Review of Jesus Tradition, Early Christian Memory, and Gospel Writing

Kirk, Alan. Jesus Tradition, Early Christian Memory, and Gospel Writing: The Long Search for the Authentic Source. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2023, pp. 370, $59.99, hardback.

Motivated students and scholars who are interested in the intersection of ancient media utilization and the Synoptic Problem will benefit greatly from reading this book. Given the breadth of this work and Kirk’s scholarly reputation, this book will most certainly make a significant impact in the Synoptic Problem debate for years to come. Kirk’s orality/literacy interface is a welcome alternative to the either/or dichotomy that has persisted in NT scholarship. Students and scholars who are willing to read slowly and carefully will reap great reward from Kirk’s labors.

Few people have the expertise to write a critique on the media assumptions of Synoptics’ scholarship over the last two centuries. Yet Alan Kirk is one of those people. Kirk’s lengthy career as professor of religion at James Madison University and author of multiple works on Synoptic origins and ancient media dynamics uniquely qualifies him for such a task. In Jesus Tradition, Early Christian Memory, and Gospel Writing, Kirk demonstrates his mastery of ancient memory, oral tradition, and writing composition as they pertain to the Gospels.

The Synoptic Problem has long puzzled New Testament scholars. For centuries, Synoptic scholarship has debated the ordering and relationship of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And while some hypotheses claim more adherents than others, the debate is far from settled. In this book, Kirk maintains that this impasse is due to the faulty media assumption of an “oral/written binary” that has influenced scholars over the last two centuries (3). This book examines the history of these approaches and proposes an alternative path forward. As Kirk maintains, “Putting Synoptic-problem inquiry on sound media premises holds the promise of breaking the impasse” (3).

Chapters 1–3 examine the media assumptions of nineteenth-century scholarship. In these chapters, Kirk explores how scholars aimed to connect Gospel tradition with apostolic memory in various ways, such as appealing to various primitive written or oral sources. Chapter 4 shifts to the form critics of the early twentieth century. In this chapter, Kirk demonstrates how the form critics overreacted against nineteenth-century scholarship’s desire to get back to apostolic memories. Chief among the form critics was Rudolf Bultmann who maintained that the Gospel accounts were primarily reflections of the Sitz im Leben of the early church, not memories of the historical Jesus. Thus the Synoptic Gospels are the result of oral tradition which had evolved and developed over time in Hellenistic churches, not memories of the historical Jesus. In Chapter 5, Kirk sets his sights on the Farrer Hypothesis (FH) with his strongest critique in the book. In an effort to dispense with Q, FH proponents contend that Luke utilized both Mark and Matthew as his primary sources. Because the double tradition that Matthew and Luke share, the FH finds it can plausibly be explained by Luke’s use of Matthew, Occam’s Razor requires the elimination of the additional Q source (208–09). In the sixth and final chapter, Kirk surveys the Q scholarship of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. He interacts with one group of scholars in particular who argue for an early Q source that goes back to a primitive autonomous Galilean community. This group maintains that this Galilean community had its own unique theology, which lacked a Passion narrative. While Kirk affirms the existence of Q, he rejects the Galilean Q position.

He concludes the book by making the case that the Two Document Hypothesis (2DH) makes the best sense of a first-century mixed media culture, particularly the intersection of memory, oral tradition, and source utilization (333). Early apostolic testimony created social memory and oral tradition, which mutually supported each other and shaped cultural identity. The cultural identity of the early Christians was then embodied by a scribal tradent and preserved in written texts. Q and Mark, then, are the “downstream artifacts of the dual didactic and narrative impulses in primitive Christianity’s commemoration of Jesus” (328). In the end, therefore, the 2DH provides the clearest avenue for getting back to the primitive beginnings of Christianity and its cultural memories of Jesus.

The Synoptic Problem has long puzzled New Testament scholars. For centuries, Synoptic scholarship has debated the ordering and relationship of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And while some hypotheses claim more adherents than others, the debate is far from settled. In this book, Kirk maintains that this impasse is due to the faulty media assumption of an “oral/written binary” that has influenced scholars over the last two centuries (3). This book examines the history of these approaches and proposes an alternative path forward.

Alan Kirk has produced an impressive piece of scholarship that has much to commend. First, Kirk critiques the oral/written dichotomy that was prevalent for so long in Gospels’ scholarship. Furthermore, he rightly emphasizes the need to consider the links between memory, oral tradition, and writing. Second, he thoroughly engages with the secondary sources. By my count, he summarizes and interacts with forty-six different scholars, some of which he devotes over twenty pages to! Third, Kirk systematically refutes the many faulty approaches over the last two centuries, particularly the FH. He thoroughly critiques the likes of Farrer, Goulder, Goodacre, Watson, and Eve, leaving no stone unturned, and argues persuasively that “the FH is a sterile hypothesis” (297). Like other 2DH proponents, he critiques the surgical “unpicking” procedure of the FH Luke (219). He also refutes Goodacre’s “Editorial Fatigue” argument (242). In fact, he suggests that Luke’s surgical “unpicking” procedure in one place does not square with his clumsy fatigue procedure in another.

These strengths aside, the book suffers from a few potential weaknesses. First, the book provides too much detail from too many scholars that made for difficult reading. Kirk did warn in the beginning that he “will drill down deeply into each” of his conversation partners (3). Yet he could have accomplished his goals by drilling less deeply with fewer scholars. Another potential weakness is that Kirk’s positions are occasionally obfuscated among scholarly views. For example, throughout his historical survey, it was sometimes difficult to determine if Kirk was reporting on a scholar’s view or providing his own analysis of that scholar. A third weakness is that Kirk assumes the existence of Q without substantiating it. Certainly he refutes the FH with force, but he does not consider the other Markan priority position that Matthew used Luke. He only gives lip service to this position in a footnote when he writes, “Matthean posteriority has found some new advocates, but it remains to be seen if it gets any traction” (203). Nevertheless, the same media interface of memory, orality, and literacy could work just as easily from a Matthean posteriority perspective. Furthermore, Matthean posteriority shares the same concerns over the FH as Kirk does.

These weaknesses aside, the book is remarkable. Motivated students and scholars who are interested in the intersection of ancient media utilization and the Synoptic Problem will benefit greatly from reading this book. Given the breadth of this work and Kirk’s scholarly reputation, this book will most certainly make a significant impact in the Synoptic Problem debate for years to come. Kirk’s orality/literacy interface is a welcome alternative to the either/or dichotomy that has persisted in NT scholarship. Students and scholars who are willing to read slowly and carefully will reap great reward from Kirk’s labors.