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Summary the dispute (RetProf)

Summary of the dispute (PiCo)

Slow down

I wasn't asking for a summary of the dispute, and I certainly wasn't asking for walls of text. Please keep your responss succinct and answers the questions I'm actually asking. Now Ret.Prof, you mentioned that the "Hebrew Gospel hypothesis" is a made-up term. Does everyone else agree that this term does not appear in the source record? Andrevan@ 00:27, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• No. Hebrew gospel hypothesis, or proto-gospel hypothesis, is a scholarly term. Not clear to me what you mean by the "source record".PiCo (talk) 00:30, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

  Can you link me to multiple references for each term? Andrevan@ 00:32, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I have never seen "Hebrew gospel hypothesis" used in a reliable source. - Ret.Prof (talk) 00:37, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Bo Reike's essay outlines the four hypotheses on the origin of the synoptic gospels (opens on page 52, but see pages 51-52). He calls it the proto-gospel hypothesis. Edwards calls it the Hebrew gospel hypothesis, and he's probably the main proponent today.PiCo (talk) 00:48, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Not really... there are some scholars that on rare occasions us the term "Hebrew Gospel" and later use "hypothesis". ie Edwards But I have never found any scholar that used the "Hebrew Gospel hypothesis" as a term or a title. - Ret.Prof (talk) 01:00, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have to disagree - Edwards is calling his theory a Hebrew gospel hypothesis. PiCo (talk) 01:02, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• I don't think anyone here would disagree to changing the name of the article to "Hebrew gospel (hypothesis)" since "Hebrew gospel hypothesis" is being interpreted as a single term. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 01:08, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Hebrew gospel hypothesis, proto-gospel hypothesis, Aramaic Matthew, Original Matthew, and no doubt others, are all terms to describe the same idea, that there was once a gospel in Hebrew that served as a source for the authors of the gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke (not John). This matters only because RetProf is championing one particular version of the larger hypothesis, and misreading his secondary sources while doing it.PiCo (talk) 01:16, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I think we can agree that "Hebrew Gospel hypothesis" should not be a part of the Gospel of Matthew. However the the testimony of Papias is an important part of this article and should be included from NPOV . - Ret.Prof (talk) 01:18, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

If you think that the Hebrew gospel hypothesis shouldn't be part of the article on Matthew, then what are we doing here? PiCo (talk) 01:24, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

The section on Papias be should be rewritten from a NPOV showing why some scholars support Papias and why some oppose. - Ret.Prof (talk) 01:28, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

No scholars support the idea that the gospel of Matthew was originally written in Hebrew. PiCo (talk) 01:34, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• Have we agreed not to use "Hebrew Gospel hypothesis" ?? It most certainly is not "a scholarly term". Please remember you were asked for a list if reliable sources that use the term. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 01:50, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Question for PiCo- you just said "Aramaic Matthew" refers to the same idea. But Aramaic is not Hebrew (it is as different as German from English) so are we certain this is really the "same thing" or would that be the perspective from a considerable distance? Til Eulenspiegel /talk/ 13:24, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I supplied Edwards - his book is called "The Hebrew Gospel" and it's about a hypothesis. But I think this discussion might be over - you've said you don't want the Hebrew gospel hypothesis in the article, Papias is the Hebrew gospel hypothesis, and you've given us no scholars who support the idea (his idea, your idea, but not Edward's idea) that Matthew was originally written in Hebrew.PiCo (talk) 02:15, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

To our mediator, should we now move onto the sources that support Papias: "Matthew wrote down the oral teachings of Jesus (logia) in a Hebrew dialect (en Hebraidi dialecto), and everyone translated (hermeneusen) them to the best of their ability." Eusebius, Church History, 3.39.16 - 17 & Editorial board, The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation. Catholic University Press, 1969. Vol. 1, p 379 - Ret.Prof (talk) 02:27, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• Pico is absolutely correct in his assessment above and Ret Prof is, as usual, disruptively idiosyncratic in his engagement with the scholarship. Btw, Pico, did you check through the German language material as well? Also, is this a necessary first step for more permanent sanctions? I am a bit late to the party, so it is unclear why we are "mediating" something that is equivalent to the earth being round. Eusebeus (talk) 02:42, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Forgive me Ret.Prof, but is "supporting Papias" akin to supporting the hypothesis that there is a Hebrew gospel? Could we just move the article to the name "Hebrew gospel" and say in the Matthew article that the Hebrew gospel concerns him? Andrevan@ 02:53, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry folk, but the comments by User:Eusebeus were so very wrong, so as to constitute a deal breaker for me. I now believe that arbitration is the way to go. - Ret.Prof (talk) 04:25, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry everyone, I had been called away for a RL engagement. Am I dreaming? Ret.Prof, are you really prepared to walk away from formal mediation after what amounts to a token effort at reaching an agreement? You may want to sleep on this and give us an answer tomorrow. Ignocrates (talk) 04:43, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I believe WP:MP contains a statement in its "Principles" section which may be relevant. To quote it in full, "Mediation is voluntary. Mediation aims to settle a question about wikipedia content through guided discussion. Its result therefore requires the consensus of the participant in a dispute. Forced participation is incompatible with the nature of the mediation process, so we cannot compel a party to participate in mediation. However, the refusal by an editor to take part in conjunction with a refusal to discuss one's position vis-a-vis content may constitute edit warring or disruptive editing, to which the response is usually blocking by an administrator." I believe, should Ret. Prof. continue to engage in editing regarding this matter consistent with his previous pattern that such editing would certainly be considered within the scope of the conduct discussed in that section. John Carter (talk) 05:00, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

It certainly looks to me like this mediation is dead in the water. This is very disappointing... StAnselm (talk) 05:36, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Can we just try a restart? So Andrevan can re-ask his questions in the order he wants, and direct them to whom he wants, and people can try their best to answer them specifically and succinctly without going on to any ancillary issues. Only respond to the question directed towards you, and avoid the temptation to try to give your disagreement before being asked. Sort of in the way the character of Socrates would demand people answer questions in the early dialogues of Plato. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 07:40, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• Answer - @Andrevan. (1) The reason for not having (hypothesis) is due to Article Title policy WP:NATURAL DISAMBIGUATION. (2) The reason for not having "proto-gospel hypothesis" is also Article Title policy WP:COMMONNAME in that "proto-gospel hypothesis" is mainly limited to the early Hebrew Gospel hypothesis of Lessing. (2) Many WP:RS scholars refer to this a "hypothesis", "theory" or family of "hypotheses" plural. See Google Book "hebrew Gospel" + "hypothesis" among which:

"The Hypothesis of an Original Hebrew Matthew - Various forms of this hypothesis have been offered. ... Another prominent form of this hypothesis is that the logia of Papias really formed an entire Hebrew Gospel, originating from Matthew's pen ..." R. C. H. Lenski The Interpretation of St. Matthew's Gospel 1-14

The link is reprint 2008 Page 11 I hope this is an answer to the question you asked. However the theory/hypothesis does not have much coverage in modern sources since it is regarded as a pious early Christian legend rather than a workable proposition. Since most of the last-50-years sources advocating an original Hebrew Matthew are non-scholarly (and self-published) they fall beneath the academics radar. James R. Edwards is an exception. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:51, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Restarting the Mediation

Stop

You guys need to chill out. There will be no restarting the mediation because the mediation hasn't even really started yet. Eusebius' comments above are unproductive; you don't talk about sanctions in a mediation. Similarly, those who are pronouncing the mediation "dead" are going to need to stop as well, as that is unproductive. As I explained I am simply asking questions to take the temperature of the discussion. It appears to be boiling over. Everyone needs to take a step back and relax. Ret. Prof, I asked you a few perhaps challenging questions (and I approve of the allusion to Socrates), and your response was to say you are no longer going to participate in the mediation. The mediation is going to continue regardless so I suggest you participate. Similarly, I am going to ask everyone else to stop attacking you or the format of mediation. Now I asked a simple question so please answer simply and succinctly. Can we establish multiple sources for all the claims we are making with respect to Papias, the Hebrew gospel, and so on? What are all of these claims and how do they relate to the overall topic of Matthew? Situate the context within the scope of the broader topic in 3 sentences or less. More pointedly. Can Pico and Ret.Prof provide specific /quotations/, as in ictu oculi did above, to support the idea that Papias' interpretation of Matthew is one that various writers have analyzed to elevate it to the level of a notable hypothesis? Pico says that Edwards is actually writing about Luke. Ret.Prof says he's writing about Matthew. There should be quotes and page numbers for that. Andrevan@ 19:06, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

One thing I can do is check the various articles or other discussion in recent reference books relating to the Bible, of which there are a rather large number, to see how much weight as per our own WEIGHT guidelines their articles or sections on the Gospel of Matthew, and, possibly, how much attention the possibility of a Hebrew Gospel of Matthew receives in them. And, in many of them, their articles on specific works are much longer than our own, by sometimes a rather great degree. I am the first to acknowledge that several of those reference works are more than a little perhaps driven by some form of Christian bias, but not all of them are. I can, probably starting in the weekend, because I am anticipating limited mobility through Saturday at the earliest, consult some of the more recent reference sources which have not been particularly described as promoting some particular form of Christian view point and see what they say. For our purposes, I think the recent Oxford Companion to the Books of the Bible might be the best of the comparatively recent sources, if anyone wants to check it before I get a chance to. John Carter (talk) 19:36, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that we need to chill out. I will go to the library and find sources that support the reliability of Papias and what he says about Matthew. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 19:39, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I just want to clarify, I pronounced the mediation "dead" because the filing party, Ret.Prof, is taking an indefinite wikibreak. StAnselm (talk) 19:49, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

One point I thing deserves some degree of attention, and, possibly, clarification. To what extent if any should the material found in reference sources, which I figure to check, be found in sections or articles relating directly to the Gospel of Matthew or Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, and how much attention should we give to material found in other topics, such as, for instance, a separate article on Papias? Under some circumstances, I could see material included in an article on another topic might be relevant, but those circumstances would I think be limited to cases when the article on the GoM or HGoM is perhaps no longer than our own. Also, I think it would not be unreasonable to see what if any child articles on the GoM could be established, and how much weight as per WEIGHT this article might give the relevant summaries of those articles. Having not checked how many articles directly relate to the GoM in wikipedia, I obviously don't know, but I tend to think that there may well be reasonable basis for many more articles than we now have relating directly to the topic in some form or other. John Carter (talk) 19:56, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

What we need to establish is whether we are in the WP:FRINGE or the mainstream. If a lot of people are talking about the dubious language of the original gospel, whether Hebrew or Greek, all properly referenced points of view may be referenced. If the idea itself has been relegated to sources which are not reliable, it certainly should not have undue weight afforded it. If we have a number of reliable authors questioning the language, certainly that controversy might be relevant for inclusion here. Andrevan@ 00:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Particularly regarding subjects of this type, which relate to early Christianity, which has been a favorite target of multiple authors, academics and otherwise, in sources, some of which may meet WP:RS in other matters regarding the subject or era, there are a lot of problems with determining exactly where to draw the "fringe" line, unfortunately. In at least some of these cases, the authors seem to be rather obviously trying to cash in on a short-term fad. Much of the material regarding the ideas of Michael Baigent and the DaVinci Code, and to an extent some of the goofier ideas about the Dead Sea Scrolls, come to mind here. Some of these ideas may receive favorable comments by others in the same profiteering field, but little if any in academic sources. If an idea is "trendy" in the popular market in the short term, even if it is basically already rejected by academia, like much of the Priory of Sion was even before the DaVinci Code was published, there can be very serious questions regarding how to deal with ideas, or interpretations, which can be popular and sometimes even widely believed by the general public for a time, but later found by even most of the popular market to be, well, silly, and something they try to avoid thereafter for fear of embarrassing or misrepresenting themselves. Now, having said that, I very much can be "popular views of" any number of religious topics, or "sectarian views of" similar topics where an idea might be supported by only one or a few of the 20,000 extant Christian denominations or other groups, provided the ideas themselves meet basic requirements of OR, NOT, and WEIGHT. Please understand I am not trying in any way to cast preemptive judgment here, just trying to indicate what seems to me might be one of the major issues to be dealt with here. John Carter (talk) 01:14, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

For the view that the canonical Gospel of Matthew was written in Aramaic or Hebrew, the most recent scholar whom I could find who affirmed this view is Charles Cutler Torrey in his book (originally published by Harper in New York, 1936) Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1937), where he says (p. ix): "The material of our Four Gospels is all Palestinian, and the language in which it was originally written is Aramaic, then the principal language of the land; with the exception of the first two chapters of Lk., which were composed in Hebrew. Each of the first two Gospels, Mk. and Mt., was rendered into Greek very soon after it was put forth." I've asked for a current scholar who holds this view , but no one has supplied one yet. What I take to be the consensus view of current scholarship can be seen for example in "Matthew, Gospel of", entry in Livingstone (ed.), The Oxford Companion to the Christian Church 3rd edition (Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 1057 which says that the canonical Gospel of Matthew "was written in Greek"; or in Duling, "Gospel of Matthew" chapter 18 in Aune (ed.) Blackwell Companion to the New Testament (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), p. 299 which says "it is generally accepted that the original language of Matthew was Greek, not Hebrew (or Aramaic)". Neither work cites any scholar who thinks otherwise. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 02:34, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed, the canonical Gospel of Matthew was a composite work written in Greek many, many years after Matthew's Hebrew Gospel. The big question: What is the relationship between these two gospels? The answer is complex! I am off to the library later today. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 03:49, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@Andrevan, you asked for quotes giving the scholarly consensus regarding the composition of Matthew.

