Here is my final post on Mark, following a literary-historical method. After this post I’ll have a reflection or two on the method, and then talk in much briefer fashion about other methods one might use to study the Gospels.
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Jesus’ Death as the Son of God
It is clear from Mark’s Gospel that Jesus’ disciples never do come to understand who he is. As we have seen, he is betrayed to the Jewish authorities by one of them, Judas Iscariot. On the night of his arrest, he is denied three times by another, his closest disciple, Peter. All the others scatter, unwilling to stand up for him in the hour of his distress. Perhaps Mark wants his readers to understand that the disciples were shocked when their hopes concerning Jesus as messiah were thoroughly dashed: Jesus did not bring victory over the Romans or restore the kingdom to Israel. For Mark, of course, these hopes were misplaced. Jesus was the Son of God; but he was the Son of God who had to suffer. Until the very end, when Jesus was actually crucified, there was nobody who fully understood.
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Prof Ehrman
It occurs to me that if some film maker made a film of the Gospel of Mark and filmed it just as it’s written it might be the most controversial Jesus movie ever made simply because for many Christians it would be unrecognizable. Mark does seem to be frequently treated as a “lesser” Matthew/Luke and triumphalism trumps fear and confusion every time.
Speaking of confusion, are we intended by the writer to interpret Mark 4:11&12 to mean that Jesus intended to deliberately obscure his message in some sense?
Thanks
Yes, I think so! It’s all part of the messianic secret in Mark. (Virtually) No one gets it.
What do you think of the theory that early copyists deliberately omitted the original ending of Mark, leaving that abrupt ending of “for they were afraid”? Maybe the original ending made clear that Jesus’ appearances after the Resurrection were in the nature of spiritual visions, and the copyists didn’t want to transmit anything contradictory to the stories that were already spreading about him having been resurrected in full material form.
I don’t think there’s anyway copyists intentionally deleted it. The early Christians were invested in Jesus’ appearances to the disciples after the resurrection — not in him *not* appearing to them!
Has the story of Peter’s denial in the High Priest’s court any historical value? If so, what kind of knowledge did Peter (and the apostles) possess that prevented him from giving more decent support, given that the arrest came as a complete surprise?
I doubt if the three denials is historical, but that some of the disciples denied him under pressure — that makes historical sense.
I see. But the question is then about the reason they had to deny him. Why did they think they would put themselves in peril by not “denying”?
Probably because if they were known to be his associates, and he was found guilty of insurrection, they too would be suspect.
If Mark ends his gospel at 16:8, what then is the motivation for the scribes to really add an ending which does not happen. Can we then trust the rest of the gospel of Mark since it contains false additions to its end and how much is addition withing the gospel?
They wanted to show that Jesus appeared to the disciples afterward. The fact that scribes added an ending doesn’t make the original author’s account untrustworthy though.
Could the women’s silence mean that, according to Mark, Jesus’ apparition in Galilee was a surprise to his disciples? Could this be an indication that the historical post-Resurrection experiences weren’t “on the third day” but at some unspecified time later in Galilee and came as a total shock to the followers of Jesus?
If this were the case would it mean the empty tomb story is trying to get across the point that Jesus’s resurrection was indeed bodily and not a spirit?
Yes and yes!
Prof. Ehrman, I hope you don’t believe that any of these things actually happened. No, Jesus in Gethsemane didn’t pray “three times not to have to undergo his fate.” According to Mark’s gospel, Jesus prayed alone while his disciples were sleeping. There were no witnesses to Jesus praying. So, how could anyone know how he prayed when he was by himself and his disciples were asleep? Obviously, this is a made up story. It didn’t happen.
No, Jesus wasn’t “in doubt” before his arrest. Jesus didn’t have ESP. He didn’t know he was going to be arrested. No one would voluntarily allow himself to be crucified. Jesus didn’t anticipate or accept his crucifixion. This is Christian mythology.
