Positive Criteria for Authenticity
Positive Criteria for Authenticity
The following is a listing of the major criteria used for establishing the authenticity of various Gospel traditions.7 In a number of instances several similar criteria are combined below into one:
1. The Criterion of Multiple Attestation
This criterion investigates the teachings and actions of Jesus to see if they are found in independent sources of the Gospel tradition. A common use of this criterion is to see if different sources of the Gospel tradition witness to a similar teaching of Jesus. An example of this involves Jesus' teaching that the kingdom of God had arrived in His ministry; i.e., Jesus taught a “realized” eschatology. Building on the fact that the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke look alike and the generally accepted belief that this was due to Matthew's and Luke's having used Mark and a common non-Markan source/s (“Q”), along with their own special sources not found in the other Synoptic Gospels (“M” for Matthew and “L” for Luke), these different sources (Mark, “Q,” “M,” and “L”) were seen as independent witnesses to Jesus having taught that the kingdom of God had arrived in His ministry. Along with these witnesses found in the Synoptic Gospels,8 John provides still another witness; and at times the quotation of a Gospel tradition by Paul, James, or another NT writer can also serve as witnesses. Used with care, the Gospel of Thomas (GT) can also serve at times as a witness. When we do this, we find the following sources indicating that Jesus claimed that the kingdom of God had arrived in His ministry: Mark (2:21–22); “Q” (Luke 11:20); “M” (Matt 5:17); “L” (Luke 17:20–21); John (4:23); Paul (1 Cor 10:11; Col 1:13; 1 Thess 2:12); GT (113). Although not an absolute proof, such evidence certainly puts the burden of proof on anyone who would deny that Jesus taught a “realized eschatology.”
Another example of a teaching of Jesus that is multiply attested involves His teaching concerning God as “Father.” We find this in: Mark (11:25); “Q” (Matt 7:11); “M” (Matt 6:18); “L” (Luke 12:32); John (5:36–47); Paul (Rom 8:15–16; Gal 4:6); GT (40, 44). We find multiple attestation also with respect to Jesus' using the title “Son of Man” for Himself (Mark [8:38]; “Q” [Matt 24:27]; “M” [Matt 10:23]; “L” [Luke 17:22]; John [12:23]); His pronouncement of the coming destruction of the temple (cf. Mark [13:2; 14:57–58; 15:29]; “Q” [Luke 13:34–35]; “L” [Luke 19:41–44; cf. Acts 6:14]; John [2:18–22]); His teaching on divorce (Mark [10:11–12]; “Q” [Luke 16:18]; and Paul [1 Cor 7:10–11]); and the great reversal in which the outcasts are entering the kingdom of God and the religious elite are being excluded (Mark [2:15–17; 10:31]; “Q” [Matt 11:16–19]; “L” [Luke 15:1–32; 19:1–10]; “M” [Matt 20:16]; and John [4:1–42]).
Related to multiple attestations by various sources is multiple attestations by various literary forms. We find for example Jesus' teaching concerning the arrival of the kingdom of God in: pronouncement stories (Mark 2:18–20; 10:13–16); miracle stories (Luke 7:11–17; 11:20–21); sayings of Jesus (Mark 1:14–15; Luke 4:42–43); parables (Mark 2:21–22; Luke 14:15–24); etc. Although the expression “kingdom of God/heaven” is not explicitly mentioned in some of these examples, they all teach that the new age, i.e., the kingdom of God, has arrived. These two criteria are most useful in demonstrating the presence of a particular theme in Jesus' teaching rather than that a specific saying is authentic.
