JETS 56/3 (2013) 499–509 PRESUPPOSITIONS AND HARMONIZATION: LUKE 23:47 AS A TEST CASE VERN S. POYTHRESS* How do presuppositions about meaning and history influence the ways in which we may deal with problems in harmonization?1 And what can we do about it? We can examine the influence of presuppositions by considering a test case, namely the centurion’s statement in Luke 23:47 and the parallels in Matthew and Mark. I. THE CHALLENGE In Luke 23:47, the centurion says that Jesus was innocent: “Now when the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God, saying, ‘Certainly this man was innocent!’” Matthew has something more elaborate: “When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, ‘Truly this was the Son of God!’”(Matt 27:54). Finally, Mark has the following: “And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, ‘Truly this man was the Son of God’” (Mark 15:39). For a direct comparison, see the following table: Matthew 27:54 Mark 15:39 Luke 23:47 When the centurion And when the centurion, Now when the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, who stood facing him, saw the earthquake and saw that in this way saw what took place, he breathed his last, what had taken place, they were filled with awe he praised God, and said, he said, saying, “Truly this was “Truly this man was “Certainly this man was the Son of God!” the Son of God.” innocent!” The most notable difference lies in what the centurion said about Jesus. In Luke, Jesus is innocent, while in Matthew and Mark, he is “the Son of God.” In addition, there is a difficulty in translation. In both Matthew and Mark, the Greek * Vern Poythress is professor of New Testament interpretation at Westminster Theological Semi- nary, 9260 Church Road, Glenside, PA 19038. 1 An earlier draft of this article was presented as a paper at the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, November 15, 2012, in Milwaukee, WI. 500 JOURNAL OF THE EVANGELICAL THEOLOGICAL SOCIETY expression for “the Son of God” is anarthrous.2 The ESV puts the phrase “the Son of God” in the text, but indicates in a footnote that the expression could also be rendered as “a son of God.” So which English rendering is correct? Colwell’s Rule says that a preverbal predicate nominative may be anarthrous even when the predicate expression is intended to be definite. The article is omitted from the predicate partly to indicate that it is in fact the predicate. Consequently, it must be left to context to determine whether the expression “son of God” is intended to be definite (“the Son of God”) or indefinite (“a son of God”). Unfortunately, the context does not definitively decide. If we picture of Roman centurion as a typical pagan, with polytheistic be- liefs, we may interpret his confession as little more than a confused statement that Jesus has something godlike about him. We might even try translating, “a son of a god.” But it is possible that the centurion, like Cornelius, had become a God-fearer, so that we at least come to translate, “a son of God.” Or maybe, though the centu- rion had not completely cast off his polytheistic background, he was reacting to the earlier mocking discussion of whether Jesus is “the Son of God” (Matt 27:40, 43). So his remark may be spoken with respect to a more Jewish context. Or perhaps the centurion, like the penitent thief of Luke 23:40–43, had already at this early point come to a deeper understanding of who Jesus was. Maybe he did mean to say “the Son of God” in its full significance. Commentators often recognize that Matthew and Mark are inviting their readers to see the title “son of God” within the larger context of their Gospels.3 Mark begins his Gospel with the words, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Mark 1:1). The expression for “Son” is anarthrous, but the meaning is definite. The full title is used at the climactic point in Jesus’ trial: “Again the high priest asked him, ‘Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?’” (Mark 14:61). In Matthew 4, the title “son of God” occurs anarthrously, but with the mean- ing “the Son of God”: “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to be- comes loaves of bread” (Matt 4:3). “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, …” (Matt 4:6). The weighty significance of the term “Son” is confirmed in Matthew’s baptismal formula: “… baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, …” (Matt 28:19). Matthew and Mark contain still other passages that indicate that Jesus is the unique, Messianic Son of God (Matt 2:15; 3:17; 16:16; etc.; Mark 1:11; 3:11; 9:7). In that light, the rendering “the Son of God” is surely right. It should be taken as an anticipation of Christian confession of Jesus as Messiah, and as a divine title as well. Note that in Matthew the Son shares with the Father in the name of God (Matt 2 Interestingly, Matthew has , while Mark has the reverse order, . 3 E.g. Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 14–28 (WBC 33B; Dallas, TX: Word, 1995) 852; R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007) 1084–85; W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison Jr., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to Saint Matthew (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997) 3:636; R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 659–60. PRESUPPOSITIONS AND HARMONIZATION 501 28:19), and that the Son’s knowledge of the Father is divine in character (Matt 11:27). How then do we deal with the relation of what the centurion might have meant to what Matthew or Mark meant? And how do we explain the relation of the expressIon “the Son oF God” to Luke’s description, which looks very different: “Certainly this man was innocent!” (Luke 23:47)? Finally, we should note that the statement in Luke has some challenges of Its own. The underlying Greek has the word dikaios, which the ESV translates as “in- nocent” (so also NASB). KJV and NIV have “righteous.” Does this term involve an allusion to the righteous servant of Isaiah 53?4 II. SHOULD WE HARMONIZE? The Bible is a rich text, a God-inspired text. So interpreting it Is delicate. A lot of presuppositions may have an influence. Our purpose is to explore how presup- positions come to bear on a particular text like Luke 23:47 and its parallels. I will express my opinions from time to time. But I mainly want to pay attention to the influences that go into forming different opinions. One of the first and most obvious questions that arises is whether we ought to strive to do harmonization at all. I think that we have three divinely authored texts. This presupposition has its influence, typically in the direction of seeking harmonization. Merely human texts may make mIstakes about what happened, but divinely authored texts do not. But even here there are differences. Even IF we have divinely authored texts, we must still decide whether the texts are intended by God to be historical narra- tives rather than some other genre. It is well known, for example, that Robert Gundry’s commentary on Matthew argued that Matthew was a midrashic text that mixed in essentially fictional elements with other elements that were historical.5 Gundry claimed that this genre decision on Matthew’s part was understood by his first readers, so that there was no deceit involved. I along wIth others believe that Gundry was wrong, but his hypothesis has to be weIghed beFore we come to the decision that he was wrong. In the process of weighing, we will bring to bear in- formation about first-century genres, and we wIll reckon wIth the textures oF the Gospel oF Matthew itself. But we will also brIng along other expectatIons. For ex- ample, how far do we emphasize the alleged original audience of Matthew, and how far do we emphasize the fact that God—and perhaps Matthew as well— intended the Gospel eventually to travel beyond the initial audience? In what way do we understand the clarity of Scripture? In addItIon, we ask questions about the relation of Matthew’s Gospel to the other three Gospels. Do all these four works belong to a single larger genre, namely the genre of “Gospel”? If so, do the com- 4 Joel B. Green, The Gospel of Luke (Grand RapIds: Eerdmans, 1997) 827. 5 Robert H. Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Handbook for a Mixed Church under Persecution (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994). 502 JOURNAL OF THE EVANGELICAL THEOLOGICAL SOCIETY monalities in fact suggest much more common ground in the treatment of history than what Gundry alleged? Consider also what happens if someone approaches the Gospel accounts without acknowledging divine authorship. Harmonization questions still have rele- vance in historical reconstruction, even when the history being studied is quite or- dinary. One may picture one historian who cares deeply about reconstructing the events with utmost precision and who also has a high level of confidence in the historical reporting of the Gospel writers.