What is the case for the Markan priority hypothesis?
About a hundred years ago, the case for the Markan priority hypothesis was thought to rest as a consequence of the observation that Mark is the middle term between Matthew and Luke. In 1951, however, B. C. Butler exposed this fallacy (he called it the “Lachmann fallacy” but a more accurate term is the “middle term fallacy”) and demonstrated that other solutions can satisfactorily account for the observation. Consequently, careful proponents of Markan priority have restated their case as a cumulation of several suggestive arguments. For example, it is argued that it is easier to understand certain material (infancy accounts, Sermon on the Mount) being added to Mark than Mark’s omission and understand both Matthew’s and Luke’s improving Mark’s style rather than the reverse. B. C. Butler, The Originality of St. Matthew (Cambridge: UP, 1951).
