Moore Perspective: The Literary World of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (Part 2 of 2)

Authorial Distinctiveness

Historically, at least as far back as Taitian’s Diatessaron in the second century,¹ the Gospels have been studied together as a collective whole, harmonizing the parallel accounts to construct an amalgamated composite of Jesus’ life. In so doing, however, the differences among the accounts are often overlooked or trivialized, and the unique focus of each Gospel writer ignored.

In the modern era, conservative scholars have been preoccupied with fitting all of the details of the four Gospels together into a harmony of the life of Christ. Liberal scholars have been just as preoccupied with stressing the theological distinctives of each Gospel. Each of these approaches, when employed to the exclusion of the other, leads to a distorted understanding of the texts. Theology without harmonization discovers only distinctions and alleged contradictions without seeing how much the Gospels have in common and how they can be combined into a harmonious whole. Harmonization without appreciation for the theological distinctives of the Gospels trades the inspired form of the text for a humanly created one.²

Words on a page detached from the inspired author are void of any real authority or communicative value.³ The written text is derived from a real person, guided by God’s Spirit, who seeks to communicate. Each Gospel offers a unique perspective, showing deliberate interest in certain aspects of what Jesus said and did, retelling the story in ways relevant to and meaningful for a particular reading audience.⁴ While “authorial intent” (what an author hopes or wishes to communicate) may be a debatable concept, “communicative intent” (what an author communicates intentionally in a text) is more readily discernable,⁵ though not without careful attention to contextual matters of authorship, audience, historical-sociocultural setting, circumstances, literary conventions, etc.

Authorial Selectivity

The Gospel writers were not creators of the material they transmitted. Nor were they mere compilers. They were authors, albeit “authors in the sense that, with the Spirit’s help, they creatively structured and rewrote the material to meet the needs of their readers.”⁶ Brevity, omission, abridgment, emphasis, and focused precision are among the plethoric narrative options for any given author. The Gospels are “selective documents” in that they provide less information than was available (note John 20:30-31; 21:25), leading interpreters to ponder why each contains the accounts it contains and why the accounts are arranged as they are.⁷Matthew, for example, tends to use quantity of elements to teach about Jesus, conveying the stories with brevity, while the other Gospels tend to highlight details. When Matthew reports the Lord healing many people inflicted with a variety of ailments (Matt. 15:30-31), Mark focuses on just one of them (Mark 7:31-32).

Independent Witnesses

Without compromising their collective integrity, the noticeable differences among the Gospels confirm each one as an independent witness.⁸ Rather than contradict, they confirm, supplement, and complement one another.⁹

--Kevin L. Moore

Endnotes:

¹ Also evident in the writings of Tatian’s teacher and mentor Justin Martyr. See K. L. Moore, “Challenging the Integrity of the Gospels: a Response (Part 2),” Moore Perspective (14 Sept. 2022), <Link>.

² C. L. Blomberg, Jesus and the Gospels (2nd ed.) 205. Robin Griffith-Jones describes the tendency to combine all the different accounts into one as an attempt “to dish up a single, digestible Jesus—and so would lose the flavor of these four wonderful courses. The gospels offer us a far more inviting, exciting, and nourishing meal than any such reduction can encourage us to look for” (The Four Witnesses ix). Steve Walton encourages conservatives not to throw the Synoptics into a blender for harmonization. Biblically-grounded theology is not dependent on all the Gospels saying exactly the same thing. There are many witnesses but just one Gospel (“I. Howard Marshall’s Luke: Historian and Theologian 50 Years Later,” ETS 73rd Annual Meeting, 17 Nov. 2021).

³ Even the “anonymous” epistle to the Hebrews reflects the author’s familiarity with his readers (5:12; 6:9-10; 10:34; 13:7, 18-25) and an obvious link with them (13:18, 19, 23).

⁴ All four Gospels follow a rough general outline of Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection, with a fairly detailed and consistent passion narrative but a “largely discontinuous and episodic” ministry narrative (C. H. Dodd, The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel 447-48).

⁵ See esp. J. K. Brown, Scripture as Communication (2nd ed.) 5, 12, 23. It is important to note, however, that if an author is writing to a community with whom he has spent considerable time verbally instructing (e.g., Paul and the Corinth church), he can readily assume a high level of familiarity with his intentions.

⁶ G. D. Fee and D. Stuart, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (4th ed.) 146.

⁷ D. M. Doriani, “Matthew,” in ESV Expository Commentary 8:28.

⁸ See K. L. Moore, “The Synoptic Problem and Markan Priority: Part 1,” Moore Perspective (3 June 2012), <Link>.

⁹ John Chrysostom observed: “And why can it have been, that when there were so many disciples, two write only from among the apostles, and two from among their followers? (For one that was a disciple of Paul, and another of Peter, together with Matthew and John, wrote the Gospels.) It was because they did nothing for vainglory, but all things for use. ‘What then? Was not one evangelist sufficient to tell all?’ One indeed was sufficient; but if there be four that write, not at the same times, nor in the same places, neither after having met together, and conversed one with another, and then they speak all things as it were out of one mouth, this becomes a very great demonstration of the truth” (Homily 1.5).