None of Mark’s details about Jesus’ crucifixion are credible:
1.) Mark had no way of knowing whether Jesus was mocked and whipped. It wasn’t a public event. None of Jesus’ followers were present when he was allegedly flogged, so where did this information come from? It’s just another made up story.
2.) Jesus’ followers didn’t witness his alleged trial and meeting with Pontius Pilate. Mark couldn’t have known whether Jesus was tried or whether he talked with Pilate, much less what was said. These are made up stories.
3.) No one would know what, if anything, Jesus said on the cross. His followers weren’t there. His disciples had deserted him. Only the women “watched from a distance.” So, they weren’t within earshot to hear his last words. Besides, a crucified man would be in horrible agony and struggling for breath. I doubt that he would be thinking about making the kinds of thoughtful statements recounted in the gospels.
4.) The Romans didn’t remove bodies from crosses after the crucified persons died. The dead bodies were left on display to rot. So, it’s doubtful that Jesus’ body would have been taken down, especially by a Jew (such as Joseph of Arimathea) since he would have become ritually unclean by handling a dead body before Passover.
5.) It’s ridiculous to suppose that a Roman soldier (who didn’t believe in Jesus) suddenly proclaimed ‘“Surely this man was God’s Son” when Jesus died.
6.) No, the curtain in the Temple wasn’t torn. Mark couldn’t have known about that even if it did happen. Another fable.
7.) Who was the mysterious man in a white robe at the tomb? Where did he come from? Another questionable episode.
And so and so on, just a lot improbable story-telling. Jesus didn’t make a triumphal entry into Jerusalem. He was from Galilee. He rarely if ever entered Judea, so he would have been unknown in Jerusalem. Even if some people in Jerusalem had heard of him, they wouldn’t have recognized him — so they wouldn’t have hailed him on sight as he entered the city. Another phony story.
When the Gospel of Mark is deconstructed — when all the far-fetched miracles and other improbable events are analyzed and discounted — there is nothing left of any historical value in Mark. I challenge anyone to find anything credible in Mark’s gospel. It seems to be almost entirely fictitious, the work of a fabulist.
Frank, how anyone knew what it was Jesus prayed, since all were supposedly sleeping, has always bugged me. Not even apologists have a sound explanation for that one. It’s just one of things Christian’s are expected to accept. Aside from that, and forgive me for not quoting Scripture here – as time is not my friend, today:
1. The flogging. Certainly Jesus was flogged, following his arrest. The Roman authorities were near famous for the cruelty involved in the flogging of their prisoners. Look up “Roman flagrum”. It was customary. Break the law, get flogged. I’ve no doubt but that this happened.
2. There might be a source for this, lost to us now. Perhaps there was a witness, such as one of the Sanhedrin?
3. “The disciple Jesus loved” was supposedly there, or nearby. Or so it is written.
4. Might you not consider the devotion of JoA to Jesus, that might have been such that he willingly forfeited the law and ritual purity out of his love for Jesus? Nothing’s been said of JoA being without sin. I believe that in this instance, he made an exception and wantonly defiled himself. Is it not possible?
5. It seems to me that had he made such a pronouncement, he too would have run the risk of being flogged; but then, who heard it? Might Paul have been anywhere about? Where was Paul while all of this was happening?
6. Indeed. There’s something about an earthquake too, isn’t there? No matter. Had the curtain torn I can well imagine that the Temple itself would have become the first Church of Christ.
7. Who was the mysterious man in the white robe at the tomb? ???
When the Book of Mark is deconstructed …. Have you ever read Jefferson’s Bible?
If the women knew there was a large stone in front of the tomb that they couldn’t move by themselves, why would they bother to get ointment and travel there to anoint Jesus’ body?
They appear to have thought someone would help them roll it away.
The Holy Bible (King James Version)
Authorized Version
Reproduction of 1917 Scofield Reference Bible
Edited by Rev. C.I. Scofield, D.D.
Stonehaven Press – no publication date given, contains a footnote at the end of the book of Mark, which reads:
1. The passage from verse 9 to the end IS NOT FOUND (emphasis, mine) in the two most ancient manuscripts, the Sinaitic and Vatican, and others have it with partial omissions and variations. Bit it is quoted by Ireneus and Hippolytus in the 2nd or 3rd century.
