Did Luke have access to the complete Matthew?

timothyu

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There is nothing outside of God. Everything we comprehend is from the same source and is subject to the same breath of life. We are each other even if we see ourselves as individuals or unique to other creation. What you do to others including other life forms, you do to yourself. That is why Jesus said to avoid the self interest inherent in man which mistakenly sets us apart from all, and to love all as self.
 
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drich0150

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This is what @Sanoy was writing
Can the Christmas stories be reconciled?


Can the Christmas stories be reconciled?


It seems I'm unable to convince @Sanoy that he is mistaken about his beliefs so I was seeing if I can get Christians here to back me up.

My belief is that Matthew and Luke are based on Mark and maybe Q. I don't think Luke had access to the complete book of Matthew.

I thought it would be better to start a new topic about this.
If you look at the in bible narrative you are both wrong.

In that Luke was the first to write. remember He was a slave to Theopilus and was sent at the time of Christ to investigate and report back to his master what was going on. The intro of Luke tells us this. (most honorable theophilus)

Then After his gospel he also wrote the book of Acts as to theophilus but this time in an informal fashion as if he where a free man, which we know he was as he pledged himself to Paul so in a sense the gospel of Luke is actually the gospel Paul taught.

This means the book of luke had to be written first because at the time of the writing he was a slave to theophilus and address theophilus as master in the gospel telling, which is different than how he address the same man while in service to paul. Which was still alive by the end of acts that gives us the idea that acts was complete pre 65 AD. which puts the book of luke first.

Which makes sense as Paul's gospel through luke is the most complete and as they get further and further away from the actual events the more that is forgotten which means less and less detail.

Again this is a chronological account of the order by a contextual reading of the events and how they would logically play out.
 
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JackRT

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People take books and re-write them as screenplays. This was similar to the scribes who took quotations and stories and assembled them into books of scripture making them more descriptive and flowing in nature.

The gospel stories existed in the oral tradition for four to six or seven decades before being written down by second or third generation Christians.

In the first few decades of the last century a great deal of research went into trying to understand oral traditions while they were still around to study. This research focused on societies which were largely illiterate. This study was greatly assisted by the use of newly invented sound recording machines. The researchers discovered that the storytellers work from a 'framework' but tailor the narrative to suit the needs and moods of the audience at the time. A story is never told the same way twice but the framework itself remains intact. Once such a story is committed to print it becomes locked in place for all time. Moreover once that has happened it becomes virtually impossible to discern what is framework and what is the story teller's own variation on the theme. This is what has happened in both the Jewish and Christian scriptures. What we are reading are very human documents.
 
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JackRT

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The gospel stories existed in the oral tradition for four to six or seven decades before being written down by second or third generation Christians.

In the first few decades of the last century a great deal of research went into trying to understand oral traditions while they were still around to study. This research focused on societies which were largely illiterate. This study was greatly assisted by the use of newly invented sound recording machines. The researchers discovered that the storytellers work from a 'framework' but tailor the narrative to suit the needs and moods of the audience at the time. A story is never told the same way twice but the framework itself remains intact. Once such a story is committed to print it becomes locked in place for all time. Moreover once that has happened it becomes virtually impossible to discern what is framework and what is the story teller's own variation on the theme. This is what has happened in both the Jewish and Christian scriptures. What we are reading are very human documents.
 
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Norbert L

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The gospel stories existed in the oral tradition for four to six or seven decades before being written down by second or third generation Christians.
So what do you make of the given claims being made in Luke 1:1-4, "Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught."

We're told his story came from first generation witnesses/servants and given what we found in the DDS, writing at least some things down contemporaneously did happen. One big unknown is how much of that would be available for investigation by this author while things are still fresh in people's minds.
 
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HardHead

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We're told his story came from first generation witnesses/servants

It did. The oral tradition described what happened. This was then written down later. It was written down so that a common reference point could be had to verify what the original witnesses had seen and heard. This does not make the oral tradition wrong. The writing serves to verify the oral tradition and to keep people from modifying it.
 
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Norbert L

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It did. The oral tradition described what happened. This was then written down later. It was written down so that a common reference point could be had to verify what the original witnesses had seen and heard. This does not make the oral tradition wrong. The writing serves to verify the oral tradition and to keep people from modifying it.
I don't exactly understand your point. Are you saying that those written words we read in those verses actually stem from a previous unwritten oral tradition? Because if that is the case then the words "I too decided to write" are plainly out of place.
 
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HardHead

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Because if that is the case then the words "I too decided to write" are plainly out of place.
I am saying that, but they are not out of place at all.

Note that other people may have also tried to write down (possibly wrong or modified forms of) the gospels and attribute them wrongly to the apostles even as early as Luke's writings.

This quote from Luke may be a recognition of the potentially fake or modified gospel accounts circulating at that time. He may have been referring to that in an attempt to protect the truth and to prevent people from reading that which is not correct. He sent the letter to his colleagues in this light, perhaps. You should talk to a proper pastor or priest to get this clarified.

My personal belief (i.e. I have no evidence of this at all) is that when Satan saw that he and death were defeated on the Cross he continued the battle by starting to push lies and half-truths to try to invalidate the Cross in any way he could. A form of this fight was fake gospel accounts, both oral and written. In my view, Luke is commenting regarding other writing so that you know he took that fight straight to the devil and that Luke wrote down what he did in Truth.

Beyond my view, there is no shortage of early accounts that are different than the proper actual real four gospels. The church had to contend with these in setting up its cannon ...

