On how many donkeys did Jesus ride into Jerusalem?
Posted on Apr.01, 2009. Filed in John, Luke, Mark, Matthew. Average rating: 4.7 / 10 (Rate It).
In all four gospels, Jesus provocatively rides into Jerusalem on a young donkey in fulfilment the prophecy in Zechariah 9:9, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” By this symbolic act Jesus claimed to be the king of the Jews. From here on in, events accelerate towards Jesus’ trial and execution.
In three of the four accounts of the triumphal entry, Jesus rides a single donkey. Matthew, though, apparently misunderstands the prophecy and, rather absurdly, has Jesus ride two donkeys.
We begin with Mark’s account, in which the disciples bring just one donkey (”a colt that has never been ridden”) for Jesus to ride into Jerusalem:
When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, “Why are you doing this?” just say this, “The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.”‘ They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them, ‘What are you doing, untying the colt?’ They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. [Mark 11:1-7 (NRSV)]
Similarly in Luke, only one donkey is involved:
When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, saying, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone ask you, “Why are you untying it?” just say this: “The Lord needs it.”‘ So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, ‘Why are you untying the colt?’ They said, ‘The Lord needs it.’ Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. [Luke 19:29-35 (NRSV)]
John is much more concise, but again describes Jesus riding a single donkey:
Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it; as it is written: ‘Do not be afraid, daughter of Zion. Look, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!’ [John 12:14-15 (NRSV)]
The prophecy in Zechariah 9:9, recall, said that the king would come ”riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey”. The repetition here is typical of Hebrew poesy, with the donkey being described twice in different words. Matthew, though, appears not to have understood this. Matthew seems to have thought that the prophecy described the king riding both a donkey and a colt and so introduced a second donkey into the triumphal entry:
When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, “The Lord needs them.” And he will send them immediately.’ This took place to fulfil what had been spoken through the prophet, saying, ‘Tell the daughter of Zion, Look your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’ The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their clothes on them, and he sat on them. [Matthew 21:1-7 (NRSV)]
In Mark, Luke, and John, then, Jesus rode one donkey, while in Matthew he rode two.
So, on how many donkeys did Jesus ride into Jerusalem?
N.B. All posts are written in a style sympathetic to the claim of Biblical error, even in cases where the author ("Errancy") disagrees with the claim. See the About page for the site's philosophy.
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April 1st, 2009 on 9:35 am
Matthew seems to add the word “and” to the prophecy…
April 1st, 2009 on 3:27 pm
και can mean either “and” or “even”, so I don’t think that’s particularly significant.
April 1st, 2009 on 4:43 pm
The second donkey was the colt’s mother. That is why they had to bring both.
As for Jesus sitting on them, Matthew may well have been referring to the donkeys. But we don’t have to imagine that Jesus was somehow straddling both beasts or running back and forth between them or any similar absurdity.
Try this:
Does this imply that all 45 players were holding their coach up?
April 2nd, 2009 on 9:40 am
“και can mean either “and” or “even”, so I don’t think that’s particularly significant.”
Well, if Matthew is reading it from the Septuagint, he seems to have understood it to mean “and”.
This is one of those cases where – if you’re not already committed to inerrancy – it’s obvious what has actually occurred. Matthew has misread the prophecy and has therefore altered Mark to suit his misreading.
April 2nd, 2009 on 1:13 pm
I am committed to inerrancy, but I don’t see how that’s coloring my reading of what Matthew said.
Obviously his citation of Zechariah does not get the exact words of Zechariah. New Testament quotations seldom do. In judging whether an error exists in a passage from antiquity (and I’m not just talking about the Bible here), we ought not measure the ancient quotation by 21st century standards of accuracy.
There is an addition of the word “and” as it comes out in these translations. But what does that really prove? Even in English, there’s some sort of rhetorical device (I forget the name of it) that involves the use of repetition in a conjunctive sentence. Because the sentence is conjunctive, it looks like you are making two separate claims, but you are really making one claim twice for the purpose of emphasis and memorability: “I struck him with a sword, and with the edge of a blade, I slashed him”. That sort of thing.
The Zechariah passage uses a slightly different repetition pattern than the pattern Matthew uses. But both patterns repeat for the sake of emphasis and memorability. And they repeat the same claim (that the King comes riding on a donkey). What exactly is the error?
Are you suggesting that Matthew added the second donkey because he did not understand this rhetorical device? Or are you suggesting that he added the second donkey because he first added an “and” to the prohecy? Or what?
