Provenance 87
PROVENANCE
From the time of the influential work of Kilpatrick,34 many have held that this book is not the work of an individual author but the product of a Christian community. Whoever wrote it was simply putting down the materials, liturgical and otherwise, that were circulating in his church. Doubtless this unknown writer ordered the material in various ways, but the book as a whole is best seen as the product of community thought and catechesis, rather than the theological and literary contribution of a single author. Indeed, Kilpatrick argues that the community deliberately and pseudonymously assigned the work to Matthew in order to ensure its wider acceptance in the Christian church.
On the basis of form criticism (see chap. 1 above), Stendahl argues that the conception of individual authorship must be relegated to an entirely subsidiary role. Unlike Kilpatrick, however, he thinks the group that produced Matthew is not some church as a whole but a school, a group within the community devoted to study and instruction, and particularly interested in the way the ancient Hebrew Scriptures are to be related to Christian life and thought. 35
These proposals no longer have the influence they once did. In part, this owes something to redaction criticism (see chap. 1), with its insistence that the evangelists, even if they took over traditional material, so presented it and shaped it that they gave it a distinctive theological cast. Reasons for a more traditional ascription of authorship
were outlined in the last section. But whether this gospel is understood to be the product of a single author or a community of thought, one must try to hazard a guess as to its geographic provenance. 36 Because the Fathers held the work to have been written first in Aramaic, quite naturally they also presupposed that it was written in Palestine. Indeed, Jerome specifically ties it to Judea (De vir. ill. 3). Certainly a Palestinian origin makes sense of many features: the inclusion of Aramaic words without translation (see Matt. 5:22; 6:24; 27:6), the assumption of some Jewish customs, the bilingual character of the text forms when the Old Testament is cited, and the adoption for literary purpose of forms of speech that are more typically Semitic than Greek.
Most scholars today, however, opt for Syria as the place of origin. This choice depends primarily on two factors: (1) the adoption of a date after A.D. 70, by which time most of Palestine was destroyed; (2) the influence of Streeter,37 who argued for Antioch as the provenance of this gospel. The first factor, we shall argue, is too subjective; the second is far more important. Not all of Streeter’s arguments are weighty. But Antioch did boast a very large Jewish population yet was the first center for outreach to the Gentile world; these two realities come together rather forcefully in Matthew, "which breathes a Jewish atmosphere and yet looks upon the Gentile mission in a most favorable light.” 38 Moreover, the gospel of Matthew has its first convincing external attestation in the writings of Ignatius, bishop of Antioch in the early years of the second century (see Eph. 19:1-3 and Matt. 2; Smyr. 1:1 and Matt. 3:15; Polyc. 2:2 and Matt. 10:16). Neither argument is conclusive, still less so others that have been adduced, but Syria, if not necessarily Antioch, is an entirely plausible suggestion.
Other centers have been suggested: Alexandria, Caesarea Maritima, Edessa, and Phoenicia all have their champions. The most plausible alternative to Syria is the Transjordan, defended by Slingerland, 39 who notes that both Matt. 4:25 and 19:1 seem to view Jesus’ presence in Palestine from the east side of the Jordan. That is possible, though Davies and Allison cautiously argue against such a reading of the text.40
In short, we cannot be certain of the geographic provenance of this gospel. Syria is perhaps the most likely suggestion, but nothing of importance hangs on the decision.