Gospel of Thomas and Q: The Theory of Oral Transmission
Ed Tyler errancy@infidels.org
Fri, 30 Apr 1999 16:10:41 -0500 (00925524641, 4.1.19990430155829.00bca230@pop.truman.edu)
At 01:08 PM 4/30/99 -0700, Ray & Sandy Briggs wrote:
>>>CARTER
>>>Ed, first of all, though Q is a *possibility*, the material that is
>>>supposed to compose Q may be explained by oral tradition present in the
>>>Jewish community of the first century. Word for word memorization of
>>>teachings and stories was very common, considering that over 90% of the
>>>population could not read. Many scholars argue that "Q" can be better
>>>explained by this than a hypothetical document for which we have no hard
>>>evidence.
>>
>>Ed
>>
>>I'm familiar with this argument, because it's one of the few aspects of
>>the topic that's actually in my field. The objections to this theory are
>>these:
>>
>>1. There's absolutely no evidence that a tradition of rote memorization of
>>oral teachings existed among the Judean peasantry in the first century;
>>there was an analogous tradition of memorization among the rabbinical
>>class, but this was memorization of written texts, not of oral compositions.
>>
>>2. The theory violates the principle of "genre dependence" in that it makes
>>no distinction among the various types of word art such as narrative
>>pericopes, proverbs, parables, or prayers and hymns, but assumes that
>>genres would have been transmitted through the same mechanism of
memorization.
>>
>>3. The texts of the gospels themselves do not support the theory. Much
>>material does not show signs of verbatim memorization, but exists in
>>multiform. Examples are significant: The Beatitudes, the words of the
>>Last Supper, accounts of the trial before Pilate, etc. It does not make
>>sense that these important passages would not have been memorized verbatim
>>if other passages were.
>>
>>Unless the theory of oral memorization can first provide some evidence that
>>the 1st C. Judean peasants had a tradition of rote memorization of oral
>>teachings, and also account for the multiformity of these important
>>passages, it cannot account for the word-for-word correspondences between
>>Matthew and Luke.
>
>Ray
>Unless I missed it, Carter never answered this post from Ed. Is this yet
>another instance of Carter disappearing when in trouble? It is very clear
>from the above that Carter's position was indefensible. In a way it was an
>unfair fight as we had a lightweight against a heavyweight. Carter mostly
>copies apologists and this subject is Ed's specialty. Those are the breaks
>however if you want to debate here.
>
>I think the underlying point of this question is at the heart of the
>argument about the reliability of the gospels as historical witnesses.
>Whether the gospels are recording oral tradition or copying other written
>reports it still shows they are not the product of eyewitnesses.
>Eyewitnesses do not copy others as to what they personally witnessed.
>Reports of eyewitnesses are not necessarilly reliable anyway but the report
>of reports of (presumably) eyewitnesses is even less reliable. I doubt if
>anyone who recognises that the gospel authors were copying others could
>believe in inerrancy.
>
>Everyone agrees that we do not know when, where, or by whom the gospels
>were written. They also are not the works of eyewitnesses (they don't even
>claim to be). There is also significant conflict between them and they all
>contain incredible stories of fantastic miracles throughout. My question is
>why would anyone even imagine they could be inerrant?
>
Ed
In about a month, Carter or somebody'll come out of the woodwork and say
that I shut up on the subject because I was taking a licking. Oh, well....
Looking over my homework before posting the above, I discovered a very
interesting thing (from an oral traditionalist's perspective). If there's
one genre of word art that characteristically gets transmitted verbatim,
it's the proverb or "gnome," which is your garden variety bit of
traditional wisdom. For instance, "Waste not, want not" or "I'd rather be
right than be President." These things are so short and pithy that they
transmit verbatim in every tradition. They also usually have mnemonic
features that help this verbatim transmission, like rhyme, alliteration, or
repetition. Jesus' beatitudes fit into this category, and so you'd expect
them to transmit verbatim whether the parables or other genres did or not.
Well, they didn't. Luke reads: "Blessed are the poor," while Matthew
reads "Blessed are the poor in spirit." How or why that "in spirit" got
inserted is beyond me.