Luke's Order and the Sermon on the Mount

 

 (The following notes are based on Mark Goodacre’s book The Case Against Q)

Perhaps the most significant, and for many the most convincing argument against Luke’s use of Matthew would be his arrange of the material in the double tradition, in particular the Sermon on the Mount/Plain material. 

Matthew’s “five blocks” of teaching material are generally marked off by the phrase “When Jesus had finished…” (Matthew 7:28; 11:1; 13:53; 19:1; 26:1). However, in Luke, this material is often scattered all over the place. Since Matthew was more “neat” in his writing, and if Luke was using Matthew, why would he arrange his common material in such a different way than Matthew did in his gospel?

Goodacre spends the chapter noting that it appears to be a common literary practice of Luke to arrange the material in this way, not just in Matthew, but also in Luke’s use of Mark:

“First, the observation concerning Luke's use of Mark is overstated, for there are several Markan incidents that are transposed by Luke. 22 While most of the incidents related in the earlier "Galilee" section of Luke, in 4:14-6:16 and 8:4- 9:50, broadly follow Mark's order, there is a good deal of material that is out of sequence.: Jesus' Rejection at Nazareth (Luke 4:16-30) comes much earlier on ( cf. Mark 6:1-6); the Call of the Disciples (Luke 5: 1-11 ) comes later (cf. Mark 1:16-20); the Naming of the Twelve (Luke 6:12- 16) and the Ministering to Multitudes (Luke 6:17-19) are invened (cf. Mark 3:13-19 and 3:7-12); the Anointing is brought forward (Luke 7:36-50; cf. Mark 14:3-9); and the Mother and Brothers pericope is kept for later (Luke 8:19-21; cf. Mark 3:31-35). On nearly all of these occasions, Matthew's order is closer to Mark's. Moreover, it is wellknown that Luke's Passion Narrative makes significant depanures from Mark whereas Matthew's is much more faithful to Mark.” (Goodacre, pg. 87) 

Another example of this would be how Luke handles the parables-material in Mark 4:

As Michael Goulder notes:

“[Luke] has indeed embodied part of it [the Sermon on the Mount] in his own Sermon on the Plain, scattered part, and omitted part; but his action has not been wanton, nor to the four winds, and the question of what moved him is not beyond resolution if it is taken seriously .... Luke treats it just as he treats long discourses in Mark. He regularly likes teaching pericopes of about twelve to twenty verses, which he regards as the amount a congregation (or reader) can assimilate at one time; and he sets them apart with a proper introduction apiece.” (Goulder, Luke: A New Paradigm, pg. 93)

Thus many of the Farrer theorists have come to the conclusion that Luke had a desire for brevity in his writing and did not like long discourses. Christopher Tuckett, a proponent of the Two-Source hypothesis, responds by appealing to the long speeches in Acts, the speech of Stephen in Acts 7 in particular and the story of Cornelius’ conversion in Acts 10. 

“It is actually Tuckett's objections, however, that do not convince. Neither Luke 12:22-53 (32 verses), nor Luke 15:3-32 (30 verses), nor Luke 21:5-36 (31 verses), nor Acts 2:14- 36 (23 verses) is substantially longer than the twelve to twenty or so verses that Goulder suggests as a rule of thumb for Luke. And Acts 10, the story of Cornelius's conversion, features at most ten verses of direct speech at a rime (10:34-43).” (Goodacre, pg. 94) 

Regarding Stephen’s lengthy speech in Acts 7, Goodacre responds by noting that it is such a speech that could not be broken up. In the context of the storyline of the book of Acts, it wouldn’t have been fitting to omit and redestribute the material of Acts 7.