Loading...So far in this thread I have argued that Mark 1:41 originally said that Jesus got angry when the leper asked him to heal him; and I have shown that elsewhere in Mark’s Gospel Jesus gets angry in context involving healing. And so: if Jesus got angry when the leper asked for healing in Mark 1:41 – what exactly was he angry about? Over the years numerous interpretations have been proposed, and some of these explanations are highly creative.
Some interpreters have argued that Jesus became angry because he knew that the man would disobey orders, spreading the news of his healing and making it difficult for Jesus to enter into the towns of Galilee because of the crowds. The problem with this view is that it seems unlikely that Jesus would be angry about what the man would do later — before he actually did it! Others have suggested that he was angry because the man was intruding on his preaching ministry, keeping him from his primary task. Unfortunately, nothing in the text says anything about this as a problem, and it seems odd as an interpretation in Mark’s Gospel in particular, where healings and exorcisms play so much a greater role than preaching.
Others have suggested that Jesus was angry with the leper for breaking the Law by coming up to him to be healed, instead of avoiding human contact and calling out “unclean, unclean” as the Law commands (Lev. 13:45). But this does not seem to work, since it fails to explain why Jesus himself would then have broken the Law, by physically touching the person.
Others have thought that the anger is
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What about the idea that in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is the secret Messiah, and he is angry because public healing in those specific situations reveals his true nature, that he is trying to withhold?
Interesting idea. The problem is that he is not *usually* angry when he heals people, only when they express some sense of doubt.
Do you think the texts in Matthew 11:23 and Luke 10:15 suggest an angry Jesus when he curses the entire population of Capernaum to Hades (Hell?)? Jesus appears to be reacting to population(s) not taking his miracles seriously.
Do you think it’s historical certainty that there were people in the past who staged miracles? Do you think there are examples of people today staging miracles for some type of gain (personal, political, religious, fortune, fame, etc.)?
I’d say it’s hard to know if he’s angry or calm at those points.
All the English versions (RSV, KJB, NKJV, NIV, NLT, ESV, etc.) of Matthew 11:21 and Luke 10:13 use exclamation points with Jesus’ quote. The use of exclamation points with the context doesn’t seem to indicate Jesus was “calm.” Were the translators using artistic license or was something in the original texts that warranted the use of exclamation points?
Second question: Are you familiar enough with Judean culture of the time to understand why the authors of Matthew and Luke would have quoted a Jewish person (presumably a high order of Jewish divinity, the son of the God of Judaism) using the name of a Greek god, Hates, in his proclamation? Was “Hates” used in the oldest texts we have?
All punctuation that you find in English translations are teh decisions of translators: ancient Greek did not use punctuation.
Jesus wasn’t Judean but Galilean; and Matthew and Luke had no personal connecteions with either Galilee or Judea (they were from Greek speaking areas of the empire).
I am afraid that this is too diffuse and subtle for me the accept the conclusion.
This explains why Jesus may have been angry, but it only works if he is also petty, self important and not well regulated emotionally. In short it portrays him as a conceited jerk. IMHO.
I love this thread- I always call the Jesus in Mark “Angry Jesus.” Dr. Ehrman, I would argue your point about the author wanting to portray Jesus as always willing. He definitely was not particularly willing to help the poor Syrophoenician woman. He seems to be somewhat selective in whom he deems worthy of helping.
Maybe Jesus just gets annoyed by people asking him to do stuff for them.
In my RSV translation of Mark 1:40-44 I do not see the words “Jesus was angry,” but only that he “sternly charged him, and sent him away at once, and that he was to say nothing to anyone, but present himself to a priest…
I guess this can be construed as being angry…but it doesn’t seem to say that.
The one time Jesus really got angry was when his disciples said they couldn’t heal a certain guy. He yelled, “oh you wicked and perverse generation…” Then he proceeded to heal the guy, and explained that “this kind can be healed only with prayer and so on and so on…begging the question.