The late 2nd or 3rd century? Partial omissions and variations? (the inspired and inerrant word of God?) “IS NOT FOUND”? Re”mark”able.
Great series of posts. The part about separate pages vs. a scroll is especially interesting as I have heard the argument that the original ending was lost before.
There’s little or no indication in Mark that he ascribed to this later theological interpretation of the tearing of the temple curtain. I think it should be understood more simply as a portent of the destruction of the temple, which Jesus prophesied in a climatic final discourse just prior to his crucifixion and which actually just took place at the time Mark’s gospel was written.
I have wondered if the sudden ending of Mark was also intended to explain why there was no uproar in Jerusalem when Jesus rose from the dead, and why the story of his resurrection took a while to get out – the women didn’t tell anybody! And as in Matthew Jesus was to meet up with the disciples in Galilee, not Jerusalem. Of course, Acts portrays the message getting out quickly and mass conversions in Jerusalem, but is there any evidence of this outside the book of Acts? (Sounds to me like the Luke/Acts author was trying to reconcile Jewish and Gentile Christians, and that’s why he keeps the disciples in Jerusalem so the church gets its start there.)
So I am sure that I understand, are you saying that the oldest and most probably, the truest gospel of Mark that is available at this time is the one that ends at 16:8?
Yup.
Is there any reason to believe there’s a connection between the young man in the tomb and the young man in 14:51-52 whose white robe is pulled off as he runs away unclothed after the arrest of Jesus? Do you have any ideas on why Mark included that very strange story about the fleeing young man?
Some have thought so. But if so, he found some clothes somewhere. I’ve thought about that streaker for years, and still don’t know what I think.
Do you have strong feelings for or against the idea that the fleeing young man is a baptismal candidate and the young man in the empty tomb is that same young man now proclaiming the risen Lord while the women flee in fear? To the listeners of the gospel, the young man would have been representative of the Markan community and their beliefs in contrast to the disciples’ Prophet Christology.
It’s one of the options. But neither Jesus nor anyone else is practicing Christian baptism in Mark, so it is not clear where this fellow would be going to be baptized. He may be the same guy as at the tomb; but if so he stopped at the local clothing shop first….
I didn’t explain myself very clearly which isn’t unusual. The baptismal candidate is the reader/listener of the Gospel of Mark in the 70s. Do you think the fleeing young man and the young man in the empty tomb could be literary devices and that both the Markan author and his listeners/readers were all aware that these stories were not meant to be historic but instead symbolic of the higher resurrected Son of God Christology of the gentile believers in contrast to the lower prophet like Moses (and Elijah) beliefs of the disciples?
I doubt it myself; I think the early readers took the account as a description of what happened. But if the *reader* is the baptismal candidate, I don’t understand who the fleeing man is in your opinion.
I always wondered about that holy of holies. After a couple of centuries, the dust build up must have been significant, unless on of the High Priest’s duties on Yom Kippur was to sweep it out?
It’s unlikely that Joseph of Arimathea took down Jesus’ body from the cross because if Joseph touched a dead body, he would have become “ritually impure for seven days (Num 19:11) and thus unable to celebrate the Passover feast.” There’s no way that a Jew would have handled Jesus’ corpse just before Passover.
According to the gospels, Jesus’ body wasn’t found in the tomb where the women claim that Joseph put it. So the story doesn’t add up. Jesus’ disciples never saw Jesus on the cross, nor did they find his corpse afterwards. So, how can we be sure that Jesus was crucified? His disciples supposedly didn’t witness his crucifixion, nor did they discover his dead body, according to the gospels.
Jesus’ crucifixion (which supposedly lasted only six hours) was reportedly observed by the women who “watched from a distance.” It would be difficult to identify a man on a cross from a distance. The women are unreliable witnesses, especially in view of their dubious report about Joseph of Arimathea and their failure to locate Jesus’ body where they said it was entombed (assuming that any of this story is true).
