Gospel Writing

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter traces a complex history of Gospel writing from Mark to Eusebius. Eusebius continued dynamics of self-conscious, expansive Gospel rewriting that are visible in earlier configurations of Gospel text (including Luke, the author of the Longer Ending of Mark, Tatian, and Ammonius of Alexandria). Eusebius was not the first reader to notice the problems and possibilities created by a pluriform Gospel, nor was he the first to rearrange Gospel texts in creative spatial ways—but his technological innovations enabled him to diverge in crucial ways from previous projects of Gospel writing. Using the textual map and the columnar table, Eusebius both preserves four individual Gospel narratives and creates new possibilities for reading the fourfold Gospel as a unity. Eusebius rewrote the Gospels by creating new meaningful sequences of readable text, a distinct fourfold Gospel. Technology here intersects with literary innovation. Because his canons facilitate creative juxtapositions and even afford juxtaposing a single section with multiple parallels, Eusebius was able both to preserve Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in order also to interweave them in a dense new web of possibilities. Eusebius’ fourfold Gospel effervesces with manifold contexts and readerly trajectories.