On Being Honored by the Jesus Seminar

Column by Bishop John Shelby Spong on 12 April 2012 1 Comments
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Question

In regard to the later additions to the Jesus story in each of the gospels, can these be traced to the source “Q?” I have heard of this source, but do not know much about it.  I would appreciate some explanation of what “Q” is and what you think in regard to my question.

 

Answer

Dear Jean,

The Q hypothesis (from the German word “Quelle” which mean “source”) was developed in the early 20th century when the discovery was made that both Matthew and Luke had used the gospel of Mark in the writing of their gospels.  Matthew was more dependent on Mark, incorporating about 90% of this first gospel into his own work.  Luke was a little less dependent, using about 50% of Mark.

When scholars lifted Mark’s content out of these later gospels, they noticed that there were in both Matthew and Luke a number of verses that were identical or nearly identical in them that were still in the two, but were not from Mark.  This caused them to speculate that Matthew and Luke must have had a second source, one other than Mark from which they both also drew.  This would account for the non-Marcan similarities in both Matthew and Luke.  The theory became very popular especially in North America and isolating the Q material, referring to it as “the earliest now lost gospel,” gave it a certain allure.  Some scholars even wrote on the theology of the Q  writer. When this material is isolated, it includes primarily some sayings of Jesus.  It has no birth stories, no miracle stories, no parables and no account of either the crucifixion or the resurrection.  It is even referred to as “a sayings gospel.”  The Jesus Seminar is, on the whole, a strong advocate of the Q hypothesis.

There is, however, a different way to think of the Q document other than as a separate source.  Matthew could have been the one who expanded Mark and Luke could therefore have had the benefit of both gospels.  Luke appears to have preferred Mark, but he also from time to time incorporated some of Matthew’s expansion of Mark into his gospel.  This would account for the non-Marcan similarity between Matthew and Luke.  That is the position that Michael Donald Goulder, the late English, New Testament scholar at the University of Birmingham developed in the prologue to his book entitled, Luke: A New Paradigm, which I believe is the best commentary on Luke that I have ever read.  If Goulder is right, Matthew is the author of Q and its early origin must be dismissed.  The weight of New Testament scholarship in America is strongly on the side of Q as a now lost document.  European New Testament scholarship is not nearly as sure.

Many of the conclusions I draw from the New Testament would be strengthened if I accepted the Q hypothesis at face value.  I am, however, still not sure that Goulder is not right.

~John Shelby Spong

 

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