It’s possible that Jesus wasn’t crucified (his disciples couldn’t vouch for it), but rather, he was killed in another way and then his body was dumped, perhaps in a pit. This would explain Jesus’ missing body. Paul said that Jesus was “buried.” (Cor. 15:4) Evidently, the entombment of Jesus’ corpse was unknown to Paul in the 50s AD. The legend of Joseph of Arimathea and the empty tomb may have developed later. Or perhaps, it was concocted by the author of Mark’s gospel.
If Jesus’ death had taken place in a city other than Jerusalem, do you think the outcome of the Christian movement would have been different? Would there be a Christian movement?
Thanks a lot.
Great question. I”m not sure! I’d guess not….
Perhaps you have mentioned this before, but is there any influence of Paul’s writings in Mark’s Gospel?
I think so! Their views of the significance of Jesus’ death are very similar.
How does one then reconcile the Historicity of Jesus withing the four gospels (including Acts) if all the authors are claiming “inspiration” from God?
It will be a good idea if Prof. Will give us same expositions on The Gospel of John. I admit this has really been of great help to me (i believe also to most of us here if not all).
None of the authors claimed to be divinely inspired!
Yeah it is clear from reading the gospels that none of their respective authors claimed inspiration.
When is the idea (by the Fundamentalist) of the gospels and other writings of Paul came to be consider “inspired”?
Is there a definitive answer to who actually wrote these gospels, can they really be Jesus’ decipels?
Christian leaders were saying this by the mid to late second century. I discuss authorship issues in a number of my books, such as Forged.
Did the allegorical intent of the ending of Mark over ride the illogical description of the women fleeing and telling no one? How would the author have known they fled if they didn’t ever tell anyone? Your interpretation of the ending of Mark makes sense to me ever since I first read about it, but the fact that they never told anyone has always made me wonder about it. Of course there are a number of head-scratchers in the NT so maybe I’m just thinking too much!
Yes, the reader of course knows that Jesus has been raised. But there are all sorts of ways to explain how they know if the women didn’t tell. E.g., what if Jesus appeared to others and *they* told….
How did the women who observed the crucifixion know that the man who entombed Jesus’ body was Joseph of Arimathea? These women were from Galilee. They wouldn’t have recognized him. They wouldn’t know a member of the Sanhedrin, so how could they know his name and status by merely watching him? Where could Mark or anyone have gotten information that Joseph of Arimathea put Jesus’ body in a tomb? It doesn’t add up.
How would Mark know what Joseph of Arimathea and Pontius Pilate said to each other in private? How would Mark know that Pilate summoned a centurion who told Pilate that Jesus was dead? Mark wasn’t there. Obviously, an outsider couldn’t possibly know about Pilate’s conversations with Joseph and the centurion. This is made up. It’s story telling.
Why would Joseph Arimathea have allowed himself to become ritually impure before Passover by handling a dead body? According to Jewish law, Joseph would have become ritually impure for seven days after touching a dead body. A devout Jew wouldn’t have touched Jesus’ corpse just before Passover. And yet Mark says that Joseph of Arimathea took down Jesus’ body from the cross, “wrapped it in linen and placed it in a tomb.” This isn’t a credible story. It’s clear that none of these things happened.
Mark’s story of Jesus’ crucifixion is full of improbable and impossible details, such as a mysterious man in a white robe appearing at the tomb. Who was he? Mark pretends to know what Jesus told Pilate and how Jesus was abused by Roman soldiers, even though there were no outside witnesses to tell what occurred. It’s all fiction. Mark doesn’t tell the true story of Jesus’ death. It can’t have happened the way that Mark told it. With the gospel of Mark, we are dealing with a fable.
