Greek Gospel Commentary Manuscripts with the Order Matthew–John–Luke–Mark

What is it about?

While the order of the gospels in ancient manuscripts almost always follows the order printed in modern Bibles (Matthew-Mark-Luke-John), some important ancient copies rearrange the order of the gospels. One of these sequences is Matthew-John-Luke-Mark, and can be found in a few important Greek and Latin manuscripts. Previously, researchers attempted to identify later Greek manuscripts in this order with inconclusive results. This article presents five later manuscripts in a cursive handwriting from the 9th to 11th centuries that feature the gospels in this rare order. These five manuscripts, and two of the older manuscripts, contain a Byzantine commentary alongside the biblical text. These commentaries are called catena, from the latin word meaning chain. They interpret the biblical text through a series of comments taken from early Christian writings by multiple authors arranged into a continuous commentary. Studying the composition of these gospel commentaries and the ways they were copied in the manuscript books explains why the Western order was adopted in these later manuscripts.

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Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash