In much the same manner the story of the Wise and Foolish Virgins (XXV, 1-13) seems to come from a period when the church was commonly spoken of as the bride of Christ, or when Christ was awaited as the coming bridegroom of the church; this is not necessarily later than the times of Paul's letter to the Ephesians, and so may be much earlier than Matthew, but is certainly later than the time of Jesus.
The saying about eunuchs who have made themselves such for the kingdom of heaven has a harsh sound in the mouth of Jesus; and we wonder whether the circumstances of the expectation of the kingdom warranted such a statement at the time Jesus is said to have made it. We cannot but notice also, as Wernle has remarked, that the saying seems to be displaced in Matthew, coming in with extreme inappropriateness between Jesus' insistence upon the sacredness of marriage and his blessing of the children. It may bespeak the period of developing asceticism within the church. If it is not to be assigned to Jesus we cannot fix very closely the date of its origin.
On the whole, we must probably say that some parts of Matthew's tradition, outside of his infancy section and the stories of the wonders at the crucifixion, show indications of antiquity and genuineness, while others arouse our suspicions as to their coming from Jesus, or even from Matthew.
As to whether the source of Luke's single tradition was one or many the statement in his prologue predisposes us toward the latter supposition. The difference between the infancy sections and the rest of Luke's peculiar material, as in the case of Matthew, is marked. Hawkins reckons one hundred and fifty-one words as characteristic of Luke. Of these, seventy-seven, or more than half, occur once or more in the first two chapters, while seventy-four of them are absent from these chapters. These first two chapters contain about one hundred and thirty-two verses, about one-ninth of the whole Gospel; yet one-half of the occurrences of Luke's peculiar words are found here.
A strong Hebraic character is observable in Luke's infancy sections, quite absent from his other peculiar material. In the twenty-one verses in i, 5-25, [Greek: kai] is used many times where Luke's habit elsewhere would lead us to expect the substitution of [Greek: de]. There are also many Hebraic phrases, such as [Greek: poreuomenoi en pasais tais entolais, probebêkotes en tais hêmerais, megas enôpion kyriou], and the construction [Greek: egeneto], thrice used, as the formula introducing a paragraph. Luke's own hand may be seen in the introduction of [Greek: de] three times. One of these is in connection with [Greek: eipen], which is probably Luke's substitute for the historic present. The retention of so many Hebraistic and non-Lucan features probably justifies Jülicher's suggestion of a special (Hebraistic, Aramaic) written source for these infancy sections. A written and not an oral source is also indicated in Luke's table of ancestors,[119] especially in its awkward placing after the baptism. It is quite impossible that Luke is here drawing upon the same source as in his great interpolation. Even more decisive in this direction than the vocabulary is the general character of the material.