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One of the books I am currently reading is "The Hebrew Gospel & the Development of the Synoptic Tradition" by James Edwards. In this book he makes the case that The Gospel of Luke was largely dependent on an earlier work known as "The Hebrew Gospel". Edwards is also the author of my favorite commentary on Mark's Gospel. Edwards told the Whitworth University News (where he is the Professor of Theology) that, "The single most important conclusion of my book is that an early Christian gospel, written in Hebrew, was widely known to the early church and was utilized by Luke in the composition of the Gospel of Luke.The Gospel of Luke thus depends on two prior documents, the Hebrew Gospel and the Gospel of Mark, both known to us from antiquity."
He continues, "The Gospel of Luke does not rest upon a hypothetical 'Q' source, which is an invention of Enlightenment scholars of the 19th century that is maintained still today without viable evidence. The effect of this Hebrew gospel is to ground the entire gospel tradition in sources known to antiquity, not invented in order to undergird modern prejudices."
Edwards was told by other scholars that pursuing this hypothesis (regarding Luke's dependance on The Hebrew Gospel) wold forever ruin his credibility in scholarly circles. Thankfully, he continued on anyway.
This is the first work I have seen on this subject from someone outside of the Jerusalem School of Synoptic Research, of which our dear friends Halvor and Mirja Ronning are members.
As an aside, I excitedly look forward to anything that challenges the rationale of the unquestioned acceptance of the "Q" source existing among biblical scholars in the past century.
My brother-in-law is all into this "prophet" by the name of Michael Rood who basically says we cannot take the Greek too seriously because of the Hebrew gospel that we have. He also insists that we go by the Levitical calendar etc. So what do you know about Michael Rood and others out there who seem to me to be going way off? I value your brain more than you know.
ReplyDeleteJeff,
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, we do not have a Hebrew gospel. I know people say that, but the earliest and best manuscripts are in Greek. The Hebrew Gospel that James Edwards is writing about is yet to be uncovered. It is mentioned by several early church fathers as being written by Matthew. Edwards thinks that the special L material (verses unique to only Luke) seem to have been crudely translated from Hebrew to Greek rather than being written in the excellent Greek that Luke usually uses. He thinks those passages may have been from The Hebrew Gospel of Matthew that The Hebrew Gospel was one of the accounts Luke references being from eyewitnesses.
Re: Rood and the Levitical Calendar. I am not very familiar with Rood and what I have seen has not caused me to want to align with him. The notion of HAVING to follow the Levitical calendar feels like taking steps backwards theologically rather than forward. My internal warning sirens go on high alert usually when that stuff comes up.