The Lives

A. Introduction

W.F. Albright wrote:

        The four books in our New Testament which are called the "gospels" stand alone, in that there is no other material by which to judge them. This is not to say that they are a wholly new literary form, but rather that the material they discuss is not to be found paralleled anywhere else. It is true that during the centuries after the events recorded in the New Testament, the apocryphal gospels and various Gnostic compilations of sayings attributed to Jesus were composed. But an examination of the materials so collected, and a comparison of them with the canonical gospels of the New Testament, reveals that these later compositions were slanted to form a belief about the person and work of Jesus which finds no expression in the pages of the New Testament. (W.F. Albright and C.S. Mann. Matthew. The Anchor Bible. New York: Doubleday, 1971, p. xix)

        In this outline of the Bible, the four Gospels and the book of Acts have been designated as "the Lives"; this was done because together they form "history" of the New Testament and together they serve as the foundation upon which the remaining books of the New Testament, all letters, can stand. It is perhaps not an accident that together, the Gospels and Acts number five, thereby corresponding to the five books of the Law, the foundation of the Old Testament.

B. The Synoptic Problem

        The reader of the New Testament may wonder at the fact that there are four books, written by different authors, each of which describe the life of Christ. When one considers the nature and importance of parallelism in the Hebrew mind, perhaps the repetition is not so surprising. Where a western writer would be concerned to present a single, unified account, the Jewish mind wished for the stereoscopic view afforded by parallelism; instead of relying on a single look at the life of Christ, the modern reader is able to view his life from more than one point, thereby getting a much clearer picture than he or she otherwise might.
        The careful reader of the gospels will notice that the similarities between the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke are much greater than is the case with the gospel of John. The result has been to refer to the first three gospels as "Synoptic". "Synoptic" means "to see together" and comes from two Greek words: sun, meaning "with" and optomai, meaning "to see".
        The synoptic problem arises because the three Gospels present the same general view of the life and teaching of Jesus, raising the question: why are there so many similarities, even to the extent of using exactly the same words -- and why are there such striking differences.
        The Synoptic Problem can therefore be summarized as follows:

1. Who wrote the Gospels?
2. Were the writers dependent upon each other, and if so, who depended on whom?
3. What other sources did the authors of the Gospels make use of, that they might have had in common?

        It seems to be clear that Matthew incorporated almost the entire gospel of Mark in his narrative, although he condensed the accounts of the miracles, apparently for thematic reasons. In addition to Mark, the author of Matthew inserted numerous sayings of Jesus, apparently taken from a source that both he and Luke had in common. This source, whether a written document, documents, or oral tradition, is designated as "Q" by scholars. Q is an abbreviation for Quelle, the German word for "source".
        Therefore, the order of the Gospels, and their relationship to one another is as follows:

1. Mark
2. Matthew, making use of Mark and Q
3. Luke, making use of Mark, Q, and other sources.
4. John, which apparently did not make reference to the earlier written Gospels, and is not, therefore, one of the synoptic gospels.

The Book of Matthew

I. Title

        The title comes from the assumed author of the book.

II. Author and Setting

A. Author

        Matthew appears in all the lists of the twelve apostles (Matthew 10:3, Mark 3:18, Luke 6:15 and Acts 1:13). In Matthew 10:3 he is described as "the tax-collector". Matthew 9:9 describes Matthew's call to be a disciple. In the parallel passages in Mark and Luke he is referred to as Levi and Mark adds that he was "the son of Alphaeus".
        Papias, the early second century bishop of Hierapolis, Phrygia (in Turkey), wrote that Matthew "compiled the oracles" in Hebrew. This statement was taken by the early church as evidence that Matthew was the author of the Gospel which had been handed down as being "according to Matthew".
        Most modern scholars think that Papias was not referring to Matthew's Gospel at all, but rather to a compilation of sayings of Jesus, or of Messianic proof texts from the Old Testament, which might have served the author of Matthew (and the other Gospel writers) as source materials.
        The disciple, Matthew, remains the best guess for author of the book that bears his name.

B. Nature of the narrative

        The Gospel of Matthew is not chronologically arranged history; rather, we are given materials organized only loosely according to time frame. More important to Matthew, in keeping with his Jewish background, is the matter of theme. As is the case with the Old Testament materials, other organizing principles often are allowed to take precedence over the chronological. As Westerners, this behavior can be somewhat confusing and disturbing; however, the modern reader should be no more surprised by the culture shock in this than he would be in traveling to the Middle East today. What we assume to be normal, self-evident, and natural, is often simply not the case with the biblical narratives. Much of the problems modern critical scholars face in handling the materials in the Bible derives from just this failure to reckon with different cultural approaches to writing a narrative. See The Thematic Arrangement of Biblical Texts for more information on this subject.
        Matthew has two principle interests in his gospel: 1) the fulfillment of God's purposes in and through Jesus and 2) how this fulfillment will find expression in the Church that Jesus founded. Matthew is much more concerned with themes than with history.

