Home

The Order of the Gospels

Why Does This Matter?

On the surface, the order in which the Gospels were written doesn't matter much. The early Church didn't seem to care, or at least not enough to write it down. We can read each Gospel independently and overlook the differences in perspective. However, many Christians want more depth, and some want to examine the Gospels deeply. This involves studying the author, the audience, the circumstances, and the cultural and historical situation. Moreover, the authors of the first three Gospels borrowed from each other in some combination, so knowing who wrote when is important.

Ideally, scholars do the hard work and then provide the rest of us with reliable conclusions about these things.

Unfortunately, liberal scholars have broken the process, and they have a great deal of influence over conservative scholars. Scholars have provided conclusions about basic questions, including who wrote each Gospel and when, which are either incorrect or undermine the integrity of the New Testament.

I want to briefly look at why this happened and what a faith-based examination of the evidence says.

What Do Scholars Say?

About the New Testament Generally

First, scholars, on principle, reject supernatural explanations. This is a reasonable control to prevent speculation.

Because of this, many scholars conclude that, because miracles can't be explained scientifically, the ones described in the Gospels didn't happen. Therefore, they conclude that the authors of the Gospels didn't record actual events; instead, the authors wrote down invented stories. Furthermore, since the early Church accepted the Gospels as historical, many scholars conclude that the testimony of the early Church cannot be trusted.

Conservative scholars don't agree with these conclusions, but they are outnumbered and are forced to work within the framework established by the mainstream. I respect and value their efforts, but they are swimming against the current.

About the Gospels

Regarding the Gospels, there is no consensus; various scholars support many different theories. However, in the early twentieth century, modern conservatives accepted one approach, which I'll call "Mark Plus Q, " also described as "Mark first." This is the theory that is generally taught in churches. Please note that in the twenty-first century, many scholars have concluded that the order of the Gospels is an "open question," that is, no theory has clear support.

In the following, I am stating the conclusions that led to the theory. In my opinion, the evidence contradicts many of them.

Mark Plus Q

• Mark wrote the first Gospel around 68. He knew only a few of Jesus' teachings in comparison to Matthew and Luke, which is why his account has relatively little teaching material.
• Mark was unaware of a second document containing the additional teachings found in Matthew and Luke. The early church did not preserve this document, so it is unknown to us. It's called Q, from the German name for source, quelle. Q served as the main source of the teachings found in both Matthew and Luke.
• Matthew and Luke were unaware of each other and wrote their accounts independently. They used Mark as the source for their narratives and Q as the source for their teachings. They most likely wrote around 85, which gave time for Mark to circulate among the churches.

For scholars, this theory raises questions, especially around Matthew.

• Why would the Apostle Matthew wait until 85 to write a Gospel to Jewish Christians?
• Why would Matthew, an eyewitness, rely on sources such as Mark and Q?
• Was Matthew even alive in 85?

Based on these issues, scholars find it very unlikely that the Apostle Matthew wrote Matthew. So, they ask,

• If Matthew didn't write Matthew, who did?
• Why did the early Church accept Matthew if it wasn't written by an Apostle?
• Why did Matthew become the early Church's go-to Gospel account?

Issues like these add to mainstream scholars' skepticism of the early Church and the New Testament.

How Should Believer's Respond?

These questions are significant. The early Church accepted books only if an Apostle wrote them. Did the Church make a serious mistake, or was the rule regarding Apostolic authorship a late invention intended to give authority to traditions? Should we accept Matthew as part of the New Testament? Should we accept the New Testament at all?

As a new Christian, I assumed that Matthew wrote the first Gospel and was unaware of Mark Plus Q. When I heard about the idea of Mark Plus Q, I realized that it seriously undermined the integrity of Matthew and the New Testament generally. My response was to examine the evidence.

In looking at evidence, I have learned that personal assumptions determine what I accept or reject as evidence. When I started reading the Bible, I realized that I had to choose whether or not to believe that God exists and whether or not he did miracles in the past that he doesn't do today. The truthfulness of Jesus' teachings led me to choose to say "yes" to both. Furthermore, I chose to believe that God inspired the authors of the Bible and that it is reliable.

