176 Wim J.C. Weren artificielle et rigide entre narration et discours” (11). That it would be advisable not to make this rigid distinction is apparent from the lack of unanimity on the precise demarcation of D and N. The clearest example of this is that Matt 23 is classified as D by one author and as N by another (and this notwithstanding the fact that we are dealing here with an uninterrupted monologue by Jesus!). Moreover, the sharp distinction between N and D suggest that the five long discourses are detached from the rest of Matthew’s story of Jesus and that they always interrupt this story. This position is untenable for, as character text, the discourses are principally embedded in the narrator’s text. Moreover it is remarkable that also narrative texts in Matthew have a discursive character. (3) Furthermore, I would like to point out two other phenomena. Firstly, in the parts classified as N, Jesus also speaks frequently and sometimes at some length: apart from 11,2-3.7a, Matt 11 only consists of words spoken by Jesus; 12,25-45 contains a monologue by Jesus, that is only interrupted in 12,38-39a by a remark from his listeners; Matt 19–22 contains many statements by Jesus. Secondly, the reverse can also be observed: the parts that are labelled D contain some narrative sentences, which remind the reader that the character text is embedded in the narrator’s text (13,10.36; 18,21-22). 2. A story in three acts A second proposal for the structure of Matthew, that continues to be influential, was developed by E. Krentz and was subsequently propagated by J.D. Kingsbury and D.R. Bauer (12). Their point of departure is the parallelism between 4,17 and 16,21. Both verses open with ajpo; tovte h[rxato oJ jIhsou'", followed by an infinitive (khruvssein kai; levgein in 4,17; deiknuvein in 16,21) and a brief summary of the content of Jesus’ words. These verses would have a macrosyntactic function and serve as the captions of two long sections, the first (4,17–16,20) about Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom and the second (16,21–28,20) about his journey to Jerusalem and about his passion, (11) D.W. GOODING, “Structure Littéraire de Matthieu, XIII,53 à XVIII,35”, RB 85 (1978) 233. (12) E. KRENTZ, “The Extent of Matthew’s Prologue. Toward the Structure of the First Gospel”, JBL 83 (1964) 409-414; J.D. KINGSBURY, “The Structure of Matthew’s Gospel and His Concept of Salvation-History”, CBQ 35 (1973) 451- 474; ID, Matthew. Structure, Christology, Kingdom (London – Philadelphia 1975) 1-39 (Chapter I; same title); BAUER, The Structure of Matthew’s Gospel.