A video version of Ron's SBL paper: 'Luke's Chronic-Fatigue Syndrome or Matthew's Quest for Order and Universal Applicability' is now available.

Chakrita Saulina, a native of Jakarta, Indonesia, is Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies (New Testament) at Seattle Pacific University. She holds degrees from the University of Indonesia (B.Eng, 2006); Acadia Divinity College (M.Div, 2013); Yale University (S.T.M., 2016) and the University of Cambridge (PhD, 2021). Her doctoral dissertation, supervised by Prof Judith Lieu, was entitled: “The Narrative Function(s) of Evil Spirits in the Gospel of Luke”. Chakrita is a member of the steering group for “The Interrelations of the Gospels Consultation” at SBL, and will be presenting a paper in this section in Denver on Sunday 20th November, 2022. Here she describes the steps that caused her to suspect that Matthew used Luke:

“I first encountered the Synoptic Problem about 11 years ago when, in my first New Testament class, Craig Evans explained Markan Priority and the concept of Q. For many years I never questioned what I’d been taught. Then I started teaching and working on my PhD.

In my doctoral studies I examined the narrative function(s) of evil spirits in Luke. I was drawn to this topic because Luke highlights these malevolent characters more than any other gospel and I wanted to find out why. While studying the relevant stories as individual units and within the broad sweep of the gospel, I considered Luke’s distinctive voice when compared with parallel episodes in Mark and Matthew. This caused me to appreciate for the first time how closely Matthew and Luke agree at certain points in the Double Tradition. Particularly, I was drawn by the verbatim agreements in the Temptations and Beelzebul Controversy. In the latter, the word-for-word parallels are particularly striking in the two accounts of the return of the evil spirit (Luke 11:24-26//Matt 12:42-45).

Besides these similarities, the differences between Luke and the other two Synoptics are also apparent, particularly in the travel narrative. There is a huge spectrum between the similarities and differences in terms of order and wording of the synoptics: they can be very similar, and they can also be very different. It means that each evangelist has some degree of freedom both at the micro-level (the wording used for a particular part) or macro-level (order of passages with the whole) in departing from or following their sources.

Given this freedom, if Luke and Matthew independently used Q, it is hugely coincidental that they both wrote virtually identical passages in similar contexts. This coincidence is even more extraordinary if we consider that Luke and Matthew may have had two or more sources. How then did they come to the same decision in writing a very similar passage in a very similar context independently? As Mark Goodacre puts it, this is surely, ‘Too Good to be Q’. I remember my own experience as a teacher several years ago, when I noticed that two students had very similar answers to the same question. I was certain that one was influenced by the other, which was indeed the case. I wondered at that moment: besides having Mark as one of their primary sources, could it be that Luke “plagiarized” Matthew or vice versa? I also recalled that Luke’s Double Tradition was closer to Q. So, was it really necessary for Q to be a separate tradition independently consulted by Luke and Matthew? Why couldn’t Luke have influenced Matthew or vice versa? Could it be that the “Q” used by Matthew was actually Luke?   

While looking for Luke’s distinct voice, his overall plot and the role of evil spirits in it, I came across other reasons to suspect that Luke may have been one of Matthew’s sources. Given Luke’s generally extensive use of synonyms, his range of names for evil spirits is surprisingly limited. This is particularly surprising if Luke used Matthew since Matthew has a relatively rich list of names denoting Satan.

In many ways, Luke is much more similar to Mark in this naming issue, which may also signify an older tradition than what we find in Matthew. Worth noting, for instance, Mark only uses Σατανᾶς in describing the archenemy of God throughout his gospel. The use of this term might not appear surprising unless we consider how it comes to be the most common name for the chief of demons in the New Testament. Luke’s use of the terms σατανᾶς and διάβολος convey a new development of the meaning of these two terms in the Jewish tradition, which refers to the archenemy of God.
In “Luke’s Naming of Evil Spirits and The Three Layers of Interpretation”, a paper presented at SBL 2019, I argued: 1) The use of either διάβολος or σατανᾶς in each scene where they appear in Luke is intentional and not merely for the sake of literary variety; and 2) The historical Jesus may have been the reason for σατανᾶς, an adaptation of aramaic term סָטָנָא, becoming the most popular term referring to the chief of demons. In the second temple period, the term ‘satan’ is not the most popular word used to denote the leader of demons. In the Dead Sea Scrolls, we find ‘Mastema’ (18 times) and ‘Belial’ (88 times) appear more frequently than ‘Satan’. Several other references to the ruler of the demons in the second-temple apocalyptic texts include Semyaz and Azazel as chiefs of the fallen angels in 1 Enoch 9; Sammael (1:8, 11:2:1), Beliar (1:8f; 2:4; 3:11), and Satan (2:2,7; 5:16) in the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah. Contrary to this ‘reservoir’ of names for the leaders in the demonic world, it is striking that in Luke and the NT in general, an unpopular term like σατανᾶς gains popularity. The historical Jesus may have used this term and it became common within his circles of disciples. This is also supported by Foerster who argues, “Study[sic] of the Synopt. and Ac. suggest that Σατανᾶς is closer to Palestinian usage…”

