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Evangelicalism and the Synoptic Problem in the Early Nineteenth Century · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to Reformed Thinking. So I want you to picture
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something for a second If you were to sit down at your kitchen
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table this morning and you opened up three separate
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Independent newspaper articles reporting on a local City
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Council meeting. Right.
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Just a normal daily routine, yeah.
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But let's say you notice something strange.
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Entire paragraphs were shared, word for word, comma for comma.
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Across all three publications. Your brain would instinctively
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jump to a very specific conclusion.
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Oh, absolutely. You would assume plagiarism.
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Or, at the very least, you'd assume that all three
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journalists got the identical press release from the City
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Council and, you know, just copied and pasted it.
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Precisely. You certainly would not assume
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that three independent journalists sitting in three
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completely separate offices miraculously drafted the precise
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identical sentences in total isolation from one another.
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No. Of course not.
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Our minds just naturally recognize that when texts are
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identical, there's some sort of mechanism of sharing, copying,
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or mutual sourcing happening. But here's the thing.
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When we transition from the morning newspaper to the pages
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of the New Testament, that natural logical instinct often
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triggers a massive crisis of faith.
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It really does. When you read the Gospels of
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Matthew, Mark and Luke side by side, and this is especially
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true if you read them in the original Greek.
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You immediately see the startling, undeniable
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similarity. Whole sentences and sometimes
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entire paragraphs are virtually identical.
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Yet alongside those astonishing similarities, there are
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distinct, glaring differences. Right, like events being placed
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in completely different chronological orders, or certain
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details are added in one account and completely left out in
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another. So it begs the question, how did
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this happen? Did these ancient writers copy
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one another? Did they share a single prior
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text that has since been lost to history?
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Or did they work in total hermetically sealed isolation,
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with the Holy Spirit dictating identical Greek sentences to men
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sitting hundreds of miles apart? For anyone listening today who
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adheres to the Westminster Confession of Faith,
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understanding how God utilized human authors to produce the
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sacred text we hold in our hands is a vital, essential pursuit.
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I agree completely, and that is why we are taking a deep dive
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today into a really fascinating academic paper.
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It's by Michael Strickland, titled Evangelicalism and the
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Synoptic Problem in the Early 19th Century.
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And what makes this specific deep dive so compelling is the
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actual historical context surrounding the debate.
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It really is. I mean, if you grew up in a
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conservative church environment, you might assume that questions
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about biblical text sharing or copying are products of modern
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secular academia. Right.
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There's this common assumption among believers today that
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asking these questions implies A skeptical, liberal approach to
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the text, like it's all born out of the Enlightenment.
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But the paper we are looking at proves that assumption is
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historically inaccurate. Faithful conservative Protestant
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theologians were having intense, highly rigorous and sometimes
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vicious debates about this very issue over 2 centuries ago.
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So our mission today is to uncover how 3 distinct 19th
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century thinkers handled the origins of the Gospels.
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We want to understand what modern believers can learn from
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their approaches to Scripture. Because we are looking at an era
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where the theological stakes felt incredibly high, the
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battles over how the Bible was constructed were fought with a
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level of intensity that mirrors or maybe even exceeds our
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current cultural moment. Yeah, we are talking about
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scholars risking their careers and their reputations over how
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they interpreted the grammatical similarities between Matthew,
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Mark and Luke. So before we look at those
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specific 19th century figures, we probably need to clarify the
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parameters of what we are actually debating.
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Here good idea. We call this the synoptic
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problem. The word synoptic simply means
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seen together. Right, and it refers
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specifically to Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
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They share a common narrative perspective and outline.
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This is unlike the Gospel of John, which operates on a highly
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distinct theological and chronological framework.
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Today, in modern biblical scholarship, academics debate
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various theories to explain the similarities between the
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Synoptics. The most dominant theory today
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is the two source or four source hypothesis.
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And that theory basically argues that Mark was written first.
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It proposes that Matthew and Luke used Mark as their primary
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narrative spine. But because Matthew and Luke
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share a large amount of teaching material that is completely
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absent from Mark, like the Sermon on the Mount, for
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instance, scholars hypothesize an unknown, lost document.
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Right, usually called cue from the German word for source.
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Then you also have the for hypothesis, which.
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Agrees that Mark was written first, but it argues that Luke
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had access to both Mark and Matthew.
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So by suggesting Luke used Matthew directly, the forrer
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hypothesis removes the need to invent a hypothetical missing
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cue document. Yeah, and you also have the two
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Gospel hypothesis, sometimes called the Neo Griesbach
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hypothesis. This one flips the time line
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entirely. It argues Matthew was written
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first, Luke was second, and Mark was essentially condensed
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summary of the two. But we need to rewind the clock
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to the early 1800s for this deep dive.
