An alternative view | ||||||
One way the results found in the study could have come about is if the author of Luke knew and used Matthew. However, there is another related explanation. We could speculate that the 2SH is correct and that Matthew and Luke both used Mark and Q independently. Then Matthew became established as the most authoritative gospel. Copyists might also have been more familiar with Matthew’s text than the other texts. Thus, the text of Luke became corrupted over time with unintentional and intentional changes that made it look more like Matthew. Most of the minor agreements would have been made by unintentional changes to Luke, in this view. Large parts of what we call Q, were not actually in the sayings source, but were added to Luke by "copyists" who were familiar with Matthew, and considered Matthew to be authoritative. Some of the Mark/Q overlap could have been caused by Matthian versions of Mark’s text being transferred into Luke. This explanation can explain the results of the study just as well as the 3SH can. So, our choice of one over the other would have to be based on other criteria. If we continue to speculate along the same lines, we could say that it is likely that parts of Mark were also changed by copyists to match Matthew. This could be the cause of some of the more suspicious items that proponents of the Griesbach hypothesis point to in support of Matthian priority. In addition, if parts of a Matthian pericope were copied independently into both Luke and Mark, this could be yet another source of Mark/Q overlap. Finally, in addition to contaminating Mark and Luke, Matthew could have contaminated Matthew. Copyists very familiar with Matthew’s text may have duplicated bits of Matthian material at other locations in the text of Matthew, causing doublets. The association between 200 and 202 in the study raises some questions for the 2SH, but any explanation that puts part of Q in M or part of M in Q will allow the 2SH to accommodate this data, and possibly offer another explanation for some of Matthew's doublets. There are arguments for and against this idea vs. Luke’s direct knowledge of Matthew. A significant argument against this alternative is that we do not have any of these hypothetical early versions of Luke. I think we would have to speculate that early proto-orthodox believers may have actively destroyed these earlier versions, if they contained things that disagreed with the proto-orthodox view. We have no Codex of significant size before the 3rd century. But we do know, for example, that Marcion had a different version of Luke in the early 2nd century, and we do not have that text. In any case, the study can support both the 3SH and this alternative idea equally well. |
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