It seems to me that if, as I believe, the author of Matthew was Matthew, it make very little sense to say that he would not understand the rhetorical device in question. Matthew was not a scholar, but oral tradition was still so important in those days that I don’t see how he could have missed it. He would have heard the kind of flourish that Zechariah uses hundreds of times. And he would know what it meant.
And if, contrary to my belief, the author of Matthew is some editor working with Mark and some Q document. The assumption that the author made that kind of mistake is even less plausible. For now we are dealing with a scholar of some sort who would be quite familiar with rhetorical flourishes.
What seems most plausible to me is:
That (the author of) Matthew made the same repetition in quoting Zechariah that Zechariah himself made in the prophecy.
That Matthew slightly altered the form of the repetition (or not, this may all be a translation issue).
That whatever alteration he made was minor.
That the colt and its mother could not be separated, so there were two donkeys.
That Matthew saw this and reported it.
That Jesus rode on only one of the donkeys.
That Matthew reported this using team/group language.
April 2nd, 2009 on 1:53 pm
“Are you suggesting that Matthew added the second donkey because he did not understand this rhetorical device? Or are you suggesting that he added the second donkey because he first added an “and” to the prohecy?”
Either Matthew misunderstood and so added “and” to the prophecy, or it was already there in his copy of the Old Testament. It makes no difference – either way this is the cause of his need to add a second animal.
April 2nd, 2009 on 7:26 pm
Some of this will repeat earlier points I’ve made, but I can’t seem to make the response read well without doing so. Please bear with me.
Your argument is, in essence, that EITHER Matthew OR a later editor/author OR the translators of the LXX didn’t understand repetition as a literary device. As a result of this misunderstanding (the author of) Matthew ‘cooked’ Mark’s account to mention 2 donkeys.
This seems implausible to me. The problem is that Matthew, and the editor/author of Matthew (if there was one) and the translators of LXX knew the languages in question with a familiarity that would make contemporary scholars green with envy. They got the repetition device (whether there was an “and” in it or not).
Also, to what end would (the author of) Matthew ‘cook’ Mark’s account? Even if he or the LXX translators did not understand the repetition device? Mark is still out there in ‘uncooked’ form.
Would Matthew assume that everyone would just stop referring to Mark in favor of his rendition? Because that’s the only way that cooking the account helps…Mark has to go away. As long as Mark is referenced people will see that the prophecy was not fulfilled. (Remember, I’m assuming that Matthew’s author, whether through his own fault or the LXX’s, misunderstands the original prophecy so that two donkeys are necessary.)
It seems unlikely that Matthew could imagine that his gospel would replace Mark’s. It seems even less likely that a later author could imagine that.
So why did Matthew mention the mother donkey?
If the donkey in question was a foal, that means it was less than a year old, and it might still have been suckling. Whether it was still suckling or not, that donkey could not easily be separated from its mother. Wherever the one goes, there goes the other. So the reason Matthew said that there were two donkeys is because there were two donkeys: the colt (which all accounts agree upon) and it’s mother.
To me the question isn’t why Matthew mentioned the mother. That seems obvious. It’s because she was there. The question is why Mark, Luke and John failed to do so.
Now, one might argue that a later author copying from Mark added the foal’s mother into the Matthew account because she was very likely to have been there anyway (his being a foal and all that). That seems more arguable to me than any assumption of misunderstanding of the prophecy on the part of Matthew, a later author or the translators of LXX.
April 3rd, 2009 on 10:39 am
“Also, to what end would (the author of) Matthew ‘cook’ Mark’s account? [...] Mark is still out there in ‘uncooked’ form.”
This is hardly the only case where Matthew alters Mark for his own purposes. For example, in Mark 11, Jesus curses a fig tree and it withers overnight, whereas in Matthew 21 it withers at once.
So he’s clearly not too concerned that Mark is “out there” contradicting him.
April 3rd, 2009 on 12:45 pm
Other strong examples of Matthew altering Mark are:
Mark 10:35-37, c.f. Matthew 20:20-21.
In Mark, the sons of Zebedee make a silly request of Jesus. In Matthew, it is their mother instead.
Mark 6:5 cf. Matthew 13:58.
Mark says Jesus could not do much. Matthew says he did not do much.
Mark 10:17-18 cf. Matthew 19:16-17.
When asked a question, Mark’s Jesus rejects the label “good”. Matthew rewords both the question and answer to avoid this.
Mark 4:38 cf. Matthew 8:25.
Mark has the disciples berate Jesus disrespectfully, whereas in Matthew they merely plead.