1. The scholarly consensus is that the apostle Matthew didn't write the Gospel of Matthew, that the author is anonymous, and that he used a variety of oral and written sources. (Link is to Denis Duling's commentary on Matthew in the Blackwell Companion to the New Testament).
2. On those sources, there's broad agreement that they were the Gospel of Mark; a collection of "sayings" of Jesus "Q"; and material unique to himself, called "Special Matthew". (This means no room for a Hebrew Gospel unless it can be fitted in to Special Matthew).
3. Papias' testimony to a Hebrew Matthew doesn't figure in the list of sources. I can't produce a quote for that because it's impossible to produce evidence for a negative. Papias' statement is discussed (briefly) in just about every commentary on Matthew, but the conclusion is invariably that it "involves more problems than it resolves" (Daniel Harrington's commentary on Matthew, 1991).
4. James R. Edwards, the leading (possibly only) proponent of a Hebrew Gospel today, doesn't think there's any relationship between canonical Matthew and Hebrew Matthew - "Canonical Greek Matthew represents a separate and independent tradition from the Hebrew Gospel and cannot be explained as a Greek translation". He thinks the Hebrew Gospel ""is most probably one of the eyewitness sources that Luke used". In other words, the idea of a Hebrew Matthew is rejected even by the foremost modern proponent of a Hebrew Gospel - which is why I think RetProf would be better off referring to a Hebrew Gospel Hypothesis and not to a Hebrew Matthew.

Hope this helps - I've tried to be concise and impartial.PiCo (talk) 05:55, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Yes thank you. Ret.Prof do you dispute any of the points PiCo has just made. (Or does anyone else) Andrevan@ 05:57, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I would have a couple of minor quibbles about the extent of the consensus. Other sources say that "most scholars" say Matthew wasn't the author, or that the "majority of scholars" accept that Matthew used Mark and Q. Other than that, I think PiCo has got it right. Papias seems to be quoted almost always in regards to the authorship question, with the "Hebrew language/dialect/style" thing merely viewed as a curiosity. StAnselm (talk) 09:03, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Addendum: I mentioned above that Special Matthew is the third source in Matthew, according to the general scholarly view. I should mention more about Special Matthew. It takes up just 170 verses out of a total of 1071 - so if there's a Hebrew Matthew in there, it wasn't very long. But scholars have concluded that there was no single written source for M sayings (Van Voorst, 2000), and that it's reasonable to conclude that the same is true for the larger body of Special M - "it likely reflects the mid-to-late history of Matthew's church rather than an earlier, independent source..." (also Van Voorst, same page). In other words, Special Matthew wasn't a single source, and originated fairly late.PiCo (talk) 10:29, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Clarification

I actually agree with what PiCo says. I am also seeing the confusion re Papias. There are two distinct aspects to his statement.

1. Did Matthew compose a Hebrew Gospel? There are many, many, primary, secondary and tertiary sources that say he did.
2. What is the relationship between Matthew's Hebrew Gospel and the Greek canonical Gospel of Matthew? Here there are no primary sources and the secondary sources are divided into three major groups:

a) Some scholars still believe the Gospel of Matthew was a Greek translation of the Hebrew Gospel.

b) The second group believe that Matthew's Hebrew Gospel was the "fountainhead" (ie only an important source) for the canonical Gospel of Matthew.

c) Finally there is a third group of scholars that believe that the Gospel of Matthew has nothing to do with Matthew (or the Hebrew Gospel). The Gospel of Matthew was written by an unknown author.

So you see PiCo and I are really very close. I do believe that the different scholarly positions be presented from a neutral point of view. Anyway, I am now at the library preparing a response for our mediator re sources - Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 14:54, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Part of what seems to me to be one of the possible problems is the question of currency. Don't take this the wrong way, but there are lots of primary and secondary sources that endorse the Flat earth hypothesis, too. And, actually, there is still an active group endorsing that belief, the Flat Earth Society. What I think would be helpful to establish is the currency of the sources. There is, probably, sufficient notability for an article on the history of study of the Gospel of Matthew, and if notability of such can be established, I can't see anyone objecting to inclusion of thinking which might no longer have any particularly significant support in the relevant academic communities. I think we would need to know which of the scholars in your point two above are current scholars. Regarding your third point, again, it would be useful to know how much current support is given in the relevant academic communities to that believe. So far as I know, which isn't much, that last point may well be getting the most support, and there may well be sufficient cause for the creation of an article or dedicated section of an article on the question of the authorship of the GoM. But, again, I think it is important for all to realize that the guidelines for content do seem to stress that any ideas put forward as current in our articles are supposed to be among those which have received significant enough support to meet WEIGHT requirements in generally reliable scholarly sources. There are a number of works by individuals who are scholars who choose to write material propounding their own ideas which they never submit to academic review. James Tabor's The Jesus Dynasty, based on the authors' own comments, is one such work. By policies and guidelines, we generally give such popular or sometimes sensationalist work no more weight than we would the works of von Daniken or Baigent or similar sensationalist sources. John Carter (talk) 15:17, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you about James Tabor's The Jesus Dynasty. However comparing to the Flat earth hypothesis to our topic is very unfair. One has to do with science the other has to do history. The scientific methods for collecting data about the shape of the earth are very, very different from the "historical method" outlined by Casey, Ehrman and Edwards. Now back to to the mediator's question! - Ret.Prof (talk) 15:36, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Well, as a counterpoint, we do cover both the Jesus Dynasty book and the flat earth hypothesis in some way. WEIGHT means we can't lean on those sources, but we can still acknowledge their existence and note their claims. Perhaps that's what we need to do here - point out that the Gospel of Matthew attracts some theories, discuss them briefly, and note that they are rejected by mainstream scholarship - if indeed that is the story our sources tell us. There's a difference between a self-published source and a published, well-known, but "popular" and not scholarly work. The latter may be a reliable source for certain things. Andrevan@ 15:38, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed! - Ret.Prof (talk) 15:42, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Actually, the more I think of it, the more I agree. Everyone knows what Papias said. Nobody denies it. Papias is included in every reference book I have looked at in the past 3 hours. Some scholars support Papias, some oppose. We have to get the balance right! - Thanks - Ret.Prof (talk) 15:50, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) :::Also agree. The question here seems to be how much coverage to give this particular proposal in this particular article or group of articles. Hell, one recent reference work even covers the Priory of Zion as a real substantial religious movement, and given when the book came out, that was a reasonable thing for it to do, as evidence to the contrary wasn't yet broadly available or known. Like I said above, if the matters have received sufficient attention for notability to be established, I have no reservations whatsoever about the individual works themselves having separate articles, or, if opinions they share have been significant noted as commonly shared opinions in independent RS sufficient to establish notability, in articles on those "theories" or "hypotheses" or whatever, or in some other direct subarticles of GoM. That does still, however, leave unanswered how much weight to give these particular individual thoughts in this main article.

Regarding Ret.Prof's intervening comment, I think we might need to see specific quotes, considering that discussing what Papias specifically said as an individual is different from discussing the ideas he put forward in a broader sense. Also, in this case, I think that what will be most useful is providing exact quotations regarding what is specifically said, and some indication of the specific article the material comes from and the length of that article. To paraphrase what I said earlier, I have no doubt that for most NT texts there are probably at least dozens, maybe in some cases hundreds, of potential articles we could have relating to them. But that is a separate matter from determining how much weight and attention to give it in this particular article, which seems to be the main article which is supposed to cover all aspects of the work in question in a neutral, balanced way. John Carter (talk) 16:03, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

RetProf and I are a long way apart, and the confusion is all his. He's made some statements up above, which is good because it means he's defined his position. But I don't think he can find any support for most of them: #Did Matthew compose a "Hebrew Gospel"? There are many, many, primary, secondary and tertiary sources that say he did.

• There are not many, many primary etc sources for this idea, there's just one, which is Papias himself, quoted by Eusebius. All the rest of the primary sources - Jerome etc - are just repeating Papias.
• What Papias said is deeply ambiguous, so much so as to be incomprehensible. He said Matthew wrote the logia of Jesus, but nobody knows just what he meant by logia. He said Matthew wrote "in Hebrew dialect", but nobody knows what he meant by "dialect". And so on. In short, the answer "Did Matthew compose a Hebrew Gospel?" is: nobody knows.

#What is the relationship between Matthew's Hebrew Gospel and the Greek canonical Gospel of Matthew?

• In the absence of any proof that such a gospel ever existed, the question is a bit premature.

a) Some scholars still believe the Gospel of Matthew was a Greek translation of the "Hebrew Gospel".

No they don't. Give us quotes.

b) The second group believe that Matthew's Hebrew Gospel was the "fountainhead" (ie only an important source) for the canonical Gospel of Matthew.

Who? Give sources.

c) Finally there is a third group of scholars that believe that the Gospel of Matthew has nothing to do with Matthew (or the Hebrew Gospel). The Gospel of Matthew was written by an unknown author.

This is the consensus. I suppose 99 out of 100 could be called a "group", but it's a pretty big one.

RetProf needs to provide names to prove that his groups (a) and (b) even exist, let alone that they're statistically significant.PiCo (talk) 16:18, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I'm with PiCo here. As said, the most recent scholar whom anyone has supplied who says that the canonical Gospel of Matthew was translated from an Hebrew or Aramaic original was Torrey (1936). Well, if that's true, then group 2.a must be even older than Torrey, since Torrey doesn't go the further step and affirm that Matthew the apostle wrote the gospel. 2.b is almost Maurice Casey's view, but not quite. He does say that the apostle compiled a sayings source in Aramaic, and this was used a source for many parts of 'Q' and 'Special Matthew' material in Matthew, i.e. "the apostle Matthew was the fountainhead of many authentic traditions now part of this Gospel." (Casey 2010, p. 88). He is not saying that the apostle wrote a gospel, and he is not saying that the apostle's document was the fountainhead for the canonical Gospel of Matthew. So I'm equally unsure sure as to who is in group 2.b. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 17:13, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Addendum: The most recent scholar I can find so far who is part of group 2.a is Theodor Zahn, where he affirms the view in his 1906–7 3rd edition of Einleitung in das neue Testament. The second volume of the 1909 English translation (Introduction to the New Testament) is available here, and the relevant §§ are 54, 56 and 57. So are we just talking about a theory which hasn't been proffered by a scholar for over 100 years? Can anyone demonstrate some examples of current scholars who are part of groups 2.a and 2.b? --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 19:38, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Response to the mediator # 1

As I said above, the problem is that there are many, many, primary, secondary and tertiary sources. My solution is to divide them into three. Today, I will focus on the primary sources.

Primary Sources

Historians prefer lots of written sources, the "closer in temporal proximity, the better". Ehrman 2010 p 41. Of the large number of primary sources, I have restricted myself to three. They are within WP:Primary:

Irenaeus: Matthew composed a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect while Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome and laying the foundations of the Church.

• Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1.1
• A.Roberts, "Ante-Nicene Fathers", Hendrickson, 1995. vol 1, p 414
• James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel and the development of the Synoptic Tradition, Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. p 265
• Edward Williams Byron Nicholson,The Gospel according to the Hebrews, C.K. Paul & co., 1879. pp 2 - 3

The heretic Origen: The first Gospel was composed by Matthew, who was once a tax collector, but afterwards an Apostle of Jesus Christ, and it was prepared for the converts from Judaism, and published in Hebrew script.

• Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 6.25.4
• Editorial board, The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation,Catholic University Press, 1969. Vol 29, p 48
• James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel and the development of the Synoptic Tradition, Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. p 268
• Sabine Baring-Gould, The lost and hostile gospels, Publisher Williams and Norgate, 1874. p 120

Jerome: Matthew, also called Levi, who used to be a tax collector and later an apostle, composed the Gospel of Christ, which was first published in Judea in Hebrew script for the sake of those of the circumcision who believed. This Gospel was afterwards translated into Greek (though by what author uncertain). Now this Hebrew original is preserved to this day in the library at Caesarea, which Pamphilus the Martyr so diligently collated.

