The Gospel

as Manuscript
 The Gospel
as Manuscript
An Early History of the Jesus Tradition as
Material Artifact

CHRIS KEITH

1
 3
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press

198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America.

© Oxford University Press 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in

a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction
rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above.

You must not circulate this work in any other form

and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.

Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data

Names: Keith, Chris, author.
Title: The Gospel as manuscript : an early history of the Jesus tradition
as material artifact /​Chris Keith.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2020] |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019035562 (print) | LCCN 2019035563 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780199384372 (hardback) | ISBN 9780199384389 (updf) |
ISBN 9780190097240 (epub) | ISBN 9780199384396 (online)
Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Gospels—​Criticism, Textual. | Bible.
Gospels—​Manuscripts. | Transmission of texts. | Jesus Christ—​History
of doctrines—​Early church, ca. 30-​600.
Classification: LCC BS2555.52 .K455 2020 (print) |
LCC BS2555.52 (ebook) | DDC 226/​.04—​dc23
LC record available at https://​lccn.loc.gov/​2019035562
LC ebook record available at https://​lccn.loc.gov/​2019035563

1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America
for Mom, September 20, 1954–​June 9, 2016

and Dad
 Contents

Preface ix
Abbreviations xiii

Introduction: The Elixir of Life and Death 1

PA RT I T H E G O SP E L A S M A N U S C R I P T
1. The Book as Artifact 17
2. Sociologies of the Book in the Study of Second Temple Judaism
and Early Christianity 35

PA RT I I T H E G O SP E L A S G O SP E L S
3. The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 73
4. The Competitive Textualization of the Synoptic Tradition 100
5. The Competitive Textualization of Johannine and Thomasine
Tradition 131

PA RT I I I T H E G O SP E L A S L I T U R G Y
6. The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition in the First Three
Centuries 163
7. The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition and the Emergence
of Christian Identity 201

Conclusion: The Gospel as Manuscript 233

Bibliography 237
Ancient Sources Index 263
General Index 275
 Preface

This book began as a PhD proposal for the University of Edinburgh in 2004.
I wanted to address the textualization of the Jesus tradition under the super-
vision of Larry Hurtado. When I arrived in Edinburgh in 2005, Hurtado went
on sabbatical for a semester and I was assigned to Helen Bond, who would
remain my primary supervisor even when Hurtado returned and served
as an active secondary supervisor. Shortly after my arrival in Edinburgh,
I also realized that I really was not as interested in my original topic as I had
thought. I dropped it and spent my doctoral years working instead on the ref-
erence to Jesus’s writing in the ground in John 8:6, 8.
I never lost my interest in the textualization of the Jesus tradition entirely,
however, and have published articles and essays on some of these matters
as opportunities arose, steadily working my way back toward this book.
Needless to say, the present study is considerably different in scope and topic
from the doctoral study I had originally imagined. It bears the stamp of my
time studying under Bond and Hurtado, as well as Tom Thatcher, who guided
my graduate work and introduced me to ancient media criticism. Readers
familiar with their scholarship will have no problem seeing their influence.
I am forever riding their coattails and thankful that they let me.
From the beginning I imagined this project as a new approach to a com-
plex of issues that Werner Kelber addressed in his The Oral and the Written
Gospel (1983). Along the way I have had the privilege of getting to know
Kelber personally. I distinctly remember meeting him for the first time in
Glasgow in 2008. I had finished my PhD thesis, was awaiting my viva, and
was already plotting a next project, which I thought at the time would be this
book. On the train over to Glasgow from Edinburgh, I worried and rehearsed
a speech about how I thought he was onto something and that I respected
him, but also thought he was wrong about this or that issue and wanted to
know what he thought. When I delivered the speech, I braced for impact,
certain he would put me in my place. I did not know then that I was address-
ing one of the kindest and least self-​important people in this field. Kelber
is humble to a degree that is uncharacteristic among scholars, even well-​
adjusted ones. He told me he thought I was right in my criticism of his earlier
x Preface

work and encouraged me to continue. I learned much that day. Even when
going a different direction than him in this study, I am conscious of walking a
path that Kelber first cleared.
Numerous colleagues read sections of this study and provided helpful
feedback. I thank Mark Goodacre, William A. Johnson, Jennifer Knust,
Matthew D. C. Larsen, Amy-​Jill Levine, Candida Moss, Eva Mroczek, Taylor
Petrey, Sarah Rollens, Nathan Shedd, Jeff Stackert, and Stephen Young.
I benefited from conversations with James Crossley, Anthony Le Donne,
Rafael Rodríguez, and Dieter T. Roth. Karl Galinsky and the Memoria
Romana project funded a very early stage of this research project, and I am
grateful for their support. St Mary’s University granted me a sabbatical that
enabled me to finish the project, and my colleague James Crossley gra-
ciously covered several of my duties in the Centre for the Social-​Scientific
Study of the Bible so that I could take it. I would also like to thank Louisville
Presbyterian Theological Seminary, where I serve as a visiting research pro-
fessor. Sue Garrett, Marion Soards, Matthew Collins, and other colleagues
there have been great hosts and conversation partners. I thank my editor at
Oxford University Press, Theo Calderara, for his patience with this project.
Since I have been working on this book for several years, I have had the
opportunity to air some of its ideas in previous venues. I presented an early
version of the research in ­chapters 6 and 7 in 2016 to the New Testament re-
search seminars of the University of Cambridge and University of Edinburgh.
I thank Judith Lieu and Helen Bond for their kind invitations and the sem-
inar participants for helpful feedback. I also presented that research to the
Second Century Consultation of the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical
Literature in 2016. I thank Jeremiah Bailey, Michael Bird, and Christopher
M. Hays not only for the invitation but for understanding and patience when
I had to cancel on short notice the previous year. I presented research that
went into c­ hapters 1 and 3 at both Johannes Gutenberg–​Universität Mainz
and a special session of the Book History seminar of the annual meeting
of the Society of Biblical Literature (2017). I thank Ruben Zimmerman
for the invitation to the former and Eva Mroczek for leading the latter, as
well as William Johnson for his participation in that SBL session. Chapter 4
served as the 18th Annual Biblical Interpretation Lecture at the Centre for
Biblical Interpretation of the University of Gloucestershire in 2018. I thank
Philip Esler for his invitation and for hosting me. Sections in ­chapters 1, 3,
and 6 draw upon prior publications from T&T Clark (Chris Keith, “Early
Christian Book Culture and the Emergence of the First Written Gospel,” in
 Preface xi

Manuscripts, Mark, and Monotheism: Essays in Honor of Larry W. Hurtado,

ed. Chris Keith and Dieter T. Roth, LNTS 528 [London: T&T Clark, 2015],
22–​39; Chris Keith, “The Public Reading of the Gospels,” in The Reception of
Jesus in the First Three Centuries, ed. Chris Keith et al., 3 vols. [London: T&T
Clark, 2019], 3:445–​69) and SBL Press (Chris Keith, “Prolegomena on
the Textualization of Mark’s Gospel: Manuscript Culture, the Extended
Situation, and the Emergence of the First Written Gospel,” in Memory and
Identity in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity: A Conversation with Barry
Schwartz, ed. Tom Thatcher, SemSt 78 [Atlanta: SBL, 2014], 161–​86). The first
part of c­ hapter 5 appeared as an article in Catholic Biblical Quarterly, which
the Catholic Biblical Association publishes (Chris Keith, “The Competitive
Textualization of the Jesus Tradition in John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25,” CBQ
78.2 [2016]: 321–​37). I gratefully acknowledge the permission of the respec-
tive presses. I have updated and modified these publications for this book.
Unless otherwise noted, translations of biblical and related texts are mine.
Likewise, unless I cite a translated edition, translations of German and
French are mine.
Finally, it remains to thank my family. To my talented, smart, and beautiful
wife, Erin: I do not deserve you, but neither does anyone else. I am grateful
that you chose me to be by your side through all these adventures. To my hi-
larious, crazy, mischievous, and sweet children, Jayce, Hannah, Michael, and
Sarah: you are the highlights of my days, weeks, months, and years. I hope
someday you will get to know the joy of looking forward all week to Friday
night pizza and movie with your family the way I do with you.
I dedicate this study to my mother, Patsy, and father, Andy. My mom
passed away in June 2016. From 1999 to 2016, she battled five separate occur-
rences of cancer before taking the battle to other ground. She was gentle and
kind, but also tenacious in a way that few got to see. As far as I was concerned,
she won Mom of the Year when she introduced me to the Police Academy
movies when I had chicken pox in fourth grade and spent whole days watch-
ing them with me. We both loved Ollie Hopnoodle’s Haven of Bliss and or-
ange cupcakes from the gas station. I doubt she would have read this book,
but she would have been really proud of me for writing it and displayed it
prominently in her living room. She was proud of all her kids, and I am lucky
to be one. Till we meet again, Mom. My dad has taught me more in my life
than I could ever hope to pass on to my own children. Over the last two
decades he taught me what it really means to love someone in sickness and
in health. I want to record in writing my gratitude for his taking care of my
xii Preface

mom and battling alongside of, and for, her. Since June 2016 he has taught
me a lesson that he did not anticipate teaching yet—​how to make music with
what remains. Lead on, Dad.

May 9, 2019
La Grange, KY
 Abbreviations

Abbreviations in this study follow the SBL Handbook of Style, 2nd ed., except
for the following, which do not occur there:

AAW Approaching the Ancient World

ASE Annali di storia dell’esegesi
BACh Bible in Ancient Christianity
BMSEC Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck Studies in Early Christianity
BPC Biblical Performance Criticism
CCS Classical Culture and Society
CM Christianity in the Making
CMP Cultural Memory in the Present
CS Cornerstones Series
DBAM The Dictionary of the Bible and Ancient Media
DRLAR Divinations: Rereading Late Antique Religion
ECCA Early Christianity in the Context of Antiquity
EDEJ The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism
ES Emerging Scholars
Exp Expositor
GCRW Greek Culture in the Roman World
HLV Hans-​Lietzmann-​Vorlesungen
JRASup Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplement Series
JSRC Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture
KTTVU Kleine Texte füe theologische Vorlesungen und Übungen
KWJS Key Words in Jewish Studies
MTS Marburger Theologische Studien
NCHB The New Cambridge History of the Bible: From the Beginnings to 600
NHMS Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies
OHP Oxford Handbook of Papyrology
PilNTC Pillar New Testament Commentary
RCM Routledge Classical Monographs
RFCC Religion in the First Christian Centuries
RJFTC Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries monograph series
RJFTC The Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries
SCL Sather Classical Lectures
StPatrSup Studia Patristica Supplements
STW Suhrkamp Taschenbuch Wissenschaft
VPT Voices in Performance and Text
 Introduction
The Elixir of Life and Death

What is the point of the writings?

Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis

The denigration of the written word in favor of the spoken word has a long
history. In one of the most well-​known traditions in the history of Western
philosophy, Plato (fifth/​fourth century bce) presents a conversation be-
tween Phaedrus and Socrates wherein Socrates discusses the legend of the
Egyptian god Theuth’s invention of letters.1 According to Socrates, Theuth
presents his invention to the god-​king Thamus, making high claims for
the potential of the written word: “ ‘This invention, O king,’ said Theuth,
‘will make the Egyptians wiser and will improve their memories; for it
is an elixir of memory and wisdom that I have discovered.’ ”2 Thamus is
less than impressed, however. He responds that writing will do the exact
opposite:

Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are no part of

themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory within them. You
have invented not an elixir of memory, but of reminding; and you offer your
pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many
things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things,
when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since
they are not wise, but only appear wise.3

1 Plato, Phaedrus 274c.

2 Plato, Phaedrus 274e (Fowler, LCL).
3 Plato, Phaedrus 275a–​b (Fowler, LCL).

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
2 Introduction

As the narrative returns to the imagined dialogue between Phaedrus and

Socrates, Phaedrus eventually concedes to Socrates that Thamus is correct
about the nature of writing. Socrates responds with the following words:

Writing (γραφή), Phaedrus, has this strange quality, and is very like painting
(ζωγραφίᾳ); for the creatures of painting stand like live beings (ζῶντα), but
if one asks them a question, they preserve a solemn silence. And so it is
with written words; you might think they spoke as if they had intelligence,
but if you question them, wishing to know about their sayings, they always
say only one and the same thing. And every word, when once it is written,
is bandied about, alike among those who understand and those who have
no interest in it, and it knows not to whom to speak or not to speak; when
ill-​treated or unjustly reviled it always needs its father to help it; for it has no
power to protect or help itself.4

A word play occurs in the Greek that the English translation does not ade-
quately communicate. The term Socrates uses for painting, ζωγραφία, lin-
guistically combines the concepts of “life” (ζωή) and “writing” (γραφή). Its
verbal cognate has a literal meaning of “paint from life.”5 But for Socrates
the association between life and writing or painting is a false one; their si-
lence upon questioning reveals that neither writing nor painting genuinely
present the “living” (ζῶντα). Compared to the “living (ζῶντα) and breathing
(ἔμψυχον) word of him who knows”6—​that is, the teacher—​the written word
is an illegitimate “bastard.”7 Memory and wisdom should not, according to
Socrates, be subcontracted to the inanimate. When it comes to the pedagog-
ical relationship between teacher and pupil, he prefers response over silence,
memory over reminding, embodied wisdom over external characters.
Already in ancient Athens, Plato’s dialogue between Phaedrus and Socrates
places its finger upon several sets of binaries—​orality and textuality, presence
and absence, power and weakness, memory and forgetting, embodiment and
disembodiment—​that have played prominent roles in the humanities in re-
cent times.8 None is more important for the present book than the headliner

4Plato, Phaedrus 275d–​e (Fowler, LCL).

5LSJ, s.v. “ζωγρᾰφεῖον”: “-​έω, paint from life.”
6 Plato, Phaedrus 276a (Fowler, LCL).
7 Plato, Phaedrus 276a (Fowler, LCL). “Bastard” is Fowler’s insertion on the basis of the fact that

what is “written in the mind of the learner” is described as a “legitimate brother” (ἀδελφὸν γνήσιον)
of the written word (276a).
8 As just two examples, see Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak,

corrected ed. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997); Paul Ricoeur, Memory, History,
 The Elixir of Life and Death 3

in the discussion—​the relationship between the oral word and the written
word. With regard to that relationship, we should not miss that Socrates’s/​
Thamus’s preference for the oral over the written is stated explicitly in terms
of loss—​loss of preservation, loss of conversation, loss of authorial control,
loss of power.
Centuries later, several followers of Jesus of Nazareth9 express senti-
ments not entirely dissimilar to those of Plato’s Socrates.10 Paul of Tarsus,
in his second letter to the Christ community in Corinth around the middle
of the first century ce, expresses a dual devaluing of the written word. He
states a preference for (1) persons over written letters of recommendation
and (2) the new covenant of Christ over the Sinai covenant of the tablets of
testimony, the connection between the two being that (in Thamus’s terms)

Forgetting, trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004).
More generally, see Kathleen Gibbons, “Plato (on Writing and Memory),” DBAM 297–​98.
9 I will generally use “Jesus followers” or some variant with reference to the group that organized

itself devotionally around the Nazarene in the first century with the understanding that the very
earliest of those followers were Jews. For their assemblies in the first century, I will use “Christ assem-
blies” in order to distinguish them from synagogues not organized around the affirmation of Jesus
of Nazareth as Christ. I use “Christ assemblies” rather than “church” in order to avoid anachronism
(Anders Runesson, “Building Matthean Communities: The Politics of Textualization,” in Mark and
Matthew I: Comparative Readings: Understanding the Earliest Gospels in their First-​Century Settings,
ed. Eve-​Marie Becker and Anders Runesson, WUNT 271 [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011], 384n.22).
I will use terms such as “Christian,” “church,” and “ecclesial” from Justin Martyr in the second century
onward, where arguably a clearer “Christian” identity emerges. When referencing the breadth of Jesus
followers from the first century through the fourth century, I will use the term “early Christianity,”
though I acknowledge that the legitimacy of the phrase is greater in the fourth century than in the first
century. Among others on these complicated issues, see Daniel Boyarin, Border Lines: The Partition of
Judaeo-​Christianity, DRLAR (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), esp. 6–​7; Dying
for God: Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism, Figurae (Stanford, CA: Stanford
University Press, 1999); Judaism: The Genealogy of a Modern Notion, KWJS 9 (New Brunswick,
NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2019), esp. 105–​29; David G. Horrell, “The Label Χριστιανός (1 Pet
4.16): Suffering, Conflict, and the Making of Christian Identity,” in Becoming Christian: Essays on 1
Peter and the Making of Christian Identity, ECC/​LNTS 394 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013),
164–​210; Judith M. Lieu, Christian Identity in the Jewish and Graeco-​Roman World (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2004); Judith M. Lieu, Neither Jew nor Greek?: Constructing Early Christianity, CS,
2nd ed. (London: T&T Clark, 2016).
10 Slightly before or contemporaneous with the earliest of these Jesus followers, the Enochic Book

of Parables at 1 Enoch 69:8–​12 also attests a connection between writing and death in Jewish tradi-
tion. The angel Pinemʼe is said to have “caused the people to penetrate (the secret of) writing and (the
use of) ink and paper” (69:9; Isaac, OTP). On this basis, “there are many who have erred from eternity
to eternity, until this very day. For human beings are not created for such purposes to take up their
beliefs with pen and ink. . . . Death, which destroys everything, would have not touched them, had
it not been through their knowledge by which they shall perish” (69:9–​11; Isaac, OTP). On the date
of the Book of Parables, in OTP, Isaac dated it to “c. 105–​64 b.c.” (OTP 1:7). More recently, Michael
A. Knibb, “Enoch, Similitudes of (1 Enoch 37–​71),” EDEJ 587, acknowledges the strong case for the
turn of the era but also proposes the end of the first century, post-​70 ce. Loren T. Stuckenbruck,
“Early Enochic and Daniel Traditions in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in his The Myth of Rebellious Angels,
WUNT 335 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 116, dates it to “late 1st cent. b.c.e. at the earliest.”
4 Introduction

“external characters” cannot rival embodied tradition. In contrast to written

letters of recommendation, he praises his recipients as, themselves, “our
letter” (ἐπιστολὴ ἡμῶν) and “a letter of Christ” (ἐπιστολὴ Χριστοῦ) (2 Cor
3:2–​3). He then further contrasts this “letter,” written “with the spirit of the
living (ζῶντος) God,” with the law, written on tablets of stone (2 Cor 3:3).
Paul goes so far as to refer to the law as the “ministry of death” in contrast
to the “ministry of the spirit” (2 Cor 3:7–​8), solidifying this point with his
famous description of the “new covenant”: “not of letter (γράμματος) but of
spirit; for the letter (τὸ . . . γράμμα) kills, but the spirit gives life (ζῳοποιεῖ)” (2
Cor 3:6). Around the same general time, Paul expressed the same sentiments
in his letter to the Christ community at Rome: “For the law of the spirit made
you free from the law of sin and death” (Rom 8:2).
In the first quarter of the second century ce, another follower of Jesus,
Papias of Hierapolis, once more aligned embodied, spoken words with “life”
and stated a preference for them over written words. Eusebius of Caesarea
(early fourth century ce) presents portions of Papias’s five-​volume Exposition
of the Sayings of the Lord in his own Church History, including the portion in
which Papias claims that his primary sources were individuals who had come
into personal contact with Jesus’s disciples:

But whenever someone arrived who had been a companion of one of the
elders, I would carefully inquire after their words, what Andrew or Peter
had said, or what Philip or what Thomas had said, or James or John or
Matthew or any of the other disciples of the Lord, and what things Aristion
and the elder John, disciples of the Lord, were saying. For I did not suppose
that what came out of books (βιβλίων) would benefit me as much as that
which came from a living (ζώσης) and abiding voice.11

Each one of these ancient thinkers makes his statement about the lesser
quality of books and writing in reference to quite specific issues: for Socrates,
the living instructor who can be questioned and defend his statement is pref-
erable to the written teaching that cannot respond;12 for Paul, the new cove-
nant of Christ is preferable to the Sinai covenant written on stone; for Papias,

11
Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4//​Papias fragment 3 (Ehrman, LCL).
12
Cf. similarly, Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 1.14.4; Theophilus, Autol. 2.38. In contrast, Philo
describes his reading of Moses and Jeremiah as a relationship between a pupil and teacher (Cher.
49). See further H. Gregory Snyder, Teachers and Texts in the Ancient World: Philosophers, Jews and
Christians, RFCC (New York: Routledge, 2000), 133.
 The Elixir of Life and Death 5

the living witness of Jesus’s disciples is preferable to written traditions about

them. Nevertheless, each in his own way articulates a preference for the oral
word that, for various reasons, was expressed frequently enough in the an-
cient world that one can speak of a “skepticism towards the written word.”13
This view was not ubiquitous,14 but neither was it uncommon.15 Along these
lines, we should notice at least two commonalities in their reflections. First,
each uses language of “life” and “living” for oral or embodied tradition. Paul
goes further and states the inverse—​“the letter” kills. Second, their view of
the written word does not reject its significance altogether, but does assign it
a secondary role, and they define the secondary nature of this role in terms
of what it cannot do that “living” words can do. For Socrates and Papias,
humans can be interrogated and answer questions, whereas writing cannot;
for Paul, humans can be a locus of the Spirit of God, whereas the stone tablets
were not.
Such opinions on the respective values of oral and written words are not
isolated to antiquity. In contemporary New Testament studies, some schol-
ars have offered similar assessments of the value of the written word to the
transmission of Jewish and Jesus tradition. Subsequent chapters will address
some of this scholarship more in depth, but at least two points are salient
now. The first is that scholars frequently repeat the ancient association of
orality with life and textuality with death. In a 1983 monograph that serves
as the fount for much research in this vein, Kelber described oral tradition
with language of “life” and written tradition with language of “death” and
“oral absence.”16 The second salient point is that much scholarship has fre-
quently followed suit and assigned a subsidiary role to the written word in
the transmission of the Jesus tradition. Rhoads, for example, states that New
Testament writings “were heard/​experienced rather than read” and that
“manuscripts of Christian writings were not central to the experience of first

13 Loveday Alexander, “The Living Voice: Scepticism towards the Written Word in Early Christian

and in Graeco-​Roman Texts,” in The Bible in Three Dimensions: Essays in Celebration of Forty Years
of Biblical Studies in the University of Sheffield, ed. David J. A. Clines, Stephen E. Fowl, and Stanley E.
Porter, JSOTSup 87 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1990), 221–​47.
14 Cicero, Att. 2.12.
15 Alexander, “Living,” 224–​42, remains a helpful discussion of primary sources.
16 Werner Kelber, The Oral and the Written Gospel: The Hermeneutics of Speaking and Writing

in the Synoptic Tradition, Mark, Paul, and Q, VPT (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1983),
185, more generally 184–​220. Similarly, Jürgen Becker, Mündliche und schriftliche Autorität im
frühen Christentum (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 154, claims that for the author of the Gospel of
Matthew, the oral teaching of Jesus was the “life elixir of the church” (Lebenselixier der Kirche).
6 Introduction

century churches. . . . Texts were peripheral.”17 Dewey similarly states, “While

texts were produced that later became very important within Christianity as
texts, these texts began as aids to orality, and seemingly had little importance
in themselves.”18 According to Horsley, “Before [the time of Constantine]
(and perhaps afterwards as well) . . . written copies of texts were evidently
of secondary, ancillary importance in the communication of the Gospels.”19
Finally, J. Becker speaks of an “obvious primacy of the orality of the gospel”
that contributed, from the origins of the Jesus tradition to the beginning of
the second century, to a preference for the oral gospel over its “innovative lit-
erary form.”20

Life, Death, and Textuality

This book is a Theuthian pushback against Socrates, Paul, Papias, and their
modern counterparts. Whatever the inherent value of some of these reflec-
tions on the shortcomings of the written word, the discussion has cast the
written word in terms of what it is not rather than what it is. In contrast, I will
pursue a fuller portrait of textuality and not be content to view it as oral-
ity’s less-​adequate sibling. We must consider what the written word does in

17 David Rhoads, “Performance Criticism: An Emerging Methodology in Second Testament

Studies—​Part 1,” BTB 36.3 (2006): 118, 121, respectively. More recently, he repeats this view in David
Rhoads, “Performance Criticism (Biblical),” DBAM 282: “An oral/​aural medium predominated, even
for the very limited number who could read or write with facility. . . . Performances were central.”
18 Joanna Dewey, “Textuality in an Oral Culture: A Survey of the Pauline Traditions,” in Orality

and Textuality in Early Christian Literature, ed. Joanna Dewey, Semeia 65 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature, 1995), 51 (emphasis removed). Elsewhere she also argues that the “difference . . . manu-
scripts make” occurs “over time, over decades or centuries. . . . This was a process of centuries”
(Joanna Dewey, “The Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic,” in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond
The Oral and the Written Gospel, ed. Tom Thatcher (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008), 86).
19 Richard A. Horsley, “The Gospel of Mark in the Interface of Orality and Writing,” in The Interface

of Orality and Writing, ed. Annette Weissenrieder and Robert B. Coote, WUNT 260 (Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck, 2010), 156. Reflecting on Second Temple texts more generally, Horsley says, “If written texts
were involved either as the source of scribal knowledge of a given text or as an aid in the recitation,
they played a subsidiary role in a much more intensive process of oral learning, cultivation, and per-
formance of cultural texts and their transmission to successive generations of scribes.” Richard A.
Horsley, Scribes, Visionaries, and the Politics of Second Temple Judaism (Louisville: Westminster John
Knox, 2007), 104. Rebecca Scharbach Wollenberg, “The Dangers of Reading as We Know It: Sight
Reading as a Source of Heresy in Early Rabbinic Traditions,” JAAR 85.3 (2017): 711–​12, argues sim-
ilarly regarding rabbinic references to “reading”: “Early rabbinic modes of engaging with the Bible
thus rendered the written text of the Bible a secondary, even peripheral, manifestation of the biblical
tradition in daily practice and did little to promote the development of a religious culture of textuality
in rabbinic circles.”
20 J. Becker, Mündliche, 158: “. . . . die Auffassung, mit der verbreitet für den selbstverständlichen

Vorrang der Mündlichkeit des Evangeliums vor der innovativen literarischen Gestaltung desselben
optiert wurde.”
 The Elixir of Life and Death 7

addition to what it does not do, what it enables in the ancient transmission
context in addition to what it halts, what reception histories it brings to life in
addition to those it brings to an end.
The claim that the written word was of “secondary” or “peripheral” sig-
nificance is, to a certain extent, simply the knock-​on effect of having already
claimed primacy for orality. In some contexts, orality was undoubtedly of
primary significance, but we need to separate two kinds of assertions. The
assertion that the ancient world was “predominantly oral”21 in the sense that
most people were illiterate is demonstrable and one with which I agree.22 But
the further assertion, often made on the basis of or related to the assertion
of majority illiteracy, that manuscripts23 were “not central” or “secondary”
specifically to “the experience of first century churches”24 or “the commu-
nication of the Gospels”25 is vexed. The full breadth of experiences in Christ
assemblies, and the full breadth of the transmission of the Jesus tradition
among these communities, included a whole host of transmission practices
and contexts beyond those that can be characterized as “oral.” We might say
that orality was of primary significance for many orality-​based activities, but
to say that manuscripts were secondary to the “experience of first-​century
churches” unnecessarily and uncritically shrinks what first-​century Jesus
followers experienced to orality-​based activities. Within the full range of

21 Rhoads, “Performance Criticism (Biblical),” 284.

22 On majority illiteracy in Palestinian Judaism, see Catherine Hezser, Jewish Literacy in Roman
Palestine, TSAJ 81 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001); Chris Keith, Jesus’ Literacy: Scribal Culture
and the Teacher from Galilee, LHJS 8/​LNTS 413 (London: T&T Clark, 2011); Michael Owen Wise,
Language and Literacy in Roman Judaea: A Study of the Bar Kokhba Documents, AYBRL (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2015). More generally, see also the still-​relevant William V. Harris,
Ancient Literacy (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989). Scholars have nuanced proposals for
majority illiteracy. See, for example, the criticisms of Harris in Roger S. Bagnall, Everyday Writing
in the Græco-​Roman East, SCL 69 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011), 2–​5, 25–​26, 35,
39; Mary Beard, “Writing and Religion: Ancient Literacy and the Function of the Written Word in
Roman Religion,” n Literacy in the Roman World, by Beard et al., JRASup 3 (Ann Arbor: Journal
of Roman Archaeology, 1991), 35–​58. I am not aware of any scholar who would instead argue for
majority literacy, however. These studies’ thorough consideration of the issues suggest against the
claim of Larry W. Hurtado, foreword to Communal Reading in the Time of Jesus, by Brian J. Wright
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), xviii, that “low levels of literacy . . . is basically an assumption.”
23 In this study, I have made every effort to follow the distinction between “texts” and “man-

uscripts” (D. C. Parker, An Introduction to the New Testament Manuscripts and Their Texts
[Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008], 2–​4; David Stern, The Jewish Bible: A Material
History [Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2017], 4). I use the former term in reference to a lit-
erary work that can appear in multiple instantiations (for example, the Gospel of John) and the latter
in reference to a particular instantiation of that tradition in written form (for example, P66). The dis-
tinction is important for the present study, since my emphasis is often upon the role that manuscripts
play as cultural artifacts, related to, but distinct from, the texts they transmit.
24 Rhoads, “Performance Criticism,” 118.
25 Horsley, “The Gospel of Mark in the Interface of Orality and Writing,” 156.
8 Introduction

transmission practices, manuscripts were not central to some practices but

were central to others. We need more nuance than generalizations can offer.
This book is therefore not necessarily a categorical disagreement with the
aforementioned ancient and modern thinkers who place significance upon
the oral word, though it will occasionally take critical points of view. Rather,
it is an invitation to view the relationship between the oral and the written
from a perspective that focuses upon how the largely illiterate and oral con-
text of antiquity did not so much diminish the value of the written word as—​
in some contexts—​create it, enable it, and accentuate it. It takes little effort
to observe that a certain irony attends contemporary consideration of an-
cient thinkers’ denigrations of the written word, since those denigrations are
known today only because someone eventually used writing to record them.
This scenario is much more than an interesting irony of history, however. It
is part and parcel of the very nature of textuality itself, the other side of the
coin, so to speak. Although these ancient individuals pontificate occasionally
about the written medium’s demerits, that very medium gave life to a recep-
tion history of their pontifications that was otherwise unavailable. In what
follows, then, I flip the conversation to the other, life-​giving, side of this coin.

The Manuscript and the Reception of the

Jesus Tradition

Proceeding from this understanding of textuality, I will trace some of the

earliest stages of the Jesus tradition in material form by presenting two phe-
nomena that were foundational for that reception history: the competitive
textualization of the Jesus tradition and the public reading of the Jesus tradi-
tion. I will offer fuller descriptions of these two aspects of the transmission
of the early Jesus tradition later in this book. Generally, however, by “com-
petitive textualization” I refer to various ways in which the tradents of the
Jesus tradition drew upon its material form—​and parasitically upon prior
instances of the Jesus tradition in material form—​in order to assert a partic-
ular position within a reception history, which was often characterized by
claims of superiority.26 With regard to the public reading of the Jesus tra-
dition, I refer more specifically to how the usage of the material form of the

26 I introduced the term “competitive textualization” in Chris Keith, “The Competitive

Textualization of the Jesus Tradition in John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25,” CBQ 78.2 (2016): 321–​37.
 The Elixir of Life and Death 9

Jesus tradition in assembly enabled and sustained a distinct reading culture.

Both phenomena are present in some form or another at the earliest stages of
the Jesus tradition to which we have direct access, and both continue well be-
yond the traditional scholarly boundaries for the study of the New Testament
and early Christianity. The chronological scope of this study will tilt toward
the pre-​Constantinian period within this long transmission history, though
I cannot hope to be exhaustive even within that time frame. By focusing upon
the competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition and the public reading of
the Jesus tradition, I highlight what they shared in common, which was an ef-
fort to place the gospel-​as-​manuscript on display, whether within the literary
tradition or within the assembly.27 My argument is simple: among a variety
of other factors, the competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition and the
public reading of the Jesus tradition demonstrate that the reception of the
Jesus tradition that unfolded in the first three centuries of the Common Era
would not have happened in the precise way that it did without manuscripts.

Stating the Obvious

By insisting that manuscripts themselves were important for the transmis-

sion of the Jesus tradition, many readers will no doubt congratulate me for
having stated what is patently obvious to just about everyone working in this
field. Scholars, students, and laypersons still revere manuscripts that have
survived, making journeys even today to see the Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa)
in Jerusalem, Codex Sinaiticus (‫ )א‬and Codex Alexandrinus (A) in London,
Codex Vaticanus (B) in Rome, or Chester Beatty Papyri in Dublin. With the
manuscripts deliberately removed from everyday life, lit up behind bullet-
proof glass, and staged carefully, it is obvious to anyone even remotely ob-
servant that these artifacts are important.
Yet the inherent value that we attribute to such manuscripts today derives
at least partially from several thousand years of cultural inertia, during which
Judaism and Christianity have come to be major world religions, major
ideological forces, and thus the foci of considerable scholarly and popular

27 I follow The SBL Handbook of Style, 2nd ed. (Atlanta: SBL, 2014), as I have throughout for sty-

listic issues, in using the lowercase “gospel” in reference to the proclaimed message about Jesus (“the
Pauline gospel”), Jesus tradition in general (“the gospel tradition”), or the “gospel” genre. I use the
upper-​case “Gospel” “as part of or substitute for a title of a work” (SBL Handbook, 42) that scholars
traditionally regard as an identifiable entity (“Gospel of Mark” or “Gospel of Peter”).
10 Introduction

attention. The artifacts are important not necessarily in and of themselves

but because of the significance of the religious traditions to which they give
concrete and ancient attestation. Like Shakespeare’s Globe in London or
Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace in Kentucky, these commemorative icons are
still visited today because of what came in the decades and centuries after the
events they originally hosted. They are revered because of what became.
A certain reorientation is required to capture the significance of what was
in the process of becoming. This observation does not preclude the notion
that manuscripts, like monuments, could have been significant in the ear-
lier stages of their existence. But it does highlight that ancient Jewish and
early Christian manuscripts were not always important initially for the same
reasons that they were important later. There are often connections be-
tween earlier and later manifestations of significance, but we must also be
careful to recognize fully the distinctions. In this light, the present study is
most concerned not only with how certain texts initially became important
among followers of Jesus of Nazareth but even more specifically with how the
written medium—​the gospel as a material artifact—​contributed to that pro-
cess. To my knowledge, this is the first book-​length study dedicated to this
specific topic, though c­ hapter 2 will show that it aligns with several trends in
the study of Jewish and early Christian book culture(s).

Stating the Non-​obvious

As a first step toward an appropriate reorientation, one must recognize that

the decision to place the Jesus tradition in the written medium was neither
logical nor inevitable. Despite legitimate criticism on other matters, Kelber’s
1983 critique of form criticism remains entirely correct on this point.28 In
an oft-​cited article from 1998, Alexander made a similar point: “Committing
one’s ideas to writing is by no means an inevitable process.”29 Outside New
Testament studies, Egyptologist Jan Assmann registers the same opinion: “It
was anything but normal for a society to write down its oral tradition.”30 One
could perhaps respond to Assmann by observing that normality is inherently

28 Kelber, Oral, 2–​8. See further ­chapter 3.

29 Loveday Alexander, “Ancient Book Production and the Circulation of the Gospels,” in The
Gospels for All Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences, ed. Richard Bauckham (Edinburgh: T&T
Clark, 1998), 93.
30 Jan Assmann, Cultural Memory and Early Civilization: Writing, Remembrance, and Political

Imagination, trans. David Henry Wilson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 242n.18.
 The Elixir of Life and Death 11

subjective and that some cultures may have had a stronger proclivity for tex-
tualization than others.31 The point nevertheless remains that in cultural
contexts where the vast majority of individuals were illiterate, there was little
reason or incentive, with regard to the population at large, to write down tra-
dition as a matter of course.
The transmission of the Jesus tradition serves as a prime example of how
scholarly familiarity with a historical sequence of events, and the ingrained
assumption that what did happen was what inevitably had to happen, can
lead us to underappreciate developments in that sequence that were far from
pedestrian. The earliest definite instance of textualization of the Jesus tradi-
tion is the Gospel of Mark, whose writing is dated as early as the 60s ce in
the patristic tradition32 but among contemporary scholars is typically dated
closer to the fall of the Jerusalem temple in 70 ce. Even if one were to date the
writing of Mark’s Gospel a decade earlier than the church fathers did,33 or to
affirm a written version of Q in the 50s,34 there would remain a period from
the 20s to the 50s or later during which tradition about Jesus circulated orally
with apparently no effort to write it down, or at least none that we can con-
cretely detect. J. Becker has astutely observed in this regard that the earliest
followers of Jesus were not simply waiting around for the creation of written
Gospels.35
The tradition was almost certainly narrativized by this time; that is, it was
crafted into a coherent story rather than, as the form critics imagined, circu-
lated in individual, decontextualized, isolated units of tradition.36 The very
31 Assmann himself cites ancient Greece as an exception to his generalization (Cultural, 242n.18).
32 For discussion of these patristic traditions as well as possible written antecedents in the Jesus tra-
dition, see c­ hapter 3.
33 James G. Crossley, The Date of Mark’s Gospel: Insight from the Law in Earliest Christianity,

JSNTSup 266 (London: T&T Clark, 2004), 159–​205, 207–​8, dates it even earlier, to the early 40s ce
(more specifically “between the mid to late thirties and mid-​forties” [208]) and defends the view in
James G. Crossley, Why Christianity Happened: A Sociohistorical Account of Christian Origins (26–​50
ce) (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006), 127–​30. Following Crossley is Maurice Casey, Jesus
of Nazareth: An Independent Historian’s Account of His Life and Teaching (London: T&T Clark, 2010),
65–​78, 500.
34 William E. Arnal, Jesus and the Village Scribes: Galilean Conflicts and the Setting of Q

(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 166 (“no later than the 50s”); John S. Kloppenborg Verbin, Excavating
Q: The History and Setting of the Sayings Gospel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000), 87(“A date in the late
50s or very early 60s is certainly possible”); Gerd Theissen, The New Testament: A Literary History,
trans. Linda M. Maloney (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012), 32. For a recent overview of propos-
als for Q’s date, see Sarah Rollens, Framing Social Criticism in the Jesus Movement, WUNT 2.374
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 94–​100, who dates the composition of Q to “somewhere in the early
60s c.e.” (99).
35 J. Becker, Mündliche, 158.
36 On this shared assumption about the transmission of the Jesus tradition among Bultmann and

post-​Bultmannians, see Chris Keith, “Die Evangelien als ‘kerygmatische Erzählungen’ über Jesus
und die ‘Kriterien’ in der Jesusforschung,” in Jesus Handbuch, ed. Jens Schröter and Christine Jacobi,
12 Introduction

idea that the tradition about Jesus warrants circulation requires some kind
of coherent narrative of the past regarding why it does so. The trauma of the
crucifixion would have required an early narrative to render it comprehen-
sible.37 Beyond simply rendering it comprehensible, spinning the crucifixion
into a seeming victory instead of a demonstrable defeat and interweaving it
with the Jewish Scriptures, as had already occurred by the time of Paul (1 Cor
15:1–​7), likewise required interpretive narrativization.
Narrativization of the past can occur in the oral, written, monumental, or
ritual registers, however; it does not require writing.38 Once more, the com-
mitment of tradition to manuscript was not an inevitability in antiquity.
Since narrativization of the past and narrativization of the past in writing
are not necessarily the same thing, this point needs even more emphasis: for
at least thirty and possibly as many as fifty years, followers of Jesus were pre-
sumably perfectly well served by their accounts of him in the oral medium.
This observation raises the question—​asked by Stanton in 1975, Kelber in
1983, and J. Becker in 2012—​of what prompted the initial textualization of
the oral Jesus tradition.39

Structure of This Book

Chapter 2 will discuss possible answers to this question, but the book as a
whole is concerned with a slightly different question. Focusing upon Mark’s40
impact instead of his intentions, I ask not why he moved the Jesus tradition

Theologen-​Handbücher (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017), 86–​98, as well as “The Narratives of the
Gospels and the Historical Jesus: Current Debates, Prior Debates and the Goal of Historical Jesus
Research,” JSNT 38.4 (2016): 437–​41, 445–​50.
37 See Chris Keith and Tom Thatcher, “The Scar of the Cross: The Violence Ratio and the Earliest

Christian Memories of Jesus,” in Thatcher, Jesus, the Voice, and the Text, 197–​214; Alan Kirk, “The
Memory of Violence and the Death of Jesus in Q,” in his Memory and the Jesus Tradition, RJFTC 2
(London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018), 163–​78.
38 For a similar point, though specifically in reference to the commemoration of the dead, see

Annette Yoshiko Reed, “Textuality between Death and Memory: The Prehistory and Formation of
the Parabiblical Testament,” JQR 104.3 (2014): 382–​83.
39 Graham Stanton, “Form Criticism Revisited,” in What about the New Testament? Essays in

Honour of Christopher Evans, ed. Morna Hooker and Colin Hickling (London: SCM, 1975), 15;
Kelber, Oral, esp. 90–​91; J. Becker, Mündliche, 117–​30, 145–​51. Tom Thatcher has also addressed the
question in relation to the Gospel of John in “Why John Wrote a Gospel: Memory and History in an
Early Christian Community,” in Memory, Tradition, and Text: Uses of the Past in Early Christianity,
ed. Alan Kirk and Tom Thatcher, SemSt 52 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2005), 79–​97; and
Why John Wrote a Gospel: Jesus—​Memory—​History (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006). I will
engage his theory more fully in c­ hapter 5.
40 I will use the traditional names of the Gospel authors with no assumption about their identities.
 The Elixir of Life and Death 13

into the written medium but what difference it made. What vistas of reception
opened to the Jesus tradition in the written medium that were unavailable to
it in the oral medium? Where could the written gospel go and what could it
do that the spoken gospel could not? In what ways did the manuscript give
life to the Jesus tradition?
Each chapter of this book contributes toward a multifaceted answer to this
question, and the book as a whole is broken into three parts. Part I, “The
Gospel as Manuscript,” argues for the significance of the manuscript as a ma-
terial artifact and tracks how prior scholarship has and has not discussed
it. Chapter 1 lays the methodological groundwork for the study by drawing
attention to the most prominent difference between oral and written trans-
mission processes—​unlike oral tradition, which was transmitted via an
ephemeral experience, the manuscript was a material artifact that, while
certainly capable of being integral to an oral/​aural transmission event
such as public reading, nevertheless remained after the transmission event
passed and contained within it the potential for future transmission events.
This chapter establishes a sociological approach to ancient book culture
by drawing upon classicist William A. Johnson’s theory of ancient reading
cultures and Egyptologist Jan Assmann’s theory of cultural texts as cultural
memory. Both these scholars developed their theories on cultures that were
adjacent to, or in some cases overlapped with, Second Temple Judaism and
early Christianity. Subsequent chapters will then give further attention to
various aspects of Johnson’s and Assmann’s theories in relation to particular
receptions of the Jesus tradition in written form. Chapter 2 situates the ap-
proach of this study within prior and current trends in the study of Jewish
and Christian book cultures. Three trends in particular are featured: the “ma-
terial turn” in the study of early Christian book culture; theories of “text as
process” in the study of Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity; and
canon studies.
Part II, “The Gospel as Gospels,” offers an early history of the competitive
textualization of the Jesus tradition. It presents the first and second major
acts in the early development of the Jesus tradition as material artifacts: the
emergence of the first written Gospel and the proliferation of written Gospels
in its aftermath. Chapter 3 addresses the initial textualization of the Jesus
tradition in the Gospel of Mark. The primary focus of this chapter is upon
how Mark enabled an open-​ended reception history for the Jesus tradition
when he shifted it into the written medium. The rest of the chapters in this
book will build from this observation, noting that the specific subsequent
14 Introduction

receptions treated here were necessarily dependent upon the gospel in tex-
tualized form. Chapter 3 will also consider the patristic testimony about the
textualization of Mark’s Gospel from a media-​critical perspective.
Chapters 4 and 5 will analyze the explosion of written Jesus tradition that
came in the wake of the textualization of Mark’s Gospel, in which subse-
quent Gospels mimic Mark’s media form in addition to aspects of his narra-
tive, and do so self-​consciously. These replications of the textualization of the
tradition are sudden and noteworthy in comparison to the decades of oral
transmission that preceded the textualization of Mark’s Gospel. I argue that
these efforts represent a cannibalization of the Jesus tradition, in which the
tradition’s status as written played a prominent, though underappreciated in
modern scholarship, role in later attempts to outbid the authority of earlier
texts. Chapter 4 will focus on the Synoptic Jesus tradition while c­ hapter 5
focuses on the Johannine and Thomasine Jesus traditions.
Part III, “The Gospel as Liturgy,” proceeds from the textualization of the
Jesus tradition to the usage of the written tradition in the assemblies of Christ
groups during its public reading. Chapter 6 presents the many references to
the public reading of the Jesus tradition. It shows that although by the time
of the fourth-​and fifth-​century canon lists, public reading of the tradition
in assembly had become a litmus test for canonicity, the practice of reading
the Jesus tradition publicly has roots as far back as the first century. During
the second and third centuries, public reading of the tradition played a role
in various expressions of, and challenges to, particular Gospels’ authority.
Chapter 7 then presents the relevance of this information for scholarly con-
ceptions of the relationship between Jewish and Christian identity claims
within the broader Greco-​Roman context. I argue that the public reading
of the Jesus tradition was a continuation and innovative adaptation of syna-
gogue liturgy, and therefore simultaneously a point of commonality and dis-
tinction between synagogues and Christ assemblies. I will also consider the
Christian adoption of the codex book format from this perspective.
The conclusion observes briefly how the emphases associated with the
gospel as artifact that this study features continued in later Christianity.
From this perspective, it considers the significance of what was achieved
when early Jesus followers textualized the Jesus tradition. With these matters
addressed, I now proceed to take up the thread of the Jesus tradition in mate-
rial form, beginning with the significance of the thread itself.
 PART I
THE GO SPE L AS M A NU S C R I P T

Part One ​introduces the significance of approaching the Jesus tradition as a

critical facet of material culture. The prior research of William A. Johnson
on “reading communities” and Jan Assmann on “cultural texts” makes clear
how books as objects link tradition and forms of identity construction in an-
cient contexts. These emphases intersect with several current trends in socio-
logical approaches to the book cultures of Second Temple Judaism and early
Christianity. Situating the methodological approach of this book within
these trends prepares us for appreciating fully the value of viewing the manu-
script as an important factor in the transmission of the Jesus tradition, apart
from, though related to, the texts it transmitted.
 1
The Book as Artifact

Writing, commitment of the word to space, enlarges the potentiality

of language almost beyond measure.
Walter J. Ong, Orality and Literacy

This chapter lays the methodological foundation for the remainder of the
study. In order to establish the distinct ways in which manuscripts open up
particular reception histories for tradition, I will draw upon the research
of William A. Johnson and Jan Assmann. I will draw upon the former for
his theory of ancient “reading cultures” in the high Roman Empire, while
I will draw upon the latter for his theory of cultural texts (kulturelle Texte) as
a form of cultural memory (kulturelles Gedächtnis) in the ancient Near East,
and even more specifically for his theory of the “extended situation” (zer-
dehnte Situation) that textuality enables. Although neither of these scholars is
unknown among those working in the book cultures of ancient Judaism and
early Christianity,1 their relevance for our understanding of the development

1 For early applications of Johnson’s work by New Testament scholars, see Larry W. Hurtado,

“Manuscripts and the Sociology of Early Christian Reading,” in his Texts and Artefacts: Selected
Essays on Textual Criticism and Early Christian Manuscripts, LNTS 584 (London: T&T Clark, 2018),
99–​114 (first published 2012); Larry W. Hurtado and Chris Keith, “Writing and Book Production in
the Hellenistic and Roman Periods,” in The New Cambridge History of the Bible: From the Beginning to
600, ed. James Carleton Paget and Joachim Schaper (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013),
77–​78; Chris Keith, “Early Christian Book Culture and the Emergence of the First Written Gospel,” in
Mark, Manuscripts, and Monotheism: Essays in Honor of Larry W. Hurtado, ed. Chris Keith and Dieter
T. Roth, LNTS 528 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015), 22–​39; John S. Kloppenborg, “Literate
Media in Early Christ Groups: The Creation of a Christian Book Culture,” JECS 22.1 (2014): 25, 40–​
58. Cf. also now Larry W. Hurtado, Destroyer of the gods: Early Christian Distinctiveness in the Roman
World (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016), 249n.95, 250n.102, and the inclusion of Johnson’s
theory in The Dictionary of the Bible and Ancient Media: Chris Keith, “Reading Culture,” in DBAM
329–​30. Johnson participated in special sessions of the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical
Literature in 2016 and 2017 hosted by the Bible and Ancient and Modern Media and Book History
groups, responding to applications of his works to Second Temple Judaism, rabbinic Judaism, and
early Christianity. For a recent application of Johnson’s work to the Dead Sea Scrolls and Philo, see
Mladen Popović, “Reading, Writing, and Memorizing Together,” DSD 24 (2017): 447–​70.

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
18 The Gospel as Manuscript

of Jesus (and other) traditions has not been fully appreciated. I will there-
fore present the main contours of the relevant aspects of their theories here.
Subsequent chapters will develop these insights further in light of relevant
phenomena in written Jesus tradition.

Manuscripts and Ancient Reading Cultures

In a programmatic article published in the American Journal of Philology in

2000, Johnson weighed in on a longstanding debate over whether ancient
people could read silently.2 At various points in this debate, scholars have
asserted that all ancient reading was aloud, sometimes claiming that scrip-
tio continua demanded this type of reading practice on a cognitive level.3
Similar opinions are not difficult to find in New Testament scholarship. As a

Scholars of the Hebrew Bible have engaged Assmann’s work for some time now. As examples, see
David M. Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2005); Ronald Hendel, Remembering Abraham: Culture, Memory, and History in
the Hebrew Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 58–​59, 64, 130n.1; Mark S. Smith, God
in Translation: Deities in Cross-​Cultural Discourse in the Biblical World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
2008), throughout; Mark S. Smith, The Memoirs of God: History, Memory, and the Experience of the
Divine in Ancient Israel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004), 4–​5, 53, 126. Gospels scholars were apply-
ing Assmann’s work as early as the early 1980s and 1990s (Cilliers Breytenbach, “Vormarkanische
Logientradition: Parallelen in der urchristlichen Briefliteratur,” in The Four Gospels 1992: Festschrift
Frans Neirynck, ed. Frans Van Segbroeck et al., 3 vols., BETL 100 [Leuven: Peeters, 1992], 2:728–​29,
749n.103; Jens Schröter, Erinnerung an Jesu Worte: Studien zur Rezeption der Logienüberlieferung in
Markus, Q und Thomas, WMANT 76 [Neukirchen-​Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1997], 49, 57, 462–​
66; Gerd Theissen, “Tradition und Entscheidung: Der Beitrag der biblischen Glaubens zum kulturellen
Gedächtnis,” in Kultur und Gedächtnis, ed. Jan Assmann and Tonio Hölscher, STW 724 [Frankfurt am
Main: Suhrkamp, 1988], 170–​96). For more recent applications, some of which will be discussed later,
see the summary in Chris Keith, “Prolegomena on the Textualization of Mark’s Gospel: Manuscript
Culture, the Extended Situation, and the Emergence of the Written Gospel,” in Memory and Identity
in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity: A Conversation with Barry Schwartz, ed. Tom Thatcher,
SemSt 78 (Atlanta: SBL, 2014), 170–​81. Assmann drew upon Maurice Halbwachs (see, for example,
J. Assmann, Cultural, 21–​33; Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, trans. Rodney Livingstone,
Cultural Memory in the Present [Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2006], 1–​9), whose work
has also been applied to early Christian book culture in Tobias Nicklas, “Neutestamentler Kanon,
christliche Apokryphen und antik-​christliche ‘Erinnerungskultur,’” NTS 62 (2016): 588–​609; Nicklas,
“New Testament Canon and Ancient Christian ‘Landscapes of Memory,’” EC 7 (2016): 5–​23; Risto
Uro, “Ritual, Memory and Writing in Early Christianity,” Temenos 47.2 (2011): 159–​82. More gener-
ally on applications of Halbwachs and Assmann in Gospels studies, see Chris Keith, “Social Memory
Theory and Gospels Research: The First Decade (Part One),” EC 6.3 (2015): 354–​76; Keith, “Social
Memory Theory and Gospels Research: The First Decade (Part Two),” EC 6.4 (2015): 517–​42.
2 William A. Johnson, “Towards a Sociology of Reading in Classical Antiquity,” AJP 121

(2000): 593–​627.
3 See Josef Balogh, “Voces Paginarum: Beiträge zur Geschichte des lauten Lesens und Schreibens,”

Philologus 82 (1927): 84–​109, 202–​40, and the response of Bernard M. W. Knox, “Silent Reading
in Antiquity,” GRBS 9 (1968): 421–​35. Johnson, “Towards,” 593–​600, provides an overview of the
debate.
 The Book as Artifact 19

prominent example, Achtemeier’s oft-​cited 1990 “Omne verbum sonat” JBL

article stated,

The sheer physical nature of the written page in classical antiquity militated
against its ease of reading and in that way also contributed to the culture’s
reliance on the oral mode of communication. . . . It is apparent that the
general—​indeed, from all the evidence, the exclusive—​practice was to read
aloud.4

Unfortunately, not as frequently cited in New Testament scholarship is

Gilliard’s 1993 JBL response to Achtemeier, appropriately subtitled “Non
omne verbum sonabat,” which demonstrated that the evidence does not
support the idea that the exclusive practice of ancients was to read aloud.5
Reading aloud may have been the norm, but silent reading is attested.
Separately from and subsequently to Gilliard, Gavrilov demonstrated simi-
larly that although “allusions to silent reading are not numerous . . . from the
classical Greek to the late Roman periods,” they are present; he then provided
a helpful collection of primary sources.6 Gavrilov concluded that ancient lit-
erate persons could read silently when they so desired. Such practices were
“quite ordinary” and even “trivial.”7 Thus, for Gavrilov, “The phenomenon of
reading itself is fundamentally the same in modern and in ancient culture.”8

A Sociology of Ancient Reading Events

In his landmark essay, Johnson agreed with Gavrilov’s conclusion on the

more specific issue of whether ancients could read silently.9 His real con-
tribution, however, came in his critique of the “blinkered” fashion in which

4 Paul J. Achtemeier, “Omne verbum sonat: The New Testament and the Oral Environment of Late

Western Antiquity,” JBL 109.1 (1990): 10, 15, respectively. Similarly, see Whitney Shiner, Proclaiming
the Gospel: First-​Century Performance of Mark (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2003), 1.
5 Frank D. Gilliard, “More Silent Reading in Antiquity: Non omne verbum sonabat,” JBL 112.4

(1993): 689–​96. Similarly, Raymond J. Starr, “Reading Aloud: Lectores and Roman Reading,” CJ 86.4
(1991): 337–​43.
6 A. K. Gavrilov, “Techniques of Reading in Classical Antiquity,” Classical Quarterly 47.1

(1997): 69, 69–​73.

7 Gavrilov, “Techniques,” 68, 69, respectively.
8 Gavrilov, “Techniques,” 69.
9 Johnson, “Towards,” 593: “Without hesitation we can now assert that there was no cognitive dif-

ficulty when fully literate ancient readers wished to read silently to themselves, and that the cognitive
act of silent reading was neither extraordinary nor noticeably unusual in antiquity.”
20 The Gospel as Manuscript

the whole debate had focused intently upon reading as a solely cognitive—​
and thus inherently individual—​act.10 For him, this conclusion amounted
to settling for vanilla ice cream when sea salt caramel truffle ice cream was
available.

But is this a proper conclusion? If we accept that the ancients did read si-
lently, yet know also (what no one disputes) that they commonly read
aloud, does it follow that ancient reading was really so like our own? Has
this century of debate in fact brought us no better understanding than that
the ancient readers’ experience was, essentially, ours?11

In stark contrast, Johnson proposed that scholars should consider ancient

“reading events” as intricate parts of socially constructed communities:

I prefer to look at reading as not an act, nor even a process, but as a highly
complex sociocultural system that involves a great many considerations
beyond the decoding by the reader of the words of a text. Critical is the
observation that reading is not simply the cognitive process by the indi-
vidual of the “technology” of writing, but rather the negotiated construction
of meaning within a particular sociocultural context.12

With such a shift toward a “wide-​angle”13 view of the specific sociohistor-

ical contexts in which reading practices were embedded, scholarly inquiry
into reading practices becomes as concerned with their usage for iden-
tity construction and articulation as it is with more typical concerns such
as the mechanics of reading or the stages of literate education and the like.
Furthermore, it reveals that Gavrilov’s conclusion that “the phenomenon
of reading itself is fundamentally the same in modern and in ancient cul-
ture” misses the forest for the trees (or the trees for the forest, depending on
one’s perspective). Readers may read texts both silently and aloud in both
contexts, but who reads, what they read, why the read, and what is going on
while they read differ so starkly not only from the ancient to modern context
but even from one ancient context to another ancient context that no one

10 Johnson, “Towards,” 593.

11 Johnson, “Towards,” 600.
12 Johnson, “Towards,” 603.
13 William A. Johnson, Readers and Reading Culture in the High Roman Empire: A Study of Elite

Communities, CCS (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 10.

 The Book as Artifact 21

reading event can be considered exactly like another, even if the same text is
being read.
Along these lines, Johnson offered some “simple—​if not simplistic—​
propositions” for his theory of ancient reading cultures:

(1) The reading of different types of texts makes for different types of
reading events. Reading a tax document and reading love poetry are es-
sentially different events, even for the same person in the same time and
place. . . .
(2) The reading of a given text in different contexts results in different
reading events. . . .
(3) A reading event is in part informed by the conceived reading
community. . . .
(4) The reading community normally has not only a strictly social compo-
nent (the conception of the group), but also a cultural component, in that
the rules of engagement are in part directed by inherited traditions. . . .
(5) Reading which is perceived to have a cultural dimension . . . is intimately
linked to the self-​identity of the reader.14

Johnson thus speaks of “reading communities” or “reading cultures” in order

to draw attention to the culturally determined aspects of reading practices. In
a subsequent monograph, he expands the article and treats in depth multiple
examples of reading cultures in second-​century Rome (Pliny, Tacitus, Galen,
Gellius, Fronto, Lucian, and others), as well as the Oxyrhynchus papyri.15
Johnson’s study is necessarily restrictive, which he notes.16 A fuller con-
sideration of the evidence even from Roman culture would need to include
documentary papyri and graffiti, for example, which were often embedded
in distinct reading cultures that were sometimes different socioeconomically
from the elite, formally educated circles that Johnson studies.17 Furthermore,
scholars especially may be as impressed with similarities between their

14 Johnson, “Towards,” 602–​3.

15 Johnson, Readers. For other articulations of his approach, see William A. Johnson, “The Ancient
Book,” in OHP 256–​81; “Reading Cultures and Education,” in Reading between the Lines: Perspectives
on Foreign Language Literacy, ed. Peter C. Patrikis, Yale Language Series (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2003), 9–​23; “Constructing Elite Reading Communities in the High Empire,” in Ancient
Literacies: The Culture of Reading in Greece and Rome, ed. William A. Johnson and Holt N. Parker
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 320–​29.
16 Johnson, “Towards,” 625.
17 For brief introductions, see Bagnall, Everyday, 7–​26; Craig A. Evans, “Graffiti,” DBAM 160–​61;

Bruce W. Longenecker, “Pompeii (writing/​literacy in),” DBAM 303–​5.

22 The Gospel as Manuscript

bookish enclaves of the academy and the ancient elite circles as they are with
Johnson’s articulation of differences between modern and ancient book cul-
tures. Nevertheless, his study is thoroughly convincing in drawing out the
ways in which reading practices were part of larger cultural realities that
shaped those practices and gave them their meaning.
As Johnson himself suggests, this approach is immensely fruitful for
scholars interested in early Christianity as another distinct book culture in
the Roman Empire.18 Gamble notes that “Christian congregations were not
reading communities in the same sense as elite literary or scholarly circles,
but books were nevertheless important to them virtually from the begin-
ning.”19 Thus, when Johnson observes how Pliny the Younger actively cir-
culated his epistles in order to construct an idealized community around
himself and thus his own role in that community,20 we may comparably ask
about the role that proactive circulation of Pauline epistles (Col 4:16) played
in the cultivation of the community of Christ followers and their conception
of Paul.21 Similarly, when Johnson observes Galen’s conviction that proper
expenditures for a gentleman include firstly underwriting the purchase of
books, the costs of copying books, the training of scribes in shorthand and
advanced writing, or the training of lectors in reading ability,22 we should
think of the roles that wealth played in who controlled access to and interpre-
tation of Jewish texts23 or early Christian texts.24 And when Johnson observes
that “the ancient book is—​not always, but in general—​a product to be asso-
ciated with the intellectual and social elite” and that “these books are best
situated within the general context of Greeks in a non-​Greek land working
to maintain their sense of Hellenic identity,”25 we have further reason to ask

18 Johnson, Readers, 15n.22: “Further work along these lines could be profitably pursued also

for the classical period . . . and for the context of early Christian writings.” Consider also Popović,
“Reading,” 449, 459, regarding Johnson’s relevance for the reading culture associated with the Dead
Sea Scrolls.
19 Harry Y. Gamble, “The Book Trade in the Roman Empire,” in The Early Text of the New

Testament, ed. Charles E. Hill and Michael J. Kruger (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 34.
20 Johnson, Readers, 42–​56.
21 For more on the collection of the Pauline corpus, see Harry Y. Gamble, Books and Readers in the

Early Church: A History of Early Christian Texts (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 58–​63;
David Trobisch, Paul’s Letter Collection: Tracing the Origins (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994); Günther
Zuntz, The Text of the Epistles: A Disquisition on the Corpus Paulinum (London: Oxford University
Press, 1953).
22 Johnson, Readers, 93.
23 Cf. Let. Aris. 321 or Sirach’s claim that only those not engaged in manual labor can become au-

thoritative Torah scribes (Sir. 38:24–​39:3).

24 Cf. the description of Origen’s many writers provided through Ambrose’s patronage (Eusebius,

Hist. eccl. 6.23; Jerome, Vir. ill. 61).

25 Johnson, “Ancient,” 269.
 The Book as Artifact 23

about the integral role of Jewish and Christian textualities in the construction
of these groups’ respective identities, particularly in social and geographical
contexts where their identities were under threat. Stern has recently taken
precisely this kind of approach to the Hebrew Bible, noting, “The concrete
specificities of a text’s material transmission profoundly affect and shape the
way we understand its words. By ‘understand,’ I mean not just interpret the
text and its meaning but also comprehend the place it inhabits in the world—​
its larger cultural, social, literary, and religious significance.”26 Like Stern,
the present study is most concerned with another area of overlap between
Jewish, Roman, and Christian reading circles—​the role of the manuscript.

“A Text-​Centeredness That Is Extreme”

A central aspect of Johnson’s theory of reading as a “sociocultural system

in which the individual participates” is his emphasis upon the “bookroll-​
as-​object.”27 Johnson brings to the fore the manners in which a manuscript
could serve as an “emblem” of the reading culture in which it was read.28 He
describes how some Romans’ reading habits “interlock as a system”:29

The system is symbiotic, in that the focal text provides fodder for the com-
munity’s activity (this is what they get together to do), while the interro-
gation of the text validates the community’s sense of self-​identity as the
educated, able to derive special meaning from this exclusive text. The suc-
cessful use of the text in this way both revalidates the text as worthy and
recommends the community as suitable gatekeepers.30

One could substitute “the Yahad,” “the synagogue,” or “the Christ assembly”
for Johnson’s italicized “the educated” and recognize the import of Johnson’s
statement for Jews and Jesus followers.31

26 Stern, Jewish, 4.
27 Johnson, Readers, 11, 22, respectively. Cf. also Johnson, “Ancient,” 256: “book-​as-​object.”
28 Johnson, Readers, 22. The “could” in this sentence is important, as the present argument is not

that a manuscript inevitably or necessarily served this function but that under specific social circum-
stances it could.
29 Johnson, Readers, 201 (emphasis removed).
30 Johnson, Readers, 202.
31 Cf. Popović, “Reading,” 449, 459. Cf. also Kloppenborg, “Literate,” 41: “The application of

the notion of a reading community to the Christ groups at a lower rung of the social ladder is ob-
vious: whatever the literacy levels among early Jesus follower and Christ groups, the depiction of
its earliest purveyors as literate and the constant iteration of quotations of, and allusions to, the
24 The Gospel as Manuscript

Throughout his study, Johnson comments on the portrayal of public

reading as a social event (especially the reading aloud of a text during a meal)
and the “interrogation” of manuscripts in social contexts. Two examples of
the latter phenomenon from Gellius’s Attic Nights are instructive. In one ex-
ample, Gellius presents an account of a visit to Fronto wherein Fronto has
many of his elite friends—​“famous for learning, birth or fortune”—​gathered
around him.32 When someone uses the word praeterpropter (“more or less”),
Fronto stops and asks about the meaning of the word. The one who spoke
the word defers to a grammarian in their company. The grammarian claims
that the word is a lower-​class term and thus unworthy of further comment,
an “utterly plebeian expression.”33 Fronto disagrees and cites Cato’s and
Varro’s usages of the term. Another friend claims that the word is used in the
Iphigenia of Ennius and asks that the work be produced and read. It is, and
upon the reading of the passage, the shamed grammarian takes his leave.
Another example from earlier in Attic Nights also features a text by
Varro. In a bookstore, Gellius comes upon a man trying to pass himself off
as learned, boasting that “he was the only one under all heaven who could
interpret the Satires of Marcus Varro.”34 Gellius pulls out his own copy of
the Satires and asks the would-​be scholar to read aloud a particularly diffi-
cult passage. The man asks Gellius himself to read. Playing the fool, Gellius
insists that his reading would no doubt be problematic for such a learned
man. When others join in pressuring the man to read, Gellius hands him the
manuscript, upon which he performs poorly (“So wretchedly did he pro-
nounce the words and murder the thought”),35 is mocked, and leaves, blam-
ing his eyesight for his reading. In this honor/​shame event, Gellius’s status
is underscored since his very possession of an “ancient” copy of Varro,36 as
well as his selection of the specific text that gave the grammarian difficulty,
displays his own intricate knowledge of the book and thus his status as a true
man of letters.
Regardless of whether these events actually happened, their narra-
tion shows how their authors conceptualized the significance of reading,

Scriptures reinforced the notion that books and the knowledge associated with books was of central
importance.” Not all early texts portray notable figures as literate (John 7:15; Acts 4:13). Kloppenborg
is correct that this is a clear trend, however. With regard to Jesus in particular, see further Keith, Jesus’
Literacy, 156–​63.
32 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 19.10; quotation from 19.10.1–​2 (Rolfe, LCL).
33 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 19.10.9 (Rolfe, LCL).
34 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, 13.31.1 (Rolfe, LCL).
35 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, 13.31.9–​10 (Rolfe, LCL).
36 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, 13.31.6.
 The Book as Artifact 25

manuscripts, and textual knowledge.37 These particular events consist

entirely of detailed knowledge of the text (or not). The manuscript itself
becomes an “active witness to an argument.”38 At the center of these reading
events are not simply “traditions,” “oral performances,” or even “texts”
in the strict sense but physical artifacts that contain those traditions and
texts. Appreciation for, possession of, and intricate knowledge of the texts
in question—​and the manuscripts that contain them—​function as a social
but nevertheless real border for elite identity. Being able to read and recall
intricate texts accurately determined whether one stood on the rejected or
accepted side of a group’s laughter. Both accounts portray the shamed intel-
lectuals as physically leaving the scene of their defeat.
In specific social circumstances, then, the significance of the manuscript
as material artifact could extend beyond its utilitarian function and repre-
sent a particular group identity: “The bookroll seems . . . an egregiously elite
product intended in its stark beauty and difficulty of access to instantiate
what it is to be educated.”39 By “difficulty to access,” Johnson refers to how
scriptio continua, punctuation that aided in syntax and breath pauses, and
even the size of the margins indicate that these manuscripts were products of
an elite culture that had the leisure time and personal finances to train users
to navigate them. He continues to emphasize the connection between these
particular literary works and elite identity:

The bookroll-​as-​object seems, to the modern eye, something more akin to

an art object than to a book, and this is, I think, not merely the consequence
of our different cultural register. The literary roll exemplifies high culture
not just in the demonstration that the owner is literate and educated, but by
means of the physical aesthetics the bookroll also points up the refinement
of the owner.40

37 Cf. Johnson, Readers, 15–​16: “It is fundamental to the enterprise that we begin to get a sense

of the reading culture not simply by accumulation of historical detail stripped from texts, or even
by analysis of the societies described in these texts, but also and importantly by apprehending the
program of the literary endeavour, and how each literary program seems to map onto the social ambi-
tions and cultural traditions of the time.”
38 Johnson, Readers, 95. Johnson makes this comment in reference to another example from Galen.
39 Johnson, “Ancient,” 263; Readers, 21. Similarly, Hurtado and Keith, “Writing,” 63; Johnson,

“Towards,” 623.
40 Johnson, Readers, 22. Similarly, 31: “The upshot of all this is that the bookroll culture in the high

empire was one designedly reserved for elite of a certain stripe, able and willing to devote immense
time and energy to its mastery.” Also Johnson, “Ancient,” 261.
26 The Gospel as Manuscript

Johnson thus considers the manuscript a “signifier” in and of itself—​“analo-

gous in many respects to statuary in a garden, or to the luxurious plate on which
dinner is served in an elite household.”41 “The result” at the level of the reading
culture, Johnson observes, “is a text-​centeredness that is extreme.”42
The book cultures of Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity were dis-
similar to the elite circles of the high empire in any number of ways. But the so-
ciological principle that their revered texts were bound up with their concepts
of who they were was as true for synagogues reading the Torah, Christ groups
reading Pauline epistles, and Justin Martyr’s church reading the Gospels and
prophets as it was for Pliny, Galen, Gellius, and their friends reading antiquarian
Greco-​Roman texts. Although one must bear in mind the differences in reading
events constructed by engagement with a land contract versus a philosophical
treatise or sacred text, the manuscript was capable in some circumstances of
enabling and reflecting a specific reading community. Furthermore, evidence
from early Christianity shows manuscripts not just as “analogous” to statuary
but as statuary. In portrayals of Jesus, Paul, and the disciples in fourth-​and fifth-​
century Roman sarcophagi, the engraver has often added a scroll to Gospel
scenes whose narration in the Gospels says nothing about a scroll.43 Early
Christianity, like Second Temple Judaism, had an extreme text-​centeredness of
its own.

The zerdehnte Situation and the entourage matériel

Johnson’s insistence that scholars consider the sociological function of man-

uscripts in reading cultures coheres with certain aspects of Egyptologist Jan
Assmann’s theory of “cultural texts” (kulturelle Texte) as “cultural memory”
(kulturelles Gedächtnis). Assmann follows Maurice Halbwachs, the pioneer
of the theory of collective memory, in affirming that particular instantia-
tions of memory “are always related concretely to time and place, even if this

41 Johnson, Readers, 22. See also Johnson’s comments on the circulation of some of Galen’s works

among his friends: “Most striking . . . is the physicality of the notion of the ‘work’: in the manner of an
artifact like a sculpture or ceramic, the bookroll is created at the request of a friend and passed along
to him as a unique copy” (88). Cf. Carr, Writing, 160, who refers to written copies of texts as “the tech-
nology and tangible written talisman for a broader process.”
42 Johnson, Readers, 112.
43 See images and discussion in Chris Keith, The Pericope Adulterae, the Gospel of John, and the

Literacy of Jesus, NTTSD 38 (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 244–​46. More generally on Jesus in the sarcophagi,
see Catherine C. Taylor, “Sarcophagi,” RJFTC 3:315–​35.
 The Book as Artifact 27

is not necessarily in an historical or a geographical sense.”44 This approach

is similar to Hans-​Georg Gadamer’s theory of the historically conditioned
nature of all knowledge,45 but Halbwachs and Assmann are particularly
concerned with the appropriation of the past in the present as a social phe-
nomenon. Halbwachs insisted that recollection of the past is primarily a
present-​oriented function of the group rather than a past-​oriented func-
tion of the individual. He opened himself to the accusation of obliterating
the individual,46 but his real point was not that there are no individuals but
that there are only individuals in society who commemorate the past.47
Individuals borrow from society the tools they use to remember—​“words
and ideas, instruments that the individual has not invented but appropriated
from his milieu.”48 In this qualified sense he spoke of a “collective memory”
and “social frameworks of memory”: “It is to the degree that our individual
thought places itself in these frameworks and participates in this memory
that it is capable of the act of recollection.”49 Halbwachs thus articulated, with
examples from early Christianity among other groups,50 his theory of how
present group identity always structures and enables recollection of the past.
He was not concerned with the actual past or “what really happened,” but
only with the received past as shaped by present interests.51 Halbwachs was
focused upon the impact of the contemporary group upon rememberers.
In building upon Halbwachs’s theory of collective memory, Assmann is
more interested in how group identity passed through several generations,
that is, how a particular shared group identity survived the death of a present
generation and continued to bind together subsequent generations. What
Halbwachs conceptualized as a horizontal phenomenon spread through
individuals in society Assmann conceptualizes as a vertical phenomenon
spread through years and generations. He renames Halbwachs’s concept
of the living group’s “collective memory” as “communicative memory”

44 J. Assmann, Cultural, 24.

45 Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, 2nd ed., rev. trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G.
Marshall, Bloomsbury Revelations (London: Bloomsbury, 1989).
46 Ricoeur, Memory, 122.
47 Maurice Halbwachs, The Social Frameworks of Memory, in his On Collective Memory, ed. and

trans. Lewis A. Coser (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 48: “It is individuals as group
members who remember.”
48 Maurice Halbwachs, The Collective Memory, trans. Francis J. Ditter Jr. and Vida Yazdi Ditter

(New York: Harper Colophon, 1980), 51. Cf. also Halbwachs, Social, 38.
49 Halbwachs, Social, 38.
50 See especially Maurice Halbwachs, “The Legendary Topography of the Gospels in the Holy

Lands,” in his On Collective Memory.

51 Halbwachs, Social, 40n.3.
28 The Gospel as Manuscript

(kommunikatives Gedächtnis) and introduces the term “cultural memory” to

refer to the commemorative practices that stretch chronologically beyond a
founding generation.52 He signals the change of focus from Halbwachs by
saying, “With cultural memory the depths of time open up.”53 Within this
theory, he uses the term “cultural texts,” borrowed from Clifford Geertz, for
what scholars of the Bible have always called “tradition”: “What communi-
cation is for communicative [memory], tradition is for cultural memory.”54
Whether oral or written, cultural texts are the “cement or connective
backbone of a society that ensures its identity and coherence through the
sequence of generations.”55 Carr, dependent upon Assmann, calls these tra-
ditions “long-​duration texts.”56 These texts were institutionalized and carried
both normative (“What shall we do?”) and formative (“Who are we?”) power
for the construction of group identity.57 Assmann focuses upon several an-
cient Near Eastern cultures in developing these thoughts, but especially an-
cient Israel.
Assmann developed his theory of cultural memory with his wife, the lit-
erary theorist Aleida Assmann.58 Their work has been deeply influential in
the humanities in general, generating vigorous critique and debate along the
way.59 They have nevertheless also spawned an interdisciplinary field of cul-
tural memory studies that has made inroads into the study of ancient Judaism
and early Christianity.60 Furthermore, and as justification for my pairing of
Assmann’s work with that of Johnson, scholars have recently begun to apply

52 J. Assmann, Cultural, 6, 21–​34 (for German, Jan Assmann, Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift,

Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen, 7th ed. [Munich: C. H. Beck, 2013],
20, 34–48); Religion, 1–​9 (for German, Jan Assmann, Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis, 5th ed.
[Munich: C. H. Beck, 2018], 11–​19).
53 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 24.
54 J. Assmann, Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis, 19: “Was die Kommunikation für das kom-

mikative, das ist die Tradition für das kulturelle Gedächtnis.” For dependence upon Geertz, see Jan
Assmann, “Form as a Mnemonic Device: Cultural Texts and Cultural Memory,” in Performing the
Gospel: Orality, Memory, and Mark, ed. Richard A. Horsley, Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), 76.
55 J. Assmann, “Form,” 78. See further Aleida Assmann, “Was sind kulturelle Texte?” in

Literaturkanon—​ Medienereignis—​ Kultureller Text: Formen interkultureller Kommunikation und

Übersetzung, ed. Andreas Poltermann (Berlin: Erich Schmidt, 1995), 232–​44; J. Assmann, Religion
and Cultural Memory, 101–​21.
56 Carr, Writing, 10.
57 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 104.
58 See esp. Aleida Assmann, Cultural Memory and Western Civilization: Functions, Media, Archives,

trans. David Henry Wilson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011).

59 For example, Eliza Slavet, “A Matter of Distinction: On Recent Work by Jan Assmann,” AJS 34.2

(2010): 385–​93; Mark S. Smith, “Theism and Violence in the Ancient World: The Argument of Jan
Assmann,” Sef 69.1 (2009): 229–​35. Assmann responds to some critics in Jan Assmann, The Price of
Monotheism, trans. Robert Savage (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010), esp. 1–​7.
60 Cf. the citations in footnote 1.
 The Book as Artifact 29

the theories of Assmann and Halbwachs to ancient Rome.61 Kirk observes

the relevance of this larger discussion for the Gospels in particular:

The pertinence of social and cultural memory theory analysis for clarifying
the phenomenology of the gospel tradition should be evident. Along with
its negation of replicative and individualistic models for memory, it rules
out the sharp distinction the form critics made between memory and tra-
dition. Rather, the gospel tradition may be understood as the artefact of
memory, the artefact of the continual negotiation and semantic engage-
ment between a community’s present social realities and its memorialized
past, with neither factor swallowed up by or made epiphenomenal of the
other.62

Kirk comments directly upon the implications of this theoretical approach

for scholarly understanding of the narrative content of the Gospels, but
the conceptualization of the tradition as a commemorative artifact applies
equally to its status as a material object. Here is where cultural memory
theory is most relevant for the present topic. A central feature of Assmann’s
understanding of the transmission of cultural memory, and specifically the
transition from the communicative memory of a present generation to the
cultural memory shared by multiple generations, involves the relationship
between oral and written tradition. This chapter will introduce two aspects
of his theory: the zerdehnte Situation (“extended situation”) and the decora-
tion of entourage matériel (“accompanying material”). Chapter 3 will present
a third aspect, the Traditionsbruch (“breakage in tradition”), as it relates to
the textualization of Mark’s Gospel.

The zerdehnte Situation

Perhaps the most important aspect of Assmann’s cultural memory program

for the reception history of the Gospels as material artifacts is his concept of

61 Karl Galinsky and Kenneth Lapatin, eds., Cultural Memories in the Roman Empire (Los

Angeles: Paul J. Getty Museum, 2015); Karl Galinsky, ed., Memory in Ancient Rome and Early
Christianity (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). See also various essays in Beate Dignas and
R. R. R. Smith, eds., Historical and Religious Memory in the Ancient World (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2012).
62 Alan Kirk, “Memory Theory and Jesus Research,” in his Memory, 187–​88. See also Alan Kirk and

Tom Thatcher, “Jesus Tradition as Social Memory,” in Memory, Tradition, and Text, 25–​42.
30 The Gospel as Manuscript

the zerdehnte Situation, or “extended situation.”63 This concept foregrounds

what a manuscript contributes to the transmission process that orality
does not. For Assmann, the categorical distinction between oral tradition
and written tradition is that writing does not demand the “copresence” of
the transmitter of the tradition and the audience that ritual and festival re-
quire: “What is decisive for the genesis of texts is the separation from the im-
mediate speech situation.”64 Despite the fact that a textualized tradition runs
“risks of being forgotten” if that particular text fails to become institutional-
ized,65 once institutionalized, the “extended situation” opens the tradition up
to a vista of transmission that ritual and festival cannot support.

The two situations, speaker and messenger on the one hand, messenger and
listener on the other, are separated in time and place and yet in commu-
nication with each other through the text and the manner of its transmis-
sion. The immediate situation of copresence is replaced by “the expanded
context” [zerdehnte Situation], in which from two to virtually an infinite
number of individual situations can unfold and limits of which are set only
by the availability of the text and the manner of its transmission.66

As this quotation’s reference to a messenger who delivers a text from one

locale to another locale indicates, Assmann acknowledges that oral com-
munication, too, can create a form of the “extended situation.” This form is
restricted, however, and cannot match a written text’s distinct ability to es-
cape interpersonal communication altogether.67 A messenger may create an
“extended situation” by connecting one text-​generating context with a sepa-
rate text-​receiving context, but this transmission is still dependent upon the
physical presence of the messenger. In contrast, “literature [connects] vir-
tually infinite concrete situations that may stretch in time.”68 He comments
further:

63 Assmann’s theory of the zerdehnte Situation builds upon the work of Konrad Ehlich, “Text und

sprachliches Handeln: Die Entstehung von Texten aus dem Bedürfnis nach Überlieferung,” in Schrift
und Gedächtnis: Archäologie der literarischen Kommunikation, ed. Aleida Assmann, Jan Assmann,
and Christoph Hardmeier (Munich: Wilhelm Fink, 1983), 24–​43 (see J. Assmann, Religion and
Cultural Memory, 103–​5).
64 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 103.
65 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 105–​6, 118 (quotation).
66 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 103 (emphasis original to German, for which see

Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis, 126). Cf. also J. Assmann, “Form,” 75.
67 J. Assmann, “Form,” 75–​76.
68 J. Assmann, “Form,” 75. Cf. Reed, “Textuality,” 407, who observes in testamentary literature “a

trust in the power of writing to stand in for the speaker.”

 The Book as Artifact 31

Writing is just one form of transmission and re-​enactment, albeit a very de-
cisive one. The use of writing in the transmission of cultural texts changes
fundamentally the time-​structure of cultural memory. All the other forms
of institutionalizing an extended situation depend on time and place, on
temporal recurrence and/​or spatial translocation. . . . To reconnect with the
meaning of written cultural texts, you do not have to wait for the next perfor-
mance, you just have to read them.69

Assmann is not the first person to opine on this aspect of textualized tradition.
Diodorus Siculus, who was working on his Library of History around 60 bce,
gives ancient articulation to precisely this aspect of textuality: “It is writing
alone which preserves the cleverest sayings of men of wisdom and the oracles
of the gods, as well as philosophy and all knowledge, and is constantly hand-
ing them down to succeeding generations for the ages to come.”70 Pliny the
Elder similarly refers to parchment as “the material on which the immortality
of human beings depends.”71 And, as the introduction showed, the Socrates
of Plato’s Phaedrus, though lamenting the loss of authorial control, similarly
attributed to the written medium the ability to escape the immediate context
of its creation.72
What Plato’s Socrates conceptualizes as a loss of control, however,
Assmann, Diodorus, and Pliny conceptualize as a gain in transmission. This
point must be emphasized: writing opens cultural texts to a virtually limit-
less history of reception, so long as the papyrus or parchment of extant copies
endures. There must also be a reader in order to actualize the tradition, and
this as well as the endurance of the writing surface are limitations inherent
to textuality. But these very constraints of textuality are also what allow the
tradition to break the constraints of orality, since the tradition’s audience
is no longer confined to those who are physically present before the initial
author/​performer/​messenger. The reader can be anyone, anywhere, at any
time. Manuscripts thus enable communicative memory to become cultural
memory in a distinct way because they allow cultural texts to cross space

69 J. Assmann, “Form,” 77.

70 Diodorus Siculus, Library of History, 12.13.2–​3 (Oldfather, LCL). For date, see C. H. Oldfather,
introduction to Diodorus Siculus, LCL (London: William Heinemann, 1933), viii.
71 Pliny the Elder, Nat. 13.21.70 (Rackham, LCL).
72 Plato, Phaedrus, 275e.
32 The Gospel as Manuscript

and time,73 becoming long-​duration texts that generation after generation

receives.74

The entourage matériel

Although independent of Johnson’s work on the bookroll-​ as-​

object,
Assmann’s discussion of the “decoration” of material artifacts reinforces the
notion that material artifacts can, under some conditions, come to reflect
group identity.75 Since for Assmann all cultural memory is socio-​historically
conditioned, this includes the everyday objects of an individual—​his or her
entourage matériel (“accompanying material”).76 When a person designs or
augments an object in a manner that exceeds its strict utilitarian function,
the socio-​historical conditioning of such an action can lead to the objects’
reflection of the cultural identity of its shapers. “A knife and a jar do not fulfill
their function any better by being decorated with ornaments or figures, but
they gain immensely in morphological features, or pregnancy, permitting
their identification with regard to provenance, date, and cultural context.”77
This morphological significance also enables decorated material objects to
function as a kind of ritualization that reflects group identity: “This world of
objects . . . has a social dimension: its value and its status symbolism are both
social factors.”78 Assmann refers to this type of manifestation of group iden-
tity as “culture” in the sense of “possessions, traditions, myths, and so forth”
and makes clear that this particular means of distinguishing self encom-
passes a wide swath of cultural activity:

Tattooed patterns, body painting, scarring, decoration, costume, language,

cuisine, lifestyle . . . mats, sarong patterns, and the design of weapons can
mark boundaries, and even songs and dances can do the same. None of

73 Similarly, Reed, “Textuality,” in reference to the theme of recording last words in testamentary

literature: “These texts . . .—​as texts—​embody one particular solution to the problem of ensuring the
survival of knowledge in the cases that succession fails, or family lines are broken, or death extin-
guishes memory” (383); “Writing might have to stand in for, or vouchsafe, what lineage can no longer
preserve” (400).
74 They also enable a culture of interpretation, and thus a class of interpreters (J. Assmann, Religion

and Cultural Memory, 40–​41; cf. 69).