Hence, in my PhD dissertation I claim that Luke’s use of Σατανᾶς may represent an earlier tradition (which may include Markan influence) that Luke follows closely. Luke uses σατανᾶς five times in his gospel: 10:18, 11:18, 13:16, 22:3, 31, and noticeably most of these are unique (except 11:18). Moreover, in this gospel, σατανᾶς appears almost exclusively in Jesus’s speech (10:18, 11:18, 13:16, 22:31, except, 22:3). A similar pattern can also be found in Mark (except, 4:15) and Matthew. Also, Breytenbach and P.L. Day (in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (DDD)) argue that prior and contemporary to the gospel, there is no datum of σατανᾶς among Greek writings associated with non-Jewish or non-Christian writers. The meaning of the root word śāṭān itself can only be developed from its occurrences in the Hebrew Bible, since there is no other occurrence of this term prior or contemporary to the Scripture. However, Luke’s use of διάβολος comes from his adaptation of the Septuagint. This term may have been used because it was more familiar to the readers; the word διάβολος is found in both Hellenistic and Jewish literature. Among Greek texts that were written between the 4th century BCE and the1st century CE, διάβολος appears significantly more often than σατανᾶς.

If Luke had access to Matthew, Matthew’s effect on Luke’s vocabulary seems to be very minimal. In the temptation of Jesus (in which the two evangelists present many close parallels), Luke employs the term διάβολος four times. Luke could have changed one of these to another term such as σατανᾶς or ὁ ἐχθρός (which he uses in 10:10), similar to what we can observe in Matthew’s version of the temptation where Matthew refers to Satan once as ὁ πειράζων (4:3). Luke, however, applies an unvarying title throughout the passage. The absence of ὁ πειράζων and ὁ πονηρός in Luke is striking if he had access to Matthew since these titles fit well with Luke’s theological agenda. Luke underlines the role of the Devil as the tempter in at least in three places: Jesus’s temptation scene, the parable of the sower, and Jesus’s passion. It seems more probable, therefore, that it is Matthew who has developed Luke’s limited vocabulary, rather than the reverse.

There are two other issues that also lead me to suspect Luke’s influence over Matthew. First, Luke’s central section (the travel narrative) has many parallels to Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount. Many Lukan scholars would agree that the travel narrative is the crux in Luke’s Gospel; many have pondered how Luke may have ordered his material in this section. If Luke had access to Matthew, the way Luke dispersed or scattered many passages in Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount is difficult to explain and runs against the grain of ancient compositional practices. However, if Matthew had access to Luke, the former may have decided to gather Luke’s “scattered” material, much as other ancient authors coordinated parallel sources to create a more comprehensive whole.  

Second, examining Luke’s plot, I observed how Isaiah has an important role in Luke’s Promise-Fulfillment framework. Luke highlights how Jesus’s life and ministry fulfills Isaiah’s exodus motif (often known as Isaiah’s new exodus). If Luke had access to Matthew, it is surprising how Luke reduces the space that Isaiah gains in Matthew’s Gospel. Luke only incorporates a small number of direct citations from Isaiah (fewer than Matthew). Even more surprising is the omissions of some direct mentions of Isaiah’s name; Matthew mentions Isaiah’s name in: 3:3, 4:14, 8:17, 12:17, 13:14: 15:7. It makes more sense to suppose that Matthew’s adaptation of Isaiah was influenced by Luke, rather than the other way around.