• Jerome, On Illustrious Men 3
• Editorial board, The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, Catholic University Press, 2008. Vol 100, p 10
• James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel and the development of the Synoptic Tradition, Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. p 281
• Bernhard Pick, Paralipomena: remains of gospels and sayings of Christ, Open court publishing company, 1908. p 2 </ref>

I can provide more primary sources if needed Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 18:53, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Primary sources are of limited usefulness to us, and some of these are extremely old (1874, 1879, 1908). Are there corresponding secondary sources that corroborate these? Quoting WP:PRIMARY, "Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. A primary source may only be used on Misplaced Pages to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the source but without further, specialized knowledge. For example, an article about a novel may cite passages to describe the plot, but any interpretation needs a secondary source. Do not analyze, synthesize, interpret, or evaluate material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so. Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them." Andrevan@ 19:03, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I have to agree, particularly as so far as I can see these sources are none of them actually in possession of any first-hand or direct knowledge of the subject they are discussing. Therefore, the only "straightforward, descriptive statements of facts" that they can support is that these authors, discussing subjects about which they had no direct knowledge and several hundred years after the fact, believed that this story was accurate. That tends to make them, honestly, rather weak sources. Even if any of them were to say that they had personally themselves seen the documents in question, regrettably, considering the reliability of their judgment in general, which in at least Eusebius' and Jerome's case is not counted among the best, modern historians would say that the degree of critical thinking regarding such matters believers of that time (and today) display regarding such matters would make them even more questionable. Basically, these sources are about as reliable for the historicity of the alleged Jewish gospel as Homer and others would be counted about the Greek gods' interference in the Trojan War. John Carter (talk) 19:13, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

No problem, tomorrow I will go though the secondary sources. I will select three. Then over the weekend I will go through tertiary sources. Again the problem is the large numbers. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 19:30, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@ John I think you are mistaken. Irenaeus, Jerome etc were writing when Matthew's Hebrew Gospel was in circulation. I found the first three chapters of Edwards 2009 very helpful. He examines the primary source carefully and critically. - Ret.Prof (talk) 19:39, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

• Two comments - It is very difficult to see Andrevan's questions in the wall of text. It would help if any answer to Andrevan's question was (a) directly diffed to the actual question, (b) brief, (c) sourced.

The two mutually exclusive modern sources (James R. Edwards vs. Maurice Casey) do not constitute "groups" but individual views and can be best addressed in the individual articles on the individual scholars. The same is true, though less relevant, for Victorian and Edwardian sources such as Bernhard Pick, celticist Edward Williams Byron Nicholson and eclectic writer Sabine Baring-Gould, etc. In ictu oculi (talk) 19:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. Re references above: the first citation is the primary source citation. The other three references are secondary sources where the primary source can be found. Sorry for the confusion. Also, I used old (1874, 1879, 1908) sources to show these quotes have been discussed for a long time! A counterbalance to Edwards, Casey etc - Ret.Prof (talk) 19:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Ret.Prof would you agree here and now to an embargo on all sources prior to the 1960s? In ictu oculi (talk) 20:00, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Embargo is a strange term. As I prepare my list of secondary sources I will leave out Nicholson, Pick etc. Tomorrow's list of secondary sources will contain nothing earlier than 1960. It will be more concise. Hope this helps! - Ret.Prof (talk) 20:10, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

(multiple e-c later): Ret.Prof: If you can verify the statement through other sources that the HB was known to be in active circulation at the time by other sources who clearly and explicitly stated that they had seen it in active distribution, that would be useful. Otherwise, you might be seen as taking an assertion of the individuals, without independent evidenciary support, as unquestionable, and those tend not to be strong arguments, and also possibly or probably violate OR and or SYNTH. Otherwise, to use another example, I am reminded of many of the lives of the saints that were circulated in the early years of Christianity. Many of them, like Saint Barbara, were, clearly, artificial stories and made up of pieces of other extant stories, although there may well be some historical fact buried somewhere in them. It would also be useful, considering that you seem to be leaning on the Edwards book, if you provided some indicators of the academic reception that work received, if possible specifically regarding the matter of this Jewish Gospel. Otherwise, regarding what in ictu oculi says above, not knowing all the details of all of them, I really have to question in particular whether a cellist qualifies as a reliable source as per WP:RS on early Christianity, although I suppose I could see Pick and Baring-Gould being considered at least knowledgable about the topic, if not necessarily up to the level of academic journals today. It would be very useful to know what specific areas of the field Pick dealt with professionally - Baring Gould is a good writer, of what are, basically, tertiary sources, but some of his work also shows dubious judgment, at least by modern standards, and receives some significant criticism in the academic community on that basis today on that basis.

I also think it would be advisable to limit the sources to be used to establish the weight of the belief to the recent era to be sources meeting the conventional RS standards. Given the sheer volume of work produced on this topic over the past two thousand years, it may well be possible for individuals to basically find enough sources to pretty much verify anything. Certainly, with the amount of lengthy works of the recent era on this topic, I think it reasonable to say that just about any idea put forward in the past two thousand years is probably covered, to some degree, in academic sources today. So, taking into account that this, the main article on the topic, is according to policies and guidelines, supposed to deal only with only a small percentage of all the material produced on the topic over that time, there is no reason for us not to limit ourselves to sources meeting conventional RS standards from the past few decades, particularly considering that time period has been among the more active in the amount of material generated on this topic. John Carter (talk) 20:23, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

FWIW there isn't a rule that we can't use very old sources, but we should definitely not weigh them the same, and we might even call them out explicitly as outdated within the article text. Andrevan@ 20:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. I used them as background. - Ret.Prof (talk) 21:04, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@John - No problem. Edwards (2009) shows evidence that several Hebrew groups had a copy. There was also one in Alexandria as well as at the library in Caesarea. Actually the discovery of the Hebrew Gospel at Oxyrhynchus in Middle Egypt evinces the breadth of its dissemination in early Christianity. Indeed for Clement to counter a luminary such as Plato with a citation of the Hebrew Gospel is a remarkable testimony to its stature in the second century. Hope this is helpful. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 21:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I just can't let this go without correcting the record. Clement of Alexandria is specifically referring to the Greek Gospel of the Hebrews which was used in Egypt. The particular passage Edwards is citing is covered in that article here. Clement is referring to a quotation in that gospel he (Clement) considers gnostic and he compares it to a similar quotation of Plato. This has nothing whatever to do with a Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, but it does illustrate the problem that Ret.Prof has had repeatedly with accurate sourcing. The Hebrew gospel at Oxyrhynchus Edwards is referring to is Oxyrhynchus 840. It is an otherwise unknown gospel, and it has nothing to do with a Gospel of Matthew composed in Hebrew. What it "evinces" (Edward's word), however, is the poor scholarship of Edwards by lumping these disparate gospels together. Ignocrates (talk) 22:45, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

You know, so far as I can see, your whole position seems to rely to an extreme degree on the work of Edwards. I would very very much welcome seeing the comments by others in the academic community regarding this book, and, considering it was published in 2009, five years ago, some indication of which recent reference sources consider it sufficiently important to be included in their biliographies on the GoM. Also, I think you probably meant someone other than Plato himself, who clearly predated the Christian era, and I regret to say that your OR conclusion about how that fraudulent document constitutes a "remarkable testimony to its stature in the second century rather clearly violates OR and or SYNTH unless you can find some other source in recent times discussing the idea. One could begin to get the impression that most, if not all, of the argument here is, more or less, based on what Edwards presents in his book. If that is the case, then I think everyone should read WP:RECENT, which under those circumstances would reasonably apply to an idea which has apparently been perhaps uniquely synthesized in its current form in that work. This is not to say that the content might not belong in an article on Edwards or his book, but the standards for inclusion in the core article about a subject which has been written as extensively about as this one, including several encyclopedic articles of 30 pages or more, are I think understandably higher than the criteria for inclusion of material in an article on almost any other published work imaginable. Also, I regret to say, your second link links only to the book itself, and there is no clear indication exactly which specific text you are seeking to point out. John Carter (talk) 21:36, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The general abandonment of interest in the Hebrew Gospel in the twentieth century, and certainly the skepticism about its antiquity, its independence of the Synoptic tradition, and its original Hebrew character, are sufficient to explain why many modern scholars doubt its existence or significance for NT studies.

— Edwards, p. xxxii

scholarly mentors gently suggested that the Hebrew Gospel could be a trap. An acquaintance, less well known, told me that if I published my thesis it would be the end of my scholarly career. Without having willed it, I stood at a classic existential fork in the road: should I give up and admit the unlikelihood of succeeding where others have failed, or should I forsake the safety of Haus und Hof for the upward call of the summit? This books is evidence of my decision.

— Edwards, p. xxi

Edwards about himself being minority/fringe, quoted by Tgeorgescu (talk) 21:40, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Not really. It is true that the Hebrew Gospel was seen as a trap in some circles. Yet it landed Edwards a generous invitation to pursue the project as a Member at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton. This is quite an honor! Since then many scholars have now bravely come out in support of Edwards, including Markus Brockmuehl of Oxford and Loren T Stuckenbruck of Princeton. Edwards opened up a wide range of scholarly debate. Fringe...no way. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 21:54, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) The first quote, about how "modern scholars doubt its existence or significance", is certainly relevant, as it indicates in Edwards' own words that the academic community, at least prior to publication, saw his topic as being fringey or minority, and that statement from the horse's own mouth is certainly ueful. The latter quote, regretably, can perhaps not unreasonbly be taken as a form of self-promotion and self-congratulation, indicating he acted with courage to defy the prevailing academic consensus, and it might be useful in an article about him or the book, but really seems to be more of the kind of self-promotion seen in people like Tabor and to a lesser extent Ehrman. However, it is possible that since publication the idea may have received some significant support. Without evidence for support of the ideas in this book since publication, however, all I can really see is that one book, five years ago, said something, and that the rest of the academic community has decided to comment on it. If it hasn't received significant support in the interim from other academic sources, the statements quoted above rather clearly indicate that the idea is very much a minority view, and, on that basis, very possibly not deserving significant attention in the main article on the GoM.

While noting that the self-congratulatory aspects of talking about how many scholars have "bravely come out in support of Edwards," it would be useful to know exactly what they say about Edwards and his ideas. There is a remarkable difference between saying something is an idea worth attention and actually supporting it. Cases where someone says something which others say is worth attention may well be fringe, or minority opinions, and WP:WEIGHT applies there. Based on the last comment above, it does seem to be that the core of this discussion is Edwards' presentation of the idea, and for us to be able to determine how much weight to give it in this main article on the topic we would need real evidence, like the exact quotes from those others in reliable sources regarding this subject, to determine the degree of support they are actively giving, which is kind of required to determine weight as per WP:WEIGHT. So, please, produce the comments of other reliable academics about Edwards's work, positive and negative. Without that evidence presented, there would be no way for anyone to determine whether the idea is fringe, or a minority opinion, or perhaps an interesting concept which lacks any empirical evidence. While the latter two are not, necessarily, fringe as per WP:FRINGE, they may still fail for qualification in the GoM article on the basis of WP:RECENT, WP:WEIGHT, or other policies or guidelines. John Carter (talk) 22:21, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

John, I think you're overreaching with your application of WEIGHT. If Edwards has made a claim and other reliable sources are commenting about it, regardless of whether they support it, we can cover both the claim and the commentary even if to say that they were reluctant to support it. It is valid to include something like that if only to demonstrate that it's a new idea with not much currency, if indeed that is the case. I don't think the burden is so high as you make it out to be. Not every statement in the article needs to be agreed to, simply discussed. Andrevan@ 22:37, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Certainly, Edwards' work is notable; it just has nothing significant to do with the canonical Gospel of Matthew: He is part of the group 2.c Ret.Prof lists above, with which no one has any dispute. He's not part of either of the apparently extinct groups 2.a or 2.b. Edwards supports the Hebrew gospel hypothesis, and I don't think anyone disagrees with covering his theory as such, as it already is at Hebrew gospel hypothesis#Edwards (maybe I'm wrong and some people do think it shouldn't be covered there, but I'm not one of them). --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 22:47, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

