The Synoptic Gospels & Q: Synoptic Problem and Q

"Recently reconstructed by scholars, Q is one of the New Testament's earliest source documents. Arguing that Q's participation in the apocalyptic worldview of late Second Temple Judaism has greater consequences for its compositional history than previously recognized, Olegs Andrejevs performs a new literary-critical, narrative, and philological analysis of a number of Q passages, supplementing it with recent advances made in the study of Jewish apocalyptic literature, particularly the Enochic book of Parables and Qumran wisdom documents 4QInstruction and 1Q/4QMysteries. The end result is an updated stratigraphic model which synthesizes the insights of several scholars, most notably John S. Kloppenborg and Dale C. Allison, Jr., and highlights the feasibility of Q's diachronic study." - Mohr Siebeck

"This is the first book to examine the Aramaic dimension of Q since the Aramaic Dead Sea scrolls made such work more feasible. Maurice Casey gives a detailed examination of key passages in Matthew and Luke's gospels, demonstrating that they used two different Greek translations of an Aramaic source, which can be reconstructed. He overturns the conventional model of Q as a single Greek document, and shows that Jesus said everything in the original Aramaic source. Further analysis of other gospel passages shows the evangelists editing a Greek translation of an Aramaic source. On one, it can be shown that Mark utilises a different Aramaic source. A complex model of Q is thus proposed. Casey argues that Aramaic sources behind part of Q are of extremely early date, and should contribute significantly to the quest for the historical Jesus." - CUP

"Delbert Burkett addresses the Synoptic Problem, the question of what sources were used by the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). The most common explanation for the material shared by Matthew and Luke (the double tradition) is that Matthew and Luke both used a source now lost, called Q. If we adopt the Q hypothesis to account for the double tradition, then what theory best accounts for the material that Matthew and Luke share with Mark (the Markan material)? Three main theories have been proposed: Matthew and Luke used the Gospel of Mark as a source (the standard theory of Markan priority), Matthew and Luke used a revised version of Mark's gospel (the Deutero-Mark hypothesis), or all three evangelists used a source similar to, but earlier than, the Gospel of Mark (the Proto-Mark hypothesis). Delbert Burkett provides new data that calls into question the standard theory of Markan priority and the Deutero-Mark hypothesis. He offers the most comprehensive case to date for the Proto-Mark hypothesis, concluding that this theory best accounts for the Markan material. " - Mohr Siebeck

"Goulder and the Gospels is the first comprehensive response to the radical challenge Michael Goulder has posed for New Testament scholarship. Goulder dispenses with all hypothetical sources-Q, M and L and postulates highly creative evangelists who write in the light of the liturgy. In this penetrating critique, Goodacre provides a critical overview of Goulder's work, focusing on several key areas, the vocabulary of Q, the language of the Minor Agreements, the creativity of Luke and the lectionary theory. He does not simply assess the plausibility of Goulder's ideas but also develops new ways to test them. The theories are sometimes found to be wanting, but at the same time Goulder is reaffirmed as one of the most important and stimulating Biblical scholars of this generation." - T&T Clark

"In 1776 Johann Jakob Griesbach of Jena published as a separate volume his Greek Synopsis of Matthew, Mark and Luke, previously issued as part of his critical edition of the Greek New Testament. He was in fact the first to establish the Synopsis as a fundamental tool of New Testament research. He was perhaps even more important for his text-critical studies, and for what is still called the Griesbach Hypothesis of the literary dependence of Mark on both Matthew and Luke. The editors of this volume have brought together a selection of the papers presented by a distinguished international group of biblical scholars at the Griesbach Bicentenary Colloquium held in Munster (Westphalia) in 1976. This collection provides an authoritative account of the life of Griesbach, and of his work and its continuing influence in the fields of the Greek Synopsis, the Synoptic Problem and text criticism of the New Testament." - CUP

"The literary relationships among the Synoptic Gospels have long attracted scholarly attention which has now generally coalesced into the predominant Two- (or Four-) Source Hypothesis and leading alternatives, the Griesbach (or Two-Gospel) Hypothesis (Mark used Matthew and Luke) and the Farrer Hypothesis (Luke used Mark and Matthew). Thomas J. Mosbo here argues that no theory of Synoptic relations is adequate unless it can satisfactorily explain the extensive middle third of Luke's Gospel, the so-called Travel Narrative (9:51-19:27), where Luke departs from the order shown in either Matthew or Mark and assembles stories and sayings that develop themes concerning discipleship that are important to Luke. Mosbo examines this narrative as a composed narrative, not merely an assembly of "materials," and finds that Luke has reordered materials taken from Matthew and from Mark in a very particular manner. He then examines Luke's purposes in the Gospel as a whole, then addresses objections raised by Q advocates to the hypothesis that Luke knew Matthew. At length Mosbo offers his own hypothesis of Synoptic relationships, including the relationship between Matthew and Mark." - Fortress Press

