The first part of this section varies greatly between Matthew and Luke; with strong similarity in idea, there is practically no verbal agreement. The last ten words are almost identical. Matthew inserts the section into a speech the rest of which is taken from Mark. Luke takes the same speech from Mark, without making this insertion. The verses occur with him in quite another context. His vs. 30_a_ is more primary than anything in Matthew's version. The first part of the section contains too little agreement to have been worked out of an identical source; the last part agrees so closely as to indicate an ultimate common source. We therefore assign the section to QMt and QLk.
The agreement is slight, but somewhat significant. [Greek: phortion] is used only thrice in the New Testament outside of this passage. This is the chief linguistic warrant for assigning the passage to QMt and QLk.
This proverbial saying is used by Luke in this instance as the conclusion of a speech about taking the chief seats at a feast. He also uses it in xviii, 14, as the conclusion to his parable of the Publican and the Pharisee in the temple. Matthew also uses it in two very different contexts; here as part of a speech against the Pharisees, and in xviii, 4, with reference to a child as type of true greatness. Considering these various usages, the brevity of the saying, and its apparently proverbial character, it can scarcely be assigned to any form of Q, tho it certainly cannot be proved not to have been in that document.
It is possible to regard these rather as variants of the same saying than as workings over of the same source. Even in the divergences, however, some striking resemblances are to be noted. Matthew says [Greek: kleiete tên basileian]; Luke says [Greek: êrate tên kleida]. These words seem to betray a common literary source in the background. The idea conveyed by the two phrases is the same. Matthew says, "Ye shut up the kingdom of heaven before men"; Luke says, "Ye take away the key of knowledge" (of salvation, probably, as in Lk i, 77). The last part of the saying is still more unmistakably based upon an ultimate common source. Yet, as I have so often argued with reference to other and similar sections, to ascribe to either Matthew or Luke, working upon an identical source, the amount of re-working here involved, credits them with a degree of freedom in the treatment of Jesus' sayings which finds no parallel in their treatment of such sayings as they take them from the Gospel of Mark. We therefore assign the section to QMt and QLk. But such assignment cannot be insisted upon.