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Back then, the primary academic competitors were very different,
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and the theological anxiety surrounding them was, well, it
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was palpable. It was in the early 19th
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century. The two main theories battling
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for supremacy were the Augustinian hypothesis and the
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Independence hypothesis. To really grasp the tension, we
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must define these clearly. The Augustinian hypothesis takes
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its name from Saint Augustine. Yeah, and it essentially follows
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the canonical order of the New Testament as it appears in your
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Bible today. It proposes that Matthew was
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written first, Mark was written second, utilizing Matthew as a.
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Source. And then Luke was written third,
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utilizing both Matthew and Mark. It assumes a direct linear chain
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of literary dependency. It openly acknowledges that the
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writers read each other. But on the opposing side, you
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had the independence hypothesis. This theory argues that there
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was absolutely no copying whatsoever.
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None at all. None.
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Matthew, Mark and Luke wrote their accounts in total absolute
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isolation from one another, and the independence hypothesis was
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the common default assumption for centuries of church history.
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Because for many theologians of that era, it just felt much
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safer to assume each gospel writer sat in a locked room,
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completely isolated from outside texts.
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Right. By isolating the writers, these
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theologians believe they were guaranteeing that each gospel
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was an untainted, original piece of testimony.
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I really want to pause on that concept of the locker room,
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actually, because it brings up a fascinating point for a Reformed
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Christian. Oh.
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Absolutely. Let's look at it through that
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lens. We adhere to the Westminster
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Confession, and chapter 3 of the Confessions states that God
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ordains whatsoever comes to pass, yet He does so in a way
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that second causes operate freely.
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Yes, and chapter 1 states that it pleased the Lord to commit
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His truth wholly unto writing. Exactly.
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I mean precisely. When we synthesize those
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concepts, we see that the method of how the Bible was written is
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a glorious study of God utilizing human authors.
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He uses them as second causes, with all their distinct
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personalities, historical contexts, and research methods.
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God's sovereignty does not obliterate human mechanics.
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It works through them. It guides them.
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Yet the independence hypothesis seems to stem from a genuine
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fear of that human element. Going back to our earlier
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analogy, if three independent journalists produce the
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identical paragraph about a City Council meeting, we know they
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shared notes. Right, it's just common sense.
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So why did early theologians resist this obvious logical
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conclusion when looking at the Gospels?
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What were they so terrified of losing if they admitted that
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Luke had a copy of Mark on his desk?
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Well, they resisted the logic because they tied the concept of
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divine inspiration directly to original unaided composition.
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Ah, I see. Yeah, in their minds, if Matthew
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copied a sentence from Mark, then Matthew is no longer an
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inspired eyewitness providing original supernatural testimony.
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She was reduced to a compiler and editor, or worse, a
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plagiarist. So the fear was entirely driven
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by apologetics. Yes, completely.
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They believe that literary dependency would open the door
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wide to skepticism. If the writers copied from each
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other, secular critics could legitimately argue that there
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was really only one original witness to the life of Jesus,
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rather than three independent corroborating verifications.
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To protect the courtroom credibility of the New
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Testament, they felt an absolute obligation to defend the total
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isolation of the authors. But as we will see through the
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figures in Strickland paper, ignoring those identical Greek
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paragraphs eventually became intellectually unsustainable,
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especially for thinkers who actually spent their lives
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translating and harmonizing the text.
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That reality brings us to our first historical figure.
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This was a man who decided to face those identical paragraphs
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head on rather than ignoring them or explaining them away
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with spiritualized rhetoric. Yes, let us consider John David
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McBride. He lived from 1778 to 1868.
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He was an Oxford scholar, a highly respected academic, and
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the principle of Magdalene Hall. In 1824, McBride published a
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massive, highly detailed work called Lectures Explanatory of a
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Dietesseron. And for those listening who
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might not be familiar with the term, a dietesseron is a gospel
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harmony. It's an attempt to blend the
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four distinct gospels into a single, seamless chronological
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narrative. Anyone who has ever attempted to
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study the timeline of Passion Week knows how hard that is.
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Or, you know, trying to reconcile John's placement of
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the temple cleansing at the beginning of Jesus's ministry
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with the Synoptics placing it at the end.
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Creating a harmony is an agonizingly intricate task.
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Oh, it's incredibly difficult. You are forcing 4 distinct
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theological portraits into one historical timeline.
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Now, McBride was not some secular liberal academic trying
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to tear the Bible apart for sport.
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His goal was entirely pastoral and evangelistic.
