Matthew has made rather a larger number of changes in the order of his Marcan material; due perhaps to his habit of combining his Marcan and his other matter, and to his wish to present most of his sayings-material in one block (chaps. v-vii). His notable transpositions occur near the beginning of his Gospel, just before or after the insertion of his Sermon on the Mount, and in that section (the sending out of the twelve) where he has made his most obvious conflation of Marcan and other matter. From sec. 37 to the end, however, changes in order are extremely few. The insertion of 8 between 54 and 55 may be only an apparent dislocation, since the saying about salt may here not have been derived from Mark but from Q. The placing of the cleansing of the temple before the cursing of the fig tree (secs. 62, 63) may be due to his wish to bring the cursing of the fig tree into immediate connection with the remarks to which it gave rise; the transposition is an improvement. From here on to the end the sections occur precisely as in Mark, except that 21 is inserted between 74 and 75; apparently owing to the influence of Q. The table will also show that Matthew and Luke practically never concur in forsaking the order of Mark. It also warrants the assertion often made of late years that Matthew is more faithful to the content of Mark, permitting himself fewer omissions, but Luke is more faithful to his order.
CHAPTER III
THE OMISSIONS OF MATTHEW AND LUKE IN THE MARCAN NARRATIVE[10]
OMISSIONS MADE BY BOTH MATTHEW AND LUKE
The omission of the stories of the healing of the deaf-and-dumb man and the blind man (Mk vii, 31-37; viii, 22-26), is sufficiently accounted for by the character of those accounts. The crassness of the means used and the apparent difficulty of the cures offended the growing sense of the dignity of Jesus.
The exceedingly patronizing answer of the scribe to Jesus in Mk xii, 32-34 is probably omitted by Matthew and Luke for the same reason. The parable of the Seed Growing of Itself (Mk iv, 26-29) may have been omitted because it so closely duplicated other material in both Matthew and Luke;[11] it has been suggested also that it might have a discouraging effect, or at least not a stimulating one, upon the missionary activities of the early church.
The first visit of Jesus to the temple (Mk xi, 11) is mentioned by Mark in three words only. No incident is connected with it, but Jesus is said to have looked about and, as it was late, to have gone back to Bethany. The incident may have dropped out because unsupported by any events or sayings; or the three words εἰς τὸ ἱερόν may have crept into the text of Mark after its use by Matthew and Luke (the sense is equally good without them).
The mention of the man in the linen garment (Mk xiv, 51) and the names of Alexander and Rufus (Mk xv, 21) may have been omitted because neither Matthew nor Luke nor their readers would be acquainted with these persons.