Why do I need to reference a scholar to ask questions?
You need to reference a scholar in order for your points to be taken seriously. So far all you have done is provide links to bogus websites.
If it's debatable whether or not Q was oral or written then why don't the sayings come with a narrative?
Here again is evidence of your basic lack of knowledge. Oral traditions are often lacking narrative. In fact, the very fact that Q is composed of "sayings" make it oral in nature, and if it is a written text, it is a record of sayings.
There is over 60 sayings that make up Q, and over a hundred that make up the Gospel of Thomas. Are you suggesting that people rattled off these lists to each other orally without any narrative?
Absolutely. That's how oral tradition works, which you would know had you read anything on the topic. You are way too oriented in the 20th century. Teachings and parables were passed on independently of narrative in oral tradition.
One of the only contributions from form criticism was analysis of oral nature underlying Mark. Not only are many of the sayings/teachings/parables clearly translated from aramaic, the overall narrative and unity is artificially imposed in what are clearly independent orally transmitted pericopes.
Really? You think Luke and Matthew could recite Q, practically word for word, identical with each other without copying from a sayings gospel?
We have evidence for such verbatim transmission today (for example, illiterate arabs who are taught to recite the entire koran verbatim). However, having never studied the subject, I guess you wouldn't know.
The only explanation if not from a written text, and it has been offered
Again, you simply don't know enough to make any judgements.
And how do you explain that Matthew's birth story is entirely different than Luke's if there was an oral tradition floating around? If oral tradition, how come Matthew's and Luke's post resurrection stories are so different?
The fact that you even ask this again makes it clear you simply haven't read a single thing on the subject, because oral tradition, by its very nature, is subject to change. The level of change depends on the type of material being transmitted and the culture within it. The Jesus tradition took greater care transmitting sayings/teachings/etc than events.
I suppose the following has nothing to do with Mark borrowing from Hebrew scriptures, nothing to do with a written tradition you say:
Mark 15:
24 And they crucified him, and divided his clothes among them, casting lots to decide what each should take.
Psalm 22:
18 they divide my clothes among themselves,
and for my clothing they cast lots.
I did not say that the gospels never made use of scriptures. As Jews, after Jesus died his followers naturally searched through scriptures in an attempt to strengthen their particular view of Jesus. For this reason, there are several explicit and a few implicit references to scripture (apart from those references made by Jesus himself). The passion narrative is a pre-Markan oral text. It was given its shape before Mark, probably in the 40s. Along with the birth narratives (which are not as early) it is part of the gospels most likely to contain implicit references to scripture.
Dogsgod, you seem to be under the very baseless impression that an oral tradition of Jesus would have taken the form of some overall story which was transmitted as a whole from person to person. This is completely and totally wrong, so let me tell you how oral tradition (particularly the Jesus tradition) worked.
Jesus, living as he did in an oral culture, taught in a very oral mode. In other words, he used short pithy sayings, and memorable parables, in order to transmit his teachings. He probably repeated these over and over and with some variations. His disciples and followers, particularly the twelve, but also others who were close, would have learned these. It is even possible that particularly important events, such as a particular miracle/healing, would have been transformed into an oral text by Jesus' community of followers during his life (for a modern example of this type of process, see K. E. Bailey, "Informal Controlled Oral Tradition and the Synoptic Gospels"
Asia Journal of Theology 5 1991).
In any case, after his death, those disciples who were most acquainted with his teachings were responsible for passing them on to new members of the Jesus sect. Remember that this is an oral culture, and the vast majority of people could neither read nor write. The teachings would have consisted of many sayings and parables which were units independent of one another. Certain parts of the gospels, like the passion narratives, were formed early by the Jesus sect, and retained overall their structure in Mark.
It is these seperate teachings/sayings/events that Paul, Papias, etc, describe as being "handed down." Mark took many of these teachings/sayings/events and strung them together into his gospel.
