Rebuttal Case For Markan Priority

Synoptic Problem: Markan Priority Defies Logic (Part 11/13)

There Is No Definitive Case For Markan Priority

To this point, we have established four things:

1. The Patristic record is unanimous and uncontested that Matthew wrote first.
2. We gain no insights whatsoever about priority from the Arguments From Order, nor percentage of text in one source vs. another.
3. Markan Priority can’t be logically established with the circular editorial fatigue argument.
4. The case for Mark’s omissions and redactions, besides having both reasonable explanations and reversible arguments, is speculative and inconclusive.

At this point, the case for Markan Priority is not merely inconclusive, it’s non-existent. So where does that leave us? We’ve considered the “strongest” evidence, and that did nothing to reject our null hypothesis. Let’s review some additional evidence and see if it, cumulatively, pushes us over the top.

Photo by James Coleman on Unsplash

Can the Case Be Made With Literary Criticism?

By “literary criticism” here, I’m referring broadly to the group of: form, source, redaction, and textual criticism we briefly discussed earlier. There are additional, nuanced arguments of these types supporting Markan Priority made by the experts in the field. As these are literary critical concepts (and far beyond my area of expertise), I cannot fully do them justice. That said, I believe with what we have, and what others who are specialists on the subject have stated, that there is no way to attain a definitive solution to the Synoptic Problem with literary criticism alone. There is a simple, logical reason for saying so. And that is, literary critical arguments, by definition, require the presumption of priority in order to be made.

Circularity In Literary Criticism Generally vs. Circularity In Priority

Returning for a moment to our case against editorial fatigue, we pointed out that one cannot use it to establish priority. This, however, is distinct from using form critical arguments like editorial fatigue to support a priority position after that’s already assumed. This distinction is important, and often lost on the proponents of arguments like editorial fatigue. If, for example, we started with a circumstantial case of Markan Priority — assume for argument’s sake it was Mark with the overwhelming Patristic record— one could use editorial fatigue, or other circular arguments to support such a finding. I.e., “If Mark was first, then X reading would make sense.” This presumes priority already, and doesn’t try to argue this as proof of priority. This, again, is different from saying “X reading proves Mark is first.” In short, without some other basis to already believe one text is first, literary critical arguments alone cannot be used as the basis for priority. That is unless there are statistically-significant, overwhelming patterns of unidirectional tendencies. In other words, the types of patterns that render other readings absurd. These don’t exist with the editorial fatigue examples, and are even less with the examples to follow.

The Science on “Tendencies”

A critical point regarding “tendencies” in literary criticism is one made by the eminent Biblical scholar, E.P. Sanders who said “[o]ne cannot establish tendencies by citing only examples. What is needed is a thorough investigation of all the evidence, considering how many instances there are which point in each direction. Listing only some instances, all of which point in one direction, is neat, but useless and even misleading.”¹ Sanders has argued for a “scientific” approach to literary criticism. His work has specifically challenged four basic assumptions regarding the development of tradition, namely that it necessarily occurs with: “1) increasing length, 2) increasing detail, 3) diminishing Semitisms, and 4) the (what amounts to two criteria) use of more direct discourse and the conflation of episodes.”² In other words, merely pointing out cases where one Gospel is more detailed here, or uses more Semitisms there, would not be sufficient, scientifically, to make any case for directionality one way or another.

The gist of Sanders’ analysis is that “[t]here are no hard and fast laws of the development of he Synoptic tradition” and as such “dogmatic statements that a certain characteristic proves a certain passage to be earlier than another are never justified.”³ I am not a subject matter expert here. And I was unable to read his full work myself. But I can say that the statements of E.P. Sanders, especially those calling for drawing conclusions methodologically and reproducibly, are consistent with other scientific fields of study, and thus I have no reason to doubt his presumptions.

Mark’s Aramaisms

It is widely believed that Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, although modern scholars increasingly believe that Jesus and his disciples may have also spoken some Hebrew as well. The latter view has come more into focus with additional supportive archaeological findings.⁴ Regardless, what’s notable about Mark’s Gospel as compared to Matthew and especially Luke is that it includes more Aramaic expressions than the others.

For example, only in Mark do we see the phrase “Talitha kum!” (Mark 5:41). When Mark includes this phrase, he also includes the parenthetical “(which translated means, “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”). Another example, only in Mark is “Abba!” in Mark 14.36, which he follows with its meaning “Father!” Lastly, for our purposes, we see “Ephphatha” at Mark 7:34 (“He said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!”). This latter example is from a pericope found only in Mark, and there are only 7 such examples in his Gospel.⁵

This has been argued as intrinsic support for the fact that Mark’s Gospel must have been earlier, likely catering to an earlier church that would have been more familiar with the Aramaic. Is that the only or best interpretation? Again, the references above all have the translations following them. Would a translation have been necessary for the early Aramaic-speaking church? How does that reconcile with the widely argued view that Mark was written for a “Gentile” audience? Mark’s distinctive use of detail can also account for his addition of the “Aramaisms.” Details such as these help paint a vivid picture of the living Jesus, and could just as easily be explained if Mark was writing later to a Greco-Roman, Gentile audience.