75 J. Assmann, “Form,” 70.
76 J. Assmann, Cultural, 24.
77 J. Assmann, “Form,” 70.
78 J. Assmann, Cultural, 25.
 The Book as Artifact 33

these things are simply “there”—​they provide a separation from “others,”

and are linked to concepts and ideologies of preference and superiority.79

Assmann understands the function of writing and manuscripts in ancient

Near Eastern cultures against this background, since “the laws of morphology
apply to language as well as to all of the other human artifacts.”80 Indeed, tex-
tualization of tradition is a primary means of enabling language to cross the
line separating utilitarian from ritual, a transition that the decoration of mate-
rial objects also enables. Both function as a “symbolic” or “secondary” level of
formalization.81 He sees language as the realm in which “the alliance between
the aesthetic and the mnemonic becomes most obvious”: “If an utterance is
to be preserved and to stay efficient beyond the moment of its pronunciation,
that is, to serve the secondary purpose of becoming a mnemonic mark, it has
to be submitted to a process of secondary formalization.”82 Assmann consid-
ers textualization to be this level of formalization.83 Like decorated material
objects, written texts that capitalize upon this capacity and enter into a gener-
ational cultural repertoire similarly can exhibit a reciprocal relationship with
the group that reveres them in terms of identity construction, much as Johnson
observes for manuscripts in some elite Roman reading cultures.
Against the background of Assmann’s framework, the scroll or codex
would have functioned in some contexts doubly as a vehicle of “secondary
formalization,” in a first sense as a transmission agent of ritualized language
and in a second sense as a material object with a distinctive physical shape.
Assmann’s theory of cultural memory therefore provides a means of recog-
nizing how both texts and the manuscripts that hold them could function,
separately and in relation to one another, as identity markers.

Summary

In what follows, I will say more on Johnson’s theory of ancient reading cul-
ture and Assmann’s theory of cultural texts as cultural memory. Subsequent

79 J. Assmann, Cultural, 133–​34 (quotation from 134).

80 J. Assmann, “Form,” 72.
81 J. Assmann, “Form,” 69, 72. For a material object, the primary aspect is “its function as a tool”

(69). For language, the primary aspect is “communication” (72).

82 J. Assmann, “Form,” 72.
83 J. Assmann, “Form,” 73.
34 The Gospel as Manuscript

chapters will return to aspects of their theories in relation to specific phe-

nomena associated with the Jesus tradition’s transmission history as manu-
script. This chapter has highlighted their common focus upon the role of the
manuscript in linking tradition and group identity. Johnson demonstrates
that scholars should ask not just about the mechanics of ancient reading
practices but about the social contexts that lead to particular kinds of reading
events. In some social contexts, manuscripts, as physical objects, can both en-
able and emblemize a reading culture. In a similar fashion, Assmann articu-
lates what manuscripts contribute to a tradition’s reception history that ritual
and oral tradition alone cannot. The textualization of tradition creates the
possibility of limitless reception contexts, allowing the tradition to be carried
through space and time. The manuscript’s capacity to carry cultural identity
is not limited to the content on its pages, however, but includes its status as a
material object, part of the “accompanying material.”
Neither Johnson nor Assmann argues that these qualities are innate to
written forms of tradition. There were many forms of writing in the ancient
world that never came to function in these ways. Their point, which I affirm
here and will affirm further in the rest of this study, is that particular contexts
activate these latent potentialities. In the words of Assmann, “Extended situ-
ations do not occur naturally; they have to be culturally institutionalized.”84
The rest of this book will argue that the competitive textualization of the
Jesus tradition and the public reading of the Jesus tradition are two cultural
forms of institutionalization that created such “extended situations” among
early Jesus followers. Before that, however, ­chapter 2 demonstrates how this
approach to ancient book culture challenges and reinforces three trends in
the study of Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity.

84 J. Assmann, “Form,” 76.

 2
Sociologies of the Book in the Study
of Second Temple Judaism and
Early Christianity

We can now form an idea of what ancient books were like. We can see
the limitations imposed on the writer by material and by format, on the
reader by layout.
Eric G. Turner, Greek Papyri

Proceeding from the theories of Johnson and Assmann, the rest of this book
will present several “extended situations” associated with the Jesus tradition
in written form, highlighting specific convergences of manuscript, iden-
tity, and forms of cultural institutionalization among Jesus followers. This
approach to the history of the Jesus tradition intersects with various trends
in the study of the Gospels and ancient book culture in general. In order to
clarify its distinct contribution, this chapter will situate this approach in re-
lation to some of these studies. Such a task has become substantially more
complex than it was when I first started working toward this project. Of late,
writing about the writing of the gospel has become fairly popular within New
Testament studies.1 Inevitably, then, what follows cannot be comprehensive.

1 As just a few examples, see Eve-​Marie Becker, The Birth of Christian History: Memory and Time

from Mark to Luke-​Acts, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017); Markus Bockmuehl
and Donald A. Hagner, eds., The Written Gospel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005);
Eric Eve, Writing the Gospels: Composition and Memory (London: SPCK, 2016); Alan Kirk, Q
in Matthew: Ancient Media, Memory, and Early Scribal Transmission of the Jesus Tradition, LNTS
564 (London: T&T Clark, 2016); Jennifer W. Knust and Tommy Wasserman, To Cast the First
Stone: The Transmission of a Gospel Story (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018); Matthew
D. C. Larsen, Gospel before the Book (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018); Thatcher, Why;
Francis Watson, Gospel Writing: A Canonical Perspective (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans), 2013. More
generally, Roger S. Bagnall, Early Christian Books in Egypt (Princeton: Princeton University Press,
2009); Larry W. Hurtado, The Earliest Christian Artifacts: Manuscripts and Christian Origins (Grand

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
36 The Gospel as Manuscript

I concentrate on studies that best exemplify three specific trends to which

this study makes a direct contribution: the “material turn” in the study of
early Christianity, conceptions of “text as process,” and canon history.

The Material Turn and Sociological Studies of Early

Christian Book Culture

Several streams of research have combined to make sociological approaches

to early Christian book culture a burgeoning field of inquiry. One stream
consists of text-​critical studies that have shifted away from a laser-​like
focus on finding an “original” text. Epp’s 1966 monograph on the theolog-
ical tendencies of variant readings in Codex Bezae (D) broke new ground
in text-​critical studies by seeking to connect particular scribal changes with
sociological and theological factors in Christian communities.2 Eventually
following suit, text-​critical inquiry broadened from a focus on the words
of the papyrus to historically imagined scenarios behind or around them,
and thus on to the motivations and social statuses of scribes and copyists.
By 1995, Ehrman spoke of “the text as [a]‌window” into the “social history
of early Christianity,”3 and his 1996 The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture,
which similarly located variant readings within early Christian theological
debates, became a landmark study.4
Ehrman’s “text as window” essay was originally published in his and
Holmes’s status quaestionis collection of essays, The Text of the New Testament
in Contemporary Research.5 Capturing the growth and significance of socio-
logical approaches to manuscripts, the 2013 second edition of this collection
includes an essay by Haines-​Eitzen, “The Social History of Early Christian
Scribes,” that was not part of the first edition.6 In it she coins the phrase

Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006); Brent Nongbri, God’s Library: The Archaeology of the Earliest Christian
Manuscripts (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018).
2 Eldon Jay Epp, The Theological Tendency of Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis in Acts, SNTSMS 3

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966).

3 Bart D. Ehrman, “The Text as Window: New Testament Manuscripts and the Social History of

Early Christianity,” in The Text of the New Testament in Contemporary Research: Essays on the Status
Quaestionis, ed. Bart D. Ehrman and Michael W. Holmes, 2nd ed., NTTSD 42 (Leiden: Brill, 2013),
803–​30.
4 Bart D. Ehrman, The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effects of Early Christological

Controversies on the Text of the New Testament, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).
5 Ehrman and Epp, Text.
6 Kim Haines-​Eitzen, “The Social History of Early Christian Scribes,” in Ehrman and Epp, Text,

479–​95.
 Sociologies of the Book 37

“material turn” for a second stream of research that has led to more sociolog-
ical approaches to early Christian book culture. She describes the “material
turn” as “a renewed interest in the physical features of our earliest Christian
literary papyri for what they might tell us about early Christian scribes and
readers” and calls it “one of the exciting advances of the last few decades . . . in
the study of early Christianity.”7 The material turn goes beyond interest in
textual variants and encompasses textual phenomena that critical editions
do not replicate, such as nomina sacra, the staurogram, margin size and mar-
ginalia, line and word spacing, and the like. Haines-​Eitzen has contributed
to this renewed interest. Her 2000 Guardians of Letters applied studies of
ancient literacy to the social status of Christian scribes, demonstrating that
most copying in early Christianity happened via private social networks.8
Her 2012 The Gendered Palimpsest is the first and most comprehensive study
of women as readers and writers in early Christianity.9
In her overview of the material turn, Haines-​Eitzen justifiably traces
it to Skeat’s 1969 contribution on early Christian book production to
the Cambridge History of the Bible.10 Equally important was Roberts’s
Manuscript, Society, and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, three lectures orig-
inally delivered in 1977 that covered the relevance of manuscripts and the
book practices they evince for understanding ancient Christian society in
Egypt.11 Another key representative of the material turn was Gamble’s Books
and Readers in the Early Church (1995).12 Gamble’s wide-​ranging study of
early Christian book culture discusses everything from illiteracy among
early Christians to the emergence of the Pauline collection and the earliest
Christian libraries. In general, it is an attempt to canvas the book culture of
early Christianity and in this capacity sits in the background of the present
study, though I am focused directly on the reception history of the Jesus tra-
dition. After Gamble’s study, Hurtado’s 2006 The Earliest Christian Artifacts
replicated Roberts’s general approach, but with a more robust discussion

7 Haines-​Eitzen, “Social,” 486.

8 Kim Haines-​Eitzen, Guardians of Letters: Literacy, Power, and the Transmitters of Early Christian
Literature (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
9 Kim Haines-​Eitzen, The Gendered Palimpsest: Women, Writing, and Representation in Early

Christianity (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).

10 T. C. Skeat, “Early Christian Book-​Production: Papyri and Manuscripts,” in The Cambridge
History of the Bible: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation, ed. G. W. H. Lampe
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), 54–​79.
11 C. H. Roberts, Manuscript, Society, and Belief in Early Christian Egypt: The Schweich Lectures

1977 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979). See now also Bagnall, Early.
12 Gamble, Books.
38 The Gospel as Manuscript

of evidence and without a restricted focus on Egypt.13 Hurtado argues that

scholars should approach artifactual elements of manuscripts such as the
nomina sacra, the staurogram, and the Christian preference for the codex as
evidence of an early Christian visual and material culture, but also considers
more mundane matters such as the margin size of manuscripts and readers’
aids such as ekthesis. Hurtado’s book does not consider how the manuscript
itself would have functioned as a material artifact, which is the lacuna that
the present study addresses. Hurtado was the first New Testament scholar to
apply Johnson’s model to early Christian reading communities, so this study
follows his work in this way as well. Most recent in this line of research is
Nongbri’s impressive 2018 God’s Library.14 This study contains detailed dis-
cussion of what scholars know of early Christian books and how they have
come to know it with reference to three particular collections: the Chester
Beatty Papyri, the Bodmer Papyri, and Christian books from Oxyrhynchus.
Particularly helpful are Nongbri’s challenges on the datings of many manu-
scripts and his combing of archived materials dealing with the sometimes
conflicting discovery stories of the manuscripts. Like the present study,
Nongbri has a “relentless . . . focus on these manuscripts as objects.”15 I will
take this focus in a complementary but different direction from Nongbri, as
I am most concerned with the significance of the text as material artifact in
the early transmission history of the Jesus tradition.
A final study in Christian book culture that deserves mention is Parker’s
classic 1997 The Living Text of the Gospels.16 Over twenty years old now,
Parker’s study has had an impact disproportionate to its slim size. Along with
Epp’s Theological Tendencies, Ehrman’s Orthodox Corruption, and others,
Parker’s study contributed to a distinct approach to textual criticism that
Lin has called “narrative textual criticism.”17 Parker’s study perhaps dealt
the death blow to the practice of defining the primary goal of textual criti-
cism as establishing an “original” text. He used several examples of variant
readings to propose that scholars instead view the totality of the readings as

13 Hurtado, Earliest.
14 Nongbri, God’s.
15 Nongbri, God’s, 17.
16 D. C. Parker, The Living Text of the Gospels (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
17 Yii-​Jan Lin, The Erotic Life of Manuscripts: New Testament Textual Criticism and the Biological

Sciences (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 10, 97–​100. On the shifting goals of New
Testament textual criticism, see Michael W. Holmes, “From ‘Original Text’ to ‘Initial Text’: The
Traditional Goal of New Testament Textual Criticism in Contemporary Discussion,” in Ehrman and
Epp, Text, 637–​88, also Charles E. Hill and Michael J. Kruger, “Introduction: In Search of the Earliest
Text of the New Testament,” in Hill and Kruger, Early, 3–​5.
 Sociologies of the Book 39

evidence of the tradition as a “living text.” This description of the textual tra-
dition of the New Testament as “living” is significant from a wider perspec-
tive. Like Assmann’s concept of the “extended situation,” it turns the ancient
and contemporary association of the written word with “death”18 completely
on its head and reminds the scholar that manuscript tradition constituted a
sprawling network of the Jesus tradition rather than a cul-​de-​sac. In theoret-
ical terms, Parker’s study anticipated several developments in the study of
Jewish and Christian book culture away from conceptualizing texts as final
and closed entities that I will discuss immediately below. Parker’s full impact
is observable now in Knust and Wasserman’s 2018 To Cast the First Stone, an
impressive full reception history of a textual variant (the pericope adulterae,
John 7:53–​8:11) that Parker had treated in brief.19 Knust and Wasserman
dedicate the study to Parker and then proceed to analyze this tradition’s re-
ception in manuscript, patristic, and liturgical sources in the East and West
from the second through the fifth centuries, and even beyond in some cases.
Their study demonstrates the immense benefit of studying the full tradition
history rather than just those elements of it that are deemed valuable for
reconstructing a hypothetical “original” version. The present study will align
with such a reception history approach, though it will specifically feature the
reception history of the tradition’s status as material artifact.

The Text as Process

The second trend in the study of Jewish and Christian book cultures to which
this study contributes is one that views texts as open tradition processes.
Some scholars of the Hebrew Bible, Second Temple Judaism, and early
Christianity have argued convincingly against the idea that “books” in these
cultures should be regarded as fixed and finished entities. The conceptual
problem that many of these studies address is the conflation of theoretical
“canonical” forms of texts with the actual forms of texts that ancient readers
would have encountered and used. One could equally consider this stream of
scholarship under the category of “canon history” as something of an anti-​
canon-​history approach in the sense of dislodging the development of the

18 See the introduction.

19 Knust and Wasserman, To Cast. Parker’s discussion of the pericope adulterae is in Parker, Living,
95–​102.
40 The Gospel as Manuscript

Jewish and Christian canons and their authority as the predominant focal
areas of scholarship.20 The common element of these studies is the claim that
in ancient Israel, Second Temple Judaism, and early Christianity, although
there were texts, authors, and authority, these entities did not come to ex-
pression in the same ways that they do in modern scholarship and religious
traditions. Rather than viewing texts as static, scholars should view texts as
free-​flowing, open tradition processes. The work of two recent scholars in
this stream of scholarship—​Mroczek and Larsen—​provides particularly
good reference points for the contribution of the present study. My concen-
tration upon the book as a material artifact complements their studies by
focusing upon an aspect of ancient book culture that, although not directly
under their microscopes, nevertheless contributes to scholarly conceptions
of ancient “books.”

Mroczek and the Ancient Jewish Literary Imagination

Mroczek’s 2016 The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity contrasts “na-

tive literary theories”21 within Second Temple Judaism with the book con-
cepts of modern scholarship. She builds upon the work of previous scholars
such as Najman, Reed, and Breed. Najman, for example, focuses on the pre-
sentation of Moses and Ezra as scribal authors in texts like Jubilees and 4
Ezra.22 Scholars sometimes have classified these texts as part of a genre called
“rewritten Bible,” even though there was no “Bible” as such and these texts
often do not present themselves as rewritings. There is an inherent mismatch
between how they present themselves and how scholarship presents them.
Likewise, scholars sometimes have classified these texts under the label of
“pseudepigrapha” on the basis of the fact that the texts are “falsely written”

20 David Brakke, “Scriptural Practices in Early Christianity: Towards a New History of the New

Testament Canon,” in Invention, Rewriting, Usurpation: Discursive Fights over Religious Traditions
in Antiquity, ed. Jörg Ulrich, Anders-​Christian Jacobsen, and David Brakke, ECCA 11 (Frankfurt
am Main: Peter Lang, 2012), 280; Eva Mroczek, The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 4.
21 Mroczek, Literary, 5.
22 Hindy Najman, Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism,

JSJSup 77 (Leiden: Brill, 2003); Najman, “How Should We Contextualize Pseudepigrapha?: Imitation
and Emulation in 4 Ezra,” in her Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation and
the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity, JSJSup 53 (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 235–​42; Najman,
“Interpretation as Primordial Writing: Jubilees and Its Authority Conferring Strategies,” in Najman,
Past, 39–​71; Najman, “Torah of Moses: Pseudonymous Attribution in Second Temple Writings,” in
Najman, Past, 73–​86.
 Sociologies of the Book 41

under the authorial names they claim. The “pseudepigrapha” label, however,
reflects a post-​canon perspective, and specifically a concern for (and judge-
ment about) who the author “really was” that is more at home in modern
scholarship than the ancient world. As such, it too is a classification of the
texts based on categories that were not operative at the time in which these
traditions initially gained currency. Similarly challenging the appropriate-
ness of the category of “pseudepigrapha” for the Second Temple period, Reed
demonstrates that ancient conceptions of authorship were organized around
the legendary biography of an esteemed tradent rather than the modern
question of who literally put reed pen to papyrus.23
Applying these and related insights to the Hebrew Bible, Breed has chal-
lenged the distinction between a “text” and its “reception.”24 Similar to the
aforementioned developments in New Testament textual criticism, he points
specifically to how this distinction associates the former term with an “orig-
inal text” and associates the latter term with secondary occurrences of the
“text” rather than as full instantiations of the traditions themselves.25 In con-
trast, Breed argues for seeing the “text as process” and a “nonessentialist on-
tology of biblical texts.”26 “Texts” are, according to Breed, “nomads” with “no
origin and no endpoint.”27
Breed describes the scholarly concept of the “original text” as
“Miltonesque.”28 Mroczek also challenges John Milton’s concept (from his
1644 speech Areopagitica) of the book as a vial, a closed container that holds
“the essence of the author’s creation.”29 She rightly identifies this concept as
still operative in the scholarly edifice, since scholars continue to devote much
ink to single points of origin, whether that means interest in who “really”

23 Annette Yoshiko Reed, “Pseudepigraphy, Authorship and the Reception of ‘the Bible’ in

Late Antiquity,” in The Reception and Interpretation of the Bible in Late Antiquity: Proceedings of
the Montréal Colloquium in Honour of Charles Kannengiesser, 11–​13 October 2006, ed. Lorenzo
DiTommaso and Lucian Turcescu, BACh 6 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 467–​90. Cf. also her “The Modern
Invention of ‘Old Testament Pseudepigrapha,’” JTS 60.2 (2009): 403–​36.
24 Brennan W. Breed, Nomadic Text: A Theory of Biblical Reception History, ISBL

(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2014), 1–​14.

25 Breed, Nomadic, 15–​74.
26 Breed, Nomadic, 65.
27 Breed, Nomadic, 203.
28 Breed, Nomadic, 15, 50.
29 Mroczek, Literary, 19. John Milton, Areopagitica (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

1918), 6–​7: “For books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be
as active as that soul was whose progeny they are; nay, they do preserve as in a vial the purest efficacy
and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. . . . A good book is the precious life-​blood of a
master-​spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.” Breed and Mroczek are
both dependent upon D. F. McKenzie, Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1999), 31–​53.
42 The Gospel as Manuscript

wrote a text, critical editions that boil diffuse traditions down to a hypothet-
ical “original,” or even attempts to determine “what really happened” histor-
ically. Against such concerns, Mroczek’s main argument is that concepts of
“books” in Second Temple Judaism were anything but Miltonian, since this
was a time “when neither text nor canon was fixed.”30 The conceptual frame-
work of modern biblical scholarship, however, was built upon the notions of
fixed texts and canons, and thus, for Mroczek, there is a crucial theoretical
gap that must be addressed:

Our major bibliographic categories—​ books and authors—​ have con-

strained a dynamic literary culture where revelation can be found in mul-
tiple and shifting fragments, and writing figures are the main characters in
narratives about an effusion of revelation that cannot be contained in any
human scribal collection.31

Mroczek reorients scholarly understanding of “authors” and “books”

with case studies on the association of David with psalms, the portrayal of
books and authority in Sirach and Jubilees, and eventual articulations of an
enumerated canon. A brief description of her arguments regarding Davidic
psalms and Sirach will indicate her major emphases. Mroczek demonstrates
convincingly that there was nothing exactly like the canonical Book of
Psalms among ancient Jewish readers. There were instead various collections
of psalms that were often attributed to David based on the popular recep-
tion of David as a singer and writer. Attributions of authorship under these
circumstances were the result of David’s reputation functioning like a gravi-
tational center, absorbing traditions within its orbit—​“a poetic and honorific
association of a body of texts with a character who becomes more and more
powerfully linked with efficacious prayer, beautiful song, and divine favor.”32
She furthermore argues, particularly on the basis of the reference to 4,050
Davidic psalms in 11QPsalmsa, that Davidic psalms were not thought of as
a discrete collection but as “an open series, overwhelmingly prolific divine
writing and speech with no upper boundary.”33 The psalms were thus not a
closed “book” like the (later canonical) Book of Psalms but an “open genre, a
heavenly corpus of texts only partly reflected in available collections”34
30 Mroczek, Literary, 20.
31 Mroczek, Literary, 85; see also 186–​88.
32 Mroczek, Literary, 84.
33 Mroczek, Literary, 43; see also 70–​78.
34 Mroczek, Literary, 71.
 Sociologies of the Book 43

With regard to Sirach, although he self-​identifies as the author of his

“book” (βιβλίον) in Sir 50:27 LXX, Mroczek argues that Sirach is more like
so-​called pseudepigraphal literature in its conception of authorship and tra-
dition.35 Sirach describes the Torah tradition to which he gives expression
as tied to Wisdom, and thus as something that antedated him and that he
cannot fully present, like an overflowing river (Sir 24:25–​34).36 For Mroczek,
this is one more example of Second Temple book culture running contrary
to the Miltonian concept of books and authors: “This sacred tradition cannot
be contained even within the banks of great rivers—​the very opposite of the
Miltonian book as a vial of preserved essence.”37 Overall, Mroczek argues for
viewing texts as unfolding processes, or for “text as project,” rather than as a
vial containing pure authorial essence.38
Most of Mroczek’s study aligns with emphases in the present study.
In affirming the idea that “the material form of texts . . . affect[s]‌the way
they are received,” she articulates a principle that stands at the core of this
entire study.39 Likewise, her observation in relation to Sirach’s textual self-​
consciousness—​“It is as if the text itself was highlighting, or even enabling,
its own openness, as a moment in a long process of writing, reading, and
collection”40—​expresses succinctly some aspects of the process of competi-
tive textualization in the Jesus tradition that I discuss in Part II of this book.
Furthermore, she is correct that in reference to some Jewish writings, and in
contrast to “modern concepts of ‘books’ and ‘authors,’ ”

other metaphors—​such as databases, projects, and even archives, heavenly

and earthly—​are helpful for imagining an ancient bibliographical poetics
that does not assume that revealed writing is entirely graspable or entirely
known, but exists beyond the horizons of available text.41

This point has pressing relevance for this study on the Jesus tradition. John
20:30 and 21:25 state explicitly that the traditions about Jesus and his “signs”

35 See further Mroczek, Literary, 92–​93, 93n.18, where she notes that there is “no reference to

writing or books” in the underlying Hebrew of this verse (92), but that there is in the Hebrew of MS B
at Sir 39:32 (93n.18).
36 For discussion of a similar portrayal of abundant tradition from heavenly tablets that exceeds

the written text of Jubilees, see Najman, “Interpretation,” 39–​71.

37 Mroczek, Literary, 94.
38 Mroczek, Literary, 41, 42.
39 Mroczek, Literary, 128. Similarly, Stern, Jewish, 5 and throughout.
40 Mroczek, Literary, 113.
41 Mroczek, Literary, 88.
44 The Gospel as Manuscript

exceed the capacity of books to hold them: “Thus Jesus also did many signs
in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. . . . But
there are also many other things that Jesus did, that if each one were written,
I think not even the world itself would hold the books written.”

Holding on Loosely to the “Book”

Despite much agreement with Mroczek, I am not quite ready to jettison lan-
guage of “books” and the authority associated with them in antiquity. This
position is partially a result of the way that John 20:31 as well as Sirach 24:30–​
34 leverage the openness of the tradition precisely for constructing their own
authority as written entities. It also emerges from my foregrounding of a dif-
ferent set of textual phenomena.
Important in this regard is that Mroczek constructs the Second Temple
“literary imagination” specifically in contrast to the seventeenth-​century
Miltonian concept of the “book” as a closed container of authorial (and thus
authoritative) intent and its continued currency in contemporary contexts.42
This argumentative move is independent of but similar to New Testament
scholars such as Kelber and Dunn who previously juxtaposed ancient oral
cultures with the print cultures of modern scholarship, insofar as the asserted
contrast in both cases is between ancient realities and modern scholarly
categories.43 New Testament scholars juxtaposed these cultures in order to
“alter the default setting” of scholarship,44 which they rightly understood
as a product of modern print culture. In pressing the contrast between an-
cient orality and post-​Gutenberg textuality, however, these scholars gave in-
sufficient attention to the fact that Gutenberg invented only movable type,
not textuality itself. There was an ancient textuality before Gutenberg that
they overlooked, and that textuality coincided culturally with the ancient

42 Likewise, Breed, Nomadic, 15, 50.

43 Kelber, Oral, 164: “If to the modern typographical consciousness the epistemological flavor
of Paul’s discourse on the fall inclines toward the pessimistic, one must remember that the apostle
approaches the Law in the fashion of an oral traditionalist”; James D. G. Dunn, “Altering the Default
Setting: Re-​envisaging the Early Transmission of the Jesus Tradition,” in his The Oral Gospel Tradition
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013), 44: “We are children of Gutenberg and Caxton. . . . We are, there-
fore, in no state to appreciate how a nonliterary culture, an oral culture, functions.” More recently,
Rhoads, “Performance Criticism (Biblical),” 282: “The print-​age media model . . . may not have been
typical of the predominantly oral cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world.”
44 Dunn, “Altering.”
 Sociologies of the Book 45

orality they sought to isolate from it.45 Kelber has since embraced the fact
that many of the qualities he earlier associated with orality (such as plurifor-
mity) were also inherent to ancient manuscript culture.46 Prior to this more
recent acknowledgment, however, when exorcising from the field an inap-
propriate ancient category of textuality, they overlooked an appropriate an-
cient category.
Similar to these scholars, Mroczek’s approach is intended to unsettle the
modern scholarly apparatus.47 I do not disagree with this move; it is neces-
sary and appropriate. Nevertheless, in pressing the contrast between some
native literary theories and Miltonian concepts of books, other native lit-
erary theories have been sidelined. The relevance of this point is most clear
when considering Mroczek’s frequent definition of “book” as a “collection.”48
She similarly associates the term “book” with “bound” and “fixed” entities,49
as well as with “an original and final written composition.”50 As such, for
Mroczek, “book” as a term “brings to mind an isomorphic identity of object,
figure, and text.”51 From this perspective, she concludes that “Ben Sira is nei-
ther an author nor a book” because “the idea of a ‘book’ in anything close to
the Miltonian sense, as an iconic contained text, is not to be found.”52
But what if we understood “book” in senses other than Miltonian and do
not insist that it refer to a finished product? Mroczek’s portrayal of the term
“book” is not wrong, but it is incomplete. “Book” often means “collection” in
the modern context and could mean “collection” in antiquity as well, such
as the “book of Psalms” (βίβλος ψαλμῶν) in Luke 20:42 and Acts 1:20. Yet
the term did not always or necessarily take on a meaning of “collection.” The
relevant terms for “book”—​‫ספר‬, βίβλος, βιβλίον, liber, volumen—​carried a

45 See further Chris Keith, “A Performance of the Text: The Adulteress’s Entrance into John’s

Gospel,” in The Fourth Gospel in First-​Century Media Culture, ed. Anthony Le Donne and Tom
Thatcher, ESCO/​LNTS 426 (London: T&T Clark, 2011), 59–​61.
46 See especially Werner H. Kelber, “Orality and Biblical Scholarship: Seven Case Studies,” in

his Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner H. Kelber, RBS 74
(Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 297–​331; Kelber, “The History of the Closure of Biblical
Texts,” in Kelber, Imprints, 413–​40. See further ­chapter 3.
47 Mroczek, Literary, 21: “Scholars have continued to use a later entity—​ the biblical book of
Psalms—​as a way of grouping and defining a more complex diversity of psalm materials than such a
concept suggests.” See also the frequent references to the “mental architecture” of the scholarly appa-
ratus (6, 17, 21, 117, 118–​22, 155; cf. 219n.14).
48 Mroczek, Literary: “a set, specific collection—​ a book” (45); “a specific contained normative
collection—​a book” (45); “coherent collection or ‘book’ ” (81).
49 Mroczek, Literary, 20, 41, 85.
50 Mroczek, Literary, 93.
51 Mroczek, Literary, 112.
52 Mroczek, Literary, 88.
46 The Gospel as Manuscript

more rudimentary meaning of “bookroll” or “scroll.” “Book (liber, βιβλίον),

as far as the ancients were concerned, meant a roll (Lat. volumen).”53 At base,
these terms referred simply to the cultural artifact of papyrus or parchment54
that contained the written script, an instantiation of the tradition that a given
person was currently holding or portrayed as holding. An example where
this meaning is assumed is when Luke imagines Jesus taking up “a scroll of
the prophet Isaiah” (βιβλίον τοῦ προφήτου Ἠσαΐου) and even says “he found
the place where it was written” (εὗρεν τόπον οὗ ἦν γεγραμμένον) (Luke 4:16).
Another example is when Lucian mocks the ignorant book collector: “To be
sure you look at your books (βιβλία) with your eyes open and quite as much
as you like, and you read some of them aloud with great fluency, keeping your
eyes in advance of your lips; but I do not consider that enough.”55 The em-
phasis in such passages is not on whether the tradition is bound or unbound,
a collection or not, but upon the material artifact that the author wishes the
reader to imagine the person holding.56
Reflecting this basic meaning, but slightly different from it, “book” could
also take on a meaning that was the inverse of the meaning that Mroczek
draws upon. Instead of referring to a completed collection, “book” could
refer to only one part of a collection, or more specifically one roll of a mul-
tiroll literary work. Such is the case when Irenaeus and Eusebius refer to
Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord as consisting of five “books”
(βιβλία/​libri) or when the author of the Refutation of All Heresies (sometimes
identified as Hippolytus) opens Book 5 by referring to what he wrote in the
previous four “books” (βίβλοις),57 among a plethora of other examples.58
Also stemming from the basic meaning of “bookroll” or “scroll” but car-
rying a slightly different nuance, “book” could refer to what we would today
call a “literary work” or “text,” a distinct, recognizable tradition in written

53 Adam Bülow-​ Jacobsen, “Writing Materials in the Ancient World,” in OHP, 18. As Nongbri
notes, “Before about the third century ce, the word ‘book’ (biblos or biblion in Greek, volumen in
Latin) invariably referred to rolls” (God’s, 21). C. H. Roberts and T. C. Skeat, The Birth of the Codex
(London: Oxford University Press, 1983), 54n.1, observe that βιβλίον could refer to a codex at least by
the fifth century ce.
54 Bülow-​Jacobsen, “Writing,” 22, notes that half of the known parchment scrolls are Hebrew or

Christian Scriptures. Cf. Johnson, “Ancient,” 265.

55 Lucian, Ind. 2 (Harmon, LCL).
56 For a similar emphasis upon the book as an artifact that readers “literally held in their hands,” see

Stern, Jewish, 3 (quotation), 4, 32.

57 Haer. 5.6.1 (Litwa).
58 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.3//​Irenaeus, Haer. 5.33.4; cf. Jerome, Vir. ill. 18: “five volumes”

(quinque . . . volumina) (Ehrman, LCL). Further, and with other examples, see Johnson, “Ancient,”
264; also Harry Y. Gamble, “Bible and Book,” in In the Beginning: Bibles before the Year 1000, ed.
Michelle P. Brown (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 2006), 19.
 Sociologies of the Book 47

form that occurs in multiple copies and thus is not isolated to a single man-
uscript. Examples that will be discussed later in this study are Matt 1:1 and
John 20:30. The former tradition opens Matthew’s Gospel by referring to it-
self as the “book of the beginning” (βίβλος γενέσεως) of Jesus Christ, or, as
I will argue in ­chapter 4, allusively as the “book of Genesis.” The latter tra-
dition refers to itself as a discrete literary work when it refers to the things
written “in this book” (τῷ βιβλίῳ τούτῳ). Whatever may have been in
the mind of the person or persons who committed this tradition to man-
uscript (that is, “bookroll” or “literary work”),59 later copyists copied and
recopied the Gospels of Matthew and John upon different manuscripts but
under the same title. At least for these tradents and the myriad readers of the
manuscripts they produced, “book” at Matt 1:1 and John 20:30 assumed the
meaning of “bookroll” but extended beyond it to refer more specifically to a
literary work in written form that one could find on any number of bookrolls.
Although many other examples exist, a similar meaning for “book” is present
in Mark 12:26’s reference to what readers find “in the book of Moses” (ἐν
τῇ βίβλῳ Μωϋσέως). Mark 12:26 presents the law as an identifiable “literary
work” that occurs in manuscript form, but which tradents knew was not re-
stricted to a single bookroll, since there were many copies of the law. That
“book” can refer to a literary work that is identifiable, as is the case in these
texts, need not imply further that the tradition is therefore “closed” or “final”
in any real sense. It indicates only that some tradents were able to conceptu-
alize it as such.
Therefore, in antiquity, terminology for “book” can refer strictly to the lit-
erary artifact (“bookroll”), or to one part of a multiroll literary work (e.g.,
“book” 1 of 5), or to the literary work itself (the “book” of Moses). None of
these three meanings is exactly the same as “collection,” which remains also
a viable understanding of “book,” and all are consistent with the idea that the
tradition remained open to further elaboration, growth, and tradition in the
hands of subsequent tradents.
When Mroczek describes “the literary world” of Second Temple Judaism
as reflective of a time “before the categories of ‘Bible’ and ‘books’ were avail-
able concepts,”60 then, this point is right only to the extent that one defines
“book” as “Bible.” “Book” in the alternative senses of “bookroll” or “literary

59 Cf. Stern, Jewish, 17, on the phrases “this sefer of the torah” (Deut 29:20; 30:10; 31:26) and “this

torah” (Deut 1:5; 4:8; 27:3) reflecting that Deuteronomy was “probably written on a single scroll.”
60 Mroczek, Literary, 5; also 187.
48 The Gospel as Manuscript

work in bookroll form” were available concepts and regularly put to good use.
Mroczek is aware of these meanings for the terms, and I am not suggesting
otherwise. My point is that in acknowledging that the authority associated
with the book-​as-​collection in the Miltonian sense may need to be dismissed
from the scholarly apparatus,61 we need to maintain the authority associated
with the bookroll-​as-​object (in Johnson’s language), because this “bookish”
language was sometimes a core component of constructions of identity.
I thus cannot agree that “ ‘book’ language . . . requires us to posit . . . a fun-
damental identity for a work—​either its ‘original’ or its ‘completed’ form.”62
“Book” language can take on such a formulation, but it is not the case that
such a formulation is “required.”
I retain “book” language, then, because the book as artifact—​the book as
bookroll or literary work upon a bookroll—​was also part of the literary im-
agination in Jewish antiquity. This point is well made by Stern when he refers
the “the book” as a “whole artifact” in his The Jewish Bible,63 which was pub-
lished at the end of the research process for the present study but is concep-
tually the closest scholarly work to it. Stern approaches “the history of the
Jewish book” on the basis of its materiality:

This new history brings together the study of the text with the history of
its reading and reception as shaped by the book’s material form. It uses
the intersection between textuality and materiality—​the two sides of any
book—​as a window into the book’s meaning in Jewish culture. And most
important of all, it views the book as a whole artifact. It makes sense of all
its elements—​material and textual—​and reads the book simultaneously
as a textual constellation and as a material artifact so as to appreciate the
value, the significance, that these books have possessed for the Jews who
produced, owned, and held them in their hands.64

This study focuses intently upon two specific aspects of book practices among
early followers of Jesus—​competitive textualization and public reading of the
Jesus tradition—​and so cannot compare with the sheer breadth of Stern’s

61 Similarly, see Jacobus A. Naudé and Cynthia L. Miller-​Naudé, “The Translation of biblion and

biblos in the Light of Oral and Scribal Practice,” IDS 50.3 (2016): 1–​11.
62 Mroczek, Literary, 96.
63 Stern, Jewish, 5.
64 Stern, Jewish, 5. Similarly, Popović, “Reading,” 453, argues for an approach to the Dead Sea

Scrolls that “combine[s]‌a material approach to the manuscripts as archaeological artifacts with con-
siderations based on the content of the texts.”
 Sociologies of the Book 49

magisterial study, which treats the Hebrew Bible from antiquity down to
Yiddish communities and even modern translations and critical editions.
Despite this narrower focus, it has a similar methodological approach and
will likewise highlight the role of books as material artifacts within textual
constellations.

Larsen and Gospels before “Book”

The second scholar whose work deserves special mention in this context is
Larsen, whose 2017 article and 2018 monograph cast the Gospels as an open
tradition of textual constellations rather than discrete “books.”65 Drawing
upon Mroczek, Najman, Reed, and others, Larsen problematizes scholarly
conceptions of ancient book culture, and does so in order to disrupt the
print-​culture-​based assumptions of contemporary New Testament scholar-
ship.66 Like Breed, Larsen’s primary target in his 2017 article is the concept
of the “original” or “final” version of a text in textual criticism, though he is
focused on New Testament textual criticism. He asks,

What does it mean to talk about a truly “original text” or “final text” in the
ancient world? Is such a category productive? Is textual finality something a
scholar of antiquity can reasonably presuppose? What if the “original text”
or “final text” was not only practically impossible to recover but also theo-
retically a bit of a chimera?67

Citing ancient discussions of unfinished books, books that were multiply re-
vised, and books that were accidentally published, Larsen concludes that the
idea of a definitive version of the text is out of place in antiquity: “Every new
draft functions only provisionally and temporarily as a final draft, while the
notion of a truly finished text in a definitive version does not map neatly on
to the material realia of the ancient world.”68 As part of his argument, Larsen
defines the term “book” as “contained, bounded, stable and definitive—​a sin-
gular text to which we cannot return,” and enlists Mroczek’s discussion of

65 Matthew D. C. Larsen, “Accidental Publication, Unfinished Texts and the Traditional Goals of

New Testament Textual Criticism,” JSNT 39.4 (2017): 362–​87; Larsen, Gospels.
66 Larsen, “Accidental,” 363. Larsen draws upon Mroczek frequently in Gospels.
67 Larsen, “Accidental,” 365.
68 Larsen, “Accidental,” 376.
50 The Gospel as Manuscript

Milton’s vial.69 In contrast to such a concept, which is attached to the concept

of the “original” and “final” text in scholarship, he proposes that the “initial
text may not be a text at all, but a moving, growing constellation of textual
traditions.”70 On the basis of second-​century and later assessments of Mark’s
Gospel, Larsen argues that subsequent Gospel authors instead likely viewed
Mark’s Gospel as ὑπομνήματα (“notes”) or ἀπομνημονεύματα (“memoirs”):

But what if Mark was unfinished textual raw material, ὑπομνήματα, notes,
memoirs, a draft? The earliest users and readers of Mark describe it that
way. From a text-​compositional point of view, Luke, Papias, Justin Martyr
and Clement of Alexandria describe or treat Mark as disorderly or unpol-
ished notes, ὑπομνήματα or ἀπομνημονεύματα, words which we might
translate in some contexts as “rough draft.”71

The creation of another Gospel book on the basis of Mark’s Gospel was thus
not really the creation of another “book” at all but rather “an act of macro-
level revision of an open textual tradition.”72 Indeed, for Larsen, “Early users
of gospel texts regarded the gospel not as a book, but as a fluid constellation
of texts.”73
Larsen’s 2018 monograph, Gospels before the Book, gives fuller expression
to these ideas. After presenting relevant examples of ancient unfinished and
accidentally published works, he surveys the earliest discussions of readers of
Mark’s Gospel and then treats the Synoptic problem and various endings of
the Gospel from the perspective of Mark’s Gospel as ὑπομνήματα.74 He also
forwards in his final chapter a model for reading some of the narrative ten-
sions in Mark’s Gospel from a perspective of the textual tradition as unfin-
ished.75 Larsen reiterates that the concept of Mark’s Gospel as a “book” with
an “author” is not attested until the second century with Irenaeus and is most
at home in a third-​century context.76 He thus argues for approaching Mark’s

69 Larsen, “Accidental,” 376–​77, 374n.43; also Larsen, Gospels, 23, 144.

70 Larsen, “Accidental,” 377.
71 Larsen, “Accidental,” 377. He cites Eusebius’s reading of Luke 1:1–​4 in Hist. eccl. 3.24.15,
Clement’s description of Mark in Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1–​2, Papias’s comments in Eusebius, Hist.
eccl. 3.39.15, and Justin Martyr, Dial. 106.3. See discussion later in this chapter.
72 Larsen, “Accidental,” 379.
73 Larsen, “Accidental,” 379.
74 Larsen, Gospels, 79–​98, 99–​120.
75 Larsen, Gospels, 121–​45.
76 Larsen, Gospels, 82, 93, 96, 106, 150.
 Sociologies of the Book 51

Gospel as unfinished notes, ὑπομνήματα, as more appropriate to its “native”

status among first-​and second-​century readers and users.77
I share Larsen’s view that manuscripts should be treated as “textual objects
in their own right” and his general approach to “the gospel—​textualized.”78
He is also correct that the Gospels were part of an open-​ended tradition pro-
cess. I argued similarly in the previous chapter on the basis of Assmann’s
concept of the zerdehnte Situation and will buttress this argument in sub-
sequent chapters. Nevertheless, I wish once more to recover an appropriate
ancient concept of the “book” for the Jesus tradition and in that respect give
attention to three aspects of Larsen’s argument: ὑπομνήματα as a category for
the Gospels among its earliest readers, the omission of relevant first-​century
data, and writtenness as a point of fixity.

Ὑπομνήματα and the Earliest Readers of the Gospels

First, Larsen’s primary category, ὑπομνήματα, is not attested as a term for the
Gospels prior to Origen in the third century and Eusebius in the fourth cen-
tury.79 The singular ὑπόμνημα is used for Mark’s Gospel slightly earlier, in a
late second-​/​early third-​century Clementine tradition that Eusebius relays
in the fourth century.80 Larsen states these facts clearly, but he also edges
the term into the first and early second centuries in an effort to argue for its
validity in the earlier periods. One way he does this is by describing these
later attestations as evidence of an earlier—​though otherwise unattested—​
discourse. For example, he claims, “Even as late as the third and fourth cen-
turies ce, remnants of prior gospel discourses can be detected,” and thus
these discourses “preserve older traditions” and “preserve the idea of the
Gospels according to Matthew and John as recording hypomnēmata.”81

77 Larsen, Gospels, 4, 106, 122, 143, 149, inter alia.

78 Larsen, Gospels, 116, 4, respectively.
79 Origen, Cels. 2.13 (PG 11:824; Marcovich 92): “For surely they will not say that Jesus’ own pupils

and hearers hand down the teaching of the gospels without writing it down, and that they left their
disciples without their reminiscences (ὑπομνημάτων) of Jesus in writing” (Chadwick); Eusebius,
Hist. eccl. 3.24.5: “Yet nevertheless of all those who had been with the Lord only Matthew and John
have left us their recollections (ὑπομνήματα), and tradition says that they took to writing perforce”
(Lake, LCL). Cf. Larsen, Gospels, 83, 87, 96, 150. Cf. also E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 17, who cites Hegesippus
as someone who “suggest[s]‌thinking of apostolic traditions in terms of . . . hypomnemata” in refer-
ence to Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.23.2; 4.22.1, and in light of Justin Martyr’s usage of ἀπομνημονεύματα
at 1 Apol. 67.3. At both these texts, though, Eusebius makes clear that Hegesippus refers to his own
five-​volume literary work, whereas Justin is referring to the Gospels.
80 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1–​2; cf. Larsen, Gospels, 96–​98.
81 Larsen, Gospels, 83.
52 The Gospel as Manuscript

Similarly, he describes the occurrence of ὑπόμνημα for the Gospel of Mark

in the Clementine tradition as evidence that Clement “retains reminiscences
and traditions from previous discourses of gospel textuality and tradi-
tion, . . . which do not assume the concepts of books, authors, or publica-
tion.”82 Describing these attestations as “remnants” or “reminiscences” that
“preserve” earlier “gospel discourses” conveys the idea that such discourses
were there in the first place. Even if it is possible that some first-​and early
second-​century readers of the Gospels could have conceptualized them as
such, there is, nevertheless, no evidence that they did so.
Another way that Larsen pushes the idea of the Gospels as ὑπομνήματα
into an earlier period is by claiming that Papias in the early second century
refers to the Gospel of Mark or Gospels as ἀπομνημονεύματα83 and, citing
classicist George Kennedy, observing that this term in context is “roughly a
synonym of hypomnēmata.”84 This Papian description of Mark is reported
by Eusebius in the fourth century,85 though there is no reason to doubt
that Papias could have thought of the Gospels as ἀπομνημονεύματα. Justin
Martyr uses this term for the Gospels in his First Apology in the mid-​second
century.86 There is also no reason to doubt that these terms were sometimes
synonymous.87
Nevertheless, two matters regarding Papias’s and Justin’s language for
the Gospels complicate Larsen’s portrait. First, the claim that Papias says
that Mark “textualized Peter’s teaching in the form of apomnēmoneumata”
is contestable.88 Papias does not use the noun ἀπομνημονεύματα, which,
like ὑπομνήματα, functions as a jargon term for literary categories in antiq-
uity and also in Larsen’s argument. Papias uses the verb ἀπομνημονεύω in
claiming that Mark wrote things that “he remembered” (ἀπεμνημόνευσεν)
from Peter.89 In other words, Papias technically does not claim that Mark

82 Larsen, Gospels, 96, in reference to Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1–​2.

83 Larsen, 90–​91, 180n.52.
84 Larsen, Gospels, 90; also 98; Larsen, “Accidental,” 377n.54.
85 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15.
86 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 67.3. Radka Fialová, “‘Scripture’ and the ‘Memoirs of the Apostles’: Justin

Martyr and His Bible,” in The Process of Authority: The Dynamics in Transmission and Reception of
Canonical Texts, ed. Jan Dušek and Jan Roskovec, DCLS (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016), 170, thus argues
that Justin had read Papias, though she acknowledges that “there is no direct evidence that Justin
was familiar with Papias’s work.” For further discussion of 1 Apol. 67.3, see ­chapter 6. For Justin
on the Gospel of Mark, Larsen appeals specifically to Dial. 106.3 and a conjectural emendation for
ἀπομνημονεύματα there (Gospels, 180n.52).
87 Wally V. Cirafesi and Gregory Peter Fewster, “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα and Ancient Greco-​

Roman Memoirs,” EC 2.7 (2016): 192–​95.

88 Larsen, Gospels, 90; see also Larsen, “Accidental,” 377.
89 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15.
 Sociologies of the Book 53

wrote his sayings of the Lord “as memoirs” but that he wrote them “as he
remembered,” so it is not clear that Papias is making a claim about the lit-
erary category of Mark’s Gospel. Second, when Justin Martyr does use
ἀπομνημονεύματα (“memoirs”) for the Gospels (and does so frequently), he
is imitating Xenophon’s Memoirs of Socrates,90 which he cites at 2 Apol. 11.3–​
5.91 Justin uses the term for an apologetic purpose; it is not proto-​orthodox
Christian apologetic, but it is apologetic nonetheless.
The apologetic function of dressing the Gospels in language recognizable
to readers of Xenophon makes explicit the second-​century context and is-
sues that Justin was addressing—​the Second Sophistic literary tradition of
philosophical memoirs92—​which would need to be demonstrated as oper-
ative for Jesus followers close to the last quarter of the first century in order
for Larsen’s application of such terms to this period to carry weight. If one
were to exchange this second-​century discourse for the Gospels that appeals
apologetically to readers of Xenophon for a second-​century discourse for the
Gospels that appeals apologetically to a proto-​orthodox Christian reader-
ship, I doubt that many scholars would affirm efforts to push that language
back into the first century. They would not, for example, accept the notion
that one could push Irenaeus’s conception of the Gospels as a fourfold au-
thoritative collection93—​which arises around the same time that Justin
first refers to the Gospels as ἀπομνημονεύματα and the Clementine tradi-
tion refers to the Gospel of Mark as ὑπόμνημα, and before Origen refers to
the Gospels as ὑπομνήματα—​into the first century and onto the Gospels of
Mark, Matthew, Luke, or John.
These points do not threaten Larsen’s argument that some readers of
Mark’s Gospel could have viewed it as unfinished, but they do challenge his
claim that first-​century Gospel readers would have considered Mark’s Gospel
as ὑπομνήματα. At some places in his arguments, Larsen is careful, claiming
only that the person(s) responsible for Luke’s Gospel might have thought of

90 Fialová, “Scripture,” 169; Martin Hengel, The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus

Christ, trans. John Bowden (London: SCM, 2000), 4, 212n.13; Hurtado, Destroyer, 115; Oskar
Skarsaune, “Justin and His Bible,” in Justin Martyr and His Worlds, ed. Sara Parvis and Paul Foster
(Minneapolis: Fortress), 72–​73. Justin compares Jesus qua Logos to Socrates in 1 Apol. 5.4 and 2 Apol.
10.3–​5. Helmut Koester, “From the Kerygma-​Gospel to Written Gospels,” in his From Jesus to the
Gospels: Interpreting the New Testament in Its Context (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 67n.76, notes
that the connection between Justin’s terminology and Xenophon was observed already in the nine-
teenth century. Koester unconvincingly rejects the connection. See the brief history of research in
Cirafesi and Fewster, “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα,” 189–​92.
91 See Xenophon, Mem. 2.1.21–​34.
92 Cirafesi and Fewster, “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα,” 189–​99, Fialová, “Scripture,” 170.
93 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.11.8.
54 The Gospel as Manuscript

Mark’s Gospel as “like hypomnēmata,”94 that Irenaeus remembered Mark

in categories that are “similar to hypomnēmata,”95 or that it is “a useful pro-
ject to try to read the Gospel according to Mark as hypomnēmata.”96 His
final chapter functions along these lines as a theoretical reading of Mark’s
Gospel that is “productive”: “It is productive to read the Gospel according
to Mark as unfinished notes (hyomnēmata).”97 Such a claim—​that Luke or
Irenaeus could have viewed, or we could productively view, Mark’s Gospel or
other Gospels as “similar to” ὑπομνήματα—​is defensible and an important
contribution.
In other places, though, the claim is stronger and pushed earlier. As noted
earlier, in his article, he asks, “But what if Mark was unfinished textual raw
material, ὑπομνήματα, notes, memoirs, a draft?” and answers, “The earliest
readers and users of Mark describe it that way,” among whom he includes
Luke in the first century.98 Likewise, in his book, he applies the category of
ὑπομνήματα to the Gospel of Mark in the first century on the basis of the
Gospel of Matthew:

The interaction between the textual traditions we now call the Gospels
according to Matthew and Mark, as well as the variety of ways of ending
the Gospels according to Mark, are concrete data points that demonstrate
early readers’ attempts to review and polish existing hypomnēmata, thus
improving the Gospel according to Mark’s rough yet powerful text.99

In another instance, he claims that Mark’s “earliest readers approached

it . . . as hypomnēmata.”100 He elsewhere claims that in using this language
for the Gospels, he is “attempt[ing] to avoid the ideas of book and author as
much as possible to speak historically about first-​and second-​century texts
on their own terms.”101

94 Larsen, Gospels, 86, in reference to Luke’s Gospel.

95 Larsen, Gospels, 96.
96 Larsen, Gospels, 100; also 149.
97 Larsen, Gospels, 122.
98 Larsen, “Accidental,” 377 (emphasis added). Similarly, Larsen, Gospels, 127: “If we take the

earliest readers and users seriously in their characterization of the Gospel according to Mark as
hypomnēmata . . .” Larsen also claims that Eusebius—​in the fourth century—​“corroborates my reading
of the Gospel according to Luke” (Gospels, 87) as viewing Mark’s Gospel as “like hypomnēmata” (86).
Needless to say, using Eusebius in the fourth century to demonstrate how Luke would have read
Mark’s Gospel in the first century is highly questionable.
99 Larsen, Gospels, 120.
100 Larsen, Gospels, 143.
101 Larsen, Gospels, 82–​83.
 Sociologies of the Book 55

The problem with these stronger statements that move beyond a theoret-
ical reading to assert a historical claim is that the earliest readers of Mark’s
Gospel do not use these terms for it. Ὑπομνήματα does not occur until the
third century with Origen. Ὑπόμνημα does not occur until the late second/​
early third century with Clement (according to a fourth-​century source).
Ἀπομνημονεύματα does not occur until the middle of the second century
with Justin Martyr.

The Relevance of Other First-​Century Data

The relevance of the prior discussion for the present study becomes most
clear when considering first-​century conceptions of the Gospels that do
not feature in Larsen’s study. At Matt 1:1, Matthew’s Gospel refers to itself
as a βίβλος: “book of the beginning of Jesus Christ” (βίβλος γενέσεως Ἰησοῦ
Χριστοῦ). At John 20:30, John’s Gospel refers to itself as a βιβλίον: “Jesus did
many other signs that are not written in this book (ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τούτῳ).”
Neither Matt 1:1 nor John 20:30 appears in Larsen’s 2017 article or 2018
monograph. If one considers John 21 a first-​or early second-​century Jesus
tradition, as I do,102 a third relevant text could have been included. At John
21:25, the Gospel again uses βιβλίον, in the plural, in hyperbolic reference
to all “the written books” (τὰ γραφόμενα βιβλία) of the world that could not
contain all the things Jesus did.103 Papias also uses βιβλίον in the plural seem-
ingly in reference to written accounts of Jesus’s disciples.104 Larsen does not
mention the occurrence of this term, though he does discuss this passage in
Papias.105 These fairly important “archeological layers of knowledge about
Gospel textuality,”106 which remain unexcavated in Larsen’s discussion, hold
great potential for our conceptions of how early tradents of the Jesus tradi-
tion spoke of its written status.
I will discuss some of these traditions in depth in subsequent chapters,
but note now how they could have contributed to a broader portrait of
early Gospel production. Larsen frequently defines “book” with concepts
such as “discrete,” “stable,” “definitive,” “author,” “finished,” “published,” and

102 See ­chapter 5.

103 Cf. 1 Macc 9:22.
104 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4.
105 Larsen, Gospels, 89–​90.
106 Larsen, Gospels, 98.
56 The Gospel as Manuscript

“bound.”107 On this basis, he argues that the discourse for discussing the
gospel as a “book,” particularly a “published” “book” with a named “author,”
does not emerge until Irenaeus at the end of the second century and does not
become “dominant” until the third century.108 The result of this argument is
the related claim that first-​and second-​century Jesus followers did not think
of the Gospels in such terms: “There is no evidence of anyone using concepts
of book, author, or publication to think about the gospel prior to Irenaeus.”109
Perhaps Larsen is correct that Irenaeus is the earliest to discuss the Gospels
as “published” books with named authors,110 but tradents used the “concept
of book” to think about the gospel tradition before Irenaeus. They did not
use the Miltonian concept of “book,” but they did use their own concepts of
“book.” Matthew 1:1, John 20:30, and John 21:25 provide direct evidence that
some of the Jesus tradition self-​identified as “book” or “bookroll,” “scroll,” or
“manuscript” already in the first century. The omission of this evidence is cu-
rious since Larsen otherwise makes much of Irenaeus’s usage of βιβλίον for
the Gospels.111
A related reason why these texts are important is that in asserting that the
Gospel of Mark should be, and was, understood as ὑπομνήματα, Larsen con-
trasts this term with βιβλίον. Regarding Luke’s view of Mark’s Gospel, Larsen
says, “It’s more like hypomnēmata and less like a suggramma or biblion.”112 It
needs to be stated upfront that Luke does not use these terms for his sources in
Luke 1:1–​4 (or anywhere else), and when he does refer to his written Gospel
in the prologue of Acts, he does so with λόγος (literally “word” but here “trea-
tise”) (Acts 1:1). Furthermore, sometimes the categories of ὑπομνήματα,
συγγράμματα, and βιβλία were compatible. A σύγγραμμα was a “book,”
“writing,” or “written work,”113 but as Turner notes, it also could carry the
more specific genre meaning of “monograph”: “ϲυγγράμματα . . . are studies
devoted to the elucidation of particular topics.”114 Turner further observes
that the similarities between συγγράμματα and ὑπομνήματα have “at times

107 Larsen, Gospels, 1, 7, 82, 86, 90, 93, 100, 101, 106, 109, 122–​23, 135, 136, 1140, 143, 149, 150,

152–​54.
108 Larsen, Gospels, 1, 93–​96 et alia.
109 Larsen, Gospels, 150; see also p. 2, 82; Larsen, “Accidental,” 379.
110 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.1.1. Cf. however, the argument of Hengel, Four, 48–​56, that the titles of the

Gospels go back to the earliest days of their circulation. Larsen makes no reference to Hengel’s argu-
ment. Cf. also the incipit of the Gospel of Thomas, which has a named author prior to Irenaeus.
111 Larsen, Gospels, 93–​95.
112 Larsen, Gospels, 86.
113 “σύγγραμα, ατος, τό,” BDAG 951.
114 Turner, Greek Papyri, 114.
 Sociologies of the Book 57

led to the works in question [συγγράμματα] being mistaken by the mod-

erns for hypomnemata, which they resemble in form.”115 Likewise, Turner,
who discusses ὑπομνήματα as commentaries on corrected copies (διορθώ
σεις) and official versions (ἐκδόσεις) per the ancient Alexandrian text crit-
ics, states that “the commentaries, hypomnemata, are complementary to the
copy of the text.”116 In these cases, the ὑπομνήματα are not texts waiting to
be finished but extratextual or post-​textual interpretive works—​“supplemen-
tary volumes” in the words of Knust117—​that come in the wake of texts hav-
ing already received a certain status in circulation. They emerge from, not
lead to, literary texts.118 Aside from this point, if we bear in mind once more
that βιβλίον can simply mean the “scroll” of any written work instead of nec-
essarily a “finished” “book,” such observations point to the fact that at least
some ancient readers had the capacity to view these categories as comple-
mentary rather than contrastive.
Relevant in this regard is Larsen’s discussion of T. Ab. Rec B 10.1–​16 (cf.
T. Ab. Rec A 12.1–​18), a second-​century ce tradition in which Abraham and
Michael watch the souls of a man and his daughter judged in consultation
with the celestial books.119 According to T. Ab. Rec B 10.7–​11,

The judge commanded the one who writes the records (τὰ ὑπομνήματα)
to come. And behold, (there came) cherubim bearing two books (βιβλία),
and with them was a very enormous man. . . . And the man had in his hand
a golden pen. And the judge said to him, “Give proof of the sin of this soul.”
And that man opened one of the books (τῶν βιβλίων) . . . and he found it.120

115 Turner, Greek Papyri, 114.

116 Turner, Greek Papyri, 113. For further discussion of Alexandrian text-​critical practices as
they relate to Christian manuscripts, see Jennifer Knust, “‘Taking Away From’: Patristic Evidence
and the Omission of the Pericope Adulterae from John’s Gospel,” in The Pericope of the Adulteress in
Contemporary Research, ed. David Alan Black and Jacob N. Cerone, LNTS 551 (London: Bloomsbury
T&T Clark, 2016), 79–​84; Knust and Wasserman, To Cast, 122–​34.
117 Knust, “Taking Away,” 80.
118 Kirk, Q, 42–​47, rightly observes that ὑπομνήματα can refer to preliminary drafts as well as com-

mentaries on established texts, in addition to other meanings it carries.

119 Larsen, Gospels, 123–​24. On the date of Testament of Abraham, Dale C. Allison Jr., Testament of

Abraham, CEJL (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2003), suggests dating it “before a.d. 115–​117” (38), but
more specifically argues that Rec B (his “RecShrt.”) was “largely in place” by the third century ce, with
some form of it having appeared by the second century ce, and that Rec A (his “RecLng.”) “as we have
it” is “medieval,” but that the “basic work” is Byzantine (40).
120 Sanders, OTP. For Greek, see Montague Rhodes James, The Testament of Abraham, TS 2.2

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1892), 114. James’s critical text is included with an English
translation in Michael E. Stone, trans., The Testament of Abraham: The Greek Recensions, SBLTT 2
(Missoula, MT: Society of Biblical Literature, 1972).
58 The Gospel as Manuscript

Testament of Abraham Rec B 11.1–​10 then explains that the judge is Abel
(11.2) and the man who writes and consults the heavenly books is the scribe
(γραμματεύς) Enoch (11.4), whose task is “only to write” (μόνον τὸ γράψαι)
(11.8).121
As part of his argument, Larsen suggests that the written ὑπομνήματα
(10.7) are a separate, though overlapping, textual process from the two βιβλία
(10.8) that the cherubim bring before the judge: “In the story, a huge man
is constantly making hypomnēmata, producing textual records of human
deeds. The man’s hypomnēmata are then collected into two books, which
cherubim bring to the scene of judgment.”122 Such a description of the scene
fits Larsen’s theory that ὑπομνήματα are not themselves finished “books” but
“pre-​book” entities.123 Yet I am not sure that one would reach this interpre-
tation of T. Ab. Rec B 10 based on the text alone since the text does not state
that the ὑπομνήματα are produced separately and “then collected into two
books.” Another perspective is available. Although the description of Enoch
as “the one who writes” in 10.7 could indicate that he is “constantly” making
ὑπομνήματα, since the participial phrase τὸν . . . γράφοντα (“the one who
writes”) is in the present tense, it could also simply describe writing as his
characteristic activity, which would comport with T. Ab. Rec B 11.8’s descrip-
tion of writing as his sole activity. That is, although the Greek can mean that
he was repetitively, “constantly,” writing records, it can also mean only that he
was “the one who writes” them, that is, the record writer. In this light, another
interpretation is possible, which would feature the basic meaning of “scrolls”
for βιβλία—​ the “records” (ὑπομνήματα) are what Enoch writes in the
“scrolls” (βιβλία), and it is his writing of these records in the celestial scrolls
that qualifies him uniquely as the scribe consulted by the judge. Allison sim-
ilarly understands the “record[s]‌” as what are contained “in the books”: “The
judge, in assessing the soul, asks the large man to find the record of its sins in
the books of the cherubim.”124 Under such an interpretation, the ὑπομνήματα
are the content of the βιβλία, not the products of separate textual processes
(though the term may carry that sense elsewhere).125 A similar scenario of
using a genre-​specific term alongside βιβλία occurs when Eusebius uses συ

121 For Greek, see James, Testament, 115.

122 Larsen, Gospels, 124.
123 Larsen, Gospels, 14, in reference to Caesar’s commentarii, which he equates with ὑπομνήματα
(Gospels, 1–​17).
124 Allison, Testament, 259.
125 Larsen, Gospels, 12: “The lexical range of both terms [ὑπομνήματα and commentarii] is wide.”
 Sociologies of the Book 59

γγράμματα (“monographs,” or “treatises” per Lake in LCL) interchangeably

with βιβλία for Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord with the clear
indication that Papias’s five-​treatise work occurs on five scrolls.126 The signif-
icant matter with regard to the occurrence of βιβλία in the particular instance
of T. Ab. Rec B 10.7–​11, then, is not its distinction from ὑπομνήματα on a
theoretical spectrum of finality but its identity as the physical artifacts on
which the records are written.127
As is clear in this case also, the contrastive relationship between the terms
that Larsen asserts is not as clear as it may be elsewhere.128 The rhetorical ef-
fect of this asserted contrast is crucial to his argument, because it reinforces
the idea that ὑπομνήματα is more appropriate than a term like βιβλίον when
considering how Mark’s readers in the earliest period thought of it, which
also bolsters the claim that later attestations of ὑπομνήματα are actually reac-
tivations of earlier language. In terms of the actual evidence, however, βίβλος
and βιβλίον are attested in the earliest period, and when ὑπομνήματα is later
attested, it is compatible with concepts of “books” as artifacts.
Larsen’s softer claim that scholars can benefit from imagining how
some ancient readers might have viewed the Gospels as unfinished notes
is convincing and a contribution that should not be overlooked.129 His
stronger claim that the earliest readers of Mark’s Gospel themselves
thought of this textual tradition as ὑπομνήματα is less secure. In relation
to the present study, the key point is that the concept of the Gospels as

126 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.1 (συγγράμματα and βιβλία, the latter citing affirmatively Irenaeus);

3.39.7 (συγγράμματα); cf. also 3.39.14, where he uses γραφή (“writing”). Papias himself referred to
βιβλία in reference to written traditions about Jesus and his disciples (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4).
Johnson, “Ancient,” 264, notes that “in general terms, we can assume that one work or book of a work
was equivalent to one roll, but complications and exceptions occur.”
127 Cf. Plutarch’s usage of βιβλίδιον alongside ἀπομνημονεύματα for “a small book containing

memoirs” (βιβλίδιον μικρὸν ἀπομνημονευμάτων) (Brut. 13.2; Perrin, LCL).

128 See Larsen’s discussion in Gospels, 11–​36. Cf., however, also the juxtaposition of “book” with

ὑπομνήματα in Larsen’s discussion of Plutarch, Tranq. an. 464e–​f (Larsen, Gospels, 27). Larsen offers
the following translation: “Since I neither had the time to produce the book you requested . . . nor
could I have born the thought of him arriving from me at your house completely empty-​handed,
I picked out Contentment from the notes that I just happened to have made for myself (peri euthumias
ek tōn hypomnēmatōn).” The Greek of Tranq. an. 464f, however, does not have a term for “book,”
making the presumed contrast of ὑπομνήματα less explicit than it otherwise appears in the trans-
lation Larsen provides. The translator for the LCL edition of Tranq. an. thus translated: “But since
I neither had the time I might have desired to meet your wishes” (Hembold, LCL).
129 Francis Watson, “How Did Mark Survive?,” in Matthew and Mark across Perspectives: Essays

in Honour of Stephen C. Barton and William R. Telford, ed. Kristian A. Bendoraitis and Nijay K.
Gupta, LNTS 538 (London: T&T Clark, 2016), shows that one can read Mark’s Gospel as a “work-​in-​
progress” (2) and part of an “editorial chain” (3), in which his successors “did not regard it as final and
definitive” (2) without the concomitant claim that subsequent tradents considered it ὑπομνήματα.
60 The Gospel as Manuscript

unfinished need not necessarily be juxtaposed with concepts of “book,”

depending on how one defines “book.” I retain the term “book,” not in
reference to finalized texts or collections but in reference to artifacts like
bookrolls and codices that were important factors in the transmission of
streams of tradition.130

Manuscripts as Points of Fixity

The preceding engagement with Mroczek and Larsen lays the groundwork
for including other “book” phenomena, particularly ancient conceptions of
the book-​as-​artifact, in the landscape of open textual processes that they and
others construct. The inclusion of these other phenomena creates a some-
what different image at the forefront of that landscape. In many descriptions
of ancient reading events, the users of manuscripts appear completely un-
concerned with whether the text is finished or unfinished, bound tradition or
unbound tradition. The cultural relevance of the text emerges in these cases
from the simple fact that it was the manuscript in their hands, being read
in the assembly. I earlier mentioned the portrayal of Jesus reading from a
scroll of Isaiah in Luke 4, but one could also include the instructions in the
Damascus Document and Irenaeus regarding the correct pronunciation of
a text.131 These examples do not preclude the notion that these manuscripts
were part of a sprawling tradition but do draw attention to the reading
event created by interacting with a particular physical manifestation of that
tradition.
Here, then, I differ from Larsen’s statement that “the sheer fact of [the
Gospels’] writtenness, by ancient standards, does not create a point or points
of fixity.”132 Writtenness could create a “point of fixity” if one assumes the
perspective of an ancient tradent holding a manuscript in their hands. In this
case, writtenness enabled a realization of the tradition as a material artifact
with an identifiable beginning and end. In such cases, and as was argued in
the previous chapter on the basis of Assmann’s theory of the extended situa-
tion, the manuscript was a vehicle of open tradition. Open streams of tradi-
tion thus often had discernible nodes.

130 I use the term “book” in reference both to scrolls and codices; similarly, Stern, Jewish, 5.
131 4Q266 5 II, 1–​4//​4Q267 5 III, 3–​5//​4Q273 2, 1; Irenaeus, Haer. 3.7.2. See further c­ hapter 6.
132 Larsen, “Accidental,” 379n.62.
 Sociologies of the Book 61

Manuscripts within Open Tradition

Tracing the cultural significance of the manuscript as artifact thus requires

this study to move in a different direction at times, though one that is com-
plementary to the aforementioned studies’ emphasis upon the open-​ended
nature of tradition. I proceed initially from the fact that, as a material object,
the manuscript was finite; it had edges, limits, and boundaries. The fixity of
the scroll did not create the ontological reality of a fixed tradition, but it did
sometimes create the illusion of it, and this illusion became rhetorically sig-
nificant to some ancients in their constructions of textual authority.133
I am thus concerned with how manuscripts fit within open textual pro-
cesses.134 In that sense, a “book” could be conceptualized as an unrestrained
stream of tradition (Sir 24:25–​34) or a reproduction of one part of an all-​
encompassing set of heavenly tablets (throughout Jubilees), but it could also
be associated with the security of restrained tradition. The surety invoked by
the concepts of the Book of Life,135 heavenly tablets,136 and aforementioned
references to books of deeds in T. Ab. Rec. A 12//​Rec. B 10–​11 is generated by
a combination of these emphases. They are not just reflections of unbounded
tradition but attempts to express the unbound as bound. They imaginatively
dwell at the intersection of the celestial perspective from which all is known
and the earthly perspective from which all is yet unfolding, stressing that
what was, is, and will be is known, even if it is not known by all. In this way,
they leverage the certainty of “that which is written” toward the uncertainty
of the unknown.
Native literary theories could also view writing as final, as is the case in
Pilate’s response to the Jewish leadership when refusing to alter Jesus’s titulus

133 Mroczek, Literary, 43, rightly notes that 11QPsalmsa’s 4,050 psalms “refer neither to this scroll

nor any other specific collection,” and that “instead it presents us with an open series, overwhelm-
ingly prolific divine writing and speech with no upper boundary.” But this does not mean that ancient
readers dissociated the notion of written psalms from scrolls altogether, or did not revere the scrolls
that served as particular instantiations of this “unbounded revealed text.” Elsewhere Mroczek notes
places where the Jewish literary imagination included ideas of fixity; cf. the acknowledgment that
Deuteronomy was “a largely stable text contained within specific boundaries” (48) or her astute dis-
cussion of how the idea of a fixed canon inevitably led to innovation (180–​82).
134 Mroczek, Literary, 43, asks a similar question with regard to psalms: “But what is the relation-

ship between these imaginative constructions of psalms—​thousands of psalms received through

prophecy, or various hymns and songs in pentameter and trimester—​and the actual psalmic texts
that were collected and copied by ancient scribes?”
135 Ps 56:8; 139:16; Dan 12:1; Luke 10:20; Phil 4:13; Rev 3:5; 13:8; 20:15; 21:27; Gos. Truth (NHC

I 19.34–​21.25); cf. Mal 3:16. See further Allison, Testament, 264–​65; Leslie Baynes, The Heavenly
Book Motif in Judeo-​Christian Apocalypses 200 bce–​200 ce, JSJSup 152 (Leiden: Brill, 2011).
136 Inter alia, Jub 32:21; 1 En. 81:1–​4.
62 The Gospel as Manuscript

in John 19:22: “What I have written, I have written” (ὃ γέγραφα, γέγραφα).

Testamentary literature could view textualization as a means to “vouchsafe”
teaching or “safeguard” a debt agreement.137 Sometimes “writing had the
power to bind, and the power of the binding resided in the written object.”138
As Najman observes,

From prebiblical times, we have written inventories, deeds, manumissions,

and other legal documents such as treatises, law codes, and the like. This
part of writing’s function of course influenced its reputation as well, and
writing soon came to acquire less practical or immediately necessary roles.
Perhaps this expanded function had something to do with, for example, the
writing down of mythical texts (such as those of ancient Babylon or Ugarit),
texts whose enduring importance was, as it were, embodied by their being
written down.139

As Najman observes, this function of writing is only one “part” of writing’s

function, and linked to textuality’s “reputation,” not its reality.
The key relationship to make explicit in this regard is the one between a
body of tradition and the manuscript as a manifestation of that body of tradi-
tion; for it is this relationship that produces the ability of the term “book” to
serve as a signifier for a material artifact and to serve metonymically for the
body of the tradition. “Book” was multivalent and, as a result, fertile ground
for metaphors of both insecurity and security, free and fixed, unbound and
bound. The material reality that one could construct as large a scroll as was
needed by adding papyrus sheets would only have further enabled the malle-
ability of the book metaphor for both infinite and finite tradition.140

137 Reed, “Textuality,” 381–​412, quotations from 400, 406, respectively. Among others, she high-

lights 4Q542 1 II, 10–​12 (Testament of Qahat), 4Q546 1 (Visions of Amram), and T. Job 11:1–​12.
138 Reed, “Textuality,” 406, in reference to Elizabeth A. Meyer, Legitimacy and Law in the Roman

World: Tabulae in Roman Belief and Practice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 21–​43.
Reed observes that this “sense of writing . . . is similar to what we see in the Testament of Job, where the
document of a debt is not just a record for reminding but represents the agreement itself, which thus
can be broken by its physical destruction” (406).
139 Najman, “Symbolic,” 6.
140 On the construction of bookrolls, see Theophrastus, Hist. plant. 4.8.3; Pliny the Elder, Nat.

13.21.68–​13.26.83. Bülow-​Jacobsen, “Writing,” 4, notes that Pliny repeats Theophrastus without ac-
knowledgment. Papyrus was typically sold in sheets of twenty (Bülow-​Jacobsen, “Writing,” 7, 19;
Johnson, “Ancient,” 257) but could be shortened or lengthened by the scribe as was necessary. Thus,
“your roll could be as long or as short as you cared to make it” (Turner, Greek Papyri, 4). Likewise,
Bülow-​Jacobsen, “Writing,” 19, 21; Gamble, “Bible and Book,” 19; Johnson, “Ancient,” 265; Frederic
G. Kenyon, The Text of the Greek Bible (London: Duckworth, 1937), 15–​17.
 Sociologies of the Book 63

Thus, although ancient tradents were capable of rhetorically stressing

the provisional nature of their works, they were also capable of rhetori-
cally stressing the finished and set nature of their works. Another clear and
common example is the imprecation against “adding or taking away,” stem-
ming from Deut 4:2 and occurring throughout Jewish and Christian litera-
ture in reference to texts and canonical collections of texts.141 Likewise, Paul
stresses that his readers know that even when it comes to regular covenants,
“once a covenant has been ratified by a person, no one annuls it or adds to it”
(Gal 3:15).
At the risk of repetition but in service of clarity, I want to state that my
argument is not that such imprecations actually did close off the tradition.
The apparatus of any critical edition of any ancient text would easily dispel
that notion, and, furthermore, such imprecations bear witness to the fact that
authors could do very little to limit revision of their works other than issue
these threats; if no one was altering texts, such warnings would have been
unnecessary. Authors were nevertheless capable of conceptualizing their
texts as finished even if they were not—​from our viewpoints or even their
own later viewpoints—​finished or even if they had the capacity quickly to
become revisions en route to a new “finished.”142 Similarly, they were capable
of conceptualizing versions of texts as better or worse, existing in greater or
lesser degrees of an authorial ideal, and as more or less authoritative than
other versions, whether by “versions” we mean other textual traditions or
other witnesses to the same textual tradition.143 And both conceptions drew
heavily upon the book-​as-​artifact, whether real or visualized.

141 Inter alia, see Deut 4:2; 12:32 (MT 13:1); Prov 30:6; Let. Aris. 311; Josephus, Ag. Ap. 1.42; Rev

22:18–​19; Did. 4.13; Barn. 19.11; Dionysius of Corinth apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.23.12; Anonymous
apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 5.16.3; Irenaeus, Haer. 1.10.2; 4.33.8; Athanasius, Ep. fest. 39.19. See further
Knust, “Taking Away,” 68–​73; Michael J. Kruger, “Early Christian Attitudes toward the Reproduction
of Texts,” in Hill and Kruger, Early, 72–​76; Bernard M. Levinson, “You Must Not Add Anything
to What I Command You: Paradoxes of Canon and Authorship in Ancient Israel,” Numen 50.1
(2003): 1–​51.
142 Cf. Tertullian, Marc. 1.1: “Thus this written work, a third succeeding a second, and instead of

third from now on first” (Evans).

143 See, for example, Let. Aris. 303, 310–​311, on the claimed accuracy of the LXX translation in

contrast to the inferior copies discussed at Let. Aris. 30, or Possidius, Vita Augustini 18, who claims
that the best copies of Augustine’s works are housed at the library at Hippo. On the other hand,
authors often complained about inferior, error-​ridden manuscripts of their works in the commer-
cial book trade (Cicero, Ad Quintum fratrem 3.6; Strabo, Geography 13.1.54). Dionysius of Corinth
complains that his epistles have been edited by “the apostles of the devil” according to Eusebius, Hist.
eccl. 4.23.12 (Lake, LCL). Cf. also Jacob’s anxiety and God’s reassurances regarding Jacob’s ability to
reproduce faithfully in writing what he had read and seen in Jub. 32.24–​26.
64 The Gospel as Manuscript

As I noted already with the Book of Life and the heavenly tablets motifs,
sometimes these dueling aspects of textual culture—​the illusion of fixity and
the reality of impermanence—​appear right alongside each other. A perfect
illustration is the instance of a later corrector of Codex Vaticanus (B) chas-
tising an earlier corrector of the manuscript for changing a reading at Heb
1:3: “Fool and knave, leave the old reading, don’t change it!”144 The actions
of both correctors reflect the assumption that there is “a” way that the man-
uscript “should be,” though their conceptions differed from each other.
The chastisement of the first corrector by the second corrector similarly
reinforces the notion on his part that rather than the tradition being open
and unending, it is set and should be left alone, even if incorrect. At exactly
the same time, the dialogue between the two and their alterations to the man-
uscript that remain visible to modern scholars show that the tradition actu-
ally was open and being received in new situations. Similar to this scenario
is the enlisting of the metaphor of laying hands on, cutting out, excising, or
removing parts of a text as a heresiological charge against one’s opponents,
which will be discussed briefly at the end of this book.145 These metaphors
draw upon the physical aspect of the tradition, and the charge emerges from
the collision of the expectation of a text’s “correct” form and the reality of
manuscripts that do not meet that expectation.

Summary

Thus, the primary difference between the approach of the present study
and that of Mroczek’s and Larsen’s works is that the concept of the book-​as-​
manuscript, as cultural artifact that tradents could hold in their hands, plays
the leading role here. In conceptualizing the Jesus tradition as open-​ended,
I am interested in how the material artifact simultaneously enabled the text-​
as-​process and an illusion of fixity that later readers and tradents sought to
capitalize on for various reasons.146 For, at times, like John 20:30–​31 and
21:24–​25, both kinds of expression were intertwined with bids for authority.

144 Translation from Bruce M. Metzger and Bart D. Ehrman, The Text of the New Testament: Its

Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, 4th ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 260.
145 For example, Justin Martyr, Dial. 71–​73, esp. 72; Irenaeus, Haer. 1.27.2; Tertullian, Marc. 1.1;

5.13.4; Origen, Cels. 2.27; Augustine, Incomp. nupt. 2.7; Origen, Comm. Rom. 10.43.2. See further
Knust, “Taking,” 68–​79, particularly in reference to charges against Marcion.
146 Mroczek, Literary, 49, leans in this direction when she says, “But perhaps the sacredness of

these texts in the literary imagination is dependent, in part, on their indeterminacy, their very lack of
commitment.”
 Sociologies of the Book 65

Canon History

It should be relatively clear, then, that this approach also intersects with
studies of the development of the Christian canon.147 A full discussion of
earlier studies that fall under the category of “canon history” is beyond the
scope of this chapter. Its usefulness would also be limited since I will make
no attempt in this book to trace the development of the canon. This study
will overlap with canon studies only insofar as the material expression of the
tradition came to play a role in the construction of the tradition’s authorita-
tive status, and mostly in relation to the public reading of the Gospels (Part
III). In this light, I observe the distinction between concepts of texts as au-
thoritative Scripture, which can be traced as early as the first century among
Jesus followers, and concepts of a closed New Testament canon, which can
be dated firmly to the fourth century with Athanasius’s Thirty-​Ninth Festal
Letter in 367 ce.148 The significance of some of these contexts of reception,
and especially the public reading of the Jesus tradition, has not received suf-
ficient consideration in the broader field of canon studies. A least two prior
studies are germane to this more limited contribution to scholarly concep-
tions of the development of authoritative Christian Scripture.
Heckel’s Vom Evangelium des Markus zum viergestaltigen Evangelium
focuses distinctly on the Jesus tradition and traces a historical development
from point A to point B.149 Similar to the present study, Heckel begins with
the Gospel of Mark as his point A; dissimilar to the present study, Heckel’s
point B is, as his title indicates, the fourfold gospel collection. He thus traces
the historical development of a theological construct and positions his study
as a contribution to canon studies.150 As stated already, my focus is not upon
the canon itself. The present study aligns with other contributions to canon
studies that foreground textuality, orality, memory, ritual, and other aspects
of the ancient media environment in Jewish and Christian constructions of
authority, such as those of J. Becker, Bokedal, and Nicklas, though my con-
centration exclusively on the Jesus tradition as material artifact remains

147 Canon and canon creation were key aspects of Assmann’s cultural memory theory as well: J.

Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 31–​45, 63–​80, 101–​38.

148 On this distinction, see succinctly, see Brakke, “Scriptural,” 264–​65.
149 Theo K. Heckel, Vom Evangelium des Markus zum viergestaltigen Evangelium, WUNT 120

(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999).

150 Heckel, Vom Evangelium, 2–​30.
66 The Gospel as Manuscript

distinctive.151 Chapter 4 will nevertheless develop an underappreciated as-

pect of Heckel’s study. In discussing the evangelists as redactors of the Jesus
tradition and conceptions of authority in the Gospels, Heckel introduces the
term “self-​reflections” (Selbstreflexionen) for “metanarrative sections” (meta-
narrative Abschnitte) in which authors claim authority for their texts.152 He
uses this term especially in reference to the Lukan prologue (Luke 1:1–​4)
and John 20:30–​31, the latter of which he considers the original ending of
the Fourth Gospel.153 Independent of Heckel, but in essential agreement,
I have referred to these texts as exhibiting a “textual self-​consciousness” that
reflects their participation in a process of “competitive textualization” within
the Jesus tradition.154 In ­chapters 4 and 5, I will build on my and Heckel’s
earlier insights by including more traditions as part of this process in pre-​
Constantinian Jesus tradition. I will argue there as well that such texts are
clear instances of what E.-​M. Becker has helpfully described as “visual
memory” within the media mode of “literary memory,”155 whereby the nar-
rative engages in visualization of the manuscripts as material artifact.
The second canon study with relevance for situating my approach is
Brakke’s programmatic 2012 essay, “Scriptural Practices in Early Christianity,”
in which he sets out a new approach to the New Testament canon.156 Similar
to some of the previously mentioned studies of Second Temple book culture
that seek to dislodge the canon as the primary point of scholarly focus, Brakke
argues for “a history of scriptural practices that accounts for the formation of
the closed New Testament canon of 27 books, without depicting that collec-
tion as the inevitable τέλος of all Christian uses of authoritative writings in
the first four centuries.”157 Within such a model, Brakke proposes to describe
conflict between emerging Christian groups as “several discursive fights over

151 J. Becker, Mündliche; Tomas Bokedal, The Formation and Significance of the Christian Biblical

Canon: A Study in Text, Ritual and Interpretation (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014); Nicklas,
“Neutestamentler,” 588–​609; Nicklas, “New Testament,” 5–​23.
152 Heckel, Vom Evangelium, 20. See also J. Becker, Mündliche, 131n.25, who refers to the

“Selbstbezeichnung . . . als ‘Buch’ ” in John 20:30; 21:24–​25, and Papias, or François Bovon, Luke
1: A Commentary on the Gospel of Luke 1:1–​9:50, trans. Christine M. Thomas, ed. Helmut Koester,
Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002), 17, who refers to Luke 1:1–​4, John 20:30–​31; 21:24–​25,
and Rev 1:1–​3; 22:18–​19 as passages “in which the author(s) reflect on their work at a metalinguistic
level.”
153 Heckel, Vom Evangelium, 80–​103 (Lukan prologue), 144–​57 (John 20:30–​31).
154 Keith, “Competitive,” 322 and throughout.
155 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 7–​12.
156 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 263–​80.
157 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 280.
 Sociologies of the Book 67

what should count as ‘the Christian tradition.’ ”158 The concept of “discursive
fights” fits well with what I have described as “competitive textualization.”
Brakke’s model of canon history as a history of “scriptural practices” builds
upon Stock’s model of textual communities.159 In reference to the fact that in
Stock’s theory the “text” at the center of the group could be oral, written, or
“not physically present,” Brakke states,

To some extent it is how the group reads, not really what it reads that deter-
mines its character. Canonicity and authority are important variables that
need to be tracked, especially when applying this concept [Stock’s textual
communities] to antiquity. . . . Here I suggest that Stock invites us to think
less about the contents of any particular list or precisely which books an au-
thor cites, and instead to describe how Christians used texts and how they
formed groups for using them.160

As should be clear, this approach has great affinity with Johnson’s theory of
ancient reading cultures; each model encourages the scholarly view to widen
beyond labels and categories to include the groups using them as well as the
means by which they use them. As a first step toward this approach that “de-​
center[s]‌the closed canon within our narrative,”161 Brakke proposes three
specific “scriptural practices” that illustrate components of developing au-
thority and canonicity in early Christianity: “study and contemplation,”
which he illustrates with Marcion and Eusebius; “revelation and continued
inspiration,” which he illustrates with the Melitians; and “communal wor-
ship and edification,” which he illustrates with Justin Martyr, the Muratorian
Fragment, and Athanasius.162 For Brakke, these types of scriptural practices
can overlap, and others could be added to his typology, such as ascetic lit-
erary practices, memorization of Scripture, and magical usages of texts.163
In this study, I take up Brakke’s implicit invitation to add to his typology
by proposing manuscripts themselves as part of an early Christian mate-
rial culture, but a part that, in some ways, transcended the other scriptural

158 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 280.

