Matthew's Messiah is the most "Davidic"; John's, the most "Samaritan"

As discussed elsewhere on this blog, Jews and Samaritans had different understandings of what sort of person the Messiah was supposed to be. The entire Messianic tradition of the Samaritans is derived from the 18th chapter of Deuteronomy. Their Messiah is a prophet like Moses -- the only prophet besides Moses, in fact -- who will tell us all things. The Jews, on the other hand, added to this the Messianic writings of the prophets, in which David has largely eclipsed Moses as the Messiah's most important precursor. If the Samaritan Messiah is essentially a prophet like Moses, his Jewish counterpart is primarily a king like David. The two visions are not mutually exclusive -- both peoples expected the Messiah to be both a prophet and a king -- but they represent very marked differences in emphasis.

Corresponding differences in emphasis are found in the Four Gospels. A writer with a more "Samaritan" idea of the Messiah might be expected to mention Moses more often, and to give the Samaritans themselves a more prominent role in the Gospel story. A writer whose views were more traditionally "Jewish," on the other hand, would mention David more often and speak more of kings and kingdoms.

I searched each of the Gospels for the strings "Moses," "Samari-," "David," and "king-." (Why not also "Jew" and "prophet" to contrast with "Samaritan" and "king"? Well, naturally most of Jesus' story takes place among the Jews, so of course every Gospel will mention them a lot. "Prophet" is also not useful for distinguishing between the two Messianic visions, since the Samaritans see the Messiah as being primarily a prophet, while the Jewish Messiah is based on the writings of the prophets.) Here are the results.

To control for the varying lengths of the Gospels, the numbers indicate
what percentage of verses in each Gospel contain the target string.

The pattern is clear, and confirms the impression I already had. The Fourth Gospel ("of John") emphasizes Moses and the Samaritans, while downplaying David and Jesus' role as king; Matthew shows the opposite pattern; and Mark and Luke are intermediate.

I should mention that it is already my opinion, for reasons unrelated to this issue, that the Fourth is the most trustworthy of the Gospels and that Matthew is the least so.