A New Perspective on Jesus

Dunn challenges the "literary bias" in most historical treatments of the gospels ignoring the prior oral transmission that had to be involved. First, this must have begun in Jesus's mission and particularly in his instruction of the disciples. Second, this must have been maintained over the next 20-40 years - and quite possibly long after the first written gospels appeared.

Scholars have long deduced the existence of "Q" - a Quelle or shared source used by Matthew and Luke. Dunn argues that the original "Q" was most likely not a document but oral tradition. That would explain the roots of both the commonalities and the differences between the synoptic gospels.

Oral tradition lives in a community. While some people take on the role of a storyteller, they are disciplined by telling those stories to a critical audience who are able to respond "that's not how the story goes. What you said before was this...."

Postscript:

One of Dunn's modern sources on oral tradition in the Middle East has been reprinted online and is well worth a read:

Kenneth E. Bailey, "Informal Controlled Oral Tradition and the Synoptic Gospels", Themelios 20.2 (January 1995): 4-11 ( https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_tradition_bailey.html )