We're supposed to be discussing changes to our article on the Gospel of Matthew, and I gather that RetProf's saying we should take note of scholarly arguments that a gospel written in Hebrew by the apostle Matthew lies behind it. Edwards is making no such claim - he doesn't think the Hebrew Gospel has any connection with it. He's not really relevant. PiCo (talk) 22:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) The reason for the possible overreching of the application of WEIGHT, is, unfortunately, the length of some of the existing articles on this topic, and the number of things individuals might be discussing in the academic community. Although, given current circumstances of being in the hospital awaiting procedures, I can't go to a library and explicitly verify this right now, I do remember that some of the extant recent published well-regarded encyclopedic articles on this topic run to 30, 40, and sometimes more pages of sometimes small encyclopedic type in length, much longer than wikipedia rules permit any of our articles being. That being the case, what we would be talking about would not be inclusion of this material, but in a way rather exclusion of some of the material which is in some of those other sources which would, for space considerations, maybe have to be excluded to include this material. So determining relative WEIGHT of this content, as opposed to some of the content in those other generally well-regarded encyclopedic discussions, is, basically, one of the points which this mediation would seem to have to address. And there is also the matter of any number of other similarly discussed current theories, other than Edwards's, which may not yet have a wikipedia editor who seems to be as interested in, effectively, promoting that person's work. I admit I don't know of any, but like I said my access to sources right now is reduced. A separate article, with a summary section in the GoM article, on "Modern views of the GoM" or similar is another matter entirely, and I can definitely see discussion of maybe determining which child articles can and should exist, possibly including one on variant views of the GoM or some similar related topic, and would welcome seeing someone else actually address that matter, but I do believe given the extent to which this topic is covered in numerous recent reference articles, maybe WEIGHT for inclusion in the main article on the topic in general is probably the most significant matter regarding that article to deal with. John Carter (talk) 23:02, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

PiCo, it's not clear to me that the discussion is only about the canonical gospel's article. Evensteven (talk) 23:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Evensteven, that's the problem - we're meant to be in a mediation about the canonical gospel article. PiCo (talk) 23:15, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

From the start, that was never clear to me either. And I agree it's a problem. Evensteven (talk) 00:11, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I'd just like to second John Carter, and also repeat what Atethnekos says a little above: "I don't think anyone disagrees with covering his theory as such, as it already is at Hebrew gospel hypothesis#Edwards." (Edward's book on the Hebrew Gospel has been reviewed at the Review of Biblical Literature, by the way - reviews by Timothy A. Friedrichsen and James P. Sweeney)PiCo (talk) 23:09, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

See also, Gregory, A. "Prior or Posterior? The Gospel of the Ebionites and the Gospel of Luke", New Testament Studies 53 (2005), pp. 344–346 here. Andrew Gregory's review of Edward's scholarship is a scathing critique of Edward's failure of method. Ignocrates (talk) 00:10, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

1960

@User:Andrevan, hi, would you agree with my second above that one-advocate theories with no seconders or thirders are generally best located in the relevant scholar bio articles? FWIW the reason for 1960 as a start point is Nag Hammadi library 1945 and Dead Sea Scrolls 1946-1956, but the request to Ret.Prof to embargo primary and Victorian/Edwardian sources is largely an attempt to reduce the number of bytes here to a manageable level - i.e. help Ret.Prof focus on his two modern sources James R. Edwards and Maurice Casey. In ictu oculi (talk) 22:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that single-advocate theories probably belong in the scholar bio article, with maybe one line of explanation in the broader topic. It seems above that there is some dispute as to whether Edwards is actually talking about the Gospel of Matthew at all. Andrevan@ 23:06, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

@Andrevan. Thank you. Correct. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:27, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

If there are sufficient independent reliable sources to establish notability, which is often taken to be just two such sources, discussing one or more theories relating to this topic in such a way as to not violate OR/SYNTH requirements about their relationship or identity, I think the existing ways policies and guidelines are applied would indicate that whatever topic is so notable would certainly merit a separate article where whatever the topic is could be discussed at much greater length. But that is rather irrelevant to the GoM article itself, except perhaps in terms of the content of a summary section. John Carter (talk) 23:25, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

We seem to be on an asymptote to infinity referring to Edwards. For the penultimate time, Edwards is referring to a source document that he believes lies behind the L source contained within the Gospel of Luke. The L source, by definition, has no content overlapping with the canonical Gospel of Matthew. All of this discussion of a hypothetical Hebrew source behind the L source is a red herring with respect to the article on the canonical Gospel of Matthew. Ignocrates (talk) 23:27, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The Sweeney review PiCo includes above includes the following direct quote from the second page: "His resultant thesis, in nuce, is that “the high concentration of Semitisms in Special Luke—portions of Luke that are not shared in common with Matthew and/or Mark—can be accounted for on the assumption that they derive from the original Hebrew Gospel”. This reference to "Special Luke", a document whose existence is SFAIK not particularly discussed outside of Edwards, is worth noting. In the same review, Sweeney says, and I quote verbatim, "Here Edwards draws three further conclusions in connection with the Hebrew Gospel: (4) he distinguishes it from the “Traditions of Matthais” (5); he contends that the apostle Matthew published a Hebrew Gospel in the Hebrew language that bore several related titles; and..." The reviewer also says, "He maintains that the Gospel of Mark and the Hebrew Gospel account for the majority, but not all, of the Gospel of Luke," which some might perceive, in some form of OR, could be seen as being an an effective equivalent of Matthew, but that would still be OR. Sweeney even says, relating to the relationships between the canonical gospels, "The first is Matthew’s probable use of Luke (“Matthean Posteriority,” 245–52). Edwards maintains that the twenty-three pairs of shared interrelationships among Matthew, Mark, and Luke indicate that Matthew is either the source of material for Mark and Luke or the recipient of them. Edwards considers the latter more probable." This would indicate that Matthew is a later generation work than either the Hebrew Gospel or Luke, and in fact, apparently based on both. That being the case, it is hard to see how this would be called the "Hebrew Gospel of Matthew. The second question is why canonical Matthew came to bear the name of the apostle Matthew (“The Authorship of Canonical Matthew,” 253–58), when Matthew was likely the author of the Hebrew Gospel (composed originally in Hebrew), not canonical Matthew (composed originally in Greek)." That is a reason, if a rather weak one, to say that the work should be called the "Hebrew Gospel of Matthew" but wikipedia's policy of WP:NAME would seem to indicate that, even according to the presentation of Edwards' statements contained in the review, that even Edwards calls it the "Hebrew Gospel," not the "Hebrew Gospel of Matthew," and raises very serious questions regarding how relevant this topic is to this existing article on the GoM. I also note that review, which I urge everyone to read, like I just did, is very definitely worth reviewing in this matter. While it does offer some support of aspects of Edward's book, it is more than a little equivocal about its quality or reliability in other aspects. Friedrichsen's review is a bit shorter than Sweeney's, and doesn't contain much new, alhough he explicitly says that the last chapter of Edwards' book "argues that the Hebrew Gospel is not the Hebrew/Aramaic Vorlage of canonical Matthew, which was a mistaken attribution...", and also contains some serious criticism, as does the Gregory review referenced above. Now, unless these reviews are using clearly faulty information and also grossly misrepresentative of the broader academic reception of Edwards work, which seems to me extremely unlikely, I would have to say that I very seriously question both the assertion that Edwards himself considers this the "Hebrew Gospel of Matthew" rather than the "Hebrew Gospel," and to what degree, if any, that material belongs in this article. John Carter (talk) 00:26, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

John Carter, would you please stop text-walling and address the claim directly here. While I asked for quotes, I think you are digressing quite heavily into counterfactual speculation, and that's really quite excessive. Are you agreeing that Edwards is irrelevant or not? Are there two forms of Hebrew gospel hypothesis - a strong one which seems to be claiming that all of the gospels were written in Hebrew and not just one? Or do I misunderstand, Ret Prof? If the claim is that we want to make sure people realize that there was previously this idea, stated originally by Papias, applied to Matthew, and occasionally referred to by authors in antiquity? Or is there more to it than that? Andrevan@ 03:36, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I didn't see exactly which claim there was to address, which is why I provided the quotes from the reviews themselves above. Having not read the book itself, they are all I have to base things on, and that seems to include some of what some might call speculation about things not explicitly stated in the reviews. I agree that Edwards's proposal is of at best extremely limited relevance to the GoM, as one author's conjecture regarding a possible source of some of the material in the extant GoM. There is a separate question about the "idea" of a Hebrew Gospel being worthy of a separate article, provided that such an article would meet OR, SYNTH, NOT, and other requirements beyond just Edwards himself to establish its meeting requirements. John Carter (talk) 04:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

A Real Disagreement

Wow! So much of the above is simply wrong. It totally misrepresents Edwards, who is writing about Matthew’s ‘’Hebrew Gospel’’ and the "Synoptic Gospels". Obviously what he says about Luke, Mark and L should not be a part of our article. However, what he says about Matthew’s ‘’Hebrew Gospel’’ and the Gospel of Matthew should be included. Finally, there is solid scholarship to support the possibility that the Gospel of Matthew had nothing to do with Matthew. Neither Edwards nor Ehrman should be excluded because they support this position. Nor should their scholarship re Papias. Ret.Prof (talk) 04:15, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Taking up In Ictu's suggestion that we help RetProf focus on the two good sources, Edwards and Casey: RetProf, what exactly do you think Edwards says about the Gospel of Matthew? Can you give quotes/links? PiCo (talk) 04:24, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Sure, but I have been so distracted I have not even fully responded to the mediator's request! - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Ok, let's you and me propose to the mediator (and others I hope will agree) that from now on we go through the sources (secondary ones, beginning with Edwards and then Casey), one by one, a section each, and you identify specific items that you think need to be reflected in the Gospel of Matthew article, with Hebrew Gospel hypothesis article as the fallback. That should stop all this pontificating and focus us on real improvements to the two articles. PiCo (talk) 06:03, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

And, Ret.Prof, that, in the process of going through them, you provide specific quotations from each source which can be used to indicate, without violations of OR or SYNTH, that those sources support the specific statements you wish to include in the article. Also, honestly, it would be very much in your own interests if you could provide specific instances of comments from independent academics or others which explicitly support the specific points from those sources. It is not now, and never has been, the case around here that just because an individual or his work has a generally positive reputation that each and every point he raises has to be regarded as being held in the same regard. And, considering we have an article on the Synoptic gospels, and you yourself state that this would apply to all of them, I can't see why you believe the material must be added specifically to the GoM article, as it also, apparently, applies to the gospels of Mark and Luke. John Carter (talk) 08:30, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

P.S. I also agree with PiCo, that the best way to proceed with this is to produce indicators of what specific content Ret.Prof wishes to see added to the article, preferably in the form in which it would be added to the article, and either a direct quotation from the sources which clerly support that material, or, alternately, a link to an online version of the source with at least an indicator of the page number on which the material is to be found. At least one of your links above linked for me only to the book as a whole, and such links are not really useful to others in trying to with reasonable speed find the quotation or quotations involved. John Carter (talk) 14:24, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Glossary (terms being used in this discussion)

I thought it might be useful to clarify some of the terms used in this rather arcane subject, not least because RetProf seems to be confused by the many very similar names in use. (His "Irenaeus, Jerome etc were writing when Matthew's Hebrew Gospel was in circulation..." is an impossible statement).

• Gospel of Matthew: One of the four canonical gospels, written in Greek by an unknown author about 70-100 AD.
• Hebrew Gospel: A term with no precise meaning - see the disambiguation page.
• Hebrew Gospel of Matthew: A group of translations of canonical Matthew into Hebrew made during the middle ages, some of them by Jews to point out the errors of the Christians, others by Christians to convert the Jews - nothing to do with our discussion, but RetProf keeps using the phrase as if it means an ancient gospel written by Matthew.
• Jewish-Christian gospels: Gospels used by Jewish Christians (Jews who recognised Jesus as messiah but not as Son of God, i.e., as human, not divine). This is what Irenaeus and Jerome meant when they used the term Hebrew Gospel - a gospel used by Hebrews, i.e., Jews. They believed there was only one such gospel, but modern scholars think there were three, the Gospel of the Ebionites, the Gospel of the Hebrews, and the Gospel of the Nazarenes. All are known from fragments quoted by Jerome and others, which makes it hard to say much about their origins, but Ebionites and Hebrews are generally thought to have been written in Greek early in the 2nd century and based on the canonical gospels, while Nazarenes was based on canonical Matthew and written in Aramaic. When Edwards and Casey talk about "the Hebrew Gospel", they mean one or all of these.
• Hebrew Gospel hypothesis: A group of theories revolving around the idea that a very early gospel, composed in Hebrew, was used as a source to write one or more of the four canonical gospels. It was first advanced by Jerome, based on Papias' comment about Matthew, and Matthew is frequently, though not always, proposed as the author. Jerome's hypothesis was that Papias was talking about the origins of canonical Matthew. James Edwards is putting forward a modern version of this hypothesis, one which does not involve the canonical Matthew, Maurice Casey a quite different version, which does.

