations of the Gospels (see
here), but ascribes them under the collective title of “Memoirs of the Apostles,” without making any explicit mention of their traditional names. Finally, Irenaeus (c. 175-185 CE) refers to the Gospels by their traditional names in the late-2nd century (see
here). As such, there is a clear development in which the Gospels were first referred to anonymously by external sources, and only later associated with their traditional attributions. For this reason, Ehrman (
Forged, p. 225) concludes:
It was about a century after the Gospels had been originally put in circulation that they were definitively named Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. This comes, for the first time, in the writings of the church father and heresiologist Irenaeus [
Against Heresies 3.1.1], around 180-85 CE.
So, it is not until some century after the Gospels’ original composition, around the time of the church father Irenaeus, that they were even given their traditional authorial attributions.
[20] Incidentally, Irenaeus wanted there to be specifically “four gospels” because there are “four winds” and “four corners” of the Earth (
Against Heresies 3.11.8). This was the kind of logic by which the Gospels were later attributed…
Ehrman (
Forged, p. 226) goes on to explain:
Why were these names chosen by the end of the second century? For some decades there had been rumors floating around that two important figures of the early church had written accounts of Jesus’ teachings and activities. We find these rumors already in the writings of the church father Papias [now lost, but still partially preserved by Eusebius in
Historia Ecclesiastica 3.39.14-17], around 120-30 CE, nearly half a century before Irenaeus. Papias claimed, on the basis of good authority, that the disciple Matthew had written down the saying of Jesus in the Hebrew language and the others had provided translations of them, presumably into Greek. He also said that Peter’s companion Mark had rearranged the preaching of Peter about Jesus … and created a book out of it.
So, we do have references to works written by Matthew and Mark, which date prior to Irenaeus, in the writings of the church father Papias. Unlike the sources mentioned above, however, Papias does make allusions to or quote any passages from these texts, so that it is unclear whether he is referring to the texts that we know today as the
Gospel of Matthew and the
Gospel of Mark. Papias’ own writings are likewise no longer extant, and so his reference to these works is only preserved in the later writings of the 4th century church father Eusebius. Incidentally, Eusebius (
Historia Ecclesiastica 3.39.13) elsewhere describes Papias as a man who “seems to have been of very small intelligence, to judge from his writings.” Likewise, another fragment of Papias tells a story about how Judas, after betraying Jesus, became wider than a chariot and
so fat that he exploded…
Here is what Eusebius (
Historia Ecclesiastica 3.39.15) preserves regarding Papias’ claim that Mark, an attendant of Peter, had written an account about Jesus:
Now, the presbyter would say this: “Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, accurately wrote down as much as he could remember, though not in order, about the things either said or done by the Lord. For he had neither heard nor followed the Lord, but only Peter after him who, as I said previously, would fashion his teachings according to the occasion, but not by making a rhetorical arrangement
[ου μεντοι ταξει] of the Lord’s reports, so that Mark did not error by thus writing down certain things as he recalled. For he had one intention: neither to omit any of the things which he heard nor to falsify them.”
Regarding the account written by Matthew, Eusebius (
Historia Ecclesiastica 3.39.16) records Papias as stating:
These things are recorded in Papias about Mark, but concerning Matthew this is said: “Matthew organized the reports in the Hebrew language, and interpreted each of them as much as he was able.”
Since Irenaeus clearly knew Papias’ works (
Against Heresies 5.33.4), he probably drew the connection between these texts and the gospels
Matthew and
Mark from his testimony.
[21] However, a major problem with this tradition, noted above, is that Papias never quotes from the works that he attributes to these authors, and he could very well not be referring to the texts that were later called
Matthew and
Mark. This is especially true for
Matthew, which Papias claims was written in Hebrew/Aramaic, even though the
Gospel of Matthew that we possess today is a Greek text. But for
Mark as well, Papias’ statement that the gospel “lacked rhetorical arrangement” (ου μεντοι ταξει) does not mesh very well with the internal evidence the text itself, which is actually pretty sophisticated in its plot and rhetorical devices.
[22]
Papias himself had never met any of the apostles (
Historia Ecclesiastica 3.3.2), and he was relying on a tradition reported by an unknown figure named
John the Presbyter, or “elder John.” It could be the case, therefore, that this oral tradition was referring to other, unknown texts that were later conflated with
Matthew and
Mark. Even if Papias is correctly referring to our
Gospel of Mark, however, there are still problems with this attribution. As New Testament scholar Michael Kok, who argues that Papias is referring to the text that is known as
Mark today, explains about Papias’ source (
The Gospel on the Margins, p. 105):
The traditional authors of the canonical Gospels—Matthew the tax collector, Mark the attendant of Peter, Luke the attendant of Paul, and John the son of Zebedee—are not held to be the Gospels' actual authors by the majority of mainstream New Testament scholars. Christian apologists nevertheless...
infidels.org
