The AD33 crucifixion detail in Judea

[Crispvs]

"I assume somebody had to have written the original material down,possibly as far back as the time of the public ministry"

I am inclined to agree with you here. This may be exactly what 'Q' was. There may also have been other first hand sources which are quoted by Matthew and Luke but which have not been identified due to being quoted by one gospel but not the others. I agree that some of the twelve apostles may well have been literate, with Matthew, as a tax collector, being a likely candidate, and there must surely have been at least someone in the wider group of disciples, who we can be sure also travelled some or all of the time with Jesus, who was literate. Acts 1:15 notes a group of a hundred and twenty "brothers" (who may or may not have included the twelve) from whom Matthias was selected to replace Judas Iscariot. I find it hard to believe that no-one in that number would have been literate to at least some degree.
The introduction to Luke's gospel notes that many others had previously drawn up accounts of the event described and states that from the outset these had been written by people who were eyewitnesses to the events. The implication given by the introduction is that the author has drawn his material from a number of accounts. Only two of these have been identified ('Q' and the gospel of Mark) but the implication is that there were possibly several other firsthand accounts available to inform him.


"This is what Ehrman says, based on a study of ancient literacy by another scholar, who said at best 10% of people could read at the time."

I don't know what evidence that would be based on, but even if it is a fairly accurate estimate, I see no reason why people who were effectively small businessmen who employed others might not be in that 10%. As we understand though that most Jewish boys of the period received their education in the form of learning scripture from pharisees, the likely figure for Jewish men with at least a basic level of literacy is likely to have been higher than 10%. It should be noted though and is perhaps relevant here, that studies have repeatedly shown that illiterate people often retain more accurate memories of events due to not having the facility to record these memories on paper and thus have the need to remember them in a way a literate person might not need to. This might be pertinent in the case of Mark's gospel having been dictated by Peter, which, as I said above, there is little reason not to accept the possibility of. Even if Peter was illiterate, the descriptions of him in Acts indicate that he had an excellent memory.

This is disingenuous though, as none of the four apostles known to have been fishermen (Simon-Peter, Andrew, and the sons of Zebedee, James and John) are attested as gospel writers, although as already stated, Mark's gospel is said to have been dictated to him by Peter.
As I stated above, neither Matthew or Luke were members of the inner twelve apostles and must therefore both have been part of the wider population of disciples (Matthew's use of 'Q' as a source shows that Matthew the gospel writer was not the same man as Matthew the tax collector and apostle, who having first hand experience, would not need to quote an earlier source [although see my note above]).

As to dating, reading through the book of Acts again I note that the latest event which can be dated in it is the start of the procuratorship of Porcius Festus, which is known to have begun in around AD60. The work comes to an end around two years after that, which means that Acts (which was part, along with Luke's gospel, of a two volume work which was only later separated into its two parts when the four gospels were arranged together in the New Testament [cAD150]) is likely to date to no earlier than AD62 and perhaps not much later. Luke's gospel was completed earlier than its sister volume (it is referred to as "my earlier work" in the introduction to Acts) but it may not have been much earlier as parts of chapters 16 and 20, chapter 27 and part of chapter 28 of Acts are written in the first person, indicating that the author accompanied Paul prior to his arrest in Jerusalem in cAD58 and again during his voyage to Rome in cAD60. It would seem likely therefore that Luke's gospel was written either during the period when Paul was imprisoned in Caesarea (cAD58-cAD60) or after the voyage to Rome with Paul in cAD60 (after which they seem to have parted again). Thus it is likely to date to between AD58 and A62 and certainly must have been completed by AD68 at the latest for it to have been part of the library at Kumran. There is no way of knowing whether Matthew's gospel was written any earlier than Luke's as neither shows any sign of their authors having read each other's work prior to writing.

Crispvs