Biblica
The NT Quest

Traditional methods of text analysis - recognizing differences, isolating interpolations, separating strata - are universal in application; capable of shedding light on text problems from Caesar to Confucius. In applying them to NT texts, the Quest does not seek to recover the Historical Jesus, or to reach any other predetermined goal, but simply to see what the texts are, and what they can tell us. These researches are undertaken without regard to doctrinal implications. They assume the following points, which are common to the study of all ancient textual traditions:

• Texts may have a period of authorial or proprietarial growth before they are made public, and become subject to copyist errors. That is, there may be a growth process before the corruption process sets in. Both processes may involve the addition or subtraction of material to the text.
• Material added to a text, whether during its growth process or afterward, may sometimes be recognized by the discontinuities it produces, either at its edges or elsewhere in the text, and by the greater local continuity that results when it is removed.
• Any added material is later, not earlier, than the text to which it is added

The Quest has been in operation for some time, so that a preliminary report on its results is possible. The picture which has so far tended to emerge is that most of the material in the Gospels was addressed to the members of the early Jesus Movement in the years after Jesus's death. In large part, this materal is not documentary in intention; rather, it speaks to the situation and needs of that time and place. As far as it goes, this conclusion differs little from the opinion held by some leading NT investigators about a century ago. In addition, and as a new contribution to the subject, we find that successive layers of some texts, in particular the Gospel of Mark, reflect the evolution of doctrine and community practice over a considerable period of time, the earliest layers being probably not far removed from the time of the Crucifixion.

It will be evident that this earliest Markan layer will eventually provide the best basis for inferences about the words and acts of the Historical Jesus. It would be premature to draw those inferences at the present time, and they are reserved for later a later stage in the investigation, which at present continues to examine the structure of the texts.

In terms of the perennial Synoptic Problem, these results tend to support Markan Priority Without Q; that is, roughly the Farrer-Goulder (FG) position, but with a more complex view of the evolution of the several Gospels, and with different explanations of some passages in Luke which appear to be earlier than their Matthean counterparts. In our view, these explanations together take some of the explanatory burden off the FG view, that Luke may be explained on the single premise that it is derived from Mark and Matthew. We leave that that theory to do only the work for which it is best adapted. The proprietors of FG have declined to accept these additional suggestions as friendly amendments to their hypothesis. The emerging hypothesis accordingly needs its own designation, which by established convention would be FGB.

Some notes or articles deriving from the NT Quest enterprise are available here in PDF form, for discussion on the Quest's own dedicated E-mail network, as background for a possible in-person session at the November 2008 SBL meeting in Boston, or for comment by any viewer at any time. Some items are preprints from one or another volume of the Project's journal, Warring States Papers. Comments on any of them are welcome. Unless otherwise stated, all are copyright by their respective authors.

• General Methodology
  • The Anticipation of Reader Objection (E Bruce Brooks)
• Gospel Researches
  • The Pre-Markan Passion Narrative (Yarbro Collins, original)
  • The Pre-Markan Passion Narrative (Yarbro Collins, interlinear)
    • Critique 1 (E Bruce Brooks)
    • Critique 2 (E Bruce Brooks)
    • Critique 3 (E Bruce Brooks)
    • An Alternative Reconstruction (E Bruce Brooks)
  • The Accretional Theory of Mark
    • Three Textual Layers in Mark (E Bruce Brooks)
    • Judas and the Twelve in Mark (E Bruce Brooks)
  • Luke/Acts Studies
    • Prolegomena to Proto-Luke (E Bruce Brooks)
    • The Lukan Great Omission (E Bruce Brooks)
    • The Lukan Travel Narrative (E Bruce Brooks)
    • The "We" Source in Acts (E Bruce Brooks)
• Other Early Texts
  • The Epistle of James (E Bruce Brooks)
• Paul
  • The Career of Paul (E Bruce Brooks)
  • The Formation of the Pauline Canon (E Bruce Brooks)

Additional contributions, and comments on these contributions, are welcome, and as appropriate will be posted in this space for general consideration.

17 Aug 2008 / Contact The Project / Exit to Home Page