The Demise of the Two-Document Hypothesis? Dunn and Burkett on Gospel Sources

Abstract

Two recently published books by James Dunn and Delbert Burkett, Jesus Remembered and Rethinking the Gospel Sources, pose critical challenges to the two-document hypothesis. Dunn's advocacy of oral tradition(s) to account for a significant proportion of the synoptic tradition militates against the two-document hypothesis, despite his continuing adherence to it. Burkett's arguments against direct literary relations between any of the synoptic gospels and his hypothetical reconstruction of a number of pre-canonical gospel sources, including three separate written versions of Proto-Mark, constitute a direct assault on the two-document hypothesis. Despite significant differences between Dunn and Burkett, the combined effect of their respective challenges to re-conceive the interrelations between the synoptic gospels is the inadequacy of the two-document hypothesis as traditionally understood and taught.