Those assumptions, that is, my faith, strongly influence what I accept as evidence.

What Does the Evidence Say?

I'm not going to lay out all the evidence; instead, I'm going to share a few key facts.

• The early Church put heavy emphasis on Apostolic authorship. Luke was included because of Luke's close association with the Apostle Paul, and Mark was included because of Mark's close association with Peter. On the other hand, Hebrews and James were not included for centuries because they were not written by Apostles. The early Church would not have included Matthew if it was written by anyone other than the Apostle.
• Mainstream scholars believe that the early Church was small and fragmented, and didn't know the history of their writings; therefore, very little that the early Church said can be used as evidence.
• The early Church relied on Matthew much more than the other Gospels, despite its Jewish tone. Starting in the second century, various church leaders wrote that Matthew wrote first. The idea that Matthew wrote first wasn't questioned until around 1800 in Germany.
• Mark Plus Q was proposed by a German liberal in the mid-1800s who soon said that his theory was too simple to be correct. He, along with others proposing similar theories, added other "source" documents to make their theories work. None of them proved effective in describing the evidence they attempted to address in the Gospels themselves. There is no evidence that any of the "source" documents existed.
• In the early 1900s, two British scholars adopted Mark Plus Q and forced it on other scholars, even though its originator had given up on it long ago. Their goal seemed to be simply to replace Matthew first with Mark first.
• Matthew, Luke, and Mark used one another's works as sources in some combination. However, Matthew and Luke had independent perspectives and styles, and each provided substantial unique material. Mark's style was simple, and he provided much less unique material.
• Matthew has a very Jewish tone, and it assumes that the audience is fully aware of the culture and politics of Judea and Galilee, which points to an audience in Judea and Galilee. Matthew, writing to Jews, was pro-Gentile. This points to a time of writing early on when the inclusion of the Gentiles in the Church was still an issue. The ascension of Herod Agrippa and his killing of the Apostle James in 41 provides a suitable historical context.
• Luke and Acts appear to have been finished around 62, when Acts abruptly cuts off without describing Paul's work in Rome.
• Mark was a part of the church in Jerusalem, very likely from the start. He worked closely with both Paul (2 Timothy 4.11) and Peter (1 Peter 5.13.) He was in a position to know as much as anyone in the Church, in some ways more the individual Apostles themselves.
• Mark was written around 68, shortly after Peter's death, based on widely-accepted early tradition.
• Mark has very little material that is not based on what is found in Matthew or Luke. However, it adds many important details and expands on some passages.

Here are my conclusions, based on this evidence.

• Mark Plus Q was forced on the scholarly community for reasons that had little to do with the evidence; today many scholars refuse to accept it or any similar theory. The reasons for this were complicated, but they had to do with politics, increasing scholarly skepticism toward the Bible because of its supernatural aspects, and the desire to describe the Gospel as an evolving myth.
• Matthew wrote to Jewish Christians in Judea and Galilee in late 41 or early 42. Herod Agrippa arrived in Judea in spring 41, and the Apostles were soon forced to leave the reason, which provided Matthew with the incentive to write. His status as an Apostle and the early circulation of his Gospel account during the earliest days of the Church
• Luke started writing in Caesarea around 58, while Paul was in prison, and he finished in Rome by 62. Luke used Matthew as one of his sources, but he spoke with many other eyewitnesses, and he freely adapted the material from Matthew to fit his own concerns.
• Mark wrote around 68. He used Matthew and Luke as sources and added a small amount of his own material. Where Matthew and Luke disagreed, Mark did not include anything. This explains why Mark has no accounts of Jesus' early life and why it ended so abruptly in 16.8 (Others later added the longer endings.)
• John probably wrote around 97, at the end of his life. He was aware of the other Gospels; he avoided what they had already talked about, provided insights into gaps caused by what they didn't say, and at times clarified the others.

This approach follows the evidence, which is its most important attribute. It also places each account in a natural historical and cultural setting that makes it possible to analyze each account without coming to contradictory conclusions.