https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2155-3766
Overview
Mark Goodacre is Professor of Religious Studies at Duke University. He specializes in the New Testament and Christian Origins. He earned his MA, M.Phil and DPhil at the University of Oxford. He has been at Duke since 2005.
His research interests include the Gospels and the Historical Jesus. Goodacre is the author of five books including The Case Against Q (Trinity Press International, 2002), Thomas and the Gospels (Eerdmans, 2012), and The Fourth Synoptic Gospel (Eerdmans, 2025). He is well known for creating web resources on New Testament and Christian origins, including his podcast, the NT Pod. Goodacre has acted as consultant for several TV and radio programs including The Passion (BBC / HBO, 2008) and Finding Jesus (CNN, 2015-17).
Current Duke Appointments & Affiliations
Professor in the Department of Religious Studies
·
2013 - Present
Religious Studies,
Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Director of Undergraduate Studies of Religious Studies
·
2025 - Present
Religious Studies,
Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Recent Scholarly Works
Why Not Matthew's Use of Luke?
Book section · February 17, 2022 A recent resurgence in support for Matthean Posteriority (Alan Garrow; Rob Macewen) builds on the secure footing of Marcan Priority alongside growing skepticism about Q. Could it be that advocates of what Francis Watson calls the "L/M Theory" have the dire ... Full text CiteA World without Mark: an Experiment in Erasure History
Journal article Biblical Interpretation · January 1, 2022 Erasure History is a subset of the discipline of counter-factual history, an exploration in imagining history without a work that scholars see as pivotal. Erasing Mark's gospel provides a fruitful thought experiment about the key role it plays in current s ... Full text CiteHow Empty Was the Tomb?
Journal article Journal for the Study of the New Testament · September 1, 2021 Although the term ‘empty tomb’ is endemic in contemporary literature, it is never used in the earliest Christian materials. The term makes little sense in the light of first-century Jerusalem tombs, which always housed multiple people. One absent body woul ... Full text CiteEducation
University of Oxford (United Kingdom) ·
1994
D.Phil.
University of Oxford (United Kingdom) ·
1990
M.Phil.
University of Oxford (United Kingdom) ·
1988
B.A.