Loading...I’ll be be dealing with just one question in this week’s Readers’ Mailbag, since the response will require some explaining. I has to do with the literary artistry of the Gospel of Mark – is it a fairly unsophisticated account of Jesus’ life and death?
The question itself will require a bit of set-up and explanation. In an earlier post I argued that Mark’s Gospel almost certainly ended in chapter sixteen at verse 8. Jesus has been crucified, dead, and buried. On the third day some women go to his tomb to anoint his body more appropriately for burial, but when they arrive the tomb is already opened, Jesus’ body is not in it, but a young man is, who asks them if they are looking for Jesus of Nazareth. He then tells them that he has been raised and that they, the women, are to go tell the disciples that Jesus will meet them in Galilee. The women, though, flee the tomb and don’t say anything to anyone because they were afraid.
In my post I argued that Mark meant to leave his ending abrupt and breath-taking, for several reasons. One of them is that Mark throughout his Gospel emphasizes that no one could understand Jesus – almost no one at all. His family thinks he has lost his mind; the people from his hometown can’t understand where he got all his knowledge; the Jewish leaders think he is possessed by the Devil; and even his own disciples never “get” who he is (Jesus harangues them for not understanding). Mark is unique among the Gospels in stressing this idea that no one can figure out who Jesus is. And in my view, the ending supports that motif: in the end, the disciples never *do* come to understand about him. They never even hear he has been raised from the dead. They are oblivious to the end.
This, then, was a question about that interpretation, raised by a reader:
QUESTION:
Is it really likely that “Mark,” the least sophisticated of the gospel authors, would have intended an ending parallel to a motif of obliviousness?
RESPONSE:
I think Mark has an undeserved (though very common!) reputation for being unsophisticated. I have just the contrary view. I think as a literary artist Mark was extremely sophisticated, in ways that require deep study to recognize.
Let me give just one example….
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Did Christ actually prophesy is suffering and death or was this created by mark?
I don’t think Jesus made these predictions. I’m not sure Mark invented them, but some story teller did — either Mark or someone before him.
As i remember, it’s said that Mark’s Greek is less polished (sophisticated) than that of the other gospel writers’. Is this true? Does it count against Mark’s literary sophistication?
Yes, it’s not as good as, say, Luke’s. It means that his philological skills were not finely honed. But he could still have a good literary sense (e.g., for plot, imagery, and so on)
Is it likely Greek was not his first language?
No, Greek appears to be his native language.
Beautiful analysis. I think people assume the more elaborate story is always the more sophisticated story. This would mean the average 500 page commercial potboiler you buy at the airport, full of twists and turns, is more sophisticated than a short story by Kafka, or a Steinbeck novel. Sophistication in literature can be deceptive–sometimes what seems very simple and basic can have extraordinary depth, many layers of meaning. The most sophisticated writer may seem to be the least sophisticated, to someone who associates excessive ornamentation with artistry.
Not to dismiss the three other gospels. They each have things to offer. But taken as a whole, as a story with a beginning, middle, and end, meant to convey overarching themes, and to make the reader work to understand the points being conveyed, Mark easily surpasses them all.
Is it likely that such an amazing writer as ‘Mark’ would have only written one thing, you think?
That’s a great question! I assume not!! Wow, it would be great to have some of his other things….
Thank you, Prof. Ehrman, for another enlightening post. Like you, Mark is my favorite gospel, but for many years I’ve had a nagging question about it that you may have answered in previous blogs.
In her excellent Great Courses lecture series “The Holy Land Revealed,” your colleague Jodi Magness notes that Jesus predicted the destruction of of the Second Temple. To me, the supposed prescience of this prophecy (Mark 13) stands or falls on whether Mark wrote his gospel before or after the event. Where do today’s scholars stand on this issue, and do you believe it will ever be resolved?
No historical issue will ever be solved to general satisfaction. But my view is that the historical Jesus did indeed predict that the temple would be destroyed (as did other Jews both before and after his day), but that Mark was probalby written soon after the destruction.
As always, a superb post, Dr. Ehrman.
Dr Bart, in one of the talks I watched in the internet , I heard you articulate that you believe that “Jesus was probably left to rot in the cross and dumped into a common grave” . Is that still your personal belief ?
I have the following question for you. If that was what originally happened . How can you explain the origin of christianity ? How probable do you think is for some one to invent a story that he rose from the dead , if the whole Jerusalem watched the man die on the cross and have birds pick on his corpse .
That’s what my book How Jesus Became God is all about. No, I don’t think anyone tried to deceive anyone by inventing something they didn’t believe. I think some of jesus’ followers believed they saw him alive after his execution.
