Contention 8: The earliest Gospel has no passion narrative in it!
You might be saying that I've gone bonkers for claiming that the earliest Gospel has no passion narrative. You might think I'm talking about Mark which is considered by scholars to be the first of the four canonical Gospels to be written. No, I am not talking about Mark. Rather, I am talking about a Gospel that predates even the Gospel of Mark. I'm talking about the lost Gospel "Q". To understand what the Gospel Q is one needs to understand some background concerning the first three Gospels. The first three Gospels are labelled as Synoptics which means "seen together" the reason of which is due to the fact that the passages and pericopes in the three bear numerous stark similarities. Biblical scholars considered this as the "Synoptic Problem". The conclusion that they arrived at was that both Matthew and Luke relied heavily on a common source namely, the Gospel according to Mark. However, Mark cannot account for a considerable number of verses that are found in Matthew and Luke. These are verses that Matthew and Luke share in common, but are missing in Mark. To solve this issue German Biblical scholars postulated another source that Matthew and Luke relied upon which they have simply dubbed "Q" which is short for the German word Quelle meaning source. Though there are scholars who contest the existence of "Q", the majority accept it as the most tenable explanation for the parallels found between Matthew and Luke that are not accounted for in Mark. Most scholars have dated the "Q" Gospel to approximately 50 CE predating the Canonical Gospels.[17]
By comparing Matthew and Luke closely the scholars have reconstructed this "Q" Gospel. What does it contain? A lot of things, but most importantly is that it has no passion or resurrection narrative at all. One of the foremost scholars on the "Q" Gospel notes, ".the Sayings Gospel has no passion narrative or resurrection stories."[18]. Bart D. Ehrman also notes, "Most striking was the circumstance that in none of the Q materials (that is, in none of the passages found in Matthew and Luke, but not in Mark) is there an account of Jesus' death and resurrection." [19]
Gospel "Q" came about around the same time Paul was writing his letters and teaching the theology of the crucifixion and resurrection as essential to the Christian faith. If the crucifixion truly happened and indeed necessary for salvation and that Jesus definitely raised from the dead why is it not mentioned in this gospel that was made used by Matthew and Luke? We contend that the reason why it does not contain either passion or resurrection narrative is because neither really took place and are indeed unessential to the faith that Jesus brought.