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Markan Priority

Shermana

Heretic
Markan priority - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Are there actually good arguments for Markan priority?

Are the arguments for the Augustinian Hypothesis (Matthew Priority) and Griesbach somehow inferior? Is Markan Priority a default position that stems from arguments against the AH and GB? Is it better than Lukan priority?

Is there a possible Theological agenda behind Markan priority? (For example, would traditional Matthean priority pose a greater initial Jewish element into the equation than many may prefer)?

The theory was first proposed by a Protestant Theologian and subsequently supported by Protestant Theologians. How well supported is it by Non-Protestant scholars?

Now Markan Priority is accepted by the "Majority of New Testament Scholars", but is it accepted by the majority of non-Protestant New Testament scholars? Would this have a bearing on the weight of the arguments for Markan Priority?

Is there any weight that those pursuing this "majority position" have that the early Church Fathers wouldn't have?

Before the 18th century, the belief of many, including the Church Fathers Papias (c. 60-130), Irenaeus (c. 130-200), Origen (c. 185-254), Eusebius (c. 260-340) Jerome (c. 340-420), and Augustine of Hippo (c. 354-430), had been that Matthew was the first gospel to be written. Therefore, Matthew is the first gospel to appear in the chronological order of the four gospels in the Second, or New Testament. This traditional view of gospel origins, however, began to be challenged in the late 18th century, when Gottlob Christian Storr (1786) proposed that Mark was the first to be written.
 
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Jayhawker Soule

-- untitled --
Premium Member
Markan priority - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Are there actually good arguments for Markan priority?
Of course not. All those scholars involved in synoptics research were simply ignorant buffoons.

But, since you're here to enlighten us, rather than trying to provoke us with a laundry list of rhetorical questions why not identify the major arguments underpinning Markan priority and (a) show us why they should be discarded and (b) argue for your preferred alternative?
 

Shermana

Heretic
Of course not. All those scholars involved in synoptics research were simply ignorant buffoons.

I most certainly agree, Sarcastic one. And I'd bet more than a few of the dissenters who agree with Matthean priority agree too.

But, since you're here to enlighten us, rather than trying to provoke us with a laundry list of rhetorical questions why not identify the major arguments underpinning Markan priority and (a) show us why they should be discarded and (b) argue for your preferred alternative?

Here we go, straight from the Wiki which does a fine job categorizing these non-arguments:

Ahem....

Content not present in Mark
Mark's gospel is by far the shortest, and omits much that is in Matthew and Luke. It is argued that he would be unlikely to omit important events from Matthew and Luke, if he had access to their gospels.[5][2]
[edit]

I fail to see how content not present in Mark means it was necessarily omitted. This argument gets flushed instantly. He could have just wanted to keep it simple or didn't feel they were of importance to his version of the story. But directly omitting?

Content only found in Mark
There are very few passages in Mark that are found in neither Matthew nor Luke, which makes them all the more significant. If Mark was editing Matthew and Luke, it is hard to see why he would add so little material, if he was going to add anything at all. The choice of additions is also very strange. On the other hand, if Mark wrote first, it is often the case that Matthew and Luke would have strong motives to remove these passages.[6]

Ah, what are these strong motives that Matthew and Luke would want to omit something from Mark? What agenda did Matthew and Luke have? Flushed.

One example is Mark 3:21, where we are told that Jesus' own family thought he was "out of his mind". Another is Mark 14:51-52, an obscure incident with no obvious meaning, where a man with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane flees naked.
Significant too is Mark 8:22-26, where Jesus heals a man in a process that is slow and involves saliva; Mark Goodacre suggests both these features make it a passage more likely to be omitted than added,[7] implying Mark wrote first.

Yeah, apparently Matthew and Luke would want to omit the idea that they thought Jesus was crazy, and they'd totally want to cover up some random naked guy fleeing (issues of secret gospel of Mark for another day) that's totally a logical idea that a non-ignorant-buffoon would pick up as a defacto concept.

Alterations
Regarding verses where Mark differs from Matthew and/or Luke, it is often easier to see why Matthew or Luke would alter Mark than the reverse. For example, the pericope starting at Matthew 20:20 lacks a criticism of the disciples found in Mark 10:35 and later verses.[2] Matthew 8:25 and Luke 8:24 both lack disrespect towards Jesus from the disciples, portrayed in Mark 4:38.[2] Henry Wansbrough writes: "Mark is highly, even shockingly, critical of the disciples' lack of faith and understanding; Matthew and Luke both weaken this criticism, in a way that might be expected to have occurred at a time when reverence for the first leaders of Christianity was increasing."[8]
Mark's Jesus often seems more human than Matthew's. Davies and Allison[6] list a number of passages where Mark but not Matthew portrays Jesus as emotional (e.g. Mark 1:41, cf. Matthew 8:3), ignorant of some fact (e.g. Mark 6:37-38, cf. Matthew 14:16-17), or incapable of some action (e.g. Mark 6:5, cf. Matthew 13:58). They argue that it is easier to see why Matthew would edit Mark to make Jesus more divine and more powerful, than why Mark would edit Matthew to weaken Jesus.

Basically more of this "omission" concept. So because Mark portrays a somewhat more critical and less "Divine and powerful" Jesus, it HAD to be altered. Flushed.


Primitive and unusual language in Mark
Mark's Greek is more primitive than the other Gospel writers. Often, Luke or Matthew will state a parallel Jesus quotation much more eloquently than Mark. In addition, Mark occasionally uses an unusual word or phrase where Matthew uses a common word. It is argued that this makes more sense if Matthew was revising Mark, rather than the reverse.[6]

Care to explain how a "Primitive and unusual" style of Koine necessitates it came first?

Vividness and verbosity of Mark
When Mark and Matthew agree, Mark often has a more vivid, verbose version. It is argued that it is unlikely that Mark was inserting details into many Matthean quotes while leaving out huge events such as the birth of Jesus. Rather, this verboseness is explained as nearness to actual eye-witness testimony.[2]

"Vivid and verbose", yeah that totally objectively explains why Mark came first. While I agree, as you know, that Matthew probably had the Virgin birth narrative later interpolated in, I don't see how this detail issue necessitates that it came first. Perhaps you'd like to explain why it so heavily weighs in its favor. What exactly constitutes "Vivid and verbose". Matthew's pretty vivid and Verbose I'd say. Maybe Mark just decided to spice up the account.


Fatigue
Mark Goodacre lists a number of occasions where it appears that Matthew or Luke begin by altering Mark, but become fatigued and start to copy Mark directly, even when doing so is inconsistent with the changes they have already made. For example, Matthew is more precise than Mark in the titles he gives to rulers, and initially (Matthew 14:1) gives Herod Antipas the correct title of "tetrarch", yet he lapses into calling him "king" at a later verse (Matthew 14:9), apparently because he was copying Mark 6:26 at that point.[9]
Another example given by Goodacre is Luke's version of the feeding of the multitude. Luke apparently changed the setting of the story: whereas Mark placed it in a desert, Luke starts the story in "a town [nb 1] called Bethsaida" (Luke 9:10). Yet later on, Luke is in agreement with Mark, that the events are indeed in a desert (Luke 9:12). Goodacre argues that Luke is here following Mark, not realising that it contradicts the change he made earlier.

As pointed out by others, Fatigue can equally work against Markan Priority, it could have been Mark who was fatigued. If this concept is even legit. Assuming this fatigue argument has any weight to begin with, which I don't see why it would.

And that folks, are all the arguments behind this position that the majority of New Testament scholars hold. (Though not necessarily the majority of non-Protestant NT scholars).

Now on your turn perhaps you'd like to explain why those supporting Matthean authorship are wrong and why those "arguments" are remotely weighted in favor of Markan priority.
 
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steeltoes

Junior member
Ah, what are these strong motives that Matthew and Luke would want to omit something from Mark? What agenda did Matthew and Luke have? Flushed.

Matthew and Luke omitted very little, such as Mary coming to get Jesus because she thought he was gone mad. Matthews' birth story made that a bit awkward because Mary should have known he was divine. Luke omits the names of Jesus' siblings, he doubted that they were believers.

On the other hand you didn't ask what agenda Mark would have had to omit whole chapters and all of the Q sayings. Because he wanted to make it short and sweet fails to convince.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
The evidence is there for Markan priority, enough so it shouldnt even be a real arguement.

The points brought up do not really even bring anything relevant to the table.
 

Pegg

Jehovah our God is One
Markan priority - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Are there actually good arguments for Markan priority?

Is there any weight that those pursuing this "majority position" have that the early Church Fathers wouldn't have?


does it really matter who wrote the gospel first? Isnt the information contained within it more important then when it was written?

Anyway, its interesting that this is being debated by scholars who are almost 1,000 years after the fact. How can they possibly purport to know more then the historians who lived during in the first/second centuries???

:facepalm:
 

sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
does it really matter who wrote the gospel first? Isnt the information contained within it more important then when it was written?

Anyway, its interesting that this is being debated by scholars who are almost 1,000 years after the fact. How can they possibly purport to know more then the historians who lived during in the first/second centuries???

:facepalm:
Yes, it does matter, because in the process of exegeting the texts, ordinal priority becomes extremely important in some matters of parsing out similarities and differences between multiple attestations of the same statement.

We know more than the historians who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries in matters of being able to place the events in a broader context. We do not know more of the minute details. But ancient historians weren't so much concerned with verbatim as they were with "jist." Additionally, since it's highly likely that the gospel writers didn't know each other, they wouldn't know "who wrote first." They only know, "Here's some source material I can use for my story."
 

Shermana

Heretic
The evidence is there for Markan priority, enough so it shouldnt even be a real arguement.