There’s the theory (by James Tabor, for example) that, based on careful analysis of the passage in the Gospel of John, Jesus’ corpse was first laid into an empty tomb that happened to be nearby because there was not much time for a decent burial with Passover approaching fast. Joseph of Arimathea then sent his people to that temporary tomb as soon as Passover was over (Saturday evening). That’s why the tomb was empty on Sunday morning when Mary and/or the women came. And since they were low-class peasant people from Galilee they had no way to find out who had moved the corpse where. Details here: http://jamestabor.com/2012/07/17/reading-mark-and-john-the-first-burial-of-jesus/
I’m not so sure that’s based on a close analysis of the biblical stories. 🙂
The notion that Joseph of Arimathea went to Pontius Pilate in the middle of the night to ask for Jesus’ body is ridiculous. Then, Joseph supposedly trooped over to Golgotha in the middle of the night to take down Jesus’ body from the cross. How did Joseph manage that? Did he carry Jesus’ 150 lbs. body over his shoulder? Impossible. So, was Joseph strong enough to drag the body over rocky ground until he reached a tomb? How bizarre. Was the tomb conveniently located nearby? That seems unlikely. The whole scenario is unrealistic.
Why would Joseph of Arimathea perform such a strange task in the middle of the night? Because he didn’t want a crucified Jew to remain on the cross during Passover? Well, what about the two other crucified men on crosses? Did Joseph neglect them? Were they still alive? Or, did Joseph also haul their dead bodies to a tomb? The story is farcical. How would Joseph have been so motivated to go to Pilate to get permission to carry out such an arduous task in the middle of the night — a task that would violate his ritual purity? It’s absurd nonsense. It didn’t happen.
Perhaps this question is out of place in this thread, but I wonder where does the emphasis on Heaven and Hell in Christianity come from? Is it in Mark and developed in later Gospels? It seems to me that the Hebrew Bible and modern Judaism are much more interested in the here-and-now and Jews don’t go around threatening people with eternal damnation if they don’t do this or that or believe this or that. Do you agree?
I discuss where these notions came from in a chapter in my book Jesus Interrupted (Chapter called “Who Invented Christianity?”)
Prof. Ehrman,
If you think that Joseph of Arimathea wasn’t a real person and you don’t believe in the empty tomb (which I don’t believe, either), what do you think happened to Jesus’ body? Did Jesus’ body remain on the cross until it rotted away? If his body wasn’t properly buried, how could Paul and the gospel authors have been so wrong about such a basic fact?
If you don’t accept the gospels’ version of Jesus’ crucifixion and burial, then what happened to his dead body? If it decayed and fell apart on the cross (which was typical for Roman crucifixions), that would seem to preclude his followers’ believing in Jesus’ resurrection since there wouldn’t have been anything left of his body to resurrect — and there wouldn’t have been a three day time interval for the resurrection to occur. Since the gospels’ account seems to be wrong, what do you think actually happened?
Ah, I deal with this in the book, and don’t want to spoil the suspense!
OK, I’ll read your book~! I look forward to reading what you have to say on these questions.
Even though I give you a hard time sometimes, I respect your scholarship. I appreciate your informative well-reasoned books and your blog. Thanks —
I’ve just finished reading your book (HJBG) and must congratulate you on an excellent read.
One thing that struck me while reading it is that, while there is lots of debate from ancient times on whether or not Jesus was divine or fully human and so on, no one seems to address the question on what it would mean for Jesus to have died.
In whatever sense one would consider Jesus to be God, how could he have died? If he rose on the third day, what was he (his spirit??) doing during that time? Did views on what it meant for Jesus to have died evolve as views on his Christology evolved?
Are there any writings I could consult on this issue?
Yes, it has been hotly debated for centuries. For example, in the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, his body died, and his spirit went down and deprived Hades of all its captives.
I came across a Christian on youtube who said that you have attested that the incident of Mary Magdalene finding the tomb of Jesus empty came from more than one independent sources. Is that true? Do you still hold on to this position? If not, why? Thanks!
Ha! This is not a disputed matter — does anyone *not* think it’s independently attested?! By saying that I attest it makes it sound like I’ve conceded an important point!
If this does indeed come from more than one independent source then would this not prove that Jesus rose from the dead? Just to play devil’s advocate, why else would Mary Magdalene say the tomb of Jesus is empty if the resurrection never happened?
