Authorship of Matthew (long)(Steve CR)

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MATT
Here is what the Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels has on the authorship
of the Gospel of Matthew. Before someone jumps in with a 'thought you
didn't use commentaries' post, the reason I do so is to offer something
rather than nothing in response to Steve CR's post, as I am not
sufficiently informed on textual criticism to  comment much further, nor
presently have the time to research it myself.

Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels, Edited by J.Hastings, D.D.

The Sources.- If, then we take the year A.D. 70, as an approximate date for
the composition of the Gospel, there remains the questions of its sources,
its author, and its historical value. The facts about the sources are
these;-

(1) The editor (!) has borrowed the greater part of the Second Gospel, and
has made it the framework of his narrative. He has altered the order of Mk
1-7:24 in order to group the material under subjext-heads. He has greatly
expanded the discourses. He makes omissions and alterations in phrases
relating to the Person of Christ, omitting especially expressions which
attribute to Him inability, or desire for information, and terms of human
emotion; and makes a series of somewhat familiar changes in clauses
relating to the Apostles.

(2) The Gospel contains, besides this Markan material, a good deal of
matter, almost entirely sayings, which is found also in substance in the
Third Gospel. It is generally supposed that this was borrowed by the two
Evangelists from a common source, viz. a collection of Gospel material
compiled by the Apostle Matthew, and referred to by Papias (Eus. HE
III.xxxix.).
 The present writer (Willoughby C. Allen.) has elsewhere attempted to prove
that, so far as Luke goes, this is not a very probable theory. Besides
these sayings which he has in common with St. Luke, the editor of the First
Gospel has also a number of sayings found only in his Gospel. The
probability is that he borrowed these  peculiar sayings, and most of those
common to him and St. Luke from the Apostolic collection of sayings
mentioned by Papias. If so, it is not very likely that St. Luke had also
seen this collection. Rather material from it had passed into some of the
many sources which he had used (Luke 1:1) and were borrowed by him from
them. Thus Mt.s second source was the Matthean Logia or collection of
discourses.

(3) What remains of the Gospel, when we have put aside the matter borrowed
from Mk. and the sayings drawn from the Logia, consists of a number of
narrative traditions. These deal with Christ's Birth and Infancy, with a
few incidents concerned with St Peter and with some details commected with
Christ's Trial and Resurrection. They were all drawn, it may be supposed,
from current Palestinian Christian tradition.

(4) Lastly, a number of quotations of a peculiar type, which are introduced
by a special formula, were drawn from the catena or list of OT Messianic
passages, whaich had already been translated into Greek when the editor
borrowed them.

The Author:- Now, who was the writer who thus welded together the Second
Gospel, the Matthean Logia, a number of Palestinian traditions and a series
of OT quotations, into our present Gospel? From the end of the 2nd Century
the work has been ascribed to St. Matthew. But there are the following
difficulties in this ascription:

(1) The same writers who attribute our Gospel to St. Matthew state that he
wrote it in Hebrew or Aramaic. Now it is clear that our Gospel was composed
in Greek, and is based upon Greek sources. This is certain so far as the
material drawn from the Second Gospel is concerned, and probable for the
sayings drawn from the Matthean Logia.

(2) It does not seem very probable that the Apostle Matthew should have
written a Gospel from second-hand materials. The work lacks that freshness
of presentation which we would expect from an eye-witness of many of the
events.
 How then explain the ascription of the Gospel to him? Because the book, in
a sense in which the statement is not true of St. Luke's Gospel, is based
directly upon the collection of sayings compiled by the Apostle. We must,
therefore suppose that the author was an otherwise unknown Jewish Christan
of Palestine, who about the year A.D.70 compiled his Gospel, using as his
framework the Second Gospel, but borrowing largely from the Matthean Logia,
and inserting also some Palestiniam traditions with which he was familiar.
The Gospel, as it left his hand, represents the conception of Christ's
Person and work which was dominant in the Palestinian church in the middle
of the 1st Cent. A.D. To Christian there Jesus was the Jewish-King Messiah.
His life on earth was only the prelude to his sovereignty. For He was to
come again as Son of Man at the end of the age, and that was imminent, and
would follow immediately upon the final downfall of the Jewish polity.

STEVE CR
Before we discuss whether the apostle Matthew is the author of the
hypothetical document Q, some points are in order:
1. You realise this is saying that Matthew is not the author of the 'Gospel
according to Matthew'? Is this something you think?
2. Irenaeus attributes the 'Gospel according to Matthew' to the apostle
Matthew. He also states (in Adv. Her. 3.1.1) that Matthew wrote his gospel
before Mark, whereas acceptance of Marcan priority makes this impossible.
Do you think that Irenaeus was wrong and didn't know who the author of
Matthew's gospel was?

Steve Carson-Rowland
Brisbane, Australia
(Witty or incisive quote pending)

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