159 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 267–​68. See especially Brian Stock, The Implications of Literacy: Written
Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1983).
160 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 267–​68.
161 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 279.
162 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 271–​77, 273–​75, and 276–​78, respectively.
163 Brakke, “Scriptural,” 279–​80.
68 The Gospel as Manuscript

practices by being a constituent part of those disparate practices. By doing

so, I suggest also that although Brakke is correct that texts did not have to
be physically present for some kinds of receptions of the tradition in which
a group identity is constructed, at others times they did, or, in the least,
their presence altered the nature of the reading event in important ways.164
I am less concerned with what was constructed as authoritative and more
concerned with how manuscripts played a role in the construction. It is
also worth observing that the usage of the manuscript (or the manuscript
as a concept) played a role in the construction of identity and authority
across the breadth of so-​called proto-​orthodox, apocryphal, and heretical
traditions.

Summary

Building upon the foundational work of Assmann and Johnson, therefore,

the undergirding conviction of the rest of this study is not that the manu-
script was the only factor or even the most important factor in the develop-
ment of the Jesus tradition in pre-​Constantinian Christianity; it is simply that
it was a factor, and an important one. The theories of Assmann and Johnson
are not necessary to reach some of the conclusions that will be forwarded in
subsequent chapters. One could easily appeal to other theorists to reach a
similar place, as does Brakke with Stock or Mroczek with McKenzie. Their
theories have nevertheless been helpful in articulating the distinct role that
manuscripts, as material artifacts, can play in the construction and mainte-
nance of the identity of the ancient group that reads them. As the preceding
discussion has observed, this concentration upon the manuscript as an ele-
ment of material culture intersects with a number of trends in the study of
the book cultures of Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity. It stands
firmly in the line of sociological approaches to early Christian book culture
and within the trend of viewing books as parts of an open-​ended transmis-
sion process. Within that trend, it suggests that we must place alongside con-
ceptions of the book as unbound other conceptions of the book as bound,

164 Cf. similarly Stern, Jewish, 40, who observes that according to some rabbinic and medieval

descriptions of Torah scrolls, “it would have been unnecessary for a physical Sefer Torah to be pre-
sent for a sage to teach Torah,” but then also immediately observes, “As the Sefer Torah was used less
for regular study, it became a ritual artifact in the synagogue service.” The approach taken here does
not assume that a manuscript of the Jesus tradition had to be present but asserts that when it was, the
manuscript as artifact was sometimes imbued with symbolic significance.
 Sociologies of the Book 69

since both metaphors served as rhetorical arrows in the quivers of ancient

authors. An emphasis upon the book as artifact similarly fits within some
current trends in the study of the history of the New Testament canon that
purposefully include diverse practices alongside more typical concerns for
dates and terminology.
 PART II
THE GO SPE L AS G OSPE LS

Part Two presents the competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition. The
initial textualization of the Jesus tradition occurred with the commitment
of the Gospel of Mark to manuscript. Following this watershed act, written
Gospels proliferated, and the earliest examples of such texts invariably call
attention to their status as written tradition either at the beginning of the
narrative or its close. Part Two thus argues that, from the Gospel of Mark to
the Gospel of Thomas and beyond, competitive textualization was not simply
a feature of the written Jesus tradition, but a significant feature that is fore-
grounded in the texts themselves.
 3
The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel

Texts play a central part not just in the documentation of what it

meant to be Christian, but in actually shaping Christianity.
Judith M. Lieu, Christian Identity in the Jewish and
Graeco-​Roman World

The Gospel of Mark is the earliest certain instance of narrativized Jesus tra-
dition in the written medium, and thus it is taken here as the fountainhead
of the reception history of the Jesus tradition in material form. Scholars typ-
ically date the textualization of Mark’s Gospel to somewhere between 60 and
80 ce. The destruction of the Jerusalem temple in 70 ce is usually posited
as a prime instigating factor for the textualization and thus the center point
of that proposed range.1 In this chapter, I will give reasons for questioning
whether the destruction of the temple was necessarily the catalyst for the
writing of Mark’s Gospel rather than one possible catalyst of many. I am com-
fortable with this general time frame, however, and will make no attempt at
greater precision. My focus is upon what the textualization of Mark’s Gospel
initiated in the transmission of the Jesus tradition rather than the specific
time frame in which it did so.
Mark’s Gospel is noteworthy as a “major step in the transmission of the
Jesus tradition” specifically as textualized narrative, with equal emphasis
on “textualized” and “narrative.”2 The explosion of written Jesus tradition

1 John S. Kloppenborg, “The Farrer/​Mark without Q Hypothesis: A Response,” in Marcan Priority

without Q: Explorations in the Farrer Hypothesis, ed. John C. Poirier and Jeffrey Peterson, LNTS 455
(London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015), 234, refers to the dating of Mark’s Gospel to “about 70 ce,
perhaps just slightly after 70,” as “the most secure date that we have for any gospel.”
2 Larry W. Hurtado, “Greco-​Roman Textuality and the Gospel of Mark: A Critical Assessment of

Werner Kelber’s The Oral and the Written Gospel,” BBR 7 (1997): 105–​106: “Considered as the ear-
liest written narrative of Jesus’ ministry, the Gospel of Mark was of course a major event in the lit-
erary history of early Christianity and a major step in the transmission of the Jesus tradition.” In
this article, Hurtado responds critically to Kelber, Gospel. Elsewhere I have argued that in offering
some valid criticisms, Hurtado overlooked the significance of Kelber’s main question (Keith, “Early
Christian,” 22–​39). Cf. also William Wrede, The Origin of the New Testament, trans. James S. Hill

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
74 The Gospel as Gospels

in the first and early second centuries consisted of written narratives. The
exception was the Gospel of Thomas, which Goodacre has shown to be not
an independent form of the Jesus tradition or even a later attestation of an
earlier sayings genre3 but a second-​century, innovative, and purposeful de-​
narrativization of Synoptic tradition.4 It was parasitic upon the social cur-
rency of the narrative Gospels, reflective of their impact even in its attempt
to challenge them. Whatever other written forms of the Jesus tradition may
have existed prior to or alongside Mark’s Gospel, they did not in the earliest
stages proliferate at a pace similar to texts generically similar to Mark’s nar-
rativized tradition, or even at all, judging by the known evidence.5 We cannot
speak of a comparable explosion of testimonia or sayings sources, because
there is no evidence of such an explosion. This chapter therefore views Mark’s
Gospel as a media innovation among Jesus followers and will argue for the
importance of Mark’s act of textualization by demonstrating its connection
to the reception history that came after it.6 Far from being insipid, Mark’s
placement of the Jesus tradition upon a manuscript introduced potentialities
that later tradents would actualize. From this perspective, the Jesus tradition
would not have had the reception history in pre-​Constantinian Christianity
that it did without this groundbreaking act.
This chapter will break into four sections. The first section will briefly ex-
plain why I do not start with hypothetical predecessors to Mark’s Gospel. The
second section will discuss the influence of Werner Kelber’s The Oral and the
Written Gospel on prior considerations of Mark’s textualization of the Jesus
tradition. The third section will both affirm and counter Kelber by returning

(London: Harper & Bros., 1909), 68: “The earliest gospel writings, then, are a landmark in this
development.”
3 Cf. Watson, Gospel Writing, 217–​85. Watson elsewhere also argues that although the Gospel of

Thomas in its present form shows dependence upon Matthean and Lukan redaction, it also preserves
pre-​Markan tradition (Watson, “How,” 6–​7).
4 Mark Goodacre, Thomas and the Gospels: The Case for Thomas’s Familiarity with the Synoptics

(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), esp. 172–​92. Jens Schröter, From Jesus to the New Testament: Early
Christian Theology and the Origin of the New Testament Canon, trans. Wayne Coppins, BMSEC
(Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2013), 90, likewise speaks of “de-​biographization” in the Gospel
of Thomas, “in which narrative contextualization is avoided.” For more on the hermeneutical con-
tribution that narrativization made to the portraits of Jesus in the Gospels as “historical” writings,
see E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 3–​19; Schröter, From, 89–​94. Schröter includes Q as one of the narrativized
Gospels (90, 110n.48).
5 Similarly, E.-​
M. Becker, Birth, 4, in reference specifically to the Jesus tradition, observes the
“complete absence of any documented sources or data in the time period between Jesus’ lifetime and
death (around 30 ce) and the rise of the written gospel (between 70 and 90 ce).”
6 Cf. H. N. Roskam, The Purpose of the Gospel of Mark in Its Historical and Social Context, NovTSup

114 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 1: “Mark’s Gospel seems to have been written without an obvious model at a
time when writing an account of Jesus’ life was not a common thing to do.”
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 75

to the work of Jan Assmann, and specifically to two aspects of his work: the
Traditionsbruch (“breakage in tradition”), which I have not yet presented,
and the zerdehnte Situation (“extended situation”), which I introduced in
­chapter 1. The fourth section will consider the patristic testimony about the
writing of Mark’s Gospel in media terms.

Precursors to Mark’s Gospel?

Although no one can really contest the claim that Mark’s Gospel is the first
certain instance of narrativized Jesus tradition in the written medium, many
would contest the idea that Mark’s Gospel was the first written Jesus tradi-
tion. Of the possible predecessors of Mark that scholars have proposed, the
most popular candidate would almost certainly be Q, the hypothetical source
posited on the basis of the overlapping tradition in the Gospels of Matthew
and Luke that does not appear in Mark’s Gospel (the so-​called double tra-
dition). As I noted in the introduction, some scholars date the writing of Q
to the 50s,7 and thus around twenty years earlier than scholars traditionally
date the Gospel of Mark (ca. 70 ce). Several scholars therefore consider Q the
“earliest” or “first” Gospel.8
This book is not a monograph on solutions to the Synoptic problem and
will not offer a full evaluation of the Q hypothesis. To put my cards on the
table, I am Q agnostic, leaning so heavily toward Q disbelief that if ever there
were an anti-​Q firing line, I suppose I would have to line up behind the Farrer
hypothesis folks.9 Beyond my lack of belief in Q, I do not begin the reception
history of the Jesus tradition in material form with Q for two other reasons.
First, despite the publication of The Critical Edition of Q,10 there remains con-
siderable disagreement among Q advocates regarding what exactly Q was.
Some consider it a sayings Gospel sans narrative along the lines of the Gospel
of Thomas, while others consider Q a narrative Gospel along the lines of

7 Arnal, Jesus, 166; Kloppenborg, Excavating Q, 87; Theissen, New Testament, 32.
8 Arland D. Jacobsen, The First Gospel: An Introduction to Q (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 1992);
John S. Kloppenborg, Q, the Earliest Gospel: An Introduction to the Original Stories and Sayings of Jesus
(Louisville: WJK, 2008); Yoseop Ra, Q, the First Writing about Jesus (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2016).
9 See especially Mark Goodacre, The Case against Q (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2002). For the most

recent articulations of this view, see Poirier and Peterson, Marcan Priority, with a critical response
from Kloppenborg, “Farrer/​Mark,” 226–​44.
10 James M. Robinson, Paul Hoffman, and John S. Kloppenborg, eds., The Critical Edition of Q,

Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000).

76 The Gospel as Gospels

attested first-​century Gospels.11 Some consider Q a literary product, while

others consider it subliterary.12 There is also disagreement over its stages
of development,13 how scholars are to reconstruct those stages, how those
stages relate to particular socio-​historical circumstances, and even whether
the early stages might actually be oral tradition.14 Q scholarship is not alone
in New Testament studies in hosting an unsettled status quaestionis, but the
sheer amount of disagreement over the fundamental issue of what Q was
makes integration of it into the reception history I am tracing difficult.
It is perhaps easier to state that the focus of this chapter intersects with
reconstructions of Q’s transmission history at the point at which Q propo-
nents view Q as a written narrative. If someone eventually discovers Q and
it turns out to have been a written narrative, what would change in this book
is the title of this chapter and a few subheadings. I thus invite Q advocates to
transfer the points about the significance of the Gospel of Mark’s textualiza-
tion in this chapter to the narrative textualization of Q if they wish. Mark’s
Gospel would then be bumped down a place in the reception history, but the
significance of the act of textualization of narrativized Jesus tradition and
the relationship between earlier and later acts of textualization would remain
intact.
Many Q proponents, however, would argue that Q had an earlier trans-
mission history as a sayings source that one cannot simply isolate from an
eventual (again, hypothetical) existence as a written narrative. I am not going
to engage this debate or the robust scholarship on Q’s transmission history
for a second reason: as a point of methodology I prefer to build my argument
upon confirmed sources.15 This position should not to be confused with an
argument that theories of Q are illegitimate. I regard Q theories as large-​scale
conjectural emendation and perfectly legitimate as theories.16 Yet theories

11 For a recent overview, see Rollens, Framing, 80–​ 105, who concludes that Q was a literary
document written in Greek. Even more recently, Dieter T. Roth, The Parables in Q, LNTS 582
(London: T&T Clark, 2018), 39–​44, advocates approaching Q as an intertext between the Gospels of
Matthew and Luke rather than as a word-​for-​word reconstructed text.
12 For a review of this discussion, see Kirk, Q, 151–​61.
13 Kloppenborg, Excavating Q, offered the most influential view of Q’s developmental stages.
14 James D. G. Dunn, “Q1 as Oral Tradition,” in Kelber, Oral, 80–​108. For critical responses to

Dunn’s proposal, see Kirk, Q, 157–​59.

15 At the panel review for their book To Cast the First Stone at the New Testament Textual Criticism

seminar of the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature (Denver, November 20, 2018),
Knust and Wasserman stated they adhered to this principle in their study as well.
16 Parker, Living, 115: “Conjectural emendation is a weapon that, even if it need not be used, should

not be surrendered.”
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 77

they remain, and I would rather start my argument with evidence about
which we can be relatively sure.
For this reason, despite the considerable amount of scholarly effort
exerted in arguing for other hypothetical sources for the Gospels—​among
which are Ur-​Markus, the pre-​Markan passion narrative, proto-​Luke or
L, M, the Johannine signs source, testimonia that go back “before the ear-
liest NT compositions,”17 and, least persuasive of them all, notebooks
that Jesus’s own disciples purportedly wrote18—​I will not begin my argu-
ment about the textualization of the Jesus tradition with these sources ei-
ther. Despite the efforts of Vinzent, I will also not begin with Marcion’s
Gospel as the first written Jesus tradition in narrative form, as I remain
convinced with the majority that Marcion’s was a second-​century Gospel
that purposefully modified prior written Jesus tradition.19 There were say-
ings sources; there were written passion narratives; there were testimonia;
and there were notebooks. But there is no incontrovertible evidence that
the Jesus tradition circulated in these forms prior to the textualization of
Mark’s Gospel. Therefore, although I do not deny the possibility of pre-​
Markan written Jesus tradition, I affirm a robust interaction of oral and
written tradition before, during, and after Mark’s textualization, and I fur-
thermore acknowledge that I will need to rewrite this section if more ev-
idence is ever discovered, I nevertheless commence with Mark’s Gospel
as the first clear instance of narrativized Jesus tradition in the written
medium.

17 Martin C. Albl, ‘And Scripture Cannot Be Broken’: The Form and Function of the Early Christian

Testimonia Collections, NovTSup 96 (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 6.

18 This theory was the driving force behind Alan Millard’s otherwise useful Reading and Writing in

the Time of Jesus, BibSem 69 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001). He mentions the theory at
the beginning (12) and then ends the book on this point (211, 223–​29). More recently, and drawing
upon Millard, Michael Bird, The Gospel of the Lord: How the Early Church Wrote the Story of Jesus
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 46–​47, has argued on the basis of second-​century testimonia usage
and a fourth-​century testimonia collection, as well the possibility that Q was a notebook, that “it is
highly probable that notebooks were used by Jesus’ own disciples and by later adherents in the early
church to assist in memory retention by functioning as an aide-​mémoire” (47–​48). Needless to say,
one cannot skip from the second and fourth centuries to the first century quite this easily, especially
when class considerations and literate education are determinative factors in who even could own or
write in notebooks. Neither Millard nor Bird addresses the fact that no Jesus tradition of the first or
second centuries portrays the disciples as writing in notebooks during his ministry, and it is difficult
to ignore the apologetic nature of their arguments. Larsen, Gospels, does not interact with this note-
book theory in his argument that the Gospels were ὑπομνήματα, despite the fact that notebooks were
one form of ὑπομνήματα, though he does cite Millard’s book (Larsen, Gospels, 166n.85).
19 Markus Vinzent, Marcion and the Dating of the Synoptic Gospels, StPatrSup 2 (Leuven: Peeters,

2014), esp. 277.

78 The Gospel as Gospels

The Long, Tall Shadow of Werner Kelber

Starting with Mark’s Gospel, then, the remainder of this chapter and the next
two chapters will assert a fresh approach to the textualization of the Jesus
tradition. In this approach, scholarly assessment of the significance of Mark’s
transition of the Jesus tradition from the oral medium to the written medium
must account for the aftermath of that decision. To address one possible ob-
jection here at the outset, I am not claiming that Mark intended to create this
reception history.20 I will not be too timid to speculate on authorial inten-
tions for textualization in subsequent chapters, but Mark’s narrative does not
give us enough information to form speculations from. My claim is rather
that, regardless of his intentions, this reception history was a consequence of
his actions.
As I will detail further below, this proposal stands in stark contrast to
many prior media-​critical assessments of Mark’s textualization of the Jesus
tradition, which exhibit what I call an “oral-​preference perspective” on
Mark’s actions. The contribution of this chapter is to provide a base for un-
derstanding Mark’s written Gospel in terms of what it commenced in the tex-
tual tradition. If Mark’s Gospel was anything in the ancient Christian media
world, it was not the oral tradition’s Grim Reaper but rather the catalyst for
a new genre that harnessed the technology of writing and manuscripts, at
times in unprecedented ways.21

Kelber and The Oral and the Written Gospel

Werner Kelber’s landmark The Oral and the Written Gospel (1983) still looms
large over the general question of orality in early Christianity and the specific
question of the textualization of Mark.22 It is no overstatement to say that the
answers scholars still seek in New Testament media studies are to questions

20 See p. 92 for a correction of an earlier claim in this regard.

21 Similarly, Ruben Zimmermann, “Memory and Form Criticism: The Typicality of Memory as a
Bridge between Orality and Literality in the Early Christian Remembering Process,” in Weissenrieder
and Coote, Interface, 140: “The written texts were simultaneously aural texts that did not finalize a
memory culture so much as set it in motion.”
22 The question of Mark’s occasion for writing a Gospel is distinct from the question of why he

chose the manuscript medium to address that occasion. In view of the overlap between them, how-
ever, it is surprising that monographs on the purpose of Mark’s writing ignore The Oral and the
Written Gospel altogether (Roskam, Purpose) or discuss it in a single footnote (Adam Winn, The
Purpose of Mark’s Gospel, WUNT 2.245 [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008], 23n.6).
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 79

that originate with Kelber. Fortunately, there is no need to rehearse Kelber’s

theory, criticisms of it, or the subsequent discussion that it generated in de-
tail. Two volumes on Kelber and his work,23 as well as a related collection
of essays,24 amply accomplish these tasks. Here I focus on Kelber’s framing
of the question and the manner in which his approach privileged the oral
aspects of the composition of Mark’s Gospel over the textual aspects of that
phenomenon.
Kelber persuasively exposed a serious flaw in the form-​critical paradigm,
and he did so in terms of the socio-​historical contexts of early Christianity.
For the form critics, the move from oral gospel tradition to written gospel
tradition was significant insofar as it was the symbolic threshold between the
two great eras of early Christianity that their model assumed as its founda-
tion: early Palestinian Christianity and later Hellenistic Christianity.25 The
move from oral to written tradition was, however, insignificant for the form
critics from a media-​critical perspective, since they saw no substantive differ-
ence between the oral medium and the written medium. As Kelber percep-
tively noted, the form-​critical model of tradition treated the written Gospels
like a gravitational pole toward which the oral tradition was inevitably
moving, and always had been moving; they viewed textuality as the logical
telos for orality. This perspective is evident, for example, in Bultmann’s claim
that the composition of the Gospels “involves nothing in principle new, but
only completes what was begun in the oral tradition.”26 The written Gospels,
under such a paradigm, lack all novelty and are the mere “completion” of the

23 Horsley, Draper, and Foley, Performing; Thatcher, Jesus, the Voice, and the Text. See also Dewey,

Orality and Textuality in Early Christian Literature, esp. 139–​212; Eric Eve, “Werner Kelber,” DBAM
202; Tom Thatcher, “Beyond Texts and Traditions: Werner Kelber’s Media History of Christian
Origins,” in Thatcher, Jesus, the Voice, and the Text, 1–​26.
24 Weissenrieder and Coote, Interface.
25 Rudolf Bultmann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, trans. John Marsh, rev. ed. (Peabody,

MA: Hendrickson, 1963), 5, referred to the distinction between Palestinian Christianity and
Hellenistic Christianity as “an essential part of my inquiry.” Martin Dibelius, From Tradition
to Gospel, trans. Bertram Lee Woolf, SL 124 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1934), argues
throughout that the literary origins of the Greek, textualized, narrativized, gospel tradition cannot be
located in Aramaic-​speaking Palestinian Christianity due to its illiteracy and lack of familiarity with
literary culture (for example, 5, 9, 39, 234).
26 Bultmann, History, 20; cf. also 163, 331, and Dibelius, From, 3. Before Kelber’s critique, the lin-

gering effects of this approach to the composition of the Gospels is illustrated in the following quo-
tation from John A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976),
94: “But if we have learnt anything over the past fifty years [i.e., the reign of the form critics from
the 1920s to the 1970s] it is sure that whereas epistles were written for specific occasions . . . , gospels
were essentially for continuous use in the preaching, teaching, apologetic and liturgical life of the
Christian communities. They grew out of and with the needs” (94, original emphasis altered to cur-
rent emphasis; cf. also 96). Even earlier, Wrede, Origin, 47: “The literary form of the gospels is rather a
product of the Christian Church itself, and sprang out of its natural needs.”
80 The Gospel as Gospels

transmission forces of the oral tradition, having organically emerged out of

those processes.27 Although Dibelius attributes some degree of significance
to the writing of the tradition, seeing the text as an effort to corral an oral
tradition “that had grown ‘wild’ and had been consciously corrected,” he nev-
ertheless refers to “the work of the evangelists” as a “further development” of
what had already happened in the development of the oral forms.28
Kelber’s major accomplishment was to demonstrate that the assumed
inevitability, and organic nature, of this transition was incongruent with a
predominantly oral early Christian culture. Kelber’s alternate proposal was
multifaceted, and it was more complex than often portrayed. Two of his
foundational points are particularly important for the present discussion.
First, for Kelber in 1983, oral tradition and written tradition are different;
they have different dynamics of transmission and different social contexts in
which they operate. These differences are perhaps best highlighted for Kelber
by the performative nature of oral tradition.29 The Oral and the Written
Gospel draws heavily upon the works of Parry, Lord, and Ong to demonstrate
the dynamics of oral tradition and their considerable differences with the dy-
namics of textuality.30 On this basis, Kelber concluded, “The written gospel
cannot be properly perceived as the logical outcome of oral proclivities and
forces inherent in orality.”31 Although I and others have argued that Kelber
overstated the differences between orality and textuality,32 there can be little
doubt that some genuine differences require scholars not to overlook the sig-
nificance of the transition between the two media.
Second, in his criticism of Birger Gerhardsson’s alternative to the standard
form-​critical model,33 Kelber highlighted an issue that the form critics
assumed but did not address sufficiently—​if most early followers of Jesus

27 Dibelius, From, 11, explaining the need to “inquire . . . as to the law” by which the fixation of the

gospel tradition occurred, reasons that “if there is no such law, then the writing of the Gospels implies
not an organic development of the process by means of collecting, trimming, and binding together,
but the beginning of a new and purely literary development. If there was no such motive, then it is
quite impossible to understand how men who made no pretentions to literature could create a tradi-
tion which constituted the first steps of the literary production which was then coming into being.”
Implicit in this statement is the proposition of both Kelber and the current argument: if one does not
assume an inherent move toward textuality, Mark’s textualization of the tradition cries out for an
explanation.
28 Dibelius, From, 4.
29 Kelber, Oral, 91–​92.
30 Kelber, Oral, esp. 44–​89.
31 Kelber, Oral, 90.
32 See Achtemeier, “Omne,” 15n.87, 27n.156; Keith, “Performance,” 49–​69; Alan Kirk, “Manuscript

Tradition as a Tertium Quid: Orality and Memory in Scribal Practices,” in Kirk, Memory, 114–​18.
33 Kelber, Oral, 14–​25. Kelber later wrote an appreciative essay on Gerhardsson: Werner H. Kelber,

“The Work of Birger Gerhardsson in Perspective,” in Kelber, Imprints, 367–​411.

 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 81

were illiterate, what need did they have of a written text? “Plainly, the taking
of notes and the cultivation of writing was a world apart from the life style of
these prophetic transmitters of Jesus’ sayings. They had no aids in writing.”34
In this way, Kelber again drew attention to the fact that the writing of a Gospel
was far from inevitable or commonsensical, a point that, as the introduction
noted, Stanton had earlier made.35 Since 1983, the studies of Harris, Hezser,
Wise, and others have confirmed the predominantly illiterate nature of the
social contexts in which the early Jesus movement emerged, making Kelber’s
observation even more acute.36 In drawing attention to the differences be-
tween orality and textuality on the one hand and the illiterate/​oral nature of
early Christianity on the other, Kelber framed the essential question “Why
did Mark write a Gospel?” in an enduring fashion: Why did a written text
emerge in a mostly illiterate culture that had functioned well with the Jesus
stories in an oral medium? What, in other words, necessitated the medium
transition?
Kelber’s initial answers to these questions have been less enduring than
his impact on the field of inquiry.37 The Oral and the Written Gospel focused,
almost obsessively, on the rupture between the oral tradition and the written
tradition that occurred at Mark’s hands. Kelber consistently referred to the
differences between “fluid” oral tradition and “fixed” written tradition,38
offering negative qualitative assessments of the media transition: Mark’s
work was “disruptive,” “disjunctive,” “destructive,” a “disorientation”; “the
text . . . has brought about a freezing of oral life into textual still life. . . . Mark’s
writing manifests a transmutation more than mere transmission, which
results in a veritable upheaval of hermeneutical, cognitive realities.”39
Ultimately, Kelber asserted that Mark assaulted the oral medium as a means
of assaulting the Christology of the oral Jesus tradition, which focused upon
Christ’s living presence in the community. Kelber located this composition
(which, for him, means both the narrativization and textualization of the tra-
dition) socio-​historically after 70 ce, a time when the trauma of the “death of
Jerusalem” forced early Jesus followers to face fully the earlier trauma of the

34 Kelber, Oral, 25.

35 Stanton, “Form,” 15.
36 Harris, Ancient; Hezser, Jewish; Wise, Language; Keith, Jesus’ Literacy, 71–​ 123; Keith,
Pericope, 53–​94.
37 Cf. Thatcher, “Beyond,” 2: “Time has shown that the book [The Oral and the Written Gospel] was

a milestone in biblical studies, significant less for the answers it gave than for the questions it raised.”
38 Kelber, Oral, 32, 62, 63, 91, 94, 146, 158, 202, 209, 217.
39 Kelber, Oral, 91, 92, 94, 169, 172, 207, main quotation 91.
82 The Gospel as Gospels

crucifixion of Jesus, since both events made Jesus’s absence painfully clear.40
In this context, Mark employed the technology of writing in order to shift the
locus of authority from a present-​focused Christology of the living Lord to a
past-​focused text that recounted his life and death.41 Mark’s text was the salve
for the wounds of the crucifixion and destruction of Jerusalem, and it simul-
taneously brought death to the oral tradition.
Like the form critics against whom he argued, then, Kelber too saw the
transition from orality to textuality as the threshold between two early
epochs and as a marker between two Christologies. Unlike the form critics,
he saw the transition from orality to textuality as a cataclysmic explosion de-
manding explanation rather than casual dismissal as the logical outcome of
oral-​transmission processes.

The Oral-​Preference Perspective

In light of the predominantly illiterate culture of early followers of Jesus,

Kelber is entirely correct that the writing of Mark demands an explanation,
even though his original explanation does not enjoy wide acceptance. In
my estimation, Kelber’s original proposal has proven unpersuasive partly
because it ignored almost entirely the textual and artifactual dynamics of
Mark’s act. This point raises a crucial but overlooked aspect of Kelber’s sem-
inal proposal and its effect on subsequent discussion. When Kelber assessed
Mark’s transition of the Jesus tradition from the oral to the written medium,
he stood firmly on the oral side of that transaction. His foci were the nature
of orality, the oral nature of early Christianity, the ways in which textuality
supposedly brings those dynamics to a grinding halt, and yet also the ways
in which Mark’s Gospel (as written text) continues to reflect its oral heritage.
Entirely absent from The Oral and the Written Gospel is any sustained discus-
sion of the book culture into which Mark moved the tradition and the func-
tions of textuality as textuality, rather than as simply the residue of orality.42
In light of this seeming preference to approach the phenomenon in terms of
orality, I refer to Kelber’s position as “the oral-​preference perspective.”

40 Kelber, Oral, 211.

41 Kelber, Oral, 93, 184–​226.
42 Thus, Kelber, Gospel, speaks throughout c­ hapter 3 of “Mark’s oral legacy” (also the chapter title),
and in c­ hapter 4 (“Mark as Textuality”) he describes his approach by noting, “This chapter is con-
cerned with Markan textuality and the nature of its relation to the oral legacy” (90, emphasis added).
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 83

This wide-​angle perspective rooted in orality led Kelber to fail to consider

at least two matters: what a manuscript contributes to the transmission pro-
cess, and the explosion of Gospel literature that came in the wake of Mark’s
Gospel. I will here concentrate on the former issue and leave the latter issue
for ­chapters 4 and 5. At least three developments in the post–​Oral and the
Written Gospel discussion have brought these two issues to the fore since
1983: the fall of the so-​called Great Divide between orality and textuality,43 an
emphasis upon tradition transmission as identity marking and/​or construct-
ing,44 and the enlarging role of “memory” as an analytical category in con-
ceptions of transmission processes. Each of these theoretical developments
has forced scholars to reconsider transmission practices in terms of conti-
nuity in addition to degrees of discontinuity. Kelber himself has often led the
charge in reconsideration and further development of his prior ideas,45 to
such an extent that one could now justly refer to the early Kelber and the later
Kelber. As a particular example, and one to which I will return shortly, in
a 2005 essay, while discussing again the composition of Mark’s Gospel, this
time in light of cultural memory theory, Kelber shifts the accent from Mark’s
destructive act upon oral Christology to his constructive act of “solidifying
present group identity.”46
Despite the progress of the discussion, scholars (including Kelber) still
routinely overlook the significance of Mark’s Gospel as a physical artifact,

43 On the fall of the “Great Divide,” see Keith, “Performance,” 54–​61. In multiple locations, Kelber

has claimed that the term “Great Divide” was imposed on his work by others: Werner H. Kelber,
­introduction to The Oral and the Written Gospel, VPT (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1997), xxi; Werner H. Kelber and Tom Thatcher, “ ‘It’s Not Easy to Take a Fresh Approach’: Reflections
on The Oral and the Written Gospel,” in Thatcher. Jesus, the Voice, and the Text, 29). On the one hand,
Kelber doth protest too much: he himself uses the phrase “great divide” (Oral, 203), and his insistence
on the dichotomy of “orality versus textuality” (Oral, 32, emphasis added) does nothing to dispel the
attribution of the so-​called Great Divide to him. On the other hand, Kelber is correct that “the atten-
tive reader will observe that my understanding of tradition and gospel is more nuanced than the label
of the Great Divide gives it credit for” (xxi) since he often speaks of texts absorbing tradition (instead
of being completely “fixed”; Gospel, 5) and of the blurring of the lines between orality and textuality
(Gospel, 23). In my view, Kelber’s original study emphasized the complexity of early Christian media
culture, and further research has shown that it was even more complex than Kelber initially thought.
44 Kelber’s seminal work emphasized social identity as the key for understanding transmission pro-

cesses (Gospel, 24–​25), but this insight was largely overlooked in subsequent research (see Richard
A. Horsley, “Oral Performance and Mark: Some Implications of The Oral and the Written Gospel,
Twenty-​Five Years Later,” in Thatcher, Jesus, the Voice, and the Text, 47; Keith, “Performance,” 66).
45 Inter alia, see Werner H. Kelber, “Die Fleischwerdung des Wortes in der Körperlichkeit des

Textes,” in Materialität der Kommunikation, ed. Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer,
STW 750 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1988), 31–​42; “Jesus and Tradition: Words in Time, Words
in Space,” in Kelber, Imprints, 103–​32; “History of the Closure,” 413–​40; “The Oral-​Scribal-​Memorial
Arts of Communication in Early Christianity,” in Thatcher, Jesus, the Voice, and the Text, 235–​62;
“Orality and Biblical Studies,” 297–​31; “Work of Birger Gerhardsson,” in Kelber, Imprints, 367–​411;
“The Works of Memory: Christian Origins as Kelber, Mnemohistory,” in Imprints, 265–​96.
46 Kelber, “Works of Memory,” 291.
84 The Gospel as Gospels

preferring instead to focus upon texts’ effects upon oral tradition or the man-
ners in which texts still function like oral tradition. For example, in an essay
titled “The Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic,” Dewey describes her ap-
proach to Mark in precisely this manner: “I think that the Gospel of Mark is
basically an oral narrative built on oral storytelling, employing an oral style,
and plotted according to oral conventions.”47 Furthermore, and ironically
while disagreeing with Kelber’s view on the precise effect of the introduc-
tion of the written medium, Dewey exhibits perfectly the oral-​preference
perspective that Kelber champions: “Whether composed in performance, by
dictation, or in writing, the Gospel of Mark was composed in an oral style
and performed orally. The gospel remains fundamentally on the oral side of
the oral/​written divide.”48 Such statements raise an obvious question: Why,
then, did Mark use a manuscript? Whatever it meant in terms of content and
context, upon textualization, the Gospel of Mark moved into the written
medium. This fact does not require the further conclusion that the Gospel
of Mark thereby left orality behind, but there is no point in denying its new
media status.
Dewey and Kelber are far from alone in displaying the oral-​preference
perspective. Dunn consistently speaks of texts functioning as if they were
oral tradition in claiming that Matthew and Luke could have written their
Gospels and copied Mark’s Gospel—​acts that were, if nothing else, textuality
in action—​in “oral mode.”49 Wire also has placed the emphasis upon orality
in arguing that Mark’s Gospel was an oral composition.50 And there are many
other scholars who exhibit a preference for speaking of Mark’s Gospel in
terms of its dependence upon, reflection of, or affinity with orality.51 On the

47 Dewey, “Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic,” 72 (emphases added). More broadly, Achtemeier

claims, regarding the New Testament writings as a whole, “They are oral to the core, both in their cre-
ation and in their performance” (“Omne,” 19).
48 Dewey, “Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic,” 86 (emphasis added); see also p.73.
49 Dunn, “Q1,” 86; see also 89, 97, and Dunn, “Altering,” 66; James. D. G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered,

CM 1 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 212, 214, 218, 220, 221, 237, 254. See critique in Keith,
“Performance,” 57–​61.
50 Antoinette Clark Wire, The Case for Mark Composed in Performance, BPC 3 (Eugene,

OR: Cascade, 2011); cf. also Shiner, Proclaiming; “Memory Technology and the Composition of
Mark,” in Shiner, Performing, 147–​65.
51 Inter alia, Christopher Bryan, A Preface to Mark: Notes on the Gospel in Its Literary and Cultural

Settings (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 65–​151; Holly Hearon, “The Implications of
Orality for Studies of the Biblical Text,” in Shiner, Performing, 3–​20; Holly Hearon, “Mapping Written
and Spoken Word in the Gospel of Mark,” in Weissenrieder and Coote, Interface, 379–​92; Horsley,
“Oral Performance and Mark,” 63–​70; Horsley, “Gospel of Mark,” in Weissenrieder and Coote,
Interface, 155–​56; David Rhoads, Joanna Dewey, and Donald Michie, Mark as Story: An Introduction
to the Narrative of a Gospel, 3rd ed. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012), xii; cf. Achtemeier, “Omne,” 3–​27. Cf.
also Philip F. Esler, “Collective Memory and Hebrews 11: Outlining a New Investigative Framework,”
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 85

one hand, these studies provide a counterweight to a long stream of biblical

scholarship that has ignored the oral environment of early Christianity alto-
gether. On the other hand, the oral-​preference perspective has sometimes led
to inaccurate statements or truncated lines of inquiry.52 An unfortunate side
effect of the oral-​preference perspective has been a neglect of the Gospel of
Mark’s status as physical artifact and its reflection of textual media dynamics.
The time is thus ripe to complement these studies by considering the signifi-
cance of what Mark added to the transmission process—​a manuscript.

Mark, the Traditionsbruch, and the zerdehnte

Situation

To balance this discussion, I return to Jan Assmann’s theory of cultural

memory, which I introduced in ­chapter 1. A central feature of his under-
standing of the transmission of cultural memory involves the relationship
between oral and written tradition and the transition between the two.
Particularly relevant for considerations of the textualization of Mark’s Gospel
are his theories of the Traditionsbruch (“break in tradition”) and zerdehnte
Situation (“extended situation”).

The Traditionsbruch

Heretofore in Gospels scholarship, the most significant aspect of Assmann’s

cultural memory program for theories of the textualization of Mark’s
Gospel has been his concept of the Traditionsbruch.53 Assmann locates
the Traditionsbruch in the shift between the communicative memory of

in Kirk and Thatcher, Memory, Tradition, and Text, 158–​59, who claims that the text of Hebrews was
“an adjunct to memory.”
52 As a clear example, it is common to find unqualified statements that ancient manuscripts did

not have spacing between words, paragraph divisions, or other helps to the reader, with the implica-
tion being that they were not read (e.g., Horsley, “Oral Performance and Mark,” 51; David Rhoads,
“Performance Events in Early Christianity,” in Weissenrieder and Coote, Interface, 181; Wire, Case,
42–​43, 190; cf. Achtemeier, “Omne,” 10–​11, 17, 26). Yet even some of the earliest Christian manu-
scripts provide ekthesis, varying degrees of spacing, sense-​unit and paragraph division, punctuation,
and other readers’ aids (e.g. P52 P46 P64 P66 P45 P75; see further Hurtado, Earliest, 177–​85).
53 J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 32, 157, 218, 293–​94; J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 68–​70

(for German, see J. Assmann, Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis, 87–​89).

86 The Gospel as Gospels

interpersonal interaction and the cultural memory it must become if a

group’s identity is to survive the death of the generation that stands at its
origins. In short, as an “emergent community”54 slowly loses touch with its
origins through the death of the first generation, the group has “a crisis in
the collective memory” thrust upon it.55 Assmann consistently locates this
crisis of memory at the forty-​year mark from the originating event56 and
contends that “if a memory should not be lost, then it must be transformed
from biographical to cultural memory.”57 A crisis of memory can occur also
in well-​established cultures that undergo a traumatic experience that simi-
larly threatens group identity.58 To illustrate, Assmann locates the textualiza-
tion of Deuteronomy in the wake of the trauma associated with the Josianic
reform, which redefined Israelite identity as monotheistic, and views Deut 28
in particular as a means of addressing the perception that idolatry led to the
Assyrian and Babylonian exiles.59
Although for Assmann both oral and written tradition can transmit cul-
tural memory (oral tradition through festival and ritual, written tradition
through manuscripts),60 writing is a particularly effective means of stabi-
lizing group identity in the crisis of memory. Writing involves the possibility
of cultural forgetting of ritualized tradition that does not become institution-
alized.61 It also, however, offers “the possibility of preservation”62 because
its more durable medium offers the opportunity of survival. “In such situ-
ations we find not only that new texts emerge, but also that already existing
texts are given an enhanced normative value. Where the contact with living
models is broken, people turn to the texts in their search for guidance.”63 The
perception of permanence contributes to the symbolic value of written cul-
tural memory. Assmann’s Traditionsbruch theory thereby describes the move
from oral to written tradition—​from communicative to cultural memory—​
as a cultural coping mechanism that draws upon a manuscript’s relative
durability and symbolic value, an effort at identity (re-​)construction in the

54 Alan Kirk, “Memory Theory and Jesus Research,” in Kirk, Memory, 204; cf. Alan Kirk, “Social

and Cultural Memory,” in Kirk, Memory, 18.

55 J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 218: “eine Krise in der kollektiven Erinnerung.”
56 J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 11, 51, 217, 218.
57 J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 218: “Wenn eine Erinnerung nicht verlorengehen soll, dann muß sie aus

der biographischen in kulturelle Erinnerung transformiert werden.”

58 Kirk, “Social and Cultural Memory,” 6.
59 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 55–​57, 68–​69; also J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 215–​22.
60 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 39–​40, 105.
61 J. Assmann, Kulturelle, 101; J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 118.
62 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 39.
63 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 69.
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 87

aftermath of a crisis of generational succession, violence, or other cultural

threats.64
New Testament scholars have found Assmann’s theory of the
Traditionsbruch to be effective in explaining the textualization of biblical
tradition. Most prominent is Kelber. In his more recent work, Kelber’s un-
derstanding of Mark’s composition has shifted toward identity construction,
specifically in reference to Assmann’s conception of the Traditionsbruch.65
According to Kelber,

If we date the Gospel some forty years after the death of the charismatic
founding leader and in all likelihood in the aftermath of the destruction
of Jerusalem in 70 C.E., one could conceivably understand the document
[Mark’s Gospel] as a narrative mediation of a threefold crisis: the death of
Jesus, the devastation of Jerusalem culminating in the conflagration of the
temple, and the cessation of a generation of memories and memory carriers.
Could we not be dealing here with an acute example of a Traditionsbruch
that, following the initial trauma of Jesus’ death, was acutely compounded
by a secondary dislocation some forty years later?66

This quotation displays how Kelber combined his prior ideas with
Assmann’s Traditionsbruch theory to offer an explanation for the textu-
alization of Markan Jesus tradition. In particular, one may note the shared
emphases of a crisis of communicative memory at the forty-​year mark67 and
an experience of violence that threatens group identity. Remaining intact
from Kelber’s earlier work, then, is the general date of the composition of
Mark as well as its function as a means of confronting an earlier crisis (the
crucifixion) in light of a more recent crisis (destruction of the temple). Dewey
follows Kelber in affirming, in regard to Mark’s Gospel, “that there was some
sort of Traditionsbruch (break in the tradition) post-​70 c.e., due both to the
disruption caused by the war and to the passage of time and the death of the
first generations.”68 Similarly, Kirk accounts for the textualization of Mark
(and Q) among early Jesus followers in terms of a Traditionsbruch, as well as

64 Kirk, “Memory Theory and Jesus Research,” 204–​205.

65 Kelber, “Works,” 273–​76, 289–​92; cf. Thatcher, “Beyond,” 12.
66 Kelber, “Works,” 290.
67 As Thatcher, “Beyond,” 12, notes, Kelber has consistently located the writing of Mark’s Gospel in

a post–​70 CE context, forty years after the crucifixion, even in his earlier writings; see, e.g., Werner H.
Kelber, Mark’s Story of Jesus (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979), 13, 70, 91–​92.
68 Dewey, “Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic,” 73.
88 The Gospel as Gospels

that of the Torah in post-​exile Judaism.69 With regard to Mark in particular,

Kirk attributes textualization to a generational succession Traditionsbruch.70
As indicated by the review above, the Traditionsbruch theory of Mark’s
composition has much to commend it. It fits firmly within the traditional
dating of Mark between 60 and 80 ce and thus within around forty years
of Jesus’s crucifixion. It also fits with the many proposals that Mark wrote
in response to some trauma, whether the crucifixion71 (although under
Kelber’s Traditionsbruch theory a much later response to the crucifixion),72
the Neronian pogroms in Rome,73 or the destruction of Jerusalem,74 to name
only a few possibilities.75 Alternatively, the text as a response to a generational
succession crisis of memory makes sense in the context of an early church
that was obsessed with the first generation of leadership and identifying and
maintaining living connections to it.76 Furthermore, a violence-​inspired
Traditionsbruch and a generational succession–​ inspired Traditionsbruch
are not mutually exclusive possibilities, especially in the case of early follow-
ers of Jesus, where both occurred around forty years after Jesus’s death. The
Traditionsbruch theory of Markan composition thus provides a thoroughly

69 Kirk, “Memory of Violence,” 177–​78; Kirk, “Memory Theory and Jesus Research,” 202–​205.
70 Kirk, “Memory Theory and Jesus Research,” 205.
71 Robert H. Gundry, Mark: A Commentary on His Apology for the Cross (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
1993), 1, 1026, 1044. Gundry denies that issues of orality/​writing lay at the base of Mark’s
writing: “The Gospel of Mark contains no ciphers, no hidden meanings, no sleight of hand: . . . No
freezing of Jesuanic tradition in writing” (Mark, 1). He criticizes Kelber directly on this count
later (1023, and 1044 on a separate issue). Following statements of Clement of Alexandria inter
alia, Gundry places the writing of Mark in Rome, based on Peter’s preaching, and for the benefit of
Caesar’s knights: “Especially in Rome, the center of power and culture, and more especially among
these knights, representing Roman power and culture, death by crucifixion would be repugnant and
an apology for the Cross, such as Mark’s, would be called for” (1045). Gundry makes no attempt to
explain why the knights needed a manuscript of the narrative rather than an oral presentation of it.
72 For an argument for the early formation of the Markan narrative (not necessarily text) as a re-

sponse to the crucifixion, and in dialogue with Kelber, see Keith and Thatcher, “Scar,” 197–​214.
73 See Hengel, Four, 78–​ 79; William L. Lane, The Gospel according to Mark, NICNT (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974), 12–​17; Robert A. Spivey, D. Moody Smith, and C. Clifton Black, Anatomy
of the New Testament, 6th ed. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 60–​61.
74 Prior to The Oral and the Written Gospel, Kelber himself advocated this position and referred

to it as “a scholarly consensus [that] is beginning to emerge” (Mark’s Story, 13–​14, 70, 91–​92, quo-
tation from 13). More recently, see Roskam, Purpose, 236. James R. Edwards, The Gospel according
to Mark, PilNTC (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 9, places the authorship of Mark’s Gospel in
Rome between the Neronian pogroms and the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 ce (cf. Adela Yarbro
Collins, Mark, Hermeneia [Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007], 14; Robert H. Stein, Mark, BECNT [Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008], 14–​15).
75 Theodore J. Weeden, Mark—​Traditions in Conflict (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971), argued that

Mark’s Gospel was a response to a “crisis of faith” that occurred forty years after “Easter morning”
(159), wherein Mark attacked a theios aner Christology and asserted a suffering Son of Man
Christology. He does not address why confrontation with this Christology involved a manuscript.
76 For example, John 21:24; Papias apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.3–​4; Clement of Alexandria apud

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.14.5–​7; Irenaeus, Haer. 3.3.2–​3.

 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 89

plausible media-​critical answer to the question of Mark’s textualization that

coheres with broader historical hypotheses in Markan scholarship.
Yet despite the Traditionsbruch theory’s considerable help in offering plau-
sible explanations, or plausible contexts, for Mark’s production of a written
Gospel, it remains incomplete as a theory of textualization. As Assmann’s
work demonstrates, written tradition can be a helpful means of managing
a memory crisis, but oral tradition is also capable of transferring commu-
nicative memory into cultural memory in the form of ritual and festival.77
A Traditionsbruch does not always require a manuscript for the group’s suc-
cessful navigation of the crisis and is therefore not an automatic explanation
for the textualization of oral tradition. One must still explain what a manu-
script contributed to the transference of memory that was not available in the
form of rituals such as weekly worship meetings, the Eucharist, and baptism.
In making these observations, I am not rejecting the relevance of the
Traditionsbruch for understanding the textualization of Mark. This model
firmly establishes that the textualization of memory is at core related to the
(re-​)construction of group identity, especially in violent contexts and/​or con-
texts of cultures with an “emergent” identity. The aforementioned cautious
criticisms are intended to underscore that a comprehensive understanding of
Mark’s textualization cannot rest on this concept alone.

Manuscripts and the Markan zerdehnte Situation

Building upon prior applications of the Traditionsbruch theory, I propose

that the more significant aspect of Assmann’s model for understanding the
textualization of Mark’s Gospel is his concept of the zerdehnte Situation,
which I introduced in ­chapter 1. This concept is more important than the
Traditionsbruch not only because it explains how a manuscript can aid
the transformation of collective memory into cultural memory (and thus
underlies the Traditionsbruch theory) but also, and primarily, because it
foregrounds what a manuscript contributes to the transmission process
that orality does not. This focus upon the distinctive contribution of a man-
uscript to the transmission process stands in contrast to the oral-​preference
perspective. It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that thus far New Testament

77 J. Assmann, “Form,” 75–​79; Religion and Cultural Memory, 105

90 The Gospel as Gospels

scholars have overlooked the relevance of this concept for this issue.78 It
also allows us to exchange the question “Why did Mark write a Gospel?”
for “What difference did it make that Mark wrote a Gospel?” The shift is
important because, although scholars mine Mark’s narrative for implicit
indications of its origin(s), the narrative offers no indication whatsoever of
why it was placed on a manuscript. As we will soon see, this silence on the
part of Mark’s Gospel stands in some degree of contrast with Mark’s succes-
sors, who frequently comment on the purpose of their textualization of the
Jesus tradition.
As a brief reminder from ­chapter 1, for Assmann the key distinction be-
tween the written register and the oral register is that textuality does not
require the “copresence” of the speaker or author of the tradition and the
audience. Writing enables a “separation from the immediate speech situa-
tion.”79 Manuscripts are not the only means of doing this (a messenger or fes-
tival, as examples, also can), but their capacity to detach from the immediate
situation in a more thorough way than ritual and survive the passing of time
made them distinctive. The immediate speech situation is replaced by the
“extended situation,” or zerdehnte Situation, whereby the originating context
of the individual(s) with authorial control can be connected to a virtually
limitless number of reception contexts, crossing space and time. Spanning
the zerdehnte Situation, the touchstone between these earlier contexts and
later contexts of reception is the manuscript.
This aspect of manuscript culture is critical for Assmann because it
explains how the communicative memory of a present generation is passed
down to subsequent generations, becoming cultural memory in the process.
Assmann is aware that not all traditions become institutionalized, and his
point is not that institutionalization was an automatic byproduct of textu-
alization. Rather, his point is that, of those traditions that did become in-
stitutionalized as cultural memory, the manuscript played a key role in the
multifaceted process. The manuscript, for Assmann, was a means of canon-
ization, and (as noted in ­chapter 1) it was canonization that really solidified
the move from communicative to cultural memory.
With regard specifically to the textualization of Mark’s Gospel, two
further points on the significance of the zerdehnte Situation that a man-
uscript enables must be emphasized. First, within Assmann’s concept of

78 Cf., however, Keith, “Performance,” 63–​69; “Prolegomena,” 161–​86. Cf. now also Eve, Writing,

27–​28, who follows my earlier work on this matter.

79 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 103.
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 91

the zerdehnte Situation resides a distinction between his view of the re-
lationship between orality and textuality and Kelber’s view. Assmann’s
theory is both similar to and dissimilar from Kelber’s earlier perspec-
tive. Like Kelber, Assmann points out the distinction between oral and
written media in terms of whether the author/​speaker and audience/​read-
ers are copresent or separated. Unlike Kelber, Assmann accounts for the
continuity between oral and written tradition in their shared function as
identity-​forming memory in addition to the discontinuity between the
media forms in their contexts of reception. In other words, Kelber’s orig-
inal thesis defined the distinction between orality and textuality as one of
media and contexts, and thus suffered as a result of the fall of the so-​called
Great Divide and the growing recognition that manuscript tradition
often functioned similarly to oral tradition. Kelber also saw the identity
construction of the written text as necessarily an attack on the identity
construction of the oral tradition. In contrast, Assmann’s theory of the
zerdehnte Situation defines the distinction between orality and textuality
as strictly one of communication:

The concept of the expanded context [zerdehnte Situation] does not apply
to the storage, but to the communication of a message. It refers to the ma-
jority of concrete communication situations in which the communication
is uttered. Compared to this communication, the question of storage is su-
perficial. The essential distinction between the oral and the written trans-
mission of cultural texts consists, therefore, not in the storage medium
or technology, but in the form in which the expanded context [zerdehnte
Situation] is institutionalized.80

The institutionalization of memory in the zerdehnte Situation therefore also

points to the fact that textuality does not necessarily involve an alternative
identity-​construction process.81 Although this is possible, it can also func-
tion as an extension or hardening of the identity-​construction processes
already underway in the oral tradition. In this way, Assmann’s theory is an
improvement on Kelber’s original theory, because it highlights what Kelber
had correct (the introduction of a manuscript demands explanation),

80 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 105 (for German, see J. Assmann, Religion und kul-

turelle Gedächtnis, 128–​29).

81 Achtemeier, “Omne,” 4n.7, was therefore correct that Kelber’s argument in this regard “would

fall into the category of premature conclusions.”

92 The Gospel as Gospels

addresses what he ignored (how the introduction of a manuscript continued

the transmission process), and provides warrant for dismissal of the less per-
suasive aspects of his original thesis (the introduction of the manuscript was
definitely an attack on oral Christology).
The second point is that Assmann identifies the creation of the zer-
dehnte Situation as the core consequential act of textualization. As
noted already, he refers to it as “decisive for the genesis of texts.”82 The
manuscript’s ability to escape the confines of copresence has the virtue
of explaining the media transition in terms of what was added to the
situation that was previously missing—​ the manuscript. The manu-
script’s ability to create a zerdehnte Situation that stretches through
time and space is precisely why it is an attractive means of managing a
Traditionsbruch and the reconstitution of group identity in its wake. In
this sense, not only is the zerdehnte Situation theory of textualization
compatible with the Traditionsbruch theory, but the former is a key as-
pect of the latter when manuscripts are involved.

Summary and Comment

In an earlier version of this research, I suggested that Mark intended to

create a zerdehnte Situation.83 I now regard that claim as overly confident.
As I have observed and will discuss further in c­ hapter 6, the narrative of
the Gospel of Mark does not offer us enough fodder for hypotheses about
why Mark moved the Jesus tradition to a manuscript. The most that we can
claim is that, assuming that ancient tradents were not completely oblivious
to this characteristic of writing, this theory provides scholars with at least
one reason why a person or group might have employed the written me-
dium to create the possibility of cultural memory, and furthermore that
this theory comports with some ancient explanations for Mark’s textualiza-
tion. Yet the manuscript’s capacity to create a zerdehnte Situation stands
apart from any tradent’s intention when using it. In that sense, whether
or not Mark intended to create a zerdehnte Situation, he did create one, or
rather many of them, and this act had substantial ramifications that the
next chapters will elucidate.

82 J. Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory, 103. See further ­chapter 1.

83 Keith, “Prolegomena,” 178: “He textualized the tradition in order to create a zerdehnte Situation.”
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 93

The Textualization of Mark according to the Fathers

Viewing the textualization of Mark’s Gospel from the perspective of

Assmann’s zerdehnte Situation and associated concept of the Traditionsbruch
provides a distinct angle for scholarly assessment of the patristic discussions
of the writing of the Gospel. To a certain extent, this returns the discussion
to the question “Why did Mark write a Gospel?” insofar as I am considering
early answers to that question. I do so in order to demonstrate the relevance of
Assmann’s theories for this specific issue. The early Christian answers to the
question of why Mark wrote a Gospel also assume that a manuscript’s ability
to create a zerdehnte Situation made it useful in navigating a Traditionsbruch,
in their case one of generational succession.
Eusebius’s fourth-​century citation of Clement of Alexandria (late second/​
early third century ce) explains why Mark wrote his Gospel with language
that exhibits precisely what Assmann means by the replacement of the im-
mediate situation with the extended situation being the “genesis” of writing.

But a great light of religion shone on the minds of the hearers of Peter, so that
they were not satisfied with a single hearing or with the unwritten teaching
(τῇ ἀγράφῳ . . . διδασκαλίᾳ) of the divine proclamation, but with every
kind of exhortation besought Mark, whose Gospel is extant, seeing that he
was Peter’s follower, to leave them a written statement of the teaching given
them verbally, nor did they cease until they had persuaded him, and so be-
came the cause of the Scripture called the Gospel according to Mark.84

Eusebius attributes this account to Book 6 of Clement’s Hypotyposeis85 and

reproduces it later in Book 6 of his Ecclesiastical History: “When Peter had
publicly preached the word at Rome . . . those present . . . exhorted Mark,
as one who had followed him for a long time and remembered what had
been spoken, to make a record of what was said; and that he did this, and
distributed the Gospel among those that asked him.”86 The same tradition
appears in Clement’s comments on 1 Pet 5:13 in his Adumbrationes, pre-
served in a sixth-​century Latin translation, except here he identifies “those
present” as “Caesar’s equites.”87 Like the Clementine tradition, Irenaeus

84 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1 (Lake, LCL).

85 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.2.
86 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.14.6 (Oulton, LCL).
87 ANF 2:573.
94 The Gospel as Gospels

(second century ce) reports that Mark wrote the Gospel in Peter’s absence,
the cause of his absence here being Peter’s death.88 The anti-​Marcionite
prologue to Mark makes a similar claim. Eusebius also cites Papias’s tra-
dition that “Mark became Peter’s interpreter and wrote accurately all that
he remembered,” though there is no mention in this case of an instigating
factor for the writing.89
On the one hand, that some of the traditions claim Mark wrote before
Peter died90 and others claim he wrote upon his death91 rightly inspires ques-
tions concerning the historicity of these traditions. On the other hand, they
all agree that Mark’s Gospel entered the written medium as a means of over-
coming the absence of the oral proclaimer Peter. Regardless of the histor-
ical value of the legendary biographies of Peter and Mark in these traditions,
the discussion in the previous section supports the notion that manuscripts
of Mark’s Gospel could have overcome the restrictions of oral performance.
There may be no better examples of the zerdehnte Situation being “decisive
for the genesis of texts” in early Christianity. On this basis, Assmann’s theory
of the zerdehnte Situation offers grounds for joining with those scholars who
argue that we should not dismiss entirely the patristic evidence concerning
Mark’s textualization.92 That does not prove that Peter genuinely stands be-
hind Mark’s Gospel, but it does indicate that whoever circulated and accepted

88 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.1.1.

89 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15 (Lake, LCL).
90 Clement of Alexandria apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.14.7; Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.2; Origen apud

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.25.5.

91 Anti-​Marcionite prologue; Irenaeus, Haer. 3.1.1; cf. Papias apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15.
92 Hengel in particular champions the reliability of the patristic testimony concerning the writing

of Mark’s Gospel (Martin Hengel, “Entstehungszeit und Situation des Markusevangeliums,” in

Markus—​Philologie: Historische, literargeschichtliche und stilistische Untersuchungen zum zweiten
Evangelium, ed. Hubert Cancik, WUNT 33 [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1984], 1–​45; Martin Hengel,
Studies in the Gospel of Mark, trans. John Bowden [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985], 47, 50; Hengel, Four,
36–​37) against a line of scholarship that is, in the words of Black, “so leery of patristic biases . . . that
the burden of proof tends to be shifted onto those who would give any credence whatever to the
fathers’ comments on the Gospels’ authorship” (C. Clifton Black, Mark: Images of an Apostolic
Interpreter [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994], 198). To cite one example, Roskam, Purpose, 77, claims
Papias is “of no use to us in dating or locating Mark’s Gospel” due to his “apologetic character.” More
nuanced is Watson, “How,” 15, who states, “Papias’s statements provide no reliable historical informa-
tion about the origins of either gospel” but also observes, “They do provide valuable insight into the
early reception of Mark and Matthew.” Helen K. Bond, “Was Peter behind Mark’s Gospel?” in Peter in
Early Christianity, ed. Helen K. Bond and Larry W. Hurtado (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), 46–​61,
argues for a connection between Mark’s Gospel and Peter. The issues here are complex (see Black,
Mark, 195–​257), but in any case this discussion pertains only to patristic comments on the shift from
orality to textuality. More generally on the early Christian association of Peter with Rome, see Milton
Moreland, “Moving Peter to Rome: Social Memory and Ritualized Space after 70 ce,” in Galinsky,
Memory in Ancient Rome, 344–​66.
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 95

these traditions considered Peter to be the type of person who needed an

amanuensis, which historically he almost certainly did.93
The preceding discussion nevertheless also cautions against any claim that
one specific “occasion” is more likely to have prompted the writing of Mark’s
Gospel than another. The crucifixion, Neronian pogroms, destruction of the
temple, and death of the first generation of apostles were all Traditionsbrüche
that could have called forth a textualized Gospel in order to stabilize the tra-
dition into cultural memory. It may be just as likely that it was a combination
of these factors, as Kelber originally proposed. For this reason, I have focused
in this chapter upon the role of the manuscript in this process.
Another neglected aspect of the manuscript’s role in this process concerns
its ability to reflect identity through the zerdehnte Situation distinctly as a
material artifact, which brings to bear on the current matter the prior dis-
cussion of Assmann’s emphasis on the entourage matériel and Johnson’s em-
phasis on the bookroll-​as-​object. One cannot physically see and touch oral
tradition. Oral tradition thus cannot play the visual and aesthetic roles in
reading communities—​in particular in liturgical settings—​that a physical
manuscript is capable of playing. One can craft a material artifact in order
to reflect group identity, whereas one cannot (to state the obvious) physi-
cally shape oral tradition. As Assmann notes, “In early times . . . the aesthetic
seems inseparably linked to the mnemonic.”94 This point will be particularly
important for later chapters, where I argue for the crucial role of the manu-
script as a material artifact in the construction of reading events in Christ
assemblies.
Significant in this regard is the fact that Papias explicitly describes the
Gospel of Mark’s production as Mark’s textualizing of what “he remem-
bered.”95 This fact is not significant because it somehow guarantees that
Mark’s Gospel is historically reliable, which is something that neither it nor
anything else can guarantee.96 It is significant because it demonstrates the
strong link in the native literary imagination of Papias (to borrow Mroczek’s
language once more) between the creation of a literary artifact, mnemonic

93 Acts 4:13 presents Peter and John as “illiterate” (ἀγράμματοι). Further on this text, see Chris

Keith, “The Oddity of the Reference to Jesus in Acts 4:13b,” JBL 134.4 (2015): 791–​811. On portrayals
of Peter and literacy, see Sean A. Adams, “The Tradition of Peter’s Literacy: Acts, 1 Peter, and Petrine
Literature,” in Bond and Hurtado, Peter in Early Christianity, 130–​45.
94 J. Assmann, “Form,” 70. For a cognitive approach to this issue, see Edwin Hutchins, “Material

Anchors for Conceptual Blends,” Journal of Pragmatics 37 (2005): 1555–​77.

95 Papias apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15 (Lake, LCL).
96 On this point, see rightly Bond, “Was,” 60–​61.
96 The Gospel as Gospels

activity, and the effort to connect generations. It thus provides a clear early
Christian example of Assmann’s theory of textualization as part of the work-
ings of cultural memory processes.
Returning, then, to a point made at the beginning of this chapter, and con-
trary to the oral-​preference perspective, scholarly assessment of Mark’s tex-
tualization of the Jesus tradition must be capable of explaining, and thus must
include, the Wirkungsgeschichte (“history of effects”) of that act. Buttressing
an oral-​preference perspective with a Wirkungsgeschichtliche perspective on
Mark’s actions is particularly appropriate because the explosion of Gospel
literature in the early church, along with its center-​stage role in identity-​
construction processes, demonstrates that Mark’s employment of textuality
was, by any account, overwhelmingly successful in creating not only cultural
memory but a market for this kind of cultural memory.

Conclusion and Introduction

In conclusion, this chapter has taken Mark’s Gospel as the first certain in-
stance of narrativized Jesus tradition in the written medium and presented
the significance of that media transition in terms of how Mark’s actions con-
nect his Gospel to its reception history. I affirmed Kelber’s argument that
Mark’s textualization of the Jesus tradition demands an explanation when
viewed in light of Mark’s media environment. In contrast to Kelber and others
who exhibit an “oral-​preference perspective,” I argued that this action should
be viewed as the creation of a reception history, not simply the death of the
oral tradition. I drew upon Assmann’s concepts of the Traditionsbruch of tex-
tuality and the zerdehnte Situation but placed the emphasis on the latter of
those concepts. In creating a written Gospel, Mark may have been respond-
ing to the destruction of the temple, the Neronian pogroms, the death of
Peter and other disciples, or any number of other crises among early Jesus
followers. Most important for present purposes is not what he was respond-
ing to but what he responded with—​a manuscript. The introduction of the
manuscript to the tradition enabled a limitless number of reception contexts,
giving new life to the tradition beyond the confines of orality.
Some readers may wonder cynically at this point whether I have just spent
an entire chapter arguing that Mark wrote a Gospel and that this action
enabled people to read his Gospel. I suppose I would have to plead guilty, but
I would also insist once more that some things that current readers of Mark’s
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 97

Gospel take as commonplace were not commonplace when they initially

happened, and this is one of them. To that end, I am not simply observing
that Mark wrote a Gospel, and, likewise, the following chapters will not
simply observe that others did as well. In light of the fact that textualization
of tradition was not a predetermined eventuality or organic outgrowth of the
tradition process, the point of casting Mark’s textualization of the Jesus tra-
dition in terms of Assmann’s zerdehnte Situation is to highlight a few things
that are often overlooked: first, that such an action is inevitably wrapped up
in identity formation and affirmation; second, that its reception history is
therefore equally intertwined with these cultural operations; and, third, that
the manuscript as a material artifact not only enables this process to occur
over years, decades, and centuries but also enables certain kinds of identity
constructions that are unavailable without it.
These points have some relevance for scholarly debates over whether
Mark’s successors were trying to “supplement” or “supplant” their predeces-
sors.97 The framing of the issue in these terms is a false choice. The critical re-
sponse to such a framing must be a deliberately uncooperative “either, both,
or either and both.” In the following two chapters, I will argue that some later
textualizations of the Jesus tradition were competitive with predecessors,
sometimes claiming superiority to those who have gone before. But this does
not mean that they wholesale rejected their predecessors. Likewise, their fre-
quent replication of words or ideas from predecessors does not mean that
they accepted them wholesale. It would be naive to understand the situation
in either of these ways. If a later tradent stood on the receiving end of Mark’s
zerdehnte Situation and was motivated (for whatever reason) to continue this
line of transmission by offering his own contribution to it, thereby creating
a new zerdehnte Situation with his perceived audience(s), he willfully placed
himself within this reception history and implicitly asked to be understood in
reference to it. Acceptance, critique, neither, and both are options within the
hermeneutical constraints of the zerdehnte Situation and are not to be con-
fused with the constraints themselves. Even if attempting to undermine and

97 Cf. Justin Marc Smith, Why Βίος? On the Relationship between Gospel Genre and Implied

Audience, LNTS 518 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015), 113, who argues that it is “unclear”
whether the canonical Gospels and Jewish-​Christian Gospels were intended to supplement or
supplant previous Gospels. Among other studies in this vein, recently on the Gospel of Matthew’s
usage of the Gospel of Mark, see J. Andrew Doole, What Was Mark for Matthew?, WUNT 2.344
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013); on the Gospel of John’s usage of the Gospel of Matthew, see James W.
Barker, John’s Use of Matthew, ES (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015). The general issues will be addressed
more fully in c­ hapters 4 and 5.
98 The Gospel as Gospels

recast the inherited tradition, a tradent must have regarded Mark’s Gospel as
at least significant enough to warrant augmentation rather than disregard.
Writing a manuscript was laborious and costly; no one did it by accident. We
should likewise take seriously what is already on display in the narratives. In
some places, a later evangelist repeats an inherited narrative, even verbatim.
In other places, the evangelist offers corrections to and disagreements with
the same inherited narrative. Both postures happen within the same text. The
coexistence of continuity and discontinuity is a normal and necessary aspect
of a tradent simultaneously standing on the receiving end of one zerdehnte
Situation and the initiating end of another.98 Moving toward the next two
chapters, therefore, we should not think of evangelists’ receptions of prior
tradition under the rubric of either “supplement” or “supplant” but as what
sociologists Zhang and Schwartz have called “critical inheritance”: “The past
serves the present interests not by unwitting reconstruction but deliberately
selective appreciation and condemnation.”99 Most important is the recogni-
tion that Mark’s introduction of the manuscript to the Jesus tradition was in-
novative. The subsequent explosion of written Gospels is itself a recognition
of that fact. Whatever Mark did with this act, other followers of Jesus rather
quickly tried to do it as well.
There is one more aspect of Mark’s textualization of the Jesus tradition
that I have not yet mentioned. I reserve a fuller discussion for the next
chapters, but I will mention it here in anticipatory fashion. Mark’s Gospel
introduces “textual self-​consciousness” to the Jesus tradition. Whatever
markers of a previously oral existence that may remain in the Markan
narrative, it presents itself unequivocally as textualized tradition. It
does so specifically at Mark 13:14, where the narrator or author refers
to “the reader” (ὁ ἀναγινώσκων) of the Gospel in an aside comment. In
so doing, Mark’s Gospel self-​consciously reflects its cultural status as a
material artifact, a book that requires a reader to vocalize its script.100

98 Although the argument of Weeden, Mark, 168, that Mark’s Gospel was a response to a theios

aner Christology is unconvincing, he astutely captured the simultaneous possibilities and risks that are
inherent to a tradent’s response to prior tradition: “For even Mark must have had to make some con-
cessions in his thinking to the theios-​aner position. This was inevitable because of the very nature of
his polemic. As soon as he introduced his opponents’ material into his composition, his own position
was compromised. It was the price he had to pay to unmask his opponents’ position and substantiate
his own.” Cf. also Derrida’s description of his “relation” to deconstructed texts as “loving jealousy and
not nihilistic fury” (Jacques Derrida, The Ear of the Other: Otobiography, Transference, Translation, ed.
Christie V. McDonald and Claude Lévesque, trans. Peggy Kamuf [New York: Schocken, 1985], 87).
99 Tong Zhang and Barry Schwartz, “Confucius and the Cultural Revolution: A Study in Collective

Memory,” IJPCS 11.2 (1997): 206.

100 I argue that “the reader” at Mark 13:14 is a lector who read the text aloud more fully in c
­ hapter 6.
 The Textualization of Mark’s Gospel 99

This verse is regularly overlooked, but the rest of this book will argue
that the textual self-​consciousness that it displays became a dominant
characteristic of the Jesus tradition in the immediate aftermath of the
textualization of Mark’s Gospel and remained so for several centuries
thereafter.
 4
The Competitive Textualization of the
Synoptic Tradition

We are free to make the first move, but we are servants of the second.
Georg Simmel, The Problems of the Philosophy of History

The next two chapters proceed from Mark’s textualization of the Jesus tra-
dition to subsequent tradents’ relatively rapid replication of Mark’s media
format for the Jesus tradition. This chapter will focus upon the Synoptic
Gospels. After initial comments on the explosive nature of Gospel prolifera-
tion in the first and second centuries, I will introduce the concepts of “textual
self-​consciousness” and “competitive textualization.” The rest of the chapter
will argue that the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, and Luke display varying lev-
els of these concepts, but that they are present in each of them. The Gospel
of Mark displays textual self-​consciousness and a soft form of competitive
textualization in reference to the Jewish Scriptures. The Gospel of Matthew
then displays even more textual self-​consciousness by referring to itself as
a βίβλος (Matt 1:1), and it also displays a competitive textualization with
the Jewish Scriptures. The Gospel of Luke displays both concepts but also
displays a heightened form of competitive textualization that is aimed at its
predecessors in the Jesus tradition. In each of these Gospels, the presence of
these concepts underscores the degree to which the tradents appeal to other
written tradition and incorporate such appeals into the fabric of their own
narratives.
As part of this argument, I will develop Johnson’s concept of “reading
events” by arguing that such events are literary phenomena in addition to
socio-​historical phenomena. I will also develop Assmann’s concept of the
zerdehnte Situation by arguing that sometimes these reading events created
deferred engagements with prior written tradition, which inevitably also
established the later tradition as a point of access to the earlier tradition.

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
 The Synoptic Tradition 101

Overall, the chapter will argue that these first-​century Gospels self-​present
specifically as written tradition but also come to incorporate that status
into the core of their own bids for authority. They therefore self-​consciously
mimic Mark’s innovative media development—​usage of the manuscript—​in
their attempts to offer their gospels as manuscript.

In the Wake of Mark

The proliferation of textualized Jesus tradition in the wake of the writing

of Mark’s Gospel was explosive.1 In the forty-​year stretch between the late
20s/​early 30s ce and Mark’s textualization ca. 70 ce, there were no written
Gospels for which we have clear evidence; in the forty-​year stretch be-
tween ca. 70 ce and 110 ce, at least four emerged—​Gospel of Mark, Gospel
of Matthew, Gospel of Luke, and Gospel of John—​and possibly as many as
eight depending on when one dates the Gospel of Thomas, Gospel of Peter,
Marcion’s Gospel, and the Egerton Gospel. If one were inclined to include
Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord as textualized Jesus tradition,
even though it did not, to our knowledge, receive the εὐαγγέλιον label, there
could have been as many as nine by this time or thereabout.2 Many schol-
ars would understandably hesitate to date some of these texts to the ear-
liest stages of the second century, and I am not arguing for these dates; I am
merely observing possibilities. By the mid-​second century, however, there
were at least this many written Gospels or Gospel-​like texts, and the number
could increase to at least twenty if we extend that far and add books that
scholars have occasionally dated to this time: the so-​called Jewish-​Christian
Gospels (Gospel of the Hebrews, Gospel of the Ebionites, and Gospel of the
Nazoreans, if these Gospels are three separate texts),3 Nag Hammadi Gospels
other than the Gospel of Thomas (Gospel of Philip, Gospel of Truth, Gospel

1 Pace J. Becker, Mündliche, 140–​ 41, who speaks consistently of other textualized Gospels
spreading slowly.
2 Charles E. Hill, “The Fragments of Papias,” in The Writings of the Apostolic Fathers, ed. Paul Foster

(London: T&T Clark, 2007), 42, dates Papias’s writing to “as early as 110 and probably no later than
the early 130s.”
3 On the Jewish-​Christian Gospels, see James R. Edwards, The Hebrew Gospel and the Development

of the Synoptic Tradition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 1–​96; Andrew Gregory, “Jewish-​Christian
Gospels,” in The Non-​Canonical Gospels, ed. Paul Foster (London: T&T Clark, 2008), 54–​67; Gregory,
“Jewish-​Christian Gospel Traditions and the New Testament,” in Christian Apocrypha: Receptions of
the New Testament in Ancient Christian Apocrypha, ed. Jean-​Michel Roessli and Tobias Nicklas, NTP
26 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014), 41–​59.
102 The Gospel as Gospels

of the Egyptians [NHC III 2 and IV 2], Gospel of Mary), (Greek) Gospel of
the Egyptians,4 Gospel of Judas, the Fayum Gospel (P.Vindob.G 2325), and
Gospel of the Savior (P.Oxy. 840). To state this information succinctly:

between the 20s/​30s ce and ca. 70 ce: 0 written Gospels

between ca. 70 ce and 150 ce: 8–​20 written Gospels

Further instances of written gospel literature like the Diatessaron, Infancy

Gospel of Thomas, and the Protevangelium of James followed soon there-
after in the late second century. Again, the dating of each of these texts
is debatable. There are others that I could add,5 and I can observe with
Tuckett the problematic issue that some texts having the “Gospel” title on
ancient manuscripts contain little or no information about Jesus, and other
texts presenting themselves as teachings of Jesus do not have the “Gospel”
title.6 These numbers nevertheless reveal that Mark’s textualization of the
Jesus tradition was a watershed act that was soon copied, and to great ef-
fect. Writing in the third century, Origen complains that seemingly eve-
ryone, even Basilides, is getting in on the act.7 Jürgen Becker argues that
later Gospel authors followed Mark’s practice of integrating prior written
tradition into his literary “Gospel.”8 I am substantially less certain than
J. Becker that we can identify earlier written Jesus tradition in Mark’s
Gospel. I am entirely in agreement with him, however, that, Mark’s Gospel
was a “pioneer work” (Pionierarbeit), an “immediate model” (unmittel-
baren Vorbild) for subsequent textualizations of the tradition, and thus “a
product of a great, innovative achievement” (ein Produkt einer großen inno-
vativen Leistung).9

4 Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 3.9.63; 3.13.93 (cf. 2 Clem. 12.2); Hippolytus, Haer. 5.7.9;

Epiphanius, Pan. 62.2.4.

5 For the most recent comprehensive collection, see Christoph Markschies and Jens Schröter, eds.,

Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher Übersetzung, 2 vols. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012).
6 Christopher Tuckett, “Forty Other Gospels,” in Bockmuehl and Hagner, Written Gospel, 242.
7 Origen, Hom. Luc. 1.2: “Basilides, too, dared to write a gospel and give it his own name”

(Lienhard, FC).
8 J. Becker, Mündliche, 137–​38.
9 J. Becker, Mündliche, 137, 138, respectively. Cf. Petr Pokorný, From the Gospel to the

Gospels: History, Theology and Impact of the Biblical Term ‘Euangelion,’ BZNW 195 (Berlin: de
Gruyter, 2013), 161: “ ‘Mark’ was surprisingly successful.”
 The Synoptic Tradition 103

Textual Self-​Consciousness and

Competitive Textualization

As was noted in the introduction, a certain defamiliarization with this tra-

dition in written form is required to appreciate the significance of the fact
that this proliferation of written Jesus tradition was, from its beginning—​and
on the heels of decades of nonwritten Jesus narrative circulating—​not only
textual but self-​consciously textual. For this reason, I introduce two con-
cepts: “textual self-​consciousness” and “competitive textualization.”10 These
concepts are related but distinct. By “textual self-​consciousness” I refer to a
tradition’s awareness of its status, or at least self-​presentation, as a written
text, in contrast to being ritual, oral performance, a rote recitation, a monu-
ment, or some other form of media. Part of such awareness would include an
assumed reading community. Clear indications of textual self-​consciousness
in the first-​century Jesus tradition are Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15’s acknowledg-
ment that a “reader” would actualize the tradition or Matt 1:1’s self-​reference
as a “book.”
By “competitive textualization” I refer to the fact that in many cases an in-
stance of tradition goes beyond reflecting on itself as written tradition and is
also conscious of other written traditions that it holds in its direct or periph-
eral vision, by which or with which it is vying for (authoritative) status. So as to
avoid possible misunderstanding, let me say that at a foundational level this
relationship is “competitive” only in the sense that the tradition is aware of a
prior tradition’s social position and is vying for its own particular position
by drawing parasitically upon that predecessor. My usage of the term “com-
petitive” neither assumes nor precludes the possibility that a given tradition
views the prior tradition in a derogatory manner.11 Both stances are possible
and evident in the texts under question in these chapters. In some cases, a
given tradition may invoke a prior writing as a means of affirming the prior
tradition or bolstering its own position with no clear claim for superiority. In
these cases, competitive textualization appears as an amplification of textual
self-​consciousness, but not in a discernibly hostile way. Examples of such soft
competitive textualizations are the Gospel authors’ frequent citations of or

10 I previously introduced both concepts in Keith, “Competitive,” 321–​37.

11 In this regard, Watson’s description of Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels as “rivals” to Mark’s Gospel
(Watson, “How,” 2, 13, 14) is a particularly helpful way to think about their position toward their
predecessor. A rivalry can consist of mutual respect, mutual disdain, or even elements of both in
varying proportions.
104 The Gospel as Gospels

allusions to the prophets. In other cases, textual self-​consciousness blossoms

into a more agonistic form of competitive textualization. The tradition self-​
presents as written, is aware of other written tradition, and attempts to estab-
lish itself as superior. Such competitive textualizations of the Jesus tradition
are perhaps most clear in Luke 1:1–​4 or John 20:30–​31, 21:24–​25, but these
are concentrations of a proclivity that is otherwise on display elsewhere in the
written Jesus tradition and is not limited to tradition that became canonical.
My usage of “competitive” for both kinds of textualizations runs the risk
of giving the impression that I consider all invocations of prior written tra-
dition to be polemical, which I do not. Accepting this risk, I nevertheless re-
tain “competitive” for both polemical and nonpolemical invocations of prior
written traditions in order to keep at the forefront of my argument the fact
that both forms are manifestations of a single impulse to establish the social
position or authority of a writing by means of aligning it in some way with a
previous writing.
Although I developed this argument independently, it has conceptual
overlap with Heckel’s concepts of “self-​ reflection” (Selbstreflexion) and
“the Evangelists as redactors of the Jesus tradition” (“die Evangelisten als
Redaktoren der Jesusüberlieferung”).12 Whereas Heckel is most concerned
with the evangelists’ likely knowledge of earlier tradition and the fourfold
Gospel collection as a terminus, my focus is specifically upon the portrayal
of texts as material culture. We discuss some of the same phenomena, but
I will also address matters that he does not discuss, such as the occurrence of
βίβλος in Matt 1:1 or the claim that Jesus dictated to Thomas in the Gospel of
Thomas’s incipit.
Overall, the next two chapters shine a spotlight upon a serially ignored
aspect of the development of the Jesus tradition among his followers—​these
chapters draw explicit attention to the fact that their presentation of the Jesus
tradition is in manuscript form. They are not just copying Mark’s innova-
tion in terms of media but purposefully doing so and pointing it out to their
audiences. More often than not, they do not make it past the first words or
sentences of their written Gospels before displaying this awareness. The first-​
and second-​century Gospels that immediately follow Mark—​Matthew, Luke,
John, and Thomas—​invariably display this textual self-​awareness promi-
nently at their opening or closing. Although their moments of textual self-​
consciousness are entirely familiar to modern scholars who encounter the

12 Heckel, Von Evangelium, 15–​22.

 The Synoptic Tradition 105

Jesus tradition predominantly in this form and who are typically more con-
cerned with the authors’ Christologies and the like, it was anything but insig-
nificant to the ancient tradents who inherited Jesus tradition and redeployed
it in written form.

