Thread: NT Studies in the Gospels and Jesus Studies

I've been doing some research in the gospels; Im trying to answer critics who hold to "Redaction criticism," whatever that is. I also came across some who hold to the Q Hypothesis. So here are my questions:

1. What is Redaction Criticism?
2. What is the Q Hypothesis?
3. What books do you recommend on NT studies?

(I need some good insight on this subject. Maybe this is also an extention of Jesus studies?)
I appreciate all your insight.

People who espouse such theories do so out of hatred for God, and are therefore objects of evangelism. If you convince them with cunning words of man's wisdom, that will not shake their fundamental faith in themselves. I don't mean to be pedantic, but they need a simple stumbling-stone presentation of the Gospel, such as Paul gave to the Corinthians.

That said, I'm sure people will have helpful suggestions.

Cheers,

Originally Posted by Christusregnat

People who espouse such theories do so out of hatred for God, and are therefore objects of evangelism. If you convince them with cunning words of man's wisdom, that will not shake their fundamental faith in themselves. I don't mean to be pedantic, but they need a simple stumbling-stone presentation of the Gospel, such as Paul gave to the Corinthians.

That said, I'm sure people will have helpful suggestions.

Cheers,

I appreciate your comments, but I'm looking for an academic answer to these objections that are raised contra the gospels and Jesus studies. But I get what you're saying. I would further agree that such "imaginations" or reasoning is futile and they come out of a depraved mind. However I am also a student and would like to know the academic/apologetic answer to these objections.

Redaction Criticism is a discipline which studies both the way the redactors/editors/authors changed their sources and the seams or transitions they utilized to link those transitions into a unified whole. The purpose of this approach is to recover the author's theology and setting. Unlike 'Literary Criticism' which looks at the individual gospels as a literary whole and cares little about authorial intent, Redaction Criticism wants to ask questions like, 'What is the specific theological emphasis in Luke, or why does Matthew change the order of his account to Mark. Of Course, when Matthew, Mark and Luke are talked about what is meant is an unknown author (or more likely) authors, editors are redactors who put that particular document together.

The 'Q' Hypothesis: Q is from the German 'Quelle' (source) and is a hypothetical document that contains the 230 so sayings of Jesus which Matthew and Luke share, but which are not found in Mark (thus the basis of the 'Synoptic Problem'). It is claimed that Matthew and Luke had drawn on two main sources to compile their own gospels: Mark's gospel and a collection of sayingsof Jesus referred to as 'Quelle' by German critics. It was J.Weiss in 1890 who shortened it to Q.

As an overall great resource on this you should get a hold of:

'Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels' edited by Joel Green, Scot McKnight and I. Howard Marshall. It's an IVP publication and has many good conservative writers.

'Exploring the New Testament Vol 1: The Gospels and Acts' by David Wenham and Steve Walton is another great resource.

Although it is less conservative I was assigned:

'The Gospels and Jesus' (2nd Edition) by Graham Stanton. It covers the material well and lays out what you need to know.

Other books that are helpful particularly regarding Redaction Criticism and Q:

'The Gospels for all Christians' by Richard Bauckham

'The Synoptic Problem' by Robert Stein

'Reading Matthew, Mark and Luke: A Fresh Assault on the Synoptic Problem' by J.W. Wenham

Websites:

The New Testament Gateway | NTGateway.com | Dr Mark Goodacre is the website of Mark Goodacre who is a modern critic of Q.

www.biblicaltraining,org is the website of William Mounce and if you register you can download Robert Stein's Mp3s on these and other subjects.

OK you're going to have to rephrase the following because I'm just now studying this.

Redaction Criticism is a discipline which studies both the way the redactors/editors/authors changed their sources and the seams or transitions they utilized to link those transitions into a unified whole.

Can you give me an example of this please?

Of Course, when Matthew, Mark and Luke are talked about what is meant is an unknown author (or more likely) authors, editors are redactors who put that particular document together.

Thanks for these resources. I'm definitely going to look into them.

'Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels' edited by Joel Green, Scot McKnight and I. Howard Marshall. It's an IVP publication and has many good conservative writers.

'Exploring the New Testament Vol 1: The Gospels and Acts' by David Wenham and Steve Walton is another great resource.

Although it is less conservative I was assigned:

'The Gospels and Jesus' (2nd Edition) by Graham Stanton. It covers the material well and lays out what you need to know.

Other books that are helpful particularly regarding Redaction Criticism and Q:

'The Gospels for all Christians' by Richard Bauckham

'The Synoptic Problem' by Robert Stein

'Reading Matthew, Mark and Luke: A Fresh Assault on the Synoptic Problem' by J.W. Wenham

Oh, I should have mentioned that the best all round New Testament intro is:

'New Testament Introduction' by D.A. Carson and Douglas Moo.

It's well worth having on the shelf for serious New Testament Studies from a conservative and mostly reformed perspective.

-----Added 10/16/2009 at 07:27:18 EST-----

[quote=Julio Martinez Jr;702888]OK you're going to have to rephrase the following because I'm just now studying this.

Redaction Criticism is a discipline which studies both the way the redactors/editors/authors changed their sources and the seams or transitions they utilized to link those transitions into a unified whole.

Can you give me an example of this please?

Of Course, when Matthew, Mark and Luke are talked about what is meant is an unknown author (or more likely) authors, editors are redactors who put that particular document together.

