Some discussions never go away entirely, even if they can go dormant for a season or two. When I was doing my PhD degree at the University of Nottingham a big debate occurred among NT scholars over the genre (kind of literature) of a Gospel. At the time, the NT Gospels were seen by the redaction critics as theological, pastoral communications to singularly-shaped local churches. They, of course, knew the Gospels grew out of sources they were using.
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The standard source theory went like this: Mark was first; alongside Mark was a sayings source called Q (from the German Quelle, meaning source, though even that “from” was disputed by some); Matthew used Mark and Q and had access to another source or sources called “M” (Matthew’s special source); Luke used Mark and Q as well, independently of Matthew’s use, and he too had access to another source or sources called “L” (Luke’s special source). So, the Gospel of Matthew was a pastoral communication about Jesus to his congregation based on editing or redacting Mark and Q, and Luke more or less did something similar to his sources for his community. A summary of this Gospel-genre-is-unique approach, in the wake of responding to the work of the rumbling bios theory, is The Gospel and the Gospels edited by Peter Stuhlmacher with an important essay by R.A. Guelich.
But in those days someone suggested the NT Gospels derived from a Greco-Roman form of literature called a bios, or “life,” and hence they were “biographies.” One major scholar at the time on this issue was Charles Talbert, who was reworking and revising the work of an older study by Charles Votaw. At the time many saw the Gospels as a unique genre but the bios scholars denied the genre uniqueness and proposed instead to read them in light of Greco-Roman biographies. Anything new in scholarship is fun, but this was more than fun: this genre reclassification took over, and most librarians (figuratively) moved the Gospels to a new shelf, from the 200s to the 900s (in the Dewey Decimal System).
Votaw and Talbert were superseded by Richard Burridge’s What are the Gospels? in 1992, with a 25th year edition from Baylor University Press (2018) that both reprinted the original and added an extensive discussion of that book’s impact. One cannot overestimate the impact of Burridge. Burridge’s work was taken to its next level in some ways by Helen Bond in her The First Biography of Jesus.
Not everyone agreed with the bios proponents, but it sure seemed to me that the consensus has shifted.
For a season or two.
Until Francis Watson, who in his newest book, What is a Gospel? (notice the plural), makes the statement that “The claim that the gospels are biographies is only possible if noncanonical gospels are overlooked and if the dynamic nature of genre reconfiguration is ignored.” #boom (His earlier mammoth book was called Gospel Writing.)
A new day has dawned for gospel genre discussions with Watson’s book. I both agree with him and disagree. Here’s a brief.
First, against the grain, Watson contends that the genre of a Gospel book cannot be defined accurately if one reduces the evidence to the canonical Gospels. So, one must include the extra canonical Gospels like Thomas. (Gospel is upper case in the USA if it is a specific book; if it is the message, is it lower case. The UK uses lower case more often. Irritating we can’t get together on this one. And some USA publishers don’t even care which you use.)
Second, he finds three characteristics of the genre when one stretches the evidence to include those texts called “Gospel” in the early church. Here are his three points:
We come now to the proposed definition, answering the question, What is a gospel? (1) Gospels or gospel-like texts are characterized by a common focus on the human Jesus in his interactions with other humans (family, followers, beneficiaries, opponents, crowds). (2) In these texts Jesus is always understood as the supremely authoritative figure who finally and definitively mediates the human relationship to the divine, as they present selected episodes or aspects of his human existence. (3) These texts are ascribed to apostles (individually or collectively) or to those closely associated with them, and they are thus authenticated by the claim that their authors or their authors’ informants participated in the events of which they speak, bearing witness to what they have seen and heard (p. 16, then expounded on 16-22).
Some agreements and disagreements now, and I have not read the entire book. If I get some of this wrong I will come back to revise it and say so.
Maybe Watson has a fuller discussion somewhere about this, but the decision to include all texts called “gospel” in the early church to define gospel genre could get us into some odd situations. Let me give an egregious example. Let’s say you want to determine the genre of American history textbooks. Do you include David Barton’s The American Story? We may all be able to name some books that claim they are doing American history but we would have serious questions if they are history. I use this only as an example. Just because it is called “American history” does not mean it is.
You get out of your study what you include in your study.
There were reasons the early church did not include the Gospel of Thomas and they made that decision because there were elements in the GThom deemed unsuitable for the kind of Gospel the church wanted. So, I have a question about the impact of including the other Gospels.