The Deferred zerdehnten Situationen and

the Visualization of the Manuscript

The competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition provides an excel-

lent case study of Assmann’s concept of the zerdehnte Situation that textu-
ality enables. As inheritors of prior tradition and crafters of new tradition,
Mark’s successors stand between the two zerdehnten Situationen, as simulta-
neously readers of Mark (and others) and authors of their own Jesus books,
crafting their narratives in light of their assumed audience(s). As I noted at
the close of ­chapter 3, their written Gospel is the touchstone between these
situations and, like all commemorative artifacts, subject to the pressure of the
past and the openness of the future. We will see that the development of the
Jesus tradition, in creating hermeneutical contacts with later tradents via the
manuscript, bears out Schwartz’s observation that some “texts are . . . ‘path-​
dependent’—​affected not only by their social contexts, but also by previous
representations of their content.”13

Literary Reading Events and the Deferred

zerdehnten Situationen

The competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition also presents an oppor-

tunity to build upon Assmann’s theory of the zerdehnte Situation of textu-
ality, as it likewise allows us to build upon Johnson’s theory of ancient reading
cultures. Johnson details convincingly how reading cultures used manu-
scripts as a social border, and thus how manuscripts can become emblem-
atic of a reading culture. In making his argument, Johnson appeals to ancient

13 Barry Schwartz, “Where There’s Smoke, There’s Fire: Memory and History,” in Memory and

Identity in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity: A Conversation with Barry Schwartz, ed. Tom
Thatcher, SemSt 78 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2014), 16. In the original quotation,
Schwartz specifies “sacred texts,” but there is no reason why only texts deemed sacred are subject to
path dependency, even if they are a clear class of this phenomenon.
106 The Gospel as Gospels

portrayals of people using texts in particular socio-​historical contexts.14

Yet Johnson’s theory of a “reading event” applies as fully to a text’s engage-
ment with a prior text as it does to a person’s engagement with a manuscript.
Some “reading events” involve readers reading texts, and some involve texts
reading texts. The former category consists in antiquity of a lector on the re-
ceiving end of the zerdehnte Situation, vocalizing the tradition. The latter cat-
egory consists of another text on the receiving end of the zerdehnte Situation,
citing or alluding to an earlier text. Access to the earlier text is thus deferred
to a second zerdehnte Situation, that of the later text that is citing it. The sec-
ondary level of access to the earlier text would eventually be vocalized by the
reading of the later text or theoretically deferred even further by allusion and
citation in subsequent written tradition. I therefore refer to such an instance
of intertextuality as a deferred zerdehnte Situation. Concrete examples of it
are New Testament texts’ citations of the Hebrew Bible, Jubilees’s taking up of
the Sinai narrative from Genesis, Josephus’s usage of Nicolaus of Damascus,
Origen’s citation of Celsus’s True Doctrine in Contra Celsum, or Eusebius’s
citation of Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord in his Ecclesiastical
History and many others.
In some of these examples—​especially Nicolaus of Damascus in Josephus,
Celsus in Origen, and Papias and others in Eusebius—​the deferred nature of
the point of access is pronounced because modern scholars otherwise have
no access to the earlier text. We have yet to discover the cited works and are
reliant upon the citations in the works of later authors. On the receiving end
of the initiating tradent’s zerdehnte Situation is not a lector in these cases
but another written text—​those of Josephus, Origen, and Eusebius—​which
enables the deferred zerdehnte Situation with ancient lectors or modern
readers. Yet even when a cited text is otherwise accessible to scholars, as is
the case with the Jewish Scriptures in the New Testament texts or Genesis in
Jubilees or a myriad other instances of intertextuality, later tradents situate
themselves as a distinct point of access to earlier tradition.
Modern scholars stand far down the historical line on the receiving
end of these deferred zerdehnten Situationen as readers of ancient works.
Furthermore, they simultaneously stand on the authorial end of another zer-
dehnte Situation when they publish their research, crafting their narratives
of the past for their assumed reading community. This point is blindingly
obvious but needs to be stressed: I am simultaneously on the receiving end of

14 Johnson, Readers, 9–​14.

 The Synoptic Tradition 107

a zerdehnte Situation organized around Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History (for

example) and the authorial end of a zerdehnte Situation organized around my
The Gospel as Manuscript, and books-​as-​objects are what make this position
between cultures and times possible.
The work of modern scholars is also a clear example of the inherent authority
claim of such scenarios, since our scholarly work also makes a bid for providing
an authoritative point of access. This dynamic of tradition transmission is one
that we share with our ancient counterparts. By invoking inherited written tra-
dition (whether through direct citation, footnotes, dreaded endnotes, allusion,
shared characters, settings, etc.), a text constructs itself as another instance of
tradition that sits at the center of an assumed or desired reading community
that is shared. Sometimes the later text’s position toward the inherited text is
complementary, and sometimes it is adversarial. What should not be missed
in the attempt to extend and occupy the narrative world of the inherited tradi-
tion is the implicit claim to define the community that reads such texts. It is an
attempt to create or maintain a reading culture, and to graft the new tradition
onto that community. Stated otherwise, when a new text enlists a prior text,
it also makes a bid to be understood in relation to it. Scholars often recognize
the deferred nature of the access to the earlier tradition by cautioning that we
cannot simply accept prima facie what, for example, Origen says about Celsus
or Irenaeus says about Marcion. But the crucial matter at present is that the
very dynamic that inspires this rightful hermeneutic of suspicion is also what
makes the survival of the tradition possible in the first place and is inherently
(though not exclusively) a product of manuscript culture.

Literary Memory and the Visualization of the Manuscript

In order to buttress my argument about the creation of internal, literary

reading events, I draw upon and advance the astute observation of E.-​M.
Becker that visualization is a core component of the creation of what she
calls “literary memory.”15 E.-​M.Becker defines “the art of literary memory”
in reference to historiography, stressing the contribution that narrativiza-
tion makes to historical and commemorative writings: “It is the literary
concept of narrativizing the past that contributes to ancient memoria.”16

15 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 7–​12.

16 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 2, 6, respectively.
108 The Gospel as Gospels

She thus approaches “the gospel writings as literary memory that both pres-
ents and represents memoria of the earliest Christians in literary terms,”
stating, “The gospel writings generate historia in a literary—​and therefore
interpretive—​sense.”17
Although recognizing the overlapping and interacting natures of his-
tory writing and memorial activity,18 E.-​M. Becker separates the two more
cleanly than I would, since historiographical writing not only “serves the
cultural memory” but is simply another manifestation of it.19 Additionally,
narrativization is not restricted to literary media.20 There can be no doubt
that it is a core component of literary works, however, and E.-​M. Becker is
correct to highlight the role of “visualization” in literary memory, especially
the Gospels. She uses this term in a technical sense for the making public of
images for narrativization purposes, and stresses that such “visual memory”
occurs “in various material forms,” “a variety of memorial modes,” and “via
various types of media.”21 “Modes of visualization” can include iconography
or can “just as easily be an expression of imagination.”22 The core element is
the employment of an image. E.-​M. Becker cites, for example, early Christian
invocations of the cross in iconographic representations of Jesus with the
titulus above him or its usage by Paul in “literary context[s]‌” where it thus
becomes a “literary incarnation” of the visual image.23 She also observes how
literary memory can represent ritual in addition to imagery, or perhaps as
imagery. Citing the “memory of the Eucharist” in 1 Cor 11:23–​25 and Mark
14:22–​25 (and parallels), she observes that even though this event was a
practiced ritual among early followers of Jesus, “the Eucharist is delivered as
literary memory” in these texts.24
E.-​M. Becker’s correlation of visual memory and ritual memory with lit-
erary memory gives further theoretical grounding to my argument that com-
petitive textualization in the early Jesus tradition creates internal, literary

17 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 4–​5.

18 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 5, 7, inter alia.
19 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 5 (emphasis removed). More fully: “Processes of memorization precede the

literary construction of history; historia itself, however, serves the cultural memory of past events and
people so that historiography constitutes a substantial contribution to ancient memorial culture.”
20 Cf. E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 5–​6: “As soon as memory is stored within a literary product, the neces-

sary merging of fact and fiction so characteristic of narrative produces an environment conducive to
the dissemination of various ideologies.” The merging of fact and fiction via narrativization can occur
long before “storage in a literary product,” however, and can persist without it.
21 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 7–​8.
22 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 9, 8, respectively.
23 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 8.
24 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 10.
 The Synoptic Tradition 109

reading events because it links the visual presentation of commemora-

tive imagery to the social functions of the rituals or icons within particular
reading communities. It also expresses aptly why I am concerned not simply
with the Jesus tradition as manuscript but also with the Jesus tradition repre-
sented as manuscript. For while c­ hapters 6 and 7 will discuss the creation of
reading events by the public reading of the Jesus tradition in assembly, this
chapter and the next will consider the creation of reading events by deploy-
ment of the image of the manuscript within the Gospel narratives. In these
cases, the image that the tradition visualizes on behalf of the reader is not that
of the cross or the Eucharist but “the book.” “The book” as an idea is mediated
literarily but visualized as a physical artifact, thereby drawing upon the cul-
tural significance of manuscripts in communities.25 By self-​identifying as a
“book” or written tradition, then, and especially in reference to other written
traditions, the texts actively construct a reading event with themselves at its
center.

Summary

Before presenting instances of textual self-​consciousness and competitive

textualization in the Jesus tradition, I want to clarify that my point in dis-
tinguishing between “reading events” created by readers reading texts and
“reading events” created by texts reading texts is neither to deny the rele-
vance of the former category for the issue at hand nor to distance the latter
category of reading events uncritically from authorial figures with crea-
tive control over the tradition. Part III of this book will give considerable
space to the significance of public reading of the Jesus tradition in assembly
by lectors, and I affirm that for texts reading texts there is ultimately an au-
thorial figure (or figures) constructing that text’s invocations of prior tradi-
tions. I wish only to highlight that sometimes the creation of a reading event
around a manuscript or textualized tradition is internal to the texts rather
than external. When it is internal, it constitutes either a bid to occupy the
same thought world, narrative world, or projected socio-​historical context of
the inherited tradition or an effort to otherwise bring that world to bear upon
the present context. By such means, a text can use inherited tradition in order

25 Cf. Lieu, Christian, 59: “Even the physical character of ‘text’ participates in this symbolic

function.”
110 The Gospel as Gospels

to nudge its reader toward a particular identity. One need look no further
than the citation of the Jewish Scriptures in the Gospels, Acts, or writings of
Paul in order to see how these texts use literary allusions in order to make a
claim about the true referent of those earlier texts, parasitically drawing upon
their established authority while claiming them as their own. Identity claims
are here asserted and contested. Complementing Johnson’s focus upon the
portrayals of people using texts in particular sociocultural contexts, there-
fore, I focus upon texts’ portrayals of earlier texts as a form of textual canni-
balism.26 To cast this observation in language more common among scholars
of Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity, a key argument of what
follows in the next two chapters is that in addition to the Christologies that
appeared in texts, the very cultural idea of “text” played a prominent role in
the process of the development of the Jesus tradition, including the develop-
ment of New Testament canon.27

Competitive Textualization in the Synoptic Tradition

Because the rest of this chapter will discuss the presence of these concepts in
the first century in roughly chronological order, I need to indicate my working
assumptions with regard to the dating and general relationship between
some of these texts. I do not assume the existence of Q or other hypothetical
pre-​Markan written sources,28 and thus do not include them here. With re-
gard to the Synoptic Gospels, I affirm Markan priority, Matthean familiarity
with Mark’s Gospel, and Lukan familiarity with at least Mark’s Gospel, and
possibly Matthew’s Gospel as well.29 Only the assumption of Markan priority
plays a crucial role in my argument. Details of the argument may change if a
scholar instead assumed, for example, Matthean posteriority,30 but the core
argument for the roles of textual self-​consciousness and competitive textu-
alization in the reception history of the Jesus tradition would not. Chapter 5
will support affirmations of Johannine familiarity with two or more of the

26 This type of focus coheres strongly with Johnson’s efforts to identify a particular “literary pro-

gram” (Readers, 15).

27 Cf. Mroczek, Jewish, 13: “The very idea of a written text was sometimes more significant than

any specific verbal content it communicated.”

28 See ­chapter 3.
29 I am in agreement with Goodacre, Thomas, 7, that speaking of one text’s “knowledge of ” or “fa-

miliarity with” another text is preferable to speaking of one text’s “dependence upon” another text.
30 Robert K. MacEwan, Matthean Posteriority: An Exploration of Matthew’s Use of Mark and Luke

as a Solution to the Synoptic Problem, LNTS 501 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015).
 The Synoptic Tradition 111

Synoptics. In terms of dates of textualization, as working hypotheses, I would

place Mark’s Gospel around 70 ce, Matthew’s Gospel ca. 75–​85 ce, Luke’s
Gospel ca. 85–​95 ce, and John’s Gospel ca. 100 ce. The dating of each of these
texts, and others discussed in c­ hapter 5, is debatable. I will not dedicate more
discussion to these matters either, since they too affect my main argument in
only minor ways. The main focus of these chapters would remain even if one
were to rearrange some of these books chronologically.

The Gospel of Mark

I begin at the beginning with the Gospel of Mark. Chapter 6 will discuss
Mark 13:14 thoroughly as part of a larger argument about the role of the
public reading of the Jesus tradition in Christ assemblies, so here I observe
how Mark’s Gospel illustrates the dynamics of textuality just discussed.
First, Mark 13:14 provides the earliest instance in the Jesus tradition of ex-
plicit textual self-​consciousness. Mark 13:14 reveals the author’s assumption
that the tradition is written when it refers to “the reader” who must vocalize
its script: “Let the reader (ὁ ἀναγινώσκων) understand.” Some interpreters
have suggested otherwise,31 but the most obvious referent for “the reader”
is the literate individual who would read the manuscript aloud to the gath-
ered assembly, the majority of whom would not have been able to read it for
themselves.
Second, Mark’s Gospel also displays a soft form of competitive textualiza-
tion. We need not look beyond its opening. Mark opens his narrative with
ἀρχή (Mark 1:1), which is a likely allusion to Gen 1:1.32 I will return to this
point shortly, but another reference to the Jewish Scriptures provides a more
overt example of competitive textualization. After the incipit of Mark 1:1,
Mark’s Gospel begins its narrative of Jesus’s life with John the Baptist. Before
the author even introduces John the Baptist, though, he first provides a her-
meneutical anchor for the narrative by invoking Isaiah: “Just as it is written in
the prophet Isaiah . . .” (Mark 1:2). Mark proceeds to quote both Mal 3:1 and
Isa 40:3 (cf. also Exod 23:20). Trying to rectify Mark’s misstatement, several
manuscripts change Mark 1:2 to “the prophets” (A K P W Γ f13 et al.), but the

31 See ­chapter 6.
32 Francis J. Moloney, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic,
2002), 30–​31.
112 The Gospel as Gospels

main point at present is unaffected: Mark situates his written narrative about
Jesus in relation to the writings of the prophets. Mark is aware of his own
status as written (Mark 13:14), he has other written traditions in his sight,
and he positions his narrative as a continuation of, and in reference to, what
is “written in the prophet Isaiah” (1:2).
Mark’s deployment of Isaiah at the beginning of his Gospel illustrates the
fact that the main focus of the next two chapters—​the evangelists’ refer-
ences to other instances of written Jesus tradition—​are simply a subclass
of competitive textualization that applies equally to other inherited written
traditions, such as Torah or the prophets. Mark’s invocation of the pro-
phetic writings in Mark 1:2–​3 is a clear example of what I have described as
an internal or literary reading event of a written text. It creates a deferred
zerdehnte Situation, providing a secondary level of access to Isaiah for the
reader of Mark’s Gospel. We need to grasp at least two aspects of this de-
ferred zerdehnte Situation in order to understand the nature of this form
of competitive textualization. On the one hand, Mark’s citation of Isaiah
with the scriptural formula “as it is written” (γέγραπται) shows deference
to Isaiah as an authority and draws upon the social currency of that textual-
ized tradition in order to situate itself.33 By explicitly invoking Isaiah in his
narrative, Mark’s Gospel pulls Isaiah into its orbit. He conscripts Isaiah’s
readers into his readership, and thereby uses Isaiah to construct imagina-
tively a reading community around the Gospel. In this way, Mark para-
sitically appropriates the assumed authority of Isaiah and asks his reader
to understand his written Gospel in light of “what is written in Isaiah the
prophet” (Mark 1:2).
On the other hand, the position of Mark’s Gospel vis-​à-​vis the written,
prophetic text is not limited to appropriation of Isaiah. Sliding along the de-
ferred zerdehnte Situation that Mark creates for his reader, Mark also posi-
tions his narrative as an authoritative point of access to Isaiah. By beginning
his narrative with a claim that the story of Jesus happened according to the
prophet Isaiah, Mark claims that Jesus’s story is the true referent of Isaiah.
“Isaiah,” Mark expresses, “was talking about what I am about to narrate.”
Such a claim obviously indicates to a reader of Isaiah that if they truly care
about Isaiah, they should listen to Mark’s Gospel. Although Mark’s narrative
makes no obvious attempt to usurp Isaiah or even to establish an authority

33 Similarly, E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 101: “By citing Isaiah, Mark situates himself within a literary-​

historical tradition.”
 The Synoptic Tradition 113

on par with Isaiah, it does make a bid to stand within the reception history of
Isaiah and provide an authoritative point of access to it. The hermeneutical
positioning of Mark’s Gospel vis-​à-​vis Isaiah thus runs in both directions si-
multaneously, from Isaiah to Mark and from Mark to Isaiah.
This dynamic is a result, to say it once more, of the creation of a literary
reading event of Isaiah’s written text, with Mark drawing attention to the fact
that the tradition “has been written” (γέγραπται). Although Mark does not
refer to a “scroll” (βιβλίον) of Isaiah,34 as does Luke 4:17, 20, Mark’s narrative
at this juncture is itself every bit as much a “reading event” of Isaiah with a
written tradition at its center as is the public reading of Isaiah in the Nazareth
synagogue that Luke narrates.
I am once more conscious of the fact that in making this argument
I could seem to be working hard to make something entirely mundane—​
Mark cites Isaiah—​more significant than it was or is. Yet we should not
allow the sheer volume of such citations of the Jewish Scriptures in the
writings of Jesus followers to blind us to the sophistication with which
these tradents operated. Even if such appropriations of prior written
tradition were commonplace—​in texts that came to form the New
Testament alone, the formulaic third person perfect passive of γράφω
occurs sixty-​seven times and the participial perfect passive another
thirty-​four times35—​t hey were not simplistic. The dual aspects of this
deferred zerdehnte Situation constitute a two-​way exchange that grafts
Mark’s Gospel into the reception history of Isaiah and simultaneously
claims Isaiah as a prehistory of his Gospel in a way that positions both
the invoked tradition and the receiving tradition in a decisive relation
to one another. “The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ . . . as it
was written in the prophet Isaiah” asks the reader to understand Mark’s

34 On the textual variants of ἀναπτύξας (‫ א‬D et al.) and ἀνοίξας (B A et al.), and thus whether Jesus

is portrayed as unrolling a scroll or opening a codex, see Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on
the Greek New Testament, 2nd ed. (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2000), 114; Roger Bagnall,
“Jesus Reads a Book,” JTS 51.2 (2000): 577–​88; Peter van Minnen, “Luke 4:17–​20 and the Handling of
Ancient Books,” JTS 52.2 (2001): 689–​90; John C. Poirier, “The Roll, the Codex, the Wax Tablet and
the Synoptic Problem,” JSNT 35.1 (2012): 6n.6. Van Minnen and Poirier both argue against Bagnall’s
contention that Jesus is portrayed anachronistically as opening a codex. See also Martin Wallraff,
Kodex und Kanon: Das Buch im frühen Christentum, HLV 12 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013), 9: “πτύσσω,
it says in Luke; literally: he rolled it up” (πτύσσω, heißt es bei Lukas, wörtlich: er rollte es zusammen).
35 Γράφω occurs another ninety times in New Testament texts that are not citation formulas. These

statistics are drawn from “γράφω” in Concordance to the Novum Testamentum Graece, ed. Institute
for New Testament Textual Research, 3rd ed. (New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1987), 343–​48; James A.
Swanson, John R. Kohlenberger III, and Edward W. Goodrick, eds., The Exhaustive Concordance to
the Greek New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995), 179–​81.
114 The Gospel as Gospels

Gospel in light of what is written in Isaiah and to understand what is

written in Isaiah in light of Mark’s Gospel. It therefore also becomes
clear that the deference that Mark’s Gospel shows toward Isaiah by citing
it as Scripture contains within it an implicit claim to provide an author-
itative hermeneutical lens for it. This posture is what I mean by a soft
form of competitive textualization. Mark’s Gospel does not denigrate
Isaiah and compete with it in that way, but it does draw upon and manip-
ulate Isaiah in order to construct a particular reading culture as well as
its place within that culture.
I need not establish this point further by discussing the other one hun-
dred citation formulas for “that which is written” in texts that were in-
cluded in the New Testament. I will also not give further attention to each
evangelist’s engagement with the Jewish Scriptures by means of citation
and allusion, with the exception of Matt 1:1 and, in the next chapter, John
20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25, since in these texts the evangelists’ conceptions of
their books-​as-​artifacts draw upon the Jewish Scriptures. It suffices to ob-
serve that competitive textualization is nevertheless on display when Mark
and other writers saturate their writings with references to prior writings.
These occurrences are, again, not instances of competitive textualization
like we see in the Lukan prologue (Luke 1:1–​4) or Johannine colophons
(John 20:30–​31; 21:24–​25), where there are accompanying denigrations or
claims for superiority. They are nevertheless forms of competitive textual-
ization, attempts to create a reading culture by invocation of prior writings.
These kinds of textual self-​consciousness led to more competitive processes
of textualization in subsequent Jesus tradition, upon which I will focus in
the rest of this chapter and the next.
Third, and before leaving Mark’s citation of Isaiah in Mark 1:2, I want to
highlight a point made in passing above: Mark constructs a reading event
of textualized Isaianic tradition right at the beginning of his narrative. This
point bears repetition because we will see that it becomes a standard fea-
ture of written Jesus tradition. Gospel authors frequently refer explicitly to
books—​whether Jewish Scriptures, previous Jesus tradition, their own status
as textualized tradition, or a combination of these—​at the opening of their
narratives. In the case of John’s Gospel, instances of textual self-​consciousness
and competitive textualization with regard to other Jesus books are delayed
until the closing (John 20:30–​31; 21:24–​25). Competitive textualization,
then, is not marginal but a typical, foregrounded, and prominent feature of
early written Jesus tradition.
 The Synoptic Tradition 115

The Gospel of Matthew

In borrowing from Mark’s Gospel, Matt 24:15 repeats the author’s instruc-
tions to “let the reader understand” and thus also self-​consciously identifies
as written tradition. Seemingly insignificant, this reflection of knowledge of
Mark’s Gospel is important, and I will return to it shortly. Like Mark 13:14,
Matt 24:15 also is not itself an example of competitive textualization. Also
like Mark’s Gospel, however, there are grounds for identifying a compet-
itive strain of textual self-​consciousness elsewhere, and at the narrative’s
inception.

The γένεσις of Jesus Christ

The first sentence of Matthew’s Gospel exhibits textual self-​consciousness

and competitive textualization. Both matters are clear when Matt 1:1 is
viewed alongside Mark 1:1.

Mark 1:1: ἀρχὴ τοῦ εὐαγγέλιου ‘Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ

“The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ”
Matt 1:1: βίβλος γενέσεως ‘Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ
“The book of the beginning/​origin of Jesus Christ”

Matthew makes two alterations to Mark’s incipit. First, he exchanges Mark’s

reference to the εὐαγγέλιον with a reference to his βίβλος: instead of Mark’s
“the beginning of the gospel,” we have Matthew’s “book of the beginning.”
Second, Matt 1:1 uses γένεσις for “beginning” (or “origin”) instead of Mark
1:1’s ἀρχή (cf. John 1:1). Although still an allusion to Genesis, the Matthean
phrase is likely drawing upon Gen 2:4 and 5:1 LXX, where the phrase βίβλος
γενέσεως also occurs. Since Matthew’s Gospel includes a genealogy of Jesus
in Matt 1:2–​17, some scholars argue that Matt 1:1 functions as a formal in-
troduction only to the genealogy of Matt 1:2–​1736 or only the birth narrative
in Matt 1–​2, and thus that βίβλος γενέσεως should be translated as “a record
of the genealogy” or “an account of the origin,” even while admitting that the
phrase literally means “book of the genesis” or “book of the origin.”37

36 John Nolland, The Gospel of Matthew, NIGTC (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 71.
37 Craig L. Blomberg, Matthew, NAC 22 (Nashville: Broadman, 1992), 52, argues that the
phrase refers to Matt 1–​2 and prefers to translate “an account of the origin.” For a thorough
116 The Gospel as Gospels

One can rather easily dismiss the idea that Matt 1:1 clearly introduces
only the genealogy of Matt 1:2–​17. Genesis 5:1 LXX indicates that βίβλος
γενέσεως can refer to a listing of lineage, but Gen 2:4 LXX shows equally
that it does not necessarily have to, since it here refers to an account of ori-
gins that does not include a family lineage. Furthermore, although one can
read Matt 1:18—​“The beginning (γένεσις) of Jesus Christ was thus”—​as a
closing to the preceding sense unit or as a seamless transition between the
genealogy and subsequent narrative,38 it was often taken as an introduc-
tion to the following sense unit, in which case the γένεσις of Jesus includes
what occurs subsequently in the narrative. Fourth-​century Sinaiticus (‫ )א‬and
fifth-​century Vaticanus (B) both present this reading by placing Matt 1:18 in
a sense unit with Matt 1:19, separated from the close of the genealogy of Matt
1:17. Whatever Matthew means by Jesus’s γένεσις, it is not clear that scholars
should restrict it to Jesus’s lineage.
Due to the flexibility of the phrase and the narrative connection between
Matt 1:1 and 1:18, it may be that Matt 1:1 has in its immediate purview the
wider birth narrative of Matt 1:1–​2:23. Without denying this possibility,
there are several reasons that scholars nevertheless should not limit the pur-
view of Matt 1:1’s βίβλος γενέσεως to Matt 1:1–​2:23.39 First, and perhaps to
state the obvious, there is no known evidence that the incipit (Matt 1:1), ge-
nealogy (Matt 1:1–​17), or Matthean infancy narrative (Matt 1:18–​2:23) ever
circulated without the rest of the Gospel.
Second, interpreting βίβλος γενέσεως as “a record of the genealogy” or
“an account of the origin”40 misses a larger connection that Matthew is likely
making with inherited Jewish tradition. As has been already observed, the
phrase βίβλος γενέσεως occurs already in Gen 2:4 and 5:1 LXX. It is highly
unlikely that Matthew is unaware of these texts. Two-​thirds of the other first-​
century Jesus books also begin their narratives with allusions to Genesis.
The author of Mark’s Gospel and the author John’s Gospel open their ac-
counts of Jesus with ἀρχή and ἐν ἀρχῇ,41 respectively, the latter of which is

presentation of views and varying English translations of the phrase, see Dale C. Allison Jr., Studies in
Matthew: Interpretation Past and Present (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005), 157–​62.
38 P1 (third century) proceeds seamlessly.
39 Cf. Allison, Studies, 160. Consider also Ulrich Luz, Matthew, ed. Helmut Koester, trans. James

E. Crouch, rev. ed., 3 vols., Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 1:70, who argues that “the title
refers to the entire book” instead of the genealogy: “The first readers probably did not need to choose
between the two possibilities.”
40 Blomberg, Matthew, 52.
41 Luke 1:2 includes ἀρχή as well, but not in a clear allusion to Genesis (“those from the beginning,”

οἱ ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς).
 The Synoptic Tradition 117

a verbatim citation of Gen 1:1 LXX.42 Furthermore, as Davies and Allison

observe, “Genesis was a βίβλος, and its name was Γένεσις.”43 They follow this
observation to its logical conclusion: “One is therefore led to ask whether
the introductory use of βίβλος γενέσεως would not have caused Matthew’s
readers to think of the Torah’s first book and to anticipate that some sort of
‘new genesis,’ a genesis of Jesus Christ, would follow. It is difficult to think
otherwise.”44 I am in agreement, and in the very least it is clear that Matthew
is following Mark’s practice of opening his Jesus book with an allusion to
Genesis. If βίβλος γενέσεως is a purposeful allusion to the Book of Genesis
as the first book of Torah, the phrase’s hermeneutical significance extends far
beyond referring only to Jesus’s genealogy—​the author is claiming that with
Jesus a new creation or “origin” begins, but one that should be thought of in
connection to the origin story in the book of Genesis.45 More important, this
reference is an instance of soft competitive textuality—​Matthew’s Gospel is
parasitically relying upon the authority of Genesis and Torah to undergird its
presentation of a written narrative about Jesus.
These observations gain even more force if the narrative structure of the
five major discourses in Matthew’s Gospel (cf. the formulae at 7:28; 11:1;
13:53; 19:1; 26:1) mimics the five books of Torah.46 If that is the case, which is

42 Blomberg, Matthew, 52, misses this point when he claims that “genesis is not a natural descrip-

tion of the contents of the whole book or of the events of Jesus’ adult life.” Blomberg is likely thinking
too literally here. Even under that possibility, it is significant that the book of Genesis itself includes
much more than simply the genealogies of patriarchs. It is therefore not clear why γένεσις would be
unnatural as a description for the rest of the narrative.
43 W. D. Davies and D. C. Allison, The Gospel according to Saint Matthew, 2004 ed., 3 vols., ICC

(London: T&T Clark, 1988–​1997), 1:150. Similarly, Eduard Schweizer, The Good News according to
Matthew, trans. David E. Green (Atlanta: John Knox, 1975), 1:151. See also Allison, Studies, 161–​62;
Luz, Matthew, 1:70.
44 Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:151. Allison elsewhere argues, “At the very least, if English ver-

sions continue to favor ‘an account of the genealogy of Jesus’ or some such, they should add in the
margin or in a footnote: ‘ “Genealogy” is lit. “genesis” ’ ” (Studies, 162).
45 Consider Nolland, Gospel, 71: “While a Genesis allusion is probable, its intention is likely to be

less profound (use of a ‘biblical’ style?; offering another important account of origins?).” The implica-
tion of the present argument is that Matthew’s allusion to Genesis is quite profound, as it draws upon
the social value of that book, a revered Scripture in Judaism and Christ communities. In the words of
Luz, Matthew, 1:70, “The evangelist probably thus gives his book a biblical background and a biblical-​
like importance.” It should be remembered that there was no “Bible” and thus no “biblical-​like im-
portance.” There was, however, Scripture and scriptural-​like importance, and it is these categories
with which Matthew’s Gospel seems to be aligning itself.
46 See the original proposal of B. W. Bacon, “The ‘Five Books’ of Matthew against the Jews,” Exp 15

(1918): 56–​66. According to Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:61, 71–​72, one must at least acknowl-
edge that the Gospel’s structure consists of five major discourses. They end up concluding that there
is no “grand scheme” to Matthew’s structure (1:72). See further Allison, Studies, 135–​42. Cf. also
Matthias Konradt, Israel, Church, and the Gentiles in the Gospel of Matthew, trans. Kathleen Ess,
BMSEC (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2014), 102n.77: “The structural outline of the Gospel of
Matthew is chronically disputed and difficult to determine. . . . The five discourses are a striking fea-
ture of the Gospel, but they are not suitable as a central criterion for defining its macrostructure.”
118 The Gospel as Gospels

far from certain but also not impossible, Matthew’s Gospel would be present-
ing itself even more thoroughly as a new Torah, perhaps even a rival to Torah.
The concept of a new or updated Torah is not entirely out of place within the
narrative of Matthew’s Gospel, which presents Jesus’s “antitheses” on Torah
(5:17–​48), placing him on the mountain while giving them, like Moses when
he received the law (Matt 5:1; 8:1; cf. Exod 19:3–​25; 24:1–​18; 31:18; 32:15;
34:2–​29). Since Jesus is the new Moses for Matthew’s Gospel,47 does the au-
thor intend to suggest that the Gospel’s narrative itself contains the new law,
beginning with the βίβλος γενέσεως? Regardless of how one answers that
question, the likelihood of Matthew drawing upon the symbolic significance
of Torah, and Genesis as its first scroll, at Matt 1:1 remains.

The Matthean βίβλος and the Markan εὐαγγέλιον

The third reason that interpreters should be hesitant to restrict βίβλος

γενέσεως in Matt 1:1 to a reference to the genealogy of Jesus or the infancy
narrative hinges upon the word βίβλος itself, and here I return to my first
point regarding Matt 1:1. Perhaps understandably in light of the debates
mentioned, commentators have dedicated the bulk of their ink on Matt 1:1
to γένεσις. As ­chapter 2 observed, Larsen also omitted the occurrence of this
term in Matt 1:1 from his monograph on book language for the Gospels.48
But the seemingly pedestrian occurrence of βίβλος carries significance in
its own right. The author of Matthew’s Gospel repeats Mark 13:14’s “let the
reader understand” in Matt 24:15, and does so verbatim. Scholars almost uni-
versally agree that by Matt 24:15, Matthew has returned to following Mark’s
Gospel as his source and is directly dependent upon Mark 13:14, to the ex-
tent that Davies and Allison comment “So Mark” for ὁ ἀναγινώσκων νοείτω
at Matt 24:15.49 The author of Matthew’s Gospel thus knows Mark’s Gospel as
written tradition that requires a “reader” to actualize it—​and βίβλος is a term
for such tradition.
In this light, the nearly unquestioned familiarity of Matthew’s Gospel
with Mark’s Gospel at both Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15 and Mark 1:1//​Matt 1:1

47 Dale Allison, The New Moses: A Matthean Typology (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1993).
48 Larsen, Gospels.
49 Davies and Allison, Matthew, 3:346. Similarly, Nolland, Gospel, 968: “Matthew returns now to

the Markan sequence, with material paralleling Mk. 13:14–​20”; Luz, Matthew, 3:195: “With v. 13
Matthew returns to his Markan source.”
 The Synoptic Tradition 119

becomes significant.50 Matthew’s adaptation of the Markan opening attests the

conviction that what Mark called the εὐαγγέλιον Matthew called a βίβλος.51
The combination of Mark 1:1//​Matt 1:1 and Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15 there-
fore complicates not only Larsen’s claim that Mark’s interpreters understood
his work as ὑπομνήματα but also a longstanding debate over the earliest ex-
ample of a Jesus follower using the term εὐαγγέλιον for written tradition.
With regard to this latter debate, the relevance of Mark 1:1//​Matt 1:1 and
Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15 has been, as far as I can tell, entirely ignored. The
generally agreed grounds for the debate are the following: (1) Paul (e.g., Gal
2:2) and the Gospel narratives (e.g., Mark 1:14) use εὐαγγέλιον in reference
to the oral proclamation of or about Jesus, likely in knowledge of the Greco-​
Roman usage of the term for a military or royal announcement, the similar
Isaianic or other Hebrew Bible usages of the term in reference to YHWH, or
both; (2) at some point in time, Jesus followers began to use εὐαγγέλιον more
specifically in reference to Jesus books, as is clear at least by the mid-​second
century with Justin Martyr’s 1 Apol. 67.3–​452 or the late-​second/​early-​third
century usage of the term in a titular fashion on manuscripts of the Gospels
such as P66, P75, and P4;53 and (3) the usage of εὐαγγέλιον in Mark 1:1 most
likely reflects the meaning of oral proclamation or, in the least, is not yet re-
flective of a “Jesus book” meaning.54
Beyond these general grounds, there has been great debate regarding
when exactly the transition between the “oral proclamation” and “Jesus
book” meanings occurred. In a 1989 article and 1990 monograph, Koester
argued that Marcion was the first to use εὐαγγέλιον in reference to a written
book.55 Stanton, on the basis of Matt 26:13, aligns himself against Koester,
suggesting,

50 On Matt 1:1, Nolland, Gospel, 71: “It is likely that some influence on the wording has come

from Mk. 1:1.” Similarly, Luz, Matthew, 1:69: “The presence of a title in Mark 1:1 may have inspired
Matthew to provide a completely different title.” Nolland and Luz, and many others, ignore the sub-
stitution of βίβλος for εὐαγγέλιον.
51 Cf. also Doole, What, 181–​83.
52 See discussion in c­ hapter 6.
53 See Simon Gathercole, “The Titles of the Gospels in the Earliest New Testament Manuscripts,”

ZNW 104 (2013): 33–​76.

54 For example, Lane, Gospel, 44: “In the initial phrase of Mark’s Gospel and the summary of Jesus’s

Galilean proclamation, the word ‘gospel’ has not yet come to mean a written document. It refers to
a living word of hope from the lips of an appointed messenger”; R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark,
NICNT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 4: “There is . . . broad agreement that when Mark wrote
those words he was not using εὐαγγέλιον to designate a literary genre”; Graham N. Stanton, Jesus and
Gospel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 58: “Mark’s usage is closer to Paul’s.”
55 Helmut Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels: Their History and Development (Harrisburg,

PA: Trinity, 1990), 36, 42–​43; Koester, “From the Kerygma-​Gospel,” 69–​70. See also Helmut Koester,
120 The Gospel as Gospels

While it is true that Mark’s development of Paul’s use of τὸ εὐαγγέλιον

paves the way for later reference to the written story of the life of Jesus as
τὸ εὐαγγέλιον, Mark did not take that step himself. Matthew, however,
did so.56

Stanton argues more specifically that Matthew’s addition of the demonstra-

tive pronoun τοῦτο (“this”) to inherited Markan usages of εὐαγγέλιον at
Matt 24:14 and 26:13 reflects an assumption that his readers will know “this
gospel” in the form of his own written document. Under this understanding,
Matt 26:13 (“Wherever this gospel [τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦτο] is proclaimed in
the whole world . . .”) is a “capsule-​summary of his work.”57 Also disagreeing
with Koester, Kelhoffer instead attributes the key step to the Didache.58
Pokorný instead identifies Justin Martyr as “the most ancient explicit evi-
dence about the Gospels as books,” though he nevertheless considers it likely
that some references in 2 Clement and the Didache refer to Jesus books.59
(Often overlooked in this debate is the occurrence of εὐαγγέλια in the Epistle
of Diognetus, where the term is paired with the law and the prophets and
thus likely assumes a “book” meaning.)60
I am not convinced that τοῦτο (“this”) can carry the weight that Stanton’s
argument demands of it.61 If the narrative indicated in some way that “this
gospel” in particular—​that is, the immediate referent of the phrase in Matt
24:14 and 26:13, not the Gospel of Matthew as a whole—​was expected to
be read, the argument would have more force. Both Matt 24:14 and 26:13
specify that “this gospel” will be “proclaimed” (κηρυχθήσεται, Matt 24:14;
κηρυχθῇ, Matt 26:13), which can be equivalent to the public reading of a text
(Acts 15:21) but is not necessarily so.

“The Text of the Synoptic Gospels in the Second Century,” in Koester, From, 49–​50. Vinzent,
Marcion, 275, now argues this point: “Marcion, who created the new literary genre of the ‘Gospel’
and also gave his work this title, has no historical precedent in the combination of Christ’s sayings
and narratives.”
56 Stanton, Jesus, 56.
57 Stanton, Jesus, 57.
58 James A. Kelhoffer, “‘How Soon a Book’ Revisited: ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ as a Reference to ‘Gospel’

Materials in the First Half of the Second Century,” in Conceptions of “Gospel” and Legitimacy in Early
Christianity, WUNT 324 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 55–​69.
59 Pokorný, From, 182; see also 186.
60 Diogn. 11.6. Also included is the “tradition of the apostles.” Cf. Tertullian, Praescr. 36.5, where

this same fourfold division of tradition occurs and also seems to indicate written traditions.
61 I will, however, place considerable weight upon the occurrence of this demonstrative pronoun in

John 20:30 for other reasons in ­chapter 5.

 The Synoptic Tradition 121

Mark 1:1//​Matt 1:1 and Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15 nevertheless provide sub-
stantial evidence, on other grounds, that one can trace a conceptualization
of εὐαγγέλιον as a book to Matthew, even if he did not clearly use the term
as such and even if his narrative also attests an “oral kerygma” meaning for
the term.62 These texts also complicate this debate with respect to scholarly
conceptions of the decisive “step” in this development in the Jesus tradition.
Stanton, though he is not alone in doing so, defines the key step as the lin-
guistic usage of the term rather than the media transition between orality
and textuality. Particularly in light of my arguments in the previous two
chapters, I am inclined to give Mark credit for more than merely “paving the
way” for a bookish understanding of εὐαγγέλιον. He did not simply pave the
way for this idea or anticipate it; he created it. Mark did not use εὐαγγέλιον
unambiguously as a reference to a book about Jesus, but he textualized the
Jesus tradition in the first place and in this sense gave birth to the idea of
“good news” about Jesus in written form.63 From this perspective, Mark—​
not Matthew, the Didachist, Justin Martyr, or Marcion—​first presented the
idea of the εὐαγγέλιον in the written medium, and Matthew very soon there-
after affirmed this connection of ideas by referring to his Gospel as a βίβλος.

Matthew’s Posture toward Mark

Matthew 1:1 and 24:15 (as well as possibly the five-​discourse narrative struc-
ture of Matthew’s Gospel) display both textual self-​consciousness and com-
petitive textualization. Matthew’s Gospel presents itself as written tradition,
but it has in its peripheral vision other written tradition—​especially Mark’s
Gospel and Genesis/​Torah—​and positions itself with reference to those
written traditions. In doing so, it implicitly and explicitly draws upon their
authority in order to establish its own, which raises the question of its posi-
tion toward the sources upon which it draws. At the end of his recent con-
sideration of Matthew’s “attitude” toward Mark, Doole notes how Matthew

62 Pace Watson, “How,” 14, then, Papias was not “the first to associate Matthew with a written

gospel text”; it was Matthew himself.

63 Cf. Pokorný, From, 4, “The Gospel of Mark is a meeting point of all three different meanings

of the term ‘gospel’: the message proclaimed by Jesus, the Easter proclamation of the death and res-
urrection of Jesus, and (indirectly) the later use of this term for a kind of Christian liturgical book
(Gospels).” As will be argued in ­chapter 6, I do not agree with Pokorný that Mark intended his tex-
tualization of the Jesus tradition to be “liturgical,” even if it did later become that. Bird, Gospel, 20,
rightly notes that Mark “birthed the literary genre we call ‘Gospel.’ ”
122 The Gospel as Gospels

positions itself with reference to Mark and the Jewish Scriptures. Doole
concludes that Matthew intended his Gospel as “an edition of Mark,” offered
“in a spirit of respectful succession.”64 Despite this conclusion, he elsewhere
seems to entertain the possibility that Matthew’s attitude toward his prede-
cessor could have been more than simply honorific. He speaks of Matthew’s
effort to “usurp” or “replace” Mark, and on the same page as the latter com-
ment notes the manner in which Matthew’s author engages prior written
tradition—​particularly the Jewish Scriptures—​in an effort to strengthen his
own authority:

Matthew shows a similar respect for both his scripture references and his
Jesus traditions, which rather than displacing the scriptures, elevates the
gospel (βίβλος) which he is writing. In replacing Mark he can no longer
make reference to it as an independent source of the words of the Christ,
but he shows how the story of Jesus has become a central religious text for
a community familiar with the Greek scriptures, and an authority on a par
with the words of the prophets.65

Although much of Doole’s argument resonates with my previous com-

ments on Mark’s usage of the Jewish Scriptures, I am more hesitant to affirm
that Matthew’s Gospel clearly claims for itself a status “on a par with the words
of the prophets.” There are greater grounds for seeing an explicit scriptural
consciousness in the Fourth Gospel.66 But there can be no doubt that, like
Mark’s Gospel, Matthew’s Gospel constructs its own authority by carefully
negotiating its position with reference to Jewish Scriptures and by siphoning
their authority. For my present purposes, it is more important that when
Matthew’s Gospel asserts itself as a version of the Jesus story, it does so by
presenting itself in precisely the same media format that Mark’s Gospel and
Torah did—​the manuscript—​as well as by drawing explicit attention to that
fact by identifying its tradition as a βίβλος (Matt 1:1) that must be read aloud
(24:15).67 The author of Matthew’s Gospel thus attempts to occupy not only
the same narrative space as Mark’s Gospel but also the same physical space in

64 Doole, What, 196, 193, respectively.

65 Doole, What, 21, 189, respectively.
66 See ­chapter 5.
67 Cf. Doole, What, 21: “Regardless of whatever model(s) upon which the text was based, it is its

content, not only its format, which determines its success.” While not denying the significance of the
content of the Matthean narrative, I suggest an elevated role for its format. The format was crucial to
the Gospel’s transmission success and the narrative itself calls explicit attention to it in Matt 1:1.
 The Synoptic Tradition 123

the hands of “the reader” (Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15). Matthew absorbs Mark’s
words at Matt 24:15, but the implication is that “the reader” is now holding
Matthew’s Gospel instead of Mark’s Gospel. On this basis, Doole is correct to
detect a Matthean impulse to “usurp” Mark.
Matthew’s Gospel does not outright reject Mark’s Gospel. Matthew’s
Gospel is more nuanced than that. In its allusions to Moses and Torah as
well as its explicit citations, and in its verbatim and allusive reproduction of
Mark’s Gospel, the author of Matthew’s Gospel uses a βίβλος, actually and
narratively presented, to construct a reading culture around itself, thereby
also generating reading events of the written traditions upon which it draws.
Matthew’s Gospel cannibalizes Torah and Mark’s Gospel—​their content but
also their media format as authoritative tradition. With reference to Johnson’s
theory of “reading cultures,” the narrative presentation of the Gospel of
Matthew as a book (whether bookroll or codex) serves every bit as much for
the author of Matthew’s Gospel as a boundary for identity construction as
it does for those antiquarian elite readers whom Johnson studies. By all ac-
counts, Matthew’s replication of Mark’s media format was overwhelmingly
successful if surviving manuscripts and patristic citations are any indication
of ancient reality.68 Matthew’s Gospel would proceed to become substantially
more popular than Mark’s Gospel in the early church, but it did so by har-
nessing the technology and the gospel format that Mark first introduced to
the Jesus tradition.

The Gospel of Luke

Within another five or ten years, Luke had once again replicated Mark’s tex-
tualized gospel format. Luke’s competitive textualization will require less dis-
cussion precisely because it is so thoroughly on display. In some ways, Luke’s
engagement with other textual traditions is similar to his predecessors’. Like
Mark and Matthew, for example, he appeals to and draws upon the Jewish
Scriptures in painting his portrait of Jesus. Yet Luke is not a tradent who has
given over authorial control to his sources, and in other ways his textual self-​
consciousness is different. He does not, for example, repeat the Markan and

68 Hurtado, Earliest, 20–​41, esp. 20, 28, on the surviving manuscript witnesses. On the receptions

of Mark’s Gospel and Matthew’s Gospel in patristic citations, see the helpful summary of Michael J.
Kok, The Gospel on the Margins: The Reception of Mark in the Second Century (Minneapolis: Fortress,
2015), 3–​11.
124 The Gospel as Gospels

Matthean instruction to “let the reader understand”; he also does not include
εὐαγγέλιον or βίβλος in his prologue.69 Instead, Luke begins with other
authors of written Jesus tradition and in doing so offers the most textually
self-​conscious statement yet among Jesus followers:

Since many have undertaken (ἐπεχείρησαν) to set down an orderly ac-

count (διήγησιν) of the events that have been fulfilled among us, just
as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning (ἀρχῆς)
were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, I too decided, after investi-
gating everything carefully (ἀκριβῶς) from the very first, to write (γράψαι)
an orderly (καθεξῆς) account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that
you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been
instructed. (Luke 1:1–​4)70

“I too decided to write.”

Much has been written on the Lukan prologue, to the extent that already in
1922 Cadbury opined, “In the study of the earliest Christian history no pas-
sage has had more emphasis laid upon it than the brief preface of Luke.”71 For
present purposes, I am most interested in the way that the Lukan prologue
gives a sense of the Jesus book market that Luke sees himself entering. This
market obviously predates Luke, and he knows that he has competitors in
it. Luke enters this market by “writing” the Jesus tradition (1:3). The signif-
icance of the appearance of γράφειν in 1:3 is easily overlooked, at least ini-
tially. Scholars holding critical editions of the Gospels have become entirely
accustomed to the written nature of the Jesus tradition. We almost by default
revert to thinking of the Jesus tradition as written Gospels.
Yet Luke’s bid to vie for his own place among other Jesus traditions spe-
cifically by committing his version to writing is indeed significant when we
recall that (1) Luke is writing only a decade or two after Mark, and (2) prior to
Mark’s textualization there were four decades of Jesus tradition, but none of it
was in the form of written narrative. To modify a claim made in the previous

69 In Acts 1:1, Luke refers to his Gospel as a λόγος rather than as a βίβλος. Luke includes ἀρχή in

the opening of his Gospel (Luke 1:2), but not in a clear allusion to Genesis.
70 NRSV.
71 Henry J. Cadbury, “Commentary on the Preface of Luke,” in The Beginnings of Christianity, Part 1,

The Acts of the Apostles, vol. 2, edited by F. J. Foakes-​Jackson and Kirsopp Lake (London: Macmillan,
1922), 489. The standard work now remains Loveday Alexander, The Preface to Luke’s Gospel: Literary
Convention and Social Context in Luke 1.1–​4 and Acts 1.1, SNTSMS 78 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1993).
 The Synoptic Tradition 125

chapter, there were tradents, and Luke mentions some as “eyewitnesses”

(αὐτόπται) and “servants of the word” (ὑπηρέται . . . τοῦ λόγου) who were
there “from the beginning”; there was tradition that had been received and,
as Luke says, “handed on” (1:2), a description of the transmission process
that is also attested in 1 Cor 11:23 and 15:3; there were ritual receptions of
Jesus and Jesus tradition in the Eucharist, baptism, prophetic utterance, and
so on; there were Pauline epistles in which Paul assumes a story of Jesus.72
But prior to Mark’s Gospel there were no written narratives of the Jesus tradi-
tion of which we can be certain, and it is precisely the narratival and written
nature of his own presentation of the tradition to which Luke draws explicit
attention: he, too, decided “to write” (1:3) a “narrative” (1:1).73 Once more,
from this perspective, Luke’s claim “to write” Jesus tradition is not nearly as
pedestrian as the silence of most commentaries would make one think. Luke
1:1–​4 attests the ascendancy of written narrative as a prominent media form
for the Jesus tradition, within a decade or two of its introduction to the trans-
mission processes of the Jesus tradition. It therefore also constitutes a recog-
nition on Luke’s behalf of what Mark accomplished by shifting the tradition
into the written medium. Luke joins Matthew in referring explicitly to the
connection between the tradition in written form and authority, or at least
its potential authority insofar as Luke’s narrative will give Theophilus “truth”
or “security” (τὴν ἀσφάλειαν). Regardless of whether modern scholars con-
sider Mark’s usage of the written medium significant, Matthew and Luke did,
and neither of them can get out of their introductions without pointing out
to their reader that they too are presenting the tradition in material form.
This development demonstrates the extent to which authority was already
tied to the written medium, even though it is not a canonical or explicitly
scriptural brand of authority at this point.

Luke and Predecessors

Luke draws attention not only to the fact that his actualization of the Jesus
tradition is an orderly narrative and the fact that his orderly narrative is

72 Further on Paul’s sophisticated usage of Jesus tradition, see Christine Jacobi, Jesusüberlieferung

bei Paulus? Analogien zwischen den echten Paulusbriefen und den synoptischen Evangelien, BZNW
213 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2015).
73 Cf. my explanation for beginning with Mark’s Gospel as the first written, narrative Jesus tradi-

tion in ­chapter 3. Related to this point, Alexander, Preface, 111, shows that διήγησις does not invari-
ably refer to a connected story, but it can mean this, and that “ ‘narrative’ is appropriate for a Gospel.”
She also observes that in light of καθεξῆς in 1:3 (and Acts 11:4), “a regular connected account is in
view” (132).
126 The Gospel as Gospels

written but also to the superiority of his orderly written narrative to his
predecessors’.74 It is therefore clear that Luke’s textual self-​consciousness
is a hardened competitive one. Luke affirms that these earlier tradents had
“undertaken” or “attempted” (ἐπεχείρησαν)75 to write an “account” or “nar-
rative” (διήγησιν), not that they had succeeded, or at least they had not suc-
ceeded in writing “in order” (καθεξῆς). Thankfully, for Theophilus, Luke
has come to do the job correctly. The effects are nothing less than episte-
mological certitude on the part of the reader: “In order that you know the
truth concerning the things about which you have been informed” (1:4).
As Bovon observes, “Luke begins with a reference to his predecessors (v.
1), but the manner in which he mentions them shows that he is, at the same
time, more or less refuting them. . . . He introduces his own product as
better and more reliable.”76
Wolter concludes the opposite, namely, that Luke has a neutral or re-
spectful view toward his predecessors. He argues, “It is not possible to hear
a critical subtext in the Lukan ἐπιχείρησαν” and that “in what follows Luke
does not devalue his predecessor’s works with a single word.”77 Contrary to
Wolter, already by the time of Origen it was possible to hear a critical subtext
in precisely this Lukan terminology. In his Homilies on Luke, Origen seizes
upon the phrase ἐπιχείρησαν (“have attempted/​tried”) in order to conscript
Luke into his shaming of heretical Gospels that do not, for Origen, count as
real Gospels:

We can know this from Luke’s own prologue, which begins this
way: “Because many have tried to compose an account.” The words “have
tried” (ἐπιχείρησαν) imply an accusation against those who rushed into
writing gospels without the grace of the Holy Spirit. Matthew, Mark, John,
and Luke did not “try” to write; they wrote their Gospels when they were
filled with the Holy Spirit.78

74 Almost a year and a half after I wrote these words, I found the following statement in Watson,

“How,” 11, with which I agree: “The Lukan evangelist believes his work to be superior to his predeces-
sors’: what they only ‘attempted’ he has now achieved.”
75 BDAG, “ἐπιχειρέω,” 386: “endeavor, try.”
76 Bovon Luke 1, 19. Likewise, Eve, Writing, 30: “The fact that ‘it seemed good’ for him ‘to write

an orderly account’ is surely an implicit criticism”; Watson, Gospel, 91: “[Luke] seeks to persuade its
readers that only the present work is fully reliable” (further 121–​31).
77 Michael Wolter, The Gospel according to Luke, trans. Wayne Coppins and Christoph Heilig,

BMSEC, 2 vols. (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016), 1:45.

78 Origen, Hom. Luc. 1.1 (Lienhard, FC; PG 13:1801b). For further discussion, see the conclusion.
 The Synoptic Tradition 127

Prior to Origen, Josephus can use the phrase with a critical tone79 and without
one.80 Citing Josephus, Cadbury thus observed that the verb “by itself ” is am-
bivalent,81 which indicates that context is determinative. Although the verb
does not necessarily connote a critical perspective in every usage, then, it can,
which Origen’s reading of the Lukan prologue demonstrates concretely.
Other scholars seem to struggle with the issue, hesitant to give full voice
to Luke’s sense of superiority. For example, regarding Luke 1:2, Alexander
acknowledges that Luke emphasizes his access to the tradition over his pre-
decessors’: “It is Luke’s own contact with the tradition, not that of his pre-
decessors, which he really wants us to appreciate.”82 She also agrees with
Cadbury that Luke 1:3 “is a boast rather than a disclaimer” and that it is not
a “neutral, uninformative phrase.”83 Yet she also insists that Luke places him-
self “alongside his predecessors” and is “not setting himself against them.”84
His statement that he wrote his narrative “orderly,” for Alexander, “need not
imply any particular criticism of his predecessors.”85 The fact that the phrase
“need not” carry such an implication is not a demonstration that it cannot
or did not, a point that is relevant in light of Origen’s understanding of the
term but also since Alexander is otherwise prepared to acknowledge that
Luke emphasizes his own access to the tradition over his predecessors’ and
“boasts” of his work in particular. In this particular context, Luke does use
the phrase in order to indicate his sense of superiority to his predecessors.
Furthermore, an attitude of superiority does not necessarily entail a deroga-
tory spirit or a position contrary to his predecessors.86 Luke does not have to

79 Josephus, Vita 9 §40, 65 §338.

80 Josephus, C. Ap. 1.2.13.
81 Cadbury, “Commentary,” 494. Cf. also Bovon, Luke 1, 19, who interprets the verb neutrally

(“That ‘many’ have ‘undertaken’ [lit. ‘have laid their hand upon it’] means neither that they have been
successful nor that they have fallen short of their goal”) but nevertheless affirms that Luke takes a
posture of superiority toward his predecessors.
82 Alexander, Preface, 117.
83 Alexander, Preface, 133.
84 Alexander, Preface, 134.
85 Alexander, Preface, 135.
86 Cf. Watson, “How,” 11, who observes, “The Lukan preface tacitly acknowledges that Mark has,

and will presumably continue to have, an independent status of its own—​alongside Matthew and
whatever else is included in the πολλοί (1.1). . . . But he does not demand or expect that these early
attempts should be discarded. . . . They are presented as discrete, finished, and individually authored
works, not as a single ongoing production on which numerous editors or scribes have collaborated
to preserve and shape the collective apostolic testimony. The Lukan πολλοί is perhaps the earliest
acknowledgment of gospel plurality and thus of Mark’s right to a continuing existence.” Watson is
correct that the reference to “many” in Luke 1:1 contains the assumption of separate textual identities
for his predecessors’ written Jesus traditions, and I would add to it the occurrence of “this book” in
John 20:30, which similarly identifies John’s Gospel as distinct from other Gospels.
128 The Gospel as Gospels

be anti-​his predecessors in order to believe that his written Gospel is simply

better than their written Gospels.
Luke’s “I too decided to write” (ἔδοξεν κἀμοί . . . γράψαι) in 1:3 indicates
that regardless of whether he may have oral tradition in mind that was
“handed down” (1:2), he has other written versions of the Jesus tradition
in his peripheral vision when he claims “to write” his own.87 In light of the
previous discussion of the role of manuscripts in effecting reading cultures,
therefore, I also demur from Alexander’s judgment that “making a statement
about the author’s predecessors is probably the least important aspect of ”
Luke’s opening, and that “essentially these ‘predecessors’ are only there to re-
assure the reader that the subject is worth spending time on.”88 Quite to the
contrary, referring to his predecessors orients his readers to the reception
history in which he now stands. Luke’s references to his predecessors actively
constructs a reading community around his written tradition; it is a “reading
event” of those prior works.
On this basis, and despite the fact that it is frequently ignored,89 Luke 1:1–​
4 also has relevance for scholarly solutions to the Synoptic problem, though
it must be acknowledged that it does not solve the problem. Wolter may be
correct that “it is not possible to infer the number of works Luke alludes to.”90
We can, however, rather safely conclude that the usage of the plural πολλοί
(“many”), if not a completely empty rhetorical device (which is equally im-
possible to infer), requires his awareness of at least two other written Jesus
narratives. Scholars are nearly unanimous that one of those books was Mark’s
Gospel in light of the amount of Markan material that Luke repeats.91 For
those who affirm hypothetical sources such as Q and L, these texts must be
admitted as possibilities as a second Jesus book.92 As noted in ­chapter 3,

87 Contra Alexander, Preface, 136.

88 Alexander, Preface, 116.
89 For exceptions, see Michael D. Goulder, Luke: A New Paradigm, 2 vols., JSNTSup 20

(Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989), 1:198–​199; Watson, Gospel, 129–​31. My thanks to Mark
Goodacre for alerting me to Goulder’s discussion of this issue.
90 Wolter, Gospel, 44.
91 Cf. the tradition relayed by Papias that Mark “wrote accurately (ἀκριβῶς ἔγραψεν), though in-

deed not in order (τάξει)” (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15). It is difficult to avoid the possibility that
this tradition, which Papias attributes to John the Elder, is a combination of a defense of Mark and
concession to Luke’s claim that Luke’s Gospel was investigated “carefully” or “accurately” (ἀκριβῶς)
and “in order” (καθεξῆς) (Luke 1:3); so also Goulder, Luke, 1:199–​200. If that were the case, it would
indicate that at least some of the earliest Jesus followers read Luke 1:3 as a criticism of Mark’s Gospel.
It would also increase the possibility that when Papias refers to “books” (βιβλία) about Jesus and his
disciples, he could have one or more of the Synoptic Gospels in mind (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4).
92 Cf. E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 93.
 The Synoptic Tradition 129

my methodological procedure is to explain the evidence of which I am sure

rather than enlisting hypothetical sources. In that sense, Matthew’s Gospel
has the distinct advantage of having left evidence of its existence and evi-
dence that it demonstrably moved within the circles of Jesus followers who
read Mark’s Gospel, that is, the reading community to which Luke is also
appealing. From this perspective, Luke 1:1–​4 supports the notion that Luke
was aware of Matthew’s Gospel in addition to Mark’s Gospel. Once more, it
by no means proves his knowledge of it on its own, so Watson is right to claim
only that “Luke’s prologue does . . . tend to support the theory that this evan-
gelist was dependent on both Mark and Matthew.”93 We will shortly see that
a similar situation attends Johannine competitive textualization of the Jesus
tradition.
Luke 1:1–​4 exhibits the most competitive textualization up to that point in
the reception history of the written Jesus tradition. He too begins his account
of Jesus by drawing attention to the fact that he offers his narrative in written
form. Unlike his predecessors, Luke refers explicitly to previous written ver-
sions of the Jesus story and indicates his sense of superiority over, and im-
provement upon, those prior attempts.

Conclusion

At the earliest stages of the Jesus tradition to which we have access, there-
fore, there was textual self-​consciousness and competitive textualization.
Mark’s Gospel assumes that a “reader” needs to actualize its tradition and
thus self-​identifies as a manuscript (Mark 13:14). It also displays a soft or
muted form of competitive textualization with the Jewish Scriptures, by
which it enlists those Scriptures in order to establish its own location in
their reception history. Mark’s immediate successors, Matthew’s Gospel and
Luke’s Gospel, similarly display this form of competitive textualization of
the Jesus tradition vis-​à-​vis the Jewish Scriptures. Matthew’s Gospel also
repeats Mark’s reference to the “reader” (Matt 24:15), displaying its own
textual self-​consciousness, which is otherwise prominently on display at
its opening when it refers to itself as a βίβλος (Matt 1:1). Matthew 1:1, in
combination with Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15, indicates unquestionably that

93 Watson, Gospel, 130.

130 The Gospel as Gospels

Matthew conceptualized the εὐαγγέλιον as a manuscript in addition to con-

ceptualizing it as oral proclamation. Luke’s Gospel opens with references
not to the εὐαγγέλιον or to a βίβλος but to something far more interesting—​
a market for the Jesus tradition in manuscript form. Luke 1:1–​4 therefore
attests the heightened significance of what Mark initiated in the Jesus tradi-
tion: textualized narrative tradition. Luke displays the most amplified ver-
sion of competitive textualization to date in the Jesus tradition by stating
his superiority to prior attempts to textualize the Jesus tradition. His or-
derly narrative, as opposed to those of the many who have tried, will give
Theophilus certitude.
Already we can see the folly of referring to manuscripts as “peripheral,”
“secondary,” or “ancillary” to the communication of the gospel among early
Jesus followers. It is by means of the manuscript that the Synoptic tradents
construct a readership and a placement within that readership, access-
ing the reception histories of the Jewish Scriptures and prior written Jesus
tradition while sometimes claiming to be authoritative points of access to
those texts or improvements upon them. In this sense, one basic but crucial
answer to Watson’s fascinating question “How did Mark survive?”94 is “As
a manuscript.” For Matthew and Luke, self-​identification as written tradi-
tion is among the very first things the authors do. Such claims to be a “book”
about Jesus or “to write” a narrative about Jesus are humdrum to scholars
who have typically only ever encountered the Jesus tradition in such media
states. Lethargic scholarly assessment of these aspects of their tradition only
attests to their success in harnessing the written medium and subsequent
dominance of the Jesus tradition market into which they stepped by means
of that medium, however. For them, it was anything but insignificant “to
write” a “book” or “narrative” about what the prophets had foretold. John’s
Gospel does not open with such claims, but it does nothing to dilute the sig-
nificance of textual self-​consciousness and competitive textualization for the
construction of its own authority. Shortly after John’s Gospel, the Gospel of
Thomas and other textualized Jesus tradition continue along these lines. To
these traditions I now turn.

94 Watson, “How,” 16–​17. Watson’s answers to this question are its widespread usage, gospel plu-

rality, revised endings, and eventual association with Mark and Peter.
 5
The Competitive Textualization
of Johannine and Thomasine Tradition

Sometimes my manuscript will make allusive references. It will insist

on some things, it will make a simple statement of others. Sometimes
I will try to say something unobtrusively or to reveal something
without uncovering it or to demonstrate it without saying.
Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis

The competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition continued beyond the

Synoptic tradition and intensified. In moments of textual self-​consciousness,
this competitive stance emerged sometimes in claims of superiority to prede-
cessors, sometimes in claims for scriptural status, and sometimes in claims
that Jesus himself served as author of the written tradition. The bulk of this
chapter will concentrate on competitive textualization in the Gospel of John,
though it will turn at the end to discuss competitive textualization in the
Gospel of Thomas.

The Gospel of John

The apex of the Gospel of John’s textual self-​consciousness occurs at the end
of its narrative rather than the beginning. The so-​called Johannine colo-
phons1 of John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 display a competitive textualization
that rivals—​if not aims to outdo—​the Lukan prologue. Although they do not

1 D. Moody Smith, John among the Gospels, 2nd ed. (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press,

2001), 28–​29. Armin Baum, “The Original Epilogue (John 20:30–​31), the Secondary Appendix
(21:1–​23), and the Editorial Epilogues (21:24–​25) of John’s Gospel,” in Earliest Christian History,
ed. Michael F. Bird and Jason Maston, WUNT 2.320 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 262, objects
to identifying John 21:24–​25 as a colophon, because colophons typically came from copyists, not
authors or editors. He prefers the term “editorial epilogue.”

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
132 The Gospel as Gospels

settle the debate over the relationship between the Gospel of John and the
Synoptics on their own,2 I will argue that they do strengthen the theory of
Johannine familiarity with the Synoptics.3

John 21 and John 1–​20

Among the myriad methodological matters that beset the question of John’s
knowledge of the Synoptics, one is necessary to address now, and another
(appeal to hypothetical sources) I addressed in the introduction. Placing my-
self in a growing minority of Johannine scholars,4 I presently consider John
21 a constituent part of the early text of the Gospel of John. I am not blind to
the narrative and vocabulary curiosities of John 21 that cause most schol-
ars to view it as a later addition. Yet, in light of the fact that linguistic style
is an unreliable indicator of authorial origin,5 the fact that one can equally
read John 21 as a planned epilogue to the Gospel,6 and, most important,
the absence of any early manuscript or patristic evidence that the Gospel of

2 For the lengthy history of research, see D. M. Smith, John among the Gospels.
3 With the exception of a few comments on John 20:31 and Mark 1:1 at the end of this section, I am
not concerned here with discussing John’s knowledge of a specific Synoptic Gospel. I would, how-
ever, affirm his knowledge of at least Mark’s Gospel, and I have supported this view elsewhere (Chris
Keith, “‘If John Knew Mark’: Critical Inheritance and Johannine Disagreements with Mark,” in John’s
Transformation of Mark, ed. Eve-​Marie Becker, Helen K. Bond, and Catrin Williams [London: T&T
Clark, forthcoming]).
4 Several scholars note the growing popularity of this minority position. See, for example, Carsten

Claussen, “The Role of John 21: Discipleship in Retrospect and Redefinition,” in New Currents through
John: A Global Perspective, ed. Francisco Lozada Jr. and Tom Thatcher, RBS 54 (Atlanta: Society of
Biblical Literature, 2006), 57; Raymond E. An Introduction to the Gospel of John, ed. Brown Francis J.
Moloney, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 84n.95.
5 The comments of Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, AB 29a (Garden

City, NY: Doubleday, 1970), on “the uncertain criterion supplied by style” (1080) reflect a similar
sentiment as regards John 21: “Twenty-​eight words used in ch. xxi do not appear elsewhere in the
Gospel; yet since this is the only fishing scene in the Gospel, we expect a percentage of appropriate
vocabulary” (1079). For further comments on the unreliable nature of linguistic style as an indicator
of authorial origin, see Chris Keith, “The Pericope Adulterae: A Theory of Attentive Insertion,” in
Black and Cerone, Pericope of the Adulteress, 89–​113.
6 Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, 2nd ed.

(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 358–​411; Richard Bauckham, The Testimony of the Beloved
Disciple: Narrative, History, and Theology in the Gospel of John (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic,
2007), 271–​84; Edward Clement Hoskyns, The Fourth Gospel, ed. Francis Noel Davey, 2nd ed.
(London: Faber & Faber, 1947), 550, 559, 561–​2; Craig S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary,
2 vols. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2003), 2:1219–​1222; Christina Petterson, From Tomb to
Text: The Body of Jesus in the Book of John (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017), 127–​133; Stanley
E. Porter, “The Ending of John’s Gospel,” in From Biblical Criticism to Biblical Faith: Essays in Honor of
Lee Martin McDonald, ed. William H. Brackeney and Craig A. Evans (Macon, GA: Mercer University
Press, 2007), 55–​73; Hartwig Thyen, Das Johannesevangelium, HNT 6 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck,
2005), 772–​73; cf. Claussen, “Role,” 59. For a recent defense of the majority position that John 21 is a
late addition to the Gospel of John, see Baum, “Original Epilogue,” 227–​70.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 133

John circulated without John 21, I view it as original until further evidence
emerges.7 We have no evidence whatsoever that any follower of Jesus in the
first through third centuries read or heard read aloud a Gospel of John that
ended at John 20:31. For me, this carries more weight than hypothetical tra-
dition histories that reciprocally reinforce the idea that John’s Gospel origi-
nally ended at John 20:30–​31. This weighting of the evidence is a departure
from much previous Johannine scholarship.8 I will not, however, defend my
view on John 21 further because taking the opposite view would not affect
my argument. Under that circumstance, John 21:24–​25’s later extension of
themes from John 20:30–​31 would only reinforce my claim that such themes
are present in John 20:30–​31.9 Similarly, my argument is entirely unaffected

7 Surviving witnesses to Tatian’s Diatessaron, originally compiled in the late second century ce (on

the date of the Diatessaron, Peter J. Williams, “The Syriac Versions of the Bible,” in NCHB, 528) con-
tain John 21 (§54:24–​38; 55:17), including John 21:24–​25 (§54:38; 55:17) (ANF 9:127–​9; my thanks
to James Barker for pointing out the evidence of the Diatessaron). P66, dated by some to ca. 200
ce (NA28; Hurtado, Earliest, 127n.96, 140, cf. 219), is the earliest manuscript to attest the relevant
portion of the Gospel of John and contains John 21:1–​9. Although M.-​J. Lagrange, Évangile selon
Saint Jean, EBib (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1925), 520, overstates the implausibility of John 21’s later addi-
tion, I agree with his general sentiment: “But this hypothesis of an appendix, even from the same
author, does not seem plausible or necessary” (“Mais cette hypothèse d’un appendice, mȇme émané
du mȇme auteur, ne nous paraȋt ni plausible, ni necessaire”). The lone manuscript of the Gospel of
John that appears to end at John 20:31 is a fourth-​century Coptic manuscript (see Gesa Schenke,
“Das Erscheinen Jesu vor den Jüngern und der ungläubige Thomas, Johannes 20,19–​31,” in Coptica—​
Gnostica—​Manichaica: Mélanges offerts à Wolf-​Peter Funk, ed. Louis Painchaud and Paul-​Hubert
Poirier Bibliothèque Copte de Nag Hammadi 7 [Leuven: Peeters, 2006], 893–​904; note especially
the appropriately cautious statement regarding a Greek original [902]). As a late versional witness,
this manuscript cannot provide evidence of the state of the Greek manuscript tradition two or three
centuries earlier, pace Pokorný, From, 182n.333, and Christian Askeland has now argued that it was
not part of a continuous text (“Caveat Copticam: Cautionary Tales for the Johannine Exegete” [paper
presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, Boston, November 19, 2017]).
One must, however, now consider statements that the Gospel never circulated without John 21 as
overstatements, if only slightly. More recently, Brent Nongbri, “P.Bodmer 2 as Possible Evidence
for the Circulation of the Gospel according to John without Chapter 21,” EC 3.9 (2018): 345–​60,
argued that P.Bodmer 2 (P66) possibly attests the circulation of John 1–​20 without John 21 on the
basis of unused space after John 20 in that manuscript. Ryan A. Kaufman, “Does P66 Suggest a Vorlage
Lacking John 21?” (unpublished paper), offered a rebuttal, suggesting that a variant that Nongbri
overlooked should be included in the reconstructed text, and Nongbri appreciatively acknowledged
that Kaufman offered a better solution (Brent Nongbri, “Ryan Kaufman on the Ending of John 20 in
P.Bodmer 2,” Variant Readings (blog), December 11, 2018, https://​brentnongbri.com/​2018/​12/​11/​
ryan-​kaufman-​on-​the-​ending-​of-​john-​20-​in-​p-​bodmer-​2/​).
8 It is nevertheless aligned with the astute observation of Petterson, From, 126: “A classical position

is to regard the chapter as a later addition. The most important argument against this position is that
there is no textual evidence for such a dismissal; nevertheless, it is carried out with breathtaking ease.
It is thus one of the most consensual sleights of hand in New Testament scholarship.”
9 Scholars frequently view John 21:24–​25 as an imitation of, echo of, or attempt to link to John

20:30–​31. See Brown, Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, 1126, 1129; Rudolf Bultmann, The Gospel
of John, ed. R. W. N. Hoare and J. K. Riches, trans. G. R. Beasley-​Murray (Oxford: Basil Blackwell,
1971), 718; Keener, Gospel, 2:1240–​1241; Francis J. Moloney, The Gospel of John, SP 4 (Collegeville,
MN: Liturgical Press, 1998), 546, 562; Andrew T. Lincoln, The Gospel according to St John, BNTC 4
(London: Continuum, 2005), 523–​24; D. Moody Smith, John, ANTC (Nashville: Abingdon, 1999),
401; Thyen, Johannesevangelium, 773–​4, 796.
134 The Gospel as Gospels

by those who would date the addition of John 21 to John 1–​20 to the first
century ce or early second century ce,10 including those who would at-
tribute this action to the author himself11 or one or more of his immediate
disciples.12

Textual Self-​Consciousness in John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25

Regardless of one’s opinion about John 21, it is clear that John 21:24–​25
repeats some claims from John 20:30–​31. Several repeated themes in John
20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 collectively signal the author’s heightened awareness
of his Gospel’s significance as written tradition. Both texts emphasize that
Jesus’s deeds exceeded those found in the Gospel (John 20:30; 21:25).13 Both
texts also emphasize the sufficiency of the content of John’s Gospel, “these
things” (ταῦτα), for leading the readership to saving belief in Jesus or consti-
tuting true testimony about Jesus (John 20:31; 21:24).14
Related strongly to both of these themes, both texts exhibit a near manic
obsession with the manuscript status of the Johannine account of Jesus.
A form of γράφω occurs at least once in every verse in 20:30–​31 and 21:24
and twice in 21:25.15 John 20:30–​31 contrasts the “many other signs” of Jesus

10 Brown, Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, 1128; R. Alan Culpepper, Anatomy of the Fourth

Gospel: A Study in Literary Design, FF (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983), 96; Heckel, Von Evangelium,
217–​8; Barnabas Lindars, The Gospel of John, NCB (London: Oliphants, 1972), 618; David Trobisch,
The First Edition of the New Testament (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 97.
11 D. Walter Bauer, Das Johannesevangelium, 3rd ed., HNT 6 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1933),

324–​25; J. B. Lightfoot, Biblical Essays (London: Macmillan & Co., 1893), 195 (cf. 197); Brooke Foss
Westcott, The Gospel according to St. John, 2 vols. (London: John Murray, 1908), 2:359; cf. Baum,
“Original Epilogue,” 247, 267; Porter, “Ending,” 73.
12 Baum, “Original Epilogue,” 247 (cf. also 267); Marie-​Émile Boismard, “Le chapitre XXI de Saint

Jean: Essai de critique littéraire,” RB 54 (1947): 495–​97; Brown, Introduction, 82–​84; Martin Hengel,
The Johannine Question, trans. John Bowden (London: SCM, 1989), 84; Hengel, Four, 40, 105.
13 A similar claim occurs in 1 Macc 9:22 in reference to Judas Maccabeus.
14 Although the precise referent of “these things” in 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 is debated, the most

natural reading in light of the emphasis upon the things written in “this book” (20:30) is that they
refer to the Gospel of John as a whole. Similarly, Baum, “Original Epilogue,” 231, 262; Bultmann,
Gospel, 717n.4; Lincoln, Gospel, 505–​7, 522–​23; Lindars, Gospel, 641.
15 Bauckham, Jesus, 358–​62, focuses upon the meaning of γράφω in John 21:24 while arguing that

the passage intends to claim that the Beloved Disciple was in fact responsible for the authorship of
the Gospel of John, “whether or not he wielded the pen” (362). In response to those who have argued
otherwise, he states, “It must be stressed that no one has yet produced any evidence that graphein can
be used to refer to a relationship between the ‘author’ and text more remote than that of the dictation
of a text to a scribe” (361). Although I agree with Bauckham regarding the meaning of the verb in
John 21:24, there is evidence for precisely such a wider usage, even if other scholars have overlooked
it. In Esth 8:8 LXX, Artaxerxes commands Esther and Haman, “Write in my name what you like
and seal it with my ring” (γράψατε καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐκ τοῦ ὀνόματός μου ὡς δοκεῖ ὑμῖν καὶ σφραγίσατε τῷ
δακτυλίῳ). After scribes come and take dictation from Mordecai (Esth 8:8–​9 LXX), Esth 8:10 LXX
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 135

that are not “written” (γεγραμμένα) in the Gospel of John with “these things”
that “have been written” (γέγραπται) in it. Similarly, John 21:24 refers to the
author as “the one who wrote” (ὁ γράψας) “these things,” while 21:25 refers
to the “many other things” that Jesus did, stating that if each one of them
was “written” (γράφηται), the world could not contain “the books written”
(τὰ γραφόμενα βιβλία). This repetition is deliberate and purposeful, as in-
dicated by the fact that 21:24–​25 repeats a number of specific vocabulary
items from 20:30–​31 in addition to γράφω: “many other” (πολλὰ . . . ἄλλα//​
ἄλλα πολλὰ . . .; 20:30//​21:25); “Jesus did” (ἐποίησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς; 20:30//​
21:25); “these things” (ταῦτα; 20:31//​21:24); and “book/​books” (τῳ βιβλίῳ//​
τὰ . . . βιβλία; 20:30//​21:25).

Competitive Textualization in John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25

Furthermore, both of these texts establish a contrastive relationship be-

tween accounts of Jesus in the Gospel of John and accounts of Jesus outside
the Gospel of John that expresses the superiority of the Gospel of John. Both
John 20:31 and 21:25 begin with a δέ, which could be read as adversative.16
Regardless of that possibility, the narrative signals that in contrast to Jesus’s
“many other signs” (20:30) that have not been written in the Gospel of John,
only those written in the Gospel of John do or can have salvific significance.17
As Brown notes, “The contrast between signs not written down and signs that
have been written down is too obvious to overlook.”18 Similarly, the conjunc-
tion’s function in John 21:25 is to signal that in contrast to Jesus’s “many other
things” that could be written in books, it is the testimony of the author “who
wrote these things” (21:24) in John’s Gospel that is true.19 John, therefore,

again clarifies that the edict “was written through the king and sealed in the king’s ring” (ἐγράφη δὲ
διὰ τοῦ βασιλέως καὶ ἐσφραγίσθη τῷ δακτυλίῳ).
16 See BDF §447, which notes that the inclusion of μέν (see John 20:30) always “throws the em-

phasis” upon the content of the δέ clause (see John 20:31).

17 Consider Heckel, Von Evangelium, 149, on John 20:30–​31 specifically: “Der Satz formuliert eine

Selbstreflexion auf das niedergeschriebene Evangelium. Das unterstreicht auch der Hinweis auf das
Buch. Das Evangelium soll in geschriebener Form wirken.” As I note in the main text, the emphasis
on prior written tradition is clearer in John 21:24–​25, though it is possible in John 20:30–​31.
18 Brown, Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, 1056. Similarly, Lincoln, Gospel, 505, 522–​23, notes

the contrasts in John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25.

19 Brown, Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, 1126–​7, 1129, overstates the lack of connection be-

tween 21:24 and 21:25.

136 The Gospel as Gospels

does not imagine a neutral relationship between his book and other sources
for stories about Jesus.
John 21:25 builds upon John 20:30–​31, extending an opinion toward other
accounts of Jesus that is already present in the earlier passage, namely, that
accounts of Jesus outside the Gospel of John are superfluous. John 21:25
extends this opinion in two ways—​by stretching the temporal focus be-
yond the present and by specifying the media form of alternative accounts of
Jesus. John 20:30–​31 has a present temporal focus, as the perfect periphrastic
of 20:30 refers to Jesus’s many other signs that “are not written” (οὐκ ἔστιν
γεγραμμένα) in “this book.” These verses do not clarify whether accounts of
Jesus’s “many other signs” existed as oral tradition or written tradition; either
could serve as the point of contrast depending on where interpreters place
the point of emphasis. That is, the author could conceivably be contrasting
“this book” with oral tradition. But the author could just as conceivably be
contrasting “this book” with another book or other books. Or he could be
doing both. What sources one thinks the author already had available almost
inevitably influences how one reads John 20:30, as we will see later in this
chapter.
John 21:25, however, specifically identifies other written tradition20 and
extends the temporal focus into the future or, more accurately, into the hy-
pothetical, with the subjunctive. Even if someone wrote Jesus’s many other
things one by one (ἐὰν γράφηται καθʼ ἓν), the world could not contain “the
books written” (τὰ γραφόμενα βιβλία).21 One does not need many written
accounts of Jesus; one needs only this particular written account of Jesus.
John 21:25 technically refers to Jesus books that could exist in the future, not
Jesus books that exist in the present. But it is not unreasonable to assume that
the author castigates any and all future competitors in the Jesus book market
in John 21:25 as a means of castigating present competitors. In light of the
connections with John 20:30, this is the most likely meaning. To the dismay
of Johannine scholars, the author does not refer to any other Jesus books
by name, but his rhetoric is clear with these deliberately repeated themes.
Collectively, John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 assert the superiority of John’s
Gospel, as a Jesus book, to any other Jesus traditions that do exist or could
exist in the future, particularly those that might also take the form of a book.

20 D. M. Smith, John, 372, rightly observes this shift.

21 Brown, Gospel according to John XIII–​XXI, 1129, misses the temporal shift and overlooks
the manners in which 21:25 extends the claims of 20:30 when he claims that 21:25 “awkwardly”
repeats 20:30.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 137

“This Book” among Other Books or in Contrast to

Other Books?

Some readers may object that I am reading too much into the “this” (τοῦτο)
of John 20:30’s “this book.” They might suggest that I am committing the
same error with which I charged Stanton in the previous chapter regarding
his reading of “this (τοῦτο) gospel” at Matt 24:14 and 26:13, that of asking
a demonstrative pronoun to carry more argumentative weight than it can.
John 20:30 should be read, so the argument would run, as a neutral refer-
ence to “this book” as a particular Jesus book among other equally good
Jesus books rather than as “this book” in contrast to other Jesus traditions,
including other books.
As an initial response, Stanton and I are not making the same argu-
ment about what the presence of the demonstrative pronoun indicates. For
Stanton, the Matthean references to “this gospel” (Matt 24:14; 26:13) indi-
cate an awareness of the gospel specifically as written. As I stated previously,
Matthew is aware of his Gospel as a written entity, but such awareness rises
to the surface of the narrative in Matt 1:1, not Matt 24:14 and 26:13.22 It is not
clear that the usages of τοῦτο at Matt 24:14 and 26:13 necessarily indicate a
meaning of Matthew’s written Gospel instead of, for example, a meaning of
orally proclaimed gospel. In contrast, I have argued that the usage of τοῦτο at
John 20:30, particularly in combination with the reference in 21:25 to other
“written books” (τὰ γραφόμενα βιβλία), indicates an awareness of the written
Johannine Gospel with a view to other written Jesus tradition. I am, in other
words, arguing that the demonstrative pronoun in John 20:30 reflects aware-
ness of and demarcation from others in the same class.23
If John views “these things” written in “this book” as solely complemen-
tary to the “many other signs” outside his Gospel, it is difficult to explain why,
once he creates the distinction between the traditions in his book and those
outside it, he presses the distinction further by stating specifically that “this
book” leads to salvific “life” in 20:31 and that “these things” (ταῦτα) in it were
written by the disciple whose testimony is “true” in 21:25. In both ways, he
aligns “life” and “truth” not just with Jesus but with Jesus as he is presented in

22 See ­chapter 4.
23 Cf. Petterson, From, on John 20:30–​31, who similarly observes an emphasis in the text upon the
Jesus traditions in John’s Gospel as a “selection out of a larger body of material” (124) and observes
further: “The significance of the references to writing at the end of the text instead of at the beginning
is the gradual coming into the world of the word, which began ἐν ἀρχῇ (1.1) and here materializes
into a book in one’s hands in 20:30–​31” (132).
138 The Gospel as Gospels

“this book” (20:30) and in distinction from other “written books” (21:25). It
is therefore not an over-​assertion to see the presence of these demonstrative
pronouns in the Johannine colophons as expressive of a conviction of supe-
riority to rivals.
The heightened sense of the social significance of writing and texts in John
20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 is present elsewhere in the Gospel of John. It displays
a similar awareness of the importance of textuality in the uniquely Johannine
account of the Jewish leadership requesting Pilate not to write “king of the
Jews” on the titulus but that Jesus claimed to be king of the Jews (19:19–​21).
In response, the author has Pilate state: “What I have written, I have written”
(ὃ γέγραφα γέγραφα). Similarly, only the Gospel of John includes the ac-
count of Jesus’s audience asking about his literacy (John 7:15). The Gospel
of John was also the chosen location for a later scribe to insert the Pericope
Adulterae into John 7:53–​8:11, the only account of Jesus in tradition that be-
came canonical that applies γράφω or its cognates to Jesus (John 8:6, 8).24

Scriptural Consciousness in the Gospel of John

Going beyond a sense of superiority, the Gospel of John also exhibits a scrip-
tural consciousness. The author conceives of the written Gospel as on par
with the Scriptures of Israel since it can lead to life (John 20:31). In the words
of Sheridan, “This book takes the position that in writing γραφή of its own,
John is ‘re-​telling’ the biblical narrative.”25 The key part of Sheridan’s state-
ment for the present argument is that John does envision that he is writing
Scripture of his own, as is particularly clear in his usage of the formulaic
γέγραπται at John 20:31 for the things written in his book. Like other known
early Jesus books, then, the Gospel of John parasitically draws upon the
Hebrew Scriptures to establish its position, but it takes a step heretofore not
taken in claiming that it leads—​as written Jesus tradition—​to salvation.
The earlier Johannine narrative buttresses the argument that its author
considers it to be scriptural. At the end of John 5, in dialogue with “the Jews”
(οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι) (John 5:16, 18), Jesus conscripts “the Scriptures” to his side of

24 See Keith, Pericope Adulterae.

25 Ruth Sheridan, Retelling Scripture: ‘The Jews’ and the Scriptural Citations in John 1:19–​12:15,
BibInt 110 (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 32. Consider Keener, Gospel of John, 2:1215: “Because he is inspired
by the Paraclete . . . , the author may quietly suggest that his work belongs in the same category with
the Scriptures of old.”
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 139

the debate: “You search the Scriptures (τὰς γραφάς), because you consider to
have eternal life (ζωὴν) in them; yet these testify about me” (5:39). He drives
this point home by enlisting Moses and the law on his side but, even further,
by claiming that he is their interpretive referent (5:45). Pressing this logic
to its conclusion, Jesus then equates their rejection of him with rejection of
Moses: “For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for that one wrote
(ἔγραψεν) about me” (5:46). The Johannine Jesus here turns the law of Moses
into something of a Jesus book, since, according to Jesus, “Moses wrote about
me.” Returning to the end of the Johannine narrative, we should not miss the
logical connections to John 5, in addition to the repetition of the language of
“writings” and “life.” When the narrator states that “these things have been
written (γέγραπται) . . . in order that you have life (ζωὴν)” (John 20:31), he
claims that his Gospel accomplishes what, according to John 5:39, Jesus’s
opponents search for in “the Scriptures”—​“life” (ζωή). In light of the Mosaic
themes, the narrator is also likely claiming that his Gospel provides what,
according to Deut 30, the Mosaic commandments provide when Moses
admonishes the Israelites on the plains of Moab to choose “life” (τὴν ζωήν)
(Deut 30:19 LXX) by keeping those commandments (30:16).
The scriptural consciousness on display in John 20:30–​31 thus extends
from the Johannine Jesus’s conviction that Moses wrote about him and
attempts to establish a considerable position for itself within the reading
community it constructs, a community in which the distinction between
Scripture and Jesus books has collapsed, at least in reference to the law and
“this book” about Jesus. The Gospel’s claim to a preeminent, even scriptural,
position is patent. By “writing” “these things” about Jesus “in this book,” the
author asserts nothing less than that he is providing “life” to the reader, and
thus continuing the work of Moses himself, who “wrote” about Jesus.

