Synoptic Challenge

Considering that Mark was written first, and that Matthew and Luke probably had access to it...

So what? God did the inspiration, man just did the writing.

Matthew was writing to a different audience than Mark, but the message was the same. Therefore, much of what Mark had written would crossover to Matthew's account. And, since Mark basically copied down what Peter told everyone anyway, Matthew was just using Mark's gospel as a parallel work.

Luke, on the other hand, was attampting to write a complete history of what had transpired. Why did he not include the childhood and early years of Jesus' adult life? Because he did not have any type of record for it, except for the word of Mary. Hence, Mark's gospel became a source document.

In Christ,
Trotter

 

When Mathhew wriote he often used two of a number of things while Mark and Luke telling the same event use one. But the message is still the same.

 

I think Luke tells us that he used sources:

He wrote his gospel based on his own careful investigation. This doesn't negate inspiration, for certainly the Holy Spirit superintended Luke's work, so that what he wrote down in consecutive order was indeed the exact truth. Once of the tools the Holy Spirit used to produce the God breathed text was Luke's own examination of various sources of info--eyewitness accounts, and such.

 

I suspect they copied each other. What reason is there to believe in a separate Q as opposed to copying each other (take your pick which was first) and the others tweaking?

 

Q describes that what Lukas&Matteüs have in common but cannot be found in Markus his account.
It most likely would have been a list of sayings by Jezus. Formatwise something like the gospel of Thomas found in Nag Hammadi.

 

Could Matthew have used Mark (adding new information to Mark's), and then Luke copied off Matthew?

 

As russell55 said, a theory of transmission in which Matthew or Luke copied from Mark or from each other or from a hypothetical document Q (or L or M, representing the material unique to Luke or Matthew respectively) doesn't threaten any theory of inspiration.

Mark says numerous times that Jesus taught the people, but he focuses on Jesus' actions rather than his teachings. Matthew, on the other hand, has five extended passages of Jesus' teaching. Some scholars therefore hypothesize that Matthew's Gospel came about partially to fill in some of the details about Jesus' teachings.

 

In a Greek course in Bible College based upon the Apostle John's style of Greek, we spent a day looking at a verse from Matthew.

The professor called it "a bolt from the johannine blue"

Matthew 11
27 All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.


HankD