[Claud]

In all honesty, the level of scientific honesty I've seen to date from others with regard to this work have extended to the point of stating as though factually that the book originated in Aramaic....Further, no 1st century equivalant of Matthew has ever been found written in Aramaic. And if I'm not mistaken, nor have any of the other Gospels.

True enough about the putative original never having been found. But there's a pretty solid tradition that it DID once exist:

Let us now recall the testimony of the other ecclesiastical writers on the Gospel of St. Matthew. St. Irenæus (Adv. Haer., III, i, 2) affirms that Matthew published among the Hebrews a Gospel which he wrote in their own language. Eusebius (Hist. eccl., V, x, 3) says that, in India, Pantænus found the Gospel according to St. Matthew written in the Hebrew language, the Apostle Bartholomew having left it there. Again, in his "Hist. eccl." (VI xxv, 3, 4), Eusebius tells us that Origen, in his first book on the Gospel of St. Matthew, states that he has learned from tradition that the First Gospel was written by Matthew, who, having composed it in Hebrew, published it for the converts from Judaism. According to Eusebius (Hist. eccl., III, xxiv, 6), Matthew preached first to the Hebrews and, when obliged to go to other countries, gave them his Gospel written in his native tongue. St. Jerome has repeatedly declared that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew ("Ad Damasum", xx; "Ad Hedib.", iv), but says that it is not known with certainty who translated it into Greek. St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Epiphanius, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, etc., and all the commentators of the Middle Ages repeat that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew. Erasmus was the first to express doubts on this subject: "It does not seem probable to me that Matthew wrote in Hebrew, since no one testifies that he has seen any trace of such a volume." This is not accurate, as St. Jerome uses Matthew's Hebrew text several times to solve difficulties of interpretation, which proves that he had it at hand. Pantænus also had it, as, according to St. Jerome ("De Viris Ill.", xxxvi), he brought it back to Alexandria. However, the testimony of Pantænus is only second-hand, and that of Jerome remains rather ambiguous, since in neither case is it positively known that the writer did not mistake the Gospel according to the Hebrews (written of course in Hebrew) for the Hebrew Gospel of St. Matthew. However all ecclesiastical writers assert that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew, and, by quoting the Greek Gospel and ascribing it to Matthew, thereby affirm it to be a translation of the Hebrew Gospel.

Perhaps these traditions are wrong, but to say there is NO evidence is not at all correct.

[Havoc]

Oh, yes, I'm well aware of the heresay that is oft injected into these arguments. I'm also aware of both the source and said source's history of manufacturing heresay to bolster it's claims when nothing else did. The litany is long and distinguished - or perhaps I should say infamous.
This is what makes such debates so contentious in the first place. This is to say nothing of Eusebius' reputation. This is why I largely ignore heresay evidence unless it can be backed up in a testable fashion. When Eusebius is put under the microscope, among others, the stories tend not to hold up. But then historians tend to view his works as romantic fictions.