Ken Plant
The word you’re looking for is before “sternly charged him.” Look for how Jesus felt when he reached out his hand: compassionate (whichver word they use for it) not angry.
The word you refer to, I simply don’t see. The full context is, “Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, saying, See that you say nothing to anyone; but go….”
I don’t see the word you are talking about that says Jesus was angry. Sorry to belabour the point.
Ken
It’s before that in v. 41. Start reading with v. 40.
If there was a reason for Mark to make Jesus angry at the leper there was a reason for a later scribe to make Jesus angry at the leper.
Or compassionate. That’s how intrinsic evidence works: there are choices/decisions that have to be made on the basis of what seems most likely.
But surely what’s least likely is that codex bezae miraculously is the sole custodian of the original version of mark 1:41?
One solitary scribe having a bad day and entire testimony of the greek manuscript tradition for Mark 1:41 gets thrown out.
It wouldn’t at all be a miracle. This kind of thing happens a good bit of the time. Plus it’s not just Bezae — it’s the Old Latin tradition before Bezae. No one throws out the Greek manuscript traditoin when making a textual judgment, but nearly all textual critics recognize that a reading that is multiply attested in a reading that must at least go back to the 2nd century (prior to any of our surviving manuscripts) has to be taken seriously. (BTW, even the NIV accepts it as the original reading)
Yes but the NIV translates it as two separate sentences “Jesus was indignant. He reached out his hand and touched the man.”
It does this because it realizes that the two facts are at odds with each other. Jesus heals him in spite of being angry with him.
But the use of the double participle indicates the two facts should be read as one.
So “moved with compassion having stretched out his hand touched him” is a better fit for the sentence structure rather than “moved with anger having stretched out his hand touched him”.
I’ve seen TONS of people help those they were angry with. I can’t remember if you read break, but the “getting angry” is a participle that is dependent on the main verb of the sentence; it can’t be it’s own sentence.
Exactly; it can’t be its own sentence – but the NIV puts it in its own sentence.
Because the NIV knows the “getting angry” and “stretching out the hand to heal” belong in two separate juxtaposed sentences. People help despite being angry.
Which is why 99.9% of greek manuscripts are right and Bezae is wrong.
In this thread did I understand you to say that, in Mark, Jesus never “expresses” compassion (though maybe it’s implied that he felt it) when healing people?
If so I’m not shocked but am surprised.
I will admit that I myself prefer the “I don’t want to spend all my time healing” explanation, but I realize it’s an inference. This is one of those instances when i find Jesus’s behavior to be somewhat peevish. So many of our current prayers are based on the “I know you can do this if you are willing” approach, which I find quite reasonable. If part of the healings was to prove Jesus was God’s son, then why be angry when someone says, “I’m sure you can do this; will you do it for me?” We have no indications that He healed everyone who believed in Him automatically, so it seems the willingness is somewhat vague. Like sniping at His parents when He stayed behind in the Temple missing the caravan, or telling Mary it was not yet His time to do miracles at the marriage feast, I can’t quite wrap my head around what early Christians were trying to say about Jesus i these episodes.
I’m sorry, but I think you (personally or the other scholars) haven’t taken into consideration a different reason why Jesus would get angry. Maybe Jesus got angry because he knew that, in order for this man to get sick, he had sinned, so Jesus got angry because that person was a sinner – and probably a terrible one, given the severity of his disease. This explanation aligns with John 5:14 and the general spirit of God’s character in Revelation (so I guess it aligns with a trinitarian view as well. But the trinity was invented centuries later, so I suppose my explanation is already starting to collapse under historical scrutiny. Oh boy, that didn’t take long).
Possibly. But Jesus is never shown elsewhere getting angry at sinners. He seems rather to like being with them.
Looks like I need an education on the Greek word/words for the word anger. What it meant then in context versus what it is considered to mean in our current understanding. Is there any difference here? Many times we get accused of anger but are feeling something different. All these instances are others looking in and assuming anger. For example, my face is built to look angry whenever I am concentrating. I’ve been told this many times. Only to ask my accusers what are they talking about. Of course, with a smile on. I have to think all of these stated situations are tense.
