Book Review: Matthew C. Williams. Two Gospels from One: A Comprehensive Text-Critical Analysis of the Synoptic Gospels. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2006

Abstract

"Matthew C. Williams’ Two Gospels from One: A Comprehensive Text-Critical Analysis of the Synoptic Gospels promises more than it can deliver, misleads readers with its subtitle, and stymies rather than advances the agendas of text-critical research and gospel criticism. Williams’s study not only fails to shed new light on the Synoptic Problem, but also misappropriates (and misapplies) text-critical criteria to problems beyond their purview. The result is a work that amounts to little more than a cataloguing of well-known arguments for Marcan priority, encumbered by repeated attempts to tether a text-critical approach to the Synoptic Problem. Despite the appearance of copious detail, the work is selective in its treatment and founded upon a number of abstractions. 2. The work’s subtitle leads readers to expect detailed treatment of all three Synoptic Gospels. In fact, only Matthew and Mark are considered. Nor is every pericope relevant to the Synoptic Problem examined—less than a third of Mark’s evidence is taken up (173 verses, or 27%). The exclusion of arguments from “order” or any consideration of Q, both of critical relevance to the Synoptic Problem, further heightens the disparity between the work’s claim and its execution. The author acknowledges these limitations, but makes no effort to reconcile them with the subtitle (p. 46-47). On the contrary, the grand claim is carried over into the first chapter heading: “A Proposed Method for Solving the Synoptic Problem.”"(pg 1)