The Formula Quotations in the Infancy Narrative of Matthew: An Enquiry Into the Tradition History of Mt 1-2

The Old Testament quotations in the Gospel of Mt can be studies in different ways, and from various points of view. We may, with Stendahl, study the text-type of these quotations, so as to find out their milieu of origin and eventually the Sitz im Leben of the Gospel itself. Or we may, as Strecker and now Rothfuchs have done, examine the function of the quotations in the Gospel narrative, and so gain a new insight into Matthew's theology. Or again, we may, like Gundry, compare the meaning which the OT passages quoted now have in their new Matthean context with their original literal sense, in order to justify the way in which Matthew handles his OT texts. None of these points of view in ours in the examination of the specialized group of OT quotations in Mt's Infancy Narrative that we undertake here. Neither the text- type of these quotations, nor their function, nor the hermeneutics of their use, is our primary concern. Instead, we are interested in their context. Our aim is to study the way in which these quotations have been integrated into the Infancy Narrative, in the hope that this will throw light on its tradition history: show us, that is, the sources which Matthew may have used in composing his narrative, nad the way in which he has adapted and integrated them.