The kicker for me is Mary Magdalene’s (and Peter’s) obscured identities in Mat/Mark/Luke. She was the key eyewitness, having seen the pre & post resurrection feet of the L-rd– up close!! Thus Mag & Pete hidden in some scenes in writings done while they were alive, and revealed by John, after they had departed.
in response to Dr. Ehrman’s comment:
That’s what my book How Jesus Became God is all about. No, I don’t think anyone tried to deceive anyone by inventing something they didn’t believe. I think some of jesus’ followers believed they saw him alive after his execution.
And if the disciples fled back to Galilee immediately after the crucifixion, they never saw how long Jesus’s body was on the cross or what happened to it.
Could it be that Mark in part can be considered a polemical work directed against Jewish Christians with a Palestinian background, where the motif is to explain why they have a wrong or an inferior theology? After all, in Mark , the disciples are mentally slow, do not understand very much, there is a traitor among them, and Peter is a coward.
A book by a NT scholar named Weeden argued precisely that. I’m afraid he didn’t convince many experts, but it was a view people floated around for a bit.
The connection between the two passages is, as you have explained, quite “sophisticated.” It is still odd to me that who this Jesus, described by Mark, was would be so unclear to those around Him. Shouldn’t such a Jesus be clear to all? Why in the world didn’t all, at least many, catch on? If they didn’t catch on in the here and now, how in the world are we supposed to catch on 2,000 years later?
I hope the Heels are practicing free throws today.
Mark wants to emphasize that no one understood him, all as part of his theme that Jesus was a messiah no one expected (and so didn’t understand). Go Heels!
Mark’s Gospel is brilliant. Mark is also the single originator of the fabricated Jesus of Nazareth story. The other Gospels are later knock-offs, and embellishments, of the original Gospel of Mark.
Mark likely used contemporary literature, such as the works of Josephus for characters such as John the Baptist and Pilate. The Septuagint was mined for prophesies and phrases. However, the most important literature Mark had in front of him were Paul’s letters.
Mark transformed Paul’s heavenly Christ “hanged on a tree” event into an earthly crucifixion. The celestial Christ told Paul that Christ was sacrificially killed by Satan, and hanged on a tree – in Satan’s world, Gal 3:13. This is similar to Christ’s fate as told in the Ascension of Isaiah.
It is not difficult to find other specific Pauline sources for Mark’s story, for example:
When Mark in 3:14 first introduces his twelve disciples, he hedges his bets and actually calls them “apostles” (in some versions). This is based on Mark’s misinterpretation of 1 Cor 15:5 where “the twelve” do not include Peter (Cephas) and are not identified as disciples or apostles. Paul is silent of the designation of the twelve and never mentions the term disciples by name or function. Of course, that has not stopped scholars of all stripes to read the Gospel back into Paul’s “twelve” and make them disciples. The Power of Mark!
Another obvious adaptation is Mark’s Lord’s Supper. Here Mark takes Paul’s Christ vision from 1 Cor 11:23-26 and uses near identical phrases for Mark’s bread and wine ceremony. Makes for great paintings! Again, we see well known NT scholars repeatedly claiming that Paul’s original ceremony included “his disciples”. So confident are these same scholars that they translate Paul’s “handed over” as “betrayed”. After all, that’s what the Gospels say….
In view of such scholarly naivety, herd mentality and uncritical acceptance, is it any wonder that those not bound by faith through upbringing or association, are increasingly pushing the obvious alternative?
I’m not sure that scholars who disagree with you are naive. Most of them study these texts for years, at great depth, in the original Greek.
Scholarly naivety may be a kind term for an apparent inability to see the forest for the trees. Long years of study does not neccesarely equate with an ability or willingness to think outside the box.
Is his Greek sophisticated?
No, not really. By high literary standards it’s sub-par.
Christianity in Antiquity / Christianity in Historical Context
There is a resurrection cult (Osiris-Serapis) in Alexandria and throughout the Roman empire.
The Jesus Son of Man Movement turns into a resurrection cult after Jesus’ death.
Emperor Hadrian makes his deceased lover Antinous a god of resurrection.
“Antinous had a marvelous life after death.
His cult spread with great speed and his popularity grew with the years. As a god who dies and is resurrected, he even became a rival to Christianity for a while.”
