The Gospel of Matthew has something significant to offer scholars who study the historical Jesus in terms of the sayings, parables, and teachings of Jesus. The main reason for this is that whenever a saying, parable, or teaching of Jesus is found in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, but NOT in the Gospel of Mark, that saying, parable, or teaching probably came from an early source of the words of Jesus known as Q. Without the Gospel of Matthew, it would be very difficult, perhaps impossible, to determine the content of this early source of the sayings, parables, and teachings of Jesus.

However, the stories about Jesus found in the Gospel of Matthew might not provide historically reliable information about the life, ministry, and crucifixion of Jesus. If the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Mark are historically unreliable, then the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew are also historically unreliable (in general) because most of the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew come from the Gospel of Mark.

On the other hand, if the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Mark are historically reliable, then most of the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew would also be historically reliable (in general), because most of them come from the Gospel of Mark.

However, the author of Matthew did make some changes to the stories about Jesus that came from the Gospel of Mark, and did add some stories or events to what is found in the Gospel of Mark. The changes and additions by the author of Matthew to stories about Jesus from the Gospel of Mark could either be historically reliable or not. If those changes and additions are historically unreliable, then in terms of stories about the historical Jesus the Gospel of Matthew has very little historical information to offer beyond what we already find in the Gospel of Mark.

THREE REASONS FOR THE HISTORICAL UNRELIABILITY OF THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

In this post (and in future posts in this series), I am going to argue that the changes and additions to the stories about Jesus from the Gospel of Mark made by the author of the Gospel of Matthew are DUBIOUS and historically unreliable.

First of all, there are some general considerations about the Gospel of Matthew that suggest that there is a good chance that its additions and changes to stories from the Gospel of Mark are historically unreliable:

• The Gospel of Matthew is Christian propaganda: it was written by a Christian believer to promote Christian beliefs about Jesus and God.
• The Gospel of Matthew was NOT written by an eyewitness to the life or the ministry or the crucifixion or the burial of Jesus.
• There is no information in the Gospel of Matthew about the sources that were used by the author as the basis for any of the stories about Jesus in that Gospel.
• The Gospel of Matthew was written about five or six decades after the crucifixion of Jesus.
• The Gospel of Matthew was written in Greek by an author who was fluent in Greek, and did not make use of sources or traditions in Aramaic, the language of Jesus and his disciples.

These general considerations about the Gospel of Matthew provide good reason to doubt the historical reliability of the additions and changes that the author of the Gospel of Matthew made to the stories about Jesus that the author borrowed from the Gospel of Mark.

Second of all, the Gospel of Mark has no story about the birth of Jesus, but the Gospel of Matthew adds a birth story about Jesus to the stories about Jesus found in the Gospel of Mark, and there are good reasons to doubt the historical reliability of the birth story in the Gospel of Matthew.

Third, the various additions and changes that the author of the Gospel of Matthew makes to the Passion Narrative in the Gospel of Mark are consistently DUBIOUS and are historically unreliable.

The above three reasons are sufficient to show that the changes and additions made by the author of the Gospel of Matthew to the stories about Jesus from the Gospel of Mark are historically unreliable:

• General considerations indicating the historical unreliability of the Gospel of Matthew
• The historically DUBIOUS Birth Story presented in the first two chapters of the Gospel of Matthew
• Various DUBIOUS additions and changes to the Passion Narrative of the Gospel of Mark made by the author of the Gospel of Matthew

1. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS INDICATING THE HISTORICAL UNRELIABILITY OF MATTHEW

The Gospel of Matthew is Christian propaganda: it was written by a Christian believer to promote Christian beliefs about Jesus and God:

The unusual nature of the gospels…arises in part from the fact of their being written by people who were not neutral about the person they were describing and whose life they were purportedly reporting. The gospel writers were all “supporters” of Jesus; they were all Christians. Indeed, we have very little literature anywhere near contemporary with Jesus from someone who was either neutral or hostile towards Jesus.

