Gospel of Matthew – Authorship

(From NRSVCE)

EARLY CHURCH WRITERS CLAIMED that the author of this Gospel, Matthew the tax collector, a disciple of Jesus
(9:9, 10:3), collected Jesus’ sayings in the Hebrew dialect for others to translate (Papias, early second century),
or wrote the Gospel in the 50s or early 60s (Irenaeus, late second century), or wrote it in Judea in the decades
following Jesus’ death (Jerome, fifth century).

Various considerations cast serious doubt on those ancient views.

First, the Gospel of Matthew contains, but is not itself, a collection of sayings.

Second, a Hebrew version of this Gospel exists, but it is medieval, and scholars argue that the Gospel was
originally written in Greek; thus it is not a translation.
Third, the author of Matthew was almost certainly aware of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 70
CE (see 21.41; 22.7;24.15–16).
Fourth, Jesus’ main opponents in the story are the Pharisees, whose authority developed predominantly in the
late first century.
Fifth, according to widely held scholarly opinion (the “Two-Source Theory”), the major sources for the author
were the Greek Gospel of Mark (late 60s or early 70s) and a sayings source in Greek that has been
lost(designated “Q,”probably composed pre-70) along with some special traditions (“M,” also pre-70). These
factors suggest a date after 70, probably between 80 and 90; composition by Jesus’ Galilean tax-collecting
disciple at mid-century is therefore extremely unlikely.

More certain is the probability that it was written by a multilingual man, probably an Israelite, with a rather
sophisticated command of Israelite traditions and scribal argumentation (see 13.52) in the late first century.

New Collegeville Bible Commentary

Traditionally, the author of the First Gospel has been identified as Matthew,
the tax collector who was called by Jesus (Matt 9:9) and sent out as an apostle
(10:3). But, like many ancient authors, the evangelist nowhere identifies himself.
The apostle Matthew may have been responsible for an earlier stage of the
Gospel tradition, or he may have been a missionary to the area where this Gospel
was composed. But most scholars agree that he was not the author of the Gospel.
The composer copied extensively from the Gospel of Mark; an eye-witness
would have told the story in his own words. It is also doubtful that a tax collector
would have the kind of religious and literary education needed to produce this
Gospel. Finally, the theological concerns in this Gospel are those of secondgeneration Christians. For the sake of
brevity, however, we continue to refer to the author as “Matthew.”
The evangelist was likely a Jewish Christian, writing for a community that
was predominantly Jewish Christian. The author had extensive knowledge of the
Hebrew Scriptures and a keen concern for Jewish observance and the role of the
Law. A few scholars hold that Matthew was a Gentile because of his fierce antiJewish polemic, especially in
chapter 23. In addition, he seems to have been
unfamiliar with distinctions between Pharisees and Sadducees (e.g., 16:5-12;
22:23). He also appears to have misunderstood the Hebrew parallelism in
Zechariah 9:9, thinking that the prophet is speaking of two beasts (21:1-9).
These, however, are not sure indicators that the evangelist was a Gentile.
The anti-Jewish polemic can be explained as part of a Jewish Christian’s attempt
to define his community in relation to other Jews who have not followed Jesus.
Matthew’s juxtaposition of “Pharisees and Sadducees” is simply a generic
phrase for the religious leaders at a time when Sadducees were no longer
functioning. And the apparent misinterpretation of Zechariah 9:9 does not negate
the evidence that the evangelist had a thorough knowledge of the Hebrew
Scriptures, seen in his frequent biblical citations and allusions.

Date
Allusions to the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem (21:41-42; 22:7;
24:1-2) indicate that Matthew wrote after A.D. 70. A date of approximately A.D.
85 would allow time for circulation of the Gospel of Mark, one of Matthew’s
sources, which was composed close to A.D. 70.