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Right. He explicitly stated in his
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writings that his objective was the edification of believers and
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the conversion of non believers. He strongly opposed the rising
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academic trend of his day, which treated the Bible like it was
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just another ancient classic of literature to be dissected and
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critiqued. McBride was a staunch, vigorous
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defender of the faith. He belonged to the old
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Evangelical School in England. However, when he set out to
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explain his gospel harmony to his students, young men
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embarking on divinity studies who would soon be preaching in
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pulpits across the country, he realized he could not hide from
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the synoptic problem. He had to address it honestly,
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so he looked at the three available options circulating in
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the academic sphere. Option one was independence,
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which is total isolation. Option 2 was a common document,
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meaning a shared missing master text.
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And option 3 was dependency. The author's actually copying
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from one another. McBride looked at the
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independence hypothesis and dismissed it almost immediately.
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Which is fascinating because he acknowledged that independence
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was still the most common popular opinion of his day among
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the lady. But McBride knew the Greek text
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too well. The glaring verbal similarities
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between the Synoptics were too massive, too precise, and too
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sustained over a long narrative blocks to ignore.
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Yeah, to McBride, asserting total independence in the face
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of identical multi clause Greek paragraphs was an abdication of
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basic common sense and intellectual honesty.
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So if he dismisses independence, he is left with two choices.
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Either the gospel writers shared an outside document or they
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copied from each other. Right.
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So he looks closely at the common document theory next.
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This was the theory heavily promoted by German critics of
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the time, figures like Eichorn and Marsh.
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The German higher critics suggested there was a master
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document, perhaps written in Aramaic or early Greek, floating
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around early Christianity that Matthew, Mark and Luke all
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independently toppied from. But McBride dismisses this
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entirely, and his reasoning is really interesting from a
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historical perspective. He rejects it because no such
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master document is ever mentioned by any early church
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father in antiquity. That is a solid point.
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Nobody in the first few centuries of the Church.
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Not Irenaeus, not Tertullian, not Eusebius ever talks about a
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master template that the apostles used.
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Furthermore, the German idea relied heavily on the assumption
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that unknown, unnamed anonymous disciples compiled this master
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document before the Gospels were written.
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And for McBride, trusting the absolute bedrock of the
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Christian faith to hypothetical, unknown, invisible compilers
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felt highly improbable and honestly, spiritually reckless.
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His elimination process was incredibly rigorous.
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By removing independence and removing the common document
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theory, the bride was left with option 3, dependency.
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He concluded that the Augustinian hypothesis, Matthew
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writing first, then Mark, then Luke, with later writers
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actively utilizing the earlier manuscripts, was the most
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logical, historically sound conclusion.
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It preserved the named Apostolic authorship of the texts.
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It aligned perfectly with the canonical order the Church had
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recognized for centuries. And it logically explained the
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identical Greek paragraphs without having to invent
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hypothetical missing documents that nobody had ever actually
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seen. But what makes McBride so
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significant in the scope of Strickland's Patriot is how he
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handled the intense theological pushback from his conservative
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peers. Yeah, he had to face down the
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arguments of earlier highly respected apologists,
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specifically a man named Nathaniel Lardner.
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Lardner had forcefully and publicly argued that if the
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gospel writers copied from each other, it drastically diminished
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their value as witnesses to the resurrection.
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I think we should break down that specific argument against
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Lardner because it feels so incredibly relevant to how we
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handle apologetics and pastoral work today.
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Let's do it. Think about a modern church
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context. If a faithful pastor quotes a
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highly reliable, heavily researched theological
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commentary in a Sunday morning sermon, we do not accuse that
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pastor of lacking the Holy Spirit.
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No, not. At all.
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We do not stand up in the pews and shout that his sermon is
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unspiritual or invalid just because he utilized the
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historical research of a prior scholar.
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We naturally recognize that God works through that research,
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illuminating the pastor's mind through the study of existing
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texts. So why did Lardner think copying
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or utilizing a prior text was so inherently dangerous to the
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authority of the Bible? Well, Lardner was operating
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entirely on a rigid courtroom paradigm.
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In a criminal courtroom, IF3 witnesses take the stand and
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corroborate a story perfectly, their testimony is only
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considered convincing if the jury believes they have not
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colluded. Right.
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If the defense attorney proves that the three witnesses got
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together in a coffee shop the night before and rehearse their
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statements to match, the jury immediately dismisses the
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testimony as a fabrication. Exactly.
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Lardner applied that strict 18th century legal standard directly
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to the ancient Gospels. He believed that any proof of
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text sharing was proof of collusion, which would destroy
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the credibility of the entire New Testament.
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But McBride fired back at this logic brilliantly.
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He advised his divinity students that an unwillingness to admit
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certain consequences cannot justify rejecting a well
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supported opinion before mature consideration.
