If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ken Olson
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Michael BG wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:52 am
Ken Olson wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:34 am Though, actually, one of the problems with Goodacre's fatigue paper is that he doesn't provide a definition of fatigue, it has to be inferred from his descriptions of what he's looking at in his examples.
In “The Synoptic Problem” (linked to) Mark Goodacre when talking about editorial fatigue with regard to Mark defines it as “where Matthew and Luke seemed to have made initial, characteristic changes to their Markan source, but had apparently lapsed into docile reproduction of that source, resulting in some minor incongruities” (p 154).
I was referring to Mark Goodacre's fuller treatment in his "Fatigue in the Synoptics," in New Testament Studies 44 (1998), pp. 45-58, which he has put online at:

http://www.markgoodacre.org/Q/fatigue.htm

However, even in the example you quote, Goodacre's description is (1) not meant as a definition and (2) Foster's example of "kingdom of heaven" would not fit the description (granting we can apply the principal analogously to the double tradition). This is apparent because (1) if taken as a definition, it would apply only to Matthew and Luke's use of Mark, and (2) "kingdom of God" in Matt 12.48 is by no means incongruous in its context.

Here's the larger context of your quotation:
When we were looking at the Priority of Mark in Chapter 3 we found one of the most decisive factors to be the phenomenon of 'editorial fatigue'. There were places where Matthew and Luke seemed to have made initial, characteristic changes to their Markan source, but had then apparently lapsed into docile reproduction of that source, resulting in some minor incongruities. Now it is revealing that the same phenomenon also seems to occur in the Double Tradition, revealing because it is always in the same direction, in favour of Luke's use of Matthew. As usual, illustration will be the best form of explanation, so let us have a look at a good example, the Parable of the Talents/Pounds (Mt. 25.14-30//Lk. 19.11-27)
So at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I reiterate that Foster's example of "kingdom of heaven" and "kingdom of God" in Matthew is not an example of editorial fatigue as Goodacre uses the term.
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:26 am In the concrete, however, there is at least one point at which I believe Luke's version is pretty clearly more original than Matthew's, granted the rest of my arguments. Matthew has changed individual servants in Mark's parable of the tenants to groups of servants in his own rendition of that parable. Similarly, in the parable of the feast, where Luke has an individual servant, Matthew has groups of servants. This makes it look to me as if Matthew has made both of these changes (rather than Luke having turned groups of servants into one individual servant).
I fully agree that both cases are MtR (Matthean redaction). I think, however, there is a problem there for your classification of the material.
Ben: Material in Matthew which is thematically closer to Mark than to Luke is in red; material in Matthew which is thematically closer to Luke than to Mark is in green; and material in Matthew which is more uniquely Matthean than either Marcan or Lucan is in blue.

What is clear is that one can remove both the distinctively Matthean material and the decidedly Marcan material from Matthew's version and be left with a complete parable in its own right: one that is basically a mild rewrite of Luke's parable. One cannot, however, remove the Lucan material and be left with any kind of cohesive parable. The Matthean and Marcan stuff depends upon the Lucan stuff for its meaning, while the reverse is not true; the basic parable resembles what we find in Luke more than what we find in Mark.
The two sendings of the servants in Matt 22.3 "he sent his servants" and 22.4 "again he sent other servants" are clearly meant to be parallel to each other and also clearly parallel to Matt 21.34 and 36 (with which they are verbatim identical) in the Matthean version of Wicked Tenants. It seems to me that Matthew here means for the repeated parallel sending of the servants to be understood as an allegory for God's repeated calls to Israel for obedience (as it is in Mark). But you've color coded the two sendings of the servants in Matthew as green in your synopsis, meaning thematically closer to Luke. Luke's owner of the house has, as far as we can tell, only a single servant and he summons each guest only once, before the servant is sent out twice more (14.21, 23) to round up replacement guests. (As Goulder remarks, he must be really tired by the end of the parable). Now I realize that you can argue that Matthew is thematically closer Luke because the purpose for which the servant is sent is to summon dinner guests rather than to collect rent. But I think the fact that there are ways (and IMO more important ways) in which the sending of the servants in Matthew is thematically closer to Mark calls into question your classification of the material as green. Maybe you need another color for "more like Mark in some ways, more like Luke in others."
Last edited by Ken Olson on Tue Jun 19, 2018 11:26 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ken Olson wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:34 am
Michael BG wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:52 am
Ken Olson wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:34 am Though, actually, one of the problems with Goodacre's fatigue paper is that he doesn't provide a definition of fatigue, it has to be inferred from his descriptions of what he's looking at in his examples.
In “The Synoptic Problem” (linked to) Mark Goodacre when talking about editorial fatigue with regard to Mark defines it as “where Matthew and Luke seemed to have made initial, characteristic changes to their Markan source, but had apparently lapsed into docile reproduction of that source, resulting in some minor incongruities” (p 154).
I was referring to Mark Goodacre's fuller treatment in his "Fatigue in the Synoptics," in New Testament Studies 44 (1998), pp. 45-58, which he has put online at:

http://www.markgoodacre.org/Q/fatigue.htm

However, even in the example you quote, Goodacre's description is (1) not meant as a definition and (2) Foster's example of "kingdom of heaven" would not fit the description (granting we can apply the principal analogously to the double tradition). This is apparent because (1) if taken as a definition, it would apply only to Matthew and Luke's use of Mark, and (2) "kingdom of God" in Matt 12.48 is by no means incongruous in its context.