– Antony Everitt, bestelling author of “Cicero” in his book, Hadrian and the Triumph of Rome
Inscriptions indicate that Antinous was seen primarily as a benevolent deity, who could be turned to aid his worshipers. He was also seen as a conqueror of death, with his name and image often being included in coffins. // The pagan philosopher Celsus also criticised it for what he perceived as the debauched nature of its Egyptian devotees, arguing that it led people into immoral behaviour, in this way comparing it to Christianity. //
Surviving examples of Christian condemnation of the Antinous cultus come from figures like Tertullian, Origen, Jerome, and Epiphanios. Viewing the religion as a blasphemous rival to Christianity, they insisted that Antinous had simply been a mortal human and condemned his sexual activities with Hadrian as immoral.
-Wikipedia
Dr. Ehrman, Jesus as a resurrection god does not seem to be unique. In the monotheism of Judaism, death does not seem to be as developed as in Hinduism, Egypt’s cult of Osiris, Ptolemy I Soter ‘s invention of the cult of Serapis which survived into the first century at Alexandria.
Question: In your book How Jesus Became God or outside of that text, Judaism, via Judaism-Lite / Christianity, picks up more attention to death and life after death by Jesus being a deified resurrection figure along the lines of Shiva, Osiris, Serapis, Antinous, and the attention to death found in the gods Hades and Thanatos*; could there have been a triumph of Christianity without the integral Destruction / Death / Regeneration / Resurrection component found in the Gospels?
*Hades was the brother of Zeus and Poseidon. After the overthrow of their father, Cronus, he drew lots with them to share the universe. He drew poorly, which resulted in becoming lord of the underworld and ruler of the dead. Nevertheless, he was not considered to be death itself, as this was a different god, called Thanatos.
I would say that the Christian belief in Jesus’ resurrection is very different from the other examples you cite. But in any event, no, without the death-resurrection, there would be no Christianity.
But the apacalyptic Jewish belief, which Jesus was one proponent of, seems to have in mind a bodily resurrection, right? This is one fairly significant Jewish view about resurrection – that in the Last Days the dead would be resurrected in order to be judged? Jesus relates a story that exemplifies that kind of understanding, but this apacalyptic Jewish understanding was not unique to Jesus, and it preceded his time period, did it not?
I’m bringing this up because Christianity ultimately becomes centered around a phyisical body resurrection of Jesus – not just a spirit form of resurrection. Seems Paul, in his epistles, the earliest of Christian writings, espouses this view more or less, though he elaborates that the new bodies are different in nature than existing phyisical mortal form of human beings.
IOW, it is not surprising that Christianity took the direction it did in respect to how they viewed the nature of Jesus’s resurrection as it seems basically in accord (or at least stems from in a compatible manner) with pre-existing apocalyptic Jewish beliefs regarding resurrection of human beings.
Yes, I think Jesus inherited his view of the future resurrection from apocalpytic Jews before him (John the Baptist among them). ANd yes, this is the view of the earliest Christians, which is why they thought Jesus’ resurrection was bodily, not spiritual.
Mark’s Gospel Unsophisticated?
Given the many references to the Homeric Epics, it probably is not.
See The Homeric Epics and The Gospel of Mark by Dennis R. MacDonald
Interesting post, in my humble opinion, I give it 5 stars.
You say the narrator knows and a Roman centurion knows Jesus was the son of God but no one else does.
Catholic tradition has Mark, by request of Romans of some wealth, writing the Gospel of Mark. Rome initiates the Gospel of Mark which feeds the Gospel of Luke with Matthew being a third Synoptic Gospel.
So, we have a Roman-sponsored (publisher and editor) influencing the narrator of this Gospel and for emphasis Rome via Roman centurion calling Jesus son of God. Despite all the references made to The Hebrew Bible about Jesus, it is Rome, not Judea or Galilee, Israel, that writes Jesus as Son of God for posterity.
Dr. Ehrman, you have been against the notion that Rome did not sponsor the writing of any gospel; yet, Catholic tradition states otherwise. What are your disputes with Catholic tradition here?
= = =
Below we have an entry for St. Mark from catholic.org
The second Gospel was written by St. Mark, who, in the New Testament, is sometimes called John Mark. Both he and his mother, Mary, were highly esteemed in the early Church, and his mother’s house in Jerusalem served as a meeting place for Christians there.
St. Mark was associated with St. Paul and St. Barnabas (who was Mark’s cousin) on their missionary journey through the island of Cyprus. Later he accompanied St. Barnabas alone. We know also that he was in Rome with St. Peter and St. Paul. Tradition ascribes to him the founding of the Church in Alexandria.