Matthew also systematically purges almost all reference to Jesus feeling emotion (Mk 1:41, 1:43, 3:5, 8:12, 10:14, 10:21) or asking questions (Mk 5:30, 6:38, 9:16, 9:21, 9:33).
So yes, I take it that Matthew has no qualms about altering Mark.
As a tangential point, these things are all strong evidence that Matthew used Mark as a source, rather than vice versa. It’s almost impossible to imagine a Christian with Matthew’s gospel in hand setting out to make Jesus a weaker and less divine figure, and the disciples less sensible, whereas the reverse procedure is entirely understandable.
April 3rd, 2009 on 5:41 pm
“It’s almost impossible to imagine a Christian with Matthew’s gospel in hand setting out to make Jesus a weaker and less divine figure”
Christians have variously been making Jesus less transcendent and more transcendent to their taste for 2000 years. I’m not saying that that’s OK. Just noting the fact. The fact (if fact it be) that Mark’s Jesus is portrayed as less divine is, thus, no argument for the Priority of Mark. Of course, it’s also no argument for the priority of Matthew, nor is it an argument for their independence.
Assuming, as I do, that Matthew wrote Matthew and the Mark wrote Mark with Peter looking over his shoulder, my contention is that neither Matthew nor Mark/Peter were trying to make Jesus anything. They were trying to tell about Jesus from their points-of-view. Peter’s point-of-view is grounded in his closeness to Jesus. The humanity of Christ might thus receive greater emphasis than His deity. Matthew probably thought of Jesus with less familiarity and more awe, and that was the basis of his point-of-view.
At various times, I’ve thought about many, though not all, of the differences you bring up. But I don’t want to steal Errancy’s thunder here by getting into those details here. He’ll probably want to develop separate articles on at least some of them.
But just for clarity, I will say this. What I find implausible is this claim:
Matthew believed or hoped that his account would completely replace Mark’s.
I find this claim so implausible that any interpretation of Matthew’s writing that involves a commitment to it needs, IMO, to be seriously re-examined. Now, I think your interpretation of Matthew’s second donkey is such an interpretation. For you’ve claimed that Matthew altered Mark’s account so that it would fulfill a Messianic prophecy (as Matthew misunderstood it). That’s a very important point of disagreement.
In contrast, I doubt very seriously that, to take an example, your interpretation of Matthew’s “did not” vs. Mark’s “could not” would be such an interpretation.
April 3rd, 2009 on 5:53 pm
“But just for clarity, I will say this. What I find implausible is this claim:
Matthew believed or hoped that his account would completely replace Mark’s.”
A claim I never made. These are entirely your words.
April 3rd, 2009 on 6:12 pm
“For you’ve claimed that Matthew altered Mark’s account so that it would fulfill a Messianic prophecy”
I don’t see why the motive matters. As I understood it, your claim is that Matthew wouldn’t dare contradict Mark for any reason, since he knows the Gospel of Mark is out there.
So I simply gave some more examples. The “did not” versus “could not” case is probably the weakest one. The fig tree, the sons of Zebedee and the question of “the good” are much more blatant.
While we’re on this subject, I wonder if I could press you for your view on the synoptic problem. You write that Mark wrote with Peter’s help, and Matthew wrote Matthew, but you don’t address which of Mark or Matthew relied on the other. Can I ask for your opinion on that?
April 3rd, 2009 on 11:54 pm
Recap:
WL: It’s implausible to suppose that Matthew believed or hoped that his account would replace Mark’s
Amtiskaw: I never said that that was plausible.
Right. I agree with that. You never did say that. I’m not trying to put words in your mouth. If it came across that way, sorry. You probably agree with me that the ‘replacement hypothesis’ is implausible.
I take it though, that you do agree with something like these claims:
1. Matthew had an (incorrect) understanding of Zech. 9:9, such that the prophecy could only be fulfilled by someone riding two donkeys.
2. Because of 1, Matthew believed that Mark’s single-donkey account, as it stands, does not fulfill Z’s prophecy.
3. Also because of 1, Matthew felt that he had to add a second donkey to Mark’s account of the triumphal entry to get it to fulfill Z’s prophecy.
Am I right?
Now, I do think this next claim is true, and I assumed that you agree with me:
4. Matthew wants people to believe that Jesus fulfilled Z’s prophecy.
My argument was that, given 2 and 3, the only way that Matthew’s desire in 4 could come to be satisfied is if Matthew’s account replaces Mark’s. I also assumed that Matthew would have understood all this, and so he would have wanted his account to completely replace Mark’s.