The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume VIII, “Jesus and the Gospels” by Christopher Tuckett, p.72-73

Recognition of the essentially religious character of these works [the Gospels] raises questions for how they are best approached within an academic setting. On the one hand, such a setting demands that these books be studied like any other, with rigorous objectivity that does not exempt them from critical scrutiny. On the other hand, to ignore the religious dimension would represent a failure to engage them on their own terms. … An objective dispassionate reception is the last thing the Gospel writers would have wanted their books to receive. We are free to accept or reject, belittle or embrace, but whatever our response, we ought to understand what these books intend to do: they intend to convert us.

Fortress Introduction to The Gospels by Mark Allan Powell, p.9

The authors of our canonical gospels were Evangelists. That means they were primarily focused on proclaiming Jesus. For them, he was the Son of God, the Good Shepherd, and, especially, the long-awaited Messiah. … They knew it was necessary to focus solely on Jesus and to proclaim Jesus’ relation to God and his place within God’s final plan of salvation.

The Historical Jesus: An Essential Guide by James Charlesworth, p.xv

Because the gospels in general, and the Gospel of Matthew in particular, are instances of Christian propaganda, it is reasonable to anticipate that they are more interested in promoting Christian beliefs about Jesus and God than in providing accurate and reliable historical information about the life, ministry, and crucifixion of Jesus.

The Gospel of Matthew was probably NOT written by Matthew the disciple of Jesus, and was probably NOT written by an eyewitness to the life, ministry, crucifixion, or burial of Jesus:

Practically all critical scholars consider the evidence against apostolic authorship [of the Gospel of Matthew] to be overwhelming: (1) The Gospel itself is anonymous. … (2)The use of Mark and Q as sources undercuts its claim to eyewitness testimony. (3) The Greek language in which the Gospel was composed was the native language of the author and is of higher quality than the relatively unpolished Greek of Mark. Given the author’s setting and background, he may have known enough Hebrew and Aramaic to work with texts, but there is no evidence that he was fluent in these languages. (4) The claim to apostolic authority, implicit in the title, is sufficiently explained by the historical and theological factors discussed above. (5) Evidence used to support authorship by the publican Matthew–e.g. the numerical patterns of the narrative, supposedly pointing to a tax collector’s facility with figures–are fanciful and unconvincing.

The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume VIII, “The Gospel of Matthew” by M. Eugene Boring, p.106-107

Although the apostle Matthew may have been active in the founding of the church in which the gospel story attributed to him arose (9.9; 10.3), it is unlikely that he was the story’s author. On the contrary, the author exhibits a theological outlook, command of Greek, and rabbinic training that suggests he was a Jewish Christian of the second rather than the first generation (cf. 13.52)

The Oxford Companion to the Bible, “Matthew, the Gospel According to” by Jack Dean Kingsbury, p.502-503

For more than two hundred years most New Testament experts have concluded that the Evangelists [the authors of the Gospels] did not know the historical Jesus; moreover, they wrote decades after his death.

The Evangelists were not eyewitnesses of Jesus’ life and thought. …

The Historical Jesus: An Essential Guide by James Charlesworth, p.xiii-xiv

The bottom line is that very few scholars believe that this Gospel [the Gospel of Matthew] was written or compiled by Matthew the disciple of Jesus. The Gospel itself makes no such connection, and the church’s tradition to this effect seems to be relatively late and confused. …most scholars believe this Gospel reflects the concerns of second-generation Christianity, coming from a time when all of the original disciples were probably dead.

Fortress Introduction to The Gospels by Mark Allan Powell, p.71-72

…the gospels as we have them were not written by eyewitnesses on the basis of first-hand knowledge of Jesus.

The Historical Figure of Jesus by E.P. Sanders, p.63

By way of overall judgment on the “Matthew” issue, it is best to accept the common position that canonical Matt was originally written in Greek by a noneyewitness whose name is unknown to us and who depended on sources like Mark and Q.

An Introduction to the New Testament by Raymond Brown, p.210-211

Because it is unlikely that the Gospel of Matthew was written by Matthew the disciple of Jesus, and it was unlikely that the Gospel of Matthew was written by an eyewitness to the life, ministry, crucifixion, or burial of Jesus, it is reasonable to expect that the author of the Gospel of Matthew would have little of historical value to add to the stories about Jesus that were borrowed by that author from the Gospel of Mark.