I discuss this in my book, How Jesus Became God. But the short answer is no, just because something is reported in independent documents does not mean it has to be historical. It simply means that the tradition pre-dates the various sources that contain it.
I’m sorry if this sounds melodramatic, but I’ve always had trouble understanding the cause-effect of calling Jesus the Son of God, and you might have just cleared it up for me. You are saying then that it was simply a euphemism for someone with a close relationship to God as per the examples in the OT? The centurion could say that because of the events at the actual death? Does it imply then that ‘Mark’ was Jewish in order to be so familiar? To you this is a small piece, but to me it’s no Donnerfurz. Until right now I may have been reading it all wrong, and this also helps with Mt and Lk–they took the moniker and made it literal?
You might want to look at my book How Jesus Became God. I think it might clear it all up. The term “Son of God” could mean a number of things — it could refer to an angel, to the king of Israel, to the people of Israel, to someone with a particularly close relationship with God, to someone who was in some sense himself divine, and more. When Christians called Jesus the Son of God, the big issue was: “In what sense?”
Yeah for some reason I still conflated ‘son’ with the eventual Christian understanding. Frustrated with myself, and again thankful for the blog.
I hope I’m asking this right…If the order of the Gospel go Mark first, then Matthew, then Luke, then John, I’ve heard you in different podcast mention Pilate becomes increasingly innocent correct? As well as your “If Pilate’s innocent who’s guilty? It’s those damn Jews.” I believe that’s from a (Not You, those back in early Common Era Perspective) Christian theologian perspective correct? Why would writers of the New Testament want the Jews to be blamed instead of Pilate? If Pilate innocent, Jews guilty, Are New Testament Christian Theologians writers blaming Jews to get converts to join Christian movement?
I’m certainly not a Christian theologian!! But yes, the Gospels do want to blame the Jews more, and the Romans less, both because they want to stress that Jews have rejected their own messiah and because they want to be on the good side of the Romans.
I’m Sorry. I try not to screw up & I screwed up my parentheses to include Christian theologian perspective. I love listening to your podcasts. I wish I lived closer to go to UNC just to visit Armadillo Grill! Thank You for taking the time to answer!
Dr Ehrman,
I am in the middle of a religious debate with a good friend about the discrepancies between the time of Jesus’ death based on the seemingly differing accounts in Mark and John. My ideas about the discrepancy came from your “The Greatest Controversies in Early Christian History” lecture #5. She made some interesting points about the John 19:14 passage that states “it was the Preparation Day of the Passover” where I had referenced your ideas about the passage signifying a crucifixion on the day before Passover versus a crucifixion on Passover itself as claimed in Mark. She used the argument that “preparation day” is practically synonymous in the Bible with the day before Sabbath (whether high Sabbath or traditional weekly Sabbath). She claimed that the passage in John was not indicating a preparation day FOR Passover, but a preparation day OF Passover–a common Sabbath preparation day that happened to fall on the week of Passover.
I’m curious if you stand by your argument from the lecture or if you find the discrepancy fairly easily resolved by this explanation?
Oh yes, I completely stand by it. You should note that in John the Jews refuse to enter the Praetorian because they do not want to be defiled and thus prevented from “eating the Passover” that evening. So the trial is most definitely taking place on the morning of the day of preparation for the passover meal. In Mark Jesus is not put on trial and killed until a day later.
Dr Ehrman,
Thank you for getting back to me! I’ve been listening to your debates and teachings for a while and feel a bit starstruck to hear from you.
My friend is supportive of biblical inerrancy and a strict KJV reader. In John 18:28 the KJV doesn’t specifically mention the Praetorian as other versions do, but states, “Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of judgment: and it was early; and they themselves went not into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the Passover.” I’m absolutely clueless about whether this small difference in KJV changes the meaning overall.