The author of the account is in the “omniscient narrator” mode, explaining emotions that a person in his account had even though, strictly speaking, there could be no way he would actually know what was going on in the person’s head. For the story to “work” you have to assume that he knew the person’s emotoin (not just how he looked)
Maybe he was just in a bad mood😀. Just joking…
I think I know why Mark portrays Jesus as angry. Mark was written for Romans. For Romans, only stern regal people were considered respectable authority figures. So, Mark portrays Jesus as a stern Roman lord and has him treating underlings contemptuously just as a Roman emperor, senator, general, or wealthy businessman would treat slaves and people of lesser social status. Mark is trying to make Jesus respectable within Roman culture. If Mark portrayed Jesus as being compassionate to social underlings, then Roman readers would view that as a weakness and scoff at Jesus for not living up to the Roman virtues of being stern and looking down at lowly people. Within much of Roman culture, it seems, people of high social status are annoyed when they have to stoop down and serve somebody beneath them. An authority figure caught serving underlings would be laughed at. So, Mark has Jesus being really angry because he has to do the embarrassing task of dealing with people socially beneath him. That way, Jesus remains respectable to Mark’s readers. Mark is telling the reader that Jesus hates violating the virtues Romans assume for someone of authority. Dr. Ehrman, what do you think about this?
Interesting idea: a harsh authoritative figure rather than someone who might be seen as a softy…
Yeah, it seems that Mark portrays Jesus as a harsh authoritative figure. I don’t know Greek, but an online source says that the Greek word used in Mark 1:43 is a verb which means to have indignation on or to sigh with chagrin and sternly enjoin. The source said the word is derived from another Greek word meaning “to snort with anger”. Of course, in English the word stern means a strict harshness and severity expressive of strong displeasure. That online source also says that the Greek word used in Mark 3:12, “epetima”, classically means severe and strenuous reproach for unworthy deeds or acts. For Mark 8:30 the verb means to admonish or charge, in Mark 7:36 the verb used means command or straitly charge, in Mark 9:9 the verb means to give orders, and in Mark 5:43 the verb means commanding much or ordering much. If my online source for the Greek is basically correct, then Mark portrays Jesus as very dictatorial. Perhaps that’s the qualities may Roman elites had. The English (mis)-translations (which portray the kind Jesus of popular thought) are not faithful to the original Greek.
Jesus had a lot to be angry about in Mark’s narrative, just like the OT prophets before him.
His disciples were dimwitted, the people were more interested in his miracles than his proclamation that Gd’s Kingdom was at hand, the scribes and pharisees were always on his case, his family thought he was possessed,
but worst of all, his Heavenly Father betrayed him by not having Gd’s Kingdom arrive as promised.
Jesus was a good and noble prophet, as was Arch Bishop Oscar Romero.
Both carried their crosses, and both were martyred for their convictions.
It’s difficult to know how to answer the question about Jesus’ anger because it’s impossible to know if the event actually happened. In that case, the question becomes why did the gospel writer decide to include this event in the narrative? Let’s suppose, however, the event did happen. We still would be faced with the question why did the gospel writer decide to include this event in the narrative? Especially if the event made Jesus look bad. I think it’s very tempting of us to want to read the gospels for their historicity and weigh them in that light. But isn’t the likely truth that the gospel narratives were designed to persuade? Instead of asking did this really happen, perhaps we should rather ask why did the gospel writer want us to believe why it happened.
Yes, there are lots of stories inthe Gospels that didn’t happen, and so interpreting them is not a matter of figuring out what was going on with the historical Jesus, but seeing what the author is trying to say by the story itself. What it’s meaning is. In this case, it may seem to us that it puts Jesus in a bad light, but that almost certainly was not Mark’s intention and would not have been how many people read it. In my analysis of the story I’m not at all intereste in what really happened (anger or compassion), since I absolutely don’t think it happened.