Along with establishing the probability of various teachings of Jesus being authentic, this criterion is also helpful in demonstrating Jesus' predilection for certain literary forms. For example, the most famous form of Jesus' teaching, the parable, is found in Mark (4:2–20; 12:1–11; 13:28–29); “Q” (Luke 14:16–24; Matt 25:14–30); “M” (Matt 25:1–13,31–46); “L” (10:29–37; 15:11–32; 16:1–9); and GT (20, 57, 63). With respect to Jesus' use of antithetical parallelism (poetic parallelism in which the second line is the opposite of the first), we find examples in Mark (2:19–20; 7:15; 8:35); “Q” (Matt 6:24; 10:32–33; 12:35); “M” (Matt 5:19; 7:17; 22:14); “L” (6:21a, 25a; 16:10); and GT (41, 119). His use of circumlocution (substituting “heaven,” “power,” “the Great King,” etc.) and the divine passive in which the passive tense is used in order to avoid using the sacred name of God (Exod 20:7) is witnessed to in various sources. Jeremias gives for the latter 21 examples in Mark, 23 in “Q,” 27 in “M,” and 25 in “L.”9
2. The Criterion of Embarrassment
This criterion for authenticity seeks out examples of Jesus' teaching and actions that created difficulties for the early church. Such embarrassing material would unlikely have been created by the early church, for it would have only provided material useful for her opponents. On the contrary, the tendency of the church was to explain and ameliorate such traditions. A number of examples of this criterion come to mind. One involves the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. The embarrassment created by Jesus' having experienced John's “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4) early created problems for the church (cf. Matt 3:13–15, Luke's omission of who baptized Jesus [3:21–22], and John's omission of Jesus' baptism altogether [1:19–37]), even as it continues to do so today. Its presence in the Gospel tradition is not due to someone's creating this out of nothing but rather that despite its embarrassment the church “was ‘stuck with’”10 this event in Jesus' life.
The saying of Jesus in Mark 13:32 (“But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father”) similarly reveals its authenticity by the difficulty it creates. Who in the early church would have created a saying of Jesus in which He acknowledged His ignorance of the time of the parousia? One need only note Luke's omission of this saying from his Gospel and the omission of “nor the Son” from numerous manuscripts of the Matt 24:36 parallel to recognize the difficulty it caused. If one compares the apocryphal gospels of the second, third, and fourth centuries, we find that the attribution of ignorance to the Son of God in Mark 13:32 is diametrically opposed to their tendency to create examples of His divine qualities and miracles and read them back into His infancy.11 The embarrassment this verse causes is a strong argument for its authenticity.12
Other examples of Gospel traditions that have a strong case for being considered authentic due to the embarrassment they cause include: the tradition that Jesus was betrayed by one of His own disciples, Judas Iscariot; Jesus' saying addressed to the rich, young, ruler: “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone” (Mark 10:18); the threefold denial of Peter, a highly esteemed leader in the early church; Jesus' crucifixion by the Romans; Jesus' saying about being “eunuchs for the sake of kingdom of heaven” (Matt 19:12);13 and the saying of Jesus in which He quotes His opponents as calling Him “a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners” (Matt 11:19);14 etc.
3. The Criterion of Dissimilarity
Of all the various criteria this criterion, also called “The Criterion of Discontinuity,” was seen as the most valuable new tool for Jesus research in the middle of the twentieth-century. Ernst Käsemann, a disciple of Bultmann, brought this to the forefront of the discussion by stating, “In only one case do we have more or less safe ground under our feet [in seeking authentic material]; when there are no grounds either for deriving a tradition from Judaism or for ascribing it to primitive Christianity.”15
In actuality this criterion has limited usage, for although the passages that fit this criterion have a strong probability of being authentic, it is applicable to only a small number of examples in the Gospel traditions. Furthermore, if we were to accept as authentic only the Jesus traditions that are dissimilar to the teachings of first-century Judaism and the early church, we might find some material whose authenticity is highly probable, but this would be atypical of Jesus as a whole. To emphasize these unique teachings of Jesus would of necessity lose sight of what is characteristic of Him. It would by definition result in an unjewish and unchristian Jesus! If we were to apply such a standard to the pursuit of the “authentic teachings of Martin Luther,” the result would be a Luther who has nothing in common with sixteenth-century Lutheranism and Roman Catholicism. While individual pieces of authentic tradition might be attained, the general portrait of Luther would be grossly misleading.