I really don't think that RetProf grasps all this, which accounts for the mild confusion in his understanding of Jerome, Edwards, and others. PiCo (talk) 04:18, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Again this appears to be simply wrong. In any event, please provide a reliable source. Cheers - (User talk:Ret.Prof talk) 04:49, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

User talk:Ret.Prof, each term is linked to an article on Misplaced Pages, and each article uses the term pretty much as I've described. PiCo (talk) 11:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

• Confirm (a note to confirm agreement with PiCo's glossary, and also confirm PiCo's potted description of each related article) In ictu oculi (talk) 08:26, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

In response to Ret.Prof, I sincerely urge him to familiarize himself with WP:BURDEN, the wikipedia policy which explicitly states " burden of identifying a reliable source lies with the editor who adds or restores material," and that the process of doing so should cite or indicate "the source clearly and precisely (specifying page, section, or such divisions as may be appropriate). The citation must clearly support the material as presented in the article." I think that under the specific circumstances here it would be not unreasonable to request direct quotation from the source as well, unless the requisite clear and precise material can be found by such precise identification somewhere on the internet. John Carter (talk) 08:40, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

WP:PRIMARY

I have read this policy carefully. It seems to be divided into two sections:

1) Primary sources may be used

Policy: "Unless restricted by another policy, primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Misplaced Pages;"

2) Use with care

They must be used "with care, because it is easy to misuse them. Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. A primary source may only be used on Misplaced Pages to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the source but without further, specialized knowledge."

Therefore it is my understanding that we can use primary sources but we must take care when we start to edit the Gospel of Matthew to follow the above. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:03, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Ret.Prof, you are accusing a lot of people of misrepresentation without providing any evidence to back it up. Based on the policy on primary sources you referred to above, please state in your own words (1) how primary sources may be used in the absence of reliable secondary sources, and additionally, (2) how primary sources may be used when directly supported by reliable secondary sources. In the past, you have not been able to articulate an understanding of these concepts, and it is crucial to your arguments here that you can demonstrate you do understand the difference. Please explain using Eusebius' quotation of Papias as an example. Ignocrates (talk) 05:44, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I am not accusing people of any wrongful behavior. I am strongly disagreeing over content issues. There is a difference. 1) I believe primary sources may be used only in support of reliable secondary sources. 2) Primary sources may be used only when they stand on their own, where no interpretation is needed. For example:

Jerome's letter addressed to Pope Damasus in 383: I will now speak of the New Testament, which was undoubtedly composed in Greek, with the exception of the Apostle Matthew, who was the first in Judea to produce a Gospel of Christ in Hebrew script. We must confess that as we have it in our language, it is marked by discrepancies, and now that the stream is distributed into different channels we must go back to the Fountainhead.

LETTER 19 A letter of Pope Damasus to Jerome: To his most beloved son Jerome: DAMASUS, Bishop, sends greetings in the Lord. The orthodox Greek and Latin versions put forth not only differing but mutually conflicting explanations of the saying 'Hosanna to the son of David'. I wish you would write...stating the true meaning of what is actually written in the Hebrew text.

LETTER 20: Jerome to the Pope (Reply) “Matthew, who composed his Gospel in Hebrew script, wrote, 'Osanna Barrama', which means 'Hosanna in the Highest.’”

Now it is time I left primary sources and moved onto the secondary sources that are the heart of my position. - Ret.Prof (talk) 13:19, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Just an observation: the 2 warring factions seem to be continuing the debate in a rather unconstructive fashion, criticizing one another in ways that border on personal attack, making demands of one another that should go through the mediator, and generally not allowing the mediator to control the direction of the discussion. Could we please help the mediator do his job or this will go nowhere. Bermicourt (talk) 13:36, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed! I too am guilty! The mediator has asked me a specific question and I have gone off in all directions at the same time. I apologize to the mediator. - Ret.Prof (talk) 14:12, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Back to the issue at hand

• The Gospel of Matthew had the full quote from Papias. It also had a few words in "support" of the reliability of Papias as well as a few words that opposed the reliability.
• All the material in support of Papias was deleted as fringe. (The quote from Papias remained intact, as did the "oppose" material)
• My position is that because Papias is the earliest known reference to Matthew writing a gospel and this is almost always included in articles on our topic, it should be written from a NPOV.

Therefore I am requesting that the scholarship in support of Papias be restored. - Ret.Prof (talk) 17:13, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

In an attempt to take this discussion back to the real issue at hand, it seems that the material you wish included was deleted based on reasons acceptable by policy and guidelines. You have been asked above to abide by WP:BURDEN to establish that the material you want included merits inclusion on the basis of the relevant policies and guidelines. The best, easiest, and most effective way to attempt to get the material restored is to provide evidence to indicate that the inclusion of the material meets policies and guidelines, and you have been asked, I believe now repeatedly, to provide that evidence. The above comment in no way does anything to address those concerns, and could be taken perhaps as being contrary to WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and/or WP:TE in requesting that material be restored without such evidence being provided. I believe in the eyes of others, those issues which have so far as I can tell yet to be addressed are the more immediate issues at hand. Speaking strictly for myself, I would request that you address some of the issues and concerns expressed by myself and others above, and perhaps also read WP:CONSENSUS, because, I believe, in the absence of such required evidence being provided, the likelihood of your above request receiving favorable response is very limited. John Carter (talk) 21:00, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Let's not get into the weeds or accuse each other. Per AGF, Ret. Prof has insisted there are usable secondary sources to support the idea that Matthew might have written in Hebrew. Andrevan@ 21:37, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

He might have trouble finding those sources for the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew - as Edwards says, "many modern scholars doubt its existence." That statement alone is enough reason to leave it out of our article. Still, let's give him a chance.PiCo (talk) 21:59, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) And I believe that virtually everyone else has acknowledged that they are at least potentially usable secondary sources, provided the evidence is produced which indicates that they meet other content policies and guidelines. After I finish the verdammt testing and possible surgery and whatever else at the hospital here, I am certain I could find several, possibly hundreds or thousands, of other sources on the topic as well, based on previously seeing the bibliography sections of several reference sources on the topic. One individual editor's demand that their own apparently individually-determined content based on their own individually- selected sources without providing the requisite support does not help advance the mediation. And, yes, I have seen the bibliographies in some of the reference works on the Bible can get terrifyingly long at times, and I myself don't doubt that a separate article Bibliography of the Gospel of Matthew (or pretty much any other book of the Bible) would be useful, notable, and lengthy. But, while still AGF'ing Ret.Prof, I think it is also reasonable that he realize that, basically, simply making declarative statements about what he wants aren't necessarily of any use to others in helping them see that the content he wants included meets their concerns regarding whether it is appropriate for inclusion in this article. What would be more useful, and actually more or less necessary, is for him to actually direct responding to some of the comments of others above regarding those matters, and I regret to see that I don't see them yet. Responding to them in a meaningful fashion would I think probably be much more useful than starting a separate thread without responding to them. John Carter (talk) 22:20, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

PiCo, reading through the history of scholarship after the sentence you highlighted, it's obvious that the Hebrew Gospel Edwards is referring to is simply a hypothetical source document, not a complete gospel. I can find nowhere in the book that Edwards claims it it the autograph behind the canonical Gospel of Matthew. Focusing just on Edwards for the moment, let's see the page numbers and exact quotations to back up the claim Edwards is advocating for a complete Hebrew Gospel of Matthew which is the autograph of the canonical Gospel of Matthew. Where's the evidence Ret.Prof? Ignocrates (talk) 22:39, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

For the record, I oppose the re-insertion of the WP:SYNTH material, and I thought the consensus on the article talk page was quite clear on this issue. -- 101.119.27.149 (talk) 00:41, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Response to the mediator # 2

Of the 47 secondary sources that support the reliability of Papias, I chosen have three. Please follow link to read in context.

• Edwards 2009 p 3 & 4 states that there is a possibility that "Papias's testimony comes directly from the apostolic fountainhead. It is in any case very early, within living memory of the apostolic age. Furthermore, "Papias himself provides the most important evidence for understanding the logia in the sense of Gospel."
• Casey 2010 p 88 - Re the testimony of Papias: "It is genuinely true that the apostle Matthew 'compiled the sayings/oracles in a Hebrew language" and "There is every reason to believe this
• Ehrman 2012 p 101 - Re the testimony of Papias: " it is a testimony that explicitly and credibly traces its own lineage directly back to the disciples of Jesus themselves."

Each one of these sources when read in context support the reliability of the testimony of Papias: Matthew wrote down the sayings/oracles in a Hebrew dialect. - Ret.Prof (talk) 22:37, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I regret to say that none of those above, so far as I can see, clearly establish how this material most clearly and necessarily belongs in the article on the Gospel of Matthew. There are, as has already been said, several other articles, including the articles on the other Gospels, on the Synoptic gospels, and others where the material might be better placed. Please indicate with clearly relevant material from reliable sources exactly why you believe that this material belongs in this particular article. John Carter (talk) 22:54, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

So you want to include a statement that some scholars think that Papias is reliable? Okay, that's fine—no one is disputing that some scholars think that the testimony of Papias is reliable. But all of it says nothing about the canonical Gospel of Matthew's relation to a hypothetical Hebrew gospel. None of those authors you cite are part of groups 2.a or 2.b. Edwards says that we should not link his hypothetical Hebrew Gospel to the Gospel of Matthew (p. 257). Casey says that Papias was referring to a sayings source in Aramaic, not a Hebrew Gospel (p. 87–8). Ehrman just says (Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium, Oxford University Press 1999, p. 43): "The tradition about Matthew is even less fruitful, since the two things that Papias tells us are that (a) Matthew's book comprised only "sayings" of Jesus—Whereas out Matthew contains a lot more than that—and (b) it was written in Hebrew. On this latter point, though, New Testament specialists are unified: the Gospel of Matthew that we have was originally written in Greek. Papias does not appear, therefore, to be referring to this book.") --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 23:18, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

And so it goes, and has gone for three years and counting: (1) Ret.Prof cites the above three sources as "proof" for an autograph Hebrew Gospel of Matthew behind the canonical Gospel of Matthew. (2) Atethnekos carefully explains, providing page numbers and exact quotations, that none of the three sources actually says what Ret.Prof claims they say. (3) Ret.Prof accuses other editors of a conspiracy and says he is "stepping back". Rinse and repeat ad infinitum. Ignocrates (talk) 23:29, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I think we can sort this out. I am supportive of including a line that some scholars think that Papias' statement is accurate; I hope that can resolve some of the dispute. Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 02:10, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Nobody stated that Ehrman can't be used, but this is what the authors cited by Ret.Prof's to say about Papias and about relying upon his testimony for the authorship of the Gospel of Matthew:

The third source of eventual confusion was that it was extremely helpful to the early church to imagine that the Gospel which it most loved was written by one of the Twelve. This is the overwhelming force which drove the mistakes of the Church Fathers from Irenaeus onwards. ... Hence the quite confused tradition that it was originally written in Aramaic or even Hebrew.

— Maurice Casey, Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian's Account of His Life and Teaching, 2010, p. 89

If this interpretation of Papias is correct, there are several historical problems. First, modern specialists in language hold that the author of Matthew wrote in Greek, not Hebrew or Aramaic. Second, most scholars accept the Two-Source theory (see Chapter 15, “The Synoptic Problem,” in this volume). This theory requires that the author of Matthew knew and used Greek versions of Mark and Greek Q as sources. Third, the gospel contains sayings and sayings collections, but is itself not a collection of sayings such as Proverbs or the Gospel of Thomas. In short, Papias' description does not correspond well with the New Testament.

— Dennis C. Duling, p. 302 in David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to the New Testament, 2010, p. 302

In any event, Papias does not seem to provide us with the kind of information we can place a lot of confidence in. I should point out, in this connection, that scholars have almost uniformly rejected just about everything else that Papias is recorded to have said in the surviving references to his work.

...

If scholars are inclined to discount what Papias says in virtually every other instance, why is it that they sometimes appeal to his witness in order to show that we have an early tradition that links Matthew to one of our Gospels, and Mark to another? Why do these scholars accept some of what Papias said but not all of what he said? I suspect it is because they want to have support for their own points of view (Matthew really wrote Matthew) and have decided to trust Papias when he confirms their views, and not trust him when he does not.

The result of this quick examination of Papias is, I think, that he passes on stories that he has heard, and he attributes them to people who knew other people who said so. But when he can be checked, he appears to be wrong. Can he be trusted in the places that he cannot be checked? If you have a friend who is consistently wrong when he gives directions to places you are familiar with, do you trust him when he gives directions for someplace you've never been?

Papias is not recorded as having said anything about either Luke or John. I'm not sure why. But the bottom line is this: we do not have any solid reference to the authors of our four Gospels in which we can trust (for example, that the author is actually referring to our Matthew and our Mark) until closer to the end of the second century — nearly a full hundred years after these books had been anonymously placed in circulation.

