Q 11:9-13 - Certainty of the Answer to Prayer (Documenta Q)

The three Gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke are called synoptic Gospels. The question how the far-reaching agreements and the dissimilarities between these texts are to be explained is called the synoptic problem. In the history of research, a lot of different explanations for this question have been given and currently different models claim plausibility. The most probable and most common theory is the Two Source hypothesis. It assumes that Matthew and Luke used independently two sources: the Gospel of Mark and the so-called Sayings Gospel Q. The Gospel of Mark forms the base of the material which is found in all three synoptic Gospels, the texts which are found in Matthew and Luke in parallel without an original in Mark are derived from the source Q. To reconstruct the Sayings Gospel Q concerning the wording as well as the order of the material is a topic the New Testament scholarship deals with since about 200 years. The texts of the Gospel of Matthew and Luke are compared with each other considering the redactional tendencies of these two scribes which are distilled out of their reworking of the Gospel of Mark. Redactional tendencies means their preferred vocabulary, syntactical and stylistically peculiarities, theological focal points, as well as other scribal, socio-cultural, and rhetorical preferences. The series Documenta Q is understood as an addition to the Critical Edition of Q which appeared in the year 2000. It collects for every section of Q the history of research of the reconstruction of Q. In this way trends and prejudices of the research become visible as well as the presented arguments easily ascertainable. Based on the critical examined arguments, it is tried to make a responsible decision about the reconstruction of Q in the form of evaluations of the editors of the series in order to reflect the state of the discussion and to build the foundation for further research. The section Q 11:9-13, which is used in Matt 7:7-11 and Luke 11:9-13, follows on the Our Father and forms the first commentary on this basic prayer of Christianity from the time of the earliest Church. The text unfolds the fatherhood of God on the one hand, the concerns for the daily subsistence level on the other. It shows a surprising confidence in the providence of God. This trust was a matter of changes from the earliest times onwards concerning content and scope as already the reworking of the Q text and the New Testament shows. Furthermore, the text Luke 11:5-8 which was probably not a part of Q and belongs to a Hellenistic environment is addressed in the volume.