Here's the larger context of your quotation:
When we were looking at the Priority of Mark in Chapter 3 we found one of the most decisive factors to be the phenomenon of 'editorial fatigue'. There were places where Matthew and Luke seemed to have made initial, characteristic changes to their Markan source, but had then apparently lapsed into docile reproduction of that source, resulting in some minor incongruities. Now it is revealing that the same phenomenon also seems to occur in the Double Tradition, revealing because it is always in the same direction, in favour of Luke's use of Matthew. As usual, illustration will be the best form of explanation, so let us have a look at a good example, the Parable of the Talents/Pounds (Mt. 25.14-30//Lk. 19.11-27)
So at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I reiterate that Foster's example of "kingdom of heaven" and "kingdom of God" in Matthew is not an example of editorial fatigue as Goodacre uses the term.
I don’t see that Mark Goodacre is only defining fatigue with regard to Mark. While in the example we were discussing Mt 12:28 it is possible, as you have done, to make the case that it is intentionally “Kingdom of God” I also think it can be seen as editorial fatigue, not because it causes an inconsistency in that pericope but because it is inconsistent with Matthean usage. Which I think you were saying that was how Paul Foster sees it.
Ben C. Smith wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:26 am
Michael BG wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:45 am If Luke was using Matthew shouldn’t we see him suffer fatigue in relation to the “Kingdom of Heaven”? As we don’t this could be because Luke didn’t have Matthew to work from.
"Should" is a rather strong word for this possibility. Editorial fatigue is never, ever automatic. One has to wait for the author/editor to drop his or her guard a bit, and some authors/editors are so conscientious that they will avoid lapsing into fatigue by far most of the time, if not avoiding it altogether.
I don’t think I could have used anything else but “shouldn’t”. If there was no editorial fatigue in Luke in relation to Mark and Matthew/Q then we would not expect it with regard to “Kingdom of Heaven”. Of course the lack of such fatigue does not prove that Luke didn’t use Matthew, but it does provide evidence, even if we rate the evidence as weak, that Luke didn’t use Matthew.
Ben C. Smith wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:26 am You are still using the terms in ways that I do not, but I can agree that Matthew's additions to the core story are what make Matthew's version problematic. Call that process what you will. And I believe we are more than justified in referring to a "core story" here because, when one removes from Matthew's version (A) those parts which reflect Mark's parable of the tenants more than Luke's parable of the great feast and (B) those parts which reflect neither Mark nor Luke, what remains is a story very much like Luke's parable, and just as complete and unproblematic. This ought to be explained.
I agree with you it does point to it being Matthew’s editorial work and so unlikely to be in the original version.
Bear in mind, however, that Ken's argument is precisely that Matthew's version of the parable of the feast is both more original than Luke's version and entirely the product of Matthew's editorial work. There is no either/or for Ken on this point. The parable, in his view, is the result of Matthew's editorial activity on Mark's parable of the tenants.

I want to emphasize that here and now, as ever and always, when I refer to Matthew's version or to Luke's version or what have you I am taking a shortcut; it could be Matthew's source or Luke's source.
It is still possible that Matthew has retained more of the original story and Luke has substantially changed it.
In the abstract, this is true. Where Matthew's account of the wedding guests differs from Luke's, it is possible that Matthew is still the more primitive.