I did not think that this result was plausible, so, using reductio thinking, I climbed back up the argument chain and rejected #1.
While you may not agree with this argument, I hope now you see, at least, what I was arguing.
Maybe that also makes it clear why it matters what Matthew’s motivation is for ‘hyping’ Mark’s account. The whole issue of the fulfillment of Messianic prophecy is essential in this reductio.
I’m going to spin my answer to your question about the synoptic problem (inadequate though it may be) off into a separate comment.
April 4th, 2009 on 12:27 am
ON THE SYNOPTIC PROBLEM
Like you and Errancy, I’m an interested, and I hope thoughtful, amateur. Unlike you two, I’m probably more amateur than thoughtful. So my thinking about the synoptic problem is probably horribly naive, misguided and irrelevant. Here are some of my thoughts in no particular arrangement:
- I have difficulty accepting the Q hypothesis because of the absence of any manuscripts or even any references to them. If there were a Q document, for example, it seems like it would have at least been a candidate for the cannon.
- In spite of what we would probably rightly criticize as laxer standards of scholarship, I’m inclined to give more credence to earlier writers than later. So, for example, the views of Eusebius on Biblical authorship, prima facie, get more weight than those of Herr Doktor Weisse. Weisse is probably a better scholar, but Eusebius plainly has the advantage of being 1500 years closer to the events.
- So my default position is to believe the early historians over more recent scholars. This tends to push me toward more traditional views about the authorship of the Gospels (such as Matthew for Matthew and Mark+Peter for Mark).
- I don’t think the synoptics are independent (though I’m not convinced that that’s just a crazy idea). So I think that it’s entirely possible, and even plausible, that Matthew used Mark to help him, or vice versa.
-I don’t think that the prior point undercuts any of the typical Biblical supports for inerrancy. For example, the apostles were promised by Christ that they would be helped by God to recall Christ’s teachings. It is entirely possible that the way that God would bring this about for Matthew was through Mark (or even through Q for that matter).
- On the specific question of who wrote first, Mark or Matthew, you can probably guess that I’m going to give extra weight to the Augustinian view that Matthew was first and influenced both Mark and Luke. Not that I’d lose my faith if it turned out that Mark is first (or Luke, or even John for that matter).
- No matter who wrote first, I don’t think that you need Q. Luke could have been influenced by Matthew and Mark as easily as by Q and Mark.
-Luke and Matthew each have something like a fourth of their content that’s unique to them. I don’t see any need to think that there’s any additional document or documents that contain that additional content.
There. That’s probably more than you wanted.
April 4th, 2009 on 11:07 am
“2. Because of 1, Matthew believed that Mark’s single-donkey account, as it stands, does not fulfill Z’s prophecy.”
I don’t necessarily believe this either. It’s just that Matthew sometimes makes things in Mark more explicit. For example, Mark (9:13) just hints that John the Baptist is Elijah, whereas Matthew (17:13) comes right out and tells us so.
In the case of the triumphal entry, he may well feel that the story as Mark wrote it just isn’t explicit enough; he wants to make it clearer that it fulfils this prophecy. That’s all.
April 4th, 2009 on 11:27 am
Right, synoptics (Errancy, stop us if this is too off-topic please :)
I agree you don’t necessarily need Q for Markan priority. One article I really like is Mark Goodacre’s “Fatigue in the Synoptics” which you can find online. It argues for Markan priority without Q.
“I’m going to give extra weight to the Augustinian view that Matthew was first and influenced both Mark and Luke.”
OK, it seems your case is based on external evidence and mine is based on internal.
It’s important to recognise that almost everything that is in Mark has a counterpart in Matthew. So one of these authors certainly had the other’s work (or some closely related text) in front of him.
One therefore has to look at the changes that have been made and find a plausible motivation for them.
I find it unlikely that someone with Matthew available to him would delete Jesus’ birth, and the beatitudes, whilst adding almost nothing, except an incident where Jesus’ family thought he was mad (Mk 3:21), a couple of healings involving spit (Mk 7:33, 8:23), and a few other minor details (e.g. Mk 11:11).
I’ve also noted that Mark presents a weaker Jesus and worse disciples. I think all-in-all it’s much easier to see Matthew as editing Mark than vice versa.
(Plus, Matthew betrays his knowledge of Mark in some places, e.g. Matthew 14:9. See Goodacre for that.)
April 4th, 2009 on 1:29 pm
One of the problems with an interchange like this is that you often end up with too many points you’d like to respond to (not necessarily in disagreement). You’re forced by the constraints of time to pass many over in silence.
