In scientific circles when a hypothesis is presented, evidence is given to support this thesis. It is also implied and expected that over time future findings should for the most part add support to the hypothesis, if it is indeed a valid and accurate one.
In 2013 I completed my book, ‘The New Testament: The Hebrew Behind the Greek’. While I have made some minor edits and included some minor additional material through 2014 – 2016, it is simply not possible to be aware of all the supporting and/or contrary evidence that might have since been found and detailed. So it is only today in February 2023 that I came across this paper (see link below) from 2014 that adds some strong supporting evidence to my basic contentions and main hypothesis. Thus, I would argue that this paper adds some strong support to the basic premises and hypothesis that my book presents and hence further validates it. In fact, this paper by R. Steven Notley and Jeffrey P. García even concludes with essentially the same contentions:
“So we witness once again that the method and meaning of Jesus’ use of Scripture attests to his intimate familiarity with the contours of the Hebrew Bible. … It is clear that his exegesis was not based on a Greek or Aramaic translation, but upon the Hebrew Bible.
… The value of taking into account the original language of the discourse—Hebrew—can hardly be overstated in understanding the sense and purpose of the biblical allusions that undergird these ideas. Indeed, our aim throughout this modest study has been to demonstrate the importance of the Hebrew language and a thorough knowledge of the contours of emerging Jewish thought in order to grasp better both the method and meaning of Jesus’ exegesis of the Hebrew Scriptures.”
In this paper they also offer some supporting evidence, excerpts below (I quoted Grintz, but not Safrai and Breuer):
“Scholars had been of the opinion that, after the return of the Babylonian exiles, Hebrew no longer served as a spoken language. On this account Hebrew retained its status as a holy tongue and was used in prayer and in Torah study, and for this reason the Mishnah and contemporary Tannaitic literature was composed in Hebrew, but in everyday life Aramaic alone was spoken. Today this view is no longer accepted, the scholarly consensus now being that Hebrew speech survived in all walks of life at least until the end of the tannaitic period (the beginning of the third century CE)” (authors’ emphasis).
– Safrai, “Spoken and Literary Languages”; Buth, “Language Use”; Joshua M. Grintz, “Hebrew as the Spoken and Written Language in the Last Days of the Second Temple,” JBL 79 (1960): 32–47. Yonathan Breuer, “Aramaic in Late Antiquity,” in The Cambridge History of Judaism. Vol. 4, The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period (ed. S. Katz; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 457–58.
“It should be noted, however, that in terms of the New Testament (for Josephus, see Instone-Brewer, Techniques and Assumptions, 184) the majority of scholars have argued that the LXX was the authors’ primary source. While it is expected that authors in the Diaspora utilized the Greek version of the Scriptures, there is little reason to presume that within the confines of the land of Israel matters were the same. For all intents and purposes, it appears that Second Temple exegetical traditions developed out a reading of the Hebrew text. Furthermore, as several articles in the present volume indicate, it appears that the Evangelists’ sources originated from an environment of both spoken and literary Hebrew. In their conclusion: It is clear that his exegesis was not based on a Greek or Aramaic translation, but upon the Hebrew Bible….
The value of taking into account the original language of the discourse—Hebrew—can hardly be overstated in understanding the sense and purpose of the biblical allusions that undergird these ideas.
… Along with the colloquial Hebrew attested in the Bar-Kokhba documents, it is now accepted that in the New Testament era Hebrew was still utilized for oral communication. Second, it is routinely assumed, but rarely explicitly stated, that the ancients most often utilized the Hebrew Bible for matters of interpretation. The terseness of biblical narratives and linguistic nuances of the Hebrew language inspired the exegetical traditions which appear in various translations (e.g. the LXX, Targumim), as well as the Dead Sea re-workings of the Pentateuch —in addition to the wealth of exegetical materials that appear elsewhere in Second Temple period texts. The five Synoptic narratives that will be examined here—“Jesus’ Preaching in the Nazareth Synagogue” (Luke 4:18–19), “Jesus’ Witness Concerning John” (Luke 7:27; Matt 11:10), “And You Shall Love . . .” (Luke 10:25–37), “The Cleansing of the Temple” (Luke 19:45–46; Mark 11:11–17; Matt 21:12–13), “Jesus and Caiaphas” (Luke 22:66–71)—preserve rabbinic exegetical techniques that appear for the first time in written record. The earliest iteration of these exegetical methods (i.e. middoth) is first attributed to Hillel (a Jewish sage who flourished in the first century b.c.e.) and appears for the first time in the Tosefta (t. Sanh 7.11)—a supplement to the Mishnah which has been shown to be an amalgam of pre-mishnaic, mishnaic and later Rabbinic traditions. Yet, already in the Gospel of Matthew there is evidence of at least one of them, קל וחומר (a minori ad maius14): εἰ δὲ τὸν χόρτον τοῦ ἀγροῦ σήμερον ὄντα καὶ αὔριον εἰς κλίβανον βαλόμενον ὁ θεὸς οὕτως ἀμφιέννυσιν, οὐ πολῷ μᾶλον ὑμᾶς, ὀλιγόπιστοι; (“But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O ones of little faith?,” Matt 6:30).
In the passage, the comparison of God’s care for the grass in light of its impermanence with the more important concern for humanity reflects the transition from minori (קל) to maius (חומר). Certain middoth, especially those that are found in pre-70 c.e. texts, were conveyed orally and likely intended to be utilized in teaching contexts (e.g. bet midrash). The employment of these exegetical techniques reflects the manner in which a sage might readily interpret Scripture in the process of teaching or in regular conversation. Coupled with the acknowledgment of spoken Hebrew in the first century, we suggest that these exemplify a fluid development of interpretive techniques (middoth) that were derived out of a speaking environment rather than a literary/scribal one. Therefore, the fact that the Synoptic Gospels preserve stories with contemporaneous methods of exegesis and that most of these accounts portray a setting where Jesus is teaching, it indicates not only the language of exegesis (i.e. Hebrew) but also the primary language of discourse. …”
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