In the concrete, however, there is at least one point at which I believe Luke's version is pretty clearly more original than Matthew's, granted the rest of my arguments. Matthew has changed individual servants in Mark's parable of the tenants to groups of servants in his own rendition of that parable. Similarly, in the parable of the feast, where Luke has an individual servant, Matthew has groups of servants. This makes it look to me as if Matthew has made both of these changes (rather than Luke having turned groups of servants into one individual servant).
You make a good point about servant and servants. It would be more persuasive if Matthew had used “servant”. I think Matthew and Luke use different words for “oxen”: Matthew (v 4) ταῦροί (tauri) – bullocks or oxen; Luke (v 19) βοῶν (bous) – ox or cow. I think I read that Matthew’s word is usually used for the meat from the animal (e.g. beef), while Luke’s is used for the animal itself (e.g. cow) and therefore there is no inconsistency. However, if there was an inconsistency and both words were for the animal then Luke’s version is more likely to be the original and if both words were for the meat then Matthew’s version would be more likely the original one.
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ken Olson wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 10:27 am
Ben C. Smith wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:26 am In the concrete, however, there is at least one point at which I believe Luke's version is pretty clearly more original than Matthew's, granted the rest of my arguments. Matthew has changed individual servants in Mark's parable of the tenants to groups of servants in his own rendition of that parable. Similarly, in the parable of the feast, where Luke has an individual servant, Matthew has groups of servants. This makes it look to me as if Matthew has made both of these changes (rather than Luke having turned groups of servants into one individual servant).
I fully agree that both cases are MtR (Matthean redaction). I think, however, there is a problem there for your classification of the material.
Ben: Material in Matthew which is thematically closer to Mark than to Luke is in red; material in Matthew which is thematically closer to Luke than to Mark is in green; and material in Matthew which is more uniquely Matthean than either Marcan or Lucan is in blue.

What is clear is that one can remove both the distinctively Matthean material and the decidedly Marcan material from Matthew's version and be left with a complete parable in its own right: one that is basically a mild rewrite of Luke's parable. One cannot, however, remove the Lucan material and be left with any kind of cohesive parable. The Matthean and Marcan stuff depends upon the Lucan stuff for its meaning, while the reverse is not true; the basic parable resembles what we find in Luke more than what we find in Mark.
The two sendings of the servants in Matt 22.3 "he sent his servants" and 22.4 "again he sent other servants" are clearly meant to be parallel to each other and also clearly parallel to Matt 21.34 and 36 (with which they are verbatim identical) in the Matthean version of Wicked Tenants. It seems to me that Matthew here means for the repeated parallel sending of the servants to be understood as an allegory for God's repeated calls to Israel for obedience (as it is in Mark). But you've color coded the two sendings of the servants in Matthew as green in your synopsis, meaning thematically closer to Luke. Luke's owner of the house has, as far as we can tell, only a single servant and he summons each guest only once, before the servant is sent out twice more (14.21, 23) to round up replacement guests. (As Goulder remarks, he must be really tired by the end of the parable). Now I realize that you can argue that Matthew is thematically closer Luke because the purpose for which the servant is sent is to summon dinner guests rather than to collect rent. But I think the fact that there are ways (and IMO more important ways) in which the sending of the servants in Matthew is thematically closer to Mark calls into question your classification of the material as green. Maybe you need another color for "more like Mark in some ways, more like Luke in others."
I agree that the multiple sendings in Matthew probably mean the same thing here as they do in the parable of the tenants. The highlighted portion, however, is exactly my position: the repeated sendings are still with respect to invitations to a feast; therefore, they definitely belong to one parable and not to the other. There is really no way around this, because one can slip verses 3-5 of Matthew 22 almost seamlessly over their parallels in the Lucan parable of the great feast and still have a coherent parable; the only exception is that in Matthew the feast is specified as a wedding celebration, but this is even a bigger difference from the parable of the tenants, in which there is no feast at all. One cannot slip verses 3-5 of Matthew 22 over their parallels in the parable of the tenants and come away with any kind of coherent story. Furthermore, Matthew also has servants getting killed instead of merely being given excuses. As one part of your synopsis admits (but another part does not for some reason), the reaction of the persons to whom the slaves are sent can be a separate issue from the actual sending of the slaves, and Matthew has one set of reactions fit for the parable of the great feast (in verses 3-5) and another reaction fit for the parable of the tenants (in verses 6-7). In other words, changing one slave making the rounds to groups of slaves being sent in waves does not change the coherence of the parable in any fundamental sense, whereas changing their purpose from finalizing invitations to collecting rent and the reaction to that purpose from turning down the offer to outright violence is to find oneself writing a different parable altogether. Thus verses 3-5 are quantifiably closer to Luke, while verses 6-7 are quantifiably closer to Mark.