One can imagine Mark and Peter shortening Matthew in order to provide goo summary of Jesus’ life and ministry. This will inevitably involve leaving some things, some important things, out.
The 5% or so of non-overlapping quirky content could be accounted for by the quirky personalities of Mark and Peter. Maybe Peter just liked the stories about the spitting miracles. He seems the type that would.
The general tone of a more human Jesus and more fallible disciples may come down too Peter’s familiarity to Christ and his own humiliating failures. He didn’t see Christ as a high King, but as a loved and loving friend. And that’s what he wanted to portray.
On the Goodacre article,
This is a very interesting and accessible article.
I don’t want to go into all the cases he discusses. Again, because it might steal Errancy’s thunder on later possible articles. so I’ll just deal with Goodacre’s use of editorial fatigue to talk about Matthew’s ’slip’ regarding the terms “tetrarch” and “king”.
I notice that he tries to make a lot of hay with the notion of editorial fatigue. Matthew was clearly trying to call Herod “tetrarch” instead of king. But he flubbed it once and called Herod Antipas “king” instead of “tetrarch”. Goodacre concludes that that shows that Matthew edited Mark’s account (who used “king” consistently) rather than the other way around.
This argument is indicative of the reasons I’m highly suspicious of internal evidence. You see even if Matthew wrote Matthew and even if Matthew was first, there was at least one tired editor of Matthew. His name was “Matthew”. To put it another way, authorial fatigue is at least as important a notion as editorial fatigue. But the sword cuts the other way on authorial fatigue.
Imagine for a moment that you have written a completely original piece on the Trinity. As you might expect, the third person of the Godhead is mentioned more than once. Now imagine that you realize after you’re all done that you really wanted to refer to the third person as the Holy Ghost rather than the Holy Spirit. So you go through the piece and manually change each occurrence (no cheating and using Search/Replace). You may well miss a case or two. That’s OK, there are still no real mistakes in your text.
Now suppose that someone decides to write “The Trinity for Dummies” and bases it almost entirely on your original work. One of the things such an author might do is decide that “Holy Ghost” might be confusing or off-putting to ‘Dummies’. Most people call him the Holy Spirit. So the author of the “For Dummies” version decides to replace it throughout. But he does a better job of replacing than you do and doesn’t miss a case.
I don’t think that a later critic be entitled to argue that the “for Dummies” book was earlier than your original work on the Trinity.
April 4th, 2009 on 2:23 pm
Well, the problem with Matthew 14:9 is not just “king” versus “tetrarch”, but also “the king was sorry” which doesn’t really fit into Matthew’s version, but is explicable if he’s read Mark.
April 4th, 2009 on 7:12 pm
I didn’t see “The king was sorry” as a problem for Matthew at all. So I didn’t see that as something that needed to be explained by Markan priority.
Yes, Matthew says in verse 5 that Herod wanted to kill John. But he also tells us in verse 5 that he feared the crowd. Another way you could put this is that Herod wished that he could kill John, but he didn’t really want to do so.
Herod was grieved when Herodias’ daughter asked for the head because he had been cornered into doing something he didn’t really want to do…though he wished that he could. He was grieved because he knew that beheading John would anger the crowd (and how much more would it anger them should they find out why he beheaded him).
Hey wasn’t there a topic about this on this blog?
April 5th, 2009 on 9:03 am
Yes, I suppose he’s “sorry” in a certain sense.
April 6th, 2009 on 2:04 pm
Interesting discussion. I’m still forming an opinion on this, but it’s about time I commented.
First of all, I don’t think that the accounts are logically contradictory. Logically speaking, the “Jesus rode on one donkey; the second donkey was present, but was omitted by Mark, Luke, and John” response above works fine for me as a harmonisation of the passages.
That said, I do agree that it’s worth asking how the differences between the passages came to be there, and whether the explanation implies a biblical error.
Accepting Markan priority (which I do, but with a few minor reservations), Matthew (i.e. the author of “Matthew”, whoever that was) had a single-donkey account in front of him but chose to add a second donkey. Why?
There are several possibilities here:
(i) He had a second source of information about the event (perhaps he was even there himself) which included information about the presence of the second donkey, and chose to incorporate that information.
(ii) He didn’t have another source of information about the event, but thought that a second donkey was implicit in Mark (because a colt that had never been ridden wouldn’t have been separated from its mother) and chose to make it explicit, even though he didn’t think that the prophecy required it.
(iii) He didn’t have another source of information about the event, but thought that a second donkey was implicit in Mark (because a colt that had never been ridden wouldn’t have been separated from its mother) and chose to make it explicit because he misunderstood the prophecy in Zechariah 9:9 as requiring a second donkey.