At one point in my dissertation research, I took a bit of a “detour” into the Synoptic Problem. Reading Mark Goodacre (who thinks Luke used Matthew) and Rob MacEwen (who thinks Matthew used Luke) I certainly agreed more with Rob. At some point during my time in Cambridge, I also got the chance to talk with Richard Bauckham. I forget how the conversation started, but I remember vividly that he also supports the idea that Matthew used Luke rather than the other way around. During that period, I also heard Alan Garrow’s presentation ‘Why not Matthew’s use of Luke?’ at the Graduate Seminar. Alan’s presentation of the macrostructure of Matthew’s indebtedness to Luke was really persuasive.

Each of these factors has contributed to my growing interest in the case for Matthew’s use of Luke. I look forward to participating in this rapidly developing debate."

Chakrita will be presenting at SBL Denver, 2022
Session 20-128: November 20th 9.00-11.30am.
“Competitive Traditions: Luke’s and Matthew’s (Con)textualization of the Beelzebul Controversy”.

An expanded version of this paper is also due for publication in:
The Synoptic Problem 2022: Proceedings of the Loyola University Conference, O. Andrejevs, Simon J. Joseph, Edmondo Lupieri, Joseph Verheyden (eds.) (Leuven: Peeters, forthcoming)

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Prof Edmondo Lupieri holds the John Cardinal Cody Endowed Chair in New Testament and Early Christianity at Loyola University Chicago. An early advocate of Matthew's use of Luke, Edmondo first published on this subject, in Italian, in 1988.[see below] He is editor, alongside Olegs Andrejevs, Simon J. Joseph and Joseph Verheyden, of the forthcoming: The Synoptic Problem 2022: Proceedings of the Loyola University Conference (BiTS 44: Leuven: Peeters) and author of the forthcoming: “’Q o non Q, questo è il dilemma’. Riflessioni sulle avventure di un’ipotesi,” in Auctores Nostri 25 (2022). Here he recalls how he first came to reject the tradition conception of Q: 

"Why not Q? I remember vividly. I was at the University of Turin, Italy, working first as Assistant and then as Associate Professor of “Christian Origins”. It was the mid-Eighties. And, when I was offering courses centered on the Gospels, as I had been taught, I regularly explained the Synoptic Problem with the usual recourse to the Two Sources Hypothesis. Yes, we all knew it, there is no manuscript of Q, but the reconstruction is quite sure and then there is the Gospel of Thomas that proves that there were Gospels that contained almost only logia of Jesus and no Passion narrative. I remember writing with chalks on the blackboard for my students (no computers nor e-mails in those years) various parallel passages of Matthew and Luke, in columns, with arrows and lines to connect the contents…
 
My background was in Classical Philology: Greek Literature at the University of Pisa and at the Scuola Normale Superiore of the same city, where I had studied under the supervision of a then important Italian philologian, Graziano Arrighetti (1928-2017), a disciple of the great Giorgio Pasquali (1885-1952). I had wanted to become a papyrologist, and I studied indeed under Antonio Carlini (now emeritus) and Edda Bresciani (1930-2020). My first publication, while still a student, had been the critical edition of a literary Greek papyrus fragment, but already my dissertation (on pseudo-Athenagoras’s Treatise on the Resurrection) testifies to my interest in early Christianity and Patristics. After Pisa, I had moved to the University of Rome where, working and teaching with Manlio Simonetti (1926-2017), I matured my interest into the New Testament and what was then called Late Judaism and Early Christianity.
 
It was in Turin though, discussing the Patristic interpretation of the baptismal imagery in Mark with my new mentor Franco Bolgiani (1922-2012), that he suggested to me to start working on the figure of John the Baptist. That subject was going to keep me busy for the first decades of my academic life. And obliged me to take upfront the Synoptic Problem while trying to identify the earliest historical and literary traditions on John the Baptist.
 
I decided to consider the synoptic material on John the Baptist like a sort of a “gospel in the Gospels” and, by reading and re-reading it, I started thinking that the traditional explanation of the intrasynoptic relationship, based on the Two Sources Hypothesis, was not working in a satisfactorily way. Why a collection of Jesus logia should have contained logia of John and narrative sections on him? And why Q was more and more identical to Luke?
 
I began reflecting on the Synoptics as a whole. The explanations of the so-called “minor agreements” had never completely convinced me. The “Lukan lacuna” did not appear to be really such after all. And, if there was a Q, the Passion narrative had to be part of it – and therefore Q ought to be another complete gospel, of which no fragment was extant, and no mention was to be found in any Church Father or heresiologist. But both Luke and Matthew had had independent access to it: a quite peculiar phenomenon, from a strictly historical and literary point of view.
 
