Monday, July 15, 2024

Andrew E. Steinmann on Matthew 23:34-36/Luke 11:49-51:

  

However, even if we were to concede that the Zechariah mentioned by Jesus is the Zechariah of 2 Chronicles 24, Beckwith’s case still is not proven. Jesus could mean “from the first martyred prophet is one of the first canonical books to be written to the last martyred prophet in one of the last books to be written.” The NT generally assumes the books of the Pentateuch were the first books, written by Moses himself (e.g., Matt 8:4; Mark 1:44; Luke 20:28; 2 Cor 3:15). Certainly Chronicles is one of the last OT books to be written. Scholars could date a few books later or contemporary with it (e.g., Ezra-Nehemiah; Daniel is assumed in the NT to be earlier [Matt 24:15]). In these last books to be written, Zechariah is the last martyr mentioned.

 

OF course, one could argue that Chronicles is the first book in the Writings (as in the Aleppo and Leningrad codices) and Jesus means to say “every martyr from the last section of Scripture to the last” and cites the first martyr in the first book in the first section and the last martyr in the first book in the last section. But this would argue that the order of books in these medieval codices is more ancient than that given in the Talmud, a doubtful proposition. In fact, the argument that Chronicles was in a third section of the canon in the first century is not supported by any source. This is especially true in the NT, which never depicts Jesus as elsewhere referring to the three-part canon of the Talmud or of the codices. Instead, in the one instance where he mentions a three-part canon, the third part contains only the book of Psalms . . . (Andrew E. Steinmann, The Oracles of God: The Old Testament Canon [Saint Paul, Miss.: Concordia Publishing House, 1999], 100-1)