The single slave in Luke is interesting, is he not? Luke 20.9-19 gives us Luke's version of the parable of the tenants, and he retains Mark's design of plural slaves sent out one at a time; likewise, Luke 11.49-51 (confer Matthew 23.34-36) ensures that Luke is absolutely fine with the motif of God sending out multiple waves of messengers to Israel. So why does Luke, who on your view has (apparently only) Mark's and Matthew's respective parables of the tenants and also Matthew's parable of the wedding feast to hand, pare down the plural slaves to just one, even when he could have kept plural slaves finalizing invitations without sacrificing anything integral to the parable? He could even have retained the motif of it being a wedding feast without doing any harm to the parable (and Luke 5.34-35 shows that he has no problem with portraying Jesus as a bridegroom, while in Luke 12.36 he has actually specified the reason for the master's absence in Mark 13.34 as a wedding), but he did not.
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Michael BG wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 10:36 amI don’t see that Mark Goodacre is only defining fatigue with regard to Mark. While in the example we were discussing Mt 12:28 it is possible, as you have done, to make the case that it is intentionally “Kingdom of God” I also think it can be seen as editorial fatigue, not because it causes an inconsistency in that pericope but because it is inconsistent with Matthean usage. Which I think you were saying that was how Paul Foster sees it.
This explains, I think, some of the issues I was having in understanding you before. For future reference, then, I never call instances, on their own, of a single author using different vocabulary words for the same concept "fatigue." For me, fatigue entails an element of inconsistency within the pericope itself, not just a different word choice. If I call a member of my family my "daughter" in one sentence and then call her my "child" in another, there is no fatigue by my definition.

Sometimes the use of a different word can amount to fatigue, but only if that different word is problematic in some way other than it merely being different. A good example is when Matthew at one point (correctly) calls Herod a tetrarch a few times before then (incorrectly) calling him a king. The issue there is not that Matthew generally uses the word "tetrarch" instead of "king" for Herod; if these terms were synonyms, that would be fine. Rather, the issue is that one of these titles is correct, while the other is not. It is more like calling that member of my family my "daughter" in one sentence and then my "niece" in another.
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Jun 17, 2018 7:41 pm What is clear is that one can remove both the distinctively Matthean material and the decidedly Marcan material from Matthew's version and be left with a complete parable in its own right: one that is basically a mild rewrite of Luke's parable. One cannot, however, remove the Lucan material and be left with any kind of cohesive parable. The Matthean and Marcan stuff depends upon the Lucan stuff for its meaning, while the reverse is not true; the basic parable resembles what we find in Luke more than what we find in Mark.
Ben,

This is tough to follow. I think what you've discovered is that Matthew's Wedding Banquet is the middle term between Mark or Matthew's Wicked Tenants and Luke's Great Dinner. Matthew has parallels with Luke (not Mark), Mark (not Luke), with both Mark and Luke, and special Matthean unparalleled material, while Mark and Luke have almost no parallels with each other not found in Matthew. I don't see how this supports the theory that Matthew conflated Mark and Luke (or Q) over the theory that Matthew modified Mark and then Luke used Matthew as his source. I don't see how the observation that the Lukan-paralleled material in Matthew constitutes a complete story in its own right shows that it's the original (if that's what you meant by "basic") form.

When one of the evangelists (we could probably apply this to other authors for that matter) writes his own pericope based on a pericope found in his source, doesn't he usually take over enough material to constitute a complete story? And if we then took the story in the source and removed all the material that the second evangelist had used from it, isn't it normal for the remainder not to make sense by itself? I think this is the usual state of affairs in the triple tradition. For example, if we took the Healing of the Boy with a Spirit Matt 17.14-21/Mark 9.14-29/Luke 9.37-43, and isolated all the material that Luke has that's paralleled in Mark, it would make a complete story. But if we removed all the Luke-paralelled material from Mark, Mark would not have a complete story. Mark would have some Matthew paralleled material and special Markan material that doesn't make sense by itself. This does not mean that Mark conflated Luke's story with material from Matthew and added some of his own material. Well, some Griesbachians think it does mean that, and they're right that it's a possibility, but the phenomenon described doesn't prove the theory.

So I guess what I'm asking is--what is is you think you've shown?
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Ken Olson wrote: Tue Jun 19, 2018 3:39 pm
Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Jun 17, 2018 7:41 pm What is clear is that one can remove both the distinctively Matthean material and the decidedly Marcan material from Matthew's version and be left with a complete parable in its own right: one that is basically a mild rewrite of Luke's parable. One cannot, however, remove the Lucan material and be left with any kind of cohesive parable. The Matthean and Marcan stuff depends upon the Lucan stuff for its meaning, while the reverse is not true; the basic parable resembles what we find in Luke more than what we find in Mark.
This is tough to follow.
Sorry about that, but perhaps part of the problem is that you are responding only to the setup and not to the payoff, which I gave in the very next paragraph?
Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Jun 17, 2018 7:41 pmStructurally, then, if you are correct that Matthew knew no more than Mark's parable of the tenants, Matthew (A) created a new, cohesive parable about a feast by changing servants collecting rent to servants inviting people to a banquet before (B) borrowing again from the same exact part of Mark's parable, this time retaining unchanged the motif of the servants being killed for their trouble, and (C) borrowing the collateral motif of destruction from another part of Mark's parable, with the result that the cohesion of the parable created in step A was ruined. The other option seems far simpler on its face: Matthew (A) borrowed some elements from Mark and (B) interjected them into the parable from Luke, and the additions did not always play well with the Lucan parable.
I am trying to get at the heart of what the argument from fatigue really is: its whole logic is based on it being easier to see how one account led to the other than vice versa. But, if the above does not work for you, wait till the end of this post for another stab at it.
I think what you've discovered is that Matthew's Wedding Banquet is the middle term between Mark or Matthew's Wicked Tenants and Luke's Great Dinner.
Technically this may be correct, but it is weird thinking of these pericopes in this way because we are dealing with two separate parables: one about tenants and another about a feast. Matthew and Luke certainly treated these as separate parables, giving separate space to both of them, and so do modern synopses.

