The Question of Motive in the Case Against Morton Smith. Book Reviews

The Question of Motive in the Case Against Morton Smith. by Journal of Biblical Literature Book Summary

If there is one thing almost every NT scholar knows about the "secret" Gospel of Mark, it is the talk of forgery. Ever since Quentin Quesnell suggested the hypothetical possibility of modern forgery in 1975, those in the know have debated whether the late Morton Smith himself forged the evidence for this Gospel, a manuscript of a letter by Clement of Alexandria "to Theodore" that Smith catalogued and photographed at the monastery of Mar Saba in 1958. (1) The evidence for and against the letter's authenticity has been assessed in two new books, my own Mark's Other Gospel, which sides with authenticity, and Stephen C. Carlson's The Gospel Hoax, which accuses Smith of fraud. (2) For the case against Smith to merit serious consideration, it must meet the standards of legal prosecution, which means the "prosecutors" must establish beyond reasonable doubt that the letter is a forgery, offer evidence connecting Smith with the manuscript, and demonstrate that the accused had the ability, opportunity, and motive to produce it. In cases of fraud, motive tends to be the principal issue. A variety of people might have the ability or opportunity to produce a forgery, but very few will have a compelling reason to produce the document in question. Fortunately for us, the question of motive in the case against Smith is the subject for which we have the most evidence. Three general hypotheses of motive have emerged during the last thirty years: (1) Smith forged the letter in order to discredit Christianity with evidence that Jesus was a homosexual; (2) he forged it as a hoax or joke for the personal satisfaction of duping his colleagues; and (3) he forged it as a controlled experiment in order to study how scholars respond to new evidence. The various conjectures that appear in the secondary literature normally fit into one of these three categories but sometimes involve elements from the other two. The present article will compare these hypotheses against the evidence they purport to explain, namely, the Letter to Theodore and Smith's scholarship on this subject.

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The Question of Motive in the Case Against Morton Smith. (Journal of Biblical Literature) Book Reviews 2024

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