Personally, I think that Jesus's blasphemy was to puncture Those Holy Jews' vision of who The Lord is, and what Hashem wanted from them.
It's like the time as a young man that I took a day trip to the California coast with a friend and his younger sister. We took this bucolic drive, were almost there, and came upon a herd of sheep with dayglo identifiers spraypainted on the sheep. "That's so cruel!," exclaimed my friend's sister.
Cruel?, I thought to myself. As opposed to hanging a tag from their ears, or branding them? No, there was nothing cruel about it at all. The only cruelty was to her perception of what a flock of sheep should look like.
That's what Jesus did to the Saduccees and Pharisees.
So, do you adhere to the concept of Markan priority? Because it seems like there is a big push now to instead subscribe to Matthean priority. Some even claim that if you don't, you're being heretical or disobedient to the Magisterium. I know that in the past, some used Markan priority to try to deny that Jesus was God etc, but when I first learned it years ago, it was not applied in that way at my Catholic school.
I don’t know exactly what you’re looking for… Catholic exegete Raymond Brown in An Introduction to the New Testament, 1997, holds Marcan priority. Brant Pitre did hold a Q source stance, but now questions it. Also in “The Case for Jesus” does talk favorably about the Farrer hypothesis. Fr. Raymond Collins works presuppose Marcan priority.
All of these guys are considered top of the line Catholic Biblical exegetes. I can’t really find anything from Cardinal Vanhoye or Cardinal Dulles though they adhere to the 1964 PBC document.
The PBC issued a document in 1964. Santa Mater Ecclesia which permitted biblical scholars to engage with hypotheses.
The PBC with John Paul II in 1993: "To explain both the agreements and disagreements between the three synoptic Gospels, scholars had recourse to the 'two source' hypothesis. According to this, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were composed out of two principal sources: on the one hand, the Gospel of Mark and, on the other, a collection of the sayings of Jesus (called Q...). In their essential features, these two hypotheses retain their prominence in scientific exegesis today—though they are also under challenge."
In 2003, Cardinal Ratzinger would say on the 100th anniversary of the PBC “with regard to the Synoptic question, Maier sustained the so-called two-source theory, accepted today by almost everyone."
I do hold Mark’s composition textually to be written first being more representative of hupomnemata, I hold to the Farrer hypothesis.
Not rejected by the magisterium of the Catholic Church.
I didn't think either Marcan or Mathean priority was heretical, I thought they were reasonable alternative views. Both are taught at the Catholic theology schools I know of (which are not heterodox) although the instructors tend to favor, sometimes strongly, particular theories and right now Matthean seems to have more fans. I know Marcan was taught in Catholic schools for decades before Mathean started rearing its head again.
The "heretical" label tends to come from a certain contingent who are either at their first theology rodeo or think that all the documents of the PBC prior to its reform as an advisory body are still magisterially binding, regardless of what was issued thereafter, or what Ratzinger wrote in his anniversary address. (Akin is not a good source for topics dealing with that last because he has repeatedly expressed some unusual theory that non-enforced magisterial positions fall into "desuetude" and he does not have the educational creds to back that statement up.) I was hoping my Scripture professors would address this disconnect in the PBC authority but for various reasons that hasn't happened, so here I am bumbling around in the theologically safe spaces I can find asking people who might reasonably respond 😀
So,I think what you’re looking for and I would have to double check it, but one of my biblical exegete professors, Dr. Matthew Ramage, does talk about the “disconnect,” or change with the PBC in his book “Jesus Interpreted: Benedict XVI, Bart Ehrman, and the Historical Truth of the Gospels.”
I’m out right now, but I can take a look this evening and get back to you. Ramage does go over this development, If my memory is serving me.
That being said I’ll say 2 things—
1. The occasion for this article is to answer the biblical consensus who argues for Marcan priority & then claims Jesus doesn’t claim to be God.
2. I’m not a hardliner on it. I am totally willing to be convinced of Matthean priority.
Before there was Abraham, I AM.
Personally, I think that Jesus's blasphemy was to puncture Those Holy Jews' vision of who The Lord is, and what Hashem wanted from them.
