The Anonymous Gospel Manuscripts

[athrock]

If the gospels were in circulation for many years before they were ascribed to the authors whose names they now bear, shouldn't there be copies of the original documents bearing no name at all?

Okay that's a reasonable question. You can't expect us laypeople to answer it for you, you need to ask a new testament scholar. As you haven't done this, I'll have a guess for you. The writings were not in immediate circulation, they began circulation after a few decades of being written, sometime in the second century. We know from the records of early church fathers that the belief of who the gospel writers were was in place by early-mid second century, thus we can reasonably assume that the titles were added to the documents before this time. It's true that every early manuscript of the gospels that includes the first page has the title on it, but it's also true that it's not a part of the manuscript itself. I.e. the author didn't identify himself in the same way that Paul, James, and Jude do.

Aractus, I thank you for your thoughtful response to my OP. It is a pleasure interacting with someone who is actually interested in genuine dialogue.

I take issue with your statement that the writings were not in immediate circulation. Paul himself gave specific instructions that show the opposite to be the case:

Colossians 4:16
16 After this letter has been read to you, see that it is also read in the church of the Laodiceans and that you in turn read the letter from Laodicea.

From this, we can see that Paul EXPECTED his letters to circulate, and that there were letters of his that were not canonized. After all, we have no Letter to the Laodiceans in the NT.

Additionally, I'm no scholar, but it is my understanding that when scribes completed a document (Paul composed his letters orally and only occasionally attached a greeting in his own handwriting), a second copy was made immediately so that the contents were not lost.

I agree that the ECF's certainly were referencing the names of the gospel writers by the mid-second centure, but I would push that even earlier for the reasons I gave to Jormungandr in a post above. And remember, Papias was a disciple of John, so the apostolic origin of this confirmation of authorship is almost certain.

If the gospels were in circulation for many years before they were ascribed to the authors whose names they now bear, shouldn't there be copies of the original documents bearing no name at all? And shouldn't some existing manuscripts show evidence of having been altered to include the authors' names later as was the case with the word "Chrestianos" in Tacitus' Annals?

No, not necessarily. As I mentioned, we have no page-1's from any gospels written before their known author-attribution in the early-mid second century.

And as we have no page-1's earlier than late second century, we wouldn't expect any of them to be altered to include the "author's" name.

Then what do you make of the writings of Papias? Did he simply make all this up? I think this unlikely since the ECF's were quite keen on passing on what they had been taught VERY faithfully.

I also consider it unlikely that the early Christians went to mass on Sunday morning and someone stood up and said, "A reading from the Holy Gospel according to...um...someone."

The early Church KNEW who the authors were. And why is this most probable? Because spurious and forged letters were KNOWN even during Paul's lifetime:

2 Thessalonians 2:1-3
Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, 2 not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter—asserting that the day of the Lord has already come.

IOW, Paul is saying, "Don't be alarmed by some letter that is allegedly from me." Why would he say that if there were no reason to be on guard against false letters? So, the Early Church was VERY keen on knowing the authorship of the letters and gospels that it considered genuine.

Make sense?

And if the gospels were written and circulated anonymously throughout the near East, North Africa and the Mediterranean basin among dozens if not hundreds of local churches, wouldn't that require some effort by someone to ensure the standardization of these new names of the gospels on every single flyleaf of every single manuscript in every single church in all of Christendom? If so,

No, not at all. That's a complete misconception - there are a number of textual traditions that scholars have identified in early manuscripts (I'm thinking more narrow than "Byzantine" type etc), however they all converge at one point. What we don't know - and what you certainly don't know - is precisely what happened between AD50 and AD130. What I think happened is that the Jerusalem church was completely destroyed by 70AD. No significant early church leader is known, or even thought to have lived beyond this time. Even in official church records from the second century they are all believed dead before then. This includes: Jesus, Judas, James, Joseph, Peter, Luke, Paul, Barnabas, John, and every single person of importance in the New Testament. The church rebuilt itself after this, but not from Jerusalem. From the Syrian and other "gentile" regions.

You've omitted John (he was in Ephesus), Clement (he was in Rome), and a boatload of other folks named in the New Testament who were either scattered by the persecution that broke out after the day of Pentecost or who were not actually from Jerusalem to begin with (such as Priscilla, Aquila and Apollos). Since Clement is named in one of Paul's letters AND considered the fourth bishop of Rome, I don't think the idea of "rebuilding" is correct. It is more correct that the center of the Church shifted from Jerusalem to the heart of the Empire.

More to the point, Papias was born in AD 70, and he was a disciple of John. Consequently, when he tells us who the authors of the gospels were based on what he heard from John (and others presumably), then I think we CAN know what what happening between AD 50 and AD 130). He and others (such as Clement, Ignatius, Polycarp and Justin Martyr) tell us.

When and how was this naming accomplished, and is there any written record of this project being ordered, undertaken and completed?

No one knows exactly. That doesn't make one theory more valid than another, but the evidence is not very strong for the supposed authors of "Matthew", "Mark", and "John". Let me explain why, but first let's take care of Luke. It is quite likely the author of Luke-Acts is Luke the physician, an associate of Paul's. This comes from the fact that he leaves himself out of events in Acts that he would have been present in. However, as it has been pointed out to me, there is another possibility that is just as likely and that is that Luke-Acts was written by a close associate of Luke. I'm comfortable enough to say it was Luke and it makes not much difference if it was Luke himself or one of his close associates (the only difference it makes is how well the author of Luke-Acts knew Paul - if Luke he knew Paul personally and knew him well, and if an associate of Luke then he may not have known Paul himself).

This may be the first time in my life that I'm going to invoke "Occam's Razor" since I think folks often do so to avoid considering all alternatives thoroughly. However, does it REALLY make sense to add a second anonymous person into the mix? Why stop there? Why not assert that it was actually a friend of someone who knew Luke? Or a friend of a friend of a friend of Luke? This would enable the skeptic to cast doubt on Luke-Acts completely.

See my point? Of all the gospels, Lucan authorship is probably the least contested.

The implausibility of Matthean and Markan authorship should not need to be explained to you. Mark is supposedly written by an associate of Peter's. Even if Peter was still alive when Mark was written, it's clear that the author is not an eyewitness of Jesus or someone who is closely associated with such a person. In fact Mark has literacy dependence on pre-existing material, just as Luke and Matthew have literacy dependence on Mark as well as at least one other source.

Papias states that according to John the Elder, Mark was an associate of Peter and wrote down Peter's sayings - though not necessarily in the correct order. Luke, therefore, made an effort to write an "orderly" account.

Matthean authorship has the same issue - if Matthew was a prominent disciple of Jesus then he wouldn't need literacy dependence on Mark (who wasn't) and whatever other document or documents he was using.

No, but that doesn't mean that he didn't copy from Mark in order to save time. Why re-invent the wheel, ya know?

Luke - well no one's claiming he sat down and had lunch with any disciples, and in the introduction of his gospel he states that he's used pre-existing material to complete his work.

Actually, that's EXACTLY what is claimed. Luke would have known Peter (he and Paul were both imprisoned in Rome), he probably met numerous other apostles during Paul's missionary journey's, and it is almost certain that he got much of his infancy narrative directly from Mary.

The Gospel of John - much like the books of the Pentateuch such as Genesis and Exodus - has at least three different authors.

Which is not quite the same as saying that the Apostle John (the unnamed disciple in several passages) was not involved in the authorship of the gospel which bears his name.