(iv) He didn’t have another source of information about the event, didn’t think that a second donkey was implicit in Mark, but made up a second donkey to make the story to fit the prophecy.
The discussion so far has mostly been (i) (but with Markan priority queried) vs (iv). I’m interested in (ii) and particularly (iii) as well. WL touched on this above, writing:
If this case for an implicit second donkey stands up, then we have reason to think that the harmonisation that I described above as logically satisfactory is also true, which for me would be an interesting outcome.
April 6th, 2009 on 7:11 pm
The synoptics all call it a colt, which doesn’t mean the same as “foal” (assuming our translations are accurate and the words carry the same meaning, etc).
By the way, are any of us aware whether this particular claim – that young donkeys are inseperable from their mothers – is in fact supported by empirical evidence? :)
April 6th, 2009 on 10:36 pm
The synoptics all call the animal on which Jesus rode a πωλον (”young animal”).
Matthew has Zechariah prophecy that the king will ride on a πωλον (”young animal”), the son of a ‘υποζυγιου (”beast of burden”), and calls the second animal an ’ονος (”donkey”).
John has Zechariah prophecy that the king will ride on a πωλον (”young animal”) of an ’ονου (”donkey”), and has Jesus ride on an ’οναριον (”little donkey”).
I had thought that this was all perfectly consistent, but my lexicon (BDAG) has a note that calls this into question. It suggests that πωλος might mean “young animal” when another animal is named in its context, but simply “horse” when no other animal is so found. This raises the possibility that there is a contradiction concerning not only the number of animals that Jesus rode into Jerusalem, but also the type, with Mark and Luke seating Jesus on a horse.
April 6th, 2009 on 11:49 pm
A foal is a young donkey or horse (usually less than a year old). If you call it a colt, you mean that it is a male foal. A foal that is a female is called a filly. Here is the entry at dictionary.com
Now, we don’t know whether the colt was weaned yet or not. If it was not weaned, then of course it’s mother was nearby and would have followed the colt (and if she couldn’t, the colt would not have been easily moved). If the colt was weaned, there is more room for the possibility of his being on his own. But if the Jenny and the foal are kept together during weaning, they will be inseparable for the remainder of their lives.
April 7th, 2009 on 12:05 am
“Mark and Luke seating Jesus on a horse.”
While “horse” may be within the range of acceptable translations of “polos”. It is not likely that it is a good translation here. Jesus tells his disciples to look for an animal that had never been ridden. Now the disciples would not know by looking at an old horse that it had never been ridden. In contrast, they might guess that a colt had never been ridden.
April 7th, 2009 on 10:51 am
I think this is the relevant entry at dictionary.com – a colt is under 4, not 1.
(But this doesn’t really matter since these aren’t the Greek words.)
“Jesus tells his disciples to look for an animal that had never been ridden”
Not really. He just tells them that the animal they find will in fact have this property. Or that’s how it reads to me.
April 7th, 2009 on 11:02 am
“If it was not weaned, then of course it’s mother was nearby and would have followed the colt (and if she couldn’t, the colt would not have been easily moved).”
Well, this may in fact be true, or not. If you have experience or knowledge of horse raising, then say so, and I’ll believe you.
But otherwise, I’m sure some unweaned mammals can be separated from their mothers without distress. So I need some sort of source that indicates this isn’t true of donkeys.
April 7th, 2009 on 11:03 am
The nuances of the English words are irrelevant here; what matters is what the Greek words meant.
For those with access to JSTOR, the article arguing for “horse” in Mark and Luke is here: http://www.jstor.org/pss/3261700.
April 7th, 2009 on 11:20 am
To be honest WL, maybe you’re right that Jesus is telling them to look for a young animal. Why else does he mention that it’s never been ridden? OK.
April 7th, 2009 on 7:10 pm
When I included the bit about the meaning of “colt” and “foal” in English. I was responding to this remark of Amtiskaw’s
The synoptics all call it a colt, which doesn’t mean the same as “foal” (assuming our translations are accurate and the words carry the same meaning, etc).
I took it from his remark that he was assuming (not without justice) that the translators of the New Testament know how to translate from Greek to English better than we do. And, assuming that they were right, they translated the term in question as “colt” and not “foal”.
My point in bringing up the English definitions, then, was really just to say that you can’t get much mileage from the fact that the translators all said “colt” and not “foal”. This is because a colt is just a male foal.