It's like the time as a young man that I took a day trip to the California coast with a friend and his younger sister. We took this bucolic drive, were almost there, and came upon a herd of sheep with dayglo identifiers spraypainted on the sheep. "That's so cruel!," exclaimed my friend's sister.
Cruel?, I thought to myself. As opposed to hanging a tag from their ears, or branding them? No, there was nothing cruel about it at all. The only cruelty was to her perception of what a flock of sheep should look like.
That's what Jesus did to the Saduccees and Pharisees.
So, do you adhere to the concept of Markan priority? Because it seems like there is a big push now to instead subscribe to Matthean priority. Some even claim that if you don't, you're being heretical or disobedient to the Magisterium. I know that in the past, some used Markan priority to try to deny that Jesus was God etc, but when I first learned it years ago, it was not applied in that way at my Catholic school.
The source I cite from Jimmy Akin gives you a quick run down on the debate written in 2025 ⬇️
https://www.catholic.com/audio/tjap/which-gospel-was-written-first
Is there a more scholarly source? Jimmy Akin is a little weird/ off at times.
I don’t know exactly what you’re looking for… Catholic exegete Raymond Brown in An Introduction to the New Testament, 1997, holds Marcan priority. Brant Pitre did hold a Q source stance, but now questions it. Also in “The Case for Jesus” does talk favorably about the Farrer hypothesis. Fr. Raymond Collins works presuppose Marcan priority.
All of these guys are considered top of the line Catholic Biblical exegetes. I can’t really find anything from Cardinal Vanhoye or Cardinal Dulles though they adhere to the 1964 PBC document.
It’s not heretical.
The PBC issued a document in 1964. Santa Mater Ecclesia which permitted biblical scholars to engage with hypotheses.
The PBC with John Paul II in 1993: "To explain both the agreements and disagreements between the three synoptic Gospels, scholars had recourse to the 'two source' hypothesis. According to this, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were composed out of two principal sources: on the one hand, the Gospel of Mark and, on the other, a collection of the sayings of Jesus (called Q...). In their essential features, these two hypotheses retain their prominence in scientific exegesis today—though they are also under challenge."
In 2003, Cardinal Ratzinger would say on the 100th anniversary of the PBC “with regard to the Synoptic question, Maier sustained the so-called two-source theory, accepted today by almost everyone."
I do hold Mark’s composition textually to be written first being more representative of hupomnemata, I hold to the Farrer hypothesis.
Not rejected by the magisterium of the Catholic Church.
I didn't think either Marcan or Mathean priority was heretical, I thought they were reasonable alternative views. Both are taught at the Catholic theology schools I know of (which are not heterodox) although the instructors tend to favor, sometimes strongly, particular theories and right now Matthean seems to have more fans. I know Marcan was taught in Catholic schools for decades before Mathean started rearing its head again.
The "heretical" label tends to come from a certain contingent who are either at their first theology rodeo or think that all the documents of the PBC prior to its reform as an advisory body are still magisterially binding, regardless of what was issued thereafter, or what Ratzinger wrote in his anniversary address. (Akin is not a good source for topics dealing with that last because he has repeatedly expressed some unusual theory that non-enforced magisterial positions fall into "desuetude" and he does not have the educational creds to back that statement up.) I was hoping my Scripture professors would address this disconnect in the PBC authority but for various reasons that hasn't happened, so here I am bumbling around in the theologically safe spaces I can find asking people who might reasonably respond 😀
Okay!
So,I think what you’re looking for and I would have to double check it, but one of my biblical exegete professors, Dr. Matthew Ramage, does talk about the “disconnect,” or change with the PBC in his book “Jesus Interpreted: Benedict XVI, Bart Ehrman, and the Historical Truth of the Gospels.”
I’m out right now, but I can take a look this evening and get back to you. Ramage does go over this development, If my memory is serving me.
That being said I’ll say 2 things—
1. The occasion for this article is to answer the biblical consensus who argues for Marcan priority & then claims Jesus doesn’t claim to be God.
2. I’m not a hardliner on it. I am totally willing to be convinced of Matthean priority.