Matthew - Introduction

Introduction

Matthew is, of course, the first of the gospels. None of the gospels have the name of the authors, but from the earliest days all the gospels were associated with the names we know them by. Despite this there are those who doubt the authorship, but there would be wouldn’t there! I don’t intend to dwell on authorship, you can look in any good evangelical commentary, or the NT Introduction noted at the bottom, if you want to investigate the gory details. I will simply take it to have been written by Matthew, the tax collector disciple known as Levi.

Traditionally Matthew was taken to be the earliest gospel, though nowadays second or third is more common. However, there it is possible he was the first. 

Matthew is one of the three synoptic gospels (Mark and Luke being the other two), which cover broadly the same material, but each has its own perspective. Whereas Luke was geared towards a Gentile audience, Matthew is very much the Jewish gospel, aimed at a Jewish audience. Matthew stresses the fulfilment of Old Testament scriptures in Christ. It is also sometimes called the “Royal Gospel”, with its emphasis on kingdom and the servant king. Along with Luke, Matthew gives a birth narrative, but looking at different aspects to Luke.

It is difficult to know exactly when Matthew was written. Most date it after Mark, assuming that Matthew used Mark as a source for some of his material. However, it might be that they both used a common source, in which case the date of Mark is less relevant in dating Matthew. However, the most popular dates among evangelical scholars are between AD 60 and 70. 

Papias, a second century Christian, said that Matthew was originally written in Hebrew (Aramaic), and you may hear this claim still being made today. However, there are two things against this claim. The first is that there are no Aramaic manuscripts of Matthew, all the ones we have are in Greek. Secondly, the Greek is of quite a polished nature (better quality than Mark), and gives no indication of having been translated from Aramaic.

There are various ways of looking at Matthew, but many take five main discourses of Jesus as the framework. So we have:

Sermon on the Mount (chapters 5-7)

Commissioning of the apostles (chapter 10)

Kingdom parables (chapter 13)

Kingdom life (chapter 18)

The olivet discourse (chapters 24,25)

Bibliography

An Introduction to the New Testament, D A Carson, D J Moo, and L Morris, Apollos (1992)

The Message of Matthew, Michael Green, The Bible Speaks Today, IVP (1988)

Zondervan TNIV Study Bible, Zondervan

NKJV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, Zondervan