— Bart Ehrman, Jesus, Interrupted, pp. 107-110

This I have told at WP:FTN to Ret.Prof:

As far as Ehrman's book is concerned, the quote starts with "Many conservative Christian scholars use this statement to prove that what Papias says is historically accurate (especially about Mark and Matthew), but that is going beyond what the evidence gives us." So, Ehrman does not claim that Papias would be accurate in his reports, except for reporting the fact that he knew people who knew the apostles or their companions. As shown from another source, Ehrman believes that almost everything else Papias told is inaccurate and there is no indication that Ehrman has changed his mind about Papias's reliability. So, you cannot make Ehrman say that what Papias reports about a Hebrew Gospel written by Matthew would be a reliable report. What Ehrman stressed is that Papias is not a reliable source for the authorship of the Gospel of Matthew and it could be even be inferred that Ehrman affirms that Papias is historically inaccurate (with the exception of knowing those people). Just read the quote above ignoring the parenthesis and you will see what I mean. So, using Ehrman to establish the historical reliability of Papias's report fails verification, it is using partial quotations to justify an idea that Ehrman rejects. So, I was at least right about misrepresenting Ehrman's view. That's why I said that I cannot assume a fair rendering of the viewpoints of those sources, either you have failed to understand Ehrman's point or you have willfully misrepresented it. At least you could concede that you have misread what Ehrman has to say.

— User:Tgeorgescu

Quotes by Tgeorgescu (talk) 02:16, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Taken from Bart D. Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, HarperCollins 2012. pp 98-101

• And this is what he says about Matthew: “And so Matthew composed the sayings in the Hebrew tongue, and each one interpreted them to the best of his ability.
• This is not eyewitness testimony to the life of Jesus, but it is getting very close to that. Where conservative scholars go astray is in thinking that Papias gives us reliable information about the origins of our Gospels of Matthew and Mark. The problem is that even though he “knows” that there was an account of Jesus's life written by Mark and a collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew, there is no reason to think that he is referring to the books that we call Mark and Matthew. In fact, what he says about these books does not coincide with what we ourselves know about the canonical Gospels. He appears to be referring to other writings, and only later did Christians (wrongly) assume that he was referring to the two books that eventually came to be included in Scripture. This then is testimony that is independent of the Gospels themselves. It is yet one more independent line of testimony among the many we have seen so far. And this time it is a testimony that explicitly and credibly traces its own lineage directly to the disciples of Jesus themselves. (quote from pp 100-101)

Ehrman agrees that Matthew wrote down a collection of Jesus's sayings as Papias said, but does not believe it to be the same as the Gospel of Matthew. I hope this clarifies my position. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 02:45, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

You should know by now that such abuse of reliable sources is prohibited by WP:SYNTH. Stop misquoting Ehrman! Tgeorgescu (talk) 02:48, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

It looks like the mediator will have to go to Ehrman to verify. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 02:53, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Specifically, your quotes don't support the idea that Ehrman considers "And so Matthew composed the sayings in the Hebrew tongue, and each one interpreted them to the best of his ability" to be reliable. Perhaps he does, perhaps he doesn't. Unless you provide a quote wherein he explicitly asserts that it would be reliable, you should not infer that he says it is reliable. That's what WP:VER means in this respect. Tgeorgescu (talk) 02:55, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I think you are mistaken. However I will double check! Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 03:01, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

He is talking about what Papias "knows", i.e. the word knows put between quotation marks. Ehrman is not talking about what he (Ehrman) knows. Tgeorgescu (talk) 03:05, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Please continue the discussion. If I judge Ret. Prof to be avoiding scrutiny or trolling, I will simply block him, protect the page, or both. As of right now this appears to be within the realm of reasonable discussion nonwithstanding the outburst below which is counterproductive. If either side has a point of fact that has been blatantly distorted, bring them to me and I will see what is necessary. For right now, Tgeorgescu is saying that Ehrman does not say what Ret. Prof says he is saying. It can simply be a misunderstanding, but this can all be determined. Please note that as I have stated, the mediation will continue and I won't let you turn this into a farcical mediation - if I find someone is being blatantly disruptive, you won't need to go to ArbCom to get a block. So please continue assuming good faith and participating in a collaborative editing process. There will be no "stepping back," we are simply going to get to the bottom of all matters of fact. Andrevan@ 03:48, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I would simply add that, according to the text reproduced by Ret. Prof above from Ehrman, Ehrman is apparently adding the word "knows" in quotation marks, which in that context would seem to be a way of indicting that Papias' "knowledge" of the subject might well be seen as others as a form of belief, either in those he had spoken to, works he had read, etc., which others might consider something other than objective fact or knowledge, and, at least implicitly, that Ehrman is holding open the possibility that Papias' claim to knowledge was not necessarily well founded in hard fact. Regarding the other matters Andrevan raises above about misrepresentation, short of reading the works itself, I guess I think it not unreasonable to repeat that it might be beneficial to read the reviews linked to as pdfs above, and, presumably, some of the reviews which had been reproduced verbatim earlier. I can't necessarily verify that they are accurate, but I think it reasonable to AGF they are. Those reviews, despite the opinions they inherently express, are probably the best means of determining the basic content of the book and opinions of it short of reading the book itself. I wish I could access my beloved databanks in the near future for pdfs or other reviews of the works, but it doesn't look like I will be able to for at least a few days yet. John Carter (talk) 04:06, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

If necessary I will certainly get the book from the library to check, however I do not anticipate a need to read it in full. I do think your point about Ehrman makes sense so Ret. Prof will need to respond to it in a cogent way. Andrevan@ 04:12, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Reaching a compromise

Ret. Prof, will you respond to Athnekos' suggestion that we "includ a line that some scholars think that Papias' statement is accurate; I hope that can resolve some of the dispute." Andrevan@ 03:53, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

But isn't that already implied in the article? "Scholars have put forward several theories to explain Papias: perhaps Matthew wrote two gospels," etc. In any case, "some" would be a weasel word. StAnselm (talk) 03:58, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

We're talking about something explaining the depth of what we've learned in this mediation. Something like: "While Christian scholars for many years have taken Papias at face value, in recent times the canonical gospel has not been considered to have been written in Hebrew. However, some scholars such as Edwards or whoever else, have revived the idea of a Hebrew gospel." Andrevan@ 04:05, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

The problem is none of these "Hebrew gospel" ideas ties the logia mentioned by Papias to the canonical Gospel of Matthew. The quotations from Casey and Ehrman cited above make this explicitly clear, and Edwards isn't even talking about the Gospel of Matthew. That being the case, where are these reliable secondary sources that postulate a connection? StAnselm is right about this. Ignocrates (talk) 04:18, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I assume you mean taking Papias "at face value" means believing that the Gospel of Matthew is a translation of an original Hebrew gospel. But I think some people are disputing that. Furthermore, the sentence implies that there is a long history of Christian scholarship accepting that - I don't see any evidence of that presented above. StAnselm (talk) 04:22, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@User:Andrevan It sounds good. This could be added onto the present text of the article:

• Some modern scholars now believe the Papias tradition to be fairly trustworthy and usually interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic. David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to The New Testament, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. p 301 and p 302

I am flexible. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 04:24, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

(3 e-c's later) Although I somewhat regret saying this, the existing text of our article Gospel of Matthew reads "Scholars have put forward several theories to explain Papias: perhaps Matthew wrote two gospels, one, now lost, in Hebrew, the other our Greek version; ..." So, at least according to the current text of the article, it looks to me like the text already contains the substance of the comment from Andrevan above, if not perhaps the length or degree of detail. So I guess I personally would be interested in maybe first starting with the existing text, which presumably had some form of prior agreement among some as a basis for any changes. John Carter (talk) 04:26, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I think the Aune passage, either quoted intact or perhaps paraphrased, would represent a material improvement to the article as it stands now. Evensteven (talk) 04:39, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

It's horribly misquoted. It's Eusebius who is considered reliable, not Papias. StAnselm (talk) 04:46, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Misquoted, or taken out of context? The quote says "the Papias tradition". Evensteven (talk) 04:52, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Misquoted. The phrase "generally held by modern scholars to be fairly trustworthy" modifies "Eusebius of Caesarea". StAnselm (talk) 04:59, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry. I see what you mean. I had incorrectly assumed that was a direct quote. Evensteven (talk) 05:07, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

In any event what is important is that the Papias section be written from a NPOV. This is from Casey's newest book which will be released month. - Ret.Prof (talk) 04:50, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Good point. Does this work?

• Some modern scholars now believe the Papias tradition preserved by Eusebius to be fairly trustworthy and usually interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic. David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to The New Testament, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. p 301 and p 302 - Ret.Prof (talk) 04:55, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

:(multiple e-c later) The problems I continue to see are the use of the words "some" and "fairly trustworthy" in the Blackwell quotation. Both would qualify as weasel words by our standards, although if they are used in a quote that would be acceptable. Also, the final section of the quotation above "and usually interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic" falls more than a bit short of saying that the tradition Papias reported was necessarily identical to Matthew's alleged collection of sayings. The only way I could see using the effective quotation of Blackwell above by Ret.Prof is if it were explicitly and obviously presented as a quotation, and not in wikipedia's voice. John Carter (talk) 04:58, 22 February 2014 (UTC) Does this work?

• Modern scholars Casey and Edwards now believe the Papias tradition preserved by Eusebius to be trustworthy and they interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic. David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to The New Testament, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. p 301 and p 302 - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:07, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't have a big problem with this, although I don't like the "such as" (are there others?) It would be better to just have their names. And I think we can drop the "now" (have they changed their minds?) StAnselm (talk) 05:17, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

With StAnselm's mods, the sentence is more acceptable to me also. While we're at it, we can take out the "and" and reconstruct as two sentences. Evensteven (talk) 05:32, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Looking again, "usually interpret"? Do they interpret differently sometimes? Second sentence should start "They interpret ...". Evensteven (talk) 05:38, 22 February 2014 (UTC) Never mind. It's getting messy. Evensteven (talk) 05:41, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: User:Eusebeus is edit warring over the hatting a section above. I figured that a mediator could hat any section, so I reverted Eusebeus once, but I don't want to be drawn into an edit war over it. StAnselm (talk) 05:14, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I withdraw my earlier support based on the misrepresentation of the text. It is clear that the author is referring to Eusebius's reliability, not Papias's, and if such material is to be presented at all in the text, the only way I could see it presented would be if the material were explicitly presented in the form "According to (author of the article), "'s views were preserved by the early church historian, Eusebius of Caesarea (ca. 260-ca. 339 CE), generally held by modern scholars to be fairly trustworthy." Even then, I would have some reservations, given that even the quote as first provided seems to me demonstrably to not be referring to Papias and his alleged trustworthiness, but Eusebius and his reputation. If it were added, however, I could maybe see adding after the quotation a statement about how some modern scholars interpret Eusebius's statements, but only after the quotation, to establish the priority of the quotation. I regret to say that such a rather clearly biased misreading of the text is extremely troubling in my eyes.

Also, I would definitely welcome any input from others regarding what they see in the texts of other recent well-regarded reference works in their articles on the Gospel of Matthew. If, as I at this point think possible, there might be problems with disproportionate weight to this matter in our article, it would be useful to know what over reference sources include in their articles as a guideline. John Carter (talk) 05:19, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

The tradition is a unit. Either you support it or you oppose it. Anyway I have reworked it so that trustworthy follows Eusebius not Papias. - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:43, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Does this work?

• Modern scholars Casey and Edwards now believe the Papias tradition preserved by Eusebius to be trustworthy and they interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic. David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to The New Testament, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. p 301 and p 302 - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:48, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

In a word, no, as it does not remotely address the concerns I raised earlier. John Carter (talk) 05:50, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Let's try to avoid ultimatums. I think it's clear there are different shades of meaning here. Your point that you wish to have included is that Edwards has revived this idea of Matthew as keeping notes in Hebrew, which comes from Papias. We don't really care if Papias (or Eusebius) is trustworthy, simply that that comment of his was supported by Edwards. I think we are closing to finding a meaningful compromise here which represents the fact that there exists a viewpoint, however small, that Matthew's Hebrew was somehow involved, or at least Edwards and whoever else seem to want to think this. We don't really care if it's true or not, or if Papias is trustworthy. Andrevan@ 05:51, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I have done my best. Maybe our Mediator can give it a go. I trust you to be fair. - Ret.Prof (talk) 05:56, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

• What about this version?