The Johannine Colophons and John’s Predecessors

Such an elevated claim also has implications for how the Gospel of John posi-
tions itself with regard to its more contemporary competitors in the market
of Jesus books. Johannine competitive textualization ups the ante consid-
erably. Whereas Luke claimed superiority to prior Jesus books and to offer
“truth” or “security” (Luke 1:4), John claims that his Jesus book, and “this
book” alone, offers salvation or “life.” In light of the similarities between
the Johannine colophons and the Lukan prologue, it is not surprising that
140 The Gospel as Gospels

scholars often refer to Luke 1:1–​4 when discussing John 20:30–​31 or 21:24–​
2526 or vice versa.27 Both authors display an awareness of alternative sources
for the Jesus tradition but indicate the superiority of their written accounts of
Jesus.28 Such observations raise questions. How aware was John of his com-
petitors in this market? What exactly are the other accounts of Jesus to which
John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 could allude? And, most important, are they the
Synoptic Gospels?
The Synoptic Gospels are the strongest possible candidates for the other ac-
counts of Jesus to which John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 refer. This claim must be
tempered, however. John does not explicitly name any other contemporary
Jesus tradition, and thus any theory must proceed in light of this silence. Also,
the Synoptic Gospels are not the only possible candidates for other accounts of
Jesus that the author knew. Nevertheless, they are, in my estimation, the most
likely candidates, for the following two reasons.
First, as noted, the author seems particularly concerned to emphasize his
Gospel’s superiority, as a book itself, over other books about Jesus.29 This is ex-
plicitly the case in John 21:24–​25 and possibly the case in John 20:30–​31. In the
very least, one can observe that the author thinks that βιβλία are particularly
authoritative cultural expressions of tradition (21:25) and that his βιβλίον in
particular (20:30) is the most authoritative of any such expressions concerning
Jesus that do exist or will exist.
Second, if we ask what other Jesus books the author could have conceived
as competitors in the textualization of the Jesus tradition, only four possi-
bilities emerge in light of present evidence: the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel
of Matthew, the Gospel of Luke, and the so-​called Egerton Gospel attested
by P.Egerton 2 and P.Köln 255.30 The force of this point was often diluted in

26 Baum, “Original Epilogue,” 233; Gamble, Books, 103; Keener, Gospel, 2:1241n.12; Thyen,

Johannesevangelium, 2; D. M. Smith, John, 31; Hans Windisch, Johannes und die Synoptiker: Wollte
der vierte Evangelist die älteren Evangelien ergänzen oder ersetzen?, UNT 12 (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs,
1926), 121.
27 Bovon, Luke 1, 1:17; Cadbury, “Commentary,” 489.
28 Gamble, Books, 103, refers to both as “book conscious.”
29 Contra J. Becker, Mündliche, 141, 154, who argues that the Johannine colophons know only oral

traditions outside the Gospel of John and thus do not know the tradition process of the Synoptics,
even though he acknowledges that the Synoptics were in circulation at this point.
30 Although earlier proposals for the dating of the Gospel of Thomas exist (see Uwe-​ Karsten
Plisch, The Gospel of Thomas: Original Text with Commentary, trans. Gesine Schenke Robinson
[Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2008], 15–​16), Goodacre, Thomas, 54–​71, has argued con-
vincingly for a second-​century date. Similarly, and despite proposals to place it in the first century
ce, the Gospel of Peter is best understood as a second-​century text that develops canonical texts
(Paul Foster, “The Gospel of Peter,” in Non-​Canonical, 38–​41; Alan Kirk, “The Johannine Jesus in the
Gospel of Peter: A Social Memory Approach,” in Jesus in Johannine Tradition, ed. Robert T. Fortna
and Tom Thatcher [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001], 313–​21). The only other possibility is
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 141

previous scholarship by scholars’ willingness to treat hypothetical sources for

the Gospel of John as equally likely as known sources. But if we restrict our-
selves to definite possibilities, these are the only four.
Of these four, three predated the Gospel of John under traditional
datings—​the Synoptic Gospels. The fourth candidate, the so-​called Egerton
Gospel, exhibits some form of literary relationship with John’s Gospel. This
relationship is perhaps most clear in verbatim and near-​verbatim correspon-
dences between John 5, John 9, and lines 8–​24 on the verso of fragment 1.31
Most scholars date P.Egerton 2 to the second or third century ce, and thus
later than the Gospel of John.32 Watson, however, has recently argued for the
priority of P.Egerton 2.33 Despite his thorough consideration, the best expla-
nation of the data is still that P.Egerton 2 is later than the Gospel of John and
has knowledge of Johannine and Synoptic tradition. Watson’s arguments for
Johannine posteriority are often fragile.34 He has also underestimated, in my
view, the overlap between the Synoptic accounts of the leper (Mark 1:40–​45//​
Matt 8:1–​4//​Luke 5:12–​16) and a similar account in P.Egerton 2 fragment 1
recto lines 11–​20.35 Regardless of this point, however, even Watson would

Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord, which is unlikely. This possibility would require that the
Gospel of John be dated to later than 110–​130 ce, when Papias was writing (see Hill, “Fragments,”
42–​43).
31 For example: “Your accuser is Moses, in whom you trust” (John 5:45//​P.Egerton 2 fragment 1

verso lines 13–​15); “We know that God spoke to Moses” (John 9:29//​P.Egerton 2 fragment 1 verso
lines 15–​16); “For if you believed Moses, you would believe me, for that one wrote concerning me”
(John 5:46//​P.Egerton 2 fragment 1 verso lines 20–​24). The only differences between the Gospel of
John in NA28 and P.Egerton 2 in these passages are the tenses of “spoke” in the John 9:29 parallel
(perfect in the Gospel of John, aorist in P.Egerton 2) and of the second “believe” in the John 5:46 par-
allel (imperfect in the Gospel of John, aorist in P.Egerton 2). For Greek, see Andrew Bernhard, Other
Early Christian Gospels: A Critical Edition of the Surviving Greek Manuscripts (London: T&T Clark,
2007), 88–​89.
32 For a recent summary of proposed dates, see Stanley E. Porter, “Der Papyrus Egerton 2

(P.Egerton/​P.Lond.Christ 1),” in Markschies and Schröter, Antike christliche Apokryphen, 1:361–​2.

33 Watson, Gospel, 286–​325; see also Watson, “How,” 4–​5.
34 For example, Watson believes the whole question must be reopened on account of reading an

eta instead of an upsilon in line 23 of P.Egerton 2 fragment 1 verso, as is traditionally read (Watson,
Gospel Writing, 295–​96; for the traditional reading, see Bernhard, Other, 88–​89 and the back matter
for an image of the fragment). Thus, instead of agreeing with John 6:49’s “your (ὑμῶν) fathers,”
Watson’s reconstructed P.Egerton 2 reads “our (ἡμῶν) fathers,” which he considers a “totally un-​
Johannine usage on the lips of Jesus” (Watson, Gospel Writing, 295). Watson stretches the “totally un-​
Johannine” nature of this phrase. The phrase might not otherwise occur on Jesus’s lips, but it is hardly
un-​Johannine. The exact phrase occurs on the Samaritan woman’s lips in John 4:20 and the lips of the
crowd in John 6:31. Furthermore, even if Watson’s reconstruction is correct, it does not change the
fact that this phrase is embedded in a context in P.Egerton 2 that is thoroughly Johannine. See note
31 above.
35 Watson, Gospel Writing, 324, claims that P.Egerton 2’s version of the leper story “shows few if

any signs of dependence on the synoptic versions.” He argues that the Egerton version of the leper
pericope is pre-​Markan in “How,” 5.
142 The Gospel as Gospels

presumably agree that the case for the Gospel of John’s posteriority to (and
familiarity with) P.Egerton 2 is much more debatable than the case for the
Gospel of John’s familiarity with the Synoptics.36 Therefore, although they
are not the only possibilities, the Synoptic Gospels must hold pride of place
as the most likely possibilities for other Jesus books to which John 20:30–​31
and 21:24–​25 obliquely refer.
The position argued here is not new. Barrett saw John 20:30 as an indi-
cation that the author “was likely familiar with much of the synoptic tra-
dition.”37 Similarly in reference to John 20:30, Thyen claimed that John
assumed his readers knew these other signs from the Synoptics.38 Although
he does not elaborate the point, Bauckham likewise claimed that readers of
the Gospel of John might have understood John 20:30’s “many other signs” in
light of their knowledge of the Gospel of Mark.39 Furthermore, upon the sup-
position of the lateness of John 21, some scholars argue that John 21:24–​25
does or could refer to the Synoptics.40

Reasons for Reconsideration

The implications of John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 for the question of the
Gospel of John’s knowledge of the Synoptics furthermore bear revisiting in
light of recent research. At least three matters reflecting the changing winds

36 Cf. Watson, Gospel Writing, 290–​96, on the scholarly consensus of P.Egerton 2’s dependence

upon the Gospel of John. On John’s knowledge of the Synoptics, he says, “John’s use of Mark is highly
selective, but here at least [the trial before Pilate] it is undeniable. There are also indications that this
evangelist can draw on Matthew and Luke to supplement Mark” (384).
37 C. K. Barrett, The Gospel according to St John, 2nd ed. (London: SPCK, 1978), 575. Barrett

defends the Gospel of John’s knowledge of Mark’s Gospel at 42–​46. Barrett’s point at 45 resonates
with the argument I will develop later: “Anyone who prefers to say, ‘Not Mark, but the oral tradition
on which Mark was based,’ or ‘Not Mark, but a written source on which Mark drew,’ may claim that
his hypothesis fits the evidence equally well. All that can be said is that we do not have before us the
oral tradition on which Mark was based; we do not have any of the written sources that Mark may
have quoted; but we do have Mark, and in Mark are the stories that John repeats. . . . Anyone who after
an interval of nineteen centuries feels himself in a position to distinguish nicely between ‘Mark’ and
‘something much like Mark,’ is at liberty to do so. The simpler hypothesis, which does not involve the
postulation of otherwise unknown entities, is not without attractiveness.”
38 Thyen, Johannesevangelium, 774: “So setzt er wiederum voraus, daß seine potentiellen Leser,

vermutlich doch wohl aus ihrem Vertrautsein mit den synoptischen Evangelien, um derartige
Zeichen wissen.”
39 Richard Bauckham, “John for Readers of Mark,” in Bauckham, Gospels for All Christians, 169.
40 Heckel, Von Evangelium, 150 (cf. also the argument that the author of John 21could have intro-

duced the κατά titles to the Gospels, 207–​17); D. M. Smith, John, 372, 401; D. M. Smith, John among
the Gospels, 240n.63, 241; D. Moody Smith, “When Did the Gospels Become Scripture?” JBL 119
(2000): 13, 19; Trobisch, First, 100; cf. Keener, Gospel, 2:1241.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 143

of scholarship make the present argument more forceful than it has perhaps
been in the past: (1) a decreased interest in positing hypothetical sources;
(2) a resurgence of arguments for John’s knowledge of the Synoptics; and
(3) increased attention to the significance of the Gospels as written artifacts.
First, Johannine scholarship has witnessed a turn away from source-​
critical hypothetical reconstructions of John’s sources. Source-​critical recon-
structions of the tradition history of the Gospel of John, whether Bultmann’s
three-​source theory,41 Fortna’s signs source,42 Brown’s complex multistage
community development theory(ies),43 or any modern variants,44 gain(ed)
currency from a form-​critically inspired and historical-​positivist era of New
Testament scholarship. In this era, scholars had great confidence in their
abilities to stratify layers of the gospel tradition and assign them to corre-
sponding stages of a community’s development. This source-​critical pro-
cedure and the concomitant Gospel community hypothesis it requires,
however, have both received strong criticism. Scholars working in media
studies (orality, textuality, and memory) have increasingly eroded confi-
dence in the criteria by which scholars identify earlier (often oral) traditions
in written texts.45 (One can observe similar erosions of scholarly confidence
in the ability to mine and recover earlier states of the gospel tradition from
the written Gospels in the demise of the criteria of authenticity in historical
Jesus studies and the increased popularity of the Farrer-​Goulder solution to
the Synoptic problem.)46 Separately, Bauckham’s Gospel for All Christians and

41 Bultmann, Gospel, 6–​7.

42 Robert T. Fortna, The Gospel of Signs: A Reconstruction of the Narrative Source Underlying the
Fourth Gospel, SNTSMS 11 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970); Robert T. Fortna,
The Fourth Gospel and Its Predecessor: From Narrative Source to Present Gospel (Edinburgh: T&T
Clark, 1988).
43 Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel according to John I–​XII, 2nd ed., AB 29 (New York: Doubleday,

1966), xxxiv–​xxxix (five stages); Raymond E. Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple: The Life,
Loves, and Hates of an Individual Church in New Testament Times (New York: Paulist, 1979), 22–​24
(four stages); Brown, Introduction, 62–​89 (three stages).
44 For example, Paul N. Anderson, The Fourth Gospel and the Quest for Jesus: Modern Foundations

Reconsidered, 2nd ed. (London: T&T Clark, 2007), 101–​26; Paul N. Anderson, “Mark, John, and
Answerability: Interfluentiality and Dialectic between the Second and Fourth Gospels,” LASBF
63 (2013): 197–​245; Urban C. von Wahlde, The Gospels and Letters of John, 3 vols., ECC (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010).
45 Eric Eve, Behind the Gospels: Understanding the Oral Tradition (London: SPCK, 2013), 15–​32,

47–​65, 86–​134; Rafael Rodríguez, Oral Tradition and the New Testament: A Guide for the Perplexed
(London: T&T Clark, 2014), 55–​85.
46 On the former, see Chris Keith and Anthony Le Donne, eds., Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of

Authenticity (London: T&T Clark, 2012). On the latter, see Goodacre, Case; Mark S. Goodacre and
Nicholas Perrin, eds., Questioning Q: A Multidimensional Critique (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2005);
Poirier and Peterson, Marcan Priority without Q. Cf. however, Kirk, Q, for a detailed defense of the
Two-​document hypothesis.
144 The Gospel as Gospels

Klink’s related The Audience of the Gospels exposed numerous weaknesses in

the theory that each Gospel was intended for a single Christian community
to the exclusion of others.47
Thatcher has thus rightly observed a “waning interest” in such meth-
ods and theories among more recent scholars, and I place myself within
that group, as c­ hapter 3 made explicit.48 I acknowledge the great amount
of learning in these previous studies and the indebtedness of current New
Testament studies to their contributions. To stand on the shoulders of giants
and appreciate the view does not require us to remain there, however.
The implications of this shift for the present issue are significant. Scholars
who are willing to entertain hypothetical sources for the Gospel of John and
complex tradition histories can appeal to these sources as possible referents
in John 20:30 and 21:25. Thus, Bultmann argued that John 20:30 refers to
(and was borrowed from) his proposed signs source,49 and Fortna concluded
from 20:30 that the fourth evangelist “had the signs source before him when
he wrote.”50 More recently, J. Becker has argued that the Johannine colophons
are not references to the Synoptics and that connections between them are
better explained by secondary orality and the Johannine evangelists’ usage of
the hypothetical signs source (Wunderquelle) and independent passion tra-
dition.51 For those who restrict their theories to known evidence, however,
the possible referents for John 20:30 and 21:25 are considerably fewer. There
really are only four known Jesus books that could antedate the Gospel of
John. Among them, only the three Synoptic Gospels have a clear-​cut case for
priority to the Gospel of John. And, as noted at the beginning of this section,

47 Bauckham, Gospels for All Christians; Edward Klink III, ed., The Audience of the Gospels: Further

Conversation about the Origin and Function of the Gospels in Early Christianity, LNTS 353
(London: T&T Clark, 2010).
48 Quotation from Tom Thatcher, “The New Current through John: The Old ‘New Look’ and the

New Critical Orthodoxy,” in Lozada and Thatcher, New, 7.

49 Bultmann, Gospel of John, 6–​7, 698 (“[The evangelist] is able to use this conclusion of the source

without fear of misunderstanding, and at the same time outwardly to conform his book to the form
of Gospel literature as it had already become traditional.”). Cf. similarly J. Becker, Mündliche, 144,
154n.78.
50 Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 223; repeated at Fortna, Fourth Gospel, 219.
51 J. Becker, Mündliche, 141, 144–​45, 154n.78. J. Becker also argues against Johannine knowledge

of the Synoptics on the grounds that “there is so far no clear evidence that so early a community had
all three Synoptics in its library” (“Es gibt . . . bisher keinen eindeutigen Beleg dafür, dass es so früh
schon eine Gemeinde gab, die alle drei Synoptiker in ihrer Bibliothek stehen hatte”) (145). There is
also no clear evidence of a church not having all three Synoptics in its library, since there is no clear
evidence of a “community library” among followers of Jesus at this time at all. Our substantial igno-
rance of these matters cuts in both directions. For evidence of early Christian libraries, see Hurtado
and Keith, “Writing,” 75–​77.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 145

this point stands also for those scholars who date John 21 after John 1–​20 but
still in the first century or early second century ce.
The second matter demonstrating a renewed relevance of John 20:30–​31 and
21:24–​25 for the question of the Gospel of John’s relationship to the Synoptics
is the resurgence of arguments for John’s knowledge of the Synoptics. In 1989
and 2000, Hengel affirmed the Gospel of John’s knowledge of the Synoptics.52
Bauckham defended the Gospel of John’s knowledge of Mark’s Gospel in 1998
and 2006.53 Thyen’s major 2005 commentary on the Gospel of John argues that
it knew all three Synoptics, as does Lincoln’s 2005 Gospel of John commen-
tary.54 Brant’s 2011 commentary claims that the Gospel of John’s knowledge of
the Synoptics “remains viable,” and Barker’s 2015 John’s Use of Matthew argues
that John’s Gospel knew Matthew’s Gospel.55 At a 2018 pre-​SNTS conference in
Athens organized by Catrin Williams, Helen K. Bond, and Eve-​Marie Becker
focused on the question of John’s possible knowledge of the Gospel of Mark,
the clear majority of scholars affirmed this likelihood.56 These are just a sample
of scholars exhibiting this trend. If, on other grounds, scholars are convinced
that the author of the Gospel of John was aware of the Synoptics, this raises the
likelihood that he could have them in his peripheral vision in John 20:30–​31 and
21:24–​25.
This observation is particularly relevant because some of the most recent
advocates of the Gospel of John’s knowledge of the Synoptics overlook the
colophons entirely. This oversight has not always been the case. Windisch
considered these texts as “the last and perhaps strongest argument” for his
then-​groundbreaking thesis in 1926 that the author of the Gospel of John
was not dependent upon the Synoptics but knew them and intended to sup-
plant them.57 Nevertheless, Lincoln’s 2005 commentary, for example, never
mentions them in its defense that the Gospel of John knew all three Synoptics
and does not refer to the Synoptics in its discussion of John 20:30–​31 or

52 Hengel, Johannine, 75; Hengel, Four, 39; cf. 105–​6.

53 Bauckham, “John for Readers of Mark,” 147–​71; Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, 127–​9,
194–​201, respectively.
54 Thyen, Johannesevangelium, 4; Lincoln, Gospel, 32–​39, respectively.
55 Jo-​Ann Brant, John, Paideia (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011), 10; Barker, John’s Use,

respectively.
56 Becker, Bond, and Williams, John’s Transformation.
57 Windisch, Johannes, 121–​4; quotation from 124 (“das letzte und vielleicht stärkste Argument”).

I thank James Barker for helping me acquire a copy of Windisch’s study. Cf. D. M. Smith, John among
the Gospels, 29: “If the colophons are the strongest evidence for the displacement theory, it is much
less certain than Windisch thinks.” Smith unnecessarily downplays the significance of John 20:30–​31
and 21:24–​25 by focusing upon Windisch’s argument for the “displacement theory.”
146 The Gospel as Gospels

21:24–​25.58 Similarly, Barker’s defense of John’s knowledge of the Gospel of

Matthew does not mention John 20:30–​31 and 21:25.59 The colophons also
play no role in Bird’s 2014 report on research, which affirms the Gospel of
John’s knowledge of the Synoptics.60 If the argument forwarded above is cor-
rect, it strengthens these and other arguments for the Gospel of John’s know-
ledge of the Synoptics that are based upon literary style or redaction.

Why John Wrote a Gospel

The third scholarly trend justifying a reconsideration of John 20:30–​31 and

21:24–​25, and by far the most important for present purposes, is the recent
emphasis upon the significance of the Gospels as written artifacts, which was
discussed in c­ hapter 2. The most thorough treatment of this issue as it relates
to the Gospel of John is the work of Thatcher in his significant study Why
John Wrote a Gospel and a prior essay.61 Thatcher shows convincingly that
the Gospel of John’s theory of the Paraclete as the one who reminds, teaches,
and guides Jesus’s followers (John 14:15–​17, 26; 15:26–​27; 16:12–​14) seems
to preclude the dominant scholarly view that the author wrote his Gospel as
an aide-​mémoire.62 This observation then underscores the curious question
of why the author did commit the Gospel to writing. Thatcher argues that the
author textualized the Johannine Jesus tradition in order to capitalize upon
the symbolic significance and rhetorical impact of books in a predominantly
illiterate culture.
Thatcher’s most important observation is that asking why the author
crafted the narrative he did in response to his situation—​why he composed
the Gospel of John—​is one question, and asking why he then committed this
narrative to the written medium—​why he wrote the Gospel of John—​is an-
other question. Noting the likelihood that the author wrote the Gospel in a
context of conflict, Thatcher asks,

58 Lincoln, Gospel, 32–​39, 504–​8, 522–​24.

59 Barker, John’s Use.
60 Bird, Gospel, 188–​213. Bird does, however, cite approvingly Baum, “Original Epilogue,” in a foot-

note (191n.178).
61 Thatcher, Why; Thatcher, “Why,” 79–​97. For another engagement with Thatcher on these mat-

ters, see Eve, Writing, 32–​34.

62 Thatcher, Why, 23–​36; Thatcher, “Why,” 80–​85.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 147

Why did John choose to write a Gospel in response to his difficult situa-
tion, rather than, say, preaching a sermon? Or assassinating the leading
local Pharisees? Or organizing a mass suicide for all Christians in the area?
Or filing a protest with the Roman authorities? Or simply giving in, reject-
ing Christ, and returning to the Jewish fold?63 Why, from all these and
many other options, did John choose to write a Gospel in response to his
situation?64

He thus defines his line of inquiry: “I am interested in the shift from memory/​
tradition to written text that produced the Fourth Gospel and in the motives
behind that shift. . . . I am concerned with John’s recycling of traditional ma-
terial and the motives behind his decision to commit these traditional mate-
rials to writing.”65
Thatcher also states that in light of this focus, his study “seeks to tran-
scend the problem of possible literary sources,” which clearly includes the
question of whether John knew the Synoptics.66 He nevertheless expresses
doubt that John used any sources other than the Beloved Disciple and
states that, regardless, it “makes no difference whatsoever” to his argument
about why the author wrote a Gospel.67 Thus, when Thatcher addresses
John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25, he does so in relation to the Gospel of John’s
status as written text in the Johannine community, not in relation to the
Gospel of John’s possible knowledge of other written texts from outside the
Johannine community.68
Above I emphasized Thatcher’s two references to the “motives” behind the
shift of the oral Johannine tradition into written tradition because it reveals
the point at which his overall theory is most open to criticism. Thatcher’s
statements reveal a false choice between defining the author’s motives for
textualization internally (in terms of the Johannine community) or exter-
nally (in terms of previous written sources of the Jesus tradition). At the crux

63 Thatcher would have been better served here to imply that the author has left the Christ-​

affirming “fold” rather than the “Jewish fold” in general.

64 Thatcher, Why, 8.
65 Thatcher, Why, xvi–​xvii (emphases added).
66 Thatcher, Why, xvi.
67 Thatcher, Why, xvi. Thatcher defines the Beloved Disciple as “a real person, albeit portrayed now

as a legendary figure” (xv).

68 Thatcher, Why, 45. Cf. Thatcher, “Why,” 94, where he suggests that 21:24 has in view “competing

memories of Jesus.”
148 The Gospel as Gospels

of this presentation is possibly the aforementioned highly debated Gospel

community hypothesis, but in any case this false choice leads Thatcher to fail
to consider seriously whether even part of the author’s motives for textual-
ization could have emerged from awareness of prior instances of the textu-
alization of the Jesus tradition. In contrast, I suggest that at least one strong
possibility for why the author of the Gospel of John chose the written me-
dium for his authoritative account of Jesus was precisely that he was aware of
other accounts of Jesus that had successfully harnessed the written medium
and established themselves with some degree of prominence among early
followers of Jesus, accounts with which he intended to compete. In the least,
the tremendous amount of similar traditions between the Gospel of John and
the Synoptic Gospels—​enlisted ubiquitously in arguments over Johannine
knowledge of the Synoptics based upon redaction criticism—​warrant taking
this possibility seriously.
To state this conclusion more directly, the question of other written
sources of Jesus tradition is precisely what John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 will
not allow the critic to transcend if that critic is asking about the author’s
motives. For these passages explicitly explain the author’s commitment of
the Jesus tradition to writing—​an issue that Thatcher has rightly thrown
into sharp relief—​by referring to alternative sources for stories of Jesus,
including alternative written sources. The implication of the preceding ar-
gument is therefore that one strong possible motive for the author’s textual-
ization of the Jesus tradition was his awareness of prior textualizations of the
Jesus tradition, which he considered inferior to his scriptural Gospel. What
he envisioned for the future of earlier textualizations of the Jesus tradition
remains an open question.69 As the only certain textualizations of the Jesus
tradition that antedate the Gospel of John, however, the Synoptic Gospels
are the most likely candidates for the author’s envisioned competitors. John
20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 should thus function as supporting evidence for the
theory that John was familiar with the Synoptics. He likely was aware of the
trend of competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition and intended to
contribute actively to it.

69 Scholars have held a variety of views, ranging from the Gospel of John’s intended supplanting

of the Synoptic tradition to its intended complementarity. See D. M. Smith, John among the Gospels,
throughout, and, more succinctly, Bird, Gospel, 194–​211. As I stated in the previous chapter, the “sup-
plant versus support” framework is a false choice. The Johannine narrative alternately affirms and
contests inherited Jesus tradition.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 149

The Johannine Closing and the Markan Opening

I have thus far argued that the Synoptic Gospels are the most likely candi-
dates for other written Jesus traditions to which the colophons refer without
arguing for the Gospel of John’s knowledge of a specific Synoptic Gospel.
John 20:31 may, however, contain a more direct claim for superiority over
the Gospel of Mark. As noted above, John 20:31 states that “these things have
been written” in order that the reader have “life” (ζωήν), which, according to
Jesus in John 5:39–​46, is not available in “the Scriptures” without the recog-
nition that Moses wrote about him.70 In this way, the Gospel claims for itself
the accomplishment of the purposes of Moses’s writing. The content of the
belief that John’s Gospel offers its readers in John 20:31 is more specific than
simply leading to “life,” however. John 20:31 states, “But these things have
been written in order that you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God
(ἵνα πιστεύητε [or πιστεύσητε]71 ὅτι Ἰησοῦς ἐστιν ὁ χριστὸς ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ)
and that, by believing (πιστεύοντες), you might have life in his name.” The
Gospel states its purpose specifically as enabling a salvific “belief ” in Jesus as
“Christ” and “son of God.”
This claim is conspicuous because the very first lines of Mark’s Gospel
are “the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, son of God” (ἀρχὴ τοῦ
εὐαγγελίου Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ υἱοῦ Θεοῦ).72 The exact same two titles for Jesus—​
“Christ” and “son of God”—​appear in apposition at Mark 1:1 and John 20:31
and their occurrence together in these Gospels is not necessarily common.
Χριστός occurs nineteen times in John’s Gospel,73 and some version of ὁ υἱὸς
τοῦ θεοῦ occurs nine times.74 The two terms occur in immediate apposition
only twice—​at Martha’s confession of belief in Jesus at John 11:27 and here at
John 20:31, which describes salvific belief to the reader. Since the trifecta of
“belief,” “Christ,” and “son of God” occurs in both passages—​Martha’s con-
fession is literally, “I have believed that you are the Christ, the son of God”
(πεπίστευκα ὅτι σὺ εἶ ὁ χριστὸς ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ)—​the combination of the
two titles with Johannine “belief ” in Jesus does not seem to be accidental.
Both terms occur fewer times in Mark’s Gospel (χριστός seven times,75 ὁ

70 Also noted by Eve, Writing, 34.

71 On the tricky issue of whether to read the present subjunctive or aorist subjunctive of πιστεύω in
John 20:31, see Metzger, Textual, 219–​20.
72 I discuss manuscripts that omit “son of God” immediately below.
73 John 1:17, 20, 25, 41; 3:28; 4:25, 29; 7:26, 27, 31, 41 (x2), 42; 9:22; 10:24; 11:27; 12:34; 17:3; 20:31.
74 John 1:34, 49; 3:18; 5:25; 10:36; 11:4, 27; 19:7; 20:31; cf. 3:17.
75 Mark 1:1; 8:29; 9:41; 12:35; 13:21; 14:61; 15:32.
150 The Gospel as Gospels

υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ four times,)76 but the narrative places them in apposition only
once—​Mark 1:1.77 Does John 20:31 reveal familiarity with Mark 1:1, thereby
asserting that if one wants to believe that Jesus is who Mark 1:1 says he is and
therefore confess correctly what Martha confessed—​that Jesus is the Christ
and son of God—​one actually needs “this book,” the Gospel of John, instead
of the Gospel of Mark? In the same way that John 20:31 claims that John’s
Gospel accomplishes the life-​giving purposes of the law of Moses, does it also
claim to accomplish the purposes of Mark’s Gospel in informing readers of
the identity of Jesus the Messiah and divine Son?
Such an implicit gesture of superiority toward Mark’s Gospel is possible,
though this theory is not certain or without difficulties. First, not all manu-
scripts of Mark’s Gospel include the words “son of God” at Mark 1:1.78 NA28
places the words in brackets, as does NA27. The UBS 4th Revised Edition gave
it a C rating,79 and Holmes omitted the words from his SBLGNT.80 My theory
does not require that the words were in the earliest text of Mark’s Gospel,
however; it requires only that John was aware of the reading that occurred
there on some manuscripts. That reading is early even if secondary and
enjoys better manuscript support than the reading that omits “son of God.”81
Second, however, and related to this point, another difficulty for the theory
that the specific combination of “Christ” and “son of God” at John 20:31 is an
implicit reference to Mark 1:1 is that John could have found this combination
of titles in any number of other places. The manuscripts exhibit considerable
diversity. Some manuscripts include “son of God” with “Christ” as Peter’s
confession at Caesarea Philippi in Mark 8:2982 or Luke 9:20.83 At least some
readers of John’s Gospel found these titles in one or both of these perico-
pae, since a number of manuscripts of John’s Gospel have Peter refer to Jesus

76 Mark 1:1; 3:11; 5:7; 15:39; cf. 1:11; 9:7.

77 Following NA28.
78 Most significantly, the reading is not attested in the original hand of ‫( א‬fourth century). For dis-

cussion, see Metzger, Textual, 62.

79 Metzger, Textual, 62.
80 Michael W. Holmes, ed., The Greek New Testament: SBL Edition (Atlanta: Society of Biblical

Literature, 2010).
81 “Son of God” appears in, among others, B (fourth century), A (fifth century), W (fourth/​fifth

century), D (fifth century), and the hand of the first corrector of ‫( א‬fourth–​sixth centuries). Tommy
Wasserman, “The ‘Son of God’ Was in the Beginning (Mark 1:1),” JTS 62.1 (2011): 20–​50, defends this
reading as earliest. For an argument that “son of God” was added later, see Ehrman, Orthodox, 85–​88.
82 ‫ א‬L r1. W f13 and b have “son of the living God”; cf. Matt 16:16 and discussion in the main text.
83 NA28 reads “Christ of God.” D and 892, however, read “Christ, son of God.”
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 151

as “Christ” and “son of God” (or “son of the living God”) at the Johannine
equivalent of Peter’s confession in John 6:69.84
The relevance of these manuscript readings is difficult to determine, since
most of them reflect the harmonization practices of later copyists. They dem-
onstrate, however, just how easy the free association between these various
narratives is for someone steeped in Jesus traditions (whether written or not),
which the author of John’s Gospel was. Furthermore, the title “son of the living
God” that shows up in some manuscripts of John’s Gospel at John 6:69 is a har-
monization specifically with the Matthean, not Markan, confession of Peter at
Caesarea Philippi (Matt 16:16), though predictably some manuscripts of Mark’s
Gospel harmonize with the Matthean reading at Mark 8:29.85 If one is inclined
to think John’s Gospel reflects familiarity with Matthew’s Gospel, as Barker has
argued,86 John could have equally found the combination of “Christ” and “son
of (the living) God” at Matt 16:16. Or he could have found the combination at
Matt 26:63. Or he could have been familiar with it just through the parlance of
Jesus followers, since an early Jesus follower’s awareness of the titles “Christ” and
“son of God” would hardly have been restricted to the contents of manuscripts.
In short, Mark 1:1 is not the only place that John could have encountered “Jesus
Christ, son of God.”
At the same time, that other possible sources for this combination of titles
exist does not preclude the possibility that at John 20:31 John could have
had in mind their occurrence at Mark 1:1, even if in conjunction with other
occurrences of the terms. And there is more to be said in favor of the idea
that John 20:31 could have Mark 1:1 in its peripheral vision. If John 20:30–​31
and 21:24–​25 otherwise implicitly reflect knowledge of similar moments of
competitive textuality in Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels, whereby the Gospel
authors identify themselves as a “book” (Matt 1:1) or in reference to other
written Jesus traditions (Luke 1:1–​4), it would indicate that the Johannine
colophons are already interacting with the opening of Synoptic narratives.
Johannine familiarity with the specifically Markan opening is otherwise sup-
ported by the facts that (1) John 1:1, like Mark 1:1, begins by using ἀρχή in
an allusion to Gen 1:1, which neither Matthew’s Gospel nor Luke’s Gospel

84 “Son of God”: C (third corrector) Θ (original hand) f1 33 565 et al. “Son of the living God”: K N Γ

Δ Θ (corrector) Ψ f13 579 et al. NA28 reads “holy one of God.”

85 W f13 b.
86 Barker, John’s Use.
152 The Gospel as Gospels

replicates in this way,87 and (2) after the distinctive Johannine prologue (John
1:1–​18), John begins his narration of Jesus’s ministry with John the Baptist
and, like Mark 1:2–​3, a citation of Isaiah 40:3 (John 1:23).
Another factor in favor of this theory is that John’s narrative elsewhere takes a
posture of correction toward Mark’s Gospel. Space does not permit a full discus-
sion of John’s use of Mark’s Gospel,88 but John 12:27 is relevant for this point. In
this text, Jesus ruminates on his expected suffering and states, “My soul (ἡ ψυχή
μου) is troubled.” He then asks rhetorically, “What will I say? ‘Father (Πάτερ),
save me from this hour (τῆς ὥρας ταύτης)?’ ” and answers, “But on account of
this I came for this hour (τὴν ὥραν ταύτην).” John’s Gospel thus has Jesus reject
even the possibility of saying to the “father” precisely what Mark’s Gospel claims
Jesus said in Gethsemane, where the Markan Jesus similarly refers to “my soul,”
prays to God as “father,” and uses “the hour” as a metaphor for his impending
death. After having Jesus claim, “My soul (ἡ ψυχή μου) is grieved to the point
of death” (Mark 14:34), Mark narrates that Jesus prayed “that the hour (ἡ ὥρα)
might pass from him” (14:35). After this request, Jesus prays to God as “father”
(ὁ πατήρ) (14:36) and asks God to “take this cup (τὸ ποτήριον τοῦτο) from me;
but not as I want but as you want” (14:36).
In the parallel Gethsemane account in Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew fol-
lows Mark’s Gospel verbatim at times (for example, Mark 14:34//​Matt
26:38). He has Jesus pray to God as “father” (πάτερ), ask God that “this
cup” (τὸ ποτήριον τοῦτο) be taken from him, and add the concession
“not as I want but as you want” (26:39). The Matthean Gethsemane narra-
tive omits the reference to the “hour” that Jesus wishes to pass him, how-
ever. Luke then follows Matthew, having Jesus pray to God as “father”
(πάτερ), ask that “this cup” (τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον) be taken from him, and
concede “May it not be my will but your” (Luke 22:42), likewise omitting
any reference to the impending “hour.” Matthew’s and Luke’s omission of
“the hour” altogether indicates that the Johannine reinterpretation of “the
hour” is an engagement specifically with the Markan narrative. This conclu-
sion is significant because “the hour” became, and remains, a quintessen-
tial Johannine motif that structures the narratorial perspective in the entire

87 As noted in c
­ hapter 4, Matt 1:1 follows Mark 1:1 in alluding to Genesis but does so with βίβλος
γενέσεως rather than ἀρχή. The Lukan prologue technically includes the word ἀρχή, in reference not
to Genesis but to “eyewitnesses from the beginning (ἀρχῆς)” of Jesus’s ministry (Luke 1:2).
88 See Bauckham, “John for Readers of Mark,” 147–​ 71; Becker, Bond, and Williams, John’s
Transformation.
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 153

Gospel.89 John, however, seems to have developed it so strenuously into a

guiding and willingly accepted aspect of Jesus’s ministry in order to coun-
teract the Markan notion that Jesus did not want to accept it. John’s Gospel
here corrects Mark’s Gospel.90
In addition to this engagement with Mark’s Gospel, on several other occa-
sions John’s Gospel corrects narrative elements shared by Mark and other
Synoptic Gospels. John 19:17, for example, explicitly states that Jesus was “car-
rying the cross himself (ἑαυτῷ)” on the way to Golgotha. Like the occurrence of
the reflexive personal pronoun “himself,” the narrative detail of Jesus carrying
the cross is, strictly speaking, unnecessary for the progression of the Johannine
narrative.91 John is emphatically asserting that Jesus carried his own cross and
no one else did. The most likely explanation for this otherwise unnecessary
narrative emphasis is that John wishes to correct the Synoptic tradition that
Simon of Cyrene carried Jesus’s cross for him (Mark 15:21//​Matt 27:32//​Luke
23:26). As another example, at John 1:21, John the Baptist answers the question
“Are you Elijah?” directly with “I am not.” This Johannine rejection of John the
Baptist as Elijah, on the Baptist’s lips, directly contradicts the Synoptic affirma-
tion of John the Baptist as Elijah (Mark 9:12–​13//​Matt 17:11–​13; cf. Luke 1:17),
including the Matthean Jesus’s statement “He is Elijah” (Matt 11:14). Famously,
John’s Gospel also corrects the Synoptic tradition that Jesus died after having
eaten the Passover meal (Mark 14:1–​25; Matt 26:1–​29//​Luke 22:1–​23), claiming
instead that he died on the day of preparation, prior to the eating of the Passover
meal (John 18:28; 19:31, 42).
None of this evidence conclusively demonstrates that in affirming that
“this book” will lead the reader to (or keep the reader in) belief that Jesus
is the “Christ, son of God,” John 20:30–​31 is asserting superiority to Mark’s
Gospel, which opens by affirming that Jesus is “Christ, son of God.” It does,
however, demonstrate that such a posture would be fully consonant with

89 Jörg Frey, The Glory of the Crucified One: Christology and Theology in the Gospel of John, trans.

Wayne Coppins and Christoph Heilig, BMSEC (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018), 87–​88,
173–​74.
90 Contra P. Gardner-​ Smith, Saint John and the Synoptic Gospels (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1938), 52, who claims that in John 12 “there is certainly no evidence here of literary
dependence” on the Synoptics. Gardner-​Smith’s unwillingness to imagine that John would have con-
tradicted Mark and other Gospel authors mars his theory of the relationship between John’s Gospel
and the Synoptics. Further on this matter, see Keith, “If John Knew Mark.”
91 The participle βαστάζων already makes clear that “he” was “carrying” the cross, as opposed to

the “they” of either παρέλαβον or ἐξῆλθεν. (Which verb one regards as the governing verb depends
on how one punctuates.)
154 The Gospel as Gospels

the Johannine narrative at this point or many other points in the Gospel,92
and therefore indicate the theory’s distinct possibility. John’s Gospel other-
wise reflects familiarity with the opening of Mark’s Gospel in its own opening
and otherwise asserts a position of superiority toward and correction of the
Markan narrative. Apart from whether John may have expected his reader
to connect John 20:31 and Mark 1:1 directly, it is beyond question that John’s
Gospel closes in a flourish of competitive textualization by claiming that it—​
as a book—​distinctly enables readers to believe that Jesus is who the words of
Mark’s Gospel open by saying he is.

Summary

John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25 represent the most competitive instances of textu-
alization in contemporary Jesus tradition. Luke’s Gospel asserts superiority to
its competitors, but John’s Gospel asserts superiority to its competitors on the
basis of continuing the scriptural textuality of Moses. John asserts the value of
“this book” (20:30) about Jesus implicitly over any predecessors or current rivals
and explicitly over any books about Jesus that may yet come (21:25).

The Gospel of Thomas

John was not successful in closing down future entries into the Jesus book
market, though. The dual emphases of textual self-​consciousness and com-
petitive textualization continued well into the second and third centuries and
beyond, eventually leading to a common topos of Gospel origin stories that
I will mention briefly at the close of this chapter. Prior to that, the previous
discussion of competitive textualization in the Jesus tradition affords a dis-
tinct vantage point for appreciating the claim of the author of the Gospel of
Thomas in his incipit: “These are the hidden words that the living Jesus spoke
([ἐλά]λησεν). And Didymos Judas Thomas wrote them down (ἔγραψεν).”93

92 To state what should be clear, John’s Gospel affirms many narrative aspects of Mark’s Gospel

as well.
93 Translation from Plisch, Gospel, 37. Scholars sometimes present the incipit as part of logion 1

and sometimes as separate from logion 1. The Greek of P.Oxy. 654 is presented here in light of the
overwhelming likelihood that the Gospel of Thomas was composed in Greek (Simon Gathercole,
The Composition of the Gospel of Thomas: Original Language and Influences, SNTSMS 151
[Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012], 105–​125; Plisch, Gospel, 11–​12).
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 155

Immediately clear is that Thomas joins Luke and John in drawing attention
to the fact that he “wrote” his Jesus tradition. Robbins is correct that Thomas
never draws attention to the written texts of the Jewish Scriptures, but he is
incorrect that in the Gospel of Thomas there “is a complete lack of appeal to
written text.”94 To the contrary, there is a clear reference to a written text in
the first line of the Gospel of Thomas—​the text of the Gospel itself.
This textual self-​awareness may also relate to how Thomas positions
his Gospel vis-​à-​vis predecessors. Although there is no space to defend
these views in depth, I follow Goodacre in dating the Gospel of Thomas
to the second century and affirm its familiarity with Synoptic tradi-
tion.95 Furthermore, as stated in c­ hapter 3, I regard it as a purposeful de-​
narrativization of the Synoptic tradition—​in the apt words of Goodacre, the
Gospel of Thomas is “a brilliant attempt to re-​create Jesus’s words in its own
voice, drawing on the Synoptics but transcending them by providing new
twists on the old sayings.”96
I am also inclined, however, to see the authorial claim of the incipit as a
form of competitive textualization, and in this sense I would go further than
Goodacre. Thomas provides not only new twists on inherited traditions but
new twists on the inheritance of the tradition.97 When Thomas’s opening
lines are placed in a historical progression of Jesus books, his claim to serve
as Jesus’s amanuensis stands out as distinct and significant especially if he
knows Luke’s Gospel.98 His portrayal of a Jesus who dictates is not unique
among Jesus followers; he shares it with Rev 1–​3, the Abgar Legend,99 the
Narrative of Joseph of Arimathea (3.4), and other traditions. It is, how-
ever, a unique portrayal of Jesus in texts that carried the gospel label, and if
read against this background appears as an outbidding of his predecessors.
Whereas Luke, for example, may consider his Jesus book superior on the
basis of his “careful” investigation, “orderly” writing, and dependence upon
eyewitnesses (Luke 1:1–​4), and whereas John may claim to be an eyewitness

94 Vernon K. Robbins, “Rhetorical Composition and Sources in the Gospel of Thomas,” Society of

Biblical Literature 1997 Seminar Papers (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 88.
95 Goodacre, Thomas, 154–​71, dates Gospel of Thomas to the 140s ce. Gathercole, Composition,

168–​224, rejects Thomasine independence and affirms Matthean and Lukan influence on Gospel of
Thomas.
96 Goodacre, Thomas, 194.
97 Similarly, I would extend the claim of Gathercole, Composition, 208, that Lukan redaction is

“expanded upon” in the Gospel of Thomas. The Gospel of Thomas’s incipit, according to the theory
forwarded here, also expands upon the authoritative claims of Luke as author in the Lukan prologue.
98 For affirmation of Lukan influence on the Gospel of Thomas, see Gathercole, Composition, 185–​

208; Goodacre, Thomas, 82–​108.

99 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 1.13.
156 The Gospel as Gospels

himself (John 21:25), Thomas’s Jesus book is superior because it comes from
a source even better than “eyewitnesses”—​Jesus himself.
The Thomasine Jesus assumes the role that numerous patristic sources
assigned to Peter as the one who dictated his oral teachings to Mark the
amanuensis, a tradition that was well in circulation by the time of Gospel
of Thomas’s composition.100 Thomas’s portrayal of himself as amanuensis to
Jesus is possibly designed as a subtle attempt to rival Mark as amanuensis to
Peter, implicitly claiming greater authority for the Gospel of Thomas.
If this suggestion is plausible, it would not be an isolated incident. Later
than Thomas, the Secret Book of James (NHC I, 2)101 self-​presents as a text
that “James writes to” (1.1) its reader and describes several books, including
those written by Jesus’s disciples, as coming directly from Jesus. The author
first mentions a “secret book, which was revealed to me and Peter by the Lord”
(Ap. Jas. 1.10–​12). He then mentions “another secret book which the Savior
had revealed to me” (1.30–​32). After the surviving manuscript breaks off, it
picks back up with a story where the twelve form a scriptorium of sorts: “Now
when the twelve disciples were all sitting together and recalling what the
Savior had said to each one of them, whether in secret or openly, and [setting
it in order] in books—​but I was writing that which was in [my book]—​lo,
the Savior appeared” (Ap. Jas. 2.7–​18).102 Among other things, this tradition
contributes to the trend of providing origin stories for the books associated
with Jesus’s disciples, though it includes others, revealed in secret, with those
that were revealed “openly.” The Gospel of Thomas is therefore alone nei-
ther in the Nag Hammadi corpus nor wider Christendom in claiming Jesus
himself as the source of the tradition. A further amplification will later ap-
pear in the fourth-​century anti-​Marcionite Dialogue of Adamantius, which
portrays Marcionites as claiming that Jesus, not Peter, “wrote the gospel.”103
The fourth-​century Syriac Demonstrations of Aphrahat similarly claims that
Jesus wrote gospel tradition, likely meaning the Diatessaron.104

100 See ­chapter 3.

101 Francis E. Williams, “The Apocryphon of James (I, 2),” in The Nag Hammadi Library in English,
ed. Marvin W. Meyer (Leiden: Brill, 1977), 29, dates the Apocryphon of James to “the third century
c.e., though some would place it earlier.” Translations are from this edition.
102 Cf. Acts of Timothy 8–​10, an English translation of which is in Tony Burke and Brent Landau,

eds., New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
2016), 402–​3.
103 Adamantius, Dialogue, 2.13; see also 1.8, and cf. 2.14.
104 See Tjitze Baarda, The Gospel Quotations of Aphrahat the Persian Sage, 2 vols.

(Amsterdam: Krips, 1975), 324–​26.

 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 157

In this progression of competitive textualization involving the author-

ship of the written gospel and other traditions, Jesus goes from the pro-
tagonist within the tradition in the first century to the one dictating the
tradition in the second century to the one writing the tradition himself
in the fourth century. This progression displays the significant role of
the written medium for constructions of authority, as each claim pushes
the textualization of the written Jesus tradition closer and closer to Jesus
himself.
Relevant to this point is Gos Thom 13.1–​3: “Jesus said to his disciples,
‘Compare me (and) tell me whom I am like.’ Simon Peter said to him, ‘You
are like a just messenger.’ Matthew said to him, ‘You are like an (especially)
wise philosopher.’ Thomas said to him, ‘Teacher, my mouth ˂cannot˃
bear at all to say whom you are like’ ” (Plisch). In light of the “hidden”
nature of Jesus’s teachings, whose meaning must be searched and found
according to Gos Thom 1, there is no doubt that Thomas’s answer is the
best of those of the apostolic figures. There is a further connection be-
tween Gos Thom 1 and Gos Thom 13, however. Gathercole has recently
renewed an argument that Matthew appears in this logion specifically “as
a Gospel writer.”105 Thus, “This reference would . . . almost certainly not
be simply to any Gospel which the author of Thomas had encountered,
but to a Gospel regarded as possessing authority or at least possessing
some kind of accepted rival portrait of Jesus.”106 The Gospel of Thomas’s
incipit provides substantial support to Gathercole’s reading of Gos Thom
13 because it shows that Thomas is indeed concerned to rival other written
Jesus tradition.107
Therefore, the Gospel of Thomas also participates in a process of com-
petitive textualization of the Jesus tradition. Thomas asserts his authority by
claiming to have received teachings directly from Jesus himself. Against the
broad backdrop of prior tradents’ claims to have been dependent upon eye-
witnesses, Thomas’s claim represents an intensification in its internal origin
story, claiming to be dependent on Jesus himself.

105 Gathercole, Composition, 171.

106 Gathercole, Composition, 171.
107 It also makes Gathercole’s hesitance to see Peter as a Gospel writer as well in Gos Thom 13 inex-

plicable (Composition, 169–​70).

158 The Gospel as Gospels

Conclusion

The competitive textualization of the Jesus tradition stretched from the first
century well into the fourth century in the various battles over Jesus in the
written tradition. The present and previous chapters discussed the Gospels
of Mark, Matthew, Luke, John, and Thomas, but other texts could be added.
An example is Papias’s Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord. The evidence is
scant, since we have only Eusebius’s citations, but Papias was participating
in the processes of competitive textualization when offering his own five-​
volume work on Jesus. Like the Lukan prologue, Papias established the value
of his written Jesus tradition on the basis of his having consulted the best
human sources: “But whenever someone arrived who had been a companion
of one of the elders, I would carefully inquire after their words.”108 He also
reveals that he has other written tradition in his peripheral vision when he
constructs a position for his literary work by referring to “books”: “For I did
not suppose that what came out of books (βιβλίων) would benefit me as
much as that which came from a living (ζώσης) and abiding voice.”109 These
comments about preferring the living voice do not disprove the significance
of the concept of competitive textualization. They are thoroughly part of it,
since the implication of Papias’s stated preference for “the living voice” for
his sources is not that such voices remain(ed) “living” but that the content
of this oral tradition is now available in the five books of his Exposition of the
Sayings of the Lord. Papias’s positioning of his work in juxtaposition to other
“books” and on the basis of his own consultation of witnesses is very similar
to the rhetorical moves discussed earlier in Luke 1:1–​4 and John 20:30–​31
and 21:24–​25. His participation in the process outlined in these two chapters
is all the more clear if the βιβλία to which he refers happened to include these
Gospels whose rhetorical moves he shares or other first-​century Gospels.
Our fragmentary knowledge of Papias’s Exposition prohibits further specula-
tion, but this possibility deserves to be taken seriously.
The previous discussion nevertheless suffices to demonstrate that textual
self-​consciousness and competitive textualization were widespread and pro-
nounced features in the written Jesus tradition from its beginning. Authors’
self-​awareness that their traditions were in written form and awareness of

108 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4//​Papias fragment 3 (Ehrman, LCL).

109 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.4//​Papias fragment 3 (Ehrman, LCL).
 The Johannine and Thomasine Tradition 159

alternative written instantiations of the tradition are typically given promi-

nent places of expression in the opening or closing lines.
From one perspective, this point may seem so insignificant as to inspire
curiosity as to why it needs to be observed. Would not the readers of the
Gospels have already figured out that the tradition was written by the fact
that they were reading it or listening to someone else read it? From another
perspective, however, the redundancy illustrates that it was important for the
tradents not just to actualize the tradition in manuscript form but also to
draw their audience’s attention to the fact that it was in manuscript form. In
light of such evidence, this chapter has built upon the theory advocated in
­chapter 1 regarding the role of the manuscript in creating reading cultures,
though it has focused upon this phenomenon as internal to the literary tradi-
tion, part of what E.-​M. Becker calls the creation of “literary memory . . . with
the constant help of visual images.”110 The visual image of the “book” and
written tradition forms a cornerstone of the tradition’s self-​presentation. By
drawing explicit attention to their Jesus books and other Jesus books, tra-
dents attempted to position their version of the Jesus story within particular
reading communities or even actively construct those communities. Far
from being ancillary, the manuscript, as well as the image of it, was a primary
means of jockeying for position.
For the sake of clarity, it is also worth stating that I have not argued that
every form of written tradition necessarily is competitive. Johnson, for ex-
ample, has called attention to the many recensions of the Alexander Romance
as the kind of textual tradition wherein revisions do not necessarily reveal
authorial ambition or a competitive impulse on the part of the revisers.111
Nevertheless, it is also the case that sometimes when later tradents interacted
with inherited tradition, they viewed themselves as improving upon it, and
thus viewed their product as better in some sense than what they inherited.
Josephus indicates clearly that his work is an improvement upon the work
of Nicolaus of Damascus, one of his sources,112 and I have argued that we

110 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 15.

111 William A. Johnson, “Authorship and Publication in Late Antique Homilies and the Gospel
of Matthew” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, Boston,
November 20, 2017), 6–​7. My thanks to William Johnson for providing me with a copy of the paper.
112 Josephus, Ant. 16.7.1 §§183–​ 7; cf. Ant. 14.1.3 §9. What Mason says of Josephus’s usage of
Nicolaus could just as easily be said of Matthew’s usage of Mark or Thomas’s usage of Luke: “When
Josephus uses Nicolaus, understandably, he reshapes the material for its new home in his work”
(Steve Mason, A History of the Jewish War a.d. 66–​74 [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2016], 133–​34.
160 The Gospel as Gospels

have evidence in the transmission of the Jesus tradition of authors sometimes

believing they had improved upon their predecessors. The remaining two
chapters now turn to consider another way in which the Jesus tradition as
manuscript was embedded in its reading cultures—​the public reading of the
Jesus tradition.
 PART III
T HE GO SPE L AS LI T U RG Y

Part Three p ​ resents a sometimes underappreciated manner in which the

materiality of the Jesus tradition contributed to its transmission, namely,
through public reading. Similar to the competitive textualization of the
Jesus tradition, public reading was another way in which early Christ fol-
lowers placed the gospel as manuscript on display. Chapter Six offers a pre-​
Constantinian reception history of the public reading of the Gospels from
Mark’s Gospel to the Acts of Peter, noting especially the frequent references
to the reading of the Gospels with the prophets. Chapter Seven will then turn
and consider the implications of this reception history for the complex rela-
tionship between Christianity and Judaism, arguing that the public reading
of the Jesus tradition in assembly was an innovation in the book culture of
Jesus followers that reflects simultaneous indebtedness to and distinction
from Jewish book culture.
 6
The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition
in the First Three Centuries

For the knowledge, and therefore the understanding, of the Bible in an-
tiquity . . . the worship-​service readings and other liturgical readings
played an absolutely decisive role.
Christoph Markschies, “Liturgisches Lesen und
die Hermeneutik der Schrift”

The public reading of the Jesus tradition is explicitly acknowledged in the ear-
liest stages of the tradition to which we have direct access. In reference to the
“abomination of desolation” from Daniel (9:27; 11:31; 12:11), the author of
Mark’s Gospel directly addresses “the reader”: “Let the reader (ὁ ἀναγινώσκων)
understand” (Mark 13:14). Shortly after the Gospel of Mark, but still in the late
first century, the author of the Gospel of Matthew repeats this nota bene to the
reader in Matt 24:15.1 I will argue that these statements reveal the expectation
on the part of the authors that their texts would be read aloud to a listening au-
dience.2 They also therefore implicitly call attention to the Jesus tradition’s status
as a material artifact, a written text that required a reader to decipher and vo-
calize its script in order for the tradition to be actualized.
The public reading of the Jesus tradition in manuscript form is rele-
vant for at least two scholarly discourses related to gospel literature in pre-​
Constantinian Christianity.3 The first addresses the ways in which gospel

1 France, Gospel, 524, describes the reference to the reader as an “N.B.”

2 See further pp. 167–71.
3 Chapter 7 will contribute to a third discourse involving the emergence of “Christianity” within

and from Judaism. With reference to a general scholarly disregard of the significance of liturgical
reading, cf. also Christoph Markschies, “Liturgisches Lesen und die Hermeneutik der Schrift,” in
Patristica et Oecumenica, ed. Peter Gemeinhardt und Uwe Kühneweg, MTS 85 (Marburg: N. G.
Elwert, 2004), 77. Elsewhere, Markschies laments an overconcentration upon theologians and book
lists in canon studies (Christoph Markschies, “The Canon of the New Testament in Antiquity: Some

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
164 The Gospel as Liturgy

and other Christian literature contributed to a variety of expressions of

early Christian identity in the period, whether through broader issues like
the relation of Christian writings to Jewish and Greco-​Roman writings
or more specific issues like the semantic shifts of the term εὐαγγέλιον. In
Christian Identity in the Jewish and Graeco-​Roman World, Lieu gives de-
tailed attention to the emergence of Christian identity in the first two cen-
turies ce, and specifically to the “tripartite relationship” between Jewish,
Christian, and Greco-​Roman identity claims.4 She focuses upon the ways
in which early Christian writings reflect their authors’ simultaneous dis-
tinction from and indebtedness to their surrounding cultures: “The various
genres used by early Christian writers themselves partake in and demon-
strate the creation of a new cultural system, but one which none the less
overlaps with and draws from those already available within the Judaeo-​
Graeco-​Roman world.”5 Given the complexity of these areas of overlap,
Lieu rightly insists that the boundaries between identities were not entirely
clear in every instance, but rather were “under both construction and con-
tention.”6 These groups’ identities were not so thoroughly malleable that
they did not see themselves and others as distinct. When ancients used
labels like “Jews” or “Christians” or “heretics” for each other, they knew
well enough what they meant. But the driving force for making such dis-
tinctions was often an underlying similarity or recurrent cultural contact
that complicates any notion (ancient or modern) of thorough separate-
ness. Identity construction in these contexts necessarily involved both con-
tinuity and discontinuity, and thus “it is perhaps the confluence of these
boundaries that is more significant than precisely how and where they are
drawn at any one moment.”7
In making these particular points, Lieu often focuses upon the “var-
ious genres” of early Christian writings and their “literary testimony.”8 In

New Horizons for Future Research,” in Homer, the Bible, and Beyond: Literary and Religious Canons in
the Ancient World, ed. Margalit Finkelberg and Guy G. Stroumsa, JSRC 2 [Leiden: Brill, 2003], 182).
4 Lieu, Christian, 36.
5 Lieu, Christian, 56.
6 Lieu, Christian, 141. More fully: “We cannot, therefore, simply say, as has often been done, that in

the second century ‘the church’ had to wage war on three fronts, against the Jews, against the ‘pagans,’
and against heresy . . . ; this model wrongly presupposes that both the church and these fronts were
stable and clearly demarcated. Instead these are the frontiers under both construction and conten-
tion, at times rather more a potentially well-​populated, perhaps transient, no-​man’s land, where
movement and connectedness is at least as common as separation.”
7 Lieu, Christian, 142.
8 Lieu, Christian, 56 (“various genres”); 59 (“various genres”); 173 (“literary testimony”).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 165

a similar vein, Stanton calls attention to distinct “language patterns” of

Christianity, especially as they relate to the εὐαγγέλιον word group: “The
first followers of Jesus developed their own ‘in-​house’ language patterns,
partly on the basis of Scripture, partly in light of their distinctive Christian
convictions, but partly by way of modifying contemporary ‘street’ lan-
guage.”9 Lieu and Stanton hold in common an emphasis upon Christians’
simultaneous continuity and discontinuity with their surrounding cul-
tures, and also an emphasis upon linguistic expressions of Christian
identity.
This chapter and the next will assume the general accuracy of these claims
and also assume the broader discourse of early Christian identity in which
they participate as its background. These chapters’ particular contribution
to this discourse will be to demonstrate how Christians especially from the
second century onward bolstered their linguistic expressions of identity with
liturgical expressions, with particular focus upon the liturgical reading of the
Gospels in assembly.10 Liturgy is its own language, but the point at present
concerns how Christian practice with manuscripts of the Gospels contrib-
uted to their identity-​making processes, for public reading of the Gospels,
too, bore “testimony to a tension between what was held in common and
the way in which its various forms of expression might sharply divide.”11
Drawing upon the work of Johnson, ­chapter 1 demonstrated that public
reading created cultural events that expressed and reinforced identity among
elite Romans. This chapter will continue this line of inquiry. As should al-
ready be clear, Lieu’s description of a Christian “cultural system” aligns with
Johnson’s theory of reading practices as a “sociological system” or “reading
culture.”12 Whereas the previous two chapters concentrated on the construc-
tion of reading communities within the texts via competitive textualization,
these chapters move to the construction of reading communities outside the
text, which is more in line with how Johnson originally used the concept of
reading communities.

9 Stanton, Jesus, 2.
10 Similarly Gamble, Books, 108: “The Christian literature of the second and third centuries must
be appraised in both its continuities and discontinuities with the earliest Christian literature, not only
in respect of its genres and contents but also with regard to its publication and circulation.” Cf. Lieu,
Christian, 59, who notes that the codex as a physical artifact would have participated in the complex
identity constructions that she otherwise demonstrates via literary genres.
11 Lieu, Christian, 173.
12 Johnson, Reading, 11, 9, respectively.
166 The Gospel as Liturgy

The second relevant scholarly discourse for these two chapters was men-
tioned already briefly in the introduction and then in ­chapter 3 where
I described it as an “oral-​preference perspective.” As a reminder, scholars
exhibiting this perspective have stated that “written copies of texts were
evidently of secondary, ancillary importance in the communication of the
Gospels,”13 and that “manuscripts of Christian writings were not central to
the experience of the first century churches” and so were “peripheral.”14 The
previous chapters demonstrated the falsity of these claims in light of the
fact that Jesus traditions in the first century already call attention to the fact
that they are in manuscript form. This chapter will engage some of these
scholars further on the practice of public reading but will also demonstrate
that such a perspective has a difficult time accounting for the continuity
between first-​century expressions of the reading of the Jesus tradition in
Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15 and later, more developed, liturgical reading of the
Jesus tradition, since the crucial element of that continuity was the sup-
posedly insignificant manuscript. I will argue instead that the manuscript
stood at the center of this distinct reading culture in the Roman Empire
and enabled it.
With a goal of contributing to both these discourses, therefore, the em-
phasis in this chapter and the next will be upon what early Christian prac-
tice with manuscripts contributed to their formulation and articulation of
identity beyond, or at least in symbiosis with, the contributions of the texts
written on those manuscripts. In this chapter, after preliminary comments,
I will present references to early Christian Gospel reading in Mark 13:14//​
Matt 24:15, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, the Muratorian Fragment, Serapion,
and the Acts of Peter. Chapter 7 will then consider how early Gospel-​reading
practices related to Jewish and Greco-​Roman reading practices.

Communal Reading and Early Christian Identity

In order to appreciate fully how early Christians constructed the significance

of their Gospel reading events, some initial comments are necessary on “per-
formance,” public versus private reading, and liturgical reading.

13 Horsley, “Gospel of Mark in the Interface of Orality and Writing,” 156.

14 Rhoads, “Performance Criticism,” 121.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 167

“Reading” and “Performing”

Some scholars have argued that ancient “readers” did not actually “read” from
a manuscript. Rather, it is argued, they performed the tradition orally from
memory. Rhoads, for example, explicitly claims that New Testament writings
“were heard/​experienced rather than read.”15 Nässelqvist describes to the idea
that “all types of texts and traditions were memorized and orally performed
in the same manner” as “the axiomatic notion of performance criticism,”16
and it is not difficult to cite performance critics who make such assertions.
Horsley claims that “texts were stored in memory, were recited orally, and
were not usually read physically from manuscripts.”17 He thus consistently
favors translating a phrase concerning the law in 1QS VI, 7 (‫)לקרוא בספר‬, as
“reciting the Book” or “to recite the book,” emphasizing the derivation of the
tradition from the performer’s memory rather than from the reader’s scroll.18
This translation stands in contrast to numerous Dead Sea Scrolls scholars who
translate the phrase as a literal reference to “reading” the book.19 (The exact

15 Rhoads, “Performance Criticism,” 118. For a similar statement, see William David Shiell,

Reading Acts: The Lector and the Early Christian Audience, BibInt 70 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 11: “The
lector functioned in an oral-​aural environment, rather than a scribal one” (emphasis added).
16 Dan Nässelqvist, Public Reading in Early Christianity: Lectors, Manuscripts, and Sound in the

Oral Delivery of John 1–​4, NovTSup 163 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 8. He traces this “almost axiomatic
understanding . . . that New Testament writings were performed—​in their entirety—​by individuals
who delivered the memorized text whilst standing up and employing gestures, facial expressions, and
tone of voice” (73) to Shiner, Proclaiming. For a related critique, see Larry W. Hurtado, “Oral Fixation
and New Testament Studies?: ‘Orality,’ ‘Performance’ and Reading Texts in Early Christianity,” NTS
60 (2014): 325–​26. Other performance critics have been more nuanced, acknowledging the perva-
sive interaction between oral and written media. An example is Kelly Iverson, “Oral Performance
or Oral Corrective? A Response to Larry W. Hurtado,” NTS 62.2 (2016): 183–​200, though Iverson is
too quick to argue that “memorised delivery is not a cornerstone of performance-​critical research”
(187). Iverson is correct that some performance critics have also acknowledged the possibility of
manuscript-​based performances, but that does not alter the fact that foundational figures in perfor-
mance criticism, especially J. Dewey, Rhoads, and Horsley, have regularly and insistently relegated
manuscripts to a position of absence or irrelevance in transmission contexts while arguing that tradi-
tion was performed via memory, as quotations in the main text demonstrate.
17 Horsley, “Oral Performance and Mark,” 56. Similarly, “Even when written scrolls existed, the

texts were recited from memory, composition was usually carried out not only for but also in per-
formance” (Horsley, “Prominent Patterns in the Social Memory of Jesus and Friends,” in Kirk and
Thatcher, Memory, Tradition, and Text, 61); “Scribes cultivated texts of the Judean cultural repertoire
orally: they learned them by recitation and recited them orally” (Scribes, 11).
18 The first translation is that of Martin S. Jaffee, Torah in the Mouth: Writing and Oral Tradition in

Palestinian Judaism, 200 bce–​400 ce (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 32. Horsley cites
this translation approvingly in multiple publications: “Gospel of Mark in the Interface of Orality and
Writing,” 146; “Oral Performance and Mark,” 54; “A Prophet like Moses and Elijah: Popular Memory
and Cultural Patterns in Mark,” in Horsley, Draper, and Foley, Performing, 171; Scribes, 103–​4. The
second translation is Horsley’s in “Oral Performance and Mark,” 54. For a similar translation in
(some) rabbinic references to reading, see Wollenberg, “Dangers,” 711–​713, and throughout.
19 James H. Charlesworth, trans., “Rule of the Community (1QS; cf. 4QS MSS A-​J, 5Q11,” in The

Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, vol. 1, Rule of the
168 The Gospel as Liturgy

same phrase, “to read the book” [‫]ולקרא בספר‬, occurs also in 4Q251 1, 5.) In
a similar vein, Botha claims that when Luke says that Jesus stood “in order to
read” (ἀναγνῶναι) (4:16), was handed “the scroll” (τὸ βιβλίον) of Isaiah (4:17,
20),20 and “found the place where it was written” (εὗρεν τὸ τόπον οὗ ἦν γεγρ
αμμένον) in that scroll (4:17), he does not really portray Jesus as a reader. For
Botha, this is simply a “performance”—​“a highly rhetorical verbal presenta-
tion of stories and oral interpretations.”21 Such minimizations of the contribu-
tion of manuscripts to the transmission of Jewish and Christian texts typically
function to enable the further claims that the oral performance of the tradi-
tion, including hand and body gestures by the performer, was the real crux of
the transmission process.22
Although these claims are not wholly incorrect—​there was a performative
element to communal reading,23 teachers could teach students to read from a
manuscript in the style of an orator,24 and ancient authors could use terms for

Community and Related Documents, ed. James H. Charlesworth et al. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck,
1994), 27; Florentino García Martínez and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls: Study
Edition, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997, 1998), 1:83; Popović, “Reading,” 452; Lawrence H.
Schiffman, “The Early History of Public Reading of the Torah,” in Jews, Christians, and Polytheists
in the Ancient Synagogue, ed. Steven Fine, BSHJ (New York: Routledge: 1999), 45; Geza Vermes,
The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, 4th ed. (London: Penguin, 1995), 77; Michael Wise, Martin Abegg
Jr., and Edward Cook, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation (New York: HarperCollins, 1996),
134. See also Carr, Writing, 218; Snyder, Teachers, 157. George Brooke, “Reading, Searching
and Blessing: A Functional Approach to Scriptural Interpretation in the ‫יחד‬,” in The Temple in
Text and Tradition: A Festschrift in Honour of Robert Hayward, ed. R. Timothy McLay, LSTS 82
(London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015), 143n.10, questions whether this passage in 1QS is related
to Neh 8.
20 As mentioned already in ­chapter 4, for the scholarly debate on the variants of ἀναπτύξας (‫ א‬D

et al.) and ἀνοίξας (B A et al.) in Luke 4:17, see Metzger et al., Textual, 114; Bagnall, “Jesus,” 577–​88;
van Minnen, “Luke 4:17–​20,” 689–​90; Poirier, “Roll,” 6n.6.
21 Pieter F. Craffert and Pieter J. J. Botha, “Why Jesus Could Walk on the Sea but He Could Not

Read or Write,” Neot, 39.1 (2005): 30. (The article clarifies that Botha is responsible for the section in
which this claim is made.) Botha makes this claim partially because he is convinced that Jesus was
illiterate. I agree with this conclusion in terms of the historical Jesus, but Luke quite clearly does not.
See further Keith, Jesus’ Literacy, 139–​45, 165–​88.
22 Rhoads, “Performance,” 119–​31; Pieter J. J. Botha, Orality and Literacy in Early Christianity,

BPC 5 (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2012), 91; William David Shiell, Delivering from Memory: The Effect
of Performance on the Early Christian Audience (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011), 1–​10; Shiell, Reading,
100–​101. Cf. also Martin S. Jaffee, “Oral Tradition in the Writings of Rabbinic Oral Torah: On
Theorizing Rabbinic Orality,” Oral Tradition 14.1 (1999): 9, who suggests that for medieval rab-
binic scholars manuscripts were “an almost accidental existant.” Kirk, “Manuscript,” 219, repeats
this view.
23 Dionysius Thrax, Grammar 2: “In this way we read tragedy heroically, comedy conversationally,

elegiacs musically, and dirges softly and plaintively. Any reading done without due observance of
these rules degrades the merits of the poets and makes the habits of readers ridiculous” (Davidson).
24 Theon, Progym. 103 (Kennedy 67). Cf. also Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Dem. 53–​54; Pliny the

Younger, Ep. 7.17.4–​5.

 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 169

“recitation” in order to refer to “reading”25—​their articulation in these terms

is inherently problematic and has rightly received criticism.26 The biggest
problem is that the full breadth of evidence does not support the notion that
“reading” typically involved recitation of tradition rather than decipherment
of script on a manuscript. For example, Horsley’s preferred translation of 1QS
VI, 7 as the recitation of a book rather than literal reading is questionable in
light of the fact that it fails to render the preposition ‫ב‬, which would most nat-
urally here mean reading “in” or perhaps “from” the book, but is questionable
even further in light of other references to the reading of books in the scrolls.
The Genesis Apocryphon portrays Abraham “reading” aloud before Egyptian
officials and specifies that he reads words from a scroll: “I read in front of
them the [book] of the words of Enoch” (‫)וקרית קודמיהון ל[כתב] מלי חנוך‬.27
Similarly, when the Damascus Document prohibits priests from reading
a book publicly if they read poorly, its descriptions of what contributes to
poor reading—​inability to separate words, staccato pronunciation, poor
eyesight—​make clear that it refers to the reading of words from a manu-
script.28 After a review of ‫ קרא‬in the sectarian literature of Qumran, Brooke
concludes, “Reading seems to be more than recitation from text or memory;
it seems to involve comprehension and even some kind of active engagement
with the text as it was performed.”29 Thus, although it would not be correct to
claim that ‫ קרא‬could never carry a meaning of recitation,30 it is nevertheless
the case that a meaning of literally reading words on a manuscript is strongly
attested and far from marginal.
Along these lines, Kirk has articulated another problem that some per-
formance criticism has with the evidence related to my point about the
Damascus Document and Irenaeus, a problem that I earlier noted as well—​
“the tendency of some who work under the banner of ‘performance criticism’

25 Tertullian, Praescr. 36.1. See further footnote 170 below, as well as Brian J. Wright, Communal

Reading in the Time of Jesus: A Window into Early Christian Reading Practices (Minneapolis: Fortress,
2017), 19–​20.
26 Similarly, Kirk, Q, 15: “These claims [of performance critics], while certainly incorporating

elements of truth, stand in need of serious qualification.” For a critique of performance criticism
in classics, see Holt N. Parker, “Books and Reading Latin Poetry,” in Johnson and Parker, Ancient
Literacies, 188: “We do not find literature being performed from memory without a text in front of
a reader. . . . The testimony from Latin poets and other writers indicates quite clearly that poets in-
tended their works to be read, by readers, in books.”
27 1QapGen ar XIX, 25 (García Martínez and Tigchelaar).
28 4Q266 5 II, 1–​4//​4Q267 5 III, 3–​5//​4Q273 2, 1.
29 Brooke, “Reading,” 145.
30 Wollenberg, “Dangers,” 709–​45, demonstrates that it often carries this meaning in the rabbinic

corpus, though she also acknowledges that “classical rabbinic traditions also include references to
reading as we know it” (712).
170 The Gospel as Liturgy

to dissolve written texts into ‘orality’ and ‘performance’ in ways that fail to
reckon with the irreducible properties and effects of the written medium.”31
As these references to the Genesis Apocryphon and Damascus Document
indicate, ancient sources frequently reveal “the effects of the written me-
dium” that lectors had to navigate. These effects principally centered upon
the difficulty of reading handwritten manuscripts—​each one unique—​and
thus show why a lector had to “familiarize himself with the text and make an
informed interpretation of it before he [could] successfully read it aloud to
an audience.”32 In a text that exhibits what E.-​M. Becker means about visu-
alization being a core component of literary memory,33 Quintilian (first cen-
tury ce) claims that genuine memory of a passage is produced by writing it
in one’s own hand and that this allows the person to know the tradition as
if he were reading it from a manuscript, thereby revealing Quintilian’s as-
sumption about what reading from a manuscript involves: “For he will have
certain tracks to guide him in his pursuit of memory, and the mind’s eye will
be fixed not merely on the pages on which the words were written, but on
individual lines, and at times he will speak as though he were reading aloud
(legenti).”34 Quintilian thus refers to a reading ability that can proceed line
by line on a manuscript when he refers to a memory to match it. Lucian
(second century ce) gives further evidence that this is precisely how reading
a manuscript worked. In a text cited already briefly in ­chapter 2, he mocks
the ignorant book collector for not being truly educated, despite the fact that
he can read well publicly (a rare skill in terms of the population at large).
Lucian shows that, for him, reading meant putting one’s eyes on the manu-
script: “To be sure you look at your books with your eyes open and quite as
much as you like, and you read (ἀναγιγνώσκεις) some of them aloud with
great fluency, keeping your eyes in advance of your lips; but I do not con-
sider that enough, unless you know the merits and defects of each passage in
their contents.”35 The early Christian freedman Hermas (second century ce),

31 Kirk, Q, 14. Kirk also refers to “performance critics[’] . . . one-​sided emphasis on orality” (Q, 48).

See also Hurtado, Destroyer, 117; Keith, “Prolegomena,” 161–​86; Chris Keith, “‘The Scriptures are
Divine Charms’: Evil, Books, and Textuality in Early Christianity,” in Evil in Second Temple Judaism
and Early Christianity, ed. Chris Keith and Loren T. Stuckenbruck, WUNT 2.417 (Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck, 2016), 321–​39.
32 Nässelqvist, Public, 87 (emphasis added). Cf. also Johnson, “Ancient,” 262, on reading scriptio

continua.
33 E.-​M. Becker, Birth, 7–​12 and the discussion in c
­ hapter 4.
34 Quintilian, Inst. 11.2.32 (Butler, LCL). Similarly on the mnemonic benefits of handwriting, see

Philo, Spec. Law 4.160.

35 Lucian, Ind. 2 (Harmon, LCL).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 171

indicates a more rudimentary reading ability that proceeds syllable by syl-

lable. This is a level that Hermas had not yet attained, since he “could not dis-
tinguish between the syllables.”36 He therefore had not attained the ideal for
“reading” that Dionysius Thrax’s Progymnasmata outlined—​the “rendering
of poetic or prose productions without stumbling or hesitancy.”37 Similar to
the Damascus Document’s concern about pronunciation and Lucian’s con-
cession that the book collector can at least read fluently are Irenaeus’s admo-
nitions about proper observation of breathing pauses.38 I will discuss some
of these texts further in ­chapter 7 but note now that they place high expec-
tations on the public reader and assume quite clearly that their task is the
reading of letters on manuscripts.
Therefore, although one need not doubt that manuscripts could function
as aides-​mémoire,39 nor that there was a performative dynamic to public
reading, nor that ancients could relate public speaking to public reading,
unqualified claims that “readers” did not “read” are unwarranted.40 Readers
regularly and frequently read manuscripts, and public reading was a special-
ized skill that the majority of the illiterate ancient world was without.41

Public versus Private Reading

The concept of “public reading” needs further explanation, as does “private

reading.” In modern parlance, such terms can indicate a contrast between
reading aloud to anyone who is within hearing range (such as a worship
service, classroom, book club, public announcement, or poetry slam) and
reading silently alone (such as private study or reading for entertainment).

36 Hermas, Vis. 2.1.4 (Ehrman, LCL). Cf. also Cicero, Att. 13.25, who discusses two scribes, one of

whom can follow dictation syllable by syllable and the other of whom can follow whole sentences.
On the learning of syllables in initial literary education, see Dionysius of Halicarnassus, On Literary
Composition (2.229 in the Loeb edition); Manilius, Astronomica 2.755–​761.
37 Dionysius Thrax, Grammar 2 (Davidson).
38 4Q266 5 II, 1–​4//​4Q267 5 III, 3–​5//​4Q273 2, 1; Lucian, Ind. 2; Irenaeus, Haer. 3.7.1–​2.
39 Cf. Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 16.8.3; 17.7.5–​6; Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 1.11.1; 1.14.2.
40 The approach taken here is the photographic negative of Wollenberg, “Dangers,” 709–​ 45.
Focusing upon rabbinic references to reading as recitation, Wollenberg acknowledges that meanings
for “reading” as deciphering letters on a manuscript are attested and that manuscripts were often
present, but she is more interested in instances where recitation seems to be indicated. I acknowledge
that recitation happened but am more interested in how manuscripts altered reading events when
they were present.
41 Johnson, “Ancient,” 262: “Thorough training was necessary for one to be able to read this scriptio

continua readily and comfortably.”

172 The Gospel as Liturgy

This modern understanding of these terms does not reflect ancient reading
practices.42
The modern distinction between public and private reading has at its
base a distinction between reading aloud and reading silently because silent
reading is the norm for private reading in modern culture. As was discussed
in ­chapter 1, reading aloud was the norm for reading in the ancient world.
Silent reading was not unknown,43 but reading was frequently aloud, even if
one was reading to him-​or herself44 or having one’s slave read to him or her
alone.45 If one were to understand “public” in the modern sense of “able to be
heard by others,” then, most reading events were “public.”
But “public” also is not an ideal descriptor for typical ancient reading prac-
tices, because most reading events, though communal, were not open to an-
yone. As an example, consider Pliny the Younger’s description of the various
stages of producing a work, during which he reads in different contexts:

Personally, I do not seek praise for my speech when it is read aloud, but
when the text can be read after publication, and consequently I employ
every possible method of correction. First of all, I go through my work my-
self; next, I read it to two or three friends and send it to others for comment.
If I have any doubts about their criticisms, I go over them again with one or
two people, and finally I read the work to a larger audience; and that is the
moment, believe me, when I make my severest corrections, for my anxiety
makes me concentrate all the more carefully.46

This description demonstrates the inappropriateness of importing any

modern ideas of “publishing” onto the ancient context and complicates any
idea of an “original” text. Equally, it demonstrates the closed circles of these
reading events. More than one person may have been in the audience, but

42 Parker, “Books,” 192: “Silent/​aloud and private/​public are two quite different contrasts, and none

necessarily implies the other.”

