ABSTRACT
There is no doubt that religious education matters to the authors of the Synoptic Gospels. This is evident from the fact that Jesus’s role as a teacher is well established in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. The Greek didaskalos is employed 41 times by the Synoptic evangelists. 1 Didaskalos as a title or formal address is used in relation to Jesus by friend and foe alike. 2 Jesus also acknowledges his role as a teacher, given that he indirectly refers to himself as a teacher when clarifying his relationship with the disciples (Matthew 10:24–25a; Luke 6:40) and when instructing the disciples on how to carry out preparations for the Passover (Mark 14:14; Matthew 26:18; Luke 22:11). In addition to this, the verb didasko¯ (‘to teach’) is used in relation to Jesus on 38 occasions in the Synoptic Gospels. 3 Furthermore, the Synoptic authors include nine references to the noun didache¯ (‘teaching’), eight of which specifically relate to Jesus and are to be understood as either the act of teaching or that which is taught. 4