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In simpler terms, McBride told his students, just because you
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are terrified of how a skeptical critic might weaponize a piece
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of data against you, that does not give you permission to deny
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the reality of the data. The verbal similarities in the
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Greek text are real. They exist.
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We must deal with them honestly, rather than hiding behind a
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false theory of independence just because it feels safer in a
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theoretical courtroom debate. That is a phenomenal principle
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for any believer engaging with textual history.
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You cannot suppress truth to protect a theological system.
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True theology must encompass all the facts.
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McBride also pointed out something brilliant regarding
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the differences between the texts.
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He argued that the discrepancies between the Gospels actually
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prove his point about dependency.
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How so? Well, if Mark was just
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mindlessly, robotically copying Matthew to ensure a uniform
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story, he would have transcribed everything perfectly.
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He would have smoothed out all the chronological bumps.
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But there are differences. Right, there are obvious
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variations in detail and phrasing.
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For McBride, these variations prove that the writers were
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intelligent adapters, not mirror photocopiers.
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They were relying on additional independent sources of
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information. Perhaps they were using their
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own eyewitness memories or conducting interviews with other
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surviving apostles and blending that fresh data with the
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existing written accounts. Yeah, and McBride viewed this
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highly active editorial process as enhancing the credibility of
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the text. He argued that one gospel
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supplies the deficiencies of the others, and the reader, seeing
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this intelligent compilation, becomes even more convinced of
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the overall credibility and historical reality of the
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narrative. McBride managed to find a very
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comfortable harmony between rigorous academic logic,
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historical reality, and his steadfast faith in the
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inspiration of Scripture. He proved to his students that
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you could fully embrace literary dependency.
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You could admit that Luke read Mark without losing a single
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ounce of reverence for the nature of the Bible.
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He showed that God's Providence encompasses the research and the
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reading habits of the biblical authors.
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However, as Strickland's paper details with striking clarity,
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not everyone possessed McBride's intellectual calm.
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No, they certainly didn't. While McBride embraced the data
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in the quiet academic halls of Oxford, across the English
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Channel, another figure viewed this entire intellectual
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exercise as an absolute spiritual hazard.
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A fire that threatened to burn down the entire Christian faith,
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basically. Which leads us right to the
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friction and the panic of our second historical figure, Louis
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Gosson. He lived from 1790 to 1863.
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Gosson was a Swiss Calvinist operating out of Geneva.
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By all accounts, he was a man who possessed an intense love
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for his faith, so much so that he actually lost his pastoral
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position at Sadnier in 1831. He was ousted due to his fervent
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evangelical activities and his strict refusal to compromise his
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theological principles with the increasingly liberal national
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church authorities in Switzerland.
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He later took a teaching position at a newly founded
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independent evangelical school of theology called the Ortoir.
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Gosson was a fighter, honestly. He was, and he wrote a major
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influential work called Theo Nusti, which dealt
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comprehensively with the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures.
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And platery inspiration, for those unfamiliar, is the belief
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that all parts of the Bible are equally inspired by God.
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In this specific book, Gaussen viciously attacked the very idea
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of investigating the synoptic problem.
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He saw the entire academic field of textual comparison as a
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localized manifestation of spiritual warfare.
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Gaussen genuinely believed that asking the basic question Did
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the evangelists treat each other?
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Was fundamentally improper and honestly borderline blasphemous.
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He looked at the scholars who dedicated their lives to this
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textual comparison, men like Mill, Hug, Lardner, Michaelis,
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and Icorn, regardless of whether they were conservative or
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liberal, and he gave them a rather colorful, biting label.
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Oh yes, he called them the astrologers of theology.
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The. Astrologers of theology in the
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context of 19th century academic writing.
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That is a really vicious insult. It was meant to be entirely
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dismissive and deeply insulting. Astrology, as we know, is a
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pseudoscience. It involves looking at physical
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data, the stars in the sky, and drawing ridiculous fictional and
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superstitious conclusions about human destiny.
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So by calling these scholars astrologers, Gossan was claiming
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that comparing gospel text to find literary dependency was not
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just an enormous loss of time, but a complete delusion.
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Worse, he argued that this academic practice actively LED
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young divinity students to lose their faith.
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He stated unequivocally that these idle, speculative pursuits
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teach men to doubt where God teaches them to believe.
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For Gossen, the physical mechanics of how to text came
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together in history were entirely off limits for human
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investigation. If we're going to understand
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Gossen, we need to understand the theological root of his
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panic. It was not just general baseline
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conservatism. Right.
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It was a highly specific, extremely rigid view of how God
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interacts with humanity, Gosson held to a strict dictation
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theory of inspiration. In his book he wrote in French,
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the scriptures are the word of God.