While helpful in identifying individual pieces of authentic tradition, this criterion is limited in providing us with a general understanding of the teachings and acts of Jesus. As for the negative use of the criterion (whenever a Gospel tradition possesses a parallel with first-century Judaism and early Christianity, it must be considered inauthentic), this is completely invalid. Having said this, there are several instances in which this criterion is useful in establishing authenticity: Jesus' rejection of fasting (Mark 2:18–20), which conflicts with the practice of Judaism in His day (Matt 9:14; Luke 18:11–12) and the early church (Matt 6:16–18; Acts 14:23); Jesus' frequent use of Abba in prayer, which is unique when compared to first-century Judaism, although it is found frequently in the early church (Rom 8:15–16; Gal 4:6; “Our Father, who …”); “there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile” (Mark 7:15) clearly conflicted with contemporary Jewish practice and the concern for not eating “unclean” food as well as the struggle of the early church with this issue (Acts 10–11) make it unlikely that Mark 7:15 is a creation of the early church!16 The fact that parables are found in the four Gospels and not the rest of the NT likewise argues in favor of the parables' being authentic.
A most valuable use of this tool involves the use of the title “Son of Man” by Jesus in the Gospels. The only clear instance of this title in contemporary Judaism in the sense in which Jesus used it is found in Dan 7:13.17 Although this title is found 69 times in the Synoptic Gospels and 13 times in John, it is found only four times in Acts-Revelation (Acts 7:56; Heb 2:6; Rev 1:13; 14:14), and only in the first instance is it used as a title for Jesus. Thus it appears highly unlikely that the use of this title for describing the Messiah or Jesus could have arisen out of first-century Judaism or the early church.18
4. The Criterion of Aramaic Linguistic and Palestinian Environmental Phenomena
Although often treated as two separate criteria, it is best to treat them together as a single one19 because they both seek to demonstrate that various Jesus traditions with these characteristics belong to the earliest stages of the Christian tradition and “the closer the approximation of a passage in the Gospels to the style and idiom of contemporary Aramaic, the greater the presumption of authenticity.”20 Although such sayings could have originated in the Palestinian, Aramaic-speaking church, the probability of this material's being authentic is considerably greater than if it betrayed Greek and non-Palestinian characteristics. This is especially true when other considerations also come into play. The presence of the following Aramaic expressions and words on the lips of Jesus in the Greek Gospel of Mark almost certainly go back to Jesus: 3:17 (Boanerges);21 5:14 (Talitha cum); 7:34 (Ephphatha); 8:12; 9:1 (Amēn translated as “Truly”); 14:36 (Abba); 15:34 (eloi eloi lama sabachthani!).
From the teachings of Jesus found in the Gospels, it is evident that He made great use of a variety of literary forms, such as antithetical parallelism (more than 138 examples), puns, parables, proverbs, etc. When we realize that a saying such as, “You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel!” (Matt 23:24), results in a pun when translated back into Aramaic (gnat, galma; camel, gamla), it is highly likely that this goes back to the historical Jesus (cf. other puns found in Mark 1:17; 4:9; 8:35; 10:31; Matt 16:18; Luke 9:59–60; John 3:8; etc.). The presence of a Palestinian context in Jesus' most famous form of teaching, the parables, also supports the authenticity of various parables. The sower in the parable of the four soils (Mark 4:2–20) sowing his seed before plowing appears to portray a uniquely Palestinian custom, and the separation of the good (kosher) fish from the bad (unkosher) fish in the parable of the great net (Matt 13:47–50) portrays the practice of Jewish fisherman on a “sea” (probably the Sea of Galilee). Similarly, the hiring of workmen in the parable of the gracious employer (Matt 20:1–16) betrays a Palestinian environment, for elsewhere such work was generally performed by slaves. This, along with the theme of the great reversal brought about by the arrival of the kingdom of God in Matt 20:16 (cf. Mark 10:31,43–44; Matt 19:30; Luke 13:30), argues forcefully for the parable's stemming from Jesus. Whereas the presence of Aramaic linguistic and Palestinian environmental characteristics in the sayings of Jesus does not “prove” that these sayings are authentic, they lend support (sometimes “strong” support) to the probability that they are.