Second, in including these books, a more or less lowest common denominator forms. And two notable features are not part of Watson’s definition because of it. (1) The four Gospels have a strenuous concern for the fulfillment of the OT in the NT (whatever terms you want to use), and one thinks of how Matthew, Mark, Luke, and even John begin: each begins with strong tones of fulfillment, even if John goes his own way in the procedure. The absence of this theme in the genre proposal weakens it. And no one knows the OT in the NT discussion any better than Watson. There is then a minimizing of the Jewish resonances of the genre when one includes these other Gospels. (2) The absence of the theme of discipleship is notable. The pre-Talbert genre discussions had a more pastoral, ecclesial shape to them and hence discipleship was prominent in the genre specifications. The absence of this in Watson emerges from his selection of the other Gospels.
Third, Watson’s approach is synchronic: he examines all the Gospel books and forms common features of such literature. This synchronic approach needs supplementing by a diachronic approach that begins with the earliest Gospel traditions and Gospels and maps the storied development – central features, additions, subtractions, reshapings – from the earliest Gospels to the later Gospels. Genre then will be given a nuanced definition depending on which chapter in the development one is describing. Watson’s definition depends on taking later evidence.
Fourth, Watson is confident that moving from the Pauline gospel to the genre of the Gospel is a significant leap in the meaning of “gospel.” I’m not. The Pauline gospel is defined in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 (or 1-28!) and there the focus is the major events in the life of Jesus, with a reasonable assumption that the life etc of Jesus is inherent to the four basic events (death, burial, resurrection/ascension, return). Watson’s focus on the Pauline gospel is its message of salvation, which is clearly at work in the Pauline gospel, but it is not without significance that 1 Cor is less emphatic on salvation (forgiveness of sins) than it is on the basics of the Christ event. Add to this, now, the gospel preaching in the Book of Acts, and here one must consider the epochal small book of C.H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching of the Gospel, and what one sees is that 1 Cor 15 is the skeleton of the gospel preaching of the apostles, who bring in life of Jesus stuff as well – and gospel in the earliest gospel formulations starts to look like an outline for the life of Jesus, with an expanded introduction of course (Matthew 1-2, Luke 1-2, John 1:1-18). Speaking of the Pauline gospel, why not examine Romans 1:3-8 along with 1 Cor 15 and 1 Thess 1:9-10 in describing the Pauline gospel? And what does one do with 2 Timothy 2:8 as at least a late formation of what gospel means? Life of Jesus stuff again. I’m not so sure then that the transfer from gospel preached in Paul to gospel as genre was, as he puts it, “nothing inevitable.”
There’s much I agree with in Watson’s brief chapter that summarizes his genre solution, including the dynamic process of the formation of all the Gospels. Matthew and Luke both include so much of Mark one has to wonder why Mark survived. Which suggests – Watson discusses this well – that Mark, too, did to his sources what Matthew and Luke did to him. He thinks Luke used Matthew and eschews Q while I’m not so convinced of the erasure of Q. I’m not so sure Mark 1:1 is not somewhat of a genre use of the term “gospel” though it is not clear.
Yes, on the human Jesus but there are at least some glimmers of a more than human Jesus in the Gospels, but earthly Jesus is fine. Yes for sure on the authoritative centrality of Jesus in the Gospels – all of them, though some Gospels he includes have a little too much not about Jesus. On ascribed to or connected to the apostles, OK, but that point is underwhelming.
Watson’s shift from Pauline studies to Gospel studies is noteworthy and he has now written two significant books that will take a decade or so to tease out.
It has been a long time since I needed to think about these kinds of issues and I'm not up to that now (at age 92!). Meanwhile I read Matthew and Mark because they are in the Bible, but I really hunker down with delight when I get to Luke and John. Am I allowed those prejudices? I'm now just an aging layperson expressing my enthusiasm for Luke and John, regardless of how or when they became "Scripture." The Jesus I meet on those pages touches very deep chords in my soul. I really don't care about the dry debates about authorships. But scholars need something to write about, so I accept and actually read some of what they write. OUCH! I think I just said the wrong thing!
My edits aren't showing up, but thanks to the friend who pointed out that Watson's book is What IS A Gospel and not What are the Gospels, which is Burridge's title.