The 1st quote simply means Redaction Criticism looks at the way the author or editor of, say Matthew, used Mark and 'Q' as sources to put his gospel together. He might take a healing story from Mark and a longer piece of dialogue from Q and then put it together in a different order with some supplementary material to make up Matthew.

Let me know if this is making sense.

The 2nd quote is from the perspective of those who use redaction criticism. The starting point for this type of work is to assume that neither Matthew, Mark or Luke wrote the gospels of the same name. Matthew (says the critic) may well have been written by a community of believers who edited and mixed earlier and later sources to create that gospel.

[quote=Irish Presbyterian;702892]Oh, I should have mentioned that the best all round New Testament intro is:

'New Testament Introduction' by D.A. Carson and Douglas Moo.

It's well worth having on the shelf for serious New Testament Studies from a conservative and mostly reformed perspective.

-----Added 10/16/2009 at 07:27:18 EST-----

Originally Posted by Julio Martinez Jr

OK you're going to have to rephrase the following because I'm just now studying this.

Redaction Criticism is a discipline which studies both the way the redactors/editors/authors changed their sources and the seams or transitions they utilized to link those transitions into a unified whole.

Can you give me an example of this please?

Of Course, when Matthew, Mark and Luke are talked about what is meant is an unknown author (or more likely) authors, editors are redactors who put that particular document together.

The 1st quote simply means Redaction Criticism looks at the way the author or editor of, say Matthew, used Mark and 'Q' as sources to put his gospel together. He might take a healing story from Mark and a longer piece of dialogue from Q and then put it together in a different order with some supplementary material to make up Matthew.

Let me know if this is making sense.

The 2nd quote is from the perspective of those who use redaction criticism. The starting point for this type of work is to assume that neither Matthew, Mark or Luke wrote the gospels of the same name. Matthew (says the critic) may well have been written by a community of believers who edited and mixed earlier and later sources to create that gospel.

Yes. That's what I was looking for. Now do you know of a simple work that spells out the debate in the same rhetorical style?

'The Synoptic Problem' by Robert Stein would be the best for this.

If you can pick up 'Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels', edited by Green, McKnight and Marshall you'll have an invaluable tool for not only the above issues but many more that are currently going on in NT studies. The articles are easy to manage and incredibly helpful to gain a needed Evangelical response.

Originally Posted by Irish Presbyterian

'The Synoptic Problem' by Robert Stein would be the best for this.

If you can pick up 'Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels', edited by Green, McKnight and Marshall you'll have an invaluable tool for not only the above issues but many more that are currently going on in NT studies. The articles are easy to manage and incredibly helpful to gain a needed Evangelical response.

Yeah I have I. Howard Marshal's Survey of the New Testament, but I have to say that I'm not impressed with his theological perspective, i.e., Arminianism. I don't think it really comes out in his NT studies, but overall I like his stuff.

I agree about I. Howard Marshall's theological position especially in his 'Kept by the Power of the Spirit' but his New Testament studies work is very helpful and a great Evangelical resource to have. I'd love to see a lot more self-consciously Reformed NT scholars getting involved in these debates but until their work becomes more widespread then I'll keep turning to Marshall et al for good conservative answers.

It is Grant Osborne (of ESV Study Bible fame) who writes the article on 'Redaction Criticism' in the Dictionary and the article on 'Q' is by Graham Stanton. Also, checked up who covers the 'Synoptic Problem' and was delighted to see it was Robert Stein. I'd really recommend listing to his lectures online at Biblicaltraining.org.

Originally Posted by Irish Presbyterian

I agree about I. Howard Marshall's theological position especially in his 'Kept by the Power of the Spirit' but his New Testament studies work is very helpful and a great Evangelical resource to have. I'd love to see a lot more self-consciously Reformed NT scholars getting involved in these debates but until their work becomes more widespread then I'll keep turning to Marshall et al for good conservative answers.

It is Grant Osborne (of ESV Study Bible fame) who writes the article on 'Redaction Criticism' in the Dictionary and the article on 'Q' is by Graham Stanton. Also, checked up who covers the 'Synoptic Problem' and was delighted to see it was Robert Stein. I'd really recommend listing to his lectures online at Biblicaltraining.org.

Yeah I doing studies firstly in St. Mark and Marshall seems to have a good grasp of the general tenor of this gospel. I'm currently listening to a sermon by Dr. Ferrell Griswold from GPTS on Mark's gospel. Marshall only really traces contours and theological genres in the survey of the New Testament. Do you have that book? What are your thoughts about it? Here's the book just in case you don't know what I'm talking about.

Yeah I doing studies firstly in St. Mark and Marshall seems to have a good grasp of the general tenor of this gospel. I'm currently listening to a sermon by Dr. Ferrell Griswold from GPTS on Mark's gospel. Marshall only really traces contours and theological genres in the survey of the New Testament. Do you have that book? What are your thoughts about it? Here's the book just in case you don't know what I'm talking about.[/QUOTE]

I haven't read his 'Concise New Testament Theology' but it was on my reading list at Theological College on New Testament Theology. I have his 'The Origins of New Testament Christology' and his commentaries on Luke and Acts, all of which are excellent and first rate scholarship. He has also written a number of journal articles on different aspects of NT studies that have been very helpful.

Originally Posted by Irish Presbyterian

He has also written a number of journal articles on different aspects of NT studies that have been very helpful.

Such as? Do you know if they are accessible to the general public?