Remember, we’re not permitted to use the Patristic testimony in our analysis — testimony that says Peter was the source for Mark (this “prohibition” is obviously tongue-in-cheek). But if this is at all true, that only strengthens the argument that there is little to make of the Aramaisms from a priority standpoint since Peter presumably spoke Aramaic. Plus, even assuming these Aramaisms indicate earlier writing, how early is early? Necessarily earlier than Matthew’s Jewish-focused Gospel, which itself has Aramaisms?⁶ These few examples here and there, patterns which are reversible as well, don’t rise to the scientific level of statistically significant tendencies necessitating one Gospel having priority over another.

Matthew’s Jewish Gospel

It is widely agreed that Matthew’s Gospel appears to be written for a more Jewish audience, and with more Jewish focus, than the others.⁷ Ironically, this observation (again, another that I’m not qualified to opine on, and so I accept as true for argument’s sake) seems to be one that should favor Matthew as being earlier, given that the early church was mostly Jewish and the Apostles all identified as Jews. However, through some odd contortions, this is put forth as an argument for Markan Priority along the lines that Matthew, seeing Mark, felt a need to “re-Judaize” the Jesus narratives.⁸ Perhaps this was necessary to “reclaim” some Jewish roots that were being lost in the increasingly Gentile church of the latter part of the first century? But once again, we have a much simpler, logically cleaner argument juxtaposed against an assumption-laden one. Doesn’t this uncontested fact better support the historical record that Matthew was earlier (perhaps even written first in Hebrew/Aramaic)? I find it bizarre that this is argued otherwise. At best, charitably, this is a wash and certainly not the type of literary critical argument that mandates Markan Priority.

This is also a good example of the necessity of presuming the conclusion in literary critical arguments since “rejudaization” is only necessary if one already presumes Mark was first. If Mark is after Matthew then, of course, that assumption-laden read would be unnecessary.

Poorer Greek of Mark

The fact that Mark is written in an inferior form of Greek is a view that is widely held, and generally uncontested.⁹ As one who doesn’t read or speak Koine Greek, I have no way to properly analyze this for myself. Thus, for our purposes here, I accept this as true. And then I immediately follow up with, “so what?” As a logician, there is no way to cogently derive strong premises from this either way. For example, if Mark was written from the account of an eyewitness who would have spoken poorer Greek (e.g. Peter) all this tells us, charitably, is the Gospel was more likely written earlier than later in the first century. Without a compelling reason to believe that later scribal works always maintain or improve the polish of their previous works, this observation is not needle-moving. And what’s more, if we accept the hypothesis that Mark was writing a vivid, action-packed narrative for a more Greco-Roman audience, then Marks “degradations” could reasonably be argued to have been intentional.

Summary of the Rebuttal Case for Markan Priority

To accept Markan Priority at this point, one has to ignore the following evidence and make the following assumptions:

Evidence to Ignore

• Overwhelming Patristic record that places Matthew ahead of Mark
• Lack of any logical basis to draw priority from Arguments from Order/Wording
• Circular editorial fatigue examples which may in fact support Mark being later
• Lack of statistically significant tendencies in the literary critical arguments for Markan priority
• The reversibility of the omissions arguments, including Luke’s omissions and John’s

Assumptions to Make

• Matthew’s more “Jewish” Gospel was “re-judaized” rather than being first
• A later Gospel writer wouldn’t omit so much “important” material, despite the later John omitting this material
• Mark couldn’t have been written by Mark the Evangelist, based on notes/interpretations he obtained from the Apostle Peter
• Mark’s Aramaisms indicate that he was earlier than Matthew, despite always including translations that an earlier audience shouldn’t have needed
• The hypotheses for Mark’s omissions and redactions are all unreasonable
• Mark couldn’t have conflated Matthew and Luke, despite multiple earlier and contemporary examples of even more complicated micro-conflation than Mark would have needed
• *If Matthew was an eyewitness, then Matthew would have used Mark to write his own account (*again, recall the boogeyman fears)

In short, the rebuttal case can really be argued to be only this: “it’s hard to imagine why Mark would omit so much if he wrote last.” That’s not much of a case at all.

Before wrapping up, we’ll touch briefly on an argument advanced for Matthean Priority, called “Alternating Agreements” which, too, proves nothing on priority (Part 12/13).

[1]: Sanders, E. P. The Tendencies of the Synoptic Tradition (“Tendencies”), pp. 10–11. London: Cambridge U.P., 1969. (I was only able to get excerpts of this work and admittedly did not study it in full).

[2]: Porter, Stanley E., and Andrew W. Pitts. Christian Origins and the Establishment of the Early Jesus Movement (“Christian Origins”). 2018, citing Tendencies p. 272. (I was unable to get a copy of the full Tendencies work).

[3]: Tendencies p. 272 (quoting from Christian Origins p. 92)

[4]: See, e.g. Did Jesus Speak Hebrew? — Disputing Aramaic Priority (hebrew4christians.com)

[5]: Robert. H Stein, Studying the Synoptic Gospels: Origin and Interpretation (2ed.) pp. 59–63 (“Studying the Synoptic Gospels”), Baker Academic, 2001

[6]: For one example, Matthew also includes this in his Gospel (at 27:46) the Aramaism also found in Mark 15:34 (“Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”).

[7]: See, e.g., Four Views p. 147

[8]: A Way Through the Maze p. 97 (“If this is right, then one of the things that Matthew is doing in his Gospel is not just to ‘Judaize’ Jesus but to ‘reJudaize’ the Jesus of Mark’sGospel.”)

[9]: See generally, Studying the Synoptic Gospels, Chapter 2