In my previous post I began to discuss the understanding of Jesus as the Son of God, the Messiah, in the Gospel of Mark (this is a thread within a thread within a thread – but it doesn’t matter.  Each of these posts makes sense on their own).  I am trying to show that Mark portrayed Jesus as the Son of God (meaning:  the one who was in a particularly close relationship with God who was chosen by God to mediate his will on earth) and the messiah.  But he was the Son of God/Messiah whom no one understood.  Even his disciples. What though would it mean for first century Jews to think of someone as the messiah? Some serious background is necessary.  As I pointed out in my previous post, the word Messiah is a Hebrew term (the Greek equivalent is “Christ”) which meant “anointed one.”  Why would you call someone the anointed one? In Jewish circles the term goes back to a kind of royal ideology (i.e., understandings of the kingship) from centuries [...]