C. Date

        It has been argued that the Gospel of Matthew was likely written before AD 70, since Jesus predicts the destruction of Jerusalem in 24:2-23 and it would be odd that no mention of its fulfillment would appear in the book had it been written after this date. However, if the Gospel had been written after the destruction of Jerusalem, that destruction would have been so well known, it would have been unnecessary to point out that Jesus' words had been fulfilled.
        Matthew 27:8 and 28:15 would seem to indicate that some time had passed since the crucifixion, since both have the phrase "to this day".
        Scholarly opinion seems to favor a date between AD 55 and 75 for the date of composition, with a period from 65-75 as seeming most probable.
        It is unclear whether the book was written in or out of Palestine; considering the statement in Acts 8:1, regarding persecution and the scattering of the disciples from Jerusalem, and the subsequent persecutions and political instabilities leading up to the disaster of 66-73 AD, it is certainly possible that the Gospel was written somewhere other than Palestine.

III. An Outline of Matthew

I. The Preparation of the King 1:1-4:16
II. The Presentation of the Kingdom 4:17-16:12
III. Sermons 16:13-25:46
IV. The Sacrifice 26:1-27:66
V. The Resurrection 28:1-20




        Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph... (Matthew 1:15b-16a)

        He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph, the son of Heli, the son of Matthat... (Luke 3:23b)


Thus there were fourteen generations
in all from Abraham to David,
fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon,
and fourteen from the exile to Christ.


Chronology of Jesus' Life

I. Birth of Jesus

        The date of Jesus birth remains an open question. Certain limits can be placed upon it, however. One definite is that he was not born AD 0. AD 533, when Dionysius Exiguus fixed the date of the birth of Christ in the 754th year of Rome, he made an error in reckoning by several years.
        It is known for certain that Jesus was born during the reign of Herod the Great (Matthew 2:1; Luke 1:5). Therefore, Jesus must have been born during his reign. It is also known that Herod died in 4BC.
        Jesus must have been born at least two years before Herod's death, because Herod executed all the male children from two years of age and younger, placing Jesus birth within that time frame.
        In Luke, it is learned that Quirinius was governor during the time of the census; since the census was taken every fourteenth year, it has been figured that the census occurred about 8 BC. This would match the evidence that would suggest Quirinius was joint ruler with Sentius Saturnius around 8 BC.
        Therefore, a date around 7 or 8 BC seems likely.

II. Ministry of Jesus

A. Beginning

        John the Baptist began his public ministry in the fifteenth year of Tiberias Caesar (Luke 3:1). Tiberias became co-ruler with his father, Augustus Caesar AD 13, guaranteeing his succession to the throne AD 14. If his rule is counted as beginning AD 14, then John began his ministry around AD 28 or 29. Jesus public ministry began shortly after John's, with Jesus' Baptism occurring, therefore, also in AD 28 or 29. Luke 3:23 tells us that Jesus was "about thirty years old"; This would make one think that he was born then about 2 or 3 BC; however, "about" covers a lot of territory, so perhaps a birth in 7 or 8 -- making Jesus about thirty-five or thirty-six, would not be unreasonable.
        According to John 2:20, Jesus' first Passover (during his public ministry) occurred in the 46th year of the remodeling of the temple. The renovation of Zerubabbel's temple began around 20 or 19 BC. This would give a date of AD 27 or 28. Therefore, a date of about AD 28 seems about right for the beginning of Jesus' public ministry.

B. Length

        Jesus' ministry apparently covered about three to four years, based on the number of Passover's recorded in his life:

1. Jesus' baptism to his first Passover (Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:9- 11; Luke 3:21-23 and John 2:13).
2. Second Passover (John 4:35 and John 5:1)
3. Third Passover (John 6:4)
4. Last Passover (John 11:55)

C. Crucifixion

        1. Astronomical observations indicate that Passover (14 of Nisan) fell on Thursday-Friday AD 30 and 33. If Jesus public ministry began AD 28, then a crucifixion date of AD 33 seems most likely, when Jesus was about 39 or 40 years of age.
        2. On what day of the week was Jesus crucified? Tradition places it on Friday, however Matthew 12:40 seems to create a problem with this tradition:


        It is likely, however, that this statement in Matthew should be taken as an idiomatic expression, and should not be pressed toward a literalistic interpretation. Based on Genesis 42:17, 1 Kings 20:29 and 2 Chronicles 10:5, it is apparent that any part of a day was counted as a whole day in Jewish reckoning. Moreover, the statements "after three days" and "on the third day" seem to be referring to the same time period (Mark 8:31; cf. Matthew 16:21 and Luke 9:22).
        The other evidence, that the crucified men had to be removed from their crosses before the start of the Sabbath seem clearly to indicate that the crucifixion was occurring on a Friday (John 19:14, 31; cf. Matthew 27:62; Mark 15:42; and Luke 23:54).

III. Questions for Matthew