I will not repeat here what I have explained in two recent contributions of mine, presently under press,[1] but in those years, thanks also to the works of other scholars (and having verified that Carl Lachmann had not been a supporter of Q), I reached the conclusion that it is much more probable that whoever was in charge of the redaction of what is now the Gospel of Matthew had reworked the material of what is now the Gospel of Luke.[2] This is not to deny the existence of presynoptic traditions and sources (both oral and written, as Lk 1:1-4 explicitly states), but to stress that a) the very existence of one major written source identifiable as “Q” is an hypothesis that rests on a very slender reed and, especially, that b) it is not practically possible nor theoretically thinkable that its text can be reconstructed upon the agreement of Matthew and Luke, since their reciprocal independence cannot be proved."

[1] “What if? Historical and Literary Hypotheses on Matthean Posteriority,” in O. Andrejevs et alii, The Synoptic Problem 2022: Proceedings of the Loyola University Conference (Biblical Tools and Studies 44), Leuven: Peeters 2023 and “’Q o non Q, questo è il dilemma’. Riflessioni sulle avventure di un’ipotesi,” in Auctores Nostri 25 (2022), forthcoming.

[2] See my Giovanni Battista nelle tradizioni sinottiche (Studi biblici 82), Brescia: Paideia 1988 and Giovanni Battista fra storia e leggenda (Biblioteca di cultura religiosa 53), Brescia: Paideia 1988, 1-192.

Are you attending SBL 2022 in Denver? look out for:
'Interrelations of the Gospels Consultation'.
Nov 20th, 9.00 - 11.30 am, Room 106 (Street Level) - Convention Center (CC)
This session includes two papers by MPH supporters, Chakrita Saulina and Ronald V Huggins. 

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Fr Brendan Gerard is superior of the house of the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter, Edinburgh and lecturer in New Testament at Priesterseminar St Petrus (Bavaria).

Here is his account of how he came to suspect that Matthew used Luke: 

"About five years ago, I was referred to Alan Garrow’s articles making a case for Matthew’s use of Luke. I had previously been impressed by Mark Goodacre’s defence of Lukan dependence on Matthew, the hypothetical document Q being (on his view) superfluous. Alan’s arguments made me think again, both about the necessity of “Q” in some form (it is sometimes Matthew, sometimes Luke, who seems to give us the older form of this material) and about the real problem with Lukan dependence on Matthew: it is unlikely that Luke would systematically and meticulously have separated out Markan from non-Markan material where Matthew combines them.

With that in mind, what made me positively inclined to see Matthew as the borrower from Luke was some work I was doing on the Gospel burial narratives. Here, the minor agreements between Matthew and Luke are, as Ulrich Luz puts it, “spectacular.” There is verbatim agreement in the two evangelists’ phrasing of Joseph’s approach to Pilate (Matt 27,58 || Luke 23,52) and in their verb for the wrapping up of the body (Matt 27,59 || Luke 23,53). What is more, both have similar formulas (absent in Mark) to say “a man named Joseph” (Matt 27,57 || Luke 23,50), both agree on the new or unused status of the tomb (Matt 27,60 || Luke 23,53), and both omit two Markan features of the story: Pilate’s verification of Jesus’ death, and the purchase of the burial cloth.

For these two accounts to have arrived independently at the same range of divergences from their Markan source would be quite impressive, even when we allow for oral tradition. If we were to suppose that Luke has here made use of Matthew, we would then have to account for what Luke has omitted from Matthew’s version. Given his usual tendencies, it might be understandable for Luke to have suppressed Matthew’s description of Joseph as “a rich person.” But why should he have ignored the description of Joseph as a disciple, or the detail that the tomb belonged to Joseph, if these were available to him? If there is a direct literary relationship between Matthew and Luke in this passage, it is easier to regard Matthew as the borrower from Luke than vice versa. Alternatively, even if one would rather not posit direct dependence, preferring to explain these minor agreements in terms of "secondary orality," it is still more plausible that Matthew has used a post-Lukan retelling of the story than the reverse."

Are you attending SBL 2022 in Denver? look out for:
'Interrelations of the Gospels Consultation'.
Nov 20th, 9.00 - 11.30 am, Room 106 (Street Level) - Convention Center (CC)
This session includes two papers by MPH supporters, Chakrita Saulina and Ronald V Huggins. 

Here are twelve more MPH Origin Stories.