St. Mark wrote the second Gospel, probably in Rome sometime before the year 60 A.D.; he wrote it in Greek for the Gentile converts to Christianity. Tradition tells us that St. Mark was requested by the Romans to set down the teachings of St. Peter. This seems to be confirmed by the position which St. Peter has in this Gospel. In this way the second Gospel is a record of the life of Jesus as seen through the eyes of the Prince of the Apostles. His feast day is April 25.
I’m not *against* the idea that Mark wrote in Rome. I just don’t see any real reason to think so.
The Catholic Encyclopedia article cited is from 105-110 years ago. Would composition in Rome have been a reasonable conjecture based on what was known at that time?
It was the age-old tradition.
In 1st century Rome, if a person was literate, would they be more likely to author text in Greek or in Latin?
I guess I tend to think of Greek being predominate where Alexander the Great’s conquered. Given Gospel of Mark is in Greek, I suppose I tend to think it would not have been written in Rome. But am going solely on the intuition about Greek probably being fluent in the places that Alexander trod.
Josephus wrote his histories in Greek (or was it originally his native language Aramaic, and then Greek)? And he was based in Rome at the time? So then perhaps Greek was considered THE language that would reach the widest audience in the 1st century Roman Empire.
The major authors in Rome at the time wrote in Latin (we’re talking roughly of the time of such figures as Livy and Seneca). Yes, Josephus learned Greek as a second language, and had some trouble with it. His works were penned in Rome.
Cool. Love learning new things about texts I thought I already knew inside out. I have a related question:
Mark 8:14-21
Now the disciples had forgotten to bring any bread; and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. 15 And he cautioned them, saying, “Watch out—beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.” 16 They said to one another, “It is because we have no bread.” 17 And becoming aware of it, Jesus said to them, “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? 18 Do you have eyes, and fail to see? Do you have ears, and fail to hear? And do you not remember? 19 When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect?” They said to him, “Twelve.” 20 “And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect?” And they said to him, “Seven.” 21 Then he said to them, “Do you not yet understand?”
What do you think the numbers symbolize? I have read some ideas that suggest the broken ‘loaves’ are coded references to martyred disciples? I have to admit, I do not understand what the Markan Jesus assumes I should understand!
Yeah, I’ve never figured out the numbers. Except to say that this is why biblical scholars are terrible at math (If you take five loaves and two fish, how many basket fulls are left over?)
I don’t know if I read it somewhere or if I just assumed that the five loaves for the 5,000 represented the Torah with the result being twelve tribes (baskets) of Israel. Two fish I could never figure out, unless it was Moses and Elijah or some other dynamic duo. The seven loaves for the 4,000 yielding 7 baskets never clicked for me, that I can recall now. Seven hills of Rome? Maybe that’s the evidence the Catholic Encylopedia was banking on.
Perhaps these numbers were never intended to be symbolic, just simple hyperbole or exaggeration. Although it’s hard to imagine such an author using the number 12 without expecting readers to connect it with the tribes of Israel. Israel had 12 patriarchs because it had 12 tribes. At least the literary Israel. Even the texts show varying numbers of tribes and half-tribes which are somehow contrived to always add up to 12.
“his own disciples never “get” who he is (Jesus harangues them for not understanding). Mark is unique among the Gospels in stressing this idea that no one can figure out who Jesus is. And in my view, the ending supports that motif: in the end, the disciples never *do* come to understand about him. They never even hear he has been raised from the dead. They are oblivious to the end.”
Vs:
“Fourth, less related point. We have records of visions of Jesus in Mark, M (Matthew’s special source), L (Luke’s special source), John, Acts (different traditions), and Paul. These sources are all independent of each other. It’s hard to believe that there was simply *one* source that made up the traditions of the visions, if all these sources describe the visions independently of one another.”
El contraire Peter:
1) You are a Master of contradiction in the Christian Bible yet you do not see the contradiction between GMark having a primary theme of discrediting the Disciples and thinking GMark is any type of support for the Disciples promoting a resurrected Jesus?
2) GMark has no Jesus visions.
3) GMark, as far as we know is the original Gospel narrative. See 2).
4) Since the only thing we can be certain of here is that a resurrected Jesus did not appear to the Disciples, it is likely that they did not claim that a resurrected Jesus appeared to them and that explains GMark’s discrediting. It is exponentially more likely that those who were not Disciples claimed that the Disciples had visions of Jesus.
5) None of the sources you mention are likely independent of each other.
