LE3 .A278 2013

2013

Evans, Craig

Acadia University

Master of Arts

Masters

Theology

Acadia Divinity College

This work will investigate the claim made by Kloppenborg and others that the Gospel of Thomas affords its readers with an accurate record of Jesus’ vineyard parable. This position will be challenged on several fronts. A wide review of the context in which the Marcan Jesus told his parable will be examined and will show that the story fits well within Jesus’ agenda of self-identification at that time. A look at the social and cultural context of first-century Palestine will show that Jesus most likely spoke and read Greek and also had access to Greek translations of the OT. Further, an examination of the parable and its accompanying cornerstone saying will show that the allegorical elements are fitting and necessary to Jesus’ plan of self-identification. viii Finally, the Gospel of Thomas will be scrutinized for its reliability to accurately portray the historical Jesus. This area of work is largely indebted to Simon J. Gathercole’s The Composition of the Gospel of Thomas: Original Language and Influences (vol. 151 of SNTSMS; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012) and Mark Goodacre’s Thomas and the Gospels: The Case for Thomas’s Familiarity with the Synoptics (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012). Their expansive efforts amply demonstrate Thomas’ reliance on Mark’s gospel as filtered through the redactions of Matthew and Luke. Further thanks is owed to Craig A. Evans for graciously lending his support to this area of research by sharing his paper “Doubting Thomas: On the Genesis of a Syrian Gospel,” delivered at the 2012 Triennial Conference of the Tyndale Fellowship for Biblical and Theological Research. He contends that Thomas is a second-century text with origins in an early form of Syrian Christianity. Throughout the following, a specific question will serve as the guide. Do the scholarly evidence and arguments justify giving priority to the Thomasine version of the parable of the Vineyard? Following a review of the related material, this question will be answered negatively. The conclusion of this work is that Thomas is secondary while Mark provides an accurate portrayal of the vineyard parable and, indeed, the historical Jesus. The gospels of the New Testament offer modern readers the most reliable information related to Jesus’ life, ministries, death, and resurrection and Mark’s gospel warrants priority.

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https://scholar.acadiau.ca/islandora/object/theses:302