Obviously, this point has no bearing whatsoever on the question of whether the translators were right in this case. I never meant to suggest that it did. For that we need to look at the various allowable meanings of “polos”, how those meanings sort out in various use contexts, what the full narrative context of this use is and so on. Here, I think, my argument about it having never been ridden is more probative.
July 23rd, 2009 on 6:25 pm
The problem isn’t so much how many animals Jesus rode as it is how many the disciples were sent to get. Matthew says Jesus sent them after two; the other writers say he sent them after only one.
Now consider Luke’s account. In 1:3, the author of Luke claims to be writing with “perfect understanding” of all things. the word used is “akribos”, meaning exact, accurate or diligent. If the Luke author says that Jesus sent the disciples after one animal when he actually sent them after two, then his research was certainly not exact, accurate or diligent, which impeaches him as a reliable source. And if the author of Luke isn’t reliable, the reliability of the other authors is called into question also.
July 23rd, 2009 on 7:10 pm
Mark, Luke and John do not say that Jesus sent the disciples after only one donkey. Those accounts merely say that Jesus sent them after a young donkey that has never been ridden. The fact that Matthew notes that Jesus mentions the older donkey with the foal, while the other accounts leave that detail out, shows nothing.
All descriptions are necessarily abbreviated. Notice that none of the accounts mention the color of either donkey or the difference in length of their ears, or what they had for breakfast. The fact that Luke abbreviated this account by not mentioning the older donkey that was not ridden is just one more example of this general principle. This says nothing about the reliability of the account.
July 24th, 2009 on 6:58 pm
Luke definitely does say that Jesus sent them after only one donkey; he says this with his ititial claim of exactitude. Matthew is the one who makes an issue of it; if he hadn’t tried to make two animals fit into the prophetic scenario, there wouldn’t be a contradiction. Descriptions may be abbreviated, but only superfluous abbreviations. Matthew disagrees with the others on the details of what Jesus instructs the disciples to do.
Remember 2 Timothy 3:16-17? “All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good work.” Those “good works” must include reproof, since it’s on the list. Who do you reprove? The skeptic. How are you supposed to reprove the skeptic? With scripture. If you believe that Mark, Luke and John agreed with Matthew that Jesus sent the disciples for two animals and not just one, where are the scriptures which thoroughly furnish you with reproof of the skeptic who says they didn’t?
July 25th, 2009 on 2:25 am
Luke never records Jesus as saying that the disciples will find one donkey tied alone. So, no, he does not record that Jesus sent them after only one donkey. The most you can say here is that you think the unridden donkey is so important to the story, that Luke’s omission amounts to inexactitude on Luke’s part. I don’t find it that important.
I’m pretty sure that the 2 Timothy passage refers only to the Old Testament. A similar claim is, I believe, also true of the New Testament, but you have to argue for it. Either way, I don’t think that any point of righteousness turns on the unridden donkey. So no reproof is, I think, necessary here.
Finally, I don’t give much credence to the idea that Matthew was trying to shoehorn in a second donkey because he did not understand the nuances of ancient Jewish literature as well as we do today. He undoubtedly understood ancient Jewish literature better than we do. He was well aware that Zechariah’s prophecy does not require a second donkey.
BTW everything I just said also applies if the author of Matthew was not Matthew but an early editor. First and second century Jewish individuals intelligent enough to write something like the gospel of Matthew knew about their literature and their cultural heritage in a way that no amount of 21st century learning can match.
July 25th, 2009 on 10:55 pm
He told them, “Go into the next village where you will find a young donkey that has never been ridden.” (Luke 19:30)
He told them, “Go into the next village where you will at once find a donkey and her colt.” (Matthew 21:2)
If the Matthew account is correct, the Luke author should have quoted Jesus as telling the disciples to look for exactly the same thing, no more and no less. If this is not done, Luke’s claim of exactitude is nullified. If he wasn’t writing with such a degree of exactitude, it was improper of him to begin by saying that he was.
If the 2 Timothy passage is not true of the Christian scriptures, they are inferior to the claim made for the Tanakh and, therefore, essentialy without merit. There is, however, evidence to suggest that the same claim is made for the Christian writings. In Luke 10:7, Jesus says, “The worker is worthy of his hire” and Paul quotes this statement as “scripture” in 1 Tim. 5:18. Peter likens Paul’s writing to “the other scripture” in 2 Peter 3:16. The Christian writers seem to have regarded each other’s writing as having the same divine authority as the Tanakh.
