QUOTE : Q’ is no more, after all, than a figment of scholarly imagination (i.e. a hypothesis). Not one scrap of manuscript evidence has turned up which can plausibly be thought of as part of this document, in any of its recensions. The three supposed stages by which it came into its final form, visible in Matthew, reflect suspiciously closely the theological and history-of-religions predilections of one strand within modern New Testament studies, rather than any hard evidence within the first century.