Casey and Edwards interpret the Papias tradition to mean that Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic. David E. Aune, The Blackwell Companion to The New Testament, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. p 301 and p 302 Evensteven (talk) 05:59, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

That's pretty straightforward and to the point. Perhaps John Carter can draft a sentence or two. Here's my attempt before the edit conflict: "A group of scholars Edwards, Casey et al. continue to hold to the traditional understanding of Eusebius' reliability, interpreting Papias' "Hebrew dialect" comment to mean that Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic." Andrevan@ 06:02, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Both are acceptable to me as they solve the POV problem. I prefer the way Evensteven's draft reads. - Ret.Prof (talk) - Ret.Prof (talk)

I support Evensteven's version (with three footnotes), to be placed at the end of the first "Composition and setting" paragraph. StAnselm (talk) 06:07, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) We do however care about how small the viewpoint might be, to some degree, as per proportional weight. I just looked at the content of Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Bible/Encyclopedic articles, a list I created some time ago of articles and subarticles from, at this point, unfortunately, only two other reference sources. Having said that, the Oxford was counted as one of the outstanding reference sources of the year by the ALA, and I'm not sure the Blackwell was, so that might be a point in its favor. The article in the older Eerdman's dictionary didn't apparently have a defined structure, but the structure of the Oxford book is roughly as follows, with three stars meaning a section of two pages or longer, two stars half a page to 2 pages, and one star meaning under half a page:

• Canonical Status and Location in Canon**; Authorship**; Date of Composition and Historical Context**; Literary History**; Structure and Contents***; Interpretation**; Reception History**;

And, within the section of that article on the "Structure and Contents," it is further broken up into subsections as follows: Introduction, Part 1: The Infancy Narrative (1:1-2:23)*; Introduction, Part II: Prologue to Jesus' Ministry (3:1-4:25)*; First Discourse: The Sermon on the Mount (5:1-7:29)*; Narrative Section: Healings and Miracles (8:1-9:38)**; Second Discourse: On the Mission of the Twelve (10:1-42)**; Narrative Section: Growing Tensions and Conflicts (11:1-12:50)**; Third Discourse: Parables About the Kingdom of Heaven (13:1-52)**; Narrative Section: Messianic Claims and the Demands of Discipleship (13:53-17:27)**; Fourth Discourse: Rules for the Members of the Ekklēsia (18:1-35)**; Narrative Section: Teaching, Healing, and Conflict in Judea and Jerusalem (19:1-24:2)**; Fifth Discourse: The End of Time and the Final Judgment (24:3-25:46)**; The Passion and Resurrection: Narrative (26:1-28:20)**;

I think the information from that source, and the Eerdmans if anyone can access it, as well as any other recent well regarded reference sources would be valuable in determining how much weight and space to give all the material in our own article. I acknowledge that the specific subdivisions of text are themselves often somewhat arbitrary and unique, but the weight given the sections as a whole may well serve as rough guidelines anyway. John Carter (talk) 06:09, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Sometimes the article overweight can be addressed by moving some material into a note, rather than deleting it altogether. Evensteven (talk) 06:13, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

John Carter, that's neither here nor there, and is off topic. Do you have a problem with the text that Evensteven has proposed and Ret Prof and StAnselm have agreed to above. If so, why? Your argument about WEIGHT here is not meaningful. Andrevan@ 06:15, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@ John - Yes but the New Catholic Encyclopedia goes to the other extreme. I think Evensteven has nailed it. - Ret.Prof (talk) 06:17, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@ StAnselm, you have my OK to do the honors of adding the sentence when the mediator give us the Green light! - Ret.Prof (talk) 06:27, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

(e-c) Actually, at 05:19, I did propose a version. It was, basically, "According to (author of the article), "'s views were preserved by the early church historian, Eusebius of Caesarea (ca. 260-ca. 339 CE), generally held by modern scholars to be fairly trustworthy." Then a second sentence, perhaps along the lines of "Some modern scholars (footnote identifying Edwards and Casey) now believe the Papias tradition preserved by Eusebius to be trustworthy and they interpret the tradition to mean Jesus' disciple Matthew had assembled a collection of Jesus' sayings in Hebrew or Aramaic." It would be at this point I believe to not use the word "modern" without qualification, as they are not necessarily the only "modern" scholars, and identifying them as such is itself possibly a violation of NPOV or similar guidelines. Also, although I think Ret.Prof would actually know this, the New Catholic Encyclopedia has a historically demonstrably Catholic bias, and neither the Oxford nor Eerdmans is either historically or in the eyes of critics biased. And, yes, to the mediator, I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, that WP:WEIGHT applies at all periods of an article development, which would, presumably, mean that it is not necessarily acceptable to violate wikipedia policy, and WEIGHT is a policy, during mediation because it was not one of the factors explicitly raised at the beginning is necessarily acceptable, and seeking to adhere to policy during mediation is somehow "off-topic," or could I be wrong in that? John Carter (talk) 06:33, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Your comments about adhering to WEIGHT by comparing Misplaced Pages to other reference works are off-topic because WEIGHT isn't about comparing to other reference works. So while you have invoked the policy, you have failed to make an argument based on the reading of that policy, because it would not involve copy-pasting tables of contents or considering which reference work was given ALA notice. Edwards, Casey, and the Aune quote conceivably meet the standard of having 3 reliable sources which satisfies WEIGHT. However, this is all moot because I see very little difference between the version in your last reply and the one Evensteven pasted above, do you? Andrevan@ 06:40, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I do, and I actually identified it, regarding the relative attention to give the individual names of the authors. And, out of curiosity, how would we be able to determine what is and is not appropriate weight for any content without, perhaps, using some other sources as indicators? And I find your using rather obvious, if implicit, insulting languages to me in your own comment above to be entirely unacceptable in someone who is presumably not to take an active role in the discussion, and I cannot see how a purported mediator is ever at all justified to indulge in such language. I would also ask that you read PiCo's comments below, and, honestly, am beginning to wonder whether someone who insults the parties to a mediation is necessarily the best choice for a mediator. John Carter (talk) 06:51, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

What are you interpreting as insulting language here? Andrevan@ 06:58, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Both Casey and Edwards think there's a reliable tradition that the apostle Matthew wrote a collection of sayings (Casey) or a gospel (Edwards) in Hebrew or Aramaic. But neither of them think this has any connection to the canonical Gospel of Matthew. Casey says "this tradition (meaning Papias) is complete nonsense" when applied to our Matthew; Edwards says that "canonical Matthew ... cannot be explained as a Greek translation of (Matthew's) Hebrew Gospel". So I find it a little difficult to understand what they'd be doing in an article about canonical Matthew - beyond, of course, being charitable to RetProf.PiCo (talk) 06:38, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Good point. If Papias is correct and Matthew did write down the oral teachings of Jesus, was this work the basis of our Gospel of Matthew??

This issue is far more complex.

1) Gospel of Matthew is a translation of the Hebrew Gospel spoken of by Papias: Conservative Christians and the Roman Catholic Church have long taken the position that our Gospel of Matthew is simply a translation of the Hebrew Gospel. In our debate David Bena has put forward some strong arguments supporting this position. By sheer "numbers" it has to be admitted that this is still the majority Christian position.

2) Scholarly rejection the translation position: It has to be admitted that this position has some real problems. Jerome's letter addressed to Pope Damasus in 383 "I will now speak of the New Testament, which was undoubtedly composed in Greek, with the exception of the Apostle Matthew, who was the first in Judea to produce a Gospel of Christ in Hebrew script. We must confess that as we have it in our language, it is marked by discrepancies, and now that the stream is distributed into different channels we must go back to the Fountainhead."

See Jerome, Preface to the Four Gospels, Addressed to Pope Damasus in 383 Roland H. Worth, Bible translations: a history through source documents, McFarland & Co., 1992. p 28

And James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel and the development of the Synoptic Tradition, Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. p 286

These discrepancies raised serious doubt among scholars. Many now argue that the Canonical Gospel of Matthew could not have been a translation of the Hebrew Gospel. Bart Ehrman (2012) p 101 points out that the "Collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew" referred to by Papias bears no resemblance to what "we call" the Gospel of Matthew. Many believe this tradition that the Hebrew Gospel was translated to our Gospel of Matthew is complete nonsense, as most scholars have recognized. Edwards agrees.

3) Fountainhead: Last but not least is Maurice Casey, Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian's Account of His Life and Teaching, Continuum International Publishing Group, 2010. who after studying composite authorship in the Second Temple period comes to his scholarly conclusion. The Gospel of Matthew is anonymous and is the product of composite authorship of which Matthew's Hebrew Gospel was the fountainhead. Hence the name Gospel of Matthew as Matthew was probably a major source. - Ret.Prof (talk) 06:47, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@PiCo, We aren't making the claim that the Hebrew/Aramaic sayings formed the core of the canonical Gospel, but the statement is still conceivably in context when talking about this. The paragraph ends questioning whether Matthew wrote in Hebrew language or simply in that style. It seems that Casey and Edwards are a counterpoint to this and believe that Matthew did in fact write something in Hebrew, so it's relevant to the surrounding discussion. In order to make a compromise one must be willing. @Ret. Prof, you are returning to your old ways. Simply repeating lectures is not a way to form consensus. Andrevan@ 06:51, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@Andrevan, I cannot see how there is any remotely acceptable reason for an alleged mediator to use the word "we" in this context, although you started your first sentence above with that word. The fact that you are now rather clearly placing yourself in alliance with one of the positions which you are purportedly supposed to mediate between raises serious questions regarding your neutrality and potential effectiveness as a mediator. And your own comment above strikes me as being a form of a repeating a lecture, and is possibly similarly unacceptable in a mediator, who is if I remember correctly not necessarily supposed to be among the parties to the consensus anyway, or am I wrong in that? And how exactly is engaging in personal attacks on one of the parties of a mediation itself considered acceptable in reaching consensus? Pardon me for saying, by the way, that I have had enough implicit insults directed at me for the day by the purported mediator, and think it reasonable to allow other parties to this mediation who have apparently retired for the day to respond first, something I think most any mediator would know to keep in mind at all times. John Carter (talk) 07:02, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

John Carter, if you can't AGF you will be removed from the mediation. I'm an atheist and I could not care less about Papias or his alleged manuscripts. I don't know what insults you're referring to, but if you can't see how "we" means "we editors" the community consensus-forming body, you don't need to be involved here. Andrevan@ 07:10, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

If you don't know what insults I am referring to, then read your own comment above, in which you yourself seem to rather clearly violate AGF regarding my own actions by apparently deciding I am not among he community-consensus forming body. ON what basis do you make that implicit statement? And, once again, believe it or not, there are several parties to the mediation who have not commented on this proposal, and so far as I can tell none who have commented on my own proposal now about 2 hours old, so I think it would be both premature and irrational to assume it would even be possible to reach consensus before all the parties have spoken. I regret to say that, based on your own apparent willingness to place a limited consensus among a small group of editors who have quickly responded in this matter among a not much larger group of editors involved in the mediation, many of whom have not yet responded, there is some question as to your own motivations, and whether you are necessarily the appropriate person to be involved here. Am I to conclude by your comment above that you place consensus of the small number of people who quickly support a proposal among the limited number of parties in this mediation to be sufficient to place that limited consensus above all other policies and guidelines, and, if so, would you be so kind as to point out to me where in policies and guidelines that position is supported? By the way, I realize that this is a difficult case to mediate, and welcome any reasonable, informed assistance in the matter, but there are serious concerns raised by Athenekos, Ignocrates, In ictu oculi, and some others who have not yet responded as well, and I am far from sure that it would be reasonable to perhaps give them the impression partial consensus has been reached before they comment, given the possible social pressure they could not unreasonably perceive themselves being put under in a case where some might think the mediator himself might be placing a limited consensus above all other policies and guidelines. John Carter (talk) 07:41, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Where do you see that I plan to place a limited consensus above all other policies and guidelines? Where have I said the discussion is over? Where have I excluded you from the consensus-forming body? All I see is that my attempt to secure a meaningful way forward in this content dispute is being thwarted by outlandish accusations from you that I am insulting you and that I believe we can ignore policies and guidelines. I encourage you to read the policy test regarding WEIGHT. A tenured Professor of Theology who writes a widely reviewed book is not fringe Flat Earthing, especially if the theory he is claiming to espouse is similar to one that has been repeated by people since the middle ages in one form or another. That deserves some explanation, even if only to shoot it down. Andrevan@ 07:52, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I am sorry that you are apparently incapableof understanding that policies and guidelines indicate that even tenured professors can unfortunately at times put forward in some of their very poorly received books theories which have little if any regard in the academic communities. Despite your absolutist assertion above that indicates you believe it impossible for some academics to embarrass themselves by publishing books which are sometimes literally ridiculed in their academic communities, it happens rather often, particularly in the fields of religion and pseudoscience and the like. There are a huge number of academic journals out there, some of which have been linked to above, and I believe according to policies and guidelines their opinions regarding FRINGE and WEIGHT probably count more than the opinions of editors here. I regret to say that I believe it reasonable at this time to request that this mediation if it is to be continued do so under a different mediator, because I very sincerely believe that your conduct in this matter is such that your own neutrality and objectivity, as well as, perhaps, even basic knowledge of and understanding of the field in question, have been at least somewhat damaged by your conduct in this matter. John Carter (talk) 08:25, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I find it amazing how you can take my comment and deduce that I "believe it impossible for some academics to embarrass themselves by publishing books which are sometimes literally ridiculed." As an unbiased lay person, I have no opinion on whether Edwards is right or wrong, and it doesn't matter. FRINGE and WEIGHT do not say that a poorly reviewed publication is not a reliable source. You need to read them again. Andrevan@ 08:33, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