6) The sources all give different vision information.
http://thenewporphyry.blogspot.com/2017/03/figures-dont-lie-but-liars-figure.html
Bart,
As far as the ending is concerned, verse 8 looks like an interrupted sentence, and the most likely reason for that is that Mark was interrupted, leaving the narrative unfinished until his colleagues attached a brief summary of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances. (A summary that didn’t interlock precisely with verse 8 – which should elicit an acknowledgement that it was not written to conclude Mark’s Gospel, but was already extant.)
B: “Even his own disciples never “get” who he is (Jesus harangues them for not understanding).”
This seems true only up to a point: during Jesus’ ministry the disciples didn’t get what it meant for Jesus to be the Messiah, but they *did* get who Jesus is, eventually, after His resurrection. When Mark wrote, he was one of a group of Christians, and they claimed to recognize Jesus as the Messiah. Mark is writing to vindicate a typical Christian claim, not something unique to him individually.
B: “And in my view, the ending supports that motif: in the end, the disciples never *do* come to understand about him. They never even hear he has been raised from the dead. They are oblivious to the end.”
Do you mean that Mark wrote to convey that the disciples *never* understood Jesus’ Messiahship? ‘Cause the whole early church regarded Mark’s Gospel-account as if it constituted the disciples’ own testimony — especially Peter’s — about Jesus, and thus a Petrine understanding of Jesus’ Messiahship went along with that.
B: . . . “in ways that require deep study to recognize.”
I can’t help but recollect the Emperor’s New Clothes when you say stuff like that.
B: . . . “These all tie the two passages together, the first episode in Jesus’ life and the last episode. This is real literary artistry.”
All (or mostly) valid points. But that doesn’t make the abruptness of 16:8 look non-accidental. Mark did not want to suggest that nobody *ever* understood Jesus’ Messiahship, or else that would include Mark himself among the non-understanders. Mark (the assistant of Peter, a la Papias et al) presents an apostolic point of view, and thus had no reason to convey that the apostles themselves *never* understood Jesus’ role (much less that they never got news of Jesus’ resurrection).
My favorite post of the year.
Do any of these (or other) artistic interjections add to, diminish or confuse any points of historicity in the narrative for you?
Well, they make the strict literal historicity dubious, in my opinion. These are literary touches.
The hyperbole in John is off the charts
John 12:31-32
Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”
The claim above all claims do you agree?
It’s pretty exalted!
In a book about Jesus by John Spong I read recently, I was fascinated by his claim and accompanying explanation that early Jewish-Christians interpreted Jesus’s death through the lens of Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement. Jesus paralleled the sacrificial lamb that was offered for the people’s sins (and may also have been conflated with the scapegoat that bore the people’s sins).
That seems like a good hypothesis about the origin of the Christian doctrine of atonement. It also seems like a much less horrific way of understanding the doctrine of atonement. No doubt the lamb was slain and offered to God as part of a request for forgiveness. But, from what I can tell, there is no emphasis on the suffering of the lamb as somehow making up for the people’s sins. Likewise, Jesus’s death could be seen as a (perfect) sacrifice that was a part of reconciling humankind with God once and for all, but not as absorbing all the punishment due humankind for their sins. The lamb, and Jesus, are peace offerings.
Is the general idea of the Christian doctrine of atonement being heavily dependent on Yom Kippur a common view among scholars? And is it correct that Yom Kippur did not put a lot of emphasis on the suffering of the lamb making up for sin?
One problem is that we don’t know how Yom Kippur was celebrated in the first century. But yes, the biblical account from Leviticus does seem to provide some of the sacrificial understanding underlying the views of atonement that developed in ealry Christianit.
Do you think this is a common understanding, that Mark consciously frames Jesus’ ministry reusing these symbols, spirit, splitting, voice, son of God?
It’s not big news to Markan scholars.
I’ve been a bit behind in following your blog. Caught up yesterday with a month’s worth.
There was a good deal of discussion about non-veridical visions (dreams, hallucinations, or otherwise) of Jesus after his crucifixion. Why do you think it is so important that his apostles actually had these visions? The Gospels and Acts are full of stories about Jesus raising the dead, casting out demons, curing leprosy, feeding thousands with a couple fish, etc. I’m pretty confident that none of his followers actually saw any of these things. They didn’t need to see the miracles to report them and make them part of the mythology surrounding the historical Jesus. So, why would they need to see a resurrected Jesus to report it.
It was supposed to happen. Jesus was supposed to be crucified and raised after three days. So, why is it necessary they actually saw him to spread that story (probably even to believe it.) They didn’t see any of the other “miracles” , so why would it be important to the story that they actually had a vision of this one?
What I argue in my book is that SOMETHING had to make the disciples believe that Jesus was raised again. I don’t think he predicted it historically. So what would have done it? In all of our surviving accounts, it is because some of his followers believed they saw him again later.
