Synoptic Gospels: Mark, Matthew, And Luke

The synoptic problem, the problem of the literary relationship between the first three “synoptic Gospels” Mark, Matthew, and Luke. Some examples of the Synoptic Problem will be given. Historical Context. Also, the many different theories of the of the synoptic problem.

First, are a few examples of the synoptic problem. “Matt. 9.9 And having passed on from there, Jesus saw a man seated in the tax-office, named Matthew, and he says to him, ‘Follow me.’ And having arisen, he followed him.” (Goodarce). “Mark 2.14And having passed on he saw Levi son of Alphaeus seated in the tax-office, and he says to him, ‘Follow me.’ And having arisen, he followed him.” (Goodarce). “Luke 5.27 And he saw a tax-collector named Levi seated in the tax-office, and

Since the first three gospels were so similar it was printed side by side each other as columns which is where is” synopsis” comes from. Once the Gospels were examined thoroughly, notable differences were made. The questions, “how does one account for this mixture of similar and dissimilar material in these three Gospels? (Kugler & Hartin, 351). Similarities within the are very noticeable when one notes the words and deeds of Jesus Christ are basically the same. “Mark has 661 verses, while Matthew has 1,068 and Luke 1,149” (Kugler & Hartin, 352). Matthew has 606 of mark’s verses, while Luke has 320 of Mark’s verses. That means 31 of Mark’s verses don’t occur during Luke’s and Matthew’s Gospels. The way its arranged is also similar in the outline of Jesus, ministry presented in each gospel. The dissimilarities in Matthew’s groups the saying of Jesus into five great discourses. Luke’s has a long travel narrative to Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem. Finally, the details in vocabulary or style are both similar and

There are four well known theories of the synoptic problem: the traditional theory, the Griesbach theory, the Farrer/Goulder theory, and the Four – Source theory. “For most of Christian history, people thought that Matthew was the first and oldest gospel, and Mark was a later, shorter version of the same basic message” (Just). Mark’s Gospels contains several grammatical, historical, and geographical difficulties; as well as episodes that makes Jesus looks crazy, magical, or weak. If Matthew was the first, it would be harder to understand how mark had all the errors or how he added strange episodes of Jesus within his gospel. Mark’s gospel is the same throughout , but Matthew and Luke’s gospels have different material. Later on the third theory (the Farrer/Goulder theory) saw Mark as the first source, Matthew as the second and Luke as the third. Having Matthew taking information from mark, while Luke takes information from mark and Matthew. Finally, the Four – source Theory is what is mainly accepted by scholars today. It consists of mark, Matthew, Luke, Q (Quelle), M, and L. Q or the Quelle Source is a hypnotical source of some of Jesus teachings. M is either oral or written sources found by Matthew, while L is oral or written sources found by Luke. The Quelle source is information that consists in both Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospel. Now give that mark’s Gospel is rather short and has difficulties, it is interesting to