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They are dictated by him. He believed that the apostle
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Luke received his gospel directly from the Holy Ghost, in
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the exact identical manner that Moses received the account of
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the creation of the world. Stop and think about the
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implications of that for a second.
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Moses was obviously not present at the creation of the universe.
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He could not interview Adam or the angels or anyone who was
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there. No, He had to receive that
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historical information via direct divine impartation.
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God had to reveal it from the heavens.
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But Gaussen is arguing that Luke, who literally tells us in
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the 1st 4 verses of his first chapter that he interviewed
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eyewitnesses, consulted prior written accounts, and
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investigated everything carefully, was operating
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identically to Moses at Sinai. He is essentially saying Luke's
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introduction about doing historical research is
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irrelevant because the Holy Spirit just dictated the words
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into Luke's mind anyway. You have pinpointed the massive,
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flawing Gaussen's theology there.
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He forced a rigid philosophical paradigm onto the text that the
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text itself openly rejects. Luke openly declares his human
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methodology. He acknowledges the existence of
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prior written accounts. He acknowledges his own human
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research and his interviews with ministers of the word.
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But Gaussen's theological framework was so incredibly
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rigid, so defensive against liberal skepticism, that he
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could not allow human agency to play any meaningful role in the
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composition process. In Gaussen's mind, human
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research equates to human frailty.
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If you admit that Luke relied on a human interview or a human
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document, you invite the possibility of human error.
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Therefore, to protect the biblical text from the slightest
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possibility of error, Gaussen felt compelled to erase the
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human research entirely. He substituted it with a
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supernatural event of divine dictation.
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Looking at this through a reformed lens, relying on the
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principles laid out in the Westminster Confession, Gosson's
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view is genuinely problematic, despite his sincere intentions.
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It really is the confession affirms that God uses the
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distinct styles, vocabularies, and cultural backgrounds of the
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human authors. The divine authorship does not
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obliterate the human authorship. It works concurrently through
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it, elevating it without destroying its nature.
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Did Gaussen's intense fear of secular academia push him into a
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theological corner where he effectively erased the human
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element of Scripture entirely? It feels very similar to a hyper
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protective parent forbidding a child from learning basic
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biology out of a terrifying, irrational fear that learning
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about cellular division and DNA might cause the child to stop
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believing that God created human life.
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That is a great comparison. The fear of the mechanism
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destroys the wonder of the creation.
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That analogy captures the tragic dynamic of Gosson's ministry
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perfectly. His intense fear led him to
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isolate his students from historical reality.
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Think about the practical results of his teaching.
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If a young student at the orator is taught that inspiration
23:13
requires mechanical dictation, what happens the moment that
23:17
student eventually sits down, reads Matthew and Mark side by
23:20
side in Greek, and notices the slight grammatical variations?
23:24
Their faith shatters. It breaks into 1000 pieces
23:26
because their faith was built on a demonstrably false premise.
23:30
Golson thought he was protecting the Christian faith by building
23:32
a fortress of dictation around it, but he was actually setting
23:35
up a highly fragile, brittle system that could not withstand
23:39
basic textual observation. Strickland's paper also
23:42
highlights a fascinating historical error Gaussen made
23:46
while he was busy launching these attacks against other
23:48
scholars. It shows how blinding his
23:50
ideology truly was. Right.
23:52
Gaussen quoted a Scottish Bishop named George Glade aggressively
23:56
attacking him for his views on shared documents among the
23:59
Gospel writers. But Gaussen actually
24:02
misattributed the quote. It was originally written by an
24:04
entirely different man named John Randolph.
24:07
Furthermore, Randolph had argued that the shared document among
24:10
the Gospel writers was not a physical papyrus, but simply the
24:13
oral preaching of Jesus. They all relied on the same
24:17
reliable, heavily repeated oral tradition that circulated in the
24:21
early church. But Gaussen, so blinded by his
24:24
dictation theory, mistakenly thought Randolph meant the
24:27
dictated words of the Holy Spirit.
24:29
Gaussen literally could not even conceive of a natural historical
24:33
mechanism like shared oral tradition.
24:35
In his mind, every shared element, every matching phrase
24:38
had to be a supernatural dictation event falling from the
24:41
sky. It is a massive warning about
24:44
how a rigid ideological framework can blind a person to
24:48
what their opponents are actually saying.
24:50
Galson attacked the mechanism of gospel origins because he saw
24:53
the mechanism itself as an existential threat to
24:55
inspiration. But while he was launching these
24:58
defensive broadsides from his post in Geneva, across the
25:01
English Channel, a brilliant Cambridge scholar was proving
25:05
the historical reliability of the Gospels by looking at the
25:08
most accidental, mundane details of the text.