‘There is not a person in the narrative otherwise who understands – not Jesus’ family (including his mother), the people he grew up with, the Jewish leaders, or his own disciples. But the reader understands.’
Mark 14: ‘3 While he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper,[b] as he sat at the table, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment of nard, and she broke open the jar and poured the ointment on his head. 4 But some were there who said to one another in anger, “Why was the ointment wasted in this way? 5 For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii,[c] and the money given to the poor.” And they scolded her. 6 But Jesus said, “Let her alone; why do you trouble her? She has performed a good service for me. 7 For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish; but you will not always have me. 8 She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial.’
In Mark 14:3-8, the woman with the alabaster jar of nard clearly anoints Jesus for burial, indicating that she understands that Jesus is about to die. She must know who he is and what his fate is (in Markan terminology) if/since she has taken this action. Jesus defends her and says of her (Mark 14:9), “Truly I tell you, wherever the good news[d] is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.” If at Mark 8:29 Peter declares that Jesus is the Son of God (the first of the Markan secrets), then above in Mark 14 the woman with the jar of nard knows the second great Markan secret (one that Peter himself does not know, namely, as Son of God, Jesus must suffer and die). The Roman centurion recognizes Jesus because he experiences him in his death (seemingly for Mark, the only way to truly know Jesus), but the woman in Mark 14 has no such advantage.
Yup;, that’s the one possible exception. Too bad she doesn’t say anything to tell us what she was thinking about what she was doing (as opposed to what Jesus was thinking about what she was doing)
Almost forgot. You can tell your editor that I’m really looking forward to your book on the afterlife . That’s a great topic.
You’re probably familiar with this, but just in case you’re not; have you ever read Mark Twain’s ‘Letters from Earth’? The story was written in 1909, but not published until 1962. It was somewhat politically incorrect. But, Satan’s letter back to his buddies Micheal and Gabriel about man’s misconception of heaven and hell is worth reading. Particularly how man manages to leave out his favorite pastime from eternal life.
There are a number of public domain sources:
http://www.online-literature.com/twain/letters-from-the-earth/
Ha! I had forgotten that. Read it many, many years ago. Thanks.
what was the origin of the baptism/vision story? as none of his disciples were there.
Do you think Jesus reported the experience of his baptism to others, or more likely that John or a passerby started the tale?
I think Jesus was really baptized by John, and the story cmae about as story-tellers narrated what they imagined must have happened.
is there any reason to prefer the hypothesis that
“the vision story was created by story tellers”
to the hypothesis that
“Jesus had some kind of vision (veridical/non-veridical, as you call them, i dont know) that he reported to his disciples, that was subsequently handed down to these story tellers” ?
my sense is that the latter is more likely.
I suppose, a prophet reporting a/his vision to his disciples is not something that would be considered weird at the time.
Only reasons are that we know for a fact that story tellers are making up stories about Jesus, and that when they do so the stories coincide with their particular theological points of view. And the story of the vision fits perfectly with the CHristians’ theological points of view.
Bart,
That’s an interesting kind of “fact” you have there.
Granting that the accounts of Christ’s baptism interlock with early Christians’ theology, why do you point the current in the direction that you do, as if the theology came first and the story came second? Why not grant an apostolic tradition about Jesus’ baptism, from which proceeded both the written accounts and the theology that they express?
Simply because we know that Christians are making up all sorts of stories about Jesus. Nothing in the account links the story to an apostle. (The voice is not even publicly heard — it comes to Jesus alone.) (As you know, the voice says three different things in the three different Synoptics)
JamesSnapp, yeah it is much more reasonable, to me at least, that the vision story originated because it was told by Jesus to his disciples, rather than made up and coincidentally timed with his baptism. Especially if if one accepts the baptism as historical as most scholars do, and accepts that the baptism story is not something that missionaries would publicize unless there were a deeper reason to do so (like Jesus having actually reported his calling from God at that time).
Now every prophet’s message in prior scripture is initiated by a purported message/calling from God. Jesus starting his preaching without claiming a vision would be unique, likewise his disciples following him would be aided by his reporting such an experience.
True, no gospel explicitly states Jesus relating this incident with his disciples. On the other hand, the LDS literature I’ve seen read “the angel Moroni came to Joseph Smith [on such and such a date]”, not that “Joseph Smith reported that the the angel Moroni came to . . . .” though of course the two statements can’t mean anything at all different.