The following observations, then, are not analogous:
When one of the evangelists (we could probably apply this to other authors for that matter) writes his own pericope based on a pericope found in his source, doesn't he usually take over enough material to constitute a complete story? And if we then took the story in the source and removed all the material that the second evangelist had used from it, isn't it normal for the remainder not to make sense by itself? I think this is the usual state of affairs in the triple tradition. For example, if we took the Healing of the Boy with a Spirit Matt 17.14-21/Mark 9.14-29/Luke 9.37-43, and isolated all the material that Luke has that's paralleled in Mark, it would make a complete story. But if we removed all the Luke-paralelled material from Mark, Mark would not have a complete story. Mark would have some Matthew paralleled material and special Markan material that doesn't make sense by itself. This does not mean that Mark conflated Luke's story with material from Matthew and added some of his own material. Well, some Griesbachians think it does mean that, and they're right that it's a possibility, but the phenomenon described doesn't prove the theory.
The healing of the demoniac boy is a single story, not two. We are not in this case picking away additions from one story to find the other story complete and coherent, so I am not sure what you are getting at here.
So I guess what I'm asking is--what is is you think you've shown?
I am trying to show, apparently without success, that what Matthew displays in his parable of the wedding banquet vis-à-vis Luke's parable of the great feast is an example of fatigue. It is similar to what happens, say, between Luke and Mark elsewhere:

Mark 6.30-35: 30 The apostles gathered together with Jesus; and they reported to Him all that they had done and taught. 31 And He said to them, "Come away by yourselves to a secluded place and rest a while." (For there were many people coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.) 32 They went away in the boat to a secluded place by themselves. 33 The people saw them going, and many recognized them and ran there together on foot from all the cities, and got there ahead of them. 34 When Jesus went ashore, He saw a large crowd, and He felt compassion for them because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and He began to teach them many things. 35 When it was already quite late, His disciples came to Him and said, "This place is desolate and it is already quite late."

Luke 9.10-12: 10 When the apostles returned, they gave an account to Him of all that they had done. Taking them with Him, He withdrew by Himself to a city called Bethsaida. 11 But the crowds were aware of this and followed Him; and welcoming them, He began speaking to them about the kingdom of God and curing those who had need of healing. 12 Now the day was ending, and the twelve came and said to Him, "Send the crowd away, that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside and find lodging and get something to eat; for here we are in a desolate place."

The parts which cohere or which ought to cohere are marked in green; but red marks the bit in Luke which causes the inconsistency.

In this example, as Goodacre himself argues, it is easier to imagine Luke following Mark than to imagine Mark following Luke. Mark's account is internally consistent; in the terms I used in a previous post, Mark is of one mind. Luke, however, makes an alteration at one point but fails to follow through with it later on, reverting back to Mark's storyline; Luke is of two minds. Goodacre calls this "docile reproduction," but it is important to note that the reproduction does not by any means have to be verbatim; Luke definitely changes the wording, but what remains the same is the idea that the location is desolate, and not a city. Luke, in other words, seems to have had Mark's storyline in mind after all.

Compare Matthew and Luke in the parable of the feast:

Luke 14.16-24: 16 But He said to him, “A man was giving a big dinner, and he invited many; 17 and at the dinner hour he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come; for everything is ready now.’ 18 But they all alike began to make excuses. The first one said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land and I need to go out and look at it; please consider me excused.’ 19 Another one said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please consider me excused.’ 20 Another one said, ‘I have married a wife, and for that reason I cannot come.’ 21 And the slave came back and reported this to his master. Then the head of the household became angry and said to his slave, ‘Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the city and bring in here the poor and crippled and blind and lame.’ 22 And the slave said, ‘Master, what you commanded has been done, and still there is room.’ 23 And the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the highways and along the hedges, and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled. 24 For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste of my dinner.’

Matthew 22.1-10: 1 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying, 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. 3 And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. 4 Again he sent out other slaves saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.”’ 5 But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, 6 and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them. 7 But the king was enraged, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire. 8 Then he says to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite to the wedding feast.’ 10 Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.

Again, the parts which cohere or which ought to cohere are marked in green; but red marks the bit in Matthew which causes the inconsistency.