25:12
And this scholar essentially rendered the entire panic debate
25:15
over copying completely moot. This brings us to a refreshing
25:18
shift in perspective with John James Blunt.
25:21
He lived from 1784 to 1855. He held the prestigious
25:25
possession of Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity at
25:27
Cambridge. In 1829, Blunt published a book
25:30
with a highly descriptive, brilliant title, The Veracity of
25:33
the Gospels, and Acts argued from the undesigned
25:35
coincidences. Blunt approached the biblical
25:37
text from a completely different angle than either McBride or
25:40
Gosson. He was not trying to build a
25:42
massive top down structural theory of dependency like
25:45
McBride, mapping out exactly who copied whom.
25:48
And he certainly was not terrified of the text's human
25:51
origins. Like Gosson, Blunt decided to
25:54
hunt for minor, unplanned, incidental differences that
25:58
corroborate the broader truth of the historical narrative.
26:01
The concept of an undesigned coincidence is an absolute
26:04
stroke of apologetic genius. It really is Blunt argued that
26:08
when you have genuine independent witnesses to a real
26:11
historical event, their testimonies will naturally lock
26:14
together in ways that are far too subtle, too minor and too
26:18
incidental to be planned or fabricated.
26:21
If people are lying, they coordinate the big details
26:23
details. If people are telling the truth
26:25
from different vantage points, the minor details will interlock
26:28
perfectly without any obvious effort to make them fit.
26:31
Strickland's paper highlights a specific brilliant example from
26:34
Blunt's work regarding the calling of Levi, the tax
26:38
collector who is also known as Matthew.
26:40
I love this specific example because it illuminates human
26:42
nature so well. Let us lay this out carefully
26:44
for the listener. In Mark chapter 2 verse 15 and
26:47
Luke chapter 5 verse 29, the writers describe Jesus having a
26:50
large dinner gathering immediately after calling Levi
26:53
from the Max booth. Both Mark and Luke state that
26:56
Jesus went to eat at his house, meaning Levi's house.
27:00
They explicitly identify the owner of the property for the
27:03
reader, but when you look at Matthew's own personal account
27:07
of the exact same event located in Matthew Chapter 9 verse 9, he
27:11
also simply writes that Jesus ate in the house.
27:14
Blunt points out that this seemingly insignificant minor
27:17
shift in vocabulary is incredibly revealing.
27:20
It reveals the personal, authentic, eyewitness nature of
27:23
Matthews account. Think about basic human
27:25
psychology and how we speak in our daily lives.
27:28
A homeowner naturally refers to his own residence simply as the
27:31
house. Right.
27:32
If I'm hosting a dinner party at my own table, I do not tell my
27:35
friends I am eating dinner at the host's house.
27:37
I just say I'm eating in the house or come over to the house.
27:39
Mark and Luke, writing his outside observers describing
27:42
someone else's property needed to specify whose house it was so
27:46
the reader would not be confused.
27:48
Matthew, writing about his own property, naturally defaulted to
27:52
his own personal phrasing. Blunt argued that this tiny,
27:56
seemingly insignificant detail is an undesigned coincidence.
28:00
It is a marker of authenticity that verifies the historical
28:03
reality of the dinner and the identity of the author.
28:06
This is where Blunt's contribution to the synoptic
28:09
problem becomes so revolutionary for believers.
28:12
Blunt stated that whether the evangelists copied each other or
28:15
read each other's manuscripts is a matter of comparative
28:18
indifference. He argued that the undesigned
28:20
coincidences are such that they absolutely could not result from
28:23
mutual arrangement or collusion. Think about it.
28:26
If Matthew, Mark and Luke sat down in a locked room in
28:29
Jerusalem to fabricate a fake religion, they would not
28:33
engineer a highly subtle psychological discrepancy about
28:35
the freezing of his house versus the house just to trick future
28:40
historians living thousands of years later.
28:42
Fabricators do not think like that.
28:45
Blunt recognized a fundamental truth.
28:47
Truths known independently by the authors must be at the
28:50
bottom of documents having such organic discrepancies and
28:53
agreements. By focusing intently on these
28:56
undesigned coincidences, Blunt bypassed the terror that utterly
29:00
paralyzed Gossen. Blunt essentially said to the
29:03
academic world, Let the secular adversaries of Christianity
29:06
insist that the writers copied from one another.
29:09
Let them have that point. Let us concede that Luke had
29:13
Mark scroll on his desk. It does not matter.
29:15
The underlying independence of the eyewitness testimony is
29:18
firmly secured by the subtle markers that prove separate
29:22
intimate knowledge of the substantial facts.
29:24
It is a lot like a modern police investigation, isn't it?