43 Augustine, Conf. 6.3 §3, in reference to Ambrose: “When he was reading, his eyes ran over the

page and his heart perceived the sense, but his voice and tongue were silent” (Chadwick). For the
history of the debate on silent reading in antiquity, see Johnson, Readers, 3–​16. Pace many schol-
ars (Fowler, Let, 84; Gamble, Books, 39), it is not the case that “all” reading in antiquity was aloud,
as is rightly noted by Valeriy A. Alikin, The Earliest History of the Christian Gathering: Origin,
Development and Content of the Christian Gathering in the First to Third Centuries, VCSup 102
(Leiden: Brill, 2010), 147; Shiner, Proclaiming, 14. For the debate in New Testament studies, see the
response of Gilliard, “More,” 689–​96 to Achtemeier, “Omne,” 3–​27.
44 Galen, Ther. 14.211 K.
45 Pliny the Younger, Ep. 3.5.
46 Pliny the Younger, Ep. 7.17.7–​8 (Radice, LCL).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 173

these are “private” events in the sense that they are restricted to Pliny’s close
friends and acquaintances who would have accepted his invitations to par-
ticipate. Readings in Jewish and Christ assemblies were also private in this
sense, as they involved a specific community rather than the general popu-
lation. Markschies is correct: “Until the revolutionary changes of the fourth
century, ancient Christian worship services were in the strict sense not
public.”47
For this reason, when I use the phrase “public” in reference to ancient
reading events, I indicate primarily the communal setting associated with
the reading aloud of texts among a restricted (or “private”) audience. I will
sometimes also refer simply to “communal” reading in contrast to isolated
reading events associated with private study, which were rare in terms of the
general population and typically a luxury of wealth or patronage.48

Religious and Liturgical Reading Events

With regard to communal reading events among early Christians, another

word about terminology is necessary. At the risk of oversimplification, all
liturgical reading among Jesus followers was religious reading, but not all re-
ligious reading was liturgical reading. By “religious,” I refer broadly to any
reading event that individuals or groups undertook in direct relation to their
being followers of Jesus. This term is not ideal, since the concept of “religion”
for antiquity is contestable,49 but I use it in a purposefully broad manner in
reference to a wide variety of reading events: among others, a leader of the
Christ cult privately studying a text alone in his or her home, a small gath-
ering of Jesus followers listening to a text read in one of their homes by a

47 Christoph Markschies, Christian Theology and Its Institutions in the Early Roman Empire, trans.

Wayne Coppins, BMSEC (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2015), 117. Markschies thus speaks of
“reduced publicness.”
48 This usage of terms was prior to and independent of Wright, Communal, who, though cor-

rectly noting the numerous occurrences of public reading in the cultural contexts of Second Temple
Judaism and early Christianity, views public reading curiously as a “quality control” (8–​10, 208–​9)
on the Jesus tradition that “preserve[d]‌the integrity of a tradition’s content” (4). At best, this is a
one-​sided description of the effects of public reading in antiquity since actualization of the tradition
was just as responsible for mishearings and misunderstandings, beyond the “inevitable variation”
that Wright seems to allow (4). Since he cites my theory of the Jesus tradition as “Jesus-​memory” in
Keith, Jesus’ Literacy as a similar quality control (9), I must state explicitly that I reject such an under-
standing of social memory. In the study he cites, I argue that the nature of “social memory” created
both accurate and inaccurate perceptions of Jesus among his contemporaries.
49 Cf. Brent Nongbri, Before Religion: A History of a Modern Concept (New Haven: Yale University

Press, 2015).
174 The Gospel as Liturgy

trained slave, a gathered group of Jesus followers on Sunday listening to a

lector read an update from an itinerant acquaintance in the form of a letter,
or an assembly of believers listening to and discussing an authoritative text as
Scripture in the corporate context of Sunday worship. By “liturgical” I refer
more narrowly to this last class of reading events, wherein the reading event
is ritualistic and construed in such a way as to communicate the authoritative
status of the writing that is read to the assembled group.
This distinction is critical for understanding the diverse reading events
attested in early Christian sources, and therefore critical for what signifi-
cance scholars can attribute to any one of those events. As a cultural parallel,
one may consider the passage of Pliny cited earlier that details a similar va-
riety of reading events—​Pliny on his own, Pliny with a select few, and Pliny
with a larger group.50 Sources for early Christianity similarly evince a variety
of religious reading events, though there is ultimately a contrast in that some
of the texts read in early Christianity were considered holy or authoritative,
and their public reading was related to the ascription of that status to them.
The Muratorian Fragment in the second (or perhaps fourth) century ce
distinguishes between rejected texts and “received” texts, and then further
between “received” texts that can be read (in general) and “received” texts
that can be read specifically “in church.”51 In a related manner, Serapion in
the late second century /​early third century reveals a distinction between
texts that can be read for edification and texts that can be read specifically
in the manner of previously “received” texts.52 These reading events will be
discussed further below because they reveal that it was one thing to read a
writing and another thing to read it as a “received” or scriptural writing.
Furthermore, it must be observed that ritualistic, liturgical reading events
are the products of repetition over a sustained period wherein communities
imbue these texts with extra significance.53 Here lies the cultural threshold
that the Pauline letters first crossed in early Christianity, a threshold that, as
­chapter 1 showed, Assmann associates with the transition from communi-
cative memory to cultural memory. The Pauline epistles were initially occa-
sional correspondence between Paul and an immediate audience. At least by
the time that an early follower of Jesus wrote 2 Peter in the late first or second

50 Pliny the Younger, Ep. 7.17.7.

51 Muratorian Fragment 77–​78. Cf. Markschies, “Canon,” 181: “It is . . . important to realize the dif-
ferent levels of authority in one and the same concept of ‘canon.’ ”
52 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.3–​4.
53 I thank Simon Gathercole for encouraging me to emphasize this point.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 175

century ce, however, they were read in Christ assemblies as Scripture (2 Pet
3:15–​16).54 Strongly related to this development was the emergence of a col-
lection of Pauline epistles.55
Several factors contributed to the attribution of scriptural status to Paul’s
initially occasional correspondence, such as the presumed acceptance of the
notion that Paul did “have the Spirit of God” (1 Cor 7:40) and thus occasion-
ally spoke “a command of the Lord” (1 Cor 14:37). Colossians 4:16 and other
texts show another factor, which is the circulation of Paul’s epistles for one
assembly among other assemblies.56 This practice entailed not only multiple
readings of the same epistle but also the conviction that the audience of these
epistles has expanded beyond an initial target audience. In this way, liturgical
reading, as a form of ritual, must have time to develop. We should therefore
be hesitant to assume, without further evidence, that a text that came to be
read liturgically was always or initially read in such a manner.
Despite the fact that this differentiation between religious reading,
broadly understood, and liturgical reading, narrowly understood, is thor-
oughly grounded in some of the ancient sources, it must be taken only as a
heuristic device. The evidence is even more complex than this terminology
may suggest. It is true that some early Christians considered “in church” to
be a special set of sociocultural circumstances for reading, reserved for au-
thoritative texts, in contrast to reading outside of the assembly. It is also true,
however, that just because Christians read a text in assembly, that did not
necessarily mean that they regarded it as authoritative. Followers of Jesus
read the Pauline literature in the context of assembly prior to its attainment
of scriptural status, and they also read many other texts in assembly that did
not ultimately attain scriptural status.57 The proscriptions of the Muratorian

54 Cf. Gamble, Books, 58: “Not only were Paul’s letters, so far as we know, the earliest Christian writ-

ings, they were also the earliest to be valued, imitated, to circulate beyond their original recipients,
and to be collected.” Hurtado, Destroyer, 113, suggests that public reading of the Pauline epistles and
circulation of them led them to be considered as Scripture “probably before any of the other writings
that came to form the New Testament.”
55 Gamble, Books, 58–​60. Gamble argues that this collection was placed in a codex and served as

the foundation for the Christian adoption of the codex form for its writings.
56 Cf. also the assumed multiple readings of Pauline epistles reflected in 1 Thess 5:27 and the ad-

dress of the epistles to multiple assemblies in Gal 1:1; 2 Cor 1:1. For similar later references to such
circulation of epistles, see Marty. Poly. 20:1; Polycarp, Phil. 13:1–​2.
57 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.16, claims that 1 Clement was read “in many churches both in the days

of old and in our own time” (Lake, LCL); cf. also 4.23.11, which refers to the reading of 1 Clement
“in the church” as customary “from the beginning” (Lake, LCL). See also the reading of the apos-
tolic letter in Acts 15:23–​29 and the reading of Hermas reflected in Muratorian Fragment 73–​80;
Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.3.6. Within Hermas, Hermas is instructed to read a “little book” in the city of
Rome, but with the help of “the elders who preside over the church” (Herm. Vis. 2.4.3; Holmes). Thus,
rightly, Hengel, Studies, 76: “We may not simply identify liturgical anagnosis and ‘canonization.’ ”
176 The Gospel as Liturgy

Fragment and Serapion about which texts could be read in which contexts
would not have been necessary if Christians were already and uniformly
observing these distinctions. These categories—​“in assembly” or “in church,”
“Scripture,” “received,” “canon,” “apostolic,” and so on—​were, to greater and
lesser extents in varying periods and varying locales, in the midst of being
defined and defended. They were the means by which some Christ follow-
ers corralled a diverse set of reading practices, not a reflection of categories
that were upheld at all times and in all places by anyone claiming to follow
Jesus. At the same time, they were upheld at some times in some places by
some people claiming to follow Jesus, and historians should not underesti-
mate their significance for describing some book practices on the basis that
they cannot describe all book practices. I therefore retain a heuristic distinc-
tion between religious reading events and liturgical reading events even if we
must be aware of its limitations.

Communal Reading of the Gospels

in Pre-​Constantinian Christianity

On the basis of these foundations, I now consider the evidence for the com-
munal reading of the Gospels in pre-​Constantinian Christianity. Evidence in
the first century comes from Mark 13:14 and Matt 24:15. Evidence from the
second century and early third century includes at least four certain references
to Gospel reading, one by Justin Martyr in Rome, another by Irenaeus in Lyons,
a third by Serapion in Syria, and a fourth in the Acts of Peter. A fifth possible
reference to Gospel reading in this time period is in the Muratorian Fragment.

“Let the Reader Understand”—​Mark 13:14 and

Matthew 24:15

As was mentioned at the opening of this chapter, Mark 13:14 and Matt 24:15
refer to “the reader.” The reading event assumed by these texts is most likely
a public reading of the Gospels by a lector regardless of whether that lector
held an official position in assembly.58 Nevertheless, we do not know enough
to affirm that this public reading event was a liturgical reading event.
58 Alikin, Earliest, 178–​79, argues that only with Tertullian (Praescr. 41.8) in the early third cen-

tury does one see a formal office of reader. This theory is based solely upon Tertullian’s usage of
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 177

The “Reader” as a Lector

With several scholars, I affirm that the most natural interpretation of Mark
13:14 and Matt 24:15’s unadorned instructions to “the reader” is that they
reflect the authors’ assumptions that their texts will be read aloud by a lit-
erate individual to a group.59 Other scholars disagree. Fowler, for example,
approaches the text from the perspective of reader-​response criticism and
states that it is ultimately impossible to decide whether “the reader” envi-
sioned is an individual reading to himself in private, a lector reading to an as-
sembly, or even a listening member of the lector’s audience.60 Alikin claims,
“There is little reason to assume that this is a person who read the Gospel
in the Church” and rejects the notion that Mark 13:14 indicates a liturgical
reading context.61 His justification for this claim is that “what has to be un-
derstood here should be understood, not by the lector alone, but by anybody
who reads about ‘the desolating sacrilege.’ ”62 Shiner similarly denies that the
author refers to a single reader and also favors Fowler’s third scenario, but
he buttresses this claim by arguing that “ ‘reader’ in the ancient world often
meant those listening to someone else performing a work of literature.”63
Nässelqvist follows Shiner,64 and Shiell similarly argues that ἀναγινώσκω
(“read”) and ἀκούω (“hear”) are “used interchangeably” in ancient sources.65
In this variety of ways, scholars shift attention away from the notion of an
individual reader and toward the audience for whom the text is relevant and
who, it should be noted, is part of the “performance” event that some of them
envision.66

the noun ἀναγνώστης instead of the participle ἀναγινώσκων, which is insufficient to support
the argument. See footnote 110. I will suggest later in this chapter that Justin’s reference to “the
reader” (ὁ ἀναγινώσκων) at 1 Apol. 67.3–​4 is the first reference to a recognized position in the
church. Cf. also the early third-​century Trad. ap. 11, which refers to “the reader” in a formal
capacity.
59 Mary Ann Beavis, Mark, Paideia (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011), 197; Collins, Mark,

597–​98, 608; France, Gospel, 52–​53; 522–​23; Gundry, Mark, 742–​43; Hengel, Four, 37.
60 Robert M. Fowler, Let the Reader Understand: Reader-​Response Criticism and the Gospel of Mark

(Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2001), 84–​85.

61 Alikin, Earliest, 179.
62 Alikin, Earliest, 179.
63 Shiner, Proclaiming, 177; also 15–​16.
64 Nässelqvist, Public, 112.
65 Shiell, Reading, 107.
66 Other suggestions about “the reader” include the idea that it is “intended as part of Jesus’ dis-

course” (Mary Healy, The Gospel of Mark, CCSS [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008], 265) or that,
in Matt 24:15 especially, it refers to the reader of Daniel (Davies and Allison, Matthew, 3:346).
178 The Gospel as Liturgy

I readily admit that the meager references in Mark 13:14 and Matt 24:15 do
not yield enough information to affirm whether Fowler’s first possibility (an
isolated reader) or second possibility (a reader before a group) is in view, at
least not in a definitive sense. But there is sufficient reason to take the second
option as more likely than the first and to reject Fowler’s third possibility, that
“the reader” was actually the listener(s). First, contrary to Shiner, the singular
participle means that the authors undeniably refer to a single reader, even
if they do so with the expectation that the listening audience will hear this
instruction.67
Second, and in response to Shiner and Shiell, although the semantic ranges
of ἀναγινώσκω and ἀκούω “often” overlapped, as they state,68 they did not do
so always and inevitably or in such a manner that obliterated each verb’s dis-
tinct meaning. Their semantic flexibility in the instances where their mean-
ings do overlap—​such as Acts 15:31, where the assembly’s “reading” (ἀναγν
όντες) of the apostolic letter is almost certainly a reference to their “hearing”
the text read to them69—​is due less to indistinguishable meanings and more
to the two distinguishable, though simultaneous, aspects of the phenom-
enon of public reading: the reading of the text aloud and the hearing of the
text being read aloud.70 Thus, other texts observe their distinct meanings.
Revelation 1:3 distinguishes between ὁ ἀναγινώσκων καὶ οἱ ἀκούντες (“the
reader and the listeners”). Theon’s Progymnasmata distinguishes between
the skills of “reading” out loud (ἀνάγνωσις) and “hearing” a text read aloud

67 Oddly, Shiner, Proclaiming, 177, buttresses his claim that “the reader” refers to the listening au-

dience by invoking his own practice of performing the Gospel before an audience: “As a performer
of the Gospel, I would understand ‘reader’ to refer to the individual members of the audience, not to
myself.” This is a case of reading oneself into the text. Shiner’s contemporary practices cannot deter-
mine what a first-​century author meant.
68 Shiner, Proclaiming, 177; Shiell, Reading, 107.
69 The interpretation of Acts 15:31, which literally reads, “After they read (ἀναγνόντες), they

rejoiced,” is a bit more complex than is reflected in, for example, the NRSV (“When its members
[that is, the assembly’s] read it, they rejoiced”). The subject of the plural participle ἀναγνόντες is
the subject of the governing verb ἐχάρησαν (“they rejoiced”), and thus it is clear syntactically that
those “reading” are also those “rejoicing.” Nevertheless, the subjects of the verb and the participle
are implied, and the antecedent is the subject of ἐπέδωκαν (“they gave”), that is, Judas and Silas, who
“gave” the letter to the assembly (15:30). Given the low rates of literacy and norms for public reading
in the ancient world, the author of Acts most likely intends to indicate not that every member of the
assembly personally read the letter prior to rejoicing but that Judas and Silas, the letter carriers, or an-
other literate individual read to the assembly. Thus, the participle ἀναγνόντες refers to the participa-
tion of “they” who rejoiced in the reading event, via hearing, and not their literal reading of the letter,
as can be implied by NRSV. Under this interpretation, Acts 15:30–​31 should be read: “They [Judas
and Silas] gave the letter. After they [Judas and Silas or whoever received the letter] read, they [the full
assembly in Antioch] rejoiced.”
70 A very similar phenomenon occurred in ancient Rome with regard to the process of com-

position by dictation to a scribe: dictare could mean “to dictate” or “to compose” (Starr, “Reading
Aloud, 337).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 179

(ἀκόασις).71 Illustrating what Assmann would later refer to as the zerdehnte

Situation of textuality,72 Clement of Alexandria refers to both reading and
hearing as aspects of the reception of texts when he challenges those who
generate writings and those who receive them alike to “examine them-
selves”: “The one must see if he is fit to speak and to leave behind written
records, the other if he has the right to listen and read (ἀκροᾶσθαί τε καὶ ἐν
τυγχάνειν).”73 Shiner therefore cannot cite the mere possibility of “readers”
meaning “listeners” as proof that Mark 13:14 categorically could not have
meant “that Mark intended his Gospel to be read by single readers.”74
Third, directly related to Rev 1:3 and as the works of Alikin, Shiell, and
Nässelqvist otherwise demonstrate, ὁ ἀναγινώσκων (as well as the nominal ὁ
ἀναγνώστης and the Latin lector) was a widely recognized term for a public
reader inside and outside the community of Jesus followers.75 Although
not ubiquitously, the term commonly and typically refers to a single reader
who reads aloud for an audience. Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15, like Rev 1:3 and
also like 2 Clem 19:1 and Justin Martyr’s First Apology 67.3–​4, refers to the
“reader” in the singular, and in each of these other texts the single reader
is portrayed as one who reads before an audience. Similarly, according to
1 Tim 4:13 and 4:16, Timothy should give attention to “the reading” (τῇ
ἀναγνώσει), which occurs before “the hearers” (τοὺς ἀκούοντας). Stated
otherwise, and while also bearing in mind the possibility that Mark 13:14//​
Matt 24:15 could refer to an isolated reader, the most natural interpretation is
nevertheless the one that coheres with many other references to “the reader”
in early Christian literature—​a single reader who reads before a listening
group.76 The author’s “aside” in Mark 13:14 is, in this sense, not at all “as baff-
ling as the [Danielic] abomination itself,”77 but a common aspect of public
reading in the ancient world.
Therefore, although I agree with Alikin that one cannot take Mark 13:14
as a clear indication of a liturgical reading event, I do not agree that “there

71 Theon, Progym. 102–​7 (Kennedy 66–​69).

72 See ­chapter 1.
73 Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 1.5.1 (Ferguson, FC) (PG 8:692). I have modified Ferguson’s

translation slightly in order to read “and” instead of “or” for καί.

74 Shiner, Proclaiming, 177.
75 More generally, see “ἀναγι(γ)νώσκω,” BDAG 60; Rudolf Bultmann, “ἀναγινώσκω, ἀνάγνωσις,”

TDNT 1:343–​44.
76 Correctly, then, Gundry, Mark, 742–​ 3: “Under normal circumstances ‘the reader’ would
not mean a private reader, but a public reader to whom an audience is listening.” See also Bas
M. F. van Iersel, Mark: A Reader-​Response Commentary, trans. W. H. Bisscheroux, JSNTSup 164
(Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998), 400n.25.
77 Edwards, Gospel, 396.
180 The Gospel as Liturgy

is little reason to assume that this is a person who read the Gospel.”78 Quite
to the contrary, there is much reason to assume precisely that scenario, as
Alikin’s own further comments affirm. He observes that the ability to read
was a rare accomplishment and that Christ followers were dependent upon
“someone who was able to read in public” or an “official reader.”79

Mark’s Intentions

Can one say more about the reading event assumed in Mark 13:14//​Matt
24:15? Pokorný asserts that Mark’s decision to textualize the tradition was an
intentional attempt to produce a liturgical text that rivaled Jewish Scripture.
This view would thus imply that the reading envisioned in Mark is litur-
gical in nature, and other statements from Pokorný reflect a similar under-
standing: “Because he dared to write it as a book, [Mark] obviously intended
for liturgical reading and not only as an aid to memory”;80 “The decision
by Mark to fix Jesus traditions in a literary work corresponds to the role of
Scripture in Judaism.”81 Pokorný also argues that Mark’s Gospel was already
being read liturgically by the time of the authorship of Matthew’s Gospel and
Luke’s Gospel.82
Pokorný has claimed more than the evidence can support with regard to
the author’s intentions. One may readily affirm that the Gospel, at least as we
have it, was likely intended to be read aloud and also that Mark’s Gospel was
much more than an aide-​mémoire. The liturgical aspect of Pokorný’s claim,
however, is not as clear. An assembly context is historically likely, and the
reference to Jesus’s ἐκκλησία in Matt 16:18 (cf. also 18:17), as well as the pa-
tristic traditions about the authorship of Mark’s Gospel stemming from the
requests of the Roman church, including Eusebius’s statement that Peter “rat-
ified the scripture (τήν γραφὴν) for study83 in the churches (ταῖς ἐκκλησία

78 Alikin, Earliest, 179.

79 Alikin, Earliest, 179.
80 Pokorný, From, 127; see also 196.
81 Pokorný, From, 107.
82 Pokorný, From, 161.
83 Lake (LCL) translates εἰς ἔντευξιν as “for study.” For ἔντευξις, BDAG gives “petition, request”

and notes its potential connotations of intercessory prayer and thanksgiving. LSJ gives “lighting
upon, meeting with.” I am inclined to think that Lake has translated this phrase anachronistically
in light of modern Scripture study, and that Clement and Eusebius are referring not to study proper,
in the sense of private interrogation of the text, but to the usage of Mark’s Gospel as scripture “for
meeting with the churches,” that is, for usage as Scripture in their assembly. Cf. Williamson, who
translates as “authorized the reading of the book in the churches” (emphasis added).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 181

ις),” point in that direction.84 But, as was earlier argued, we must be careful
not to assume that a text that was later read liturgically and regarded as au-
thoritative was necessarily treated so at the origins of its circulation. There
is no explicit or implicit reference in Mark’s Gospel itself to the reading
taking place “in assembly” as one later has in Eusebius or in Justin Martyr,
the Muratorian Fragment, or the Acts of Peter. It is possible that Mark in-
tended his Gospel to fall into a category that one finds in the Muratorian
Fragment and Serapion—​permitted to be read, but not “in assembly/​church”
or as a “received” text.85 On its own, Mark 13:14 can support this possibility
just as well as it could support the possibility of a liturgical reading context
precisely because the author of Mark’s Gospel offers no explicit commentary
on how the significance (or insignificance) of the public reading should be
construed.86 The same is true concerning the author of Matthew’s Gospel
and Matt 24:15.
For these reasons, one cannot affirm that the Gospel of Mark or Gospel
of Matthew was initially read liturgically as a counterpart to Jewish Scripture
based solely on the fact that it was read publicly. It may have been, but assert-
ing this as a known reality rather than a possibility runs the risk of anach-
ronistically imposing later canon categories onto the intentions of Mark.
For the same reason, Alikin also goes too far in the other direction when he
asserts that Mark 13:14 certainly does not refer to liturgical reading.87 There
is not enough clarity for certainty in this case.
Pokorný is on safer ground when he claims that “within a few years
[Mark’s] book had a similar position in the Christian communities as did
the scrolls of the Law and the Prophets in the synagogue.”88 Regardless of
Mark’s or Matthew’s intention, their Gospels did eventually come to have this
position in assembly, which was necessarily related to the position of Jewish
Scripture. This fact remains significant apart from authorial intentions and
will be pursued in what follows.

84 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.2 (Lake, LCL). See also Clement of Alexandria, Adumbr. on 1 Pet 5:13

(ANF 2:573); Clement of Alexandria apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.1; 6.14.6; cf. also Irenaeus, Haer.
3.1.1; Anti-​Marcionite Prologue; Papias apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.15; Origen apud Eusebius,
Hist. eccl. 6.25.5.
85 Muratorian Fragment 71–​72; Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.3.6.
86 Cf. J. Becker, Mündliche, who argues that Mark 13:14 does not reflect a public reading like that

mentioned in 1 Thess 5:27 (133n.34), despite otherwise acknowledging the possibility that public
reading of the texts in assembly may have been practiced from the beginning (152). Again, there
is not enough evidence from Mark’s Gospel to conclude with certainty that 1 Thess 5:27 is not
analogous.
87 Alikin, Earliest, 179.
88 Pokorný, From, 128.
182 The Gospel as Liturgy

Justin Martyr and the “Memoirs of the Apostles”

A fuller description of the significance of public Gospel reading occurs in the

150s ce in Justin Martyr’s First Apology. Justin refers to the public reading
of the “memoirs of the apostles” (ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων)
in his congregation.89 He equates the “memoirs of the apostles” with the
Gospels: “For the apostles, in the memoirs (ἀπομνημονεύμασιν) which they
caused to be made and which are called gospels (εὐαγγέλια) . . .”90 “Memoirs,”
a term that he likely uses in deliberate imitation of Xenophon’s Memoirs of
Socrates,91 seems to be Justin’s favorite term for the Gospels. Although he
is the first early Christian to use the plural εὐαγγέλια (“Gospels”) in refer-
ence to written Gospels92 and elsewhere uses the singular noun εὐαγγέλιον
in reference to written Gospels twice,93 he employs “memoirs of the apostles”
(ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων) fifteen times.94

The Context of Gospel Reading in Justin’s First Apology

Justin is one of the few early Christians who reveals how he construes the
significance of reading as a liturgical act vis-​à-​vis Jewish and pagan cultures.
In this section of the First Apology, Justin forwards the argument that Plato
(and thus all Greek writers) was dependent upon Moses.95 As part of this
argument, Justin addresses several overlapping aspects of Greco-​Roman,
Jewish, and Christian cultures. He argues, for example, that Plato took his
idea that God created the world “by changing formless matter” from Moses,

89 1 Apol. 67.3. On the date of Justin’s First Apology, see Minns and Parvis, Justin, 44. On Justin, see

further Sara Parvis and Paul Foster, eds., Justin Martyr and His Worlds (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007);
Hubertus R. Drobner, The Fathers of the Church: A Comprehensive Introduction, trans. Siegfried S.
Schatzmann (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007), 77–​86.
90 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 66.3 (Minns and Parvis). Similarly, in Dial. 103, Justin cites Luke 22:44

from “the memoirs of the apostles and their successors” (Falls, FC).
91 Fiolová, “Scripture,” 169; Hengel, Four, 4, 212n.13; Hurtado, Destroyer, 115; Skarsaune, “Justin

and His Bible,” 72–​73. Justin compares Jesus qua Logos to Socrates in 1 Apol. 5.4 and 2 Apol. 10.3–​5
and cites Xenophon, Mem. 2.1.21–​34 at 2 Apol. 11.3–​5.
92 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 66.3. See further Hengel, Four, 4, 19.
93 Justin Martyr, Dial. 10.2; 100.1.
94 See Justin Martyr, Dial., 100.4; 101.3; 102.5; 103.6, 8; 104.1; 105.1, 5, 6; 106.1, 3, 4; 107.1; cf. 1 Apol.

66.3; 67.3. Hengel, Four, 4, correctly notes the number of occurrences. Stanton, Jesus, 54, counts four-
teen occurrences. Falls (FC) translates ἀπομνημονεύμασι incorrectly as “writings” at Dial. 102.5, and
thus also misses an occurrence. For the Greek, see Philippe Bobichon, Justin Martyr: Dialogue avec
Tryphon: Édition critique, traduction, commentaire, 2 vols., Paradosis 47.1, 2 (Fribourg: Academic
Press Fribourg, 2003), 460. Fialová, “Scripture,” 172–​73, provides a full listing in English.
95 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 59.1–​60.11.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 183

citing Gen 1.96 Similarly, he argues that Plato’s reference to the Son of God
as “arranged as an X in the whole” in Timaeus is actually a misreading of the
account in the Torah of Moses’s construction of a bronze pole, which was
to heal the Israelites from snakebites (Num 21:4–​9).97 According to Justin’s
Christological reading of the Torah, that pole was actually a cross prefiguring
Jesus’s death, and thus Plato misread the cross as an X.98 In short, for Justin,
“It is not we . . . who have the same opinions as others, but everyone who
speaks in imitation of what we say.”99
Justin similarly describes liturgical practices of early Christians by aligning
them with Israelite history, contrasting them with pagan practices, or both.
In the midst of an argument that it was actually Jesus Christ who appeared to
Moses in the burning bush (Exod 3:1–​4:17), he describes the Christian initia-
tion rite of baptism. He aligns this practice with Isa 1:16–​20 (“Wash, become
clean, put off your wicked deeds from your souls”),100 thus demonstrating
the pre-​Hellenistic origins of the Christian practice.101 Such origins are im-
portant for Justin because he then claims that “the demons” (οἱ δαίμονες)
heard about this washing practice from Isaiah and adopted it themselves, in-
cluding the practice of removing their shoes in imitation of Moses’s removal
of his shoes in Exod 3:5.102 At this point in his interpretive vortex of Exod 3,
Christology, and baptism, Justin does not name these “demons.” He will soon
identify them as Mithraists.103
After discussing at length Jesus’s appearance to Moses, Justin returns to
Christian baptism (1 Apol. 65.1) and proceeds to describe what occurs after
the new believer is baptized: “After earnestly saying prayers . . . we . . . greet
one another with a kiss. Then there is brought to the president of the brothers
bread and a cup of wine mixed with water.”104 Justin then explains the
Eucharist. He focuses upon the Gospel account of the Last Supper for the sig-
nificance of the Eucharist as “flesh and blood for our salvation”:

96 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 59.1–​5 (Minns and Parvis).

97 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 60.1–​7 (Minns and Parvis). See Plato, Tim. 36b–​c.
98 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 60.5: “Plato did not accurately understand them and did not know that it
was an image of a cross, but thinking it was an X-​formation . . .” (Minns and Parvis).
99 Justine Martyr, 1 Apol. 60.10 (Minns and Parvis).
100 NRSV.
101 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 61.7–​8.
102 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 62.1–​ 2 (Minns and Parvis). Lieu, Christian, 162, rightly identifies
Justin’s treatment of baptism vis-​à-​vis Mithraism as an instance of “Christian writers recogniz[ing]
and determinedly reimagin[ing] symbols apparently common to themselves and to those deemed
outsiders.”
103 1 Apol. 66.4.
104 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 65.1–​3 (Minns and Parvis).
184 The Gospel as Liturgy

Just so we have been taught that the food which has been eucharistized
through a word or prayer which comes from him is the flesh and blood
of Jesus who was made flesh. . . . For the apostles, in the memoirs which
they caused to be made and which are called gospels, handed down in this
way what Jesus has commanded them. Taking bread and giving thanks, he
said: “Do this in memory of me, this is my body,” and taking the cup simi-
larly and eucharistizing it he said: “This is my blood,” and he shared it with
them.105

This passage contains the aforementioned definition of the “memoirs of the

apostles” as “the Gospels,” but it is also important because it sets the stage for
Justin’s return to the “demons.” Immediately after quoting the Gospels, he
says, “The evil demons, imitating this in the mysteries of Mithras, handed
down that the same should be done, for you either know or are able to learn
that bread and a cup of water are presented in the rites of initiation along
with some accompanying words.”106 The various threads of Justin’s pre-
vious discussion now coalesce into the point to which he had always been
driving: Mithraism, despite practicing baptism and ritual bread and cup, is
actually just imitating Christian baptism and Eucharist. Like Plato long before
them, Mithraists are dependent upon the wisdom of the Christian practices,
which are themselves aligned to the ancient Hebrews who antedated Plato.

Justin’s Gospel-​Reading Culture

We are now able to see all the more clearly what Lieu refers generally to as a
“new cultural system” in which early Christian identity claims overlap with
Jewish and Greco-​Roman cultures.107 In 1 Apology, Justin weaves a tapestry,
revealing simultaneously the common threads between Christians, Jews, and
pagans as well as the distinct cords of each culture. And it is precisely in this
immediate context that Justin describes the public reading of the Gospels
alongside baptism, the Eucharist, the holy kiss, and the post-​prayer “amen”
as an early Christian liturgical practice:

105 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 66.2–​3 (Minns and Parvis).

106 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 66.4 (Minns and Parvis).
107 Lieu, Christian, 56.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 185

And on the day called Sunday there is an assembly of those who dwell in
cities or the countryside (πάντων κατά πόλεις ἤ ἀγροὺς μενόντων), and the
memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, for as long
as there is time. Then, when the reader (τοῦ ἀναγινώσκοντος) has stopped,
the president, in an address, makes admonition and invitation of the imita-
tion of their good tidings.108

Justin’s description of this Christian assembly is nearly a perfect example

of what Johnson terms a “sociological system” that renders reading events
intelligible.
At least three aspects of Justin’s description of early Christian Gospel
reading are relevant for the arguments of this chapter and the next. First, as
has already been mentioned, Justin’s description of a reading event where a
single reader reads aloud to others is typical of ancient communal reading
practices. On the one hand, Justin’s reference to a single public reader is
consistent with the first-​century references to a single reader (ὁ ἀναγινώσκ
ων) of Gospel manuscripts in Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15, as is his usage of the
participle instead of the noun ἀναγνώστης. Justin’s description of Christian
Gospel reading is also consistent with how Jews read their texts in synagogue
gatherings and how many Romans read their texts in gatherings of friends
or banquets. I will return to these various continuities below and in the
next chapter. On the other hand, there are some differences between Justin’s
Gospel reading and Greco-​Roman reading events in general, most notably
the explicitly liturgical context in Justin. Since Justin refers to the “reader”
alongside the “president” (who elsewhere presides over the Eucharist)109 and
describes a ritual context in which the Gospels are read alongside authorita-
tive Jewish Scripture, I regard Justin—​not Tertullian—​as the earliest refer-
ence to “the reader” as a formal position in early Christianity.110

108 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 67.3–​4 (Minns and Parvis).

109 Justin Martyr, 1 Ap. 65.1–​3.
110 Similarly, J. Becker, Mündliche, regards Justin’s “reader” as holding an office (“Amt”) (95) and

describes the reading as liturgical (151), contra Alikin, Earliest, 178–​79, and Nässelqvist, Public, 113,
who view only references to the reader as ὁ ἀναγνώστης, instead of ὁ ἀναγινώσκων, as indicative
of a formal position. They are likely correct that first-​century references to “the reader” (e.g., Mark
13:14; Rev 1:3) do not have in view an official position, but this is not primarily due to the usage of the
participle. Similar usages of participles and nouns warn against using linguistic forms as the sole cri-
teria in determining levels of formality. For example, already in the first century, and within the same
narrative, the author of Mark’s Gospel refers to John the Baptist interchangeably as ὁ βαπτίζων (Mark
1:4; 6:14) and ὁ βαπτιστής (Mark 6:25; 8:28).
186 The Gospel as Liturgy

Second, especially in Jewish and Christian contexts, this usage of a single

reader who read aloud often served the practical function of making the text
accessible to the majority of those in the assembly who were illiterate. The
rest of Greco-​Roman society also had a predominantly illiterate populace,
but the constituency of, for example, private reading events among the elite
Roman culture that Johnson profiles could consist primarily of educated
members of society and their slaves.111 In these contexts, the communal
reading of the text was not necessarily related to illiteracy. They often used
trained slaves to read publicly as a luxury of wealth, allowing them to avoid
the usage of the literate skills that they nevertheless possessed. Reading and
writing skills were prized possessions in elite Roman culture,112 but ones that
could nevertheless be dispensed to a trained slave.113
Jewish and Christian public reading events differed from the elite Roman
reading culture in this sense, since their assemblies often contained a mix-
ture of classes.114 Gamble suggests that they were more like events of “light
reading” of ancient novels, which typically

occurred in public, quasi-​public, and domestic settings where those lis-

tening might include the semiliterate and illiterate as well as the literate. . . .
This is the sense in which early Christian literature too can be called pop-
ular. Most early Christian texts were meant to speak to the whole body of
the faithful to whom they were read. These writings envisioned not indi-
vidual readers but gathered communities, and through public, liturgical
reading they were heard by the whole membership of the churches.115

Justin mentions this precise mixed demographic when stating that his as-
sembly in Rome included city dwellers as well as those who walked in from
the rural countryside.116 He elsewhere draws attention to this same mixed

111 Johnson, Readers, 32–​178.

112 Cicero, Att. 2.23; 7.3; Dio Chrysostom, Dic. exercit. 6; Quintilian, Inst. 1.1.28–​29; 11.2.32; Philo,
Spec. Laws 4.160, 162.
113 Cicero, Att. 2.23; 4.16; 7.2; 8.13; Rhet. Her. 4.4.6.
114 Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.17 §175.
115 Gamble, Books, 39–​40. Also Hurtado, “Manuscripts,” 105; Pokorný, From, 112.
116 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 67.3–​4. Thomas A. Robinson, Who Were the First Christians? Dismantling

the Urban Thesis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017) states that at 1 Apol. 67.3–​4 Justin “speaks of
the meetings of Christians taking place on Sunday in cities (πόλεις) and villages (ἀργοὺς μενοντων)”
(147), giving the impression that Justin acknowledges multiple assemblies, some in the city and
some in the country. As the Greek of Justin’s 1 Apology indicates, though, he quite clearly speaks of
a single meeting (συνέλευσις) on Sundays at 67.3 (and 67.8), which consists of (translated literally)
“all who abide in cities or fields” (πάντων κατά πόλεις ἤ ἀγροὺς μενόντων). Also against the idea of a
single assembly, Denis Minns and Paul Parvis, eds., Justin, Philosopher and Martyr: Apologies, OECT
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 187

demographic when he acknowledges that there are those in his church “who
do not even know the formation of letters, being simple and uncouth in
speech.”117 Although there were certainly illiterates in urban environments,
there was also a well-​attested association between agrarianism and illiteracy.
Quintilian could use illitteratus (“illiterate,” “unlearned”) as essentially a syn-
onym for rusticus (“rural,” “rustic”).118 The usage of a single reader for an
assembled group was so common because it met the practical need of the
majority of the population, which needed someone to read the texts for them.
Third, Justin describes the public reading of the Gospels as occupying the
same liturgical space as the public reading of “the writings of the prophets”
(τὰ συγγράμματα τοῦ προφητῶν).119 It is not entirely clear whether “the
prophets” in this instance refers to the prophetic literature or the Torah,

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 259n.3, argue that it is “highly improbable” that “large num-
bers of Christians” gathered in Rome and “even more unlikely that they travelled from rural areas.”
They do not explain why it would be so improbable or unlikely, however; neither do they note that
Justin does not here tell us how many Christians met, whether “large numbers” or otherwise. They
refer to the occurrence of συνέλευσις with ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτό at 1 Apol. 67.3 as pleonastic and cite usages
of the latter phrase at 1 Cor 11:20, 1 Cor 14:23, and Barn. 4:10 as support, without observing that
in these instances also a single gathering seems to be in view. Furthermore, even if pleonastic, that
strictly is irrelevant for whether it refers to a single meeting, particularly since Justin states at 1 Apol.
67.8 that on Sundays “we make the assembly” (τὴν συνέλευσιν ποιούμεθα), again using the singular.
(Minns and Parvis’s translation omits the definite article, rendering a more general “make assembly.”)
Martyrdom of Justin Martyr 2 (ANF 1:305) reports that when Justin is asked where Christians as-
semble, he first says wherever they choose and asks sarcastically whether the prefect thinks that
Christians all meet in the same place. When pressed on the issue, he states that during all his time
in Rome he was unaware of any assembly other than the one that meets in the home of Martinus,
above which he lives. Minns and Parvis mention this text with no comment on its relevance for their
argument (Justin, 259n.3). Robinson raises the possibility that it could be portraying Justin as pro-
tecting other assemblies (Who, 229, 229n.13). This suggestion is possible but is not stated in the text.
It remains that at 1 Apol. 67.3 and 67.8 Justin speaks clearly of a single assembly. I also assume that in
1 Apol. 67.5, when Justin says, “Then we all stand up together . . . ,” he is not describing a multi-​site
coordinated Christian standing practice but the actions of “all” gathered in this single assembly. Cf.
however, “the churches” (ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις) in Rome at the time of Peter in Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.2.
117 Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 60.11 (Minns and Parvis). Justin also refers to the Twelve as “unskilled in

rhetoric” (1 Apol. 39.3; Minns and Parvis). Similarly, in the third century, Origen conceded the critic
Celsus’s charge that Christians attracted a high number of illiterate individuals: “It was inevitable that
in the great number of people overcome by the word, because there are many more vulgar and illit-
erate people than those who have been trained in rational thinking, the former class should far out-
number the more intelligent” (Cels. 1.27; Chadwick). See also Clement of Alexandria, Paed. 3.11.78.
Omitting such evidence in an attempt to argue for higher Christian literacy rates is Brian J. Wright,
“Ancient Literacy in New Testament Research: Incorporating a Few More Lines of Inquiry,” Trinity
36.2 (2015): 161–​89.
118 Quintilian, Inst. 2.21.16: Nam et litigator rusticus illitteratusque. See further Chris Keith,

“Urbanization and Literacy in Early Christian Rome: Hermas and Justin Martyr as Examples,” in
The Urban World and the First Christians, ed. Steve Walton, Paul Trebilco, and David Gill (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 187–​215.
119 For similar indications of Christian reading of the prophets, see Ignatius, Magn. 8:2; 9:2;

Philad. 9:2.
188 The Gospel as Liturgy

or perhaps served as “a Christian short-​hand way of referring to [all] the

OT Scriptures.”120 Elsewhere, Justin specifies the “books of Moses” when
speaking of the law.121 He also, however, refers to Moses as a prophet among
“other prophets,”122 as “the prophet,”123 and as the “first of the prophets.”124
Justin may, then, include Moses and the law within “the prophets.”125 Both
the prophetic writings and the law were regarded as authoritative Scripture
by Justin’s time by Jews and Christians.126 As c­ hapter 7 will show, Jews read
Torah in assembly well before 70 ce,127 and Luke-​Acts provides explicit ref-
erences to the reading of the prophets in synagogue in the late first century
(Luke 4:17; Acts 13:15).
Justin’s description of the church alternating between the texts (“the mem-
oirs of the apostles or [ἤ] the writings of the prophets are read”) indicates
that the Gospels typically occupied the same liturgical space in the unfold-
ing ritual order as the prophets when read. This point is simple but impor-
tant because this liturgical practice would have ascribed to the Gospels the
same ritual significance as the prophets, thereby enabling, or perhaps even
encouraging, the assembled group to view them in similar terms.128 We

120 Stanton, Jesus, 75; similarly, Hengel, Four, 37; Hurtado, Destroyer, 106, 115. Cf. Skarsaune,

“Justin and His Bible,” 181n.20, who suggests that Justin either had “Christian lectionaries in mind,
with Haftarah-​like excerpts of selected prophecies, or . . . ordinary Jewish Septuagint manuscripts.”
Fialová, “Scripture,” 167, states that Justin uses “prophets” as a synonym for “Scripture”: “In Justin’s
view, the prophetic texts include not only the Major and Minor Prophets, but also the books that
today are classified as historical or poetic.” Justin discusses “the prophets” at 1 Apol. 31.1–​5.
121 1 Apol. 63.11.
122 1 Apol. 63.16.
123 1 Apol. 44.8; 62.2.
124 1 Apol. 59.1. Cf. also Tertullian, Apol. 19.1: “Moses was the first prophet” (Glover, LCL).
125 About half a decade later, Tertullian describes the Roman church’s reading practices and distin-

guishes between the law and the prophets (as well as between the Gospels and apostolic letters): “The
law and the prophets she unites . . . with the writings of the evangelists and the apostles” (legem et
prophetas cum euangelicis et apostolicis litteris miscet) (Praescr. 36.5; ANF 3:260; for Latin, see SC
46:138).
126 The Pauline epistles and the Gospels, for example, are replete with references to Hebrew Bible

texts as “Scripture” or “that which is written.” See also Josephus, Ag. Ap. 1.37–​42, and discussion in
Edmon L. Gallagher and John D. Meade, The Biblical Canon Lists from Early Christianity: Texts and
Analysis (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 57–​65.
127 Numerous scholars trace the roots of the practice of Torah reading in assembly to Neh

8: Donald D. Binder, Into the Temple Courts: The Place of the Synagogues in the Second Temple Period,
SBLDS 169 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1999), 399; Anders Runesson, The Origins of
the Synagogue: A Socio-​Historical Study, ConBNT 37 (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2001), esp.
398, more broadly 237–​400, 478–​80; Anders Runesson, “Persian Imperial Politics, the Beginnings
of Public Torah Readings, and the Origins of the Synagogue,” in The Ancient Synagogue: From Its
Origins until 200 c.e., ed. Birger Olsson and Magnus Zetterholm, ConBNT 39 (Stockholm: Almqvist
& Wiksell, 2003), 70–​80; Schifmann, “Early,” 44.
128 Cirafesi and Fewster, “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα,” 205–​6, challenge scholarly affirmations of

the idea that “Justin viewed the Memoirs as ‘scripture’ ” (205) when those affirmations are based
on the liturgical context and an assumed direct connection with the rise of the fourfold collection.
They overlook, however, the significance of the liturgical practice of the Roman assembly in giving
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 189

know from Irenaeus that the fourfold Gospel collection emerged around this
time, since he discusses it in the 180s in his Adversus haereses.129 The Gospel
reading of Justin’s church is in some ways the “implicit theology” counterpart
to Irenaeus’s “explicit theology” in Lyons.130 Unlike Irenaeus, Justin gives no
explicit statement that limits authoritative Jesus tradition to a set number of
Gospels, and Justin is not making an attempt to defend certain Gospels over
others.131 The liturgical practice of Justin’s church with the Gospels is also,
however, not entirely dissimilar from Irenaeus’s articulation in ascribing to
the Gospels a vaulted position in the community.132
This is not to claim that the Gospels were the only thing read in Justin’s
church or even the only thing read in a liturgical fashion. But it is to observe
the significance of the fact that they are the only thing Justin mentions as
being read ritually in the same manner as Jewish Scripture. I will return to
this issue in the next chapter but for now observe that by the 150s in Rome
the public reading of the Gospels had attained a liturgical significance.

Irenaeus of Lyons

In the latter part of the second century, Irenaeus of Lyons provides an-
other example of the public reading of the Gospels alongside the prophets
among Christians. In a section of Adversus haereses in which he is arguing
against gnostic interpretations of Scripture, Irenaeus asserts a plain-​sense

expression to ideas separately from discursive means, an approach that would otherwise align with
their emphasis upon the social value of Justin’s employment of the Gospels as specifically written tra-
dition. Regardless of the terminology Justin uses, his assembly does with the Gospels what they also
do with Jewish Scriptures. Cf. Craig D. Allert, Revelation, Truth, Canon and Interpretation: Studies in
Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho, VCSup 64 (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 102: “In Justin’s thinking, there
was no hierarchy of status between the Prophets and the Apostles, both communicated the voice of
God” (in reference to Dial. 119.6).
129 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.11.8.
130 For “implicit theology” and “explicit theology,” see Markschies, Christian, 116–​18.
131 Jens Schröter, “Jesus and Early Christian Identity Formation: Reflections on the Significance

of the Jesus Figure in Early Christian Gospels,” in Connecting Gospels: Beyond the Canonical/​Non-​
Canonical Divide, ed. Francis Watson and Sarah Parkhouse (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2018), 238.
132 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.11.8. See further Stanton, Jesus, 85. Stanton posits a connection between the

rise of the fourfold gospel and Christian usage of gospel codices (82). Regarding Justin, he states,
“Justin does not have Irenaeus’s clear conception of the fourfold Gospel, but the references in his
extant writings to written gospels suggest that he may well have had a four-​gospel codex in his cate-
chetical school in Rome by about ad 150” (76–​77). Cirafesi and Fewster, “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα,”
206n.60, rightly refer to this claim as “entirely conjecture.”
190 The Gospel as Liturgy

interpretation of the parables. Emphasizing that interpreters must be bound

by the text itself, and equally indicating that his “reading” of texts is not mere
recitation, he refers to Scripture as that which has come “before our eyes”
(ante oculos nostros).133 To underscore that this Scripture affirms that one,
and only one, God has made everything on earth, he refers to the fact that all
Scripture is heard “by all”:

Since, therefore, the entire Scriptures (universæ scripturæ), both

the Prophets (prophetiæ) and the Gospels (evangelia), clearly and
unambiguously—​so they can be heard by all (ab omnibus audiri), even
though all do not believe that there is only one God to the exclusion of
others—​preach that through his own Word God made all things, whether
visible or invisible, whether heavenly or earthly, whether aquatic or sub-
terranean creatures, as we have demonstrated from the very words of the
Scriptures.134

Irenaeus makes this claim in the same work in which he articulates the au-
thoritative fourfold Gospel collection of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,135
and in both cases his need to address those whom he perceives as heretics
prompts his ideas. There is no explicit usage of “in church” as one has in the
Muratorian Fragment, but the most natural understanding of the texts being
heard “by all” and the texts “preaching” is that these actions occur in an ec-
clesial context. This understanding is consistent with Irenaeus’s statements
about the church’s collective reading of Scripture later in Adversus haereses.136
Irenaeus thus joins Justin Martyr in providing second-​century attesta-
tion to the communal reading of the combination of the prophets and the
Gospels. Like Justin, Irenaeus asserts this combination in an effort to assert a
particular Christian identity and in contrast to contemporaries with whom
he disagrees. It is therefore also becoming manifestly clear how the cultiva-
tion of such reading cultures could eventually forge liturgical reading into a
litmus test for authority and, later, canonicity.

133 Irenaeus, Haer. 2.27.1. For Latin, see W. Wigan Harvey, ed., Sancti Irenæi: Libros quinque adver-

sus haereses, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1857), 1:347. Harvey’s enumeration
lists this as 2.50.1.
134 Irenaeus, Haer. 2.27.2 (Unger, ACW). For Latin, see Harvey, Sancti Irenæi, 1:348 (2.50.2).
135 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.11.8.
136 Irenaeus, Haer. 4.33.8.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 191

The Muratorian Fragment and Reading “in Church”

The Muratorian Fragment presents yet another liturgical combination of

the apostles and the prophets.137 The Fragment, ostensibly from the mid-​
to late-​second century, is a list of early Christian writings with comments
upon their contents, authors, and status. The dating of this “famous and
notoriously unclear” text is heavily debated, however.138 The reference to
the Shepherd of Hermas as written “very recently, in our own times, in the
city of Rome,” as well as the reference to Hermas’s brother Pius as bishop of
Rome (fl. ca. 140–​154 ce) in lines 74 and 75 of the fragment would seem to
indicate a mid-​or late second-​century date of composition.139 Challenging
this date are scholars who point to anachronisms in the fragment’s Latin
and the fact that there are no other examples of a canon list from the West
in the second century in order to argue for a fourth-​century Eastern prove-
nance; these challenges have, in turn, been met with defenses of the earlier
date, and so on.140 It is unnecessary to resolve this debate here. Although
the Fragment’s proscriptions about the public reading of the Gospels
are more explicit than what we find in earlier sources, with regard to the
Gospels in particular the Fragment merely makes clearer what is already
coming into view in both Justin Martyr and Irenaeus in the second century.
On this basis, and also in light of the possibility that it is a second-​century
text, I include it among pre-​Constantinian portrayals of public reading of
the Gospels.141
The Fragment begins mid-​sentence, likely following discussion of the
Gospels of Mark and Matthew. The first full line of surviving text refers

137 Muratorian Fragment 79–​ 80; Cf. also Pre. Pet. 5 (apud Clement of Alexandria, Strom.
6.15.128).
138 Markschies, “Canon,” 182.
139 See the discussion in Bruce M. Metzger, The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin,

Development, and Significance (Oxford: Clarendon, 1987), 194, 194n.13; Stanton, Jesus, 68; Joseph
Verheyden, “The Canon Muratori: A Matter of Dispute,” in The Biblical Canons, ed. J.-​M. Auwers
and H. J. de Jonge, BETL 163 (Leuven: Peeters, 2003), 491, 556. For this date of Pius’s bishopric, see
Gallagher and Meade, Biblical, 176. Clare K. Rothschild, “The Muratorian Fragment as Roman Fake,”
NovT 60.1 (2018): 70, dates it to 140–​61 ce.
140 For a lengthy overview of the debate, defending the second-​century dating, see Verheyden,

“Canon,” 487–​556. For a lengthy overview of the debate, defending the fourth-​century dating, see
Lee Martin McDonald, The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority, 3rd ed. (Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 369–​78. As recently as 2018, Rothschild, “Muratorian,” 79, identifies
the Fragment as a product of the “(earliest) fourth century,” while Schröter, “Jesus and Early,” 239,
dates it to “around 200 ce.”
141 For a similar approach, see Brakke, “Scriptural,” 278, though he dates the Fragment consistently

to the third or fourth century (265, 278).

192 The Gospel as Liturgy

to Luke as the “third book of the Gospel.”142 The Fragment then discusses
books that eventually were collected into the New Testament, with the ex-
ception of Hebrews, James, and 1 and 2 Peter, which go unmentioned. It
then turns to discuss texts whose status was more debated. In this final
section of the surviving fragmentary evidence, the author discusses three
types of Christian texts: (1) those “which cannot be received in the cath-
olic church” such as letters to the Laodiceans and Alexandrians that were
forged in Paul’s name;143 (2) those that can be received and read, but not
“in church” (in eclesia) [sic] such as the Apocalypse of John and Apocalypse
of Peter (according to some), as well as the Shepherd of Hermas;144 and
(3) those that can be received and read “in church” (in eclesia), such as Jude,
Wisdom of Solomon, and Apocalypse of John and Apocalypse of Peter (ac-
cording to others).145
Although the Fragmentist’s discussion can be somewhat confusing, and
understandably so since he is trying to bring order to a diverse set of prac-
tices that are not universally agreed upon, he actually asserts two main cat-
egories for early Christian texts: (1) those that can be received and read and
(2) those that cannot. Already in this delineation one can observe the cru-
cial role played by reading. Within the first category, the Fragmentist further
divides between acceptable books that can be read “in church” and accept-
able books that cannot be read “in church.”
The Fragment’s significance for the current discussion resides in its
descriptions of what can be read and in what context. Like Justin Martyr
and Irenaeus, it refers to the apostles and “the prophets” sharing liturgical
space in Christian assembly. Moving slightly beyond Justin and Irenaeus, it
states explicitly what their references to the reading of the Gospels and the
prophets indicate implicitly: public reading in the assembly was reserved
for texts regarded as scriptural or authoritative, and was thus expressive of
that status. In discussing Hermas, the Fragmentist refers to this practice of
reading “publicly to the people in church”:

142 Muratorian Fragment 2, as translated in Metzger, Canon, 305.

143 Muratorian Fragment 66, 64 (Metzger).
144 Muratorian Fragment 71–​ 72. For Latin, see Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, ed., Canon
Muratorianus: The Earliest Catalogue of the Books of the New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1867),
11, 20. Here and below, I give Tregelles’s critical edition. For an emended text, see Hans Lietzmann,
ed., Das Muratorische Fragment und die monarchianischen Prologe zu den Evangelien, KTTVU
(Bonn: A. Marcus & E. Weber, 1902), 4–​10.
145 Muratorian Fragment 68–​72. For Latin, see Tregelles, Canon, 11, 20.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 193

But Hermas wrote the Shepherd very recently, in our times, in the city of
Rome, while bishop Pius, his brother, was occupying the [episcopal] chair
of the city of Rome. And therefore it ought indeed to be read; but it cannot
be read publicly (puplicare)146 to the people in church (in eclesia) either
among the prophets, whose number is complete, or among the apostles, for
it is after [their] time.147

When the author refers to “the apostles” who wrote prior to the Shepherd,
it is not clear whether he uses the term in the more restricted sense of the
Gospel authors or in a broader sense that would include Christian authors
such as Paul.148 But it is clear from the Fragment as a whole that the author
considers the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John as undebated texts
that are received and read “in church,” which is a reference to public reading
before an audience.
Batovici may be correct that the Fragment holds out the possibility
of reading Hermas publicly in church so long as it is not read “among the
prophets or the apostles,” though that permission is not explicitly given.149
One can say confidently at least that the Fragment discourages reading
Hermas “in church” in the same way as these other texts. Thus, the Muratorian
Fragment further confirms that for some Christians public reading of the
Gospels in assembly was a liturgical expression of their authoritative status.
At least for the Fragmentist, liturgical reading was a boundary, even if one
that was under construction.
Modern scholarship on the development of the canon has focused heavily
upon the content of early Christian texts and their purported authors in
explaining the development of the canon. But when Christians such as Justin
and the unknown author of the Muratorian Fragment discuss how one would
know if a given assembly revered a particular text as authoritative, the litmus
test was not exclusively what the text said; it was what the assembly did with
that text in its communal meetings.

146 Tregelles, Canon, 20. The Latin on p. 11 of Tregelles’s facsimile also reads puplicare rather than

publicare.
147 Muratorian Fragment 73–​80 (Metzger). Cf. Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.3.6, on Hermas: “We know

that it has been used in public in churches (ἐν ἐκκλησίαις)” (Lake, LCL).
148 As noted above, Justin uses “memoirs of the apostles” as a term specifically for the Gospels, but

Tertullian, Praescr. 36.5, uses “apostolic” (apostolicis) in reference to non-​Gospel literature, since it is
juxtaposed with “evangelistic” (euangelicis) literature.
149 Dan Batovici, “The Shepherd of Hermas in Recent Scholarship on the Canon: A Review Article,”

ASE 34.1 (2017): 99.

194 The Gospel as Liturgy

Serapion and the So-​Called Gospel of Peter

Public reading served as a boundary marker as well in a story occurring in

Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History. In book six, likely written in the closing
years of the third century ce,150 Eusebius discusses Serapion, who was bishop
of Antioch ca. 199–​211 ce.151 Among Serapion’s writings, Eusebius mentions
a refutation of “the So-​Called Gospel of Peter.”152 According to Eusebius,
Serapion wrote his response for the sake of “refuting the false statements in
it, because of certain in the community of Rhossus, who on the ground of
the said writing turned aside into heterodox teachings.”153 As Schröter notes,
Serapion’s letter “is especially interesting because it demonstrates that it was
possible in the Christian community to use an additional gospel.”154
According to Eusebius, Serapion initially allowed the community in Syria
to read the Gospel of Peter but subsequently identified it as Docetic and
changed his mind. Eusebius claims to reproduce Serapion’s letter:

I myself, when I came among you, imagined that all of you clung to the
true faith; and, without going through the Gospel put forward by them in
the name of Peter, I said: If this is the only thing that seemingly causes cap-
tious feelings among you, let it be read (ἀναγινωσκέσθω). But since I have
now learnt, from what has been told me, that their mind was lurking in
some hole of heresy, I shall give diligence to come again to you; wherefore,
brethren, expect me quickly.155

Serapion’s anticipated quick trip to see them and identification of the text
now as heretical stand in contrast to his earlier permissive stance toward their
reading of it. In the meantime, he leaves no room for question about its suit-
ability, since he identifies the Gospel of Peter as not being in the category of
“received” texts: “For our part, brethren, we receive both Peter and the other
apostles as Christ, but the writings which falsely bear their names we reject,
as men of experience, knowing that such we did not receive.”156 Similar to

150 Timothy D. Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,

1981), 128, dates books 1–​7 to “before the end of the third century.”
151 For the dating of Serapion, see William Tabbernee, Fake Prophecy and Polluted

Sacraments: Ecclesiastical and Imperial Reactions to Montanism, VCSup 84 (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 53.
152 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.2; cf. also 3.25.6.
153 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.2 (Oulton and Lawlor, LCL).
154 Schröter, “Jesus and Early,” 239.
155 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.4 (Oulton and Lawlor, LCL).
156 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.3–​4 (modified from Oulton and Lawlor, LCL).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 195

the Muratorian Fragment, Serapion’s letter shows the dynamic role of public
reading in attempts to control a developing set of practices.157 One complica-
tion at this point is that Serapion’s (revised) view of the Gospel of Peter con-
veniently aligns with Eusebius’s placement of it among the Antilegomena,
or “disputed,” texts.158 Eusebius may be using Serapion as a third-​century
mouthpiece for his fourth-​century ideas, though it is also possible that
Serapion genuinely held that view and Eusebius agreed with it. There is no
way to know with certainty where Eusebius’s narratorial coloring of the past
begins and ends. Regardless of whether it is Serapion or Eusebius, it is clear
that which texts deserved recognition as authoritative was a live question,
and (restriction of) public reading was one way of answering it.
In what Eusebius presents, Serapion does not specify that their reading
of the Gospel of Peter was, in the words of the Muratorian Fragment, “in
church,” that is, in the context of the gathered assembly. At the same time,
he also does not specify that he is addressing a situation of “private reading”
of the Gospel of Peter in Rhossus.159 He states that the Gospel of Peter was
read “among you” but gives no indication whether that “you” is gathered in
assembly on a Sunday or reading in another context. As with Mark 13:14//​
Matt 24:15, however, a context of assembly makes historical sense, and this
might be supported by Serapion’s reference to his readership as “brothers and
sisters” (ἀδελφοί).160 But it is not clear.
Regardless of whether Serapion has in mind a context of reading in
Sunday assembly, there is a commonality between Serapion’s desires for a
Gospel-​reading culture in Rhossus toward the turn of the third century ce,
Justin Martyr’s and Irenaeus’s descriptions of Gospel reading in the mid-​and
late second century ce, and the Muratorian Fragment: communal reading
in these Christian assemblies manifests visibly the authoritative status of
texts. At least for these Christians, this expression of Christian identity has a
clear aesthetic and liturgical function that draws upon its status as a material
artifact.

157 Hill, Who, 80–​81, is correct to argue against theories that the Christians in Rhossus clearly

did not know the other Gospels but errs in stating that the Gospel of Peter “clearly . . . had not been
functioning as the Rhossians’ Gospel or their sacred text” (81). Hill bases this argument on Serapion’s
assessment of the situation. There is no evidence for what the members of the church did or did not
think about the authority of the Gospel of Peter outside the narration of their practices with it. Even
on that basis, Serapion’s narration indicates they there were treating the Gospel of Peter in a manner
consistent with “received” texts, since that is what he then proceeds to prohibit.
158 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.3.2; 3.25.6. My thanks to Jennifer Knust on this point.
159 Pace Hill, Who, 83.
160 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.3, 5.
196 The Gospel as Liturgy

The Gospel-​reading culture at Rhossus serves as yet another example of

Lieu’s point about the porous nature of boundary lines in ancient identity
construction. Serapion asserts public reading of the writings from Peter and
the apostles—​and not the Gospel of Peter—​as a boundary line between his
audience and “heretics” who do not reflect the “true faith” but only does so
because his audience had failed to observe that very boundary line. Public
Gospel reading serves, in this instance, simultaneously as a point of distinc-
tion and a point of contact between “non-​heretical” and “heretical” early
Christian identities. Or, in the least, Serapion’s response to the Rhossians
serves as an opportunity for him to construct these identities as such.

The Acts of Peter

A final clear reference to the communal reading of the Gospels in the

second and third centuries comes from the Acts of Peter, dated to the final
two or three decades of the second century ce.161 In this text, Peter enters a
dining hall (triclinium) and sees the Gospel being read (euangelium legi).162
Although a legendary portrayal of the preeminent disciple, this text reveals
its author’s assumptions about what a Christian reading event would or
should look like. The author even has Peter at one point declare, “Learn in
what manner the holy Scripture of our Lord ought to be declared.”163 The
text sets its portrayal of the reading event in an ecclesial setting, the home of
Marcellus, who has purified his home after Simon Magus was there, so that
the old women and widows can meet with the brethren.164 There is no ex-
plicit reference to a reader, and Peter himself, whom some early Jesus follow-
ers held as illiterate (Acts 4:13) and someone who accomplished writing via
an amanuensis,165 is not said to read himself. Peter does refer to himself (and

161 Jan N. Bremmer, “Aspects of the Acts of Peter: Women, Magic, Place and Date,” in The Apocryphal

Acts of Peter: Magic, Miracles and Gnosticism, ed. Jan N. Bremmer, SAAA 3 (Leuven: Peeters, 1998),
18, dates Acts of Peter to the 180s and 190s, while Christine M. Thomas, The Acts of Peter, Gospel
Literature, and the Ancient Novel: Rewriting the Past (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 28,
suggests the 170s for the emergence of the continuous Greek original. More recently, Hans-​Josef
Klauck, The Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles: An Introduction, trans. Brian McNeil (Waco, TX: Baylor
University Press, 2008), 84, refers to ca. 200 as “plausible.”
162 Acts Pet. 20. For Latin, see Richard Adelbert Lipsius, ed., Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha, vol. 1

(Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1959), 66.

163 Acts Pet. 20 (James).
164 Acts Pet. 19. Edward Adams, The Earliest Christian Meeting Places: Almost Exclusively Houses?,

LNTS 450 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013), 77–​78, discusses this text as evidence of a
Christian meeting place.
165 See footnote 84.
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 197

other apostolic figures) as a writer, however, claiming, “We by his grace wrote
(scribsimus) that which we could receive.”166
Peter also handles the manuscript of the Gospel, being said to have “rolled it
up” (inuolues eum) before expositing “the holy Scripture of our Lord” (sancta
scribtura domini nostri).167 These details may be borrowing from the Lukan
image of Jesus who “rolled up the scroll” (πτύξας τὸ βιβλίον) before expos-
iting Isaiah in the synagogue (Luke 4:20).168 Regardless of this suggestion,
Acts of Peter displays perfectly some of the dynamic book practices already
discussed in other sources: the reading aloud of the Gospels to a listening au-
dience; the association of public reading with “holy Scripture”; and the man-
uscript itself as the key element around which this reading event centered.
The Acts of Peter also maintains the connection between “received” texts and
the public reading of manuscripts of those texts in Christian assembly.

Summary

These are perhaps not the only references to the public reading of the Jesus
tradition in pre-​Constantinian Christianity. The Epistle of Diognetus’s com-
bination of the law, prophets, Gospels, and “tradition of the apostles” likely
assumes the public reading of each corpus, since it specifies that the “fear of
the law” is “chanted” or “sung” (ᾄδεται).169 It is very likely that Tertullian’s
reference to the fact that the Roman church “unites” or “mixes” (miscet) the
law, prophets, Gospel writings, and apostolic writings assumes the com-
munal reading of the Gospels, since he claims in the same context that the
apostles’ “own authentic writings” (ipsae authenticae litterae) are “recited”
or “read aloud” (recitantur) in the “apostolic churches” (ecclesias apostoli-
cas).170 One could also argue that his description of Christian reading of the
“books of God” or “divine books” (litterarum divinarum), as well as his ref-
erence to “Scripture readings” (scripturae leguntur) in church likely included
the Gospels.171 One could similarly argue that the Clementine tradition

166 Acts Pet. 20 (James).

167 Acts Pet. 20.
168 Thomas, Acts, 111, does not list this possibility in her catalogue of intertextual relationships be-
tween Acts of Peter and gospel literature.
169 Diogn. 11.6.
170 Tertullian, Praescr. 36.5, 1, respectively (SC 46:138, 137).
171 Apol. 39.3; 46.1 (Glover, LCL), An. 9.4 (CCSL 2:2:792), respectively. For other references to

“books” about Jesus, see John 21:24–​25; Papias apud Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.3–​4, both of which are
discussed in c­ hapter 5.
198 The Gospel as Liturgy

that Peter approved Mark’s Gospel “for study” in “the churches” refers to
the reading of the Gospel in assembly.172 The admonition in 2 Clem 19:1 for
the audience to heed “what is written” (τοῖς γεγαμμένοις), that they might
save themselves and “the reader” (τὸν ἀναγινώσκοντα), may also refer to
the reading of the Gospels. One can also assume that Tatian’s creation of the
Diatessaron ca. 170 ce reflects the public reading of the Gospels.173
Fourth-​century references to the reading of the Gospels provide evidence
of how the liturgical reception of Gospel manuscripts via reading continued
to develop along this trajectory. Cyril of Jerusalem wrote a canon list ca. 350
wherein he instructed his audience to “read (ἀναγίνωσκε) the twenty-​two
books, but have nothing to do with the apocryphal writings.”174 He included
the four Gospels of the New Testament among those twenty-​two, specifying
that there were only four—​“The rest have false titles and are mischievous.”175
Cyril thereby aligns “the divinely inspired Scriptures of the Old and New
Testament” with those texts that can be read.176 The Synod of Laodicea (be-
tween 342 and 381 ce), or at least a canon list that may have been later added
to its proceedings, is, if anything, more explicit in its statement about what
can and cannot be read in ecclesial assembly.177 Canon 59 of the Synod states:

Concerning the books which ought to be sung and read (ἀναγινώσκεσθαι)

in the church (ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ).
For it is not fitting to speak (λέγεσθαι) secular psalms in the church
(ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ) nor to read (ἀναγινώσκεσθαι) non-​canonical books
(ἀκανόνιστα βιβλία), but only the canonical books of the New and Old
Covenant (κανονικὰ τῆς καινῆς καὶ διαθήκης). All of these books are fitting
to be read (ἀναγινώσκεσθαι) and to have authority.178

Included in those permitted are the “four Gospels of Matthew, of Mark, of

Luke, of John.”179 The fourth-​century Apostolic Constitutions (ca. 375–​380)
172 As noted in footnote 83, Lake (LCL) translates εἰς ἔντευξιν in Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 2.15.2, as “for

study,” while Williamson translates it as “reading.”

173 Alikin, Earliest, 177. On the date of the Diatessaron, see Williams, “Syriac,” NCHB 528.
174 Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis 4.35 (translation Gallagher and Meade, Biblical, 114, adapted

from NPNF). Gallagher and Meade, Biblical, 111–​116, conveniently present the Greek and English
side by side.
175 Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis 4.36 (Gallagher and Meade)
176 Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis 4.33 (Gallagher and Meade).
177 For the date of the council and debated status of canon 59, see Gallagher and Meade, Biblical,

129–​31. See also Metzger, Canon, 210.

178 Synod of Laodicea canon 59 (Gallagher and Meade). Gallagher and Meade, Biblical, 132–​33,

present the Greek and English side by side.

179 Synod of Laodicea canon 59 (Gallagher and Meade).
 The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition 199

instructs the reader (ὁ ἀναγνώστης) to stand in the midst of the assembly

and read the books of Scripture.180 Included is the instruction that “an elder
or deacon read the Gospels, which we, Matthew and John, handed down to
you, and the fellow workers associated with Paul, Luke and Mark, left be-
hind for you.”181 The fourth-​century Iterium of Egeria describes the bishop’s
reading of the Gospels in assembly on Sunday after the reading of psalms.182
The aforementioned explicit references nevertheless suffice for mapping
out an early history of the public reading of the Jesus tradition as material
artifact. Jesus followers were reading manuscripts of the Gospels publicly al-
ready by the mid-​first century (Mark 13:14//​Matt 24:15). This practice was
recognized by 150 ce as characteristic at the church in Rome and related to
their reading in assembly of Jewish texts already recognized as Scripture.
That Justin Martyr does not remark upon this practice as exceptional likely
indicates that it was already established at this point and thus traceable to
some point prior to the mid-​second century ce. Justin’s and Irenaeus’s in-
clusion of liturgical Gospel reading alongside liturgical prophet reading
not only reveals the connection between public reading of the Gospels and
authoritative status but also reveals indebtedness to Jewish liturgy. The
Muratorian Fragment confirms these matters all the more, specifying that
only “received” texts could be read “in church.” Likewise, in the early third
century, the Acts of Peter also portrays the public reading of a Gospel in its
capacity as “received” tradition and “holy Scripture.”
One implication of the preceding discussion is that the cultural practice
of public reading, which was standard fare among the literate classes of the
Greco-​Roman world, steadily came in the Christ assembly to express ritually
the status of the Gospel texts that were being read. In this way, the manu-
script as a material artifact became the primary means by which that status
was displayed, separately from but related to the content of the narrative on
its pages. It is no surprise that all but one of the primary sources discussed in
this chapter indicate either explicitly or implicitly that these stories of Jesus
were being read in light of, and alongside of, Jewish Scriptures, for the syn-
agogue had already long cultivated these liturgical reading practices, and it
was onto these practices that Christians grafted the Gospels by 150 ce. From
this perspective, public reading of the Jesus tradition in manuscript form

180 Apos. Con. 2.57.5. For Greek and English, as well as this date, see Gallagher and Meade, Biblical,

136–​37, 137n.15.
181 Apos. Con. 2.57.7 (Gallagher and Meade).
182 Iterium of Egeria 24.10–​12.
200 The Gospel as Liturgy

was one way in which early Jesus followers, over time—​to borrow Stern’s apt
language for Jewish ritual development of the Torah—​“effectively turned a
‘book,’ a text to be read, into a cult object to be revered.”183 There is much
more to be said on this broader convergence of Jewish and Christian reading
cultures in the midst of wider Greco-​Roman reading cultures.

183 Stern, Jewish, 32; also 14, 20, 29, 31.

 7
The Public Reading of the Jesus Tradition
and the Emergence of Christian Identity

One might also assume that already in [Justin’s] time in Rome the
reading of the Gospels occupied a role like that played by the Torah of
Moses in Jewish worship.
Martin Hengel, The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ

The public reading of the Jesus tradition in assembly is one set of socio-​histor-
ical circumstances in which the emergence of Christian identity is on display.
The usage of Gospel manuscripts in the assembly is therefore not an inconse-
quential aspect of the transmission history of the Jesus tradition but a boundary
under construction that hosted the negotiation of these identities. This chapter
will argue that scholars should primarily (though not exclusively) understand
liturgical Gospel reading as a purposeful development of synagogue liturgy, and
thus consider it an example of how emerging Christian identity was indebted to
and distinct from the Judaism that birthed it.
This argument in itself is not new. Scholars of Second Temple Judaism,
the New Testament, early church history, and Christian liturgy have asserted
some version of it so many times that it would be pointless to try and cite
them all. Nevertheless, the matter warrants revisiting in the context of the
current study for at least two reasons. First, despite the fact that Christian
liturgical dependence upon the synagogue has been a majority opinion his-
torically, there has also been frequent scholarly disagreement over whether
Jewish or Greco-​Roman reading practices are most important for under-
standing early Christian reading practices. Scholars have even expressed dif-
fering opinions over which particular background is most neglected by other
scholars.1 In recent monographs, Alikin and Nässelqvist, among others, have
1 According to Gamble, Books, 23, “The force of Christian dependence on Jewish scripture

for the question of the literary culture of early Christianity is not much appreciated, and its

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
202 The Gospel as Liturgy

revived the argument that the synagogue is for all intents and purposes an
irrelevant background for understanding early Christian reading practices.
According to Alikin, “There is no continuity between the reading in the syn-
agogue and that in the Church,” and therefore “it cannot be correct to trace
the public reading of Scripture in Christian communities back to a prac-
tice of the Jewish synagogue.”2 Explicitly following Alikin, Nässelqvist has
claimed that early Christian reading events are “generally better understood
in the context of public reading in the Greek and Roman world at large.”3
Shiell has argued similarly.4 I will argue that this severing of the Christ com-
munity from its Jewish context is inappropriate and risks missing the innova-
tive nature of some early Christian book practices.
A second reason for revisiting the relationship between Christian lit-
urgy and synagogue liturgy is to situate this development within the trajec-
tory that this book as a whole has been following. I place primary emphasis
upon Christian liturgical dependence upon the synagogue but reject the false
choice between Jewish parallels and Greco-​Roman parallels. I will approach
the book-​as-​object as a touchstone between these respective book cultures,
as well as a touchstone between earlier and later book practices among Jesus
followers. At the close of the chapter, I will thus return to the textualization
of the Jesus tradition in the first century in order to note how second-​and
third-​century developments were related to first-​century Gospel writing,
and how both sets of phenomena are parts of a long “canonical process.”5
The second-​and third-​century descriptions of Gospel reading by Justin
Martyr, Irenaeus, Serapion, and (possibly) the Muratorian Fragment, as well
as the inclusion of the Gospels with the Torah and prophets in the Epistle to
Diognetus6 and the “uniting” of the Gospels with the Torah and the prophets

implications have been neglected under the influence of form criticism’s preoccupation with the
oral tradition.” But according to Markschies, Christian, 118, “It is worthwhile . . . to look briefly
at the pagan cult, which is scarcely drawn upon for the purposes of comparison in the context
of liturgical studies—​in contrast to the great attention given to the worship service of the Jewish
synagogue.”
2 Alikin, Earliest, 158; see also 147, 155, 179, 181. Gerard A. M. Rouwhorst, “The Reading of

Scripture in Early Christian Liturgy,” in What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical,
Jewish, and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster, ed. Leonard V. Rutgers,
ISACR 1 (Leuven: Peeters, 2000), 309–​11, lists earlier rejections of a connection between synagogue
reading and Christian reading.
3 Nässelqvist, Public, 100
4 Shiell, Reading, 133, 201–​2, 204.
5 Lieu, Christian, 54: “There is a canonical process stretching through the centuries before

Athanasius and continuing in practice long after.”

6 Diogn. 11.6.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 203

by Tertullian7 raise an obvious question: What was the relationship between

Gospel reading in Christian assembly and Scripture reading in synagogues?
Was their similarity a mere accident of history? Or did the Christ assembly
purposefully design its Gospel reading upon synagogue reading culture in a
deliberate bid to assert for their texts a similar status as Jewish Scripture?
Answering such questions on the basis of the available evidence is a tight-​
rope act, one in which the historian must be careful not to confuse what early
Christians did with what they intended to do. Gamble wisely warns that “the
historian must guard against the temptation to identify results with reasons.”8
At the same time, the significance of those results, as well as the results’ con-
nections to precipitating factors, should not be unnecessarily sacrificed on
the altar of epistemological humility. Pace Pokorný, discussed in the pre-
vious chapter, we may not be able to have tremendous confidence about the
intentions of the author of the Gospel of Mark in textualizing the Jesus tra-
dition. We can, however, make plausible proposals about how those actions
could have been perceived by contemporaries and how they could have been
connected—​regardless of authorial intentions—​to what transpired in Mark’s
aftermath. I therefore argue here that, apart from any authorial intentions,
once Jesus followers began reading the Gospels liturgically, it would have
served as a distinct identity marker.

Synagogue Reading

I commence this argument with the foundational observation that the com-
munal reading of Scripture in synagogue was a—​if not the—​central aspect of
Second Temple Jewish synagogue liturgy. Runesson defines public reading
of Torah as the “characteristic activity of early synagogues.”9 According to
Levine, “There can be little question that scriptural readings constituted the
core of Jewish worship in the synagogue.”10 Numerous other scholars observe

7 Tertullian, Praescr. 36.5.

8 Gamble, Books, 66.
9 Runesson, Origins, 193; Runesson, “Persian,” 67.
10 Lee I. Levine, The Ancient Synagogue: The First Thousand Years, 2nd ed. (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 2005), 150. Further on first-​century Scripture reading in synagogues, see Stephen
K. Catto, Reconstructing the First-​Century Synagogue: A Critical Analysis of Current Research, LNTS
363 (London: T&T Clark, 2007), 116–​25; Lee I. Levine, “Synagogues,” EDEJ 1263; Runneson, Origins,
193–​235; Schiffman, “Early,” 44–​56.
204 The Gospel as Liturgy

similarly.11 The literary, epigraphic, and archaeological evidence of Second

Temple synagogues support these claims.

Josephus

Literary descriptions of synagogue reading present a scenario in which, on a

weekly basis on the Sabbath, Jews gather to study the law. The specifics of who
reads are not always given. When they are given, however, the general audi-
ence is described as listening, or a single reader is specified. Josephus refers
to an audience that “hears” and “listens to” the law in Against Apion: “He left
no pretext for ignorance, but instituted the law as the finest and most essen-
tial teaching-​material; so that it would be heard not just once or twice or a
number of times, he ordered that every seven days they should abandon their
other activities and gather to hear the law, and to learn it thoroughly and in
detail.”12 In the Antiquities, Josephus similarly describes the Sabbath in terms
of study of Scripture: “We give every seventh day over to the study of our cus-
toms and law, for we think it necessary to occupy ourselves, as with any other
study, so with these through which we can avoid committing sins.”13

Philo

Philo similarly refers to the reading of the law on Sabbath in synagogue but
specifies the reader as a priest or elder:

[The lawgiver] required them to assemble in the same place on these sev-
enth days, and sitting together in a respectful and orderly manner hear the
laws read so that none should be ignorant of them. . . . But some priest who
is present or the elders reads the holy laws to them and expounds them
point by point till about the late afternoon.14

11 Binder, Into, 399; Catto, Reconstructing, 116; Carsten Claußen, Versammlung, Gemeinde,

Synagoge: Das hellenistisch-​ jüdische Umfeld der frühchristlichen Gemeinde, SUNT 27

(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002), 213; Andrew Krause, Synagogues in the Works of
Flavius Josephus: Rhetoric, Spatiality, and First-​Century Jewish Institutions, AJEC 97 (Leiden: Brill,
2017), 195; Schiffman, “Early,” 54; Stern, Jewish, 39.
12 Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.17 §175 (Barclay).
13 Josephus, Ant. 16.2.4 §43–​44 (Marcus, LCL).
14 Philo, Hypoth. 7.12–​13 (Colson, LCL; emphasis added).
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 205

Elsewhere, Philo claims that even non-​Jews recognized the significance of

Scripture reading in synagogue. He says that Augustus “knew therefore that
they have houses of prayer (προσευχὰς) and meet together in them, partic-
ularly on the sacred sabbaths when they receive as a body a training in their
ancestral philosophy.”15 He portrays a governor of Egypt asking Jews if they
would cling to their rituals even if invaded by enemies: “And will you sit in
your conventicles and assemble your regular company and read in security
your holy books (τὰς ἱερὰς βίβλους), expounding any obscure point and in
leisurely comfort discussing at length your ancestral philosophy?”16
Philo describes the ascetic Essenes as similarly engaging in weekly Sabbath
reading of the law in synagogue. If this group is to be equated in any respect
with the Qumran community, they likely enjoyed substantially higher lit-
eracy rates than the population at large, as some may have come from the
priestly class.17 Nevertheless, they still followed the practice of a single reader
reading the text for the group in their synagogues:

In these [the laws of their fathers, 12.80] they are instructed at all other
times, but particularly on the seventh days. For that day has been set apart
to be kept holy and on it they abstain from all other work and proceed to
sacred spots which they call synagogues. There, arranged in rows according
to their ages, the younger below the elder, they sit decorously as befits the
occasion with attentive ear. Then one takes the books (τὰς βίβλους) and
reads aloud (ἀναγινώσκει) and another of especial proficiency comes for-
ward and expounds what is not understood.18

These descriptions of synagogue practice exhibit precisely the type

of “reading culture” that Johnson theorizes.19 Their texts differ from the

15 Philo, Embassy 156 (Colson, LCL).

16 Philo, Dreams 2.18 §127 (Colson and Whitaker, LCL). Schiffman, “Early,” 47, presents a false
choice when stating that this text “seems to refer to communal study rather than to public reading.”
See c­ hapter 4 on “public” and “private” reading.
17 Carr, Writing, 215–​ 39. Wise, Language, 34–​35, overlooks this factor. He is correct that the
Qumran scrolls may reflect a “kind of cross-​section of what existed” due to the fact that many of the
scrolls originated outside the community. This observation, however, does not mean that the rest of
Second Temple Judaism was just as proficient at literary production and cultivation as the Qumran
community. It indicates only that such production and cultivation was not limited geographically to
Qumran. The concentration of literate people and literary activity at Qumran remains unrepresenta-
tive of Second Temple Judaism as a whole, as the statistics in Wise’s study indicate.
18 Philo, Prob. 12.81–​82 (Colson, LCL). Popović, “Reading,” 455, notes the parallels between this

text, the Theodotus Inscription, and 1QS VI, 7.

19 See ­chapter 1.
206 The Gospel as Liturgy

elite Romans that Johnson studies, but there is a commonality of a socially

scripted reading event that reflects and affirms the group’s identity as a
group that reads these specific texts. At the core of that ritual is the manu-
script itself, which a reader reads aloud to a listening audience.

Dead Sea Scrolls

Some of the texts from the Qumran community reveal further the serious-
ness with which some Second Temple Jews took such reading practices. The
Manual of Discipline (1QS) describes the very purpose of some gatherings of
the community as “to read the book (‫)לקרוא בספר‬, explain the regulation.”20
Halakha A (4Q251) links rest from labor and Sabbath, stating the purpose
with the same phrase that appears in the Manual of Discipline: “to read in
the book” (‫)ולקרא בספר‬.21 The Damascus Document (4Q266) gives further
understanding to why, typically, one person reads to the group. The man-
uscripts required mastering prior to reading so as not to mispronounce or
stumble over the words. The need for clear pronunciation in reading the law
is so serious that this text describes failure to do it as possibly engendering a
capital error:

[And anyone who is not quick to under]stand, and anyone w[ho speaks
weakly or staccato], [with]out separating his words to make [his voice]
heard, [such men should not read in the book of] [the Torah], so that he
will not lead to error in a capital manner [. . .] [. . .] his brothers, the priests,
in service.22

As Popović observes, this instruction requires of the reader a “higher

level of reading,” that is, ability beyond functional literacy.23 In the words of
Schiffman,

20 1QS VI, 7 (García Martínez and Tigchelaar).

21 4Q251 1, 5 (García Martínez and Tigchelaar).
22 4Q266 5 II, 1–​4 (García Martínez and Tigchelaar). Alternatively: “Whoever speaks too fast

(or: too quietly, lit., swift or light with his tongue) or with a staccato voice and does not split his
words to make [his voice] heard, no one from among these shall read the Book of [the] La[w]‌
that he may not misguide someone in a capital manner” (Vermes). See also 4Q267 5 III, 3–​5 and
4Q273 2, 1.
23 Popović, “Reading,” 461.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 207

This passage cannot be explained in any way except by concluding that it

refers to public Torah-​reading of some kind, for it is otherwise impossible
to explain the reference to the quality of the priest’s voice. . . . This statement
presumes that the congregation would not have been following the reading
in written texts, but simply listened to the reading which it comprehended.24

If this proscription was needed for the highly literate and highly textual
Qumranites, one can see that reading such manuscripts was virtually impos-
sible for the average semi-​or non-​literate ancient Jew.
This emphasis upon reading authoritative texts with proper pronuncia-
tion is shared with Christian and pagan writings. Irenaeus (ca. 185 ce) scolds
some readers of 2 Corinthians for failing to observe a hyperbaton at 2 Cor
4:4, leading them to read ἐν οἷς ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἐτύφλωσεν τὰ
νοήματα τῶν ἀπίστων as a reference to a separate “god” (that is, as “in whom
the god of this age blinded the minds of those disbelieving” rather than “in
whom God has blinded the disbelieving minds of this word”). He speaks of
their mispronunciation due to failure to recognize transposition as potential
blasphemy:

So if one would not pay attention to the reading and indicate the breathing
pause in that which is read, there would not only arise incongruences, but
the reader would even blaspheme by saying the coming of the Lord will
be by the activity of Satan. So, in such passages it is necessary to show the
transposition by the [manner of] reading and present the logical meaning
of the apostle.25

A similar emphasis upon correct pronunciation appears in a play of Plautus

(d. 184 bce) that portrays corporal punishment as the result of a student
getting “a single syllable wrong.”26 As c­ hapter 6 noted, the early Christian
Hermas claimed not to possess proficiency in reading syllables.27
These texts reveal why those synagogue attendees listened to the text read
aloud, as well as why Philo states that “some priest who is present or one of

24 Schiffman, “Early,” 46.

25 Irenaeus, Haer. 3.7.2 (Unger).
26 Plautus, Bacch. 434 (Melo, LCL). See also Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, 13.31.1–​11. For dating

Plautus, see Wolfgang de Melo, introduction to Plautus, 2 vols., LCL (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 2011), 1:xv.
27 Hermas, Vis. 2.1.4. Conversely, Lucian, Ind. 2, mocks the ignorant book collector despite his

being able to read fluently.