Righteousness doesn’t turn on the unridden donkey but reproof certainly does, as Matthew has Jesus telling the disciples to get the unridden donkey and Luke doesn’t; it’s Matthew who makes the unridden donkey important. As for Luke, this is only one place in which he falls short of his claim. If Luke’s writing isn’t as accurate as he initially says it is, he is doing a disservice to his reader Theophilus, which means that all of Luke’s writing is suspect. As the author himself has Jesus proclaim in 16:10, “…he who is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.”
I’m sure the Christian writers did know about their literature and cultural heritage, which is probably why each of them tailored his particular account to appeal to his particular audience. The problem is that they didn’t have the 21st-century hindsight which brings the inconsistencies in their accounts to light.
July 26th, 2009 on 12:00 pm
Let’s start with a point of agreement.
I think you’ve got the basic form of the argument correct for extending the OT authority to apostolic writings. It’s by induction: The apostolic writers themselves clearly treat each others’ writings (and writings, such as Mark, written with Apostolic aid and approval) as if they were on the same level as the OT (which 2 Timothy directly endorses). Obviously, it takes a bit more than a paragraph of text to actually prove that point, but I’m quite willing to grant the conclusion without further argument. As I said before, I do believe such a statement is true.
Now let’s turn to 2 Timothy 3:16,17 for a moment. Just in terms of sentence structure, what you’ve got is the claim that scripture is profitable for teaching, for reproving, for correcting, for training. Each for-phrase has a nominalized verb as its object. The list of for-phrases is capped by the phrase “in righteousness”. For each of the verbs nominalized in the for-phrases, it makes sense to add “in righteousness” to them. That is “to teach in righteousness” makes sense, “to reprove in righteousness” makes sense, and so on. The righteousness mentioned at the end of the list, then, does not just apply to the final member of the list, but to every member of the list. Or, at least, that’s one possible reading of the passage.
But is it the correct reading of the passage? I think so. In the subsequent passage Paul writes that this is so that the man of God may be equipped for every good work. That is for every righteous work. So the reproof that 2 Timothy calls for is reproof on points of righteousness. So the fact that no point of righteousness turns on the unridden donkey turns out to be quite important to the argument you raise.
Now, let us move to the Luke and Mark passages regarding how Jesus sent the disciples. These passages are summaries, not transcripts, of Jesus’ instructions. Furthermore, Jesus gave his instructions in Aramaic. They are summarized for us in Greek. If you believe some early historians, Matthew’s account of the instructions may have been summarized in Hebrew, and then what survived for us was a Greek translation.
So the idea that anyone is even trying to provide Jesus’ exact phraseology here is really a non-starter. What was given and what was only ever intended to be given was the gist of his words. This, in no way, makes any account inaccurate. Gists can be quite accurate.
It seems to me, DS, that you are interpreting Luke’s claims regarding his account to be saying something that even a moment’s reflection will show cannot be correctly claimed about any account on any subject. Now, it is true that people make intemperate claims all the time. Perhaps Luke’s claim is one such claim. But it strikes me as a poor interpretive principle to assume that that is the correct interpretation of Luke 1 when there are plenty of more measured interpretations that can be made of the passage.
July 27th, 2009 on 5:42 pm
The problem with your interpretation of the 2 Timothy passage is that, according to Paul, scripture is supposed to equip the man of God for every good work. If this really means every “righteous” work and it doesn’t equip him for reproving the skeptic on inconsistent details, then reproving the skeptic on inconsistent details must not be a righteous work. Wouldn’t the skeptic have to give up his criticism of inconsistent details in order to become “righteous”?
Can you point out the text in which Luke informs the reader that his Greek translation is a “summary” and not exact, accurate and diligent?
July 27th, 2009 on 9:35 pm
Summaries can be exact, accurate and diligent. So you are presenting a false dichotomy.
As for reproof, I’m not sure what inconsistent details you are referring to here. No inconsistent details have yet been identified.
Now, it does seem to me that a person commits no sin by believing that only one donkey was present. One might think, for example, that later editors introduced the second donkey into Matthew’s account. It also seems to me that a person commits no sin by believing that two donkeys were present (as I do) and that Mark and Luke left out the unridden donkey as an extraneous detail in their narratives. It also seems to me that a person commits no sin by suspending judgment. Furthermore, one’s belief about the unridden donkey does not run contrary to any moral or spiritual teaching that I know of. I don’t see where reproof on an issue of righteousness comes in.
Let’s try a different tack. If I were a pastor, and it came to my attention that one of the members of my church did not believe that there was a second unridden donkey, I don’t believe that I’d feel the need to go talk to that member and tell him to repent.