Beyond the Q Impasse [Paperback]

David Dungan (Editor), David B. Peabody (Editor), Allan J. McNicol (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1563381842 | ISBN-13: 978-1563381843 | Publication Date: December 1996 | Edition: Book and Access

Based on decades of painstaking, collaborative research, the authors of this volume have succeeded in making a historic breakthrough in understanding the Gospel of Luke. They have discovered never-before-seen objective data, proving that the author of the Gospel of Luke systematically and respectfully used sequences of material from the canonical Gospel of Matthew in writing his own Gospel.

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Trinity Press International; Book and Access edition (December 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1563381842
• ISBN-13: 978-1563381843
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,848,728 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Beyond Q, well researched but flawed, March 28, 2001

By 

Stuart Waugh (Sunnyvale, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond the Q Impasse (Paperback)

Beyond the Q Impasse is a collaborative effort that is very detailed and somewhat dry. This work was done by a group committed to one theory, the Two Gospel Hypothesis (2GH) - which I feel is correct in part anyway -, and so set out with that assumption in mind. As an exercise, it is probably necessary that a serious exploration of the idea that Luke used Canonical Matthew as it's primary source without knowledge of Mark, or more importantly the hypothetical Q document.

This book is an exhaustive analysis of how Luke could have been written to fit the 2GH assumption. It lacks a good introduction to the approach, and lacks examination of alternatives. As a result it is dry, and difficult reading not of much use to anyone other than a researcher into the subject. Of course I think that was the objective, simply to supply some material supporting Luke's use of Matthew. But overall it fails because of a lack of exploration, and instead becomes an uncritical narrative typical of group think. (ouch, this is from a strong supporter of Dr. Farmer and Dr. Longfellow here!)

About the Book's theory :

The presumption of 2GH, based upon the now Canonical Gospels of Matthew and Luke, made this exercise dubious. This created a need to have Luke open five scrolls of Matthew at once to create his Gospel, while theoretically possible, seems utterly ludicrous. The complexity of this approach, done without error, defies reasonable human work. A messy work like Acts seems more likely with all its' illogic and redundancy. What's more the movement of material into the Central section, such as the Lawyers' question (Luke 10:25-28), Blasphemy Against the Holy Spirit (Luke 12:10), and the parable of the mustard seed (Luke 13:18-19), creates a resulting level of complexity for the author of Mark to conflate his account from Luke and Matthew which this book supports. Somehow Mark manages to extract material sequentially common with Matthew from the Central section of Luke, such as above, without showing any hint of the other content in that section. Another problem is shown in material, such as the Lord's Prayer (Luke 11:1-4), that form and redactional criticism argue found its' way into Matthew from Luke (Matthew 6:9-13; note perhaps also Mark 11:25 was the textual basis for Matthew 6:14-15), breaking up his Blessings and Woes (Matthew 6:1-8, 16-21). Further no account is taken for the missing elements in what is likely an earlier form of that book, which the Marcionites called the "Gospel of the Lord." Simply put there are too many holes in this approach and the theory itself requires a too complex writing system by Luke.

What this book did show though, was that Q is not necessary for a solution to the Synoptic problem. Yet what I see emerging is a more complex history involved in the composition of the Synoptic Gospels than any of the three top theories (the 2SH or "Q", Farrar or "FH" and the 2GH) presents. I think the 2GH will hold, but not derived from the Canonical Luke or Matthew, rather from earlier prototype versions of these books, which were largely lacking all the missing material that cannot be found in Mark. That will be a Luke with no Central Section, and a Matthew lacking most of the common material with Luke. This exercise would look completely different if the Luke which Mark used lacked everything before 4:31 (some evidence exists that verses 4:16,22-24 may have existed in a different location paralleling Mark 6:1-6), Central section material 11:14-28, 12:10 and 8:19-21 in place of 6:20-8:3, with Luke 13:18-19 in place of Luke 8:19, no Central section from 9:51-18:14, Luke 10:25-28 placed before Luke 20:39-40 where it belongs, as well as the Marcionite version of the Ointment story (Luke 7:36-50 but much shorter) after Luke 22:2 where it belongs as well, and finally nothing after 24:11. Note, obvious later additions such as Jesus promising Simon Peter to the Devil in 22:31-33 also would not have been in this Luke. If you likewise follow Harold Riley's proposed proto-Matthew outline you have a better starting point.

