Chapter 4 traces instances where the Synoptic authors self-consciously draw attention to their tradition’s status as written in bids for authority, often in reference to prior Gospels that they consider inferior. An initial section introduces the terms “textual self-consciousness” and “competitive textualization.” Following this section, the chapter addresses moments in each of the Synoptic Gospels where the author or authors draw attention to their status as written tradition. For Mark, the chapter highlights Mark 13:14, though it also shows how Mark is aware of Jewish Scriptures and positions himself with reference to them. For Matthew, the chapter makes an original scholarly contribution by focusing upon Matthew 1:1’s reference to the Gospel as a biblos (“book”), which shows that what Mark considered a “gospel” Matthew considered a “book.” For Luke, the chapter focuses upon the Lukan prologue of Luke 1:1–4, and specifically Luke’s awareness that he is entering a market for Jesus books by writing his Gospel.
The article argues that current debates over method in historical Jesus studies reveal two competing 'models' for how to use the gospel tradition in order to approach the historical Jesus. These models differ over their treatments of the narrative frameworks of the Gospels and, concomitantly, their views of the development of the Jesus tradition. A first model, inspired by form criticism and still advocated today, attempts to attain a historical Jesus 'behind' the interpretations of early Christians. A second model, inspired by advances in historiography and memory theory, posits an unattainable historical Jesus on the basis of the interpretations of the early Christians, and as part of a larger process of accounting for how and why early Christians came to view Jesus in the ways that they did. Advocating the latter approach to the historical Jesus and responding to previous criticism, this essay argues further that these two models are methodologically and epistemologically incompatible. It therefore challenges the suggestion that one can affirm the goals of the second model while maintaining the methods of the first model.
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