In this example, I for one find it easier to imagine Matthew following Luke than to imagine Luke following Matthew. Luke's account is internally consistent; in the terms I used in a previous post, Luke is of one mind. Matthew, however, makes an addition or alteration at one point but fails to follow through with it later on, reverting back to Luke's storyline; Matthew is of two minds. He diverts the parable away from party invitations and into a whole motif involving a king waging war against a rebellious city before coming back to the plot involving the feast, which is somehow still ready. Matthew, in other words, seems to have had Luke's storyline in mind after all.

Several secondary observations, some of which I have discussed already in this thread but will put here for convenience, seem to support this assessment:
  1. It is easy to imagine Matthew turning a single slave into plural slaves, since that is exactly what he does to Mark's parable of the tenants. Why, though, would Luke have turned plural slaves into a single slave? He has plural slaves in other contexts (Luke 12.37; 15.22; 19.13, 15), so why not retain them here, if he is copying from Matthew?
  2. It is easy to imagine Matthew turning a single errand into plural waves of errands, since that is how the parable of tenants is set up, and we have seen that he has borrowed elements therefrom in order to use them in the parable of the feast. Why, though, would Luke have turned plural waves of errands into a single errand? He retains the plural errands in his own version of the parable of the tenants, so why not here, if he is copying from Matthew?
  3. It is easy to imagine Matthew turning a feast into a wedding feast, since he uses bridal imagery in other contexts (Matthew 9.15; 25.1-13). Why, though, would Luke have turned a wedding feast into an ordinary feast? Luke 5.34-35 shows that he has no problem with portraying Jesus as a bridegroom, while in Luke 12.36 he has actually specified the reason for the master's absence in Mark 13.34 as a wedding, so why not keep the wedding here, if he is copying from Matthew?
  4. It is easy to imagine Matthew turning a man into a king, since the man represents God and Matthew elsewhere has much to say about God being a king. Why, though, would Luke have turned a king into an ordinary man? He too has much to say about God being a king, and in his parable of the minas (Luke 19.11-27) he has actually (apparently) turned Matthew's ordinary master (Matthew 25.14-30) into a man receiving a kingdom, so why not retain the king in this parable, if he is copying from Matthew?
To my eye, this is a pretty clear case of Matthew making incongruous additions to Luke's parable of the feast in the same way that Luke has made an incongruous alteration to Mark's story of the feeding of the 5000. I suspect, as you do, that Matthew has brought in that addition from Mark's parable of the tenants, but that is irrelevant to the phenomenon of editorial fatigue.

One can argue that Matthew created his own botched version of the parable of the feast before Luke cleaned it up for him; in such a case Matthew must have had a clean version of the parable in mind (since it is still there in his text, so easily recovered simply by striking out verses 6-7 and then verses 11-14) while simultaneously deciding to add in those little extras which spoil the consistency. And, likewise, one can argue that Luke created his own botched version of the feeding of the 5000 before Mark cleaned it up for him; in such a case Luke must have known that the place was desolate (since that is exactly what he says in verse 12) while simultaneously deciding to set the action in a city, thus spoiling the consistency. The trick to the argument from fatigue is not that one absolutely cannot imagine things working the other way around; the trick is that it is harder to imagine them the other way around.

The argument from fatigue thus implies a direction of dependence, which is something that I have yet to see from the Farrer theory on this issue. To suggest that Matthew created the parable himself out of his reading of Mark's parable of the tenants is fine and dandy, but why is that option better than that Matthew copied the parable from Luke and mixed in some details from Mark's parable of the tenants? Where is the implied directionality? To me it appears that it is "better" only because it saves the Farrer theory, and that is not good enough a reason for me. So is there another reason? If so, what is it?
Last edited by Ben C. Smith on Wed Jun 20, 2018 8:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Michael BG
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

Post by Michael BG »

Thank you Ben for your Mark/Luke example of how you see fatigue and setting out very clearly four reasons why it is more likely that Matthew “used” Luke rather than Luke cleaned up Matthew’s story. I am disappointed that you didn’t take up the issue of oxen and discuss the possibility of which much be the more original.

