I begin systematically dismantling the completely false theory that Matthew "engages with Pharisaism" more than Luke or Mark and that John does so more than Matthew.Even if there were more stories "engaging with Pharisaism" in Matthew than in Luke, this wouldn't be a good argument for some kind of trend or development, nor that Matthew was written later than Luke. The entire theory that having more "engagement with Pharisaism" is a sign of chronological "development" is highly dubious, since we have plenty of reason to doubt that the Gospels made people (like the Pharisees) do things that they didn't really do in order subtly to make their Gospels feel more relevant to their audiences. In fact, I would go so far as to doubt that the authors even *emphasized* stories in which Jesus engages more with certain groups in order to make their stories more relevant, even if all the stories and details are true. Such theories are highly conjectural and open to doubt; it is difficult to tell whether audiences would have felt such increased relevance due to such a subtle and roundabout type of emphasis. But since the theory is that at least sometimes the authors made the Pharisees do things they never did (maybe the Sadducees did them instead), this is even more questionable.Making it even more jaw-dropping, it turns out that it just isn't even correct that Matthew has more engagement with Pharisaism than Luke and Mark, or that John has more than Matthew. In other words, even Keener's *description of the data* (who has more of what) is inaccurate. Luke has slightly more engagement with Pharisaism than Matthew, and the Synoptics have *much* more than John. How these scholarly urban legends continue and get restated without being evaluated from the ground up is a purely sociological question.This week I examine "engagement with Pharisaism" under the heading of rules controversies--these are places where the Pharisees criticize Jesus or his disciples for not following their rules. The most common type is criticism for breaking the Sabbath, but there are others, like eating without ceremonially washing hands. I show that Luke is slightly ahead as far as the number of such rules controversies. Most of these rules controversies are in the Synoptics (by a margin), usually found in two or more Synoptic Gospels.Remember, I'll be carefully going through many different categories of engagement with Pharisees during this series. So if you don't see a clash with the Pharisees in a given video, wait for it; it will almost certainly be covered later in the series.