And I find it amazing that a purported mediator seems to not be able to understand that both FRINGE and WEIGHT are, or at least were, intended to be applied on a case-by-case basis. No one has argued, at least recently, that the sources are not reliable in some context, although, apparently, you may not have read those comments? Perhaps you might benefit from reading them again regarding those particular matters. And I also find it amazing that you are apparently all but completely unaware of just how many books that meet broad RS standards in the broad field of Christianity and religion in general are published every year. I think any rational person would understand that no single main article on a topic here can include the opinions expressed in all of those works, given the sheer number of them. I also am amazed that you, apparently, don't yourself apparently pay much attention to the exact content of many of the comments here, which regularly raise serious concerns regarding the specific interpretations of individual editors, as opposed to the content of the sources themselves. I also find it amazing that someone who, apparently, is as uninformed on this topic as you might be seen as being would feel competent to pass judgment on something about which he is so clearly ill-informed. And, lastly, I find it amazing that you seem to find reaching a compromise to take priority over all other matters, including, apparently, adherence to other existing policies and guidelines. All of those concerns, I regret to say, provide in my eyes further reason to believe that you, whatever very useful and valuable qualities you may have in other contexts, are not competent or qualified to function as a mediator in this topic. John Carter (talk) 09:32, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I don't think PiCo is on point here. The Papias tradition is already discussed in the article. The proposal says "Matthew assembled", not "Matthew wrote". The sentence does not imply inclusion of any of the assembled text(s) in the canonical gospel. Evensteven (talk) 06:53, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

arbitrary break to make editing easier

@Ret.Prof, you said: "If Papias is correct and Matthew did write down the oral teachings of Jesus, was this work the basis of our Gospel of Matthew?" Casey and Edwards say it wasn't. So does everyone else. Therefore what's it doing in an article on the Gospel of Matthew?PiCo (talk) 07:00, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@Evensteven, the point is that this is an article about the Gospel of Matthew, not about the tradition of Papias. PiCo (talk) 06:56, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

And the Papias tradition is already discussed in the article about the Gospel of Matthew. Right or wrong, that's what it is right now. Evensteven (talk) 07:01, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@Andrevan, I sympathise that you see me as wrecking the first sign of a compromise, but our aim here isn't to find a comprise at all costs, it's to improve the article. Casey and Edwards believe that Matthew wrote something, but they both think that it had no connection at all, not the slightest, with the canonical Gospel of Matthew.PiCo (talk) 07:00, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I understand your view. But what does an acceptable compromise look like to you? Are you arguing for removal of the whole existing paragraph? Or do you have another object in mind? Evensteven (talk) 07:08, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I was the one who put the existing Papias material into the article. My point is that I think the article already gives an adequate account of the Papias tradition. Adding Casey and Edwards would (a) be undue weight (just two fringe voices against an overwhelming majority - you saw above the reception that Edwards' book has had), and (b) irrelevant anyway, since they both explicitly say that their hypothetical Hebrew Matthew has no connection with canonical Matthew. Yes, I do have a proposal, but editing here is like putting your head up over the parapet during the Battle of the Somme - edit conflicts flying in all directions. PiCo (talk) 07:11, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Agreed about the edit conflicts. And I see your position. Basically, you're proposing "no change", yes? Evensteven (talk) 07:21, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Evensteven - Ret.Prof (talk) 07:02, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

We know you do Ret. Prof. No need to explicitly agree every time if you're not contributing something new to the discussion. @PiCo, Edwards says on p. 3 that it is reasonable to equate the Hebrew work of Matthew with the "Hebrew Gospel." Now while I agree with you that technically that is a different thing from the canonical Gospel of Matthew that we have, according to the prevailing scholarly view, it is still reasonable to say in the article that Edwards equates the Papias comment with there being a Hebrew gospel based on Matthew's writings. Andrevan@ 07:06, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@ PiCo I disagree. Casey believes it was the fountainhead of the Gospel of Matthew. - Ret.Prof (talk) 07:18, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Remember we reached consensus that Papias should be in the article. My concern was that the section should be from a NPOV. - Ret.Prof (talk) 07:21, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

BTW PiCo, the reception met by the people who proposed this idea is totally fair game for the article too, if those are reliable review sources. If Edwards was laughed out of academia, that is certainly worth mentioning. Remember though that verifiability has nothing to do with the tone or tenor of the source. If lots of people commented on Edwards to say he was a moron, that would still enhance his notability. Andrevan@ 07:22, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

And that notability is the very reason the article should make mention of it, so as to put it into its proper scholarly context. NPOV, sure, but also to ensure the article readers gain a sense of the due scholastic weight. Call it control of notoriety. Evensteven (talk) 07:31, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Finally it is in the article because most articles on the Gospel of Matthew first discuss whether or not Papias was reliable. Then they discuss whether or not it was the basis for the Gospel of Matthew. There should not be a big problem. - Ret.Prof (talk) 07:38, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

@Ret.Prof - that's what our article does; it has two paragraphs on the composition of Matthew, and one of them is almost exclusively about Papias. And we say that the scholarly consensus is what it is.PiCo (talk) 07:44, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Right, and if we adopt Evensteven's draft it will NPOV and we will have a deal. - Ret.Prof (talk) 07:55, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I have to go out (IRL) so I'll just very briefly summarise my position: 1. Reference to Casey and Edwards is unacceptable, as both explicitly reject any link between Papias' Hebrew gospel and canonical Matthew - we'd look like idiots. 2. The existing treatment of the Papias tradition is about right - it explains what Papias said and why the consensus of modern scholars is that he's wrong (and Casey and Edwards support the consensus, by the way - both reject any link etc etc). PiCo (talk) 08:06, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I completely see what PiCo is saying: If we describe Edwards' view on the Hebrew Gospel in a section on the authorship of the Gospel of Matthew, isn't it reasonable to suspect that anyone reading it is going to think that what Edwards is saying about the Hebrew Gospel has something to do with the authorship of the Gospel of Matthew? So then we'd be linking his hypothetical Hebrew Gospel to the Gospel of Matthew on the basis of Edwards, even though Edwards says the exact opposite. I think that's a clear cut case of misrepresenting a source.

My proposal: "A minority of scholars interpret Papias' testimony as accurately describing some sort of authorial activity by Matthew the disciple in Aramaic or Hebrew, and some further maintain that the document the disciple produced influenced the sources used by the author of the Gospel of Matthew.(ref)Casey 2010; Davies and Allison 1988; Edwards 2009; Duling 2010(/ref) The consensus however is that Papias' testimony does not describe the Gospel of Matthew and that any theories of such a Semitic-language document, or of a relation between the Gospel of Matthew and Matthew the disciple, are unfounded.(/ref)Duling 2010; Livingstone 1997; Ehrman 1999(/ref). Thoughts? (I made faux-ref tags in text; page numbers, publication information where needed would be added). --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 08:32, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry if this is harsh: wordy, yielding undue weight, and giving the impression of axe-grinding (though I don't think that's your intent). I'm done now until after I sleep. Evensteven (talk) 08:36, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Here's a try for less wordiness (I don't know about the other things): "A few scholars hold that Papias accurately describes a document by the Apostle Matthew in Hebrew or Aramaic, and some further hold that this document influenced the Gospel of Matthew.(refs) The consensus however is that Papias does not describe the Gospel of Matthew and that it has no known Hebrew or Aramaic source document.(refs)" (Also, there's no need to apologize to me.)--Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 09:28, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Taken from Bart D. Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, HarperCollins 2012. pp 98-101

• And this is what he says about Matthew: “And so Matthew composed the sayings in the Hebrew tongue, and each one interpreted them to the best of his ability."
• This is not eyewitness testimony to the life of Jesus, but it is getting very close to that. Where conservative scholars go astray is in thinking that Papias gives us reliable information about the origins of our Gospels of Matthew and Mark. The problem is that even though he “knows” that there was an account of Jesus's life written by Mark and a collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew, there is no reason to think that he is referring to the books that we call Mark and Matthew. In fact, what he says about these books does not coincide with what we ourselves know about the canonical Gospels. He appears to be referring to other writings, and only later did Christians (wrongly) assume that he was referring to the two books that eventually came to be included in Scripture. This then is testimony that is independent of the Gospels themselves. It is yet one more independent line of testimony among the many we have seen so far. And this time it is a testimony that explicitly and credibly traces its own lineage directly to the disciples of Jesus themselves. (quote from pp 100-101)

Please assume good faith. I believe the above quotation to be a true copy. My understanding of the meaning is as follows:

1. The last two lines mean the testimony of Papias is reliable.
2. The "collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew", is the "Logia in a Hebrew dialect"
3. "Where conservative scholars go astray" is referring to the Roman Catholic Church and Fundamentalist Christians who believe that what we call Matthew (ie the Gospel of Matthew) was translated from the collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew in a Hebrew dialect.

Summary: Ehrman truly believes Papias meant there was "collection of Jesus's sayings made by Matthew". Please assume good faith for although I may be wrong in my reading, I am not trying to be disruptive. Cheers - Ret.Prof (talk) 14:03, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

This is direct repetition from the RSN, which I will add to previous attempts to resolve the dispute. Ignocrates (talk) 16:20, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Retirement of Eusebeus

Just thought that it might be worthwhile to note here that Eusebeus has recently retired, using the edit summary here on both his user and user talk pages. I myself am less than completely sure what the phrasing means, but I think have a fairly good guess. John Carter (talk) 16:27, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Eric Kvaalen's version

At the risk of adding more heat than light to the discussion, I thought it might be useful to revisit Eric Kvaalen's version, which he linked to during the ANI discussion. Here are three excerpts from that version that might be useful:

The Gospel of Matthew does not name its author. The record of the tradition that the author was the disciple Matthew begins with the early Christian bishop Papias of Hierapolis (about 100–140 AD), who, in a passage with several ambiguous phrases, wrote: "Matthew collected the oracles (logia—sayings of or about Jesus) in the Hebrew language (Hebraïdi dialektōi—may refer to Hebrew or Aramaic) and each one interpreted (hērmēneusen—or "translated") them as best he could." On the surface this implies that Matthew was written in Hebrew or Aramaic and translated into Greek, but Matthew's Greek "reveals none of the telltale marks of a translation." Scholars have put forward several theories to explain Papias: perhaps Matthew wrote two gospels, one, now lost, in Hebrew, the other our Greek version; or perhaps the logia was a collection of sayings rather than the gospel; or by dialektōi Papias may have meant that Matthew wrote in the Jewish style rather than in the Hebrew language.

Most contemporary scholars, based on analysis of the Greek in the Gospel of Matthew and use of sources such as the Greek Gospel of Mark, conclude that the New Testament Gospel of Matthew was written originally in Greek and is not a translation from Hebrew or Aramaic (Greek primacy). If they are correct, then the Church Fathers such as Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Jerome possibly referred to a document or documents distinct from the present Gospel of Matthew. A smaller number of scholars, including the Roman Catholic Pontifical Biblical Commission, believe the ancient writings that Matthew was originally in Aramaic, arguing for Aramaic primacy.

Papias does not identify his Matthew, but by the end of the 2nd century the tradition of Matthew the tax-collector had become widely accepted, and the line "The Gospel According to Matthew" began to be added to manuscripts. For many reasons scholars today believe otherwise—for example, the gospel seems to be based on Mark, and "it seems unlikely that an eyewitness of Jesus's ministry, such as Matthew, would need to rely on others for information about it"—and believe instead that it was written between about 80–90 AD by a highly educated Jew (an "Israelite", in the language of the gospel itself), intimately familiar with the technical aspects of Jewish law, standing on the boundary between traditional and non-traditional Jewish values. The disciple Matthew was probably honoured within the author's circle, as the name Matthew is more prominent in this gospel than any other.

While several improvements have been made to the current version, particularly the mention of Eusebius along with a note, this version seems (to me) to be more complete and neutrally worded (albeit redundant) without bringing in the problematic sources PiCo mentioned (Casey, Ehrman, Edwards) that don't support the content. I'm not endorsing this particular version; I'm simply offering it up as a suggestion to keep the discussion moving. Ignocrates (talk) 17:08, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure it's appropriate to use the present tense to refer to the Pontifical Biblical Commission statement of 1911, but here is the link. -- 101.119.14.82 (talk) 17:21, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

1. Any exceptional claim would require exceptional sources.