29:26
If a detective brings 3 witnesses into an interrogation
29:29
room and they give the exact same word for word testimony
29:32
regarding a bank robbery, the detective immediately suspects
29:35
collusion. The witnesses align their
29:38
stories to hide something. But if the witnesses describe
29:40
the same event, a car crash at a busy intersection, but one
29:44
describes the awful screeching sound of the tires, 1 describes
29:48
the bright red color of the bumper, and one happens to
29:51
mention that the street light was flickering right before the
29:54
impact. Those slight variations actually
29:57
prove they were all standing at the intersection witnessing a
30:00
real event. The variations do not diminish
30:03
the truth of the crash. They established the reality of
30:06
it. Blunt is providing A bulletproof
30:08
alternative that makes the entire academic debate less
30:11
threatening. He is radically changing the
30:13
focal point of the defense. Instead of arguing over the
30:16
architectural blueprints of how the building was constructed,
30:19
which is what the synoptic problem debate is, Blunt is
30:22
examining the foundation stones and proving they are solid
30:25
granite. He is giving believers full
30:27
permission to look at the synoptic problem as an
30:29
interesting, complex historical puzzle rather than an
30:32
existential threat to their salvation.
30:34
If the veracity of the Gospels rest on the organic reality of
30:37
undesigned coincidences, then believers do not need to panic.
30:41
If archaeologists or linguists discover that Luke utilized
30:44
Mark's manuscript, the truth of the event remains pristine,
30:48
regardless of the editorial compilation process.
30:51
Blunt's calm assertion that the exact method of compilation does
30:54
not threaten the truth of the biblical text provides a perfect
30:57
logical transition to our final section.
30:59
Because as we jump forward from the 1800s to the modern era, we
31:03
discovered that modern Christians handle this identical
31:06
debate today in ways that eerily, almost frighteningly,
31:11
mirror these 19th century figures.
31:13
You would logically think that after 200 years of intense
31:16
textual analysis, manuscript discoveries and archaeological
31:19
digs, the anxiety over this issue would have evaporated.
31:22
But Strickland's paper shows that the anxiety is alive and
31:24
well. The historical continuity is
31:26
genuinely striking. Many modern evangelicals still
31:30
exhibit the exact same attitudes, fears and
31:32
methodologies we saw in McBride, Galson and Blunt.
31:35
Consider a prominent modern scholar like Robert L Thomas.
31:39
He has publicly claimed that the best, most faithful response to
31:43
the synoptic problem is saying that the problem simply does not
31:46
exist. He advocates for a total
31:49
absolute retreat into the independence hypothesis,
31:52
demanding we ignore the identical Greek paragraphs
31:55
entirely. Then you have a figure like Ada
31:57
Linaman. Her story is fascinating.
31:59
She was actually a highly successful, widely published
32:02
liberal biblical critic early in her career in Germany, fully
32:06
utilizing historical critical methods.
32:09
But upon her conversion to conservative Christianity, she
32:12
later renounced those methods entirely.
32:14
She argued that scholars who use these historical methods to
32:17
study gospel origins naturally diverge from simple faith in
32:21
God's Word. Listening to her rhetoric, it is
32:23
almost as if the ghost of Louis Gosson is speaking.
32:25
In the 21st century. It is the exact same fear, the
32:29
fear that investigating the mechanism destroys the magic of
32:32
the inspiration. And then Strickland brings up a
32:35
modern scholar named F David Farnell.
32:37
Farnell strongly advocates for the independence hypothesis
32:40
today. But he goes a step further in
32:42
his rhetoric, claiming that the very concept of literary
32:46
dependence, the idea that the gospel writers copied from each
32:49
other or shared notes, is a liberal ideology born entirely
32:54
from the Enlightenment. He argues that admitting any
32:56
form of literary dependence denigrates the historical
32:59
accuracy of the Gospels and capitulates to secular humanism.
33:02
But the source text points out a massive, undeniable historical
33:06
blind spot in Farnell's argument.
33:08
Farnell builds his entire case on the assumption that literary
33:11
dependence is a modern liberal Enlightenment invention designed
33:15
to destroy the Bible. However, long before the
33:18
Enlightenment ever occurred in Europe, conservative theological
33:21
stalwarts openly, casually accepted dependency theories.
33:25
Martin Kemnitz, A towering 16th century Lutheran theologian
33:29
whose orthodoxy is unquestioned, accepted that the writers
33:32
utilized prior texts. 17th century Puritans men like
33:36
Sidorak Simpson and Francis Roberts accepted it in their
33:39
writings. These were men who held
33:40
incredibly high rigorous views of biblical inspiration, yet
33:45
they had absolutely no theological problem believing
33:47
the gospel. Writers utilized prior texts
33:50
texts to compile their narratives.