On the other hand if the vision story was invented independent of any experience Jesus claimed to have had, better from missionary standpoint make it up like Samuel’s calling when he was small child (Sam 3) or better still before he was born like Jeremiah (Jer 1:5). Why tack the vision on to the baptism story, that you really don’t want to advertise? And if there is a reason for someone (other than Jesus) inventing a vision story tacked on to the baptism, make sure the story from its very beginning (i.e. Gospel of Mark) reports a publicly heard voice rather than needing to wait for obvious embellishments of Matt andLuke.
Most convincing to me that this vision was reported by Jesus is that the vision is not something magical mystical (i.e. see Ezekiel), but is rather simple, and his hearing a voice saying “you are my son” explains exactly why and how Jesus lived his life as he did and spoke of God as his Father in a way that i don’t think anyone else has since.
As many scholars have written on the brilliant use of irony in Mark’s gospel, it is a bit puzzling why anyone would consider Mark to be unsophisticated. Do you think it’s because the author’s Greek is not very sophisticated that he sometimes gets a bad rap?
That’s probably part of it. Another part is that it seems on the surface to be so straightforward and lacking in depth.
Bart, with those being at opposite ends of the book, are there other pairs that perhaps suggest Mark structured the whole book with a chiasm?
I haven’t been able to find any. Either have others who have looked really hard (at least any that have convinced anyone). But one other point I did NOT mention, is that you also have the voice from heaven at the transfiguration at almost exactly the middle of the book as well, declaring Jesus to be the Son of God to the three disciples. Not an accident where it occurs.
Do you think there was any political motivation within the gospel to only have the Roman centurion declare he was the Son of God? Is there any significance to the second inner curtain being rent in two as opposed to the first curtain leading into the tabernacle?
I think the point must be that a pagan acknowledges him, not a Jew. It was the Gentiles who would come into the fold. And it doesn’t say which curtain ripped, but almost certainly it is the one before the Holy of Holies, to show that now God is available to all people, not simply the high priest on Yom Kippur.
It’s a true shame that Christian education does not put the same emphasis on Greek literacy as Muslim education does on Arabic!
This is a great explanation and you’re right, deep study and knowledge is necessary to see and explain it. Thanks!
Well taught, thanks Doc!
Thanks, as when I saw the title of the post I thought oh no! It’s my favorite because in addition to the theology it presents the most human Jesus and the narrative of impending doom is tense throughout. I’m very happy you defended it. Is it possible that Mark was writing in response to Paul’s running around saying Jesus would return soon? Was he responding with universal misunderstanding to the obvious questions and objections a later generation would be raising when Jesus didn’t return? The shorter ending also seems like an insider’s joke–because obviously somebody did tell someone.
Unless the point was that true knowledge of the resurrected Christ could not come by word of mouth, but only through direct experience. Paul’s metaphoric interpretation of baptism as dying and rising may have pointed to the same notion. Those who never saw him could die and rise with him in this life.
Is it too simplistic to say that in the Gospel of Mark proper, Jesus HAS a message while in the addendum (as in John), he IS the message?
I think there’s a good bit of truth in that simple way of putting it.
In Matthew 10:23, Jesus tells the Twelve, “you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.” But in 28:19 he says, “go out and make disciples of all nations….”
1. Did Matthew forget what he had written before when he was composing his ending, or does he have a different understanding of the coming of the Son of Man than the usual end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it scenario?
2. Did he think the conversion of the nations outside Israel would not be completed until after the Kingdom of Heaven was already established on earth?
The way it’s usually explained is that during Jesus’ *lifetime* the mission was to Israel, and after his resurrection it was to the entire world. It’s not clear when the kingdom will come in the midst of the mission.
I’ve wondered whether the Transfiguration was originally an account of a post-crucifixion apparition that Mark decided to incorporate into the main body of his gospel to serve a literary purpose — maybe to make Peter, James, and John seem especially dense. How much more obvious could it be, eh? Have any scholars you know suggested something like that?
Yes, this was a popular view in the mid 20th century among critical scholars.
I am not qualified to evaluate the language skills of the author of the Gospel of Mark, but I believe the animus that propels his narrative is obvious. We are told that Jesus’s Jewish followers are stupid and don’t really understand him. Neither do his relatives, who think he is crazy. Why does “Mark” assert these things? It’s obvious: he is attempting to denigrate the Jews, to diminish the Jewish “church” as compared to the gentile followers of Jesus. It is early (but not the earliest) anti-semitism.
