The Gospel of Matthew. Author?

FallenCopt

A book by Owen Chadwick, A HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY, states on page 14 lines 4 through 9 this information:

"But it is now almost certain that this idea of a lost Hebrew text is not true, and that all the books of the New Testement were written in Greek. Whoever wrote st. Matthew's gospel, he was not the tax collector who rose from his table to be an apostle."

Now what would lead someone to believe this from reading Owen's book?
I really don't know what's stoping me eccept for the last bit of faith I claim to have. Honestly now, someone tell me why Matthew's gospel was not written by Matthew, or is this information not accurate. Or is it that the author is not taking into account the supernatural abilities given to the apostles by the Holy Spirit.

Unknown

As far as I myself am concerned Matthew was author of his Gospel..most if not all anyway..

FallenCopt

Ya I think so too, thanks for your comment.

Unknown

No problem :)..I can ask and get back to you if you'd like actual facts..

FallenCopt

sure

copt-icboy

lol, things like that make me laugh. My sister was in a Catholic university, in a theology class, they decided that Saint Paul didn't write 9 out of the 14 epistles he wrote. So I guess the conept is not new, they are trying to discredit the Bible.

Shamas

Hi all

I found some information about that problem in the exgesis of The Gospel of St. Mathew By Fr. Tadros Yakoob Malaty (in Arabic language) in the following link
http://www.servant13.net/newtestament/index.htm

I don't know whether we can find the English translation of his book on the web. However, I'll try to state some points that I undrstode from his book:

1- the problem of the source of the four gospels arose in the western churchs in the 18 century but the orintal churchs didn't feel this problem.

2- "Every scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 3:17 that the person dedicated to God may be capable and equipped for every good work. " (2 Timothy:3)

"Above all, you do well if you recognize this: No prophecy of scripture ever comes about by the prophet’s own imagination, 1:21 for no prophecy was ever borne of human impulse; rather, men carried along by the Holy Spirit spoke from God."(2 peter 1)

+if the gospel was inspired by God. So, why are we searching for the Author?

3- the theory of Hebrow text is assumbtion by Bishob Marsh
note: I don't know who is man?!
who said that there is a primitive gospel that all the evanglesits refere to in their writing their gospels.
this theory has many many logical questions about his theory as Abouna Tadros mentioned from them:

-if there ,really, a primitive source why the church didn't keep this source?

4- Saying St.Mathew is the Author of the book depends on the testemony of Bishob Babias of Herapolis (118 A. D) and others.

5- this is a question from me: what is the evidence that the writer use to conclude his conclusion in his book?

this is a very short answer. If somebody has a lot of free time can he please, do a research on that topic.

peace and love

awad

jesus's lived way before the gospel of matt was written the gospel of matt was written in about 65 ce or annos dommoni
now they believe that this is not matt the apostle because christian scholars believe that his gospel was written after mark and lukes because he had references beforehand about jesus and his gospel is connected.

hope that helps...

jfranklin

But it is now almost certain that this idea of a lost Hebrew text is not true, and that all the books of the New Testement were written in Greek

At the heart of this controversy is whether the New Testament was first written in Aramaic and then translated{or transliterated} into Greek or vice versa.There's tons of evidence proving that Aramaic{"the lost Hebrew text"...lol}was indeed the original language of the New Testament,which was in fact the very language of Jesus and Matthew.Matthew did write his Gospel and he certainly penned his book in the original language of his day--Aramaic.A good site that has oodles and oodles of information about the Aramaic New Testament-the Peshitta, is www.peshitta.org


I think this website will give you more than enough information proving that Aramaic was the original language used in Matthews Gospel,providing more evidence that the Apostle Matthew was indeed the author{under inspiration of the Holy Spirit}. :)

Unknown

I think its really irrelevant to the Bible believing Christian as to what language the Gospels were first written in. The book of Acts testifies to the fact that the disciples received the Holy Spirit and were able to speak in tongues. Liberal protestant scholars who have warped ideas concerning the Gospel i.e. some of whom want to deny any and all forms of supernaturalism, obviously then dont take this into account.

In any event, its already been proven that Christ and His disciples would have spoken Hebrew, aramaic, AND Greek. People of 1st century palestine were living in a metropolitan type area and would have been multi-linguists. Greek was certainly a common language at the time, even for the Jews, hence the translation of the Jewish scriptures into the Greek in 300 B.C., what we know today as the Septuagint.

Guys, we have the early church testimony as to who wrote the Gospels. Authorship debates are fairly recent, within the last couple of centuries to so, although few conservative evangelical scholars have stayed true to the early church testimony and defended the authorship of these Gospels and exposed the presuppositions and bias of the liberals - liberal evangelicals remain the "majority" of so-called "scholars" who betray Christ and His disciples by causing confusion and casting doubt with their conjecture and wild speculations.

We must stand strong as Orthodox to remain faithful to the truth and tradition that we have received, and we know the apostles of Christ authored these Gospels, and there is enough external and internal evidence to prove this.