Alpha Christianity

The Q hypothesis (first proposed by Weisse in 1838), has continued to flourish in our time; one source of current support is the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity of the Claremont Graduate University (pictured above), with associated centers in Toronto and Bamberg.

Q arises from the fact that some material common to Matthew and Luke but not found in Mark is bidirectional: in some of those passages, Matthew seems to be the earlier; in other cases, Luke. Thus the Lukan Birth Narrative is a dramatically successful expansion of the rather paltry Matthean Birth Narrative; on the other hand, the poverty-centered Lukan Beatitudes are assimilated to the use of the rich in Matthew's extended Beatitudes. This situation cannot be accounted for on the theory that either Matthew or Luke is derived from the other, so that reliance of both on an outside text (called Quelle "source" or Q for short) seems to be the only available solution. In addition, most of this common material consists of what might be called sayings of Jesus, and this resonates with the claim of Papias (2c), that Matthew had written a collection of Logia (sayings, or perhaps oracles) of Jesus in Hebrew, which the various Evangelists translated as best they could. Locating these Major Agreements in the outside text Q left unexplained the hundreds of Minor Agreements which remain in Matthew and Luke, but otherwise the Q theory has seemed to many cover the ground. It gained further acceptance from the fact that this largely ethical common material contains no reference to Resurrection theology (and its very divisive Atonement development), and thus met the modern interest in a Christianity which is essentially ethical in tone, and does not require acceptance of the quaint idea that killing an innocent person results in the pardoning of a guilty person. (The vogue of the Gospel of Thomas in our time rests in part on this same tendency within modern Christianity).

Modern is as Modern does. The historical situation, however, has changed with the discovery that Luke was composed in stages, and that Matthew followed Luke A, but preceded Luke B. This shows how Matthew could have developed material from Luke (most centrally, his entire Sermon on the Plain, which Matthew pieced out with passages taken from elsewhere in Luke), and how Luke in turn could have borrowed back, and improved upon, some seemingly useful Matthean innovations. That is, the bidirectionality of Matthew and Luke is no longer a stone of stumbling, but simply a reflection of their actual historical relationship. In addition, the present theory includes without difficulty the otherwise unexplained Minor Agreements.

Q has been reconstructed many times, in many different ways. The most straightforward version remains that of Harnack, who followed the definition given above. The modern standard is inevitably the more expanded inventory of the IQP text (2000). From its 102 passages, we eliminate the 20 passages bracketed by IQP itself, plus the 45 passages with Markan parallels (44 of them so noted by IQP, plus a 45th from Fleddermann 2005), for a net inventory of 37 passages, about a third of them from the Sermon on the Plain. The convention of citing Q passages by their Luke numbers is here followed. In view of the claim that Q precedes not only Matthew and Luke, but also Mark, and is thus in effect the first Gospel, a final comment has been added on the Authenticity question: how likely the saying is to have been spoken by the Historical Jesus during his lifetime.

[1]

[4]

7:31f This Generation

10:2 Workers for Harvest
10:3 Sheep Among Wolves
10:13f Woes on Galilee
10:21 Revealed to Children
10:22 Knowing the Father
10:23 Eyes That See

13:20f Yeast
13:24f Not Know You
13:29f Many Will Come

16:13 God/Mammon

[19]

[22]

[2]

[5]

[8]

11:2bf Lord's Prayer
11:24f Return of Demon
11:31f More than Solomon
11:34f Jaundiced Eye
11:46b Woes on Lawyers
11:49-51 This Generation

14:16f Dinner Guests

17:3f Erring Brother
17:37 Vultures/Corpse

[20]

[23]

[3]

6:22f The Persecuted
6:27f Love Enemies
6:29 Foregoing Rights
6:31 Golden Rule
6:32,34 Impartial Love
6:36 Full of Pity
6:39 Blind Leading
6:40 Disciple/Teacher
6:41f Speck/ Beam
6:43f Known by Fruit
6:46 Not Say Master
6:47f Built on Sand

[9]

12:4f Not Fear Death
12:6f Than Many Sparrows
12:22bf. Be Not Anxious
12:58f Settling O/o Court

15:4f Lost Sheep

[18]

[21]

[24]

Use has been made of the several Documenta Q studies of single Q passages (also an IQP product), as well as the commentary of Goulder (1989). For some of these passages as seen from the point of view of the present theory, see instead the Commentaries on Luke and Matthew.