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RELS 3300: Early Christianity The Synoptic Problem RELS 3300: Early Christianity Wednesday March 8, 2017

Reading the Gospels What do we know about the text? What can we infer about the (intended) reader?

Redactors and Redaction Criticism Redactor: someone who edits a text Redaction criticism: the study of how authors have created a literary work by modifying or editing their sources of information Things get change to align a text with specific goals

The Synoptic Problem- What is it? The Synoptic Problem is the “problem of how to explain the wide- ranging agreements and disagreements” among the gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke.

The Synoptic Problem-Details Some stories are verbatim the same across the three synoptic gospels Sometimes the stories are the same basic plot, with markedly different wording Some stories are only found in one or two of the gospels

The Four-Source Hypothesis

“Arguments for Markan Priority” What is “Markan Priority”? Patterns of Agreement The Sequence of Narrative Characteristics of the Changes

Q Source Where do stories that are found in Matthew and Luke, but not Mark, come from? Unlikely that they were made up/added by the authors; more likely they were drawing info from another source Q: Material in both Matt. And Luke, but not Mark Likely a written document Luke is more likely to have preserved the original sequence of the Q source

M + L Sources Material that is in either Matthew or Luke, but not in any of the other gospels One source or many? Parables and miracles

Discussion/Group Activity Why does this matter?

Looking Forward… Spring Break- take a minute, relax. The Gospels Mark Matthew Luke John