But my friend did mention this passage and noted that the supposed discrepancy makes sense when considering the Feast of Unleavened Bread that coincides with the Passover week. I suppose because of the close relation between Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the whole week was sometimes referred to as “Passover.” The Jewish leaders had already eaten the Passover proper, but there remained other sacrifices to be made and meals to be eaten, and they didn’t want to be disqualified from participating in the remainder of the week’s ceremonies.
What do you think?
Whatever the hall was called, the problem is that hte Jewish leaders would been unable to eat the passover *only* if they didn’t have time to perform an act of ritual cleansing, so the meal must have been near, not a few days away.
In addition there *was* no Day of Preparation for the *Week* of Passover — which was, as you point out, not called the week of Passover, but was the week of the festival of Unleavened Bread. The “Day of Preparation” — whether for Sabbath or Passover or both — is the day on which the meal is prepared that is eaten that evening. You are preparing the meal. You are not preparing for a week of meals. They are preparing “the” passover meal. So that evening it will become Passover. IN Mark, Jesus lives through that day and is executed the next morning, *after* the meal had been eaten.
It really is a cut and dried case. (As scholars have long said!)
1. Do you think the Gospels used Paul’s epistles as a source? I’ve heard some say that the names of the disciples and other characters were just made up since Paul doesn’t say them when he mentions that he met with the 12. I highly doubt that these names were made up…thoughts?
2. Do you consider Mary (mother of Jesus) conversion to Christianity historical in Acts?
I don’t see any evidence that any of the Gospel writers, including Luke, to have known Paul’s letters. 2. I don’t know what his mother thought after his death. We simply don’t have good enough evidence to tell.
2. So if they didn’t use Paul’s epistles, and all four gospel’s seem to get their names right, it’s highly probable their names are historical? Peter, James, James 2 and John seem to match up with what Paul says. And John didn’t use the other gospel’s as a source and it also matches.
2. Why is it that in Galatians, Paul seems to use the name Peter and Cephas. It seems he’s referring to the same person, but why would he use different names? Translation issue?
2. I don’t know what you mean aout getting their names right. Do you mean the names Matthew, mark, Luke, and John? I don’t think these were the names of the authors. 2. Look Cephas up on the blog by a word search. I once wrote an academic article arguing that Cephas and Peter were two different people.
Ah I meant the names do the twelve disciples. I heard that the gospel authors didn’t actually know the historical names of the twelve disciples, so they created them first in Mark. And then these names were further used in Matthew and Luke.
There’s really no way to know if the Gospel writers knew the names of the twelve (so when some says they definitely did *not* know, you may want to ask them how they know that!). The interesting thing is that when you look at the names of the twelve in teh different Gospels and Acts, there are some differences. That would suggest that everyone know there would twelve of them, but there were different traditions about the names of some of them.
What would be the response to the argument that Jesus was not confused about the purpose of the crucifixion as evidenced by the following two things.
1. During “the last supper” Jesus explicitly discusses how his body will be broken and his blood shed for the forgiveness of sins.
2. Earlier in Bethany Jesus defends the action of the woman who anointed him by saying, “She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial.” Mark 14:8
Do these not indicate that Jesus was not confused but believed his death was preordained and its purpose the forgiveness of sin?
Thanks for the help!
Yes, those closely coincide with the three explicit declarateiong (the “Passion Predictions”) in Mark 8:38; 9:38; and 10:33-34. Already in ch. 2 Jesus indicates that he will be killed. That’s the great irony in Mark: when it comes to the moment, Jesus is in doubt. Brilliant. The key is to figure out why. Mark is trying to say something by that.
If Mark was not living in Judea and didn’t speak Hebrew, and composed his gospel after the destruction of the temple, how did he know about the holy of holies and that fact that a veil or curtain separated it? The metaphor about it ripping at Jesus’s death and thus providing access to God for all is perfect.
The curtain seems like an intimate bit of knowledge that a Gentile never would not have seen since they could not enter that part of the temple complex. By the time Mark wrote, weren’t most Christians former pagans and not converted Jews who could have told him? Is it thought that Mark got the knowledge from Josephus? (I asked the question after your talk at NINT about how we know about the curtain).