What are the three stages in the formation of the gospels?

Answer

Traditionalists would say that two of the gospels, those of Matthew and John, were written by eyewitnesses to the mission of Jesus, and that the authors simply wrote down what they had seen and experienced. However scholars say that the four gospels were written anonymously and only attributed to the disciples whose names they now bear later in the second century. Moreover, scholars say that the gospels could not have been written by eyewitnesses to the events they portray, or even by close associates of eyewitnesses to those events.

From very early times, Church leaders were aware of a literary dependence among the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. There was simply no other explanation for the gospels using exactly the same words in the Greek language. They made the assumption that Matthew was written first, with Mark and Luke based on Matthew. Modern scholars, using more advanced analyses, say that Mark was the first gospel and that Matthew and Luke were each independently based on Mark, with additional sayings material from the hypothetical 'Q' document. They also say that John's Gospel was inspired by Luke, with some material taken direct from Mark. So the three major stages in the formation of the gospels are:

1. The development of Mark's Gospel, based on unknown sources;
2. The development of Matthew's Gospel and Luke's Gospel, based on Mark's Gospel and the Q document;
3. The development of John's Gospel, based on Luke's Gospel and, to a lesser extent, Mark's Gospel.