33:53
Farnell's argument that literary dependence is an inherently
33:56
liberal concept simply fails the basic test of historical fact.
34:01
This historical amnesia brings us to a crucial warning from
34:04
Craig Blomberg, a highly respected modern New Testament
34:08
scholar, which Strickland includes.
34:10
Toward the end of the paper, Blomberg writes.
34:12
One dare not favor of you just because it is apologetically
34:16
convenient. We really need to unpack that
34:18
sentence carefully. As Christians who claim to love
34:20
the truth, picking the easiest argument rather than the most
34:23
historically accurate argument is intellectually dishonest.
34:27
The independence hypothesis is incredibly convenient for a
34:29
quick apologetics debate. It is neat.
34:31
It is tidy. It gives you 3 completely
34:33
isolated witnesses to present to a skeptic.
34:35
But if the textual data, those undeniable identical Greek
34:39
paragraphs, shouts the writer shared material, then clinging
34:42
to the convenient theory is a rejection of truth.
34:45
It is fundamentally a matter of intellectual integrity.
34:48
If we believe the God of the Bible is the God of ultimate
34:51
truth, then we must follow the truth wherever the historical
34:55
and textual evidence leads. Even if it makes our apologetic
34:58
models more complicated, messier, or harder to explain in
35:02
a 5 minute debate. This is where Conrad Gemp's
35:04
conclusion in the paper is so vital for the modern listener.
35:08
Jim rightly points out that having the correct academic
35:11
position on the synoptic problem is not grounds for anyone's
35:14
salvation. Your eternal destiny is not
35:17
testing on whether you hold the two source hypothesis, the four
35:20
hypothesis or the Augustinian hypothesis.
35:23
But, Jemf argues, Christians are called to use their minds.
35:26
We should use our God-given intellect to answer tough
35:29
questions honestly, not run from them in fear.
35:31
So how do we, as believers listening today, strike that
35:34
vital balance? How do we hold on to our
35:36
absolute reverence for the sacred text without turning into
35:39
Louis Gassin, terrified of the astrologers of theology and
35:42
hiding from the Greek data? How do we engage with rigorous
35:46
critical scholars without losing the core Orthodox tenets of our
35:50
faith? We do it by synthesizing the
35:53
best elements of the men we have studied.
35:54
Today, we adopt John David McBride's open, fearless
35:58
acceptance of historical reality and human adaptation.
36:02
Trusting that God's Providence works seamlessly through normal
36:05
historical processes like research and editing.
36:08
We heed Louis Gaussen's underlying sincere desire to
36:11
protect the authority of Scripture while firmly rejecting
36:15
his fear driven, dictation based methodology.
36:18
And we rely heavily on John James Blunt's brilliant focus on
36:22
underlying veracity, recognizing that the organic, messy,
36:25
undeniably human details of the text are actually the greatest,
36:29
most compelling proof of its divine origin.
36:31
We have covered a massive historical arc today.
36:34
We have tracked through the quiet, rigorous 19th century
36:37
halls of Oxford with McBride. We walk the tense, defensive
36:40
streets of Geneva with Gelsen. And we sat in the brilliant
36:43
analytical lecture halls of Cambridge with Blunt.
36:46
You've seen how faithful conservative believers have
36:48
wrestled intensely with the origins of the Gospels for
36:50
centuries. The synoptic problem is not some
36:53
new secular attack launched by modern atheists.
36:57
It is an old, rigorous family discussion about how our secret
37:00
text actually came to be. And understanding that deep
37:03
history grants us an incredible amount of freedom.
37:06
It frees us from the panic that so often accompanies new
37:09
archaeological discoveries, new papyrus fragments, or new
37:13
academic textual theories. We stand on the sturdy shoulders
37:16
of theologians who face these identical questions, stared at
37:20
the exact same identical Greek paragraphs, and found their
37:22
faith strengthened, not shattered, by the honest
37:26
inquiry. Let me leave you with a final
37:27
thought to Mull over as we close.
37:29
What if the very human, gritty, time consuming process of
37:33
compiling, researching, interviewing eyewitnesses and
37:35
adapting prior documents was the precise mechanism God ordained
37:39
from eternity past to produce the divine text?
37:42
It is a fascinating question. What if recognizing the human
37:45
fingerprints on the Gospels does not diminish their divine
37:48
origin, but actually highlights how God operates within human
37:52
history? He does not bypass our humanity.
37:54
He redeems it, He utilizes our minds, and he uses our
37:57
historical processes to communicate his truth to the
38:00
world. Thank you for joining us on this
38:02
deep dive on reformed thinking.