5. The Criterion of Tradition Contrary to Editorial Tendency
This is essentially an aspect of the criterion of dissimilarity applied specifically to the inscripturation of the Jesus traditions in the four Gospels. If we find material in the Gospels that could not have arisen out of the evangelists' own interests but is included despite those interests, this suggests that the tradition was so familiar and well-known that the evangelist did not feel free to omit it: “The inclusion of material which does especially serve his [the evangelist's] purpose may very well be taken as a testimony to the authenticity of that material, or at least to the inclusion of it in the tradition of the Church in such a clear and consistent way that the evangelist was loath to omit it.”22 In such instances the evangelists witness to the antiquity and often the authenticity of the material “in spite of themselves.”23
Some examples of this are: Jesus' words, “For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John came” (Matt 11:13), which at first glance seems to conflict with Matthew's emphasis elsewhere of the Law's still being binding on Christians (cf. Matt 5:17–20; 7:12; 23:1–3; etc.); the reference to a Roman cohort and tribune (chiliarchos [John 18:12]) at the arrest of Jesus seems to conflict with John's tendency to minimize the Roman involvement in the arrest and trial of Jesus; and the portrait of the disciples in Mark, which on the one hand points out their dullness and lack of faith (4:35–41; 6:35–37,52; 8:4, 14–21; etc.) and on the other to their unique calling and leadership position in the church (1:16–20; 2:14; 6:7–13,30; 16:7), argues for both of these portrayals as being historical.
6. The Criterion of Frequency
This criterion is like the criterion of multiple attestation, but instead of seeking to ascertain the breadth of a teaching or literary form in the various sources, it considers the number of times that it is found within the Gospel tradition. It assumes that a teaching of Jesus that appears frequently in the Gospel tradition is more likely to have its origin with the historical Jesus than one that is found seldom. Consequently, just as the multiple witness of various sources to a tradition increases the probability of its being authentic, so the frequency of examples of the tradition also increases its probability. This is especially true if the examples are found in different literary sources. The fact that there are 76 separate sayings of Jesus concerning the kingdom of God found in the Gospels (103 if parallels are included) argues in favor of this being an emphasis in the teachings of the historical Jesus. Likewise, the fact that parables make up 16 percent of Mark, 29 percent of “Q,” 43 percent of “M,” and 52 percent of “L,” and that about one-third of Jesus' teachings in the Gospels is in the form of parables24 argues for the authenticity of Jesus' use of this literary form. Similarly, the presence of 138 examples of antithetical parallelism in the Gospels25 and 96 examples of the divine passive (21 in Mark, 23 in “Q,” 27 in “M,” and 25 in “L”)26 also argues for their origin in the historical Jesus. Whereas the amount of this material in the Gospels does not prove that each individual example is authentic, it shifts the burden of proof from the one who argues in favor of its historicity to the one who argues against it.27
7. The Criterion of Coherence
This criterion is built on the results of the six listed above. It maintains that once a critical mass of Jesus' authentic teachings and actions has been established by these criteria, we can then assume that this critically assured minimum can serve as a template to determine other probably authentic material in the Gospels.28 Although the material fitting the criterion of coherence does not possess the degree of certainty of the first six, it enables scholars to build on the base established by the first six and construct an overall portrayal of the life and teachings of Jesus. Thus we can assume that material fitting: Jesus' teaching on the arrival of the kingdom of God, God as His Father and the Father of those who followed Him, the Son of Man as Jesus' favorite self-designation, His proclamation of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in the near future, His baptism by John, His betrayal by one of His disciples, the involvement of the Romans in His arrest and trial, His mother tongue's being Aramaic, His selection of the Twelve to be His disciples despite their many failures, His teaching in parables and antithetical parallelism, etc., should generally be assumed as authentic and that the burden of proof lies with those who deny their authenticity.