In your Mark/Luke example Luke uses two identical words from Mark – “desolate place” and for me the use of the same words is part of the evidence of dependence rather than having a common source. In the Matthew/Luke example the lack of any clear out of place words in either story makes it for me not possible to state that Luke is most likely the original. All I can conclude is that both Matthew and Luke seem to have a source which includes the meal, the rejection of invitations and the gathering of others from “the highways” to attend instead and that Matthew has added inconsistent features to the story which Luke doesn’t have. As there is no evidence that Matthew has retained any of Luke’s language which would be out of place then I can’t conclude Matthew used Luke as his source, therefore this becomes evidence for a common source.
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Ben C. Smith
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

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Michael BG wrote: Wed Jun 20, 2018 12:36 am Thank you Ben for your Mark/Luke example of how you see fatigue and setting out very clearly four reasons why it is more likely that Matthew “used” Luke rather than Luke cleaned up Matthew’s story. I am disappointed that you didn’t take up the issue of oxen and discuss the possibility of which much be the more original.
I did look into that briefly, but the data were too sparse for me to make anything of them. Matthew uses the word ταῦρος only in 22.4, and Luke never uses it, unless we count Acts 14.13. Luke does use the term βοῦς three times, but again, that is not much of a tendency. I find I am completely unable to make any determination based on words for cattle.
In your Mark/Luke example Luke uses two identical words from Mark – “desolate place” and for me the use of the same words is part of the evidence of dependence rather than having a common source. In the Matthew/Luke example the lack of any clear out of place words in either story makes it for me not possible to state that Luke is most likely the original. All I can conclude is that both Matthew and Luke seem to have a source which includes the meal, the rejection of invitations and the gathering of others from “the highways” to attend instead and that Matthew has added inconsistent features to the story which Luke doesn’t have. As there is no evidence that Matthew has retained any of Luke’s language which would be out of place then I can’t conclude Matthew used Luke as his source, therefore this becomes evidence for a common source.
For the record, I do not think that Matthew knew Luke's gospel. I suspect they both knew a common source. In my argument, I am still working at the minute level of textual detail, in which it is still impossible to determine whether Matthew is becoming fatigued with Luke or with a source like Q (a few words used verbatim here and there are not enough to make that determination on their own). So, as I have said before, every time you read me saying that Matthew knew Luke, you can easily replace that notion with Matthew having known Luke's source. This works in almost all cases for me, including Matthew having known Mark's source rather than Mark, and so on.

My only purpose here is to take up Mark Goodacre's challenge to find examples of Matthew becoming fatigued with Luke (or Luke's source), because his argument is that the lack of such examples implies the lack of a source (like Q) in between Matthew and Luke. Thus, I am trying to show that the Lucan parable of the great feast is more primitive than the Matthean parable of the wedding banquet, which is derivative of it. At this stage I frankly do not care what this relationship directionality implies for broader ideas like the Two-Source or the Farrer theories. I myself, long ago, had been seriously leaning in the direction of the Farrer theory, until I discovered examples like the one I have presented here. Now my view of synoptic relationships is much more nuanced and complex: not in the same sense, say, as Marie-Émile Boismard would have it, but rather in a David Parker sort of way:

David C. Parker, The Living Text of the Gospels, pages 121-122:

I am proposing that the evidence does not permit us to attempt a documentary solution. I am not thereby denying the existence of documents. I do not attempt to deny the substantial reality of Mark. His style alone is a sufficient criterion for us to know him in bulk from Matthew or Luke. But a documentary solution requires more than the degree of detail needed to know Mark from Matthew. It requires published editions, in which every last word, syllable and letter is known. It is this discernible, published precision which is lacking. The reason for the lack is not - as it might seem I was about to conclude — that we do not have the evidence to recover precisely what the evangelists wrote. It is that the comparison of published editions assumes, in its two-dimensional diagrams, that there is a single point of contact between two texts, for example, the single contact when Matthew copied Mark, and there was an end of the matter. I am proposing a three-dimensional diagram, in which the third dimension represents a series of contacts between texts each of which may have changed since the previous contact. For example, Matthew copies bits out of Mark in reproducing a tradition; then a later copy of Mark is enriched by some of Matthew's alterations; and next a copy of Matthew (already different from the one we began with) is influenced by something from the also changed Mark. Add in Luke, and oral tradition, and any other sources that might have been available, at any points in the development that you please, and you have a process a good deal less recoverable than any documentary hypothesis. It is not at all the orderly business we had hoped, and looks instead like molecules bouncing around and off each other in bewildering fashion.

It may be that I will be considered to be offering what has been called a complex solution, in distinction to the simple solutions such as those of Streeter and Farrer. Such a solution is presented by Boismard, who discerns over a dozen documents, some existing in earlier and later forms. But there is a major difference. I am not attempting to identify and to name sources or to recover layers. I am suggesting that the evidence is not of a kind to permit one to demonstrate the existence of the many documents posited by such theories. Thus, while Boismard's solution, like Streeter's argument for Proto-Luke, along with other theories, may be close to mine in recognising more than one point of contact between the Gospels, we differ more than we agree.

