The Temptation Story in Mark is anti-marcionite

[Peter Kirby]

WRONG! It's not clear enough to settle a debate with a Basilidian. It is clear enough to settle a debate with a Marcionite.

Please like the difference.

No.

How can you answer 'no'? We are said that Marcion interpreted ad litteram the OT.

The allegorical expedient was not available to him. It was used by Basilides when the gospels were all written (included Canonical Luke).

If you think this would trouble a Marcionite:

And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

You know nothing of Marcionites, Giuseppe.

please don't remove the phrase from their context.

Surely that voice would disturb a Marcionite when heard at the baptism

It would not be effective for use in the context of an anti-Marcionite dispute.

[Peter Kirby]

All your posting on the subject has documented conclusively that the Gospel of Mark is not anti-Marcionite.

Take a bow.

[Giuseppe]

Klinghardt gives me reason on this point:

The Markan report of Jesus’ baptism not only places the beginning of the Gospel into a framework of salvation history, it also provides the opportunity to have God himself proclaim the true identity of Jesus as ‘my beloved son’ (Mark 1,11). Compared to Jesus’ identification by the demons at the beginning of *Ev, this is a skilled and advanced development. It prepares the summary of Jesus’ message after he proved his sonship by resisting Satan’s temptations in the desert (Mark 1,12f).

(The Oldest Gospel, p. 233, my bold)

The "true identity" of Jesus as son of YHWH. Since only YHWH is the god behind the baptism by John (and behind the spirit sent during this baptism).

Pace the naive readings of a Basilides (a fake smart).

[GakuseiDon]

Ebionism is a post-Marcion phenomenon...

Yes, that's why I wrote "Ebion-like". I believe the Ebionites were the continuation of the beliefs of the original Christians, even if modified by time. This is because the letters that appear to either be written before the Gospels or were unaffected by the Gospels present a picture of a humble man perfectly obedient to God 'unto death' that is consistent with the beliefs of the Ebionites. I might start a new thread on that.

Surely Hebrews 4:15 is not an ebionite belief! So much high is the christology in Hebrews that it is virtually impossible its presence in ebionite circles.

"Heb 4:15 ... he was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin" is not an Ebionite-like belief??? The Ebionite belief is that Jesus was elected as Christ "on account of having led a life conformed to the law, and perfect", if Justin Martyr's comment is a reflection of them.

Mark is based on Hebrews 4:15 on this point. Hence the order of derivation is the following:

Hebrews 4:15 ---> temptation story in Mark ---> ebionite reading of Mark: adoptionism.

I don't have any problems with that. And surely you've just provided an option that goes against an "anti-Marcionite" reading? So the question is how do we judge the one against the other?

If Hebrews 4:15 is an "anti-Marcionite" passage, does that mean you regard the Book of the Hebrews as being written by a "pro-earthly fleshly Jesus" author? Or was the anti-Marcionite passage added into a celestial Jesus text?

But my case is built on Hebrews 4:15 being anti-marcionite (docet Joseph Turmel).

Heb 4:15 is consistent with the Ebion-like theme throughout the letter: someone who was obedient to God unto death, and so was made perfect and therefore made Christ:

Heb 5:[7] Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared;
[8] Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;
[9] And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him;

But I agree with you that such passages might have been used by the author of Mark to construct the Temptation narrative.

[Giuseppe]

GDon, Hebrews adores an archangelic deity (Melkisedek himself is assumed to be an archangel) therefore if the ebionites rejected Paul in virtue of the his high christology, then accordingly they would have rejected Hebrews in virtue of the same identical reason.

Without offence, but the Ebionites don't matter in this thread.

What is interesting is the silence by Peter Kirby about the Klinghardt's words above: is this silence evidence that he agrees with K and me on this point?

[GakuseiDon]

Without offence, but the Ebionites don't matter in this thread.

My apologies Giuseppe. All good. Sometimes I get caught up in my own hobby horse! I'll start a new thread on that at some time in the future rather than derail yours.

[Giuseppe]

Without offence, but the Ebionites don't matter in this thread.

My apologies Giuseppe. All good. I get caught up in my own hobby horse! I'll start a new thread on that sometime rather than derail yours.

it is better.

In whiletime Peter Kirby continues to ignore the Klinghardt's argument above (that Mark 1:11 is revealing the identity of Jesus as son of a specific god: YHWH).

[Giuseppe]

Interestingly, Klinghardt means the Temptation Story as the proof that Jesus is really the son of YHWH.

The birth story in Luke and Matthew make it explicit the same proof by having the angel confirming to Joseph that the Holy Spirit has worked on Mary.

These proofs are not necessary if the readers knew already that the hero of the story is the son of YHWH.

[RandyHelzerman]

Pragmatically, John in Mark acts as anti-Marcionite rhetoric, but was that the author's intent?

cf. with the majestic duel birth narrative of Jesus and John Baptist we find in Luke. Is it anti-Marcionite rhetoric pasted on to Marcion's Evangelion? Or is it something Marcion left on the cutting room floor when he butchered the bible?

For John in Mark to be deliberate anti-marcionite rhetoric, we'd have to postulate an earlier version of Mark which didn't have that pericope. Perhaps Marcion's evangelion, which does not have that pericope, is evidence of such an earlier version.

I would really like to believe that, because I believe there was no Q--that Luke and Matthew got the Q material from Marcion. But....just when we got rid of one phantom gospel, we have to postulate another--an earlier version of Mark, which didn't have the baptism by John, and a lot of other things.

And its really hard for me to read Mark as anything other than a very integral whole. The same paratactic voice, breathlessly whisking Jesus from one scene to another is consistent throughout. And, as RG Price has convinced me that Mark was composed by allegorizing the Septuagint, particularly the Elijah-Elisha cycles, it makes perfect sense that there would be a character explicitly paralleled with Elijah like John the Baptist is.

Since nobody before RG Price seems to have noticed this, including other redactors of Mark, like Luke and Matthew, it seems hard for me to imagine that somebody looked at a proto-mark and "got it" and was able to to write so closely in the original author's voice.

Any help resolving this conundrum would be appreciated. I'm really all over the place on Mark/Marcion priority.

[Giuseppe]

But....just when we got rid of one phantom gospel, we have to postulate another--an earlier version of Mark, which didn't have the baptism by John, and a lot of other things.

True. Among the 'other things', in primis the Parable of the Vineyard, where the secrecy about the identity of the father of Jesus, at the peak only a verse before (= Mark 11:27-33), is bluntly broken. Basically, that drastic changement of program (from absolute secrecy to the explicit confession within zero seconds), in addition to the hateful voice of YHWH in Mark 1:11 (obstinately denied as coming from YHWH by Peter Kirby), will work forever as genuine "nails in the brain" of the potential Markan prioritist who is in me.