There is a parallel development in another area of Christology. Some of the most distinguished scholars of Jesus and his era assert, quite properly, that Jews of Jesus’s time did not believe he was the Messiah because he was crucified and accomplished none of the things the messiah was expected to achieve. That’s clearly correct, but some scholars go even farther. They claim that 1st century Jews not only rejected Jesus as Messiah, but they despised him because he was a person who had been crucified and therefore was a vile, contaminated creature. This is arrant nonsense. After one Jewish uprising in Herod’s day, he crucified thousands of Jews. Are we supposed to believe that the families and friends of these victims despised them? Of course not. This is part and parcel of the sometimes successful effort to separate Jesus from the Jews, and in its later incarnations to actually blame the Jews for the murder of Jesus. In Matthew’s Gospel we have a mob of bloodthirsty Jews screaming at Pilate to crucify Jesus, and “his blood be upon us and our children.” This is shameful and some honorable scholars have acknowledged and denounced the anti-semitism in these views. Where do you stand, Dr. Ehrman?
My view is that it is important to differentiate between anti-Judaism and anti-semitism. The latter is rooted in theories of race that developed in the 19th century which said that Jews are an inherently inferior people by birth. No one in antiquity thought of it this way.
Doctor Erhman ,What do you think about the re-opening of the tomb of Jesus ,is relevant ?
Do you mean in Mark? It was open so he could walk out, I suppose; or at least so people could see for certain he wasn’t in it.
No, i mean that the tomb believed to be the place where Jesus was laid has been opened by archaelogist recently . Do you think that we’ll get more information and the myth that Jesus was buried there will be debunked?
No, they have not found Jesus’ tomb.
Dr Herman, Do you know the name or identification number of the oldest manuscript that has the title/name for the “Gospel of Mark” (authorship)??? ….. In addition what year was this manuscript written???
Thank you!!
I suppose it is codex Vaticanus, produced maybe around 370 CE
Bart,
Considering that most of the Gospel of Mark is linked to Peter (as stated by Papias et al), it’s not enough to say that there’s nothing in the account itself to link the story to an apostle; that seems like special demand — and even if there *were* such a statement in the text, you would just say, “Look how the mimic is going out of his way to look like Peter,” right?
Also, regarding the voice at Jesus’ baptism: you said: “As you know, the voice says three different things in the three different Synoptics.” No; I do not know that, and neither do you — the harmonization in Luke in the world’s most harmonized Gospels-MS (D) being a harmonization to the parallel Psalm-text. Without that, there are /two/ different things said by the voice, and the difference is a trifle, like the difference between “He said this to him” and “He said this about him.”
And: B: “(The voice is not even publicly heard — it comes to Jesus alone.)”
Where are you getting that idea from? The descent of the Holy Spirit, one could connect to “He saw,” but where is the
voice ever said to be exclusively heard by Jesus? (And does this mean that you’re inclined to believe the narrative about the voice at the Transfiguration, where the text says that the voice was heard by the disciples? Or does it just mean that you need to come up with different reasons to disbelieve both accounts?)
I don’t think there is any particular link between the Gospel of Mark and Peter at all. On the voice at the baptism in Luke, as you know also I devote a long discussion to this in Orthodox Corruption of Scripture.
Are you saying you believe at one point in time there was an authentic story circulating about Jesus being baptized by John which did NOT include Jesus’ vision? and only later it was embellished by adding the vision?
I can hardly imagine a more pointless story than this . . .
“all the people of Jerusalem went out to John the Baptist, Jesus was there too.”
Yes, that’s what I’m saying. There was a tradition that Jesus was baptized by John. It wasn’t a “story” so much as a piece of information that people knew. The story came later.
That makes sense. The main characterization was that Jesus began as a disciple of John the Baptist. His earliest teachings matched those of John. The mystical flourish seems to be an embellishment, not the main point.
The example Dr. Ehrman cites in his post is but one example of many throughout the synoptic gospels where the authors go to great lengths to explain why the ideas of Christianity, especially later Christology, were unknown during the lifetime of Jesus. If Jesus really was who Christians say he was, then how come no one ever heard of him? No one wrote of him. Only Christians talk about him. The diarists offer many explanations.
The idea doesn’t even occur to us. Today, everyone has heard of Jesus. Other exaggerations in the gospels show his fame spreading far and wide. The authors had to reconcile this apparent contradiction. Perhaps he was well-known as a sage of Second Temple Judaism in backwoods Galilee, but the Christian ideas were hidden. Or the disciples were dense. Or they were told not to tell anyone. Or it was not yet time. Or Jesus didn’t reveal it even to his disciples until after his death. The defense attornies flail madly about as they try to refute evidence from the prosecution.