The points brought up do not really even bring anything relevant to the table.

Okay, let's see that evidence. Surely you mean something other than the totally hole-filled "arguments" I brought up and explained how easily poked they are, right?
 

Shermana

Heretic
You seemed to avoid ...

I had a whole post last night but it had 13,000 characters of quoted text from sources detailing the arguments for Matthean primacy and why the Markan priority arguments are nonsensical, and I decided to scrap it and make it two detailed, commentated posts later. Have patience.

In the meantime, if you'd like to stick up for the "arguments" of Markan priority instead of just appeal to the majority and authority of the "ignorant buffoons", have at it.
 
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Pegg

Jehovah our God is One
Yes, it does matter, because in the process of exegeting the texts, ordinal priority becomes extremely important in some matters of parsing out similarities and differences between multiple attestations of the same statement.

We know more than the historians who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries in matters of being able to place the events in a broader context. We do not know more of the minute details. But ancient historians weren't so much concerned with verbatim as they were with "jist." Additionally, since it's highly likely that the gospel writers didn't know each other, they wouldn't know "who wrote first." They only know, "Here's some source material I can use for my story."


lol, bible writers didnt know each other... are you serious?

Peter and Mark were very closely associated...Peter even calling him "my son" in one of his letters.

Scholars of today have no idea what they are talking about.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
Okay, let's see that evidence. Surely you mean something other than the totally hole-filled "arguments" I brought up and explained how easily poked they are, right?


GLuke and GMatthew used Gmark as their foundation for their version.

Gmark also dates earlier.


Who's on first Abbott, what? no Who.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
lol, bible writers didnt know each other... are you serious?

Peter and Mark were very closely associated...Peter even calling him "my son" in one of his letters.

Scholars of today have no idea what they are talking about.


Im sorry Pegg

But the writers that are attributed, are not known to be the real authors.

Gmark is writing to and for a Roman audience explaining judaism to non jews. he is also making Romans more innocent while painting jews as guilty of killing jesus.

We all know Pilate was a bloodthirsty killer who would not bat a eyelash killing Galileans which he was known to have a severe hatred of.

Why would Galilean fishermen probably not literate, be writing a book to their very enemies?



scholars today, know more then any other time in history on this tiopic we are dealing with.

Maybe you would trust a female scholar ive emailed. Look up Candida Moss. You might like her work. Much of it has been oh Natgeo as well. Probably loaded on youtube.
 

Pegg

Jehovah our God is One
Im sorry Pegg

But the writers that are attributed, are not known to be the real authors.

Gmark is writing to and for a Roman audience explaining judaism to non jews. ...Why would Galilean fishermen probably not literate, be writing a book to their very enemies?

because christians were taught not to view anyone as their enemies...they were to view all mankind as brothers and they were commissioned to 'go and make disciples of people of all the nations' hence it is quiet reasonable that they would write to the roman people about their leader Jesus.

perhaps the scholars have not fully taken christian teachings into account.
 

Shermana

Heretic
GLuke and GMatthew used Gmark as their foundation for their version.

That's the part about the "Evidence" I'm asking for. The arguments for this position are shoddy, that is the point of this. I believe, as do other Matthean primacists, that it is much more plausible that Mark was after Matthew, or at the very least the initial version of Matthew before its redacted Greek form.

Gmark also dates earlier.
Yes that's the recent and current "majority" position, the purpose of this thread is to get into discussing the reasons for this.
Who's on first Abbott, what? no Who.
Naturally.
 
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sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
lol, bible writers didnt know each other... are you serious?
Yup.
Peter and Mark were very closely associated...Peter even calling him "my son" in one of his letters.
You do realize that Mark didn't write Mark -- right?
Scholars of today have no idea what they are talking about.
Just like scientists of the day had no idea what they were talking about when they proposed a round earth...
 

sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
because christians were taught not to view anyone as their enemies...they were to view all mankind as brothers and they were commissioned to 'go and make disciples of people of all the nations' hence it is quiet reasonable that they would write to the roman people about their leader Jesus.

perhaps the scholars have not fully taken christian teachings into account.
This is so wrong -- on so many levels. I don't know where to begin.:facepalm:
 

sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
maybe you can begin by doing some research on the activities of early christians in the roman world :D
Just completed a graduate course in that very subject. Where would you like to begin to compare notes?
 

Jonathan Hoffman

Active Member
That's the part about the "Evidence" I'm asking for. The arguments for this position are shoddy, that is the point of this. I believe, as do other Matthean primacists, that it is much more plausible that Mark was after Matthew, or at the very least the initial version of Matthew before its redacted Greek form.

Yes that's the recent and current "majority" position, the purpose of this thread is to get into discussing the reasons for this.
Naturally.

Since Matthew was directed at the Jews, I can see why it might be considered the first gospel. Do you think the Pauline content of Matthew was added by Paulinists? And was Mark a 'corrected' version of Matthew sans Paul?
 
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