The same must be said after comparing my suggestion with the Deutero-Markus theory. I agree that the copy of Mark used by Matthew will not have been identical to the copies available to us. I would add that Matthew's copy will have been different also from Mark's autograph (unless he used the autograph, which must be regarded as improbable), and that Luke's copy will have been different again. But Deutero-Mark is a document, an edition. In contrast to that, I am proposing that we should be thinking of a process, and that the solid blocks of the documentary hypotheses prove to be at best soft and crumbling rock, at worst slowly shifting sand. Let us suppose, for example, that somebody who has read newly written Matthew copies Mark from a manuscript already different from the version known to Matthew, and introduces (intentionally or inadvertently) a few Matthaeanisms, and that Luke worked with such a copy. Who is to say that such a thing is impossible? That such confusing things occurred at a later date may be demonstrated from the manuscripts. A manuscript may harmonise a passage in Luke to Matthew; when we look at the Matthaean parallel in that manuscript, we find that it has a quite different form of the text from that taken into the Lukan version. This phenomenon may be found many times in Codex Bezae, one of the most frequently harmonising manuscripts. At its most extreme, we might say that every copying of a Gospel is, in the sense required by source criticism, a separate document, for it will to a greater or lesser extent be different from any other copy.

David Parker and Mark Goodacre happen to be collaborators on some projects, interestingly enough. I bet they have had interesting debates on these matters.

At any rate, I no longer believe that the gospels are the kind of literature which is written once and then copied out as closely as possible by dutiful scribes. Rather, the gospels are the kind of literature which is added to, subtracted from, and harmonized with other texts of the same or similar kinds of literature. They are the kind of literature that can develop by the use of sources, by scribal harmonization, and by variant editions of the same text:

Marcan Models.png
Marcan Models.png (38.3 KiB) Viewed 13052 times

And I do not mean one or the other of those three options. I mean that each gospel may have experienced all three at various stages. We have hard evidence of each of those processes happening to our gospel materials once the manuscript evidence starts kicking in; it is not silly to suppose that each of those processes was already happening before that manuscript evidence becomes available to us.

Like Parker, I make no claim to being able to sort out all of the various documents and subdocuments and whatnot in a synoptic graph, whether simple (Farrer) or complex (Boismard). But, also like Parker, I find that there are individual data points which can be evaluated sometimes. In this case, I can say with some degree of certainty that Luke's version of the parable of the feast came before Matthew's version. Matthew's version presupposes something like what we find in Luke (or in Thomas, for that matter). That does not mean that I subscribe to the Matthean Conflator theory, any more than the opposite directionality in the parable of the talents or pounds means that I subscribe to the Farrer theory.

Ken Olson wrote to me recently:
I definitely do not start with a clean slate each time [that I evaluate the relative primitivity of a pericope]. I don't think anyone really does, or should.

....

Any decent exegete comparing just two pericopes could come up with several reasons to go one way or the other on which is more primitive.
And this is true. And the parable of the feast is really just two pericopes, one Matthean and the other Lucan. The peril here is very real. However, I do my level best to minimize that peril by keeping my toolbox lean and mean. The concept of fatigue is useful to me precisely because it can work at the level of individual pericopes (not saying it is infallible, just that it is a concept that applies to small stretches of text rather than relying principally upon the entire document). If I cannot make a determination without resorting to exegetical tools which are as yet untested, untried, I refuse to come to a conclusion, exactly as I did above with your question about words for cattle. Unlike Ken, I do try to evaluate each individual pericope with a clean slate each time. However, most of the time I come away without any clear indicator of directionality: our evangelists could be sloppy, but they were not always sloppy. Once I find that I have no indicator of directionality for a given pericope, then I do tend to fall into a default position. For example, I have reasons to believe that something like Mark came before something like Matthew; so in parallel Matthean and Marcan pericopes devoid of clear indicators of directionality, using my deliberately narrow range of exegetical tools, I would say that, all else being equal, it seems more likely that Matthew copied from Mark. But I do not default to that position until I have already analyzed those parallel pericopes free of such presuppositions.
Last edited by Ben C. Smith on Wed Jun 20, 2018 8:49 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Michael BG
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Re: If anyone is new to Q and the Synoptic Problem

Post by Michael BG »

Ben C. Smith wrote: Wed Jun 20, 2018 7:25 am
Michael BG wrote: Wed Jun 20, 2018 12:36 am Thank you Ben for your Mark/Luke example of how you see fatigue and setting out very clearly four reasons why it is more likely that Matthew “used” Luke rather than Luke cleaned up Matthew’s story. I am disappointed that you didn’t take up the issue of oxen and discuss the possibility of which much be the more original.
I did look into that briefly, but the data were too sparse for me to make anything of them. Matthew uses the word ταῦρος only in 22.4, and Luke never uses it, unless we count Acts 14.13. Luke does use the term βοῦς three times, but again, that is not much of a tendency. I find I am completely unable to make any determination based on words for cattle.
Thank you for trying to determine if the words ταῦρος and βοῦς are significant as words for cattle in relation to either the food from the animal or as a reference to the animal itself. I had hoped their use would have been significant.
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