Wednesday, June 10, 2020

D.A. Carson on the Authenticity of Matthew 5:17-20

 

 

17 Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

 

I propose to comment briefly on a select few of the redaction critical judgments currently in vogue.

 

1. Some see the separate verses as originally four discrete sayings that have been put together by the Evangelist. This does not seem compelling. Did Jesus speak only in one-liners? Despite the contention of Banks (“Matthew’s Understanding of the Law: Authenticity and Interpretation in Matthew 5:17-20,” JBL 93 [1974]:226-42), the connecting words like γαρ and ουν constitute no proof that the sayings were once separate; in fact if they had been joined together, would there not have been a need for connecting particles? What criteria can be offered to distinguish the one case from the other?

 

2. Some hold that the words “Do not think that” are a late rhetorical device that does not go back to Jesus (so also in a structurally similar verse, Matt. 10:34). What external evidence is there that this is a late rhetorical device? How does one explain that both here and in 10:34 Matthew ascribes these words to Jesus? If it is a late rhetorical device, and Jesus does not say precisely these words (in Aramaic or Greek), how does one methodologically distinguish between the possibility that Matthew made this part up and the possibility that even if the expression is Matthean the essential truth content is to be traced to Jesus?

 

3. Several see the words “or the prophets” as a Matthean addition, since the disjunctive “or” occurs” in thirteen other instances in this Gospel; and of these, nine are probably due to Matthew’s redactional activity. Moreover, it is agreed that eight of these betray a similar construction, viz., a conjunction followed by a noun. However, it must be noted that (1) this is not a rate construction in the New Testament; (2) the nine probable redactional instances of “or” are not entirely indisputable; (3) “nine out of thirteen” provides a statistical basis with a massive margin for error (or, otherwise put, the ratio is not demonstrably significant); and (4) even if Matthew added the term to his tradition (What tradition, precisely, if he was an eyewitness?, the joint expression may mean no more than the simpler expression, since “law” can refer to the entire Old Testament Scriptures (e.g., John 12:34; 15:25; 1 Cor. 14:21).

 

4. The words “I tell you the truth” are rejected as unauthentic by some on several grounds; (1) In the parallel saying in Luke 16:17, this clause is missing; (2) the clause might well have arisen in Greek-speaking Judaism, and (3) Matthew is the only New Testament writer to use this particular formula with γαρ (αμην γαρ λεγω υμιν). But in response we may well ask: (1) Does Luke’s parallel seem to come from the same occasion? Is it certain the utterance was unattached in the tradition and nailed down in one place by Matthew and in another by Luke? How can this hypothesis be distinguished from the more plausible one—that an itinerant preacher says similar things on many occasions? And if the two accounts have the same source, how may we know Matthew added it, rather than supposing Luke dropped it? (2) Perhaps the clause arose in Greek-speaking Judaism, but perhaps not. Note the transliterated word αμην. What does this suggest? And if the expression arose in such circles, perhaps Jesus was trilingual and invented it. And perhaps not. What methodological control is there to enable one to respond to any of these questions? (3) If Matthew is the only one to associate γαρ with the clause, might this not just as easily mean that only γαρ was added as that the entire clause is redactional? Is it not remarkable that only Jesus in the New Testament uses αμην at the beginning of clauses—would this not argue for authenticity? In any case, though it is true that Matthew is the only New Testament writer to use γαρ with the expression, he does so in only four of thirty-two occurrences. That means he uses the expression without γαρ twenty-eight times, but Mark uses the expression (without γαρ) only thirteen times, and Luke a mere six. Perhaps, it may be argued, if Mark or Luke had used the expression more, they too would have slipped in the odd γαρ. In any case, since I am not worried about the ipsimma verba of Jesus (i.e., Jesus’ own words) but only his ipsimma vox (i.e., Jesus’ own voice), might it be that where γαρ does appear, there is simply a Matthean connection that reveals a connection that Jesus himself made, whether by contextual implication, logic, explicit statement (in Aramaic?), or some other means? How does one methodologically eliminate such possibilities?

 

5. Banks argues that the italicised words for, unless, righteousness, surpasses, and kingdom of heaven are probably all unauthentic and that the verse as a whole though traditional, is probably not authentic. However, he insists that Matthew is nevertheless not imposing something essentially alien to Jesus’ intention but is simply drawing out some practical implications from the attitude Jesus maintains. My problem with this approach is in part akin to my hesitations in all the other passages; but I will press on and ask a broader question. Did Matthew (according to Banks) simply made deductions about Jesus’ general attitude without ever hearing Jesus deal with this subject? If he did hear Jesus deal with it, might he not be giving the gist of what Jesus said (ipsimma vox)? And how, methodologically speaking, can Banks (or anyone else) distinguish between these two cases?

 

I must hasten to add that these reflections in no way prove the authenticity of this snippet or that. I am at the moment concerned only with the methodological problems inherent in redaction criticism; and I am trying to demonstrate that at least in this passage redaction criticism is intrinsically incapable of dealing believably with questions of authenticity. It is not really a “tool” in any precise sense: it is freighted with subjective judgments; it is based on too many implausible assumptions; and, worst of all, in each judgment it makes it ignores numerous questions that not only are relevant but expose its fundamental weakness. (D.A. Carson, Collected Writings on Scripture [comp. Andrew David Naselli; Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2010, 163-65)