208 The Gospel as Liturgy

the elders” reads the Law. Only those literate to a degree that they could read
Hebrew or Greek, and practiced in reading the specific handwritten manu-
scripts, could read the text eloquently enough not to profane the holy text.
As the previous chapter mentioned, this evidence presents a strong counter-
example to claims that ancient “readers” typically performed from memory
rather than read from manuscripts.28

Luke-​Acts

Luke’s writings in the late first and early second centuries also contain refer-
ences to the reading of Scripture in synagogues. The historical value of every
detail in these accounts is less important than their general coherence with
contemporary descriptions of synagogue liturgy. In Luke’s effort to portray
Jesus as a scribal-​literate authority, a claim that I have elsewhere argued is
highly unlikely for the historical Jesus,29 Luke says that it was Jesus’s custom
to go to the synagogue and read (4:16). Luke specifies that Jesus was handed
a scroll of Isaiah and “found the place where it was written” (4:17). He thus
portrays Jesus as a handler and reader of manuscripts.30 Luke attributes to
Jesus the level of reading ability that 4Q266 expects of its readers of the law
and Quintilian expects of his memory of manuscripts31—​the ability to search
the text and find a specific reading in script (cf. also John 7:52), which also
enables reading it aloud. Luke portrays this kind of Scripture reading as
the customary practice in a Sabbath synagogue and similarly portrays the
reading of Scripture in synagogue in Acts 13:15, when he states that Paul
spoke in the synagogue in Pisidian Antioch “after the reading of the law and
the prophets.” In Acts 15:21, Luke has James proclaim in his speech at the
Jerusalem apostolic council: “Moses . . . has been read in synagogues on every
sabbath” (cf. 2 Cor 3:15).
Luke’s claims that Jews read the prophets in synagogue along with Torah
(Luke 4:17; Acts 13:15) are the earliest explicit references to the reading of the

28 See ­chapter 6. From a later period, one may also consider m. Meg. 2:1, which specifies that read-

ers of Esther must actually read, not recite from memory: “If a man read the Scroll in wrong order,
he has not fulfilled his obligation. If he read it by heart, or if he read it in Aramaic or in any other
language, he has not fulfilled his obligation” (Danby). For evidence that rabbinic readers sometimes
also practiced recitation from memory as “reading,” see m. Taʿan. 4:3, and the thorough discussion of
Wollenberg, “Dangers,” 709–​45.
29 Keith, Jesus’ Literacy, 124–​88.
30 The scriptural quotation that follows in Luke 4:18–​19 is a composite of Isa 61:1–​2 and 58:6.
31 Quintilian, Inst. 11.2.32.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 209

prophets in synagogue. Although the prophets are referenced together with

Torah as authoritative texts elsewhere in Luke (for example, Luke 16:16),
around the time of Luke (Rom 3:21; Matt 22:40; 4 Macc 18:10),32 and be-
fore Luke (Sir, prol.; 2 Macc 2:1–​13; 15:9), and despite the fact that other ev-
idence suggests that the prophets were read in synagogues,33 Luke’s writings
are the first explicit references among Jewish and Christian authors that the
prophets—​or any text other than Torah34—​were read ritually in synagogue
until the Mishnah (ca. 200 ce).35 Between Luke and the textualization of
the Mishnah, and as ­chapter 6 detailed, Justin Martyr and Irenaeus refer to
Christian reading of the prophets alongside the Gospels in their assembly,
as does the Muratorian Fragment later. Much is admittedly unknown, but
this evidence at least raises the possibility that Luke projected the reading of
the prophets onto his narration of first-​century synagogues in light of famil-
iarity with the liturgical reading practices of Jesus followers. This possibility
exists apart from whether Second Temple Jews in some locales included the
prophets in their synagogue reading practices, which I regard as highly likely.

The Theodotus Inscription

Epigraphic evidence from the time of the Second Temple confirms the cen-
trality of reading Scripture to synagogue liturgy. The Theodotus inscription
is from a pre-​70 ce synagogue in Jerusalem and reads:

ΘΕΟΔΟΤΟΣ . . . ΩΚΟΔΟΜΗΣΕ ΤΗΝ ΣΥΝΑΓΩΓ[Η]Ν ΕΙΣ

ΑΝ[ΑΓ]ΝΩΣ[Ι]Ν ΝΟΜΟΥ ΚΑΙ ΕΙΣ [Δ]ΙΔΑΧΗΝ ΕΝΤΟΛΩΝ

Theodotus . . . built the synagogue for the reading of the law and for the
teaching of the commandments.36

32 The majority opinion on the date of 4 Maccabees is the first century ce. Daniel Schwartz, “The

Books of the Maccabees,” in Early Jewish Literature: An Anthology, ed. Brad Embry, Ronald Herms,
and Archie T. Wright, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2018), 1:181, places it at “perhaps around the
same time as Josephus.” Jan Willem van Henten, “Maccabees, Fourth Book of,” EDEJ 909, notes that
“later dates around 100 c.e. or even in the second to third century c.e. have recently been defended.”
33 Based on the finding of the Ezekiel scroll at Masada, Binder, Into, 400, suggests that Ezekiel and

possibly other texts could have been read in synagogue there and elsewhere in Palestine.
34 The discovery of fragments of a targum of Job (11Q10) at Qumran may suggest the reading of

this text in synagogue. (Fragments of a Leviticus targum were also found [4Q156].)
35 For the reading of the prophets in synagogue, see m. Meg. 4:1–​5 (ca. 200 ce); cf. t. Meg. 3:1–​9 (ca.

300 ce). For the reading of Esther in synagogue at Purim, see m. Meg. 1:1, 3:1–​4:1. The author of 2
Baruch (ca. 100–​120 ce; Klijn, OTP 617) requests that his text be read in synagogue (86:1–​2).
36 For discussion, see Runesson, Origins, 226–​31.
210 The Gospel as Liturgy

For present purposes, little more needs to be said about this piece of evidence
beyond its clear claim. The reading and expounding of the law are the raison
d’être for the synagogue.

The Magdala Synagogue

The 2009 excavation of a pre-​70 ce synagogue in Magdala may provide

further evidence for the public reading of the law in Second Temple syna-
gogues.37 Along with the synagogue in Gamla, these remains demonstrate
conclusively that there were first-​century synagogues in Galilee. By far the
most interesting artifact from the Magdala site is the decorated stone, discov-
ered in situ in the primary room.38 The stone has a menorah and other images
on it, likely symbolic representations of the Jerusalem temple. Although the
precise function of this stone is less than clear, Aviam has suggested that it
was the base of a table for reading the Torah, and Ryan has affirmed this sug-
gestion.39 Binder, too, has argued that this is one possible function of the
stone.40 Another rectangular stone was discovered at Magdala in situ in the
secondary room. As with the first stone, this stone has two grooves near its
outer edges running perpendicular to its long sides. Runesson has suggested
that these were “reading stones”; the grooves may have served to hold the
rollers of a scroll.41 Much scholarly work remains to be done on the Magdala

37 See Mordechai Aviam, “The Decorated Stone from the Synagogue at Migdal: A Holistic

Interpretation and a Glimpse into the Life of Galilean Jews at the Time of Jesus,” NovT 55 (2013): 205–​
7; Mordechai Aviam, “The Synagogue,” in Magdala of Galilee: A Jewish City in the Hellenistic and
Roman Period, ed. Richard Bauckham (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018), 127–​33; Mordechai
Aviam,“Zwischen Meer und See—​Geschichte und Kultur Galiläas von Simon Makkabäus bis zu
Flavius Josephus,” in Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galilaä zur Zeit Jesu, ed. Jürgen K. Zangenberg
and Jens Schröter (Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012), 35–​38; Mordechai Aviam and Richard
Bauckham, “The Synagogue Stone,” in Bauckham, Magdala, 135–​59; Marcela Zapata Meza, “Neue
mexicanische Ausgrabungen in Magdala,” in Zangenberg and Schröter, Bauern, 85–​98; Jürgen K.
Zangenberg, “Archaeological News from the Galilee: Tiberias, Magdala and Rural Galilee,” Early
Christianity 1 (2010): 475–​78; as well as the entire volume of El Pensador 5 (2013).
38 Aviam, “Decorated Stone,” 209; Aviam and Bauckham, “Synagogue Stone,” 135–​59; Donald D.

Binder, “The Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” in City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange,
ed. Daniel Warner and Donald D. Binder (Mountain Home, AR: BorderStone, 2014), 17–​48.
39 Aviam, “Decorated Stone,” 207–​18; Aviam and Bauckham, “Synagogue Stone,” 147–​50; Jordan

Ryan, The Role of the Synagogue in the Aims of Jesus (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), 40–​41.
40 Binder, “Mystery,” 41–​42. Binder also suggests that it could be a base for a lampstand, a seat

for the ἀρχισυνάγωγος, or a base for an offering vessel (42–​43). Joey Corbett, “New Synagogue
Excavations in Israel and Beyond,” BAR 37.4 (2011): 56, also suggests, “It may have been used as a
table on which Torah scrolls were rolled out and read or it may have been a stand for an actual me-
norah during the service”; also p.52. In contrast, Aviam and Bauckham, “Synagogue Stone,” 155, sug-
gest that it was a table upon which attendees placed the first fruits.
41 Personal correspondence, June 16, 2014. Cf. also Ryan, Role, 40–​41.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 211

synagogue, and I do not present these theories as conclusive. They are, how-
ever, congruous with the central role ascribed to the reading of Scripture in
the literary and epigraphic evidence from Second Temple synagogues.

Summary

This evidence leads to several conclusions. First, Jews of the Second Temple
period cultivated a well-​defined reading community associated particu-
larly with the public reading of texts in synagogue. Second, public reading
in synagogues on Sabbath frequently involved what c­ hapter 6 described as
“liturgical” reading—​ritualized reading practices by which a group ascribed
authoritative status to particular writings. Third, the Torah was the particular
writing that the sources describe as sitting at the core of this reading culture.
Undoubtedly other texts were read in synagogue, but the point remains that
when Jews explicitly discuss what they read in synagogue, the Torah holds
pride of place. In the Land and the Diaspora, in literary texts and epigraph-
ical evidence, the reading of the law is a common feature of synagogue gath-
erings,42 to the extent that many scholars regard it as the main characteristic
of Second Temple synagogues. Luke, in the late first and early second centu-
ries, also refers to the liturgical reading of the prophets in synagogues.

The Synagogue and the Christ Assembly

According to Levine, “This liturgy was unique to the ancient world; no such
form of worship featuring the recitation and study of a sacred text by an en-
tire community on a regular basis was known in antiquity, although certain
mystery cults in the Hellenistic-​Roman world produced sacred texts that
were read to initiates on occasion.”43 Levine’s concession that some mystery
cults read texts in some ways similar to synagogue liturgy undermines his
claim that synagogue reading practices were unique, even if his point that
Jewish synagogue reading was a distinct and recognizable phenomenon in
the ancient world remains. The descriptions of early Christian reading prac-
tices presented in ­chapter 6 similarly demonstrate that Jewish reading liturgy

42 Consider also the public reading of the law portrayed in Let. Aris. 308–​10.
43 Levine, “Synagogues,” 1263.
212 The Gospel as Liturgy

was not, strictly speaking, entirely unparalleled. But this observation serves
merely to raise the issue of how scholars should view the relationship be-
tween Christian reading liturgy and Jewish reading liturgy.
As mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, several recent scholars,
most prominently Alikin but also Nässelqvist and Shiell, have preferred to
view early Christian reading events in terms of non-​Jewish reading events.
Alikin in particular claims that previous scholars were “forced” to posit a
Jewish background due to the scholarship of the twentieth century.44 He con-
cedes “the fact” that Jewish Scriptures were read in Christian gatherings.45
Other than this similarity, though, Alikin sees no resemblance between syn-
agogue reading and ecclesial reading.
In contrast to these opinions, I offer six reasons why the public reading of
the Gospels in assembly, at least in the earliest stages of the Christ assembly
in the first and second centuries, should be regarded as an adaptation of syn-
agogue liturgy. The reading practices of the Christ assembly did not line up
in every way with the reading practices of synagogues, but there was enough
overlap in the book practices of the synagogue and the Christ assembly that
scholars should conceptualize the latter as intrinsically related to the former.
First, three of the four indisputably first-​and second-​century descriptions
of the public reading of the Gospels indicate that they were understood in
light of, and publicly read in apposition to, Jewish Scriptures: Mark 13:14//​
Matt 24:15 refer to “the reader” in a text interpreting the prophet Daniel;
Justin Martyr describes the reading of the Gospels with “the prophets”;
Irenaeus, too, describes the reading of the Gospels with “the prophets.” Only
Eusebius’s excerpted portion of Serapion’s second-​century letter regarding
the Gospel of Peter fails to mention the prophets. If one were to include the
Muratorian Fragment in the second-​century evidence, it would mean four of
the five references to the public reading of the Gospels in the first two centu-
ries also explicitly mention the prophets.
From the same period there is not a single example of early Christians
reading in their assemblies the Greco-​Roman works that typically appear
in the banquets that Alikin, Nässelqvist, and Shiell prefer as the appropriate
“socio-​cultural counterpart and analogy” of Christian public reading.46
Never do they read Homer in assembly; never do they read Vergil in as-
sembly. This fact does not mean that early Christian book practices could

44 Alikin, Earliest, 181.

45 Alikin, Earliest, 154.
46 Alikin, Earliest, 179.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 213

not have parallels with Greco-​Roman book cultures, but it does indicate the
error of denying Jewish parallels. Early Jesus followers undeniably developed
their book practices in concert with Jewish book practices.47
Second, Christ-​oriented reading of the Gospels and Jewish Scriptures was
not an isolated liturgical indebtedness. Cultic reverence of Jesus was a pre-
dominantly Jewish movement in its earliest stages and remained such for
some time thereafter. The adaptation of the holy day from Sabbath to Sunday,
the adaptation of the Passover meal from commemorating the Exodus to the
Eucharist commemorating the death and resurrection of Jesus, the portrayal
of the earliest Jesus followers as continuing to worship at the temple (Acts
2–​4), and even the related significance of “Jerusalem” as a real and symbolic
center to the cultus (Acts 1:8; 15:2–​29; 21:15–​26; Rom 15:19, 25–​26, 31; 1 Cor
16:3; Gal 1:18; 4:25–​26; Heb 12:22; Rev 3:12; 21), all exhibit the affirmation
and development of Jewish liturgy and ritual among early Jesus followers.
Third, the early Jesus movement’s most prominent foundational figures—​
Jesus of Nazareth and Paul of Tarsus—​were both commemorated narratively
as carrying out significant portions of their careers in the synagogue. Further,
there is little reason to doubt that Jesus really did carry out part of his public
ministry in synagogues,48 as is claimed in the Gospels (see Mark 1–​6; Matt
4:23–​13:58; Luke 4:14–​38; 6:6–​11; 13:10–​20; John 6:59; 18:19) and that Paul
began his missionary career in synagogues, as is claimed in Acts (9:20; 13:5,
14–​41, 44–​47; 14:1; 17:1–​2, 10, 17; 18:4, 19; 19:8; cf. 22:19; 24:12; 26:11).49
Paul’s undisputed letters are silent on his participation in synagogue, which
is perhaps not surprising in his effort to portray himself as the “apostle to
the Gentiles” (Rom 11:13; Gal 2:8). But even if one were to suppose that Paul
never participated in synagogue, the fact remains that some Jesus follow-
ers memorialized him (and Jesus) literarily as a synagogue teacher and thus
embraced the synagogue origins of their movement at multiple points.

47 Similarly, Rouwhorst, “Reading,” 305. More generally, Bokedal, Formation, 12: “Neither the his-

tory, nor the liturgy, textuality or theology involved in the unique ‘creation’ of the biblical canon
can be understood apart from the church’s continuous reference to Second Temple and Rabbinic
Judaism, and their respective understanding, hope, use, interpretation, delimitation, preservation
and actualization of Scripture.”
48 See my earlier study, Chris Keith, Jesus against the Scribal Elite: The Origins of the Conflict (Grand

Rapids: Baker Academic, 2013), 33–​34; Anders Runesson, “The Historical Jesus, the Gospels, and
First-​Century Jewish Society: The Importance of Synagogues for Understanding the New Testament,”
in Warner and Binder, City, 265–​97, esp. 287–​92. See also now Ryan, Role.
49 See further Anders Runesson, “Entering a Synagogue with Paul: First-​ Century Torah
Observance,” in Torah Ethics and Early Christian Identity, ed. Susan J. Wendel and David M. Miller
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016), 11–​26.
214 The Gospel as Liturgy

Fourth, early Jesus followers used the term ἐκκλησία to refer to them-
selves. The Gospel of Matthew attributes this usage to Jesus himself (Matt
16:18), but it can be traced at least to the earliest of Paul’s letters in the late
40s and early 50s ce—​Galatians 1:2; 1 Thess 1:1; 2 Thess 2:1—​and thus prior
to the communal reading of the Jesus tradition reflected in Mark 13:14//​
Matt 24:15. Along with προσευχή, συναγωγή, and over twenty more words
in Greek, Hebrew, and Latin,50 ἐκκλησία was a term for a public synagogue
whose usage predates Christian origins (for example, Jdt 6:16, 21; Sir 15:5;
21:17; 23:24; 38:33; 39:10; 1 Macc 5:16; 14:19).51 Ἐκκλησία was a term also
for gatherings of Greco-​Roman civic groups and, occasionally, for the gather-
ings of non-​civic voluntary associations.52 Since, however, the earliest usages
of the term among Jesus followers are in the writings of authors who either
were Jewish or were demonstrably shaped by the Jewish Scriptures (Pauline
and deutero-​Pauline epistles,53 Gospel of Matthew,54 Acts,55 Hebrews,56
James,57 3 John,58 and Revelation59), the term’s identification with syna-
gogues remains significant.60 This does not preclude the notion that some

50 Anders Runesson, Donald D. Binder, and Birger Olsson, The Ancient Synagogue from Its Origins

to 200 c.e.: A Source Book, AJEC 72 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 10n.21, 328.
51 For synagogue terminology, see Runesson, Origins, 171–​ 73; Runesson, “Persian,” 65–​ 67;
Runesson, Binder, and Olsson, Ancient, 10n.21. Further on ἐκκλησία as a synagogue term, see Ralph
J. Korner, The Origin and Meaning of Ekklēsia in the Early Jesus Movement, AJEC 98 (Leiden: Brill,
2014). Most recent synagogue scholarship distinguishes between “public” synagogues for the general
populace and “semi-​public” or “association” synagogues that resemble Greco-​Roman voluntary
associations, like the synagogue of the Essenes. See Runesson, “Building,” 384n.22; Origins, 64.
52 See further Korner, Origin, 25–​ 80; Richard Last, “Ekklēsia outside the Septuagint and the
Dēmos: The Titles of Greco-​ Roman Associations and Christ-​ Followers’ Groups,” JBL 137.4
(2018): 959–​80
53 Rom 16:1, 4, 5, 16, 23; 1 Cor 1:2; 4:17; 6:4; 7:17; 10:32; 11:16, 18, 22; 12:28; 14:4, 5, 12, 19, 23, 28,

33, 34, 35; 15:9; 16:1, 19; 2 Cor 1:1; 8:1, 18, 19, 23, 24; 11:8, 28; 12:13; Gal 1:2, 13, 22; Eph 1:22; 3:10, 21;
5:23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 32; Phil 3:6; 4:15; Col 1:18, 24; 4:15, 16; 1 Thess 1:1; 2:14; 2 Thess 1:1, 4; 1 Tim 3:5,
15; 5:16; Phlm 1:2.
54 Matt 16:18; 18:17.
55 Acts 5:11; 7:38; 8:1, 3; 9:31; 11:22, 26; 12:1, 5; 13:1; 14:23, 27; 15:3, 4, 22, 41; 16:5; 18:22; 19:32, 39,

40; 20:17, 28.

56 Heb 2:12; 12:23 (citing Ps 21:23 LXX).
57 Jas 5:14.
58 3 John 1:6, 9, 10.
59 Rev 1:4, 11, 20; 2:1, 7, 8, 11, 12, 17, 18, 23, 29; 3:1, 6, 7, 13, 14, 22; 22:16.
60 For an argument to the contrary, see Last, “Ekklēsia,” esp. 963–​66, where he argues more spe-

cifically that Pauline groups would not have taken their bearings from usages of ἐκκλησία in the
LXX because Pauline occurrences of the term do not replicate common LXX modifiers (for example,
“ἐκκλησία of God,” “ἐκκλησία of the Jews/​Judeans,” or “ἐκκλησία of Israel”). Last’s argument is based
on the non-​occurrence of specific terms, which is a silence that applies as equally to his argument as it
does those he critiques. Regardless, my argument in the main text is more general, that many (not all)
early Jesus followers would have been thoroughly familiar with the term ἐκκλησία because they were
familiar with the LXX, where it frequently occurs, though this need not preclude their familiarity
with other usages of the term any more than familiarity with LXX vocabulary such as θεός or κύριος
would preclude their familiarity with non-​LXX meanings of these terms.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 215

early Jesus followers could have also understood the term in reference to its
Greco-​Roman meanings.
Fifth, this augmentation of synagogue liturgy coheres strongly with a her-
meneutical augmentation of the Jewish Scriptures that has already occurred
within the texts of the first-​century Gospels. Around eighty years before
Justin’s church in Rome read the Gospels publicly in the same way as they
read the prophets, Mark and others had already infused their narratives of
Jesus’s life with allusions to and citations of the prophets and other Jewish
Scriptures. These are not the same book practices, but there is a mutual
anchoring of the Jesus narrative in the Jewish prophets that we should not
overlook. Hays’s Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels is the latest in a lengthy
history of scholarship detailing the various manners in which the Gospel
authors assumed, absorbed, built upon, quoted, redeployed, re-​envisioned,
and articulated their own identity through the Jewish Scriptures.61 If the
Gospel of Matthew consciously mimics the five books of Torah with its di-
vision of the narrative into five major discourses62—​which is admittedly far
from certain—​one could go even further and observe that the very narrative
structure of this Gospel asserts its rightful place next to the Torah. Similarly,
if John 20:30–​31 and 21:24–​25’s usage of the γράφω word group to describe
itself as that which is “written” intends to claim for the Gospel of John a status
as γραφή, as I affirmed in c­ hapter 5, this evangelist also places his Gospel
alongside the Torah, which was where, John believed, Moses “wrote about”
Jesus (John 5:46).
Regardless of what one makes of the Matthean narrative structure and
the Johannine usage of γράφω, the Jesus tradition’s hermeneutical indebt-
edness to the Jewish Scriptures is unquestionable. The interpretive practice
of reading the story of Jesus in light of the prophets within Gospel narratives
coheres directly with the eventual liturgical practice of reading the story of
Jesus in light of the prophets within Christ assemblies. This coherence be-
tween interpretive practice and liturgical practice may not have been inten-
tional, but the scholar who takes this view must at least reckon with the fact
that this considerable amount of unintentionality is all moving in precisely
the same direction.
Sixth, even when the boundaries between Jewish and Christian iden-
tity later became more hardened, they also remained fluid in ways that

61 Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016).
62 See the brief discussion in c­ hapter 4.
216 The Gospel as Liturgy

indicate contexts in which similarities and differences between Jewish and

Christian liturgies would not have gone unnoticed.63 The Gospel of John
(John 9:22; 12:42; 16:2),64 Acts (throughout), and the Gospel of Matthew
(16:18), all from the late first century or early second century, make claims
for interactions between Jesus followers and synagogues. According to
Justin Martyr in the mid-​second century, Jesus and Christians were cursed
in synagogues.65 In the third century, Origen addresses members of his au-
dience who spend Sabbath in synagogue and Sunday in church.66 In the
early third century, Serapion corresponds with a former Christian who
had begun to practice Judaism.67 The Martyrdom of Pionius, likely from
the third century but recounting events from the mid-​second century ce,
warns Christians during the Decian persecution not to accept invitations
to synagogues from Jews.68 John Chrysostom’s fourth-​century invective
against his congregants’ appreciation of Jews and synagogue similarly
reveals Christian cultural contact with the synagogue.69 Even Roman per-
spectives on early Christian book culture may reflect the fluid nature of
Christian and Jewish assemblies, if Lucian’s second-​century reference to
the “synagogue” of Christians is attributable to confusion on his part due to
considerable overlap of the two cultures.70 According to all these sources,
at least some Christians, over the course of centuries but going back to the
origins of the Jesus movement, were aware of and knowledgeable about
Jewish synagogues.

63 Other than the first-​century and early second-​century texts, the examples that follow are noted

by Lieu, Christian, 144–​45.

64 Especially since J. Louis Martyn, History and Theology in the Fourth Gospel, 3rd ed., NTL

(Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003), the consensus view has been that the author of John’s
Gospel has placed synagogue turmoil from his own context onto the historical ministry of Jesus.
Recently, Jonathan Bernier, Aposynagōgos and the Historical Jesus in John: Rethinking the Historicity
of the Johannine Expulsion Passages, BibInt 122 (Leiden: Brill, 2013), argues against Martyn that the
passages do not necessarily reflect only later realities.
65 Justin Martyr, Dial. 16.4; 47.4; 96.2; 137.2; cf. 93.4; 95.4; 108.3; 133.6.
66 Origen, Hom. Lev. 5.8.
67 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.12.1.
68 Mart. Pion. 13. On the date, see Herbert Musurillo, introduction to The Acts of the Christian

Martyrs, OECT (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), xxix.

69 John Chrysostom, Adv. Jud. 1.5.
70 Lucian, Peregr. 11, refers to Peregrinus, on the basis of his literate abilities, becoming a “ξυναγω

γεύς.” Just before this reference, but still at Peregr. 11, Lucian says that Peregrinus “learned the won-
drous lore of the Christians, by associating with their priests and scribes in Palestine” (Harmon). Cf.
Lieu, Christian, 141: “How far pagan observers recognized a boundary between Christians and Jews
is much more difficult to determine.”
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 217

Summary and a Word on Dating

In contrast to suggestions otherwise, then, there is a high degree of conti-

nuity between the synagogue and the Christ assembly. Some writings of Jesus
followers commemorated the origins of their movement in synagogues,
used synagogue language for their assemblies, and were intertwined with
the sacred texts that were ritually read in synagogues. Christians from Justin
Martyr onward read those very texts in their own assemblies alongside the
Gospels. Synagogue liturgy is therefore the proper background for under-
standing the similarities between Jewish reading culture and the reading cul-
ture of Jesus followers.71
I would go further than this claim, however, and assert that the syna-
gogue is also the proper background for understanding the dissimilarities
between Jewish and Christ-​oriented public reading. When Jesus follow-
ers developed distinctive public reading practices, they did so in know-
ledge of Jewish assemblies that did not practice them.72 The element of
discontinuity—​the public reading of the Jesus tradition—​occurred right
in the midst of a prominent element of continuity, the reading of Jewish
Scripture. Against this background, we can appreciate the innovative na-
ture of the public reading of the Gospels in assembly alongside texts that
already held scriptural status.
It would have been a uniquely unaware follower of Jesus in the earliest
stages who genuinely had no sense of what was happening when they or
someone else inserted the Gospels into a liturgical space in synagogue typi-
cally occupied by the Torah and the prophets. Later followers, perhaps espe-
cially Gentile converts, may have initially been ignorant of the significance
of this liturgical development of synagogue practice. But for the earliest
stages in which this transition initially took place, and particularly among
the Jewish members of the assembly as well as the educated members of
the assembly responsible for book practices, genuine ignorance was inher-
ently unlikely. Positing ignorance would require us to affirm that a core as-
pect of perhaps the most important liturgical act of Jewish synagogues was
augmented by the reading of a text other than the law and the prophets, an
augmentation that is not otherwise explicitly discussed in Judaism until the

71 Likewise Gamble, Books, 151: “The practice can hardly be understood except as a borrowing

from the liturgy of the synagogue, and thus it would have been widespread from an early time.”
72 Cf. Hurtado, Destroyer, 111.
218 The Gospel as Liturgy

Mishnah (ca. early third century ce) with the reading of Esther in synagogue
at Purim,73 and no one gave a thought to what was happening. Therefore,
although we may not have enough information to speak of the intentions
of the author of the Gospel of Mark in textualizing the Jesus tradition, the
aforementioned factors and the general socio-​historical context of the Christ
assembly as a distinct phenomenon that emerged within and from Second
Temple Judaism give us more grounds for hypothesizing the intentions of the
early Jesus followers who took that textualized Jesus tradition and placed it
liturgically next to Jewish Scriptures.
When might this practice have begun? We do not have enough informa-
tion for an exact estimate, but Justin Martyr’s description assumes that it was
not an innovation and was thus in place prior to the mid-​second century ce.74
Mark 13:14//​Matthew 24:15 are possibly evidence of the liturgical reading of the
Gospels, but they are not clearly so. Sometime in the eighty-​year span between
Mark’s textualization of the Jesus tradition around 70 ce and Justin Martyr’s
reading of the “memoirs of the apostles” in the 150s, some members of the Christ
assembly in some locales began to read the Jesus tradition liturgically alongside
of, and in light of, Jewish Scriptures. The related phenomenon of the hermeneu-
tical influence of the Jewish Scriptures upon followers of Jesus is traceable to the
first century, as they had already adopted those Scriptures as the hermeneutical
lens for Jesus’s life and ministry at the earliest stages of their movement to which
we have access, and we have no access to a version of Christ-​worship in which
this was not the case. Insofar as the liturgical practice of public reading of the
Gospels required textualized Jesus tradition, the material element of this later
development is also traceable to the first century. To anticipate the final section
of this chapter, then, we can trace some of the precipitating factors for the public
reading of the Jesus tradition even earlier than the liturgical development itself.

Gospel Reading and Greco-​Roman Reading

Affirming Christian dependence upon the synagogue is not to claim that

the synagogue is the only socio-​historical context in which scholars can

73 m. Meg. 1:1, 3:1–​4:1.

74 Similarly, Gamble, Books, 151: “Since Justin aims to give a typical description and was familiar
with the usages of Asia Minor and Rome, the liturgical reading of scripture must have been common
and perhaps universal by Justin’s time. Most scholars assume that the practice was by then traditional
and reached back well into the first century.”
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 219

understand early Christian Gospel-​reading practices.75 Synagogue reading

itself was one reading culture in the midst of a larger Greco-​Roman world
that contained a host of reading cultures. Furthermore, as the discussion of
Justin Martyr revealed, Christians came in contact with, and sometimes un-
derstood themselves in reference to, pagan culture as much as Jewish cul-
ture. Along these lines, several scholars have productively compared and
contrasted Christian book culture with various Greco-​Roman book cultures.
In a groundbreaking study, Snyder considers Jewish and Christian “text-​
brokers” in light of philosophical groups—​Stoics, Epicureans, Peripatetics,
and Platonists.76 More generally, Eshleman compares the intellectual culture
of Christianity to Sophists and philosophers.77 Knust compares textual prac-
tices by Christian scribes to Alexandrian scribal practices.78
Although I have argued against a Greco-​Roman context taking precedence
over the Jewish synagogue as the primary socio-​historical context of refer-
ence for early Christian reading as it has in the work of Alikin, Nässelqvist, and
Shiell, this study affirmed in c­ hapter 1 that Christian reading can and should
be understood in light of Greco-​Roman reading cultures. To a large extent, this
study is a taking up of the challenge of Johnson, who stated in 2010 that his
model of “reading cultures,” developed on the basis of elites in Roman Empire,
could “be profitably pursued . . . for the context of early Christian writings.”79
Space precludes a full consideration of every possible relevant reading culture
in the Greco-​Roman world, and this is unnecessary due to the studies already
noted. I thus focus in what follows on the most obvious touchstone between
Christian, Jewish, and Greco-​Roman book cultures: the materiality of the
manuscript. This focus is especially appropriate since Gospel manuscripts, like
Torah scrolls before them, came to serve symbolically as markers of identity.

Manuscripts and Public Reading of the Gospels

As chapter 1 observed, in Johnson’s Readers and Reading Culture in the High

Roman Empire, he frequently observes the sociological significance of the

75 Pokorný, From, 196, notes how Mark’s Gospel would have appeared from a Hellenistic perspec-

tive and a Jewish perspective.

76 Snyder, Teachers.
77 Kendra Eshleman, The Social World of Intellectuals in the Roman Empire: Sophists, Philosophers,

and Christians, GCRW (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).

78 Knust, “Taking Away,” 79–​84; also Knust and Wasserman, To Cast, 122–​34.
79 Johnson, Readers, 15.
220 The Gospel as Liturgy

scroll as a material artifact when it comes to function as a “witness.” As just

one example, he cites the following text of Galen:

But you, so that you do not get confused, take up the book of Archigenes
and read it to them, first the part having this title for the chapter
heading, On the Size of the Heart Beat. . . . Next, rolling the book up
a bit, read again the section On Intensity. . . . Now roll the book up a
little [more] and read the beginning of the section On Fullness. Then,
halting the argument for a moment, that is, halting your reading of the
book, say to them that I am saying nothing new, but what Archigenes
has said too.80

Johnson comments: “We can almost hear the papyrus crinkle, so vivid is the
description. Note the vigor with which the bookroll is deployed: the dispu-
tant rolls and unrolls to this or that passage and reads out the relevant text
triumphantly. . . . The disputant uses the bookroll as active witness to an argu-
ment he is constructing.”81
In light of such usages of manuscripts, Johnson correctly observes that
“in certain performance contexts, the bookroll plays a central role”82 and
that the manuscript itself comes to represent the identity of the group.
On a surface level, this connection between a particular set of cultural
associations and its physical emblem is intuitively obvious even if often
unnoticed—​guns often serve as the symbolic representation of soldiers or
gangs, wedding rings serve as the symbolic representation of the vows of
matrimony, and so on and so on. It is not the material object alone that
gives rise to this connection, as if any person with a scroll was regarded
as elite or any person with a gun is regarded as a soldier. Rather, it is so-
cial recognition of a particular material object—​a scroll of the Aeneid in-
stead of a tax receipt or an AK-​47 rather than a Nerf gun—​deployed in a
particular set of social circumstances that gives rise to the physical object
serving the visual and material function of representing that group’s iden-
tity. As ­chapter 1 noted, this capacity for books as material objects to func-
tion as, in the words of Carr, “the technology and tangible written talisman

80 Galen, De puls. diff. 8.591–​592K (modified from translation in Johnson, Readers, 95).
81 Johnson, Readers, 95.
82 Johnson, Readers, 91.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 221

for a broader process”83 plays a role in Assmann’s theory of cultural texts as

well.84 Assmann identifies texts as one element, albeit an important one, of
the entourage matériel of a culture.

Torah Scroll as Symbol

The book culture of Second Temple Judaism exhibits precisely this type of con-
nection between manuscripts and identity construction in accounts of Torah
scrolls. Stern has recently challenged this idea, arguing that, although the Torah
scroll served as a symbolic representation of Jewish identity to Christians, Jews
themselves “never adopted the Torah scroll as a symbol of their identity”; thus
“the Torah scroll never became a symbol of their national or religious identity for
Jews.”85 Stern makes these comments specifically in relation to Christians and
Jews in late antiquity and the Middle Ages,86 but also immediately after this last
quotation acknowledges that the Torah scroll had “symbolic meaning within the
synagogue.”87 The following examples from Josephus in the first century ce sug-
gest against Stern’s claim that the Torah scroll never became a symbol of Jewish
identity, showing that it did function as such and not only within the synagogue.88
One example of the connection between Torah scrolls and Jewish identity
is Josephus’s account of Vespasian’s Roman triumph. According to Josephus,
when the Romans carried the spoils of war back to be displayed in their tri-
umphal procession, alongside sacred items from the temple in Jerusalem, and
in last and prominent place, was a scroll of the Torah.89 Stern sees the “copy
of the Jewish Law” functioning “as a trophy” in this case,90 which would seem
to imply at least some kind of symbolic significance. Fine rightly refers to the
Torah scroll, menorah, and other items as “cult images.”91 The Arch of Titus

83 Carr, Writing, 160.

84 On Assmann, see c­ hapter 1. See also Florence Dupont, “The Corrupted Boy and the Crowned
Poet: or, The Material Reality and the Symbolic Status of the Literary Book at Rome,” in Johnson and
Parker, Ancient Literacies, 143–​63.
85 Stern, Jewish, 61.
86 Stern, Jewish, 58–​61.
87 Stern, Jewish, 61.
88 Cf. Levine, Ancient, 146: “By the first century c.e., the Torah had become the holiest object in

Judaism outside the Temple itself and its appurtenances.”

89 Josephus, War 7.5.5 §150.
90 Stern, Jewish, 19.
91 Steven Fine, The Menorah: From the Bible to Modern Israel (Cambridge: Harvard University

Press, 2016), 18.

222 The Gospel as Liturgy

(ca. 81 ce) in Rome portrays Vespasian’s triumph as well. It does not include
a Torah scroll,92 though Fine suggests that one of the placards being carried
along with the menorah and table of the bread of the presence could have re-
ferred to it on the basis of Josephus’s statement.93 Josephus at least, however,
clearly places a specific emphasis upon the Torah scroll as symbolically rep-
resentative of the Jewish captives.
Another passage from Josephus’s War similarly attests the connection
between manuscripts of Torah and Jewish identity. Describing events after
the death of King Herod, Josephus claims that a Roman soldier tore up and
burned a Torah scroll that he found upon a villager,94 causing an uproar:

At that the Jews were roused as though it were their whole country which
had been consumed in the flames; and, their religion acting like some in-
strument to draw them together, all on the first announcement of the news
hurried in a body to Cumanus at Caesarea, and implored him not to leave
unpunished the author of such an outrage on God and on their law.95

Punish him he did, according to Josephus. Cumanus executed the soldier,

which quieted the scandalized villagers-​turned-​protestors.96 That the Torah
scroll here functions for Josephus as a symbol of Judaism cannot be denied.
Josephus equates “the whole country” with the Torah scroll when he states
that the people acted as if “the whole country” had been consumed by flames
as the Torah scroll had. “It is hard to imagine that even a small percentage of
the mob which gathered before Cumanus’s residence at Caesarea could read
the scroll in question, but it is obvious that they interpret the soldier’s act as
an attack” on their identity.97
Josephus reports another occasion when Jews were forced from Caesarea
and took the Torah with them.98 The Roman governor Florus was upset at
this and imprisoned some of the leaders of the Jewish community “on the
charge of having carried off the copy of the Law from Caesarea.”99 This

92 For images and introduction to the Arch of Titus, see Daniel P. Bailey, “Arch of Titus,” EDEJ 375–​

76; Fine, Menorah, 1–​16.

93 Steven Fine, Peter J. Schertz, and Donald H. Sanders, “The Arch of Titus in Color,” BAR 43.3

(May/​June 2017): 35; cf. also Fine, Menorah, 4.

94 Josephus, War 2.12.2 §229.
95 Josephus, War 2.12.2 §230 (Thackeray, LCL).
96 Josephus, War 2.12.2 §231.
97 Thatcher, “Literacy,” 134.
98 Josephus, War 2.15.5 §289–​92.
99 Josephus, War 2.15.5 §292 (Thackeray, LCL).
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 223

account reflects the perception of Torah-​as-​symbol by both the Jews and the
Romans. Forced to flee, the Jews made certain that the law was among the
few items they preserved. As for the Romans, “it would appear that the Torah
was regarded as the holiest object which the local Jewish community pos-
sessed, and . . . was the Jewish equivalent of a status of a pagan deity.”100
These passages indicate the connection in Second Temple Judaism be-
tween actual manuscripts and Jewish identity. In the words of Goodman,
“The physical scrolls which contained their sacred texts were themselves
sacred objects.”101 Later rabbinic tradition would develop specialized rules
about the treatment of scrolls that similarly reflect this connection.102 At
the risk of being repetitive, each of these instances, like those described by
Johnson in elite Roman society, features a physical manuscript that sits at the
core of the reading event and becomes symbolic of the culture that partici-
pates in such events.

Codex as Symbol

Christians came to view their holy books, including manuscripts of the

Gospels, as similarly symbolic of their identity in various fashions, as is par-
ticularly clear in descriptions of the role of manuscripts during the Great
Persecution of the early fourth century or apotropaic usages of books.103 At
present, however, I will focus upon a related but separate matter. The cul-
tural context already discussed is the immediate background against which
we may consider one of the great conundrums of early Christian book
culture—​Christian “addiction” to the codex.104 Christians did not invent the
codex, were not the only ones to use the codex, and did not use it exclusively,
but scholars of Jewish history, early Christianity, and classics all recognize
that Christians latched to the codex book form long before it went main-
stream in the wider imperial context,105 which was odd. “The textual culture

100 Levine, Ancient, 135.

101 Martin Goodman, “Sacred Scripture and ‘Defiling the Hands,’” JTS 41.1 (1990): 103.
102 See discussion in Hezser, Jewish, 190–​95.
103 See the conclusion, which will discuss some of these and other artifactual usages of the Gospels

in suggesting potential avenues for future research.

104 Stanton, Jesus, 165–​67, takes over language of Christian “addition” to the codex from F. G.

Kenyon, The Chester Beatty Biblical Papyri: Descriptions and Texts of Twelve Manuscripts on Papyrus
of the Greek Bible: Fasciculus 1: General Introduction (London: Emery Walker, 1933), 12.
105 Among many others, Stern, Jewish, 61; Gamble, Books, 49–​54; Hurtado, Destroyer, 135–​37;

Bagnall, Early, 74, 89; Johnson, “Ancient,” 267; Roberts and Skeat, Birth, 38–​66, respectively.
224 The Gospel as Liturgy

of antiquity was . . . primarily a culture of the bookroll.”106 And within this

wider culture, “in format and use the codex was a long way from anything
that might be regarded as a book.”107 Christian preference for the codex was
thus “peculiar.”108
With regard to that peculiarity, Hurtado’s 2006 study uses the Leuven
Database of Ancient Books (LDAB)109 to show that, in the surviving evi-
dence, codices make up only 5 percent of all second-​century manuscripts
(Christian and non-​Christian) but make up around 71 percent of Christian
manuscripts of that period.110 For the third century, codices make up only
around 21 percent of total manuscripts (Christian and non-​Christian)
but make up at least 67 percent of Christian manuscripts of that period.111
Christians used the bookroll and the codex, as did the rest of the popula-
tion, but Christians preferred the codex demonstrably more than the rest of
the population. One of Hurtado’s most significant demonstrations was to ob-
serve that Christians preferred the codex in particular for texts that were, or
would become, scriptural.112
Two recent studies have added nuance to Hurtado’s argument by chal-
lenging the degree to which scholars can speak of a general Christian pref-
erence for the codex or speak of the codex as a distinctively Christian book
form. Simultaneously charging Hurtado with being “partly misleading”113
and affirming Hurtado’s argument regarding the strong link between the
codex and Christian scriptural texts, Bagnall has argued that Christian usage
of the codex for their authoritative texts has skewed the scholarly view of
their general book preferences: “The Christians adopted the codex as the
normative format of deliberately produced public copies of scriptural texts,
but they did not generalize from this adoption to broader use for all books.
Or at least they did not do so a great deal sooner than other people did.”114
Thus, for Bagnall, our conception of what Christians “preferred” owes more

106 Wallraff, Kodex, 8: “Die Textkultur der Antike war . . . primär eine Kultur der Schriftrolle.”
107 Gamble, Books, 50.
108 Gamble, Books, 49.
109 The website of the Leuven Database of Ancient Books can be found at https://​www.trismegis-

tos.org/​ldab/​.
110 Hurtado, Earliest, 47.
111 Hurtado, Earliest, 47–​48.
112 Hurtado, Earliest, 57–​59.
113 Bagnall, Early, 71, 78n.7.
114 Bagnall, Early, 78. Also affirming Hurtado’s argument about the Christian usage of the codex

for scriptural texts is Scott D. Charlesworth, “Public and Private—​Second-​and Third-​Century

Gospel Manuscripts,” in Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon, ed. Craig A. Evans and
H. Daniel Zacharias, SSEJC 13/​LSTS 70 (London: T&T Clark, 2009), 153–​54.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 225

to the material remains of Christian scriptural texts than it does to an imag-

ined hard-​and-​fast rule about the codex.
Taking up another theme in Bagnall’s study of early Christian books,
Nongbri has argued that scholarly convictions of Christian “preference”
for the codex has also rested on early dating practices for the material evi-
dence, which he frequently challenges.115 He similarly suggests a slight re-
orientation: “It is perhaps more prudent to say simply that the vast majority
of Christian books that have survived are in the codex rather than the roll
format.”116 Like Bagnall, however, even in offering these helpful nuances,
Nongbri acknowledges the strong association between Christians and the
codex book form: “But in whatever way we assess the role of Christians in the
spread of the codex, the fact remains that when we speak of early Christian
books, we almost always mean codices.”117
Questions remain, then, about why Christians so strongly gravitated to
the codex format and what prompted it. Scholars have offered numerous
hypotheses, ranging from supposed costs savings associated with copying
on a codex to opposition to Judaism and its employment of the bookroll for
its Scriptures to a causal relationship with the development of the fourfold
Gospel collection or New Testament canon.118 It is now nearly a scholarly
trope to emphasize that we are all really just guessing about these matters,119
but the guessing will not halt. The sheer volume of evidence suggesting that
something was going on within early Christian reading communities that
had not yet taken root in the rest of the Roman Empire will spur research-
ers on: “The Christian use of the codex is a genuine anomaly that needs an
explanation.”120
In terms of the most recent explanations, Hurtado sides with Gamble’s
theory that Christian adoption of the codex emerged from the usage of the

115 Nongbri, God’s, 23.

116 Nongbri, God’s, 23.
117 Nongbri, God’s, 24.
118 For an earlier listing of hypotheses, see Roberts and Skeat, Birth, 45–​66; for more recent over-

views of the discussion, see Bagnall, Early, 79–​90; Hurtado, Earliest, 61–​89.
119 Roberts and Skeat, Birth: “The only hard evidence thus remains that of the manuscripts them-

selves” (61); “It has sometimes been suggested that the adoption of the codex by the early Christians
in some way influenced the development of the Canon of Scripture. No ancient writer alludes to this,
and there is no direct evidence, so whatever can be said on the subject must necessarily be conjec-
tural” (62). Bagnall, Early, 88, regarding his proposal of Romanization: “I recognize that my sugges-
tion that we look to Romanization can be no more than a hypothesis.” Irven M. Resnick, “The Codex
in Early Jewish and Christian Communities,” JRH 17.1 (1992): 16: “My suggestions are sometimes
speculative and difficult, if not impossible, to demonstrate.”
120 Gamble, Books, 54.
226 The Gospel as Liturgy

codex for a seven-​church collection of Pauline epistles.121 Bagnall, on the

other hand, argues that the codex was at core “an artifact of Roman civili-
zation,” and its origins are traceable to first-​century Rome.122 He thus sug-
gests that the gradual adoption of the codex empire-​wide was not a result of
Christians but “yet another manifestation of what for short we may still call
Romanization, the spread of Roman habits and technologies throughout the
empire.”123 In making this proposal, Bagnall also criticizes scholars of early
Christianity:

Indeed, what is most odd, and perhaps symptomatic of the state of early
Christian studies, is that scholars have been unwilling or unable to make the
logical move from the widely observed fact of the Roman origin of the codex
to the idea that the dissemination of this book-​form is also Roman. Perhaps
part of the cause is an underlying and unanalysed discomfort with the idea
that the Christian church, so commonly thought of in this period as a kind of
countercultural movement unfriendly to the imperial power, would have fas-
tened on an artifact specifically associated with the Roman elite and mandated
its use for its most central treasury of text.124

I cannot refute the charge that early Christian studies is odd, and it admittedly
suffers from any number of “underanalysed discomforts.” But while maligning
the logical capacities of such scholars, Bagnall misses the opportunity to enlist
them in some degree of support for his theory of a Roman origin for the codex.
Hengel, for example, argued that Mark’s Gospel was written in Rome, and on a
codex from the beginning.125
These are just a few of the most recent suggestions. The bibliography on
these matters is immense, and the early Christian affinity for the codex book
form could easily justify more than one further book-​length study. I cannot
here fully engage the secondary literature and have no innovative hypothesis
of my own to offer. I also will not weigh into the debate about whether Mark

121 Hurtado, Earliest, 73–​80; Gamble, Books, 49–​66, esp. 63.

122 Bagnall, Early, 86.
123 Bagnall, Early, 87.
124 Bagnall, Early, 87. Cf. Hurtado, Earliest, 78–​79; Destroyer, 136, on Christians being

“countercultural.”
125 Hengel, Four Gospels, 37, 50. Roberts and Skeat, Birth, 55–​61, had considered the writing of

Mark’s Gospel in Rome as “the inspiration” (56) for Christian adoption of the codex but eventually
argued on the basis of a common origin for the codex and the nomina sacra for writing of a Gospel
(possibly Mark’s Gospel, 61) in Jerusalem or Antioch.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 227

(or Q) was initially on a codex or a scroll.126 Instead, I observe two impli-

cations of the preceding argument in this chapter and prior chapters for
scholarly consideration of the clear popularity of the codex with Christians,
regardless of why they first started employing it.
First, theories of the Christian adoption of the codex that emphasize its
“semiotic significance” are more plausible than those that emphasize matters
of practicality associated with the codex. The phrase “semiotic significance”
comes from Hurtado: “If the Christian usage of the codex represents another
differentiation from the larger culture, this means that it is less a ‘gradual
evolution’ and something more invested with semiotic significance.”127
Christians, for Hurtado, were signaling something in choosing the codex for
scriptural texts; they did so purposefully, and the affinity for the codex was
not something that emerged slowly over a protracted period. In offering his
alternative theory of Romanization, Bagnall articulates a version of this argu-
ment that connects identity and materiality, insofar as he proposes associa-
tion with, and admiration of, Roman culture as the instigating factor. He even
enlists Johnson’s theory of reading cultures as part of this argument, stating,
“The adoption of the codex was certainly not a minor matter, a choice that
could easily have gone either way. It implies a radical shift in the way the book
was thought of.”128 Bagnall’s theory nevertheless still leads him back to “the
early Christian adoption of the codex for scripture” as a noteworthy devel-
opment within the broader pattern of codex usage in the Roman Empire.129
In this context, he repeats Hurtado’s point about the “semiotic nature of the
adoption of the codex”: “It is a matter of cultural significance and not merely
a question of convenience.”130 Such approaches to the Christian preference
for the codex for authoritative texts receive reinforcement from the earlier
articulation of Johnson’s theory of reading cultures and Assmann’s approach
to manuscripts as part of the entourage matériel.131 As ­chapter 1 showed, both
these scholars demonstrate that the material form of writing can become so
ingrained with the identity of a reading culture that it becomes emblematic
of that culture. This approach does not settle, or dictate, precisely how the

126 See preceding footnote on the Gospel of Mark as a codex. Kirk, Q, 29–​59, 170–​74, instead

assumes scroll utilization for the earliest periods of gospel transmission and argues against the idea of
codex or proto-​codex book formats like wax tablets.
127 Hurtado, Earliest, 79.
128 Bagnall, Early, 81–​83.
129 Bagnall, Early, 88.
130 Bagnall, Early, 88–​89.
131 See ­chapter 1.
228 The Gospel as Liturgy

codex related to those Christ groups’ self-​conception, but the approach does
reinforce methodologically that it did.
Second, I propose that at least one way (among many) that the usage of the
codex contributed to the construction of Christian identity centered upon its
function as an aesthetic element of liturgy in the public assembly. The codex
form would have marked its texts as distinct from Jewish Scriptures that were
also embraced and read publicly,132 but in bookroll format. The liturgical
reading of the Gospels and the prophets in assembly would have functioned
as a ritual stage on which these distinctions were displayed. Earlier scholarly
suggestions that Christians flocked to the codex as a means of marking their
texts apart from pagan and Jewish texts have already assumed this kind of
cultural mechanism at work. Roberts and Skeat, in forwarding the argument
that the nomina sacra and codex were intertwined developments, say, “It may
be further noted that, whether or not this was the intention, nomina sacra
share the same characteristic with the codex of differentiating Christian from
both Jewish and pagan books.”133 In proposing that Christians may have
“[taken] to the codex with alacrity” because the roll was a marker of elite cul-
ture, Bülow-​Jacobsen also says, “Presumably they also wanted their books to
be different from the Jewish Torah scroll.”134 Stern approaches the issue from
the perspective of the medieval period:

Christians differentiated themselves from Jews by identifying their reli-

gion with the codex, in opposition to Judaism, which they associated with
the scroll. . . . Somewhat ironically, Christians turned the material New
Testament codex, particularly the gospel book, into an icon for God’s phys-
ical presence within the church in ways strikingly parallel to the way Jews
made the Torah scroll into an icon for God’s presence in the synagogue.135
132 Pace Resnick, “Codex,” who argues that Christians adopted the codex more specifically “to

demonstrate clearly that they were no longer bound by the Law” (16) and possibly in “an expression
of disregard, if not contempt, for the Law” (12).
133 Roberts and Skeat, Birth, 57; see also 60. Hurtado, Earliest, 70–​71, rightly criticizes the larger

theory that Jerusalem or Antioch was responsible for Christian adoption of the codex in which these
comments are embedded but offers no further comment on the potential significance of the codex
serving to differentiate “Christian” books from Jewish books. This specific aspect of Roberts and
Skeat’s proposal otherwise fits with Hurtado’s consistent approach to manuscripts as cultural arti-
facts within reading cultures. Among others, see Larry W. Hurtado, “Early Christian Manuscripts
as Artifacts,” in Evans and Zacharias, Jewish and Christian, 66–​81; Hurtado, “Manuscripts,” 99–​114;
Hurtado, “P45 as an Early Christian Artefact: What It Reflects about Early Christianity” in Hurtado,
Texts, 200–​219. Hurtado gets very close to this affirmation later in his Destroyer, when he notes that
the codex “certainly had the effect of distinguishing early Christian books physically, especially
Christian copies of their sacred books” (136) and then cites Resnick, “Codex,” 1–​17.
134 Bülow-​Jacobsen, “Writing,” 24.
135 Stern, Jewish, 59–​61.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 229

There are many issues one could address in these quotations, and Stern is
specifically discussing the medieval period. My argument builds upon only
their general point, and is specifically that the capacity for the codex to
represent “Christian” Scripture in distinction from a scroll of the Torah or
prophets or other Jewish Scripture would have been present particularly in
public reading in assembly where the book form was visible to those gath-
ered. I wish to be very clear in making this claim. I am not ignoring that
Jesus followers could have read the Gospels and other texts in scroll format.
Neither am I ignoring that they read copies of the “Old Testament” some-
times in codex format. Rather, I am observing that when they did read their
texts in codex format, it would have been a distinct marker from Jewish
copies of Torah or the prophets that heretofore had always circulated in scroll
format. Furthermore, I am not concerned with the intentions of those who
used the codex, the exact origins of the initial Christian usage of the codex,
or the function of the codex outside assembly. My theory has implications
for those matters, but in light of the presentation of early Christian reading
of the Gospels in assembly in ­chapter 6, I am specifically concerned with how
the perception of the codex in ritual assembly could have contributed to the
conception of Christian identity and thus the eventual adoption of the codex
format more widely by Christians.
I acknowledge the weakest part of this argument, which is that no primary
sources of the earliest periods describe the reading of a codex in assembly. It
would be particularly convenient for my argument if Justin Martyr, for ex-
ample, described the reading of the Gospels on codices and the reading of the
prophets on scrolls, but he does not. To the contrary, the only account of the
public reading of the Gospels that gives an indication of the book form when
read in assembly, Acts of Peter, portrays Peter handling a scroll: he “rolled it
up” (inuolues eum) before preaching.136
Yet the material evidence nevertheless indicates that the usage of the codex
was a core feature of an emergent Christian reading culture. Furthermore,
there is an unquestionable corollary between the kinds of texts that
Christians typically used codices for (those that were or became scriptural)
and the kinds of texts that they typically read ritually in assembly (those that
were or became scriptural). The Christian adoption of the codex for texts
that were, or became, scriptural was happening in the same period during
which Christians were increasingly regulating the liturgical reading of their

136 Act Pet. 20.

230 The Gospel as Liturgy

texts as part of an effort to construct their status as scriptural. I suggest that

this could have been related, and thus that the liturgical reading of texts, in-
cluding the Gospels, should be one further factor for scholarly consideration
of Christian adoption of the codex.

Conclusion and Implications

The conclusion of this chapter and the previous chapter is therefore that
what Christians did with manuscripts of the Gospels was an articulation of
early Christian identity separately from, though ultimately in conjunction
with, the narrative content of those manuscripts. The reading of the Gospels
alongside, or in rotation with, Jewish Scripture in assembly reflected a Christ-​
oriented reading culture that continued and developed the Jewish practice
of reading sacred texts in community, but was simultaneously distinct from
that of Jews for whom the gospel narratives of Jesus of Nazareth did not func-
tion in an authoritative capacity. The public reading of the Gospels was thus a
key social arena in which their authoritative status came to be actualized. For
this reason, some later Christians asserted strong claims about which texts
could be read in this manner and which texts could not. These opinions were
not uniform across Christendom in this period, even if some crystallizations,
such as the fourfold Gospel collection, had already taken shape.
These articulations of early Christian identity were fundamentally de-
pendent upon the text-​as-​manuscript. An oral performance of the tradition
from memory would not have made the same aesthetic contribution to the
Christian liturgical context as a manuscript. This statement is not a denigra-
tion of the significance of orality for understanding the development of the
Jesus tradition; it is a recognition of the fact that the earliest Jesus followers
were part of, emerged from, and expressed their own identity in direct rela-
tion to a highly textual Judaism whose Scriptures already served as a symbolic
representation of their identity. It was thus through the gospel as manuscript
that “Mark created a . . . text that was able to become a counterpart of the
Law and Prophets.”137 The manuscript was not at all “secondary,”138 “ancil-
lary,”139 or “peripheral”140 to this aspect of the transmission process. It was

137 Pokorný, From, 197 (emphasis added).

138 Horsley, “Gospel,” 32.
139 Horsley, “Gospel,” 32.
140 Rhoads, “Performance,” 121.
 The Emergence of Christian Identity 231

the vehicle by which their reading culture became “a theology that was made
public.”141 It is in this sense, then, that I have argued that some scholarly at-
tention should be redirected from an emphasis upon the performance of the
Jesus tradition sans manuscript toward an emphasis upon the performance
of the Jesus tradition as manuscript.
This conclusion carries with it several implications related to the discus-
sion that opened the previous chapter. According to Lieu,

Early Christianity needs to be seen as implicated in, as well as contributing

to, the dynamics of the world in which it was situated. We should look for
continuities as well as for discontinuities between Greek, Roman, Jewish,
and Christian efforts to construct and to maintain an identity for them-
selves, in interaction with their past as well as with each other.142

This chapter has confirmed Lieu’s assessment of the tripartite nature of early
Christian identity, but it has also suggested that one should complement her
focus on genre and language with a focus on liturgy and ritual. The public
reading of the Gospels gives clear expression to this multifaceted identity by
reflecting overlaps and distinctions between Jewish, Christian, and pagan
reading cultures, as well as between different Christian reading cultures.
This chapter has also detailed some ways in which the public reading of
the Jesus tradition contributed to what Lieu described as the “long canonical
process.”143 Irenaeus first explicitly articulated the authority of the fourfold
gospel collection toward the end of the second century. But several anteced-
ents of the processes that led to this articulation of proto-​orthodox or or-
thodox Christian identity are traceable to the first century, and indeed to
Mark’s initial act of textualizing of the Jesus tradition.144 This is not to argue
that there was a direct line of causation. I have clearly distinguished be-
tween Mark’s intentions and those of the person or group who initially began

141 Markschies, Christian, 120.

142 Lieu, Christian, 20–​21. Lieu proceeds to state: “Indeed, even to say this is to have to go on to
acknowledge not only that there is not ‘any universal meaning that can be attributed to terms such
as “Roman”, “Greek”, “Christian”, “barbarian”’, Jew, but also that these are not mutually exclusive cat-
egories, and so we can only expect to understand one term in its relations with the others” (21; citing
Richard Miles, “Introduction: Constructing Identities in Late Antiquity,” in Constructing Identities in
Late Antiquity, ed. Richard Miles, RCM [London: Routledge, 1999], 4). While not detracting from
the force of this point, one may add that such an acknowledgment also points to the fact that these
terms are neither hollow nor endlessly malleable.
143 Lieu, Christian, 54.
144 Similarly, Pokorný, From, 4, 190; cf. Hurtado, Destroyer, 116, who overlooks the relevance of

Mark 13:14 for this point.

232 The Gospel as Liturgy

reading Mark’s Gospel and other Gospels liturgically with Jewish Scripture.
Neither is it to argue that the textualization of the tradition was the sole factor
in the rise of the canon. It is, however, to note that these processes were intri-
cately interrelated and that earlier acts created the fertile soil in which later
articulations of identity bloomed. It was manuscripts of the Gospels, often
read liturgically with “the prophets” of Jewish Scripture, that enabled a dis-
tinct Gospel reading culture.
 Conclusion
The Gospel as Manuscript

If a history of readings is made possible only by a comparative his-

tory of books, it is equally true that a history of books will have no
point if it fails to account for the meanings they later come to make.
D. F. McKenzie, Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts

The aspects of the transmission of the Jesus tradition under consideration in

this book did not stop where this book has stopped. In the opening lines of
his Homilies on the Gospel of Luke, written sometime in the 230s or 240s ce,1
Origen appropriates the Lukan prologue in order to address the proliferation
of Gospel writing around him and specifically to assert the superiority of the
fourfold Gospel in the New Testament over “heretical” Gospels:

Now, in the New Testament also, “many have tried” to write gospels, but not
all have found acceptance. You should know that not only four Gospels, but
very many, were composed. The Gospels we have were chosen from among
these gospels and passed on to the churches. We can know this from Luke’s
own prologue, which begins this way: “Because many have tried to com-
pose an account.” The words “have tried” (ἐπιχείρησαν) imply an accusation
against those who rushed into writing gospels without the grace of the Holy
Spirit. Matthew, Mark, John, and Luke did not “try” to write; they wrote
their Gospels when they were filled with the Holy Spirit. Hence, “Many have
tried to compose an account of the events that are clearly known among us.”
The Church has four Gospels. Heretics have very many. . . . “Many have
tried” to write, but only four Gospels have been approved.2

1 For the date, see Joseph T. Lienhard, introduction to Origen: Homilies on Luke, Fragments on

Luke, FC 94 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), xxiv.

2 Origen, Hom. Luc. 1.1–​2 (Lienhard, FC; PG 13:1801b).

The Gospel as Manuscript. Chris Keith, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199384372.001.0001
234 CONCLUSION

Origen’s usage of Luke intersects with the topics of this book at several places.
Chapters 6 and 7 showed how, in the time between the writing of Luke’s
Gospel and Origen, public reading of the Gospels in assembly eventually
came to be one way that Christians like Origen placed their convictions about
the fourfold collection on display. Eventual restriction of public reading in
assembly was one way that “the Gospels we have were chosen from among
these gospels and passed on.” As another example, Origen also engages in
the literary visualization of written tradition to make his point, drawing at-
tention four separate times just in the space of the excerpted quotation to the
attempts to “compose” or “write” Gospels. Origen is specifically concerned
with written tradition and its inherent authority (or not), not simply oral
tradition.
Origen also exhibits the continuance of competitive textualization in the
reception history of the Jesus tradition. As ­chapter 4 showed, several modern
scholars have argued that we should not read a critical tone into ἐπεχείρησαν
(“tried” or “attempted”) at Luke 1:1. Origen reads the Greek differently, and
in line with what I argued in that chapter, which is that Luke was asserting his
superiority to his predecessors. Applying the Lukan prologue’s first-​century
reference to Luke’s competitors in the Jesus book market to third-​century,
apparently Spirit-​less, competitors in the Jesus book market, Origen outright
claims that those writing Gospels other than the four in the New Testament
are heretics. Ironically, Luke’s critical words in the first century almost cer-
tainly applied to at least one of the Gospels that Luke’s Gospel was joined
with, later in the second century, in the fourfold collection that Origen
defends by appropriating those words in his homily. Thus, by the third cen-
tury, at least for Origen, the Gospels that were to become canonical were
replaced by Gospels that failed to become canonical as the referents of those
who “tried” in Luke 1:1–​4. The competitive textualization of the Jesus tradi-
tion was appropriated, sometimes creatively, and therefore continued, in the
later Christian contexts.
Several other later reception contexts for the Jesus tradition equally
display the significant role of its artifactual status. Examples are the her-
esiological charge of mutilating texts,3 the accounts of the burning of

3 Inter alia, and on Marcion in particular, see Knust and Wasserman, To Cast, 105–​ 15. As
Judith Lieu, Marcion and the Making of a Heretic: God and Scripture in the Second Century
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 183, notes, the charge that Marcion had physically
corrupted the Gospel of Luke and Pauline epistles became “one of the consistent characteristics of the
picture of Marcion.”
 The Gospel as Manuscript 235

Christian books in the Diocletianic persecution4 or their role in mar-

tyrdom accounts like the earlier Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs,5 and
magical and apotropaic usages of the Gospels.6 Each of these topics is
deserving of a monograph in its own right. Collectively, however, they
bring the current study back to its beginning, and specifically to the
Markan textualization of the Jesus tradition in the first place. They in-
dicate the significance of what Mark and others achieved, irrespective
of whether they intended to achieve it. For each one of these receptions
of the Jesus tradition in later Christianity shows that it was not only
the stories of Jesus that mattered but their occurrence in manuscript
form: Marcion’s opponents did not charge him simply with altering
narrative details but with physically altering manuscripts; Rome did
not prohibit the oral transmission of the Christian tradition, but they
burned Christian books; John Chrysostom’s congregants did not place
an oral performance at their doorsteps to ward off spirits, but they placed
Gospel books.7 All these book practices and many more, whether real or
encountered as only literary visualizations by their earliest audiences,
reveal an eventual and thorough intertwining of the book and Christian
identity itself. The Gospel book, and what one did with it, became a
physical space on which Christian standing with the rest of the world
was negotiated. The line between Mark’s introduction of the written me-
dium to the transmission of the Jesus tradition and these receptions of
that tradition centuries later is a winding one. There is nevertheless a
continuous thread running through these various extended situations—​
the Gospel as manuscript. The transmission of the Jesus tradition was
not confined to the written medium, but without the Gospel as manu-
script, we would not have the reception history of the Jesus tradition that
we have.

4 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 8.2.1–​ 2. For discussion, see Gamble, Books, 145–​50; Dirk Rohmann,
Christianity, Book-​Burning, and Censorship in Late Antiquity: Studies in Text Transmission (Waco,
TX: Baylor University Press, 2016), 24–​61.
5 Gamble, Books, 150–​52; Candida Moss, Ancient Christian Martyrdom, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 2012), 125–​26. On books in North African martyrdom accounts, see also Jeremiah
Coogan, “Divine Truth, Presence, and Power: Christian Books in Roman North Africa,” JLA 11.2
(2018): 375–​95, cf. 377: “To preserve the physical book of scripture was to preserve its content, and
thus to defend Christian confession itself.”
6 I took initial steps in this direction in Keith, “Scriptures,” 321–​39.
7 John Chrysostom, Hom. Jo. 32.
 Bibliography

Primary Sources
The Ante-​Nicene Fathers. Edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson. 10 vols.
1885–​87. Repr., Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994.
The Apostolic Fathers. Edited and translated by Bart Ehrman. 2 vols. Loeb Classical Library
24–​25. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003.
Augustine. Confessions. Translated by Henry Chadwick. Oxford World’s Classics.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Aulus Gellius. Attic Nights. Translated by John C. Rolfe. 3 vols. Loeb Classical Library.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1927–​46.
Bauer, Walter, et al. A Greek-​English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early
Christian Literature. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.
Bernhard, Andrew. Other Early Christian Gospels: A Critical Edition of the Surviving Greek
Manuscripts. London: T&T Clark, 2007.
Bobichon, Philippe. Justin Martyr: Dialogue avec Tryphon; Édition critique, traduction,
commentaire. 2 vols. Paradosis 47.1–​2. Fribourg: Academic Press Fribourg, 2003.
Burke, Tony, and Brent Landau, eds. New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical
Scriptures, vol. 1. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016.
Charlesworth, James H., et al., eds. The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek
Texts with English Translations. Vol. 1, Rule of the Community and Related Documents.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1994.
Cicero. Letters to Atticus. Translated by E. O. Winstedt. 3 vols. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1912–​18.
Clement of Alexandria. Stromateis: Books 1–​3. Translated by John Ferguson. Fathers of
the Church 85. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1991.
Diodorus Siculus. Library of History. Translated by C. H. Oldfather. 10 vols. Loeb Classical
Library. London: William Heinemann, 1933.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus. The Critical Essays. Translated by Stephen Usher. 2 vols. Loeb
Classical Library. London: William Heinemann, 1974.
Dionysius Thrax. Grammar. Translated by Thomas Davidson. St. Louis: R. P. Studley, 1874.
Eusebius. The Ecclesiastical History. Translated by Kirsopp Lake, J. E. L. Oulton, and H. J.
Lawlor. 2 vols. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973.
Eusebius. The History of the Church from Christ to Constantine. Translated by G. A.
Williamson. Revised and edited by Andrew Louth. London: Penguin, 1965.
García Martínez, Florentino, and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, eds. The Dead Sea Scrolls: Study
Edition. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill, 1997–​1998.
Holmes, Michael W., ed. The Greek New Testament: SBL Edition. Atlanta: Society of
Biblical Literature, 2010.
James, Montague Rhodes, ed. The Testament of Abraham. Texts and Studies 2.2.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1892.
238 Bibliography

Josephus. Translated by H. St. J. Thackeray et al. 10 vols. Loeb Classical Library.

Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1926–​65.
Josephus. Against Apion. Translated by John M. G. Barclay. Leiden: Brill, 2013.
Justin, Philosopher and Martyr: Apologies. Edited and translated by Dennis Minns and
Paul Parvis. Oxford Early Christian Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Kennedy, George A., trans. Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition
and Rhetoric. Edited by D. A. Russell. Writings from the Greco-​Roman World 10.
Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003.
Liddell, Henry George, Robert Scott, and Henry Stuart Jones. A Greek-​English Lexicon.
9th ed. Oxford: Clarendon, 1996.
Lietzmann, Hans, ed. Das Muratorische Fragment und die monarchianischen Prologe zu
den Evangelien. Kleine Texte für theologische Vorlesungen und Übungen. Bonn: A.
Marcus & E. Weber, 1902.
Lipsius, Richard Adelbert, ed. Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha, vol. 1. Hildesheim: Georg
Olms, 1959.
Lucian. Translated by A. M. Harmon. 8 vols. Loeb Classical Library. London: William
Heinemann, 1921.
The Mishnah. Translated by Herbert Danby. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1933.
The Nicene and Post-​Nicene Fathers. Edited by Philip Schaff. 14 vols. 1886–​89. Repr.,
Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994.
Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Edited by James H. Charlesworth. 2 vols.
New York: Doubleday, 1983–​1985.
Origen. Contra Celsum. Translated and edited by Henry Chadwick. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1965.
Origen. Contra Celsum libri VIII. Edited by M. Marcovich. Supplements to Vigiliae
Christianae 54. Leiden: Brill, 2001.
Origen. Homilies on Luke, Fragments on Luke. Translated by Joseph T. Lienhard. Fathers
of the Church 94. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 1996.
Patrologia graeca. Edited by J.-​P. Migne. 162 vols. Paris, 1857–​86.
Patrologia latina. Edited by J.-​P. Migne. 217 vols. Paris, 1844–​64.
Philo. Translated by F. H. Colson and G. H. Whitaker. 11 vols. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1929–​62.
Plato: Euthrypho, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Phaedrus. Translated by Harold N. Fowler. Loeb
Classical Library. London: William Heinemann, 1919.
Plautus. 2 vols. Edited and Translated by Wolfgang de Melo. Loeb Classical Library.
London: Harvard University Press, 2011.
Pliny the Elder. Natural History IV. Translated by H. Rackham. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1960.
Pliny the Younger. Letters and Panegyricus. Translated by Betty Radice. 2 vols. Loeb
Classical Library 55, 59. London: Harvard University Press, 1969.
Plutarch. Lives VI. Translated by Bernadotte Perrin. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1918.
Plutarch. Moralia VI. Translated by W. C. Hembold. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1962.
Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria: Books I–​III. Translated by H. E. Butler. Loeb Classical
Library. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1920.
Refutation of All Heresies. Translated by M. David Litwa. Writings from the Greco-​Roman
World 40. Atlanta: SBL, 2016.
 Bibliography 239

Sancti Irenæi: Libros quinque adversus haereses. Edited by W. Wigan Harvey. 2 vols.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1857.
St. Irenaeus of Lyons: Against the Heresies. Translated by Dominic J. Unger. Revised by
John J. Dillon and Ireaeus M. C. Steenerg. Ancient Christian Writers 55, 65, 64.
New York: Newman, 1992–​2012.
St. Justin Martyr. Dialogue with Trypho. Translated by Thomas B. Falls. Revised by
Thomas P. Halton. Edited by Michael Slusser. Fathers of the Church 3. Washington,
DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2003.
Stone, Michael E. The Testament of Abraham: The Greek Recensions. Texts and Translations
2. Missoula: Society of Biblical Literature, 1972.
Tertullian. Adversus Marcionem. Translated by Ernest Evans. Oxford Early Christian
Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972.
Tertullian. Apology and De Spectaculis. Translated by T. R. Glover. Loeb Classical Library.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966.
Tertullian. Opera. 2 vols. Corpus Christianorum: Series latina 1, 2. Turnhout: Brepols: 1954.
Tertullian. Traité de la prescription contre les hérétiques. Edited by R. F. Refoulé. Translated
by P. de Labriolle. Sources chrétiennes 46. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1957.
The Tosefta. Translated by Jacob Neusner. 2 vols. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002.
Tregelles, Samuel Prideaux, ed. Canon Muratorianus: The Earliest Catalogue of the Books
of the New Testament. Oxford: Clarendon, 1867.
Vermes, Geza. The Dead Sea Scrolls in English. Revised 4th ed. London: Penguin, 1995.
Wise, Michael, Martin Abegg Jr., and Edward Cook. The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New
Translation. New York: HarperCollins, 1996.