"New Testament scholars routinely claim that verbal agreement among parallel Synoptic pericopae is a reliable indicator of literary borrowing by the Synoptic Evangelists. In Oral Tradition and Synoptic Verbal Agreement, T. M. Derico presents a critical assessment of that claim through a consideration of the most recent empirical evidence concerning the kinds and amounts of verbal agreement that can be produced among independent performances of oral traditions." - Wipf & Stock

"Scholars have long debated the “Synoptic Problem”—. Questions about why and how the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke share so much common material. Entering this important discussion that involves the trustworthiness of the Gospels, B. Ward Powers draws attention to the evidence pointing to Matthew’s Gospel having been published progressively, with identifiable sections of his material then being seen and utilized by Luke. After both of these Gospels had been published in their current form, they together with the preaching of the Apostle Peter were the three sources used by Mark in producing a special-purpose Gospel for preachers and evangelists.The Progressive Publication of Matthew fleshes out this proposal, measuring it in detail against other hypotheses." - B&H Publishing Group

"Estimated to date back to the very early Jesus movement, the lost Gospel known as Q offers a distinct and remarkable picture of Jesus and his significance--and one that differs markedly from that offered by its contemporary, the apostle Paul. Q presents Jesus as a prophetic critic of unbelief and a sage with the wisdom that can transform. In Q, the true meaning of the'kingdom of God'is the fulfillment of a just society through the transformation of the human relationships within it. Though this document has never been found, John Kloppenborg offers a succinct account of why scholars maintain it existed in the first place and demonstrates how they have been able to reconstruct its contents and wording from the two later Gospels that used it as a source: Matthew and Luke. Presented here in its entirety, as developed by the International Q Project, this Gospel reveals a very different portrait of Jesus than in much of the later canonical writings, challenging the way we think of Christian origins and the very nature and mission of Jesus Christ." - WJK Press

"For the right understanding of the Sayings Source Q not only the relation to early Judaism but also the social “landscape” in which the texts evolved is undeniably crucial. Here results of Galilean Archeology are brought into contact with sociological models how Jesus and the Q-community might have interacted with their contemporaries." - Vandenhoeck & Ruprech

"The study analyses the current state of research on the synoptic problem and proves that the Synoptic Gospels were written in the Mark, Luke, Matthew order of direct literary dependence. Moreover, the work demonstrates that the Synoptic Gospels are results of systematic, sequential, hypertextual reworking of the contents of the Pauline letters. Accordingly, the so-called ‘Q source’ turns out to be an invention of nineteenth-century scholars with their Romantic hermeneutic presuppositions. Demonstration of the fact that the Gospels are not records of the activity of the historical Jesus but that they narratively illustrate the identity of Christ as it has been revealed in the person and life of Paul the Apostle will certainly have major consequences for the whole Christian theology." - Peter Lang Publishers

"This work examines three disputed issues in the study of Q, the hypothetical source common to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke: its existence; its unity as a document; and the plurality of its wording. It evaluates the arguments for and against the existence of Q and concludes that some form of the Q hypothesis is necessary. It presents new evidence that most of the Q material existed as a single written source unified by recurring features of style and theme. Finally, it argues that differences between Matthew and Luke in the wording of Q were caused most often when one Evangelist replaced or combined Q with parallel material from another source." - SBL Press

"This volume contains a collection of twenty-one essays of John S. Kloppenborg, with four foci: conceptual and methodological issues in the Synoptic Problem; the Sayings Gospel Q; the Gospel of Mark; and the Parables of Jesus. Kloppenborg, a major contributor to the Synoptic Problem, is especially interested in how one constructs synoptic hypotheses, always aware of the many gaps in our knowledge, the presence of competing hypotheses, and the theological and historical entailments in any given hypothesis. Common to the essays in the remaining three sections is the insistence that the literature, thought and practices of the early Jesus movement must be treated with a deep awareness of their social, literary, and intellectual contexts. The context of the early Jesus movement is illumined not simply by resort to the literary and historical sources produced by Greek and Roman elites but, more importantly, by data gathered from documentary sources available in non-literary papyri." - Mohr Siebeck

"With characteristic boldness and careful reassessment of the evidence, MacDonald offers an alternative reconstruction of Q and an alternative solution to the Synoptic Problem: the Q+/Papias Hypothesis. To do so, he reconstructs and interprets two lost books about Jesus: the earliest Gospel, which was used as a source by the authors of Mark, Matthew, and Luke; and the earliest commentary on the Gospels, by Papias of Hierapolis, who apparently knew Mark, Matthew, and the lost Gospel, which he considered to be an alternative Greek translation of a Semitic Matthew. MacDonald also explores how these two texts, well known into the fourth century, shipwrecked with the canonization of the New Testament and the embarrassment at outmoded eschatologies in both the lost Gospel and Papias s Exposition." - SBL Press