The Story Of The Storytellers - The Emergence Of The Four Gospel Canon | From Jesus To Christ | FRONTLINE | PBS

This is the main point of this link: "But they did present views of Jesus, which make him very important and make the institutional church ..."
 
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JackRT

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One big unknown is how much of that would be available for investigation by this author while things are still fresh in people's minds.

My wife and I have been married 46 years and we find that our memories of the same events can be quite different. Eyewitness testimony of long ago events can be quite "iffy".
 
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timothyu

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The gospel stories existed in the oral tradition for four to six or seven decades before being written down by second or third generation Christians.
Agreed. It was the Jewish way along with scrolls which documented said oral history. The written word was not an exact copy of the oral tradition however, any more than our description of events today would be until put into the words of an essay or compacted journalistic record.
 
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timothyu

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My wife and I have been married 46 years and we find that our memories of the same events can be quite different. Eyewitness testimony of long ago events can be quite "iffy".
Definitely so, however one can usually depend on a female recollection of a male's unfortunate event to last forever.
 
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hedrick

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I don't exactly understand your point. Are you saying that those written words we read in those verses actually stem from a previous unwritten oral tradition? Because if that is the case then the words "I too decided to write" are plainly out of place.
I'm not quite sure what point you're making here. We don't know what "I too" refers to. It might well be Mark, maybe Matthew, but also other documents we don't have now. But these documents don't necessarily include all known information about Jesus. So Luke could certainly have used oral tradition that hadn't yet been written. The consensus is that two of his sources were written: Mark, and Q. But there's information that is only in Luke. It could have been previously unwritten oral material. And while Q is generally thought to have been written, it's conceivable that it wasn't.
 
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Norbert L

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My wife and I have been married 46 years and we find that our memories of the same events can be quite different. Eyewitness testimony of long ago events can be quite "iffy".
I can see that. One of the more vivid explanations I ran across was from a prosecuting attorney. When he reviewed eyewitness statements from a crime scene that was fresh in everyone's mind, he would read differing descriptions of the suspect. One person says he's 5 foot eleven while another claims he's 6 foot two. But they all agree he was a taller man.
 
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LittleLambofJesus

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There seems to be a source that Matthew and Luke have in common: (maybe just oral)
The Bible's two Christmas stories told in parallel
They both mention Bethlehem, Nazareth, David, Zerubbabel and his father Shealtiel, and that Mary was betrothed to marry Joseph.
Apparently a lot of Matthew and Luke is word-for-word from Mark and Mark is believed to have been written about 15 years before.
I think many verses in Matthew have the same wording as Mark (or at least I've heard this is the case with Luke and Mark)
JohnClay said:
It seems I'm unable to convince @Sanoy that he is mistaken about his beliefs so I was seeing if I can get Christians here to back me up.

My belief is that Matthew and Luke are based on Mark and maybe Q. I don't think Luke had access to the complete book of Matthew.

I thought it would be better to start a new topic about this.
Hello J C. Great thread and topic.

If I am not mistaken, it is also believed that Luke wrote the historical book of Acts and was a travel companion of the Apostle Paul.

Luke and Acts make up a fairly large portion of the NT, along with Saul/Paul's Epistles [He is introduced in Acts 7 at the event of the stoning of St Stephen:
Act 7:58 and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.
Luke 1:3 it seemed good also to me, having followed from the first after all things exactly, to write to thee in order, most noble Theophilus,

Acts 1:1
In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach

Authorship of Luke–Acts - Wikipedia

The authorship of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, collectively known as Luke–Acts, is an important issue for biblical exegetes who are attempting to produce critical scholarship on the origins of the New Testament. Traditionally, the text is believed to have been written by Luke the companion of Paul (named in Colossians 4:14). However, the earliest manuscripts are anonymous, and the traditional view has been challenged by many modern scholars.[1]
========================================
Strong's Concordance with Hebrew and Greek Lexicon
Strong's Concordance - Condensed Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon
OR Thayer's Greek Lexicon


2Ti 4:11
Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for ministry.
Phm 1:24
as do Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, Luke, my fellow laborers.
=======================================
Luke is my favorite Gospel, next to John, perhaps because I am a Gentile Christian?.

BABerean2 said: The Book of Matthew was addressed mainly to a Jewish audience. Jesus was telling the Jews of His time that something similar to 167 BC would happen during 70 AD
Luke’s Gospel was written to more of a Gentile audience, so he spelled it out for them.
Matthew 24:3and what the sign of Thy parousia<3952> and full-consummation<4930> of the Age?
Mark 13:4
Tell us! when these shall be?
and what the sign whenever may be being about<3195> all these to be fully-consummated<4931>.
Luke 21:7 And what the sign whenever may be being about<3195> these to becoming<1096>?
 
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yeshuaslavejeff

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It seems I'm unable to convince @Sanoy that he is mistaken about his beliefs so I was seeing if I can get Christians here to back me up.

My belief is that Matthew and Luke are based on Mark and maybe Q. I don't think Luke had access to the complete book of Matthew.

I thought it would be better to start a new topic about this.
According to all Scripture, in perfect harmony, Yahuweh Himself Inspired/ Breathed ALL SCRIPTURE through men of His Choosing and
DID NOT LEAVE the writing up to (NOT rely on) the thoughts nor ideas nor initiative nor any other part of man (nor of a man). Also, Plainly in all Scripture, The Spiritual Truth is not understandable to the mind of man/men/ of the flesh- unregenerate- the natural man.
 
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timothyu

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The Spiritual Truth is not understandable to the mind of man/men/ of the flesh
Used to have a problem with olde english but prefer it now over todays pc translations.
 
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