Secondary Sources
Achtemeier, Paul J. “Omne verbum sonat: The New Testament and the Oral Environment
of Late Western Antiquity.” Journal of Biblical Literature 109.1 (1990): 3–​27.
Adams, Edward. The Earliest Christian Meeting Places: Almost Exclusively Houses? Library
of New Testament Studies 450. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013.
Adams, Sean A. “The Tradition of Peter’s Literacy.” Pages 130–​45 in Peter in Early
Christianity. Edited by Helen K. Bond and Larry W. Hurtado. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
2015.
Albl, Martin C. ‘And Scripture Cannot Be Broken’: The Form and Function of the Early Christian
Testimonia Collections. Novum Testamentum Supplements 96. Leiden: Brill, 1999.
Alexander, Loveday. “Ancient Book Production and the Circulation of the Gospels.” Pages
71–​111 in The Gospels for All Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences. Edited by
Richard Bauckham. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998.
Alexander, Loveday. “The Living Voice: Scepticism toward the Written Word in
Early Christian and in Graeco-​Roman Texts.” Pages 221–​47 in The Bible in Three
Dimensions: Essays in Celebration of Forty Years of Biblical Studies in the University of
Sheffield. Edited by David J. A. Clines, Stephen E. Fowl, and Stanley E. Porter. Journal
for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 87. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic
Press, 1990.
Alexander, Loveday. The Preface to Luke’s Gospel: Literary Convention and Social Context
in Luke 1.1–​4 and Acts 1.1. Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series 78.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.
240 Bibliography

Alikin, Valeriy A. The Earliest History of the Christian Gathering: Origin, Development
and Content of the Christian Gathering in the First to Third Centuries. Supplements to
Vigiliae Christianae 102. Leiden: Brill, 2010.
Allert, Craig D. Revelation, Truth, Canon and Interpretation: Studies in Justin Martyr’s
Dialogue with Trypho. Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 64. Leiden: Brill, 2002.
Allison, Dale C., Jr. The New Moses: A Matthean Typology. Edinburgh: T&T
Clark, 1993.
Allison, Dale C., Jr. Studies in Matthew: Interpretation Past and Present. Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005.
Allison, Dale C., Jr. Testament of Abraham. Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature.
Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2003.
Anderson, Paul N. The Fourth Gospel and the Quest for Jesus: Modern Foundations
Reconsidered. 2nd ed. London: T&T Clark, 2007.
Anderson, Paul N. “Mark, John, and Answerability: Interfluentiality and Dialectic be-
tween the Second and Fourth Gospels.” Liber Annuus Studii Biblici Franciscani 63
(2013): 197–​245.
Arnal, William E. Jesus and the Village Scribes: Galilean Conflicts and the Setting of Q.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001.
Askeland, Christian. “Caveat Copticam: Cautionary Tales for the Johannine Exegete.”
Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. Boston,
November 19, 2017.
Assmann, Aleida. Cultural Memory and Western Civilization: Functions, Media, Archives.
Translated by David Henry Wilson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
Assmann, Aleida. “Was sind kulturelle Texte?” Pages 232–​ 44 in Literaturkanon—
Medienereignis—​ Kultureller Text: Formen interkultureller Kommunikation und
Übersetzung. Edited by Andreas Poltermann. Berlin: Erich Schmidt, 1995.
Assmann, Jan. Cultural Memory and Early Civilization: Writing, Remembrance, and
Political Imagination. Translated by David Henry Wilson. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2011.
Assmann, Jan. “Form as a Mnemonic Device: Cultural Texts and Cultural Memory.” Pages
67–​82 in Performing the Gospel: Orality, Memory, and Mark. Edited by Richard A.
Horsley, Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006.
Assmann, Jan. Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in
frühen Hochkulturen. 7th ed. Munich: C. H. Beck, 2013.
Assmann, Jan. The Price of Monotheism. Translated by Robert Savage. Stanford,
CA: Stanford University Press, 2010.
Assmann, Jan. Religion and Cultural Memory. Translated by Rodney Livingstone. Cultural
Memory in the Present. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2006.
Assmann, Jan. Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis. 5th ed. Munich: C. H. Beck, 2018.
Aviam, Mordechai. “The Decorated Stone from the Synagogue at Migdal: A Holistic
Interpretation and a Glimpse into the Life of Galilean Jews at the Time of Jesus.” Novum
Testamentum 55 (2013): 205–​20.
Aviam, Mordechai. “The Synagogue.” Pages 127–​33 in Magdala of Galilee: A Jewish City
in the Hellenistic and Roman Period. Edited by Richard Bauckham. Waco, TX: Baylor
University Press, 2018.
Aviam, Mordechai. “Zwischen Meer und See—​Geschichte und Kultur Galiläas von
Simon Makkabäus bis zu Flavius Josephus.” Pages 13–​38 in Bauern, Fischer und
 Bibliography 241

Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu. Edited by Jürgen K. Zangenberg and Jens Schröter.
Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012.
Aviam, Mordechai, and Richard Bauckham. “The Synagogue Stone.” Pages 135–​59
in Magdala of Galilee: A Jewish City in the Hellenistic and Roman Period. Edited by
Richard Bauckham. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018.
Baarda, Tjitze. The Gospel Quotations of Aphrahat the Persian Sage. 2 vols.
Amsterdam: Krips, 1975.
Bacon, B. W. “The ‘Five Books’ of Matthew against the Jews.” Expositor 15 (1918): 56–​66.
Bagnall, Roger S. Early Christian Books in Egypt. Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 2009.
Bagnall, Roger S. Everyday Writing in the Græco-​Roman East. Sather Classical Lectures
69. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011.
Bagnall, Roger S. “Jesus Reads a Book.” Journal of Theological Studies 51.2 (2000): 577–​88.
Bagnall, Roger S., ed. The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2009.
Balogh, Josef. “Voces Paginarum: Beiträge zur Geschichte des lauten Lesens und
Schreibens.” Philologus 82 (1927): 84–​109, 202–​40.
Barker, James W. John’s Use of Matthew. Emerging Scholars. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015.
Barnes, Timothy D. Constantine and Eusebius. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1981.
Barrett, C. K. The Gospel According to St John. 2nd ed. London: SPCK, 1978.
Batovici, Dan. “The Shepherd of Hermas in Recent Scholarship on the Canon: A Review
Article.” Annali di storia dell’esegesi 34.1 (2017): 89–​105.
Bauckham, Richard, ed. The Gospels for All Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences.
Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998.
Bauckham, Richard. Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony. 2nd
ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017.
Bauckham, Richard. “John for Readers of Mark.” Pages 147–​71 in The Gospels for
All Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences. Edited by Richard Bauckham.
Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998.
Bauckham, Richard. Magdala of Galilee: A Jewish City in the Hellenistic and Roman Period.
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018.
Bauckham, Richard. The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple: Narrative, History, and
Theology in the Fourth Gospel. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007.
Bauer, D. Walter. Das Johannesevangelium. 3rd ed. Handbuch zum Neuen Testament
6. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1933.
Baum, Armin. “The Original Epilogue (John 20:30–​31), the Secondary Appendix (21:1–​
23), and the Editorial Epilogues (21:24–​25) of John’s Gospel.” Pages 227–​70 in Earliest
Christian History. Edited by Michael F. Bird and Jason Maston. Wissenschaftliche
Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2.320. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.
Baynes, Leslie. The Heavenly Book Motif in Judeo-​Christian Apocalypses 200 bce–​200 ce.
Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement Series 152. Leiden: Brill, 2011.
Beard, Mary. “Writing and Religion: Ancient Literacy and the Function of the Written
Word in Roman Religion.” Pages 35–​58 in Literacy in the Roman World by Mary Beard
et al. Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplementary Series 3. Ann Arbor: Journal of
Roman Archaeology, 1991.
Beavis, Mary Ann. Mark. Paideia. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011.
242 Bibliography

Becker, Eve-​Marie. The Birth of Christian History: Memory and Time from Mark to Luke-​
Acts. Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017.
Becker, Eve-​Marie, Helen K. Bond, and Catrin Williams. John’s Transformation of Mark.
London: T&T Clark, forthcoming.
Becker, Jürgen. Mündliche und schriftliche Autorität im frühen Christentum.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.
Bernier, Jonathan. Aposynagōgos and the Historical Jesus in John: Rethinking the
Historicity of the Johannine Expulsion Passages. Biblical Interpretation Series 122.
Leiden: Brill, 2013.
Binder, Donald D. Into the Temple Courts: The Place of the Synagogues in the Second Temple
Period. Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series 169. Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature, 1999.
Binder, Donald D. “The Mystery of the Magdala Stone.” Pages 17–​48 in A City Set on a
Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange. Edited by Daniel A. Warner and Donald D.
Binder. Mountain Home, AR: BorderStone, 2014.
Bird, Michael. The Gospel of the Lord: How the Early Church Wrote the Story of Jesus. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014.
Black, C. Clifton. Mark: Images of an Apostolic Interpreter. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994.
Blass, Friedrich, Albert Debrunner, and Robert W. Funk. A Greek Grammar of the New
Testament and Other Christian Literature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961.
Blomberg, Craig L. Matthew. New American Commentary 22. Nashville: Broadman, 1992.
Bockmuehl, Markus, and Donald A. Hagner, eds. The Written Gospel.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Boismard, Marie-​Émile. “Le chapitre XXI de Saint Jean: Essai de critique littéraire.” Revue
biblique 54 (1947): 473–​501.
Bokedal, Tomas. The Formation and Significance of the Christian Biblical Canon: A Study
in Text, Ritual and Interpretation. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014.
Bond, Helen K. “Was Peter behind Mark’s Gospel?” Pages 46–​ 61 in Peter in
Early Christianity. Edited by Helen K. Bond and Larry W. Hurtado. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015.
Bond, Helen K., and Larry W. Hurtado, eds. Peter in Early Christianity. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015.
Botha, Pieter J. J. Orality and Literacy in Early Christianity. Biblical Performance Criticism
5. Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2012.
Bovon, François. Luke 1: A Commentary on Luke 1:1–​9:50. Translated by Christine M.
Thomas. Edited by Helmut Koester. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002.
Boyarin, Daniel. Border Lines: The Partition of Judeo-​Christianity. Divinations: Rereading
Late Antique Religion. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004.
Boyarin, Daniel. Dying for God: Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism.
Figurae. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999.
Boyarin, Daniel. Judaism: The Genealogy of a Modern Notion. Key Words in Jewish Studies
9. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2019.
Brakke, David. “Scriptural Practices in Early Christianity: Towards a New History of the
New Testament Canon.” Pages 263–​80 in Invention, Rewriting, Usurpation: Discursive
Fights over Religious Traditions in Antiquity. Edited by Jörg Ulrich, Anders-​Christian
Jacobsen, and David Brakke. Early Christianity in the Context of Antiquity 11.
Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2012.
Brant, Jo-​Ann. John. Paideia. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011.
 Bibliography 243

Breed, Brennan W. Nomadic Texts: A Theory of Biblical Reception History. Indiana Studies
in Biblical Literature. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2014.
Bremmer, Jan N. “Aspects of the Acts of Peter: Women, Magic, Place and Date.” Pages 1–​20
in The Apocryphal Acts of Peter. Edited by Jan N. Bremmer. Studies on the Apocryphal
Acts of the Apostles 3. Leuven: Peeters, 1998.
Breytenbach, Cilliers. “Vormarkanische Logientradition: Parallelen in der urchristlichen
Briefliteratur.” Pages 2:725–​49 in The Four Gospels 1992: Festschrift Frans Neirynck.
Edited by Frans Van Segbroeck et al. 3 vols. Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum
Lovaniensium 100. Leuven: Peeters, 1992.
Brooke, George J. “Reading, Searching and Blessing: A Functional Approach to Scriptural
Interpretation in the ‫יחד‬.” Pages 140–​56 in The Temple in Text and Tradition: A
Festschrift in Honour of Robert Hayward. Edited by R. Timothy McLay. Library of
Second Temple Studies 83. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015.
Brown, Raymond E. The Community of the Beloved Disciple: The Life, Loves, and Hates of
an Individual Church in New Testament Times. New York: Paulist, 1979.
Brown, Raymond E. The Gospel According to John I–​XII. 2nd ed. Anchor Bible 29.
New York: Doubleday, 1966.
Brown, Raymond E. The Gospel According to John XIII–​ XXI. Anchor Bible 29a.
New York: Doubleday, 1970.
Bryan, Christopher. A Preface to Mark: Notes on the Gospel in Its Literary and Cultural
Settings. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Bülow-​Jacobsen, Adam. “Writing Materials in the Ancient World.” Pages 3–​29 in The
Oxford Handbook of Papyrology. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2009.
Bultmann, Rudolf. The Gospel of John. Edited by R. W. N. Hoare and J. K. Riches.
Translated by G. R. Beasley-​Murray. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1971.
Bultmann, Rudolf. The History of the Synoptic Tradition. Translated by John Marsh. Rev.
ed. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1963.
Cadbury, Henry J. “Commentary on the Preface of Luke.” Pages 489–​510 in The Beginnings
of Christianity: Part I: The Acts of the Apostles, vol. 2. Edited by F. J. Foakes Jackson and
Kirsopp Lake. London: Macmillan, 1922.
Carr, David M. Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Casey, Maurice. Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian’s Account of His Life and
Teaching. London: T&T Clark, 2010.
Catto, Stephen K. Reconstructing the First-​Century Synagogue: A Critical Analysis of
Current Research. Library of New Testament Studies 363. London: T&T Clark, 2007
Charlesworth, Scott D. “Public and Private—​ Second-​and Third-​ Century Gospel
Manuscripts.” Pages 148–​75 in Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon.
Edited by Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel Zacharias. Studies in Scripture in Early
Judaism and Christianity 13 /​Library of Second Temple Studies 70. London: T&T
Clark, 2009.
Cirafesi, Wally V., and Gregory Peter Fewster. “Justin’s ἀπομνημονεύματα and Ancient
Greco-​Roman Memoirs.” Early Christianity 2.7 (2016): 186–​212.
Claußen, Carsten. “The Role of John 21: Discipleship in Retrospect and Redefinition.”
Pages 55–​68 in New Currents through John: A Global Perspective. Edited by Francisco
Lozada Jr. and Tom Thatcher. Resources for Biblical Study 54. Atlanta: Society of
Biblical Literature, 2003.
244 Bibliography

Claußen, Carsten. Versammlung, Gemeinde, Synagoge: Das hellenistisch-​jüdische Umfeld

der frühchristlichen Gemeinden. Studien zur Umwelt des Neuen Testaments 27.
Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002.
Collins, Adela Yarbro. Mark. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Collins, John J., and Daniel C. Harlow, eds. The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010.
Concordance to the Novum Testamentum Graece. Edited by Institute for Textual Research.
3rd ed. New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1987.
Coogan, Jeremiah. “Divine Truth, Presence, and Power: Christian Books in Roman North
Africa.” Journal of Late Antiquity 11.2 (2018): 375–​95.
Corbett, Joey. “New Synagogue Excavations in Israel and Beyond.” Biblical Archaeology
Review 37.4 (2011): 52–​59.
Craffert, Pieter F., and Pieter J. J. Botha. “Why Jesus Could Walk on the Sea but He Could
Not Read or Write.” Neotestamentica 39.1 (2005): 5–​35.
Crossley, James G. The Date of Mark’s Gospel: Insight from the Law in Earliest Christianity.
Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series 266. London: T&T
Clark, 2004.
Crossley, James G. Why Christianity Happened: A Sociohistorical Account of Christian
Origins (26–​50 ce). Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006.
Culpepper, R. Alan. Anatomy of the Fourth Gospel: A Study in Literary Design. Foundations
and Facets. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983.
Davies, W. D., and Dale C. Allison Jr. The Gospel According to Saint Matthew. 2004 edition.
3 vols. International Critical Commentary. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 1988–​97.
Derrida, Jacques. The Ear of the Other: Otobiography, Transference, Translation.
Edited by Christie V. McDonald and Clause Lévesque. Translated by Peggy Kamuf.
New York: Schocken, 1985.
Derrida, Jacques. Of Grammatology. Translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Rev. ed.
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997
Dewey, Joanna. “The Gospel of Mark as Oral Hermeneutic.” Pages 71–​87 in Jesus, the
Voice, and the Text: Beyond The Oral and the Written Gospel. Edited by Tom Thatcher.
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Dewey, Joanna, ed. Orality and Textuality in Early Christian Literature. Semeia 65.
Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1995.
Dewey, Joanna. “Textuality in an Oral Culture: A Survey of the Pauline Traditions.” Pages
37–​65 in Orality and Textuality in Early Christian Literature. Edited by Joanna Dewey.
Semeia 65. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1995.
Dibelius, Martin. From Tradition to Gospel. Translated by Bertram Lee Woolf. Scribner
Library 124. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1934.
Dignas, Beate, and R. R. R. Smith, eds. Historical and Religious Memory in the Ancient
World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Doole, J. Andrew. What Was Mark for Matthew? Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum
Neuen Testament 2.344. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013.
Drobner, Hubertus R. The Fathers of the Church: A Comprehensive Introduction. Translated
by Siegfried S. Schatzmann. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007.
Dunn, James D. G. “Altering the Default Setting: Re-​envisaging the Early Transmission
of the Jesus Tradition.” Pages 41–​ 79 in his The Oral Gospel Tradition. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013.
 Bibliography 245

Dunn, James D. G. Jesus Remembered. Christianity in the Making 1. Grand

Rapids: Eerdmans: 2003.
Dunn, James D. G. The Oral Gospel Tradition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013.
Dunn, James D. G. “Q1 as Oral Tradition.” Pages 80–​108 in his The Oral Gospel Tradition.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013.
Dupont, Florence. “The Corrupted Boy and the Crowned Poet: or, The Material Reality
and the Symbolic Status of the Literary Book at Rome.” Pages 143–​63 in Ancient
Literacies: The Culture of Reading in Greece and Rome. Edited by William A. Johnson
and Holt N. Parker. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Edwards, James R. The Gospel According to Mark. Pillar New Testament Commentary.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002.
Edwards, James R. The Hebrew Gospel and the Development of the Synoptic Tradition.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009.
Ehlich, Konrad. “Text und sprachliches Handeln: Die Entstehung von Texten aus dem
Bedürfnis nach Überlieferung.” Pages 24–​43 in Schrift und Gedächtnis: Archäologie der
literarischen Kommunikation. Edited by Aleida Assmann, Jan Assmann, and Christoph
Hardmeier. Munich: Wilhelm Fink, 1983.
Ehrman, Bart D. The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effect of Early Christological
Controversies on the Text of the New Testament. Rev. ed. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2011.
Edwards, James R. “The Text as Window: New Testament Manuscripts and the Social
History of Early Christianity.” Pages 803–​30 in The Text of the New Testament in
Contemporary Research: Essays on the Status Quaestionis. Edited by Bart D. Ehrman
and Michael W. Holmes. 2nd ed. New Testament Tools, Studies, and Documents 42.
Leiden: Brill, 2013.
Ehrman, Bart D., and Michael W. Holmes, eds. The Text of the New Testament in
Contemporary Research: Essays on the Status Quaestionis. 2nd ed. New Testament
Tools, Studies, and Documents 42. Leiden: Brill, 2013.
Epp, Eldon Jay. The Theological Tendency of Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis in Acts. Society
for New Testament Studies Monograph Series 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1966.
Eshleman, Kendra. The Social World of Intellectuals in the Roman Empire: Sophists,
Philosophers, and Christians. Greek Culture in the Roman World.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
Esler, Philip F. “Collective Memory and Hebrews 11: Outlining a New Investigative
Framework.” Pages 151–​71 in Uses of the Past in Early Christianity. Edited by Alan Kirk
and Tom Thatcher. Semeia Studies 52. Atlanta: Scholars, 2005.
Evans, Craig A. “Graffiti.” Pages 160–​61 in The Dictionary of the Bible and Ancient
Media. Edited by Tom Thatcher, Chris Keith, Raymond F. Person, and Elsie R. Stern.
London: T&T Clark, 2017.
Eve, Eric. Behind the Gospels: Understanding the Oral Tradition. London: SPCK, 2013.
Eve, Eric. “Werner Kelber.” Page 202 in The Dictionary of the Bible and Ancient Media.
Edited by Tom Thatcher, Chris Keith, Raymond F. Person, and Elsie R. Stern.
London: T&T Clark, 2017.
Eve, Eric. Writing the Gospels: Composition and Memory. London: SPCK, 2016.
Fialová, Radka. “‘Scripture’ and the ‘Memoirs of the Apostles’: Justin Martyr and His
Bible.” Pages 165–​78 in The Process of Authority: The Dynamics in Transmission and
246 Bibliography

Reception of Canonical Texts. Edited by Jan Dušek and Jan Roskovec. Deuterocanonical
and Cognate Literature Studies 27. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016.
Fine, Steven. The Menorah: From the Bible to Modern Israel. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2016.
Fine, Steven, Peter J. Schertz, and Donald H. Sanders. “True Colors: Digital Reconstruction
Restores Original Brilliance to the Arch of Titus.” Biblical Archaeology Review 43.3
(May/​June 2017): 28–​35, 60–​61.
Fortna, Robert T. The Fourth Gospel and Its Predecessor: From Narrative Source to Present
Gospel. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988.
Fortna, Robert T. The Gospel of Signs: A Reconstruction of the Narrative Source Underlying
the Fourth Gospel. Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series 11.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970.
Foster, Paul. “The Gospel of Peter.” Pages 30–​42 in The Non-​Canonical Gospels. Edited by
Paul Foster. London: T&T Clark, 2008.
Fowler, Robert M. Let the Reader Understand: Reader-​Response Criticism and the Gospel of
Mark. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2001.
France, R. T. The Gospel of Mark. The New International Greek Testament Commentary.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002.
Frey, Jörg. The Glory of the Crucified One: Christology and Theology in the Gospel of John.
Translated by Wayne Coppins and Christoph Heilig. Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck Studies in
Early Christianity. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018.
Gadamer, Hans-​Georg. Truth and Method. Revised translation by Joel Weinsheimer and
Donald G. Marshall. Bloomsbury Revelations. London: Bloomsbury, 1989.
Galinsky, Karl, ed. Memory in Ancient Rome and Early Christianity. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2016.
Galinsky, Karl, and Kenneth Lapatin, eds. Cultural Memories in the Roman Empire. Los
Angeles: Paul J. Getty Museum, 2015.
Gallagher, Edmon L., and John D. Meade. The Biblical Canon Lists from Early
Christianity: Texts and Analysis. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Gamble, Harry Y. “Bible and Book.” Pages 15–​35 in In the Beginning: Bibles before the Year
1000. Edited by Michelle P. Brown. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 2006.
Gamble, Harry Y. Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early Christian
Texts. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995.
Gamble, Harry Y. “The Book Trade in the Roman Empire.” Pages 23–​36 in The Early Text of
the New Testament. Edited by Charles E. Hill and Michael J. Kruger. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2012.
Gardner-​Smith, P. Saint John and the Synoptic Gospels. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1938.
Gathercole, Simon. The Composition of the Gospel of Thomas: Original Language and
Influences. Society for the Study of the New Testament Monograph Series 151.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
Gathercole, Simon. “The Titles of the Gospels in the Earliest New Testament Manuscripts.”
Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 104 (2013): 33–​76.
Gavrilov, A. K. “Techniques of Reading in Classical Antiquity.” Classical Quarterly 47.1
(1997): 56–​73.
Gilliard, Frank D. “More Silent Reading in Antiquity: Non omne verbum sonabat.” Journal
of Biblical Literature 112.4 (1993): 689–​96.
Goodacre, Mark. The Case against Q. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2002.
 Bibliography 247

Goodacre, Mark. Thomas and the Gospels: The Case for Thomas’s Familiarity with the
Synoptics. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012.
Goodacre, Mark S., and Nicholas Perrin, eds. Questioning Q: A Multidimensional Critique.
Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2005.
Goodman, Martin. “Sacred Scripture and ‘Defiling the Hands.’” Journal of Theological
Studies 41.1 (1990): 99–​107.
Goulder, Michael D. Luke: A New Paradigm. 2 vols. Journal for the Study of the New
Testament Supplement Series 20. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989.
Gregory, Andrew. “Jewish-​Christian Gospels.” Pages 54–​67 in The Non-​Canonical Gospels.
Edited by Paul Foster. London: T&T Clark, 2008.
Gregory, Andrew. “Jewish-​Christian Gospel Traditions and the New Testament.” Pages
41–​59 in Christian Apocrypha: Receptions of the New Testament in Ancient Christian
Apocrypha. Edited by Jean-​Michel Roessli and Tobias Nicklas. Novum Testamentum
Patristicum 26. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014.
Gundry, Robert H. Mark: A Commentary on His Apology for the Cross. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993.
Haines-​Eitzen, Kim. The Gendered Palimpsest: Women, Writing, and Representation in
Early Christianity. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.
Haines-​Eitzen, Kim. Guardians of Letters: Literacy, Power, and the Transmitters of Early
Christian Literature. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Haines-​Eitzen, Kim. “The Social History of Early Christian Scribes.” Pages 479–​95 in The
Text of the New Testament in Contemporary Research: Essays on the Status Quaestionis.
Edited by Bart D. Ehrman and Michael W. Holmes. 2nd ed. New Testament Tools,
Studies, and Documents 42. Leiden: Brill, 2013.
Halbwachs, Maurice. The Collective Memory. Translated by Francis J. Ditter Jr., and Vida
Yazdi Ditter. New York: Harper Colophon, 1980.
Halbwachs, Maurice. The Legendary Topography of the Gospels in the Holy Lands. In his
On Collective Memory. Edited and translated by Lewis A. Coser. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1992.
Halbwachs, Maurice. The Social Frameworks of Memory. In his On Collective Memory.
Edited and translated by Lewis A. Coser. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Harris, William V. Ancient Literacy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989.
Hays, Richard B. Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels. Waco, TX: Baylor University
Press, 2016.
Healy, Mary. The Gospel of Mark. Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture. Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008.
Hearon, Holly. “The Implications of Orality for Studies of the Biblical Text.” Pages 3–​20
in Performing the Gospel: Orality, Memory, and Mark. Edited by Richard A. Horsley,
Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006.
Hearon, Holly. “Mapping Written and Spoken Word in the Gospel of Mark.” Pages
379–​92 in The Interface of Orality and Writing. Edited by Annette Weissenrieder and
Robert B. Coote. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 260.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010.
Heckel, Theo K. Vom Evangelium nach Markus zum viergestaltigen Evanglium.
Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 120. Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck, 1999.
Hendel, Ronald. Remembering Abraham: Culture, Memory, and History in the Hebrew
Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
248 Bibliography

Hengel, Martin. “Entstehungszeit und Situation des Markusevangeliums.” Pages 1–​45 in

Markus—​Philologie: Historische, literargeschichtliche und stilistiche Untersuchungen
zum zweiten Evangelium. Edited by Hubert Cancik. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen
zum Neuen Testament 33. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1984.
Hengel, Martin. The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ. Translated by John
Bowden. London: SCM, 2000.
Hengel, Martin. The Johannine Question. Translated by John Bowden. London: SCM, 1989.
Hengel, Martin. Studies in the Gospel of Mark. Translated by John Bowden.
Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985.
Hezser, Catherine. Jewish Literacy in Roman Palestine. Texte und Studien zum antikem
Judentum 81. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001.
Hill, Charles E. “The Fragments of Papias.” Pages 42–​51 in The Writings of the Apostolic
Fathers. Edited by Paul Foster. London: T&T Clark, 2007.
Hill, Charles E. Who Chose the Gospels? Probing the Great Gospel Conspiracy.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
Hill, Charles E., and Michael J. Kruger. “Introduction: In Search of the Earliest Text of the
New Testament.” Pages 1–​19 in The Early Text of the New Testament. Edited by Charles
E. Hill and Michael J. Kruger. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Hill, Charles E., and Michael J. Kruger, eds. The Early Text of the New Testament.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Holmes, Michael W. “From ‘Original Text’ to ‘Initial Text’: The Traditional Goal of New
Testament Textual Criticism in Contemporary Discussion.” Pages 637–​88 in The
Early Text of the New Testament. Edited by Charles E. Hill and Michael J. Kruger.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Horrell, David G. “The Label Χριστιανός (1 Pet. 4.16): Suffering, Conflict, and the Making
of Christian Identity.” Pages 164–​210 in his Becoming Christian: Essays on 1 Peter
and the Making of Christian Identity. Early Christianity in Context /​Library of New
Testament Studies 394. London: T&T Clark, 2013.
Horsley, Richard A. “The Gospel of Mark in the Interface of Orality and Writing.” Pages
144–​65 in The Interface of Orality and Writing. Edited by Annette Weissenrieder and
Robert B. Coote. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 260.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010.
Horsley, Richard A. “Oral Performance and Mark: Some Implications of The Oral and
the Written Gospel, Twenty-​Five Years Later.” Pages 45–​70 in Jesus, the Voice, and
the Text: Beyond The Oral and the Written Gospel. Edited by Tom Thatcher. Waco,
TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Horsley, Richard A. “Prominent Patterns in the Social Memory of Jesus and Friends.”
Pages 57–​78 in Memory, Tradition, and Text: Uses of the Past in Early Christianity.
Edited by Alan Kirk and Tom Thatcher. Semeia Studies 52. Atlanta: Scholars, 2005.
Horsley, Richard A. “A Prophet Like Moses and Elijah: Popular Memory and Cultural
Patterns in Mark.” Pages 166–​90 in Performing the Gospel: Orality, Memory, and
Mark. Edited by Richard A. Horsley, Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006.
Horsley, Richard A. Scribes, Visionaries, and the Politics of Second Temple Judaism.
Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2007.
Horsley, Richard A., Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley, eds. Performing the
Gospel: Orality, Memory, and Mark. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006.
Hoskyns, Edward Clement, The Fourth Gospel. Edited by Francis Noel Davey. 2nd ed.
London: Faber & Faber, 1947.
 Bibliography 249

Hurtado, Larry W. Destroyer of the gods: Early Christian Distinctiveness in the Roman
World. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016.
Hurtado, Larry W. The Earliest Christian Artifacts: Manuscripts and Christian Origins.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006.
Hurtado, Larry W. “Early Christian Manuscripts as Artifacts.” Pages 66–​81 in Jewish and
Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon. Edited by Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel
Zacharias. Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity 13 /​Library of Second
Temple Studies 70. London: T&T Clark, 2009.
Hurtado, Larry W. Foreword to Communal Reading in the Time of Jesus by Brian J. Wright.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017.
Hurtado, Larry W. “Greco-​ Roman Textuality and the Gospel of Mark: A Critical
Assessment of Werner Kelber’s The Oral and the Written Gospel.” Bulletin for Biblical
Research 7 (1997): 91–​106.
Hurtado, Larry W. “P45 as an Early Christian Artefact: What It Reflects about Early
Christianity.” Pages 200–​219 in Texts and Artefacts: Selected Essays on Textual Criticism
and Early Christian Manuscripts. Library of New Testament Studies 584. London: T&T
Clark, 2018.
Hurtado, Larry W. “Manuscripts and the Sociology of Early Christian Reading.” Pages
99–​114 in Texts and Artefacts: Selected Essays on Textual Criticism and Early Christian
Manuscripts. Library of New Testament Studies 584. London: T&T Clark, 2018.
Hurtado, Larry W. “Oral Fixation and New Testament Studies? ‘Orality’, ‘Performance’
and Reading Texts in Early Christianity.” New Testament Studies 60 (2014): 321–​40.
Hurtado, Larry W. Texts and Artefacts: Selected Essays on Textual Criticism and Early
Christian Manuscripts. Library of New Testament Studies 584. London: T&T Clark, 2018.
Hurtado, Larry W., and Chris Keith. “Writing and Book Production in the Hellenistic
and Roman Periods.” Pages 63–​80 in The New Cambridge History of the Bible: From
the Beginnings to 600. Edited by James Carleton Paget and Joachim Schaper.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Hutchins, Edwin. “Material Anchors for Conceptual Blends.” Journal of Pragmatics 37
(2005): 1555–​77.
Iverson, Kelly. “Oral Performance or Oral Corrective? A Response to Larry W. Hurtado.”
New Testament Studies 62 (2016): 183–​200.
Jacobi, Christine. Jesusüberlieferung bei Paulus? Analogien zwischen den echten
Paulusbriefen und den synoptischen Evangelien. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutes-
tamentliche Wissenschaft 213. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2015.
Jacobsen, Arland D. The First Gospel: An Introduction to Q. Eugene, OR: Wipf &
Stock, 1992.
Jaffee, Martin S. “Oral Tradition in the Writings of Rabbinic Oral Torah: On Theorizing
Rabbinic Orality.” Oral Tradition 14.1 (1999): 3–​32.
Jaffee, Martin S. Torah in the Mouth: Writing and Oral Tradition in Palestinian Judaism,
200 bce–​400 ce. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.
Johnson, William A. “The Ancient Book.” Pages 256–​81 in The Oxford Handbook of
Payprology. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Johnson, William A. “Authorship and Publication in Late Antique Homilies and the
Gospel of Matthew.” Unpublished paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society
of Biblical Literature. Boston, November 20, 2017.
Johnson, William A. “Constructing Elite Communities in the High Empire.” Pages 320–​
29 in Ancient Literacies: The Culture of Reading in Greece and Rome. Edited by William
A. Johnson and Holt N. Parker. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
250 Bibliography

Johnson, William A. Readers and Reading Culture in the High Roman Empire: A Study
of Elite Communities. Classical Culture and Society. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2010.
Johnson, William A. “Reading Cultures and Education.” Pages 9–​23 in Reading between
the Lines: Perspectives on Foreign Language Literacy. Edited by Peter C. Patrikis. Yale
Language Series. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.
Johnson, William A. “Towards a Sociology of Reading in Classical Antiquity.” American
Journal of Philology 121 (2000): 593–​627.
Johnson, William A., and Holt N. Parker, eds. Ancient Literacies: The Culture of Reading in
Greece and Rome. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Kaufman, Ryan. “Does P66 Suggest a Vorlage Lacking John 21?” Unpublished paper.
Keener, Craig S. The Gospel of John: A Commentary. 2 vols. Peabody, MA:
Hendrickson, 2003.
Keith, Chris. “The Competitive Textualization of the Jesus Tradition in John 20:30–​31 and
21:24–​25.” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 78.2 (2016): 321–​37.
Keith, Chris. “Early Christian Book Culture and the Emergence of the First Written
Gospel.” Pages 22–​39 in Mark, Manuscripts, and Monotheism: Essays in Honor of Larry
W. Hurtado. Edited by Chris Keith and Dieter T. Roth. Library of New Testament
Studies 528. London: T&T Clark, 2015.
Keith, Chris. “Die Evangelien als ‘kerygmatische Erzählungen’ über Jesus und die
‘Kriterien’ in der Jesusforschung.” Pages 86–​98 in Jesus Handbuch. Edited by Jens
Schröter and Christine Jacobi. Theologen-​Handbücher. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017.
Keith, Chris. “‘If John Knew Mark’: Critical Inheritance and Johannine Disagreements
with Mark.” In John’s Transformation of Mark. Edited by Eve-​Marie Becker, Helen K.
Bond, and Catrin Williams. London: T&T Clark, forthcoming.
Keith, Chris. Jesus against the Scribal Elite: The Origins of the Conflict. Grand Rapids: Baker
Academic, 2013.
Keith, Chris. Jesus’ Literacy: Scribal Culture and the Teacher from Galilee. Library of
Historical Jesus Studies 8 /​Library of New Testament Studies 413. London: T&T
Clark, 2011.
Keith, Chris. “The Narratives of the Gospels and the Historical Jesus: Current Debates,
Prior Debates, and the Goal of Historical Jesus Research.” Journal for the Study of the
New Testament 38.4 (2016): 426–​55.
Keith, Chris. “The Oddity of the Reference to Jesus in Acts 4:13b.” Journal of Biblical
Literature 134.4 (2015): 791–​811.
Keith, Chris. “A Performance of the Text: The Adulteress’s Entrance into John’s Gospel.”
Pages 49–​69 in The Fourth Gospel and First-​Century Media Culture. Edited by Anthony
Le Donne and Tom Thatcher. European Studies on Christian Origins /​Library of New
Testament Studies 426. London: T&T Clark, 2011.
Keith, Chris. “The Pericope Adulterae: A Theory of Attentive Insertion.” Pages 89–​113 in
The Pericope of the Adulteress in Contemporary Research. Edited by David Alan Black
and Jacob Cerone. Library of New Testament Studies 551. London: Bloomsbury T&T
Clark, 2016.
Keith, Chris. The Pericope Adulterae, the Gospel of John, and the Literacy of Jesus. New
Testament Tools, Studies, and Documents 38. Leiden: Brill, 2009.
Keith, Chris. “Prolegomena on the Textualization of Mark’s Gospel: Manuscript Culture,
the Extended Situation, and the Emergence of the Written Gospel.” Pages 161–​86 in
Memory and Identity in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity: A Conversation with
 Bibliography 251

Barry Schwartz. Edited by Tom Thatcher. Semeia Studies 78. Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature, 2014.
Keith, Chris. “The Public Reading of the Gospels.” Pages 3:445–​69 in The Reception of Jesus
in the First Three Centuries. Edited by Chris Keith, Helen K. Bond, Christine Jacobi, and
Jens Schröter. 3 vols. London: T&T Clark, 2019.
Keith, Chris. “‘The Scriptures are Divine Charms’: Evil, Books, and Textuality in Early
Christianity.” Pages 321–​39 in Evil in Second Temple Judaism and Early Christianity.
Edited by Chris Keith and Loren T. Stuckenbruck. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen
zum Neuen Testament 2.417. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016.
Keith, Chris. “Social Memory Theory and Gospels Research: The First Decade Part One.”
Early Christianity 6.3 (2015): 354–​76.
Keith, Chris. “Social Memory Theory and Gospels Research: The First Decade Part Two.”
Early Christianity 6.4 (2015): 517–​42.
Keith, Chris. “Urbanization and Literacy in Early Christian Rome: Hermas and Justin
Martyr as Examples.” Pages 187–​215 in The Urban World and the First Christians.
Edited by Steve Walton, Paul Trebilco, and David Gill. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017.
Keith, Chris, and Tom Thatcher. “The Scar of the Cross: The Violence Ratio and the
Earliest Memories of Jesus.” Pages 197–​214 in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond The
Oral and the Written Gospel. Edited by Tom Thatcher. Waco, TX: Baylor University
Press, 2008.
Keith, Chris, and Anthony Le Donne, eds. Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of Authenticity.
London: T&T Clark, 2012.
Kelber, Werner H. “Die Fleischwerdung des Wortes in der Körperlichkeit des Textes.”
Pages 31–​42 in Materialität der Kommunikation. Edited by Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht
and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer. Suhrkamp Taschenbuch Wissenschaft 750. Frankfurt am
Main: Suhrkamp, 1988.
Kelber, Werner H. “The History of the Closure of Biblical Texts.” Pages 413–​40 in his
Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner H. Kelber.
Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013.
Kelber, Werner H. Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays
of Werner H. Kelber. Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature, 2013.
Kelber, Werner H. Introduction to The Oral and the Written Gospel: The Hermeneutics of
Speaking and Writing in the Synoptic Tradition, Paul, and Q. Voices in Performance and
Text. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997.
Kelber, Werner H. “Jesus and Tradition: Words in Time, Words in Space.” Pages 103–​
32 in his Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner
H. Kelber. Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013.
Kelber, Werner H. Mark’s Story of Jesus. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979.
Kelber, Werner H. The Oral and the Written Gospel: The Hermeneutics of Speaking and
Writing in the Synoptic Tradition, Paul, and Q. Voices in Performance and Text.
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1983.
Kelber, Werner H. “The Oral-​ Scribal-​
Memorial Arts of Communication in Early
Christianity.” Pages 235–​62 in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond The Oral and the
Written Gospel. Edited by Tom Thatcher. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Kelber, Werner H. “Orality and Biblical Scholarship: Seven Case Studies.” Pages 297–​
331 in his Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner
H. Kelber. Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013.
252 Bibliography

Kelber, Werner H. “The Work of Birger Gerhardsson in Perspective.” Pages 367–​411 in his
Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner H. Kelber.
Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013.
Kelber, Werner H. “The Works of Memory: Christian Origins as Mnemohistory.” Pages
265–​96 in his Imprints, Voiceprints, and Footprints of Memory: Collected Essays of Werner
H. Kelber. Resources for Biblical Study 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013.
Kelber, Werner H., and Tom Thatcher. “‘It’s Not Easy to Take a Fresh Approach’: Reflections
on The Oral and the Written Gospel (An Interview with Werner Kelber).” Pages 27–​43
in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond The Oral and the Written Gospel. Edited by
Tom Thatcher. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Kelhoffer, James A. “‘How Soon a Book’ Revisited: ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ as a Reference to ‘Gospel’
Materials in the First Half of the Second Century.” Pages 55–​69 in his Conceptions of
“Gospel” and Legitimacy in Early Christianity. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum
Neuen Testament 324. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014.
Kenyon, Frederic G. The Chester Beatty Biblical Papyri: Descriptions and Texts of
Twelve Manuscripts on Papyrus of the Greek Bible: Fasciculus 1: General Introduction.
London: Emery Walker, 1933.
Kenyon, Frederic G. The Text of the Greek Bible. London: Duckworth, 1937.
Kirk, Alan. “The Johannine Jesus in the Gospel of Peter: A Social Memory Approach.”
Pages 313–​21 in Jesus in Johannine Tradition. Edited by Robert T. Fortna and Tom
Thatcher. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001.
Kirk, Alan. “Manuscript Tradition as a Tertium Quid: Orality and Memory in Scribal
Practices.” Pages 114–​37 in Memory and the Jesus Tradition. Reception of Jesus in the
First Three Centuries 2. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018.
Kirk, Alan. Memory and the Jesus Tradition. Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries
2. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018.
Kirk, Alan. “The Memory of Violence and the Death of Jesus in Q.” Pages 163–​78 in
Memory and the Jesus Tradition. Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries 2.
London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018.
Kirk, Alan. “Memory Theory and Jesus Research.” Pages 179–​206 in his Memory and the
Jesus Tradition. Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries 2. London: Bloomsbury
T&T Clark, 2018.
Kirk, Alan. Q in Matthew: Ancient Media, Memory, and Early Scribal Transmission of the
Jesus Tradition. Library of New Testament Studies 564. London: Bloomsbury T&T
Clark, 2016.
Kirk, Alan. “Social and Cultural Memory.” Pages 11–​36 in his Memory and the Jesus
Tradition. Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries 2. London: Bloomsbury T&T
Clark, 2018.
Kirk, Alan, and Tom Thatcher. “Jesus Tradition as Social Memory.” Pages 25–​42 in
Memory, Tradition, and Text: Uses of the Past in Early Christianity. Edited by Alan Kirk
and Tom Thatcher. Semeia Studies 52. Atlanta: Scholars, 2005.
Kirk, Alan, and Tom Thatcher, eds. Memory, Tradition, and Text: Uses of the Past in Early
Christianity. Semeia Studies 52. Atlanta: Scholars, 2005.
Kittel, Gerhard, and Gerhard Friedrich, eds. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament.
Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. 10 vols. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans 1964–​1976.
Klauck, Hans-​Josef. The Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles: An Introduction. Translated by
Brian McNeil. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
 Bibliography 253

Klink, Edward, III, ed. The Audience of the Gospels: Further Conversation about the Origin
and Function of the Gospels in Early Christianity. Library of New Testament Series 353.
London: T&T Clark, 2010.
Kloppenborg Verbin, John S. Excavating Q: The History and Setting of the Sayings Gospel.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000.
Kloppenborg, John S. “The Farrer/​Mark without Q Hypothesis: A Response.” Pages
226–​44 in Marcan Priority without Q. Edited by John C. Poirier and Jeffrey Peterson.
Library of New Testament Studies 455. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015.
Kloppenborg, John S. “Literate Media in Early Christ Groups: The Creation of a Christian
Book Culture.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 22.1 (2014): 21–​59.
Kloppenborg, John S. Q, the Earliest Gospel: An Introduction to the Original Stories and
Sayings of Jesus. Louisville: WJK, 2008.
Knibb, Michael A. “Enoch, Similitudes of (1 Enoch 37–​71).” Pages 585–​87 in The
Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism. Edited by John J. Collins and Daniel C. Harlow.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010.
Knox, Bernard M. W. “Silent Reading in Antiquity.” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies
9 (1968): 421–​35.
Knust, Jennifer. “‘Taking Away From’: Patristic Evidence and the Omission of the
Pericope Adulterae from John’s Gospel.” Pages 65–​88 in The Pericope of the Adulteress in
Contemporary Research. Edited by David Alan Black and Jacob N. Cerone. Library of
New Testament Studies 551. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016.
Knust, Jennifer, and Tommy Wasserman. To Cast the First Stone: The Transmission of a
Gospel Story. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018.
Koester, Helmut. Ancient Christian Gospels: Their History and Development. Harrisburg,
PA: Trinity, 1990.
Koester, Helmut. From Jesus to the Gospels: Interpreting the New Testament in Its Context.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Koester, Helmut. “From the Kerygma-​ Gospel to the Written Gospels.” Pages 54–​
71 in From Jesus to the Gospels: Interpreting the New Testament in Its Context.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Koester, Helmut. “The Text of the Synoptic Gospels in the Second Century.” Pages 39–​
53 in his From Jesus to the Gospels: Interpreting the New Testament in Its Context.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Kok, Michael J. The Gospel on the Margins: The Reception of Mark in the Second Century.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015.
Konradt, Matthias. Israel, the Church, and the Gentiles in the Gospel of Matthew. Translated
by Kathleen Ess. Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck Studies in Early Christianity. Waco, TX: Baylor
University Press, 2014.
Korner, Ralph J. The Origin and Meaning of Ekklēsia in the Early Jesus Movement. Ancient
Judaism and Early Christianity 98. Leiden: Brill, 2017.
Krause, Andrew R. Synagogues in the Works of Flavius Josephus: Rhetoric, Spatiality,
and First-​Century Jewish Institutions. Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 97.
Leiden: Brill, 2017.
Kruger, Michael J. “Early Christian Attitudes toward the Reproduction of Texts.” Pages
63–​80 in The Early Text of the New Testament. Edited by Charles E. Hill and Michael J.
Kruger. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
Lagrange, M.-​J. Évangile selon Saint Jean. Etudes biblique. Paris: J. Gabalda, 1925.
254 Bibliography

Lane, William L. The Gospel according to Mark. New International Commentary on the
New Testament. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974.
Larsen, Matthew D. C. “Accidental Publication, Unfinished Texts and the Traditional
Goals of New Testament Textual Criticism.” Journal for the Study of the New Testament
39.4 (2017): 362–​87.
Larsen, Matthew D. C. Gospels before the Book. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018.
Last, Richard. “Ekklēsia outside the Septuagint and the Dēmos: The Titles of Greco-​
Roman Associations and Christ-​Followers’ Groups.” Journal of Biblical Literature 137.4
(2018): 959–​80.
Levine, Lee I. The Ancient Synagogue: The First Thousand Years. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2000.
Levinson, Bernard M. “You Must Not Add Anything to What I Command You: Paradoxes
of Canon and Authorship in Ancient Israel.” Numen 50.1 (2003): 1–​51.
Lienhard, Joseph T. Introduction to Origen: Homilies on Luke, Fragments on Luke. Fathers
of the Church 94. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996.
Lieu, Judith M. Christian Identity in the Jewish and Graeco-​Roman World. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2004.
Lieu, Judith M. Marcion and the Making of a Heretic: God and Scripture in the Second
Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
Lieu, Judith M. Neither Jew Nor Greek?: Constructing Early Christianity. Cornerstone
Series. London: T&T Clark, 2016.
Lightfoot, J. B. Biblical Essays. London: Macmillan, 1893.
Lin, Yii-​Jan. The Erotic Life of Manuscripts: New Testament Textual Criticism and the
Biological Sciences. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.
Lincoln, Andrew T. The Gospel According to St John. Black’s New Testament Commentaries
4. London: Continuum, 2005.
Lindars, Barnabas. The Gospel of John. New Century Bible. London: Oliphants, 1972.
Longenecker, Bruce W. “Pompeii (writing/​literacy in).” Pages 303–​5 in The Dictionary of
the Bible and Ancient Media. Edited by Tom Thatcher et al. London: T&T Clark, 2017.
Luz, Ulrich. Matthew. Edited by Helmut Koester. Translated by James E. Crouch. Revised
ed. 3 vols. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
MacEwan, Robert K. Matthean Posteriority: An Exploration of Matthew’s Use of Mark
and Luke as a Solution to the Synoptic Problem. Library of New Testament Studies 501.
London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015.
Markschies, Christoph. “The Canon of the New Testament in Antiquity: Some New
Horizons for Future Research.” Pages 175–​94 in Homer, the Bible, and Beyond: Literary
and Religious Canons in the Ancient World. Edited by Margalit Finkelberg and Guy G.
Stroumsa. Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture 2. Leiden: Brill, 2003.
Markschies, Christoph. Christian Theology and Its Institutions in the Early Roman Empire.
Translated by Wayne Coppins. Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck Studies in Early Christianity.
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2015.
Markschies, Christoph. “Liturgisches Lesen und die Hermeneutik der Schrift.” Pages
77–​88 in Patristica et Oecumenica. Edited by Peter Gemeinhardt and Uwe Kühneweg.
Marburger Theologische Studien 85. Marburg: N. G. Elwert, 2004.
Markschies, Christoph, and Jens Schröter, eds. Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher
Übersetzung. 2 vols. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.
Martyn, J. Louis. History and Theology in the Fourth Gospel. 3rd ed. New Testament
Library. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003.
 Bibliography 255

Mason, Steve. A History of the Jewish War A.D. 66–​74. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2016.
McDonald, Lee Martin. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority. 3rd
ed. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007.
McKenzie, D. F. Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1999.
Melo, Wolfgang de. Introduction to Plautus. 2 vols. Loeb Classical Library.
London: Harvard University Press, 2011.
Metzger, Bruce M. The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and
Significance. Oxford: Clarendon, 1987.
Metzger, Bruce M. A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament. 2nd ed.
Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2000.
Metzger, Bruce M., and Bart D. Ehrman. The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission,
Corruption, and Restoration. 4th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Meyer, Elizabeth A. Legitimacy and Law in the Roman World: Tabulae in Roman Belief and
Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Miles, Richard. “Introduction: Constructing Identities in Late Antiquity.” Pages 1–​15 in
Constructing Identities in Late Antiquity. Edited by Richard Miles. Routledge Classical
Monographs. London: Routledge, 1999.
Millard, Alan. Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus. Biblical Seminar 69. Sheffield:
Sheffield Academic Press, 2001.
Milton, John. Areopagitica. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1918.
Moloney, Francis J. The Gospel of John. Sacra Pagina 4. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical
Press, 1998.
Moloney, Francis J. The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary. Grand Rapids: Baker
Academic, 2002.
Moloney, Francis J., ed. An Introduction to the Gospel of John by Raymond E. Brown.
Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.
Moreland, Milton. “Moving Peter to Rome: Social Memory and Ritualized Space after 70
CE.” Pages 344–​66 in Memory in Ancient Rome and Early Christianity. Edited by Karl
Galinsky. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016.
Moss, Candida. Ancient Christian Martyrdom. Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library. New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2012.
Mroczek, Eva. The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2016.
Musurillo, Herbert. Introduction to The Acts of the Christian Martyrs. Oxford Early
Christian Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972.
Najman, Hindy. “How Should We Contextualize Pseudepigrapha?: Imitation and
Emulation in 4 Ezra.” Pages 235–​42 in her Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority,
Renewed Revelation and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. Supplements to the
Journal for the Study of Judaism 53. Leiden: Brill, 2010
Najman, Hindy. “Interpretation as Primordial Writing: Jubilees and Its Authority
Conferring Strategies.” Pages 39–​71 in her Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority,
Renewed Revelation and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. Supplements to the
Journal for the Study of Judaism 53. Leiden: Brill, 2010
Najman, Hindy. Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation and the
Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of
Judaism 53. Leiden: Brill, 2010.
256 Bibliography

Najman, Hindy. Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple
Judaism. Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement Series 77. Leiden: Brill, 2003.
Najman, Hindy. “The Symbolic Significance of Writing in Ancient Judaism.” Pages 3–​38
in her Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation and the Quest for
Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism 53.
Leiden: Brill, 2010.
Najman, Hindy. “Torah of Moses: Pseudonymous Attribution in Second Temple Writings.”
Pages 73–​86 in her Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation and the
Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of
Judaism 53. Leiden: Brill, 2010
Nässelqvist, Dan. Public Reading in Early Christianity: Lectors, Manuscripts, and
Sound in the Oral Delivery of John 1–​4. Supplements to Novum Testamentum 163.
Leiden: Brill, 2016.
Naudé, Jacobus A., and Cynthia L. Miller-​Naudé. “The Translation of biblion and biblos in
the Light of Oral and Scribal Practice.” In die Skriflig /​In Luce Verbi 50.3 (2016): 1–​11.
Nicklas, Tobias. “Neutestamentler Kanon, christliche Apokryphen und antik-​christliche
‘Erinnerungskultur.’” New Testament Studies 62 (2016): 588–​609.
Nicklas, Tobias. “New Testament Canon and Ancient Christian ‘Landscapes of Memory.’”
Early Christianity 7 (2016): 5–​23.
Nolland, John. The Gospel of Matthew. New International Greek Testament Commentary.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005.
Nongbri, Brent. Before Religion: A History of a Modern Concept. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2015.
Nongbri, Brent. God’s Library: The Archaeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts. New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2018.
Nongbri, Brent. “P.Bodmer 2 as Possible Evidence for the Circulation of the Gospel
According to John without Chapter 21.” Early Christianity 3.9 (2018): 345–​60.
Nongbri, Brent. “Ryan Kaufman on the Ending of John 20 in P.Bodmer 2.” Variant
Readings (blog), December 11, 2018, https://​brentnongbri.com/​2018/​12/​11/​ryan-​
kaufman-​on-​the-​ending-​of-​john-​20-​in-​p-​bodmer-​2/​.
Oldfather, C. H. Introduction to Diodorus Siculus. Loeb Classical Library.
London: William Heinemann, 1933.
Ong, Walter J. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. 2nd ed. New York:
Routledge, 2002.
Paget, James Carleton, and Joachim Schaper, eds. The New Cambridge History of the
Bible: From the Beginnings to 600. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Parker, D. C. An Introduction to the New Testament Manuscripts and Their Texts.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
Parker, D. C. The Living Text of the Gospels. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
Parker, Holt N. “Books and Reading Latin Poetry.” Pages 186–​229 in Ancient Literacies: The
Culture of Reading in Greece and Rome. Edited by William A. Johnson and Holt N.
Parker. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Parvis, Sara, and Paul Foster, eds. Justin Martyr and His Worlds. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Petterson, Christina. From Tomb to Text: The Body of Jesus in the Book of John.
London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017.
Plisch, Uwe-​Karsten. The Gospel of Thomas: Original Text with Commentary. Translated
by Gesine Schenke Robinson. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2008.
 Bibliography 257

Poirier, John C. “The Roll, the Codex, the Wax Tablet and the Synoptic Problem.” Journal
for the Study of the New Testament 35.1 (2012): 3–​30.
Poirier, John C., and Jeffrey Peterson, eds. Marcan Priority without Q: Explorations in the
Farrer Hypothesis. Library of New Testament Studies 455. London: Bloomsbury T&T
Clark, 2015.
Pokorný, Petr. From the Gospel to the Gospels: History, Theology and Impact of the Biblical
Term Euangelion. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und
die Kunde der älteren Kirch 195. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013.
Popović, Mladen. “Reading, Writing, and Memorizing Together: Reading Culture in
Ancient Judaism and the Dead Sea Scrolls in a Mediterranean Context.” Dead Sea
Discoveries 24 (2017): 447–​70.
Porter, Stanley E. “The Ending of John’s Gospel.” Pages 55–​73 in From Biblical Criticism
to Biblical Faith: Essays in Honor of Lee Martin McDonald. Edited by William H.
Brackeney and Craig A. Evans. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2007.
Porter, Stanley E. “Der Papyrus Egerton 2 (P.Egerton/​P.Lond.Christ 1).” Pages 1:360–​
65 in Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher Übersetzung. Edited by Christoph
Markschies and Jens Schröter. 2 vols. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.
Ra, Yoseop. Q, the First Writing about Jesus. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2016.
Reed, Annette Yoshiko. “The Modern Invention of the ‘Old Testament Pseudepigrapha.’”
Journal of Theological Studies 60.2 (2009): 403–​36.
Reed, Annette Yoshiko. “Pseudepigraphy, Authorship and the Reception of ‘the Bible’ in
Late Antiquity.” Pages 467–​90 in The Reception and Interpretation of the Bible in Late
Antiquity: Proceedings of the Montréal Colloquium in Honour of Charles Kannengiesser,
11–​13 October 2006. Edited by Lorenzo DiTommaso and Lucian Turcescu. The Bible in
Ancient Christianity 6. Leiden: Brill, 2008.
Reed, Annette Yoshiko. “Textuality between Death and Memory: The Prehistory
and Formation of the Parabiblical Testament.” Jewish Quarterly Review 104.3
(2014): 381–​412.
Resnick, Irven M. “The Codex in Early Jewish and Christian Communities.” Journal of
Religious History 17.1 (1992): 1–​17.
Rhoads, David. “Performance Criticism: An Emerging Methodology in Second Testament
Studies—​Part 1.” Biblical Theology Bulletin 36.3 (2006): 118–​33.
Rhoads, David. “Performance Criticism (Biblical).” Pages 280–​89 in The Dictionary of the
Bible and Ancient Media. Edited by Tom Thatcher, Chris Keith, Raymond F. Person,
and Elsie R. Stern. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017.
Rhoads, David. “Performance Events in Early Christianity.” Pages 166–​93 in The Interface
of Orality and Writing. Edited by Annette Weissenrieder and Robert B. Coote.
Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 260. Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck, 2010.
Rhoads, David, Joanna Dewey, and Donald Michie. Mark as Story: An Introduction to the
Narrative of a Gospel. 3rd ed. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012.
Ricoeur, Paul. Memory, History, Forgetting. Translated by Kathleen Blamey and David
Pellauer. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
Robbins, Vernon K. “Rhetorical Composition and Sources in the Gospel of Thomas.” Pages
86–​114 in Society of Biblical Literature 1997 Seminar Papers. Atlanta: Scholars, 1997.
Roberts, C. H. Manuscript, Society, and Belief in Early Christian Egypt: The Schweich
Lectures 1977. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979.
258 Bibliography

Roberts, C. H., and T. C. Skeat. The Birth of the Codex. London: Oxford University
Press, 1983.
Robinson, James M., Paul Hoffman, and John S. Kloppenborg, eds. The Critical Edition of
Q. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000.
Robinson, John A. T. Redating the New Testament. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976.
Robinson, Thomas A. Who Were the First Christians? Dismantling the Urban Thesis.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Rodríguez, Rafael. Oral Tradition and the New Testament: A Guide for the Perplexed.
London: T&T Clark, 2014.
Rohmann, Dirk. Christianity, Book-​Burning, and Censorship in Late Antiquity: Studies in
Text Transmission. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016.
Rollens, Sarah E. Framing Social Criticism in the Jesus Movement. Wissenschaftliche
Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2.374. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014.
Roskam, H. N. The Purpose of the Gospel of Mark in Its Historical and Social Context.
Novum Testamentum Supplement Series 114. Leiden: Brill, 2004.
Roth, Dieter T. The Parables in Q. Library of New Testament Studies 582. London: T&T
Clark, 2018.
Rothschild, Clare K. “The Muratorian Fragment as a Roman Fake.” Novum Testamentum
60.1 (2018): 55–​82.
Rouwhorst, Gerard A. M. “The Reading of Scripture in Early Christian Liturgy.”
Pages 305–​31 in What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical, Jewish,
and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster. Edited by
Leonard V. Rutgers. Interdisciplinary Studies in Ancient Culture and Religion 1.
Leuven: Peeters, 2002.
Runesson, Anders. “Building Matthean Communities: The Politics of Textualization.”
Pages 379–​408 in Mark and Matthew I: Comparative Readings: Understanding the
Earliest Gospels in their First-​Century Settings. Edited by Eve-​Marie Becker and
Anders Runesson. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 271.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011.
Runesson, Anders. “Entering a Synagogue with Paul: First-​Century Torah Observance.”
Pages 11–​26 in Torah Ethics and Early Christian Identity. Edited by Susan J. Wendel and
David M. Miller. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016.
Runesson, Anders. “The Historical Jesus, the Gospels, and First-​ Century Jewish
Society: The Importance of the Synagogue for Understanding the New Testament.”
Pages 265–​97 in A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange. Edited by
Daniel A. Warner and Donald D. Binder. Mountain Home, AR: BorderStone, 2014.
Runesson, Anders. The Origins of the Synagogue: A Socio-​Historical Study. Coniectanea
Biblica New Testament Series 37. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2001.
Runesson, Anders. “Persian Imperial Politics, the Beginnings of Public Torah Readings,
and the Origins of the Synagogue.” Pages 63–​89 in The Ancient Synagogue: From Its
Origins until 200 C. E. Edited by Birger Olsson and Magnus Zetterholm. Coniectanea
Biblica New Testament Series 39. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2003.
Runesson, Anders, Donald D. Binder, and Birger Olsson. The Ancient Synagogue from
Its Origins to 200 c.e.: A Source Book. Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 72.
Leiden: Brill, 2008.
Ryan, Jordan J. The Role of the Synagogue in the Aims of Jesus. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017.
Schenke, Gesa. “Das Erscheinen Jesu vor den Jüngern und der ungläubige Thomas,
Johannes 20,19–​31.” Pages 893–​904 in Coptica—​Gnostica—​Manichaia: Mélanges offerts
 Bibliography 259

à Wolf-​Peter Funk. Edited by Louis Painchaud and Paul-​Hubert Poirier. Bibliothèque

Copte de Nag Hammadi 7. Leuven: Peeters, 2006.
Schiffman, Lawrence J. “The Early History of the Public Reading of the Torah.” Pages 44–​
56 in Jews, Christians, and Polytheists in the Ancient Synagogue: Cultural Interaction
during the Greco-​Roman Period. Edited by Steven Fine. Baltimore Studies in the History
of Judaism. New York: Routledge, 1999.
Schröter, Jens. Erinnerung an Jesu Worte: Studien zur Rezeption der Logienüberlieferung
in Markus, Q und Thomas. Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen
Testament 76. Neukirchen-​Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1997.
Schröter, Jens. From Jesus to the New Testament: Early Christian Theology and the Origin
of the New Testament Canon. Translated by Wayne Coppins. Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck
Studies in Early Christianity. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2013.
Schröter, Jens. “Jesus and Early Christian Identity Formation: Reflections on the
Significance of the Jesus Figure in Early Christian Gospels.” Pages 233–​55 in Connecting
Gospels: Beyond the Canonical/​Non-​Canonical Divide. Edited by Francis Watson and
Sarah Parkhouse. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018.
Schwartz, Barry. “Where There’s Smoke, There’s Fire: Memory and History.” Pages 7–​
37 in Memory and Identity in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity. Edited by Tom
Thatcher. Semeia Studies Series 78. Atlanta: SBL, 2014.
Schwartz, Daniel. “The Books of the Maccabees.” Pages 1:171–​ 82 in Early Jewish
Literature: An Anthology. Edited by Brad Embry, Ronald Herms, and Archie T. Wright.
2 vols. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2018.
Schweizer, Eduard. The Good News According to Matthew. Translated by David E. Green.
Atlanta: John Knox, 1975.
Sheridan, Ruth. Retelling Scripture: ‘The Jews’ and the Scriptural Citations in John 1:19–​
12:15. Biblical Interpretation Series 110. Leiden: Brill, 2012.
Shiell, William D. Delivering from Memory: The Effect of Performance on the Early
Christian Audience. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011.
Shiell, William D. Reading Acts: The Lector and the Early Christian Audience. Biblical
Interpretation 70. Leiden: Brill, 2004.
Shiner, Whitney. “Memory Technology and the Composition of Mark.” Pages 147–​65
in Performing the Gospel: Orality, Memory, and Mark. Edited by Richard A. Horsley,
Jonathan A. Draper, and John Miles Foley. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006.
Shiner, Whitney. Proclaiming the Gospel: First-​Century Performance of Mark. Harrisburg,
PA: Trinity, 2003.
Simmel, Georg. The Problems of the Philosophy of History: An Epistemological Essay.
Translated and edited by Guy Oakes. New York: Free Press, 1977.
Skarsaune, Oskar. “Justin and His Bible.” Pages 53–​76 in Justin Martyr and His Worlds.
Edited by Sara Parvis and Paul Foster. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Skeat, T. C. “Early Christian Book-​Production: Papyri and Manuscripts.” Pages 54–​79
in The Cambridge History of the Bible: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation.
Edited by G. W. H. Lampe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
Slavet, Eliza. “A Matter of Distinction: On Recent Work by Jan Assmann.” AJS Review 34.2
(2010): 385–​93.
Smith, D. Moody. John. Abingdon New Testament Commentaries. Nashville: Abingdon,
1999.
Smith, D. Moody. John among the Gospels. 2nd ed. Columbia: University of South Carolina
Press, 2001.
260 Bibliography

Smith, D. Moody. “When Did the Gospels Become Scripture?” Journal of Biblical
Literature 119 (2000): 3–​20.
Smith, Justin Marc. Why Βίος? On the Relationship between Gospel Genre and Implied
Audience. Library of New Testament Studies 518. London: Bloomsbury T&T
Clark, 2015.
Smith, Mark S. God in Translation: Deities in Cross-​Cultural Discourse in the Biblical
World. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.
Smith, Mark S. The Memoirs of God: History, Memory, and the Experience of the Divine in
Ancient Israel. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004.
Smith, Mark S. “Theology and Violence in the Ancient World: The Argument of Jan
Assmann.” Sefarad 69.1 (2009): 229–​35.
Snyder, H. Gregory. Teachers and Texts in the Ancient World: Philosophers, Jews and
Christians. Religion in the First Christian Centuries. New York: Routledge, 2000.
Spivey, Robert A., D. Moody Smith, and C. Clifton Black. Anatomy of the New Testament.
6th ed. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007.
Stanton, Graham N. “Form Criticism Revisited.” Pages 13–​27 in What about the New
Testament? Essays in Honour of Christopher Evans. Edited by Morna Hooker and Colin
Hickling. London: SCM, 1975.
Stanton, Graham N. Jesus and Gospel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Starr, Raymond J. “Reading Aloud: Lectores and Roman Reading.” Classical Journal 86.4
(1991): 337–​43.
Stein, Robert H. Mark. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008.
Stern, David. The Jewish Bible: A Material History. Seattle: University of Washington
Press, 2017.
Stock, Brian. The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation
in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983.
Stuckenbruck, Loren T. “Early Enochic and Daniel Traditions in the Dead Sea Scrolls.”
Pages 103–​19 in his The Myth of Rebellious Angels. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen
zum Neuen Testament 335. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014.
Swanson, James A., John R. Kohlenberger III, and Edward W. Goodrick, eds. Exhaustive
Concordance to the Greek New Testament. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995.
Tabbernee, William. Fake Prophecy and Polluted Sacraments: Ecclesiastical and
Imperial Reactions to Montanism. Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 84.
Leiden: Brill, 2007.
Taylor, Catherine C. “Sarcophagi.” Pages 3:307–​36 in The Reception of Jesus in the First
Three Centuries. Edited by Chris Keith et al. 3 vols. London: T&T Clark, 2020.
Thatcher, Tom. “Beyond Texts and Traditions: Werner Kelber’s Media History of Christian
Origins.” Pages 1–​26 in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond The Oral and the Written
Gospel. Edited by Tom Thatcher. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Thatcher, Tom. “The New Current through John: The Old ‘New Look’ and the New
Critical Orthodoxy.” Pages 1–​26 in New Currents through John: A Global Perspective.
Edited by Francisco Lozada Jr. and Tom Thatcher. Resources for Biblical Study 54.
Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2006.
Thatcher, Tom. Why John Wrote a Gospel: Jesus—​ Memory—​ History. Louisville:
Westminster John Knox, 2006.
Thatcher, Tom. “Why John Wrote a Gospel: Memory and History in an Early Christian
Community.” Pages 79–​97 in Memory, Tradition, and Text: Uses of the Past in Early
 Bibliography 261

Christianity. Edited by Alan Kirk and Tom Thatcher. Semeia Studies 52. Atlanta: Society
of Biblical Literature, 2005.
Thatcher, Tom, ed. Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond The Oral and the Written Gospel.
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008.
Thatcher, Tom, Chris Keith, Raymond F. Person Jr., and Elsie R. Stern, eds. The Dictionary
of the Bible and Ancient Media. London: T&T Clark, 2017.
Theissen, Gerd. The New Testament: A Literary History. Translated by Linda M. Maloney.
Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012.
Theissen, Gerd. “Tradition und Entscheidung: Der Beitrag der biblischen Glaubens
zum kulturellen Gedächtnis.” Pages 170–​96 in Kultur und Gedächtnis. Edited by Jan
Assmann and Tonio Hölscher. Suhrkamp Taschenbuch Wissenschaft 724. Frankfurt
am Main: Suhrkamp, 1988.
Thomas, Christine M. The Acts of Peter, Gospel Literature, and the Ancient Novel: Rewriting
the Past. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Thyen, Hartwig. Das Johannesevangelium. Handbuch zum Neuen Testament
6. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005.
Trobisch, David. The First Edition of the New Testament. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2000.
Trobisch, David. Paul’s Letter Collection: Tracing the Origins. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994.
Tuckett, Christopher. “Forty Other Gospels.” Pages 238–​53 in The Written Gospel. Edited
by Markus Bockmuehl and Donald A. Hagner. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2005.
Turner, E. G. Greek Papyri: An Introduction. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968.
Uro, Risto. “Ritual, Memory and Writing in Early Christianity.” Temenos 47.2
(2011): 159–​82.
van Iersel, Bas M. F. Mark: A Reader-​Response Commentary. Translated by W. H.
Bisscheroux. Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series 164.
Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998.
van Minnen, Peter. “Luke 4:17–​20 and the Handling of Ancient Books.” Journal of
Theological Studies 52.2 (2001): 689–​90.
Verheyden, Joseph. “The Canon Muratori: A Matter of Dispute.” Pages 487–​556 in The
Biblical Canons. Edited by J.-​M. Auwers and H. J. de Jonge. Bibliotheca ephemeridum
theologicarum lovaniensium 163. Leuven: Peeters: 2003.
Vinzent, Markus. Marcion and the Dating of the Synoptic Gospels. Studia Patristica
Supplement 2. Leuven: Peeters, 2014.
Wahlde, Urban C. von. The Gospels and Letters of John. 3 vols. Eerdmans Critical
Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010.
Wallraff, Martin. Kodex und Kanon: Das Buch im frühen Christentum. Berlin: de
Gruyter, 2013.
Warner, Daniel A., and Donald D. Binder, eds. A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of
James F. Strange. Mountain Home, AR: BorderStone, 2014.
Wasserman, Tommy. “The ‘Son of God’ Was in the Beginning (Mark 1:1).” Journal of
Theological Studies 62.1 (2011): 20–​50.
Watson, Francis. Gospel Writing: A Canonical Perspective. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013.
Watson, Francis. “How Did Mark Survive?” Pages 1–​17 in Matthew and Mark across
Perspectives: Essays in Honour of Stephen C. Barton and William R. Telford. Edited by
Kristian A. Bendoraitis and Nijay K. Gupta. Library of New Testament Studies 538.
London: T&T Clark, 2016.
262 Bibliography

Weeden, Theodore J. Mark—​Traditions in Conflict. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971.

Weissenrieder, Annette, and Robert B. Coote, eds. The Interface of Orality and Writing.
Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 260. Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck, 2010
Westcott, Brooke Foss. The Gospel According to St. John. 2 vols. London: John Murray, 1908.
Williams, Francis E. “The Apocryphon of James (I, 2).” Page 29 in The Nag Hammadi
Library in English. Edited by Marvin W. Meyer. Leiden: Brill, 1977.
Williams, Peter J. “The Syriac Versions of the Bible.” Pages 527–​35 in The New Cambridge
History of the Bible: From the Beginnings to 600. Edited by James Carleton Paget and
Joachim Schaper. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Windisch, Hans. Johannes und die Synoptiker: Wollte der vierte Evangelist die älteren
Evangelien ergänzen oder ersetzen? Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 12.
Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1926.
Winn, Adam. The Purpose of Mark’s Gospel. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum
Neuen Testament 2.245. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008.
Wire, Antoinette Clark. The Case for Mark Composed in Performance. Biblical
Performance Criticism 3. Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2011.
Wise, Michael Owen. Language and Literacy in Roman Judaea: A Study of the Bar
Kokhba Documents. Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library. New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2015.
Wollenberg, Rebecca Scharbach. “The Dangers of Reading As We Know It: Sight Reading
as a Source of Heresy in Early Rabbinic Traditions.” Journal of the American Academy of
Religion 85.3 (2019): 709–​45.
Wolter, Michael. The Gospel According to Luke. Translated by Wayne Coppins and
Christoph Heilig. Baylor–​Mohr Siebeck Studies in Early Christianity. 2 vols. Waco,
TX: Baylor University Press, 2016.
Wrede, William. The Origin of the New Testament. Translated by James S. Hill.
London: Harper & Bros., 1909.
Wright, Brian J. “Ancient Literacy in New Testament Research: Incorporating a Few More
Lines of Inquiry.” Trinity 36.2 (2015): 161–​89.
Wright, Brian J. Communal Reading in the Time of Jesus. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017.
Zangenberg, Jürgen K. “Archaeological News from the Galilee: Tiberias, Magdala and
Rural Galilee.” Early Christianity 1 (2010): 471–​84.
Zapata Meza, Marcela. “Neue mexicanische Ausgrabungen in Magdala.” Pages 85–​98 in
Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu. Edited by Jürgen K. Zangenberg
and Jens Schröter. Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012.
Zhong, Tong, and Barry Schwartz. “Confucius and the Cultural Revolution: A Study
in Collective Memory.” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 11.2
(1997): 189–​212.
Zimmermann, Ruben. “Memory and Form Criticism: The Typicality of Memory as a
Bridge between Orality and Literality in the Early Christian Remembering Process.”
Pages 130–​43 in The Interface of Orality and Writing. Edited by Annette Weissenrieder
and Robert B. Coote. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 260.
Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010.
Zuntz, Günther. The Text of the Epistles: A Disquisition on the Corpus Paulinum.
London: Oxford University Press, 1953.
 Ancient Sources Index

Hebrew Bible/​Old Testament

Psalms
Genesis 21:23 214
1 183 56:8 61
1:1 111, 117, 151 139:16 61
2:4 115–​6
5:1 115–​6 Proverbs
30:6 63
Exodus
3 183 Isaiah
3:1–​4:17 183 1:16–​20 183
3:5 183 40:3 111, 152
19:3–​25 118 58:6 208
23:20 111 61:1–​2 208
24:1–​18 118
31:18 118 Daniel
32:15 118 9:27 163
34:2–​29 118 11:31 163
12:1 61
Numbers 12:11 163
21:4–​9 183
Malachi
Deuteronomy 3:1 111
1:5 47 3:16 61
4:2 63
4:8 47 New Testament
12:32 LXX (MT 13:1) 63
27:3 47 Gospel of Matthew
29:20 47 1–​2 115
30 139 1:1 47, 55–​56, 100, 103–​4, 114–​6, 118,
30:10 47 121–​2, 129, 137, 151–​2
30:16 139 1:1–​2:23 116
30:19 LXX 139 1:1–​17 116
31:26 47 1:2–​17 115–​6
1:17 116
Nehemiah 1:18 116
8 168, 188 1:18–​2:23 116
1:19 116
Esther 4:23–​13:58 213
8:8 134 5:1 118
8:8–​9 134 5:17–​48 118
8:10 134 7:28 117
264 Ancient Sources Index

8:1 118 14:22–​25 108

8:1–​4 141 14:34 152
11:1 117 14:35 152
11:14 153 14:36 152
12:26 47 14:61 149
13:53 117 15:21 153
16:16 150–​51 15:32 149
16:18 180, 214, 216 15:39 150
17:11–​13 153
18:17 180, 214 Gospel of Luke
19:1 117 1:1 125, 127, 234
22:40 209 1:1–​4 50, 56, 66, 104, 114, 124–​5, 128–​
24:14 120, 137 30, 140, 151, 158, 234
24:15 103, 115, 118, 121–​3, 129–​30, 1:2 116, 124–​5, 127–​8, 152
163, 166, 176–​81, 185, 195, 199, 212, 1:3 124–​5, 127–​8
214, 218 1:4 126, 139
26:1 117 1:17 153
26:1–​29 153 4 60
26:13 119–​20, 137 4:14–​38 213
26:38 152 4:16 46, 168, 208
26:39 152 4:17 168, 188, 208
26:63 151 4:17, 20 113, 168
27:32 153 4:17–​20 113
4:18–​19 208
Gospel of Mark 4:20 197
1–​6 213 5:12–​16 141
1:1 111, 115, 118, 121, 132, 149–​52, 154 6:6–​11 213
1:2 111–​2, 114 9:20 150
1:2–​3 112, 152 10:20 61
1:4 185 13:10–​20 213
1:11 150 16:16 209
1:40–​45 141 20:42 45
3:11 150 22:1–​23 153
5:7 150 22:42 152
6:14 185 22:44 182
6:25 185 23:26 153
8:28 185
8:29 149–​51 Gospel of John
9:7 150 1–​20 132, 134, 145
9:12–​13 153 1:1 115, 151
9:41 149 1:1–​18 152
12:35 149 1:17 149
13:14 98, 103, 111–​2, 115, 118, 121, 1:19–​12:15 138
123, 129–​30, 163, 166, 176–​81, 185, 1:20 149
195, 199, 212, 214, 218, 231 1:23 152
13:14–​20 118 1:25 149
13:21 149 1:34 149
14:1–​25 153 1:41 149
 Ancient Sources Index 265

1:49 149 19:22 62

3:17 149 19:31, 42 153
3:18 149 20 133
3:28 149 20:19–​31 133
4:20 141 20:30 43, 47, 55–​56, 64, 120, 127,
4:25 149 134–​8, 140, 142, 144, 154
4:29 149 20:30–​31 xi, 8, 64, 66, 104, 114, 131,
5 138, 141 133–​40, 142, 145–​8, 151, 153–​4,
5:16, 18 138 158, 215
5:25 149 20:31 44, 132–​5, 137–​9, 149–​51, 154
5:39 139 21 55, 132–​4, 142, 145
5:39–​46 149 21:1–​9 133
5:45 139, 141 21:1–​23 131
5:46 139, 141, 215 21:24 88, 134–​5, 147
6:31 141 21:24–​25 xi, 8, 64, 66, 104, 114, 131,
6:49 141 133–​6, 138, 140, 142, 145–​8, 151, 154,
6:59 213 158, 197, 215
6:69 151 21:25 43, 55–​56, 134–​8, 140, 144, 146,
7:15 24, 138 154, 156
7:26 149
7:27 149 Acts
7:31 149 1:1 56, 124
7:41 149 1:8 213
742 149 1:20 45
7:52 208 2–​4 213
7:53–​8:11 138 4:13 24, 95, 196
8:6, 8 ix, 138 4:13b 95
9 141 5:11 214
9:22 149, 216 7:38 214
9:29 141 8:1 214
10:24 149 8:3 214
10:36 149 9:20 213
11:4 149 9:31 214
11:27 149 11:4 125
12 153 11:22 214
12:27 152 11:26 214
12:34 149 12:1 214
12:42 216 12:5 214
14:15–​17, 26 146 13:1 214
15:26–​27 146 13:5 213
16:2 216 13:14–​41 213
16:12–​14 146 13:15 188, 208
17:3 149 13:44–​47 213
18:19 213 14:1 213
18:28 153 14:23 214
19:7 149 14:27 214
19:17 153 15:2–​29 213
19:19–​21 138 15:3 214
266 Ancient Sources Index

15:4 214 11:20 187

15:21 120, 208 11:22 214
15:22 214 11:23 125
15:23–​29 175 11:23–​25 108
15:30 178 12:28 214
15:30–​31 178 14:4 214
15:31 178 14:5 214
15:41 214 14:12 214
16:5 214 14:19 214
17:1–​2 213 14:23 187, 214
17:10 213 14:28 214
17:17 213 14:33 214
18:4 213 14:34 214
18:19 213 14:35 214
18:22 214 14:37 175
19:8 213 15:1–​7 12
19:32 214 15:3 125
19:39 214 15:9 214
19:40 214 16:1 214
20:17 214 16:3 213
20:28 214 16:19 214
21:15–​26 213
22:19 213 2 Corinthians
24:12 213 1:1 175, 214
26:11 213 3:2–​3 4
3:3 4
Romans 3:6 4
3:21 208 3:7–​8 4
8:2 4 3:15 208
11:13 213 4:4 207
15:19 213 8:1 214
15:25–​26 213 8:18 214
15:31 213 8:19 214
16:1 214 8:23 214
16:4 214 8:24 214
16:5 214 11:8 214
16:16 214 11:28 214
16:23 214 12:13 214

1 Corinthians Galatians
1:2 214 1:1 175
4:17 214 1:2 214
6:4 214 1:13 214
7:17 214 1:18 213
7:40 175 1:22 214
10:32 214 2:8 213
11:16 214 3:15 63
11:18 214 4:25–​26 213
 Ancient Sources Index 267

Ephesians James
1:22 214 5:14 214
3:10 214
3:21 214 1 Peter
5:23 214 4:16 3
5:24 214
5:25 214 2 Peter
5:27 214 3:15–​16 175
5:29 214
5:32 214 3 John
1:6 214
Philippians 1:9 214
3:6 214 1:10 214
4:13 61
4:15 214 Revelation
1:1–​3 66
Colossians 1:3 179, 185
1:18 214 1:4 214
1:24 214 1:11 214
4:15 214 1:20 214
4:16 22, 175, 214 2:1 214
2:7 214
1 Thessalonians 2:8 214
1:1 214 2:11 214
2:14 214 2:12 214
5:27 175, 181 2:17 214
2:18 214
2 Thessalonians 2:23 214
1:1 214 2:29 214
1:4 214 3:1 214
2:1 214 3:5 61
3:6 214
1 Timothy 3:7 214
3:5 214 3:12 213
3:15 214 3:13 214
4:13 179 3:14 214
4:16 179 3:22 214
5:16 214 3:21 213
13:8 61
Philemon 20:15 61
1:2 214 21:27 61
22:16 214
Hebrews 22:18–​19 63, 66
1:3 64
2:12 214 Deuterocanonical Works and Septuagint
12:22 213 Judith
12:23 214 6:16 214
268 Ancient Sources Index

Sirach Testament of Abraham

prol. 209 Rec A 12 61
15:5 214 Rec A 12.1–​18 57
21:17 214 Rec B 10 58
23:24 214 Rec B 10–​11 61
24:25–​34 43, 61 Rec B 10.1–​16 57
24:30–​34 44 Rec B 10.7 58
38:24–​39:3 22 Rec B 10.7–​11 57, 59
38:33 214 Rec B 10.8 58
39:10 214 Rec B 11.1–​10 58
39:32 43 Rec B 11.2 58
50:27 43 Rec B 11.4 58
Rec B 11.8 58
1 Maccabees
9:22 55, 134 Testament of Job
5:16 214 11:1–​12 62
14:19 214
Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Texts
2 Maccabees
2:1–​13 209 1QapGen ar XIX, 25 169
15:9 209 1QIsaa 9
1QS 168, 206
4 Maccabees 1QS VI, 7 167, 169, 205–​6
18:10 209 4Q156 209
4Q251 206
Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 4Q251 1, 5 168, 206
4Q266 206, 208
2 Baruch 4Q266 5 II, 1–​4 60, 169, 171, 206
86:1–​2 209 4Q267 5 III, 3–​5 60, 169, 171, 206
4Q273 2, 1 60, 169, 171, 206
1 Enoch 4Q542 1 II, 10–​12 62
37–​71 3 4Q546 1 62
69:8–​12 3 11QPsalmsa 42, 61
69:9 3 11Q10 209
69:9–​11 3
81:1–​4 61 Philo
Jubilees
32:21 61 De Cherubim
32:24–​26 63 49 4

Letter of Aristeas Dreams

30 63 2.18 205
303 63
308–​10 211 Hypothetica
310–​311 63 7.12–​13 204
311 63
321 22 On the Embassy to Gaius
156 205
 Ancient Sources Index 269

Quod omnis probus liber sit Barnabas

12.81–​82 205 4.10 187
19.11 63
De specialibus legibus
4.160 170, 186 Didache 120
4.162 186 4.13 63

Josephus Diognetus
11.6 120, 197, 202
Antiquitates judiacae
14.1.3 159 Shepherd of Hermas
16.2.4 204 Vision(s)
16.7.1 159 2.1.4 171, 207
2.4.3 175
Bellum judaicum
2.12.2 222 Ignatius
2.15.5 222 To the Magnesians
7.5.5 221 8:2 187
9:2 187
Contra Apionem
1.42 63 To the Philadelphians
1.2.13 127 9:2 187
1.37–​42 188
2.17 186, 204 Martyrdom of Polycarp
Vita 20:1 175
9 127
65 127 Polycarp, To the Philippians
13:1–​2 175
Mishnah, Talmud, and
Related Literature New Testament Apocrypha and
Pseudepigrapha
m. Megillah
1:1 209, 218 Acts of Peter 161, 166, 176, 181, 196–​7
2:1 208 19 196
3:1–​4:1 209, 218 20 196–​7, 229
4:1–​5 209
Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs 235
m. Taʿanit
4:3 208 Acts of Timothy
8–​10 156
t. Megillah
3:1–​9 209 Apostolic Constitutions
2.57.5 199
Apostolic Fathers 2.57.7 199

2 Clement 120 Egerton Gospel

12.2 102 (P.Egerton 2 and P.Köln
19.1 179, 198 255) 101, 140–​2
270 Ancient Sources Index

Fayum Gospel (P.Vindob.G 2325) 102 2.13 156

2.14 156
Gospel of the Ebionites 101
Gospel of the Egyptians anti-​Marcionite prologue
(NHC III 2 and IV 2) 102 (Mark) 94, 181
Gospel of the Egyptians (Greek) 102
Gospel of the Hebrews 101 Aphrahat
Gospel of Judas 102 Demonstrations 156
Gospel of Mary 102
Gospel of the Nazoreans 101 Athanasius
Gospel of Peter 101, 140, 194–​6 Epistulae festales
Gospel of Philip 101 39.19 63
Gospel of the Savior (P.Oxy. 840) 102
Gospel of Thomas 101, 140 Augustine
incipit 56 Confessionum libri XIII
1 157 6.3 172
13 157
13.1–​3 157 De incompetentibus nuptiis
2.7 64
Gospel of Truth 101
19.34–​21.25 61 Aulus Gellius
Attic Nights
Infancy Gospel of Thomas 102 19.10 24
19.10.1–​2 24
Marcion’s Gospel 101 19.10.9 24
13.31.1 24
Martyrdom of Justin Martyr 13.31.6 24
2 187 13.31.1–​11 207
13.31.9–​10 24
Martyrdom of Pionius 16.8.3 171
13 216 17.7.5–​6 171

Preaching of Peter Cicero

5 191 Epistulae ad Atticum
2.12 5
Protevangelium of James 102 2.23 186
4.16 186
Secret Book of James 7.2 186
1.1 156 7.3 186
1.10–​12 156 8.13 186
1.30–​32 156 13.25 171
2.7–​18 156
Epistulae ad Quintum fratrem
Classical and Ancient Christian Writings 3.6 63

Adamantius Clement of Alexandria

Dialogue Adumbrationes in epistulas canonicas
1.8 156 apud 1 Pet 5:13 93, 181
 Ancient Sources Index 271

Paedagogus 2.23.2 51
3.11.78 187 3.3.2 195
3.3.6 175, 181, 193
Stromateis 3.16 175
1.1.1 1 3.24.5 51
1.5.1 179 3.24.15 50
1.11.1 171 3.25.6 194–​5
1.14.2 171 3.39.1 59
1.14.4 4 3.39.3 46
1.15.1 131 3.39.3–​4 88, 197
3.9.63 102 3.39.4 4, 55, 59, 128, 158
3.13.93 102 3.39.14 59
6.15.128 191 3.39.15 50, 52, 94–​95, 128, 181
4.22.1 51
Cyril of Jerusalem 4.23.11 175
Catechesis 4.23.12 63
4.33 198 5.16.3 63
4.35 198 6.12.1 216
4.36 198 6.12.2 194
6.12.3 195
Dio Chrysostom 6.12.3–​4 174, 194
De dicendi excercitatione 6.12.4 194
6 186 6.12.5 195
6.14.5–​7 88
Diodorus Siculus 6.14.6 93, 181
Library of History 6.14.7 94
12.13.2–​3 31 6.23 22
6.25.5 94, 181
Dionysius of Halicarnassus 8.2.1–​2 235
De Demosthene
53–​54 168 Galen
De pulsuum differentiis
On Literary Composition 8.591–​592K 220
2.229 171
De theriaca ad Pisonem
Dionysius Thrax 14.211 K 172
Grammar
2 168, 171 Hippolytus
Refutatio omnium haeresium 46
Epiphanius 5.7.9 102
Panarion
62.2.4 102 Traditio apostolica
11 177
Eusebius of Caesarea
Ecclesiastical History Irenaeus
2.15.1 93, 181 Adversus haereses
2.15.2 93–​94, 181, 186, 198 1.10.2 63
2.15.1–​2 50–​52 1.27.2 64
272 Ancient Sources Index

2.27.1 190 67.3 51–​52, 182, 186–​7

2.27.2 190 67.3–​4 177, 179, 185–​6
3.1.1 56, 94, 181 67.5 187
3.3.2–​3 88 67.8 186–​7
3.7.1–​2 171
3.7.2 60, 207 Apologia ii
3.11.8 53, 189–​90 10.3–​5 53, 182
4.33.8 63, 190 11.3–​5 53, 182
5.33.4 46
Dialogus cum Tryphone
Iterium of Egeria 10.2 182
24.10–​12 199 16.4 216
47.4 216
Jerome 71–​73 64
De viris illustribus 72 64
18 46 93.4 216
61 22 95.4 216
96.2 216
John Chrysostom 100.1 182
Adversus Judaeos 100.4 182
1.5 216 101.3 182
102.5 182
Homiliae in Joannem 103 182
32 235 103.6 182
103.8 182
Justin Martyr 104.1 182
Apologia i 105.1 182
5.4 53, 182 105.5 182
31.1–​5 188 105.6 182
39.3 187 106.1 182
44.8 188 106.3 50, 52, 182
59.1 188 106.4 182
59.1–​5 183 107.1 182
59.1–​60.11 182 108.3 216
60.1–​7 183 119.6 189
60.5 183 133.6 216
60.10 183 137.2 216
60.11 187
61.7–​8 183 Lucian
62.1–​2 183 Adversus indoctum
62.2 188 2 170–​71, 207
63.11 188
63.16 188 De morte Peregrini
65.1 183 11 216
65.1–​3 183, 185
66.2–​3 184 Manilius
66.3 182 Astronomica
66.4 183–​4 2.755–​761 171
 Ancient Sources Index 273

Muratorian Fragment Pliny the Elder

2 192 Naturalis historia 31
64 192 13.21.68–​13.26.83 62
66 192
68–​72 192 Pliny the Younger
71–​72 181, 192 Epistulae
73–​80 175, 193 3.5 172
74 191 7.17.4–​5 168
75 191 7.17.7 174
77–​78 174 7.17.7–​8 172
79–​80 191
Plutarch
Origen Brutus
Commentarii in Romanos 13.2 59
10.43.2 64
De tranquillitate animi
Contra Celsum 464e–​f 59
1.27 187 464f 59
2.13 51
2.27 64 Possidius
Vita Augustini
Homiliae in Leviticum 18 63
5.8 216
Quintilian
Homiliae in Lucam Institutio oratoria
1.1 126 1.1.28–​29 186
1.1–​2 233 2.21.16 187
1.2 102 11.2.32 170, 186, 208

Papias Rhetorica ad Herennium

Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord 4, 4.4.6 186
46, 59, 101, 106, 141, 158
Strabo
Plato Geography
Phaedrus 13.1.54 63
274c 1
274e 1 Synod of Laodicea canon 59 198
275a–​b 1
275d–​e 2 Tertullian
275e 31 Adversus Marcionem
276a 2 1.1 63–​64
5.13.4 64
Timaeus
36b–​c 183 De anima
9.4 197
Plautus
Bacchides Apologeticus
434 207 19.1 188
274 Ancient Sources Index

39.3 197 P46 85

46.1 197 P52 85
P64 85
De praescriptione haereticorum P66 7, 85, 133
36.5 120, 188, 193, 203 P75 85
41.8 176
Uncials
Theon ‫ א‬9, 113, 116, 150
Progymnasmata A 9, 111, 113, 150
102–​7 179 B 9, 64, 113, 116, 150
103 168 C 151
D 36, 113, 150
Theophilus K 111, 151
Ad Autolycum L 150
2.38 4 N 151
P 111
Theophrastus W 111, 150–​51
Historia plantarum Γ 111, 151
4.8.3 62 Δ 151
Θ 151
Xenophon Ψ 151
Memorabilia 53
2.1.21–​34 53, 182 Minuscules
f1 151
Manuscripts (Dead Sea Scrolls f13 111, 150–​51
listed above) 33 151
565 151
Medieval Hebrew 579 151
B 43 892 150

Papyri Old Latin

P1 116 b 150–​51
P45 85, 228 r1 150
 General Index

Assmann, Jan 10–​11, 13, 15, 17–​18, Kelber, Werner ix–​x, 5, 10, 12, 44–​45,
26–​35, 39, 51, 60, 65, 68, 75, 85–​97, 73–​76, 78–​84, 87–​88, 91, 95–​96
100, 105, 174, 179, 221, 227 Kentucky xii, 10

baptism 89, 125, 183–​4 Larsen, Matthew D. C. x, 35, 40, 49–​60,

Bond, Helen ix, x, 94–​95, 132, 145, 152 64, 77, 118–​9
Book of Life 61, 64 lector (see reader)
literacy 7–​8, 23–​24, 26, 37, 67, 79, 95, 138,
Celsus 106–​7, 187 168, 178, 186–​7, 205–​6
Christ assembly (see also synagogue) 23,
199, 203, 211–​8 Magdala synagogue 210–​11
codex 14, 33, 38, 46, 113, 123, 165, 175, Marcion 64, 67, 77, 101, 107,
189, 223–​30 119–​21, 234–​5
competitive textualization 8–​9, 13, 34, 43, material turn 36–​39
48, 66–​67, 71, 100–​161, 165, 234 memory 1–​2, 12–​13, 17–​18, 26–​34, 65–​
critical inheritance 98, 132 66, 77–​78, 83, 85–​92, 95–​96, 107–​9,
143, 147, 159, 167, 169–​70, 173–​4,
Diocletianic persecution 235 180, 184, 203, 230
Docetism 194 Milton, John 41–​45, 48, 50, 56
Mithraism 183–​4
entourage matériel 26, 29, 32–​33, 95, Mroczek, Eva x, 40–​49, 60–​61, 64, 68, 110
221, 227
Eucharist 89, 108–​9, 125, 183–​5, 213 Nerf gun 220
Nicolaus of Damascus 106, 159
fourfold collection 53, 65, 104, 188–​90,
225, 230–​31, 233–​4 Ollie Hopnoodle’s Haven of Bliss xi
oral-​preference perspective 78, 82–​85, 89,
Great Divide 83–​84, 91 96, 166

heavenly tablets/​books 43, 58, 61, 64 Police Academy xi

Heckel, Theo K. 65–​66, 104, 134–​5, 142 pronunciation 33, 60, 169, 171, 206–​7
Hurtado, Larry (see also Legend) ix, xi, 7,
17, 25, 35, 37–​38, 53, 73, 85, 94–​95, Q 5, 11–​12, 18, 35, 73–​77, 84, 87, 110, 128,
123, 133, 144, 167, 170, 175, 182, 186, 143, 170, 227
188, 217, 223, 224–​8, 231
hyperbaton 207 reader/​lector 19–​22, 31, 35, 37–​8, 85, 98,
103, 106, 109, 111–​2, 115, 118, 123–​4,
Johnson, William A. x, 13, 15, 17–​26, 28, 129, 163, 167–​71, 174, 176–​80,
32–​35, 38, 46, 48, 59, 62, 67–​68, 95, 185–​7, 196, 198–​9, 204–​8, 212
100, 105–​6, 110, 123, 159, 165, 169, reading, public and private 171–​3
170–​2, 185–​6, 205–​6, 219–​21, 223, 227 reading, religious and liturgical 173–​6
276 general Index

reading culture/​community 9, 13, 15, Thatcher, Tom ix, xi, 6, 12, 18, 29, 35, 45,
17–​8, 18–​26, 33–​34, 38, 67, 95, 103, 79, 81, 83, 85, 87–​8, 105, 132, 140,
105–​7, 109, 112, 114, 123, 128–​9, 144, 146–​8, 167, 222
139, 159–​60, 165–​6, 184, 186, 190, Theodotus Inscription 205, 209–​210
195–​6, 200, 203, 205, 211, 217, 219, Torah scroll 221–​3
225, 227–​32 Traditionsbruch 29, 75, 85–​96

scriptio continua 18, 25, 170–​71 visualization 66, 105–​9, 170, 234–​5
synagogue (see also Christ assembly)
3, 14, 23, 26, 68, 113, 181, 185, 188, zerdehnte Situation 17, 26–​32, 51, 75,
197, 199, 201–​219, 221, 228 85–​100, 105–​7, 112–​3, 179

text as process 39–​64

textual self-​consciousness 43, 66, 98–​100,
103–​5, 109–​11, 114–​5, 121, 123, 126,
129–​31, 134, 154, 158