In the end if this exercise were repeated on simpler basis, allowing the current compositions have been rearranged, and built up in a series of redactions, you can dispense with the cumbersome five scroll approach for Luke, as well as most of the need for Q. You can then actually apply sequential, redactional, form, and textual criticism to arrive at probable paths for many verses transmission from redaction to redaction. What this book proves is that a simpler model to explain step-wise the redactions is needed rather than a sweeping general theory such as the 2SH, 2GH ad FH give us. Only then can the Q impasse be truly broken.

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars What kind of review is the above one, November 6, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Beyond the Q Impasse (Paperback)

I am sorry, but the above review is quite barmy and has no place on a site such as this. Why on earth can't people review the books they are meant to without engaging in such obvious madness ? Jesus lived to 90 ? Shame no one in the ancient world thought to tell us so. Pity the reality (the ignoble execution of a Jewish peasant healer - thought by his followers to be the Messiah - is such a boring, conventional story for all the mad people out there). This book is a work of serious scholarship and ought to be treated as such. It has important implications for anyone engaged in the study of the gospels and Christian origins and is quite refreshing in its critique of common assumptions about the relationships between the primary texts.

0 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars About Beyond The Q Impasse, September 18, 2000

By 

J.B. Patterson (St. Augustine, Florida USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond the Q Impasse (Paperback)

Who wrote what Gospel first? Since 1924 it has seemed like a settled matter that the Gospel called Mark was the earliest of the four completed canonical gospels. But that Matthew and Luke shared material called Q, which Q, material which is not found in Mark would be still earlier than Mark's gospel. Q is a theoretical document since it is composed of material not found in Mark but extracted from Matthew and Luke. But if Q once existed, then Q would be an earler Gospel than Mark.

However lately, what has seemed since 1924 to have been so firmly settled about Q and Mark, has been challenged by William R. Farmer in his book: Beyond The Q Impasse---Luke's Use Of Matthew. This research revives a theory first generally proposed in 1764 by Henry Owen, that Matthew and Luke were earlier than Mark. And that Mark's gospel had combined Matthew and Luke in a way that excluded the Q material. If this is so, then it could be argued there never was a separate Q gospel. This divergent anti-Two Document direction of research appears to be too new for positive conclusions to be drawn from it. The synopsis so far is very interesting as a literary novelty. And probably worthy of being wrung out to the limit just to see where it goes.

But in this review, the case will be made that the Two Document theory is still valid. Because if Mark, Matthew and Luke were written separately, then the contrasting motives and purposes of the writers becomes transparently clear. And otherwise, as proposed by Farmer's theory, they do not. Contradictions are a key. Deliberate, intentional contradictions are what makes each gospel writer stand out from the others. Each has an aim not shared by competitors. They are all rivals. But Farmer does not deal with contradictions much if at all.

The second fatal flaw in the Farmer proposal is: They do not know the real Jesus survived the crucifixion and lived until his 90's. They do not deal with the fact there are two incompatable Christs in the New Testament. Therefore they do not know why each gospel is written. Therefore while their material is very interesting as a curiosity; it seems unimportant, even irrelevant, exactly how it was the gospel writers came up with such wrong conclusions as to proclaim the wrong "Christ". The best guess here is The Q Impasse is one of those ever recurring fads that come and go. Buy it if you like solving esoteric literary mysteries. But it can be safely ignored. I give it a one star grade only because there is no zero star listing allowed.