Introduction to the New Trstament – R.E Brown

If we work backwards, the title “According to Matthew”82 was attached

to this writing by the latter half of the 2d century (or perhaps earlier; Davies
and Allison, Matthew 1.7–8). Ca. 125 Papias wrote, “Matthew arranged in
order the sayings in the Hebrew [= Aramaic?] language, and each one
interpreted/translated as he was able” (EH 3.39.16). On p. 158 above I
deliberately printed the Papias reference to Matt in its actual context
following the reference to Mark, a sequence that would not suggest that
Papias thought that Matt wrote before Mark. (The claim that Matt was the
first Gospel appears with Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Eusebius.)
There has been considerable debate as to whether in referring to “sayings”
(logia) Papias meant that Matthew wrote a full Gospel (as later writers
understood, thinking of canonical Matt, e.g., EH 5.8.2–3). Logoi would
have been the usual word for “sayings” in the sense of “words,” and so
logia might mean whatever constituted the “revelations” of Jesus (see Acts
7:38 for the logia or revelations delivered by Moses). Moreover, since
Papias reported that Mark was a follower of Peter who did not make an
orderly account of the Lord’s logia and it is widely agreed that Papias was
referring to the Gospel of Mark, plausibly he would have been referring to a
gospel when he says that Matthew arranged in order the logia in
Hebrew/Aramaic.83 The meaning of syntassein, which I have translated
“arranged in order,” is not certain. It need have no connotation of
chronological or even logical order; it could refer to a persuasive or
pleasing literary arrangement or even to a fuller account.
The canonical Matthean Gospel exists in Greek—was Papias referring to
a Semitic original from which it was translated? Three different
observations point in that direction. (1) In antiquity there was a Jewish
gospel probably in Aramaic used by Palestinian Christians and associated
by the Church Fathers with Nazaraean (or Nazorean) Jewish Christians,
especially in the Aleppo area of Syria.84 References to this gospel relate it
closely to Matt; Jerome claimed that he translated it into Greek and at times
he treats it almost as if it were the Semitic original behind Matt. When
compared to the canonical Gospel, however, the few Nazaraean passages
preserved in patristic quotations seem to be secondary expansions of Matt
or interpolations. (2) There are medieval Hebrew forms of Matt that most
scholars think of as retroversions from the Greek of canonical Matt, often
made to serve in arguments between Christians and Jews. However, some
claim that these texts are a guide to the original Hebrew of Matt.85 (3) Still
other scholars think they can reconstruct the original Hebrew or Aramaic
underlying the whole or parts of the Greek text of canonical Matt on the
assumption that the original was in Semitic.86
The vast majority of scholars, however, contend that the Gospel we
know as Matt was composed originally in Greek and is not a translation of a
Semitic original. As for Papias’ attribution of the logia to Matthew, if
canonical Matt drew on canonical Mark, the idea that Matthew, an
eyewitness member of the Twelve, would have used as a major source a
noneyewitness, Greek account (Mark) is implausible. (That objection is notreally met by the thesis that
Matthew wrote an Aramaic gospel that was
translated into Greek only after Mark was written and thus under the
influence of Mark—not only the Greek wording of Matt but also its
organization and material content seem to have been influenced by Mark.)
Thus either Papias was wrong/confused in attributing a gospel (sayings) in
Hebrew/Aramaic to Matthew, or he was right but the Hebrew/Aramaic
composition he described was not the work we know in Greek as canonical
Matt.
In the latter hypothesis, did what Matthew wrote in Aramaic/Hebrew
play any role in the background of canonical Matt, thus explaining the title
given to the latter work? Since Papias speaks of “sayings,” was he
describing Q, which canonical Matt used? Yet Q as reconstructed from Matt
and Luke is a Greek work that has gone through stages of editing. Papias
could not have been describing that, but was he referring to the Semitic
original of the earliest Greek stage of Q, a stage that we can reconstruct
only with difficulty and uncertainty? Others posit an Aramaic collection of
sayings on which Matt, Mark, and Q all drew. One cannot dismiss these
suggestions as impossible, but they explain the unknown through the more
unknown.
By way of overall judgment on the “Matthew” issue, it is best to accept
the common position that canonical Matt was originally written in Greek by
a noneyewitness whose name is unknown to us and who depended on
sources like Mark and Q. Whether somewhere in the history of Matt’s
sources something written in Semitic by Matthew, one of the Twelve,
played a role we cannot know. It is not prudent for scholarship 1,900 years
later to dismiss too facilely as complete fiction or ignorance the affirmation
of Papias, an ancient spokesman living within four decades of the
composition of canonical Matt.
Today a more divisive issue is whether the unknown canonical
evangelist was a Jewish Christian or a Gentile Christian. Current
scholarship runs about four to one in favor of a Jewish Christian; but
significant commentators argue for Gentile authorship.87 For instance,
sometimes they detect mistakes in Matt that they cannot conceive a Jew
making, e.g., the evangelist’s joining the Pharisees and Sadducees four
times in chap. 16 as if they had the same teaching (16:12). Yet that joining
may simply be a shorthand way of putting together Jesus’ enemies,88 and
22:34 shows that the evangelist is aware of differences between them. Insupport of identifying the evangelist
as a Jewish Christian, the Papias
tradition at least suggests a Jewish background for Matt. The evangelist’s
use of the OT indicates that he knew Hebrew and perhaps even Aramaic—
an unlikely accomplishment for a Gentile. Although not conclusive and
possibly reflecting sources rather than the evangelist himself, there are
many features of Jewish thought and theology in Matt:89 the infancy
narrative with a genealogy, a Moses parallelism for Jesus, and a knowledge
of Jewish legends; the Sermon on the Mount with modifications of the Law;
debates with the Pharisees; images of Peter’s authority (keys of the
kingdom, binding and loosing); a command to obey those who sit in Moses’
seat (23:2–3); worry about flight on a Sabbath (24:20); and the special
material in the passion narrative that is almost a midrash on OT passages.
Overall likelihood, then, favors the Jewish Christian identity of the
evangelist.
Yet what type of Jewish Christian? Matt’s Greek is probably not
translation Greek; the evangelist often corrects Mark’s style, and there are
Greek wordplays. This linguistic skill could suggest diaspora upbringing
(witness Paul). Theologically, the evangelist was neither of the more
conservative extreme that opposed the admission of uncircumcised Gentiles
to Christian communities (see 28:19), nor of the more liberal extreme that
deemed the Law irrelevant (see 5:17–18). Yet the exact Matthean mind-set
toward the Law is hard to reconstruct; for as we shall see in the next
subsection, the Gospel reflects a complicated community history. Many
would find the evangelist’s self-description in 13:52: “a scribe trained for
the kingdom of heaven … a householder who brings out of his treasure new
things and old.” That reverence for what has gone before is attested in the
Matthean addition (9:17) to Mark 2:22, which emphasizes that both old and
new are preserved. If we compare the evangelist to Paul, the other great
writer on the Law in the NT, even though on practical issues the two might
agree and both reverenced the Ten Commandments (Matt 19:18–19; Rom
13:9), each might find the other’s slogans too sweeping: “I have not come
to abolish the Law” (Matt 5:17); “You are not under the Law” (Rom 6:14–
15)