Modern historical and biographical books usually provide evidence in support of their claims and stories. This is often done with footnotes or endnotes that specify particular documents, books, or interviews that were used as sources of information about the person or event under discussion. The Gospels, including the Gospel of Matthew, do not do this. The Gospel of Matthew has no footnotes or endnotes, and it does not provide any information about the sources used by the author as the basis of the stories in contains about the life, ministry, crucifixion, and burial of Jesus.

It is clear that most of the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew come from the Gospel of Mark. Sometimes phrases and sentences are copied word-for-word from the Gospel of Mark, and other times sentences in the Gospel of Matthew are very close to the wording of sentences in the Gospel of Mark, with just a few changes to word order or word choice.

But when the author of the Gospel of Matthew adds or changes an event or detail in a story borrowed from the Gospel of Mark, there is no mention of the evidence or the source of information upon which that change was made. Given that the author of the Gospel of Matthew was NOT an eyewitness to these alleged events, we have no good reason to believe that these changes to stories from the Gospel of Mark were made based on actual historical evidence or testimony from an eyewitness, as opposed to being changes made up by the author (or by Christian storytellers in the author’s Christian community) on the basis of theological beliefs or for the sake of enhancing the drama or impact of the story.

Because the author of the Gospel of Matthew shows no awareness of the need to provide any evidence or support for the historical claims and stories contained in that book, this provides a good reason to doubt that events or details the author of the Gospel of Matthew adds or changes in the stories borrowed from the Gospel of Mark are based on historical evidence or eyewitness testimony, and good reason to suspect that such additions and changes were made on the basis of theological beliefs or for the sake of enhancing the drama or emotional impact of those stories.

The Gospel of Matthew was written about five or six decades after the crucifixion of Jesus:

It is commonly held that Matthew was written about 85 or 90 CE by an unknown Christian who was at home in a church located in Antioch of Syria. A date toward the end of the first century seems probable because the destruction of Jerusalem, which occurred in 70 CE, appears to be an event that was rapidly receding into the past (22.7).

The Oxford Companion to the Bible, “Matthew, the Gospel According to” by Jack Dean Kingsbury, p.502

Thus it seems that the Gospel of Matthew was composed in the period 80-100, for which 90 may serve as a good symbolic figure.

The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume VIII, “The Gospel of Matthew” by M. Eugene Boring, p.106

If Matthew used the Gospel of Mark as a source, then he must have composed his work sometime after 70 C.E., a fact that might receive additional support from what appears to be an allusion to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in one of Jesus’ parables (22:7). Ignatius’s quotation of Matthew indicates the book was already regarded as authoritative by 115 C.E., and the likely reliance of the Didache on Matthew means the Gospel probably had to be written before the end of the first century. …the great majority of Matthean scholars place the work within the decade of 80-90 C.E.

Fortress Introduction to The Gospels by Mark Allan Powell, p.74

The first written gospel seems to be the Gospel of Mark, which was composed in the late sixties or the early seventies. … Matthew was composed around 85. The “final” edition of John is dated about 95. The composition of Luke-Acts is usually dated around 80-90, though some experts now suggest perhaps between 90 and 110.

The Historical Jesus: An Essential Guide by James Charlesworth, p.42

Matthew presupposes the destruction of the temple (Matt. 22.7); the terminus ante quem is given by Ignatius of Antioch (c. 110-117), who in Smyrn. I.I quotes a redactional phrase from Matt. 3.15. The Didache (c. 100?) also seems to refer to Matthew under the designation ‘the Gospel’ (15.3 etc.). It is most probable that the Gospel was composed in the 80s, or the 90s at the latest.

The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide by Gerd Theissen and Annette Merz, p.30

If the Gospel of Matthew was written in 80 C.E., then it was written about five decades after the crucifixion of Jesus. If it was written in 90 C.E., then it was written about six decades after the crucifixion of Jesus. Jesus was probably in his thirties when he was crucified, and his twelve disciples might have been younger, perhaps in their twenties. People had significantly shorter lives back in the first century, so most of the disciples were probably already dead five decades after Jesus was crucified (they probably would have been in their seventies at that point if they had survived that long).

Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, so the earliest stories about Jesus told by his disciples and original followers were told in Aramaic NOT in Greek. But the four Gospels in the New Testament were all written in Greek. The Gospel of Matthew in particular was written by an author who was fluent in the Greek language. That is one of the reasons that scholars doubt that the Gospel of Matthew was written by one of the twelve disciples of Jesus, or by one of Jesus’ original followers.

That means that if the stories about Jesus found in the Gospel of Matthew had their origin in the stories told by one of the twelve disciples or one of the original followers of Jesus, those stories had to be translated from Aramaic to Greek by somebody. Either the author of the Gospel of Matthew translated those early stories into Greek or Matthew used a source that had already translated the stories from Aramaic to Greek.

Scholars have determined that most of the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew were borrowed from the Gospel of Mark, which was also written in Greek. So, either the author of the Gospel of Mark translated early stories about Jesus from Aramaic into Greek or the author of the Gospel of Mark used a source of stories about Jesus that had already translated those stories from Aramaic to Greek.

Another possibility is that the author of the Gospel of Mark had no stories about Jesus (or very few stories about Jesus) that originated from any of the twelve disciples or the original followers of Jesus. The author of the Gospel of Mark or his sources might have invented stories about Jesus that had no basis in historical evidence or eyewitness testimony.

In any case, if any of the stories about Jesus found in the Gospel of Mark or the Gospel of Matthew DID originate with some of the original disciples or followers of Jesus, then somebody translated those stories from Aramaic to Greek. The Gospel of Matthew does not show signs of being a translation from an Aramaic source into Greek, and in fact most of the stories about Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew were clearly borrowed from the Gospel of Mark which was written in Greek. Therefore, the author of the Gospel of Matthew did NOT have direct knowledge of any original stories about Jesus told by his original disciples and followers. At best, the author of Matthew relied upon the Greek Gospel of Mark and thus relied upon whoever it was that translated Aramaic stories about Jesus into Greek (which were then used by the author of the Gospel of Mark, if indeed any of the stories in Mark originated with some original disciples or followers of Jesus).

NT scholars have generally concluded that the Gospel of Matthew was written in Greek and is not based on a previous Gospel written in Aramaic:

…it is argued that the author [of the Gospel of Matthew] did not write the Gospel in Aramaic or Hebrew but wrote in Greek, and that therefore the author could not have been the apostle Matthew (esp. Strecker). This argument has some important features: To be sure, it is now clear that our present Gospel is most likely not originally an Aramaic or Hebrew Gospel. In fact, it often betrays its Greek origin in Greek word plays (e.g., 6:16; 21:41; 24:30) and its dependence on the Septuagint [a Greek translation of the Old Testament] (1:23; 11:10; 12:21; 13:14-15; 21:16).

Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, “Matthew, Gospel of” by Scot McNight, p.528

Whoever the author of the Gospel of Matthew was, that author did NOT make use of an Aramaic Gospel or of an Aramaic document containing stories about Jesus or of oral traditions presented in Aramaic.

The author of the Gospel of Matthew did make use of Q as a source of the parables, sayings, and teachings of Jesus, and Q may have come from Aramaic sources or traditions, but the Q text used by the author of the Gospel of Matthew was probably in Greek:

…the version [of Q] behind Matthew and Luke was probably already in Greek–Tuckett 1996:84 …

A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew by Craig Keener, p.39

This linguistic gap between the stories about Jesus told in Aramaic by his original followers, and the stories about Jesus told in Greek in the sources used by the author of the Gospel of Matthew provides another general consideration that casts doubt on the historical reliability of the changes and additions that the author of the Gospel of Matthew made to the stories about Jesus that came from the Gospel of Mark.

Five general considerations cast doubt on the historical reliability of the changes and additions that the author of the Gospel of Matthew made to stories about Jesus that were borrowed from the Gospel of Mark: (1) the Gospel of Matthew is Christian propaganda, (2) the Gospel of Matthew was NOT written by an eyewitness, (3) there is no information in the Gospel of Matthew about what sources were used for stories about Jesus, (4) the Gospel of Matthew was written five or six decades after the crucifixion, and (5) the author of the Gospel of Matthew wrote in Greek and did not make use of sources or traditions in Aramaic, the language of Jesus and his disciples.