Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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Paul the Uncertain
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Paul the Uncertain »

I am not entirely sure what it is about Mark's narrative that is supposed to be incoherent. It is perfectly clear that his focal character is on a suicide mission. Jesus says so three times to his staff before being killed in the performance of the mission. The mission and its suicidal character are on the page.

There are two elements to a suicide mission: volunteering to die (check), and not dying prematurely, before accomplishing the objective. For example, the Kamikaze pilot who is shot down en route to his target has failed, even though he has died in action, as agreed.

One go-to technique for avoiding premature death that Jesus uses is the non-responsive answer to a direct question (for example, when accused of consorting with a demonic commander, Jesus replies with a disquisition on demonic tactics, the "house divided" speech; equally famous, when asked about taxation policy, he comes back with a tutorial on numismatic design). Another technique is his signature oratorical device, the parable (spontaneously volunteered "coded messages" of various kinds, from snappy one-liners to mighty speeches).

The turning point in his capital trial will be when he actually gives a straight answer to a direct question. That's a fatal step, but by then it's time to wrap up the mission. Even so, he goes back to his habitual non-responsiveness with Pilate. Perhaps the Spirit was speaking at trial, not Jesus.

Mark's Jesus' mission profile calls for him to preach before being killed (1:38). A recurrent problem with that objective is crowd management. Like "suicide mission," "crowd management" is a nuanced task. One wants to have some crowd to manage, but not so much and such kind of a crowd that it cannot be managed effectively.

Not all members of a crowd present equal management challenges. Non-ambulatory sick people and their companions (e.g. litter bearers) take up more space and impede traffic flow around them more than ambulatory sick people or demoniacs. Healthy people take up the least space most flexibly, and need the least attention per capita.

Also, not all members of the crowd fall equally within the mission profile. Jesus has to be coaxed into one early healing, and we're all familiar with the famous wrangling among critics about whether Jesus was put out by the request, or instead discovered compassion. Either reading makes sense within a coherent preaching-mission framework. Exorcism is a special case, both because Jesus can be crisp at it (he does it remotely for the SyroPhoenician woman's daughter - managing to spend more time arguing over the request than fulfilling it) and because demons are dangerous blabbers (how did that woman find Jesus when he was keeping a low profile?).

Jesus, as a character trait, is a mediocre crowd manager, and his staff isn't much help. It will be a poorly managed crowd that pressures his killer into crucifying him, when his staff are altogether absent, offstage somewhere crying.

Requests for discretion can help avoid premature death (best for the demons not to share what they know, and the appearance of having raised Jairus' daughter is fraught; John, another able storyteller, will orchestrate his Jesus' death around his version of the incident). Nevertheless, the distribution of Jesus' requests to keep quiet suggests crowd control as a prominent objective. The 9000 healthy people are not asked to keep the feeding miracles to themselves. However dangerous chatty demons are, chatty former demoniacs apparently are safe. One of them is outrightly commissioned to preach; two of them, if 16:9 is allowed.

Even among the sick, the ambulatory bleeding woman who invents the cost-efficient clothing-touch technique is not asked to keep silent, and her clothing thing does catch on (6:56). Among those who receive silence directives, Jesus tries a variety of approaches besides direct prohibition, starting with limited disclosure (please just tell the priests, as necessary to comply with Mosaic law) and ending with "Don't go through the villiage, don't tell anybody there."

Perhaps those of us here mean different qualities by coherence. When I see purposeful action plausibly conducive to the achievement of a stated objective, then I call that coherence. I do not demand that all such action be efficacious, nor do I demand the arguably related quality of non-adaptive consistency (e.g. doing again and again what hasn't worked yet, without at least some variation from time to time). It is also irrelevant to coherence whether some sheltered critic would do things differently in centuries-later hindsight.
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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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arnoldo wrote: Sat Mar 10, 2018 7:21 pmActually, Wrede writes that is was written as a coherent narrative.
Wrede wrote: We must not suppose that the evangelists were merely fishers and handicraftsmen. They were in a way literary men who as such belonged to the more cultured members of the Church. At least that is true of the author of Mark, more of that of Matthew, and especially of that of the Gospel of Luke. The latter prefaces his work with an introduction such as we find usual with educated men in the literature of the period, in which he speaks of predecessors, mentions the order of events, is interested in chronology, in short, he makes it clear that he is following a certain historical plan. Of course, this is not to be denied of the other two : their intention is not merely to preach about Christ, but to tell of Him in narrative form.
Just a bit after that comment, however, Wrede comments that "nothing could be more perverse than to regard these authors as modern writers of history." He emphasizes that the evangelists are writing a narrative meant to be edifying, not a history.

More to the point, however, Wrede explicitly deals with internal contradictions and tensions in the gospel of Mark (especially) in another book of his, The Messianic Secret, in which he is at pains to account for the fact that, in Mark, we find Jesus enjoining his miracle recipients to silence despite there being no chance for that silence to be maintained (because the word is already out, for example, or because there are so many people serving as witnesses that few people even remain to be told).

Now, I have elsewhere pointed out that Matthew, in manipulating Mark (on the assumption of Marcan priority), has created a very similar sort of tension in the cleansing of the leper in Matthew 8.1-4, which starts off with "great multitudes" in 8.1 before Jesus' usual injunction to silence in 8.4, a meaningless gesture if "great multitudes" have witnessed the event. In Mark the healing seems to take place in private, so there is no contradiction in this case. Thus, even if we did not have Mark at hand to which to compare Matthew, it would look suspiciously like a case of Matthew having mislocated or mistreated a pericope which someone else had devised. It would look like Matthew was concerned to point up Jesus' Mosaic character and healing abilities, and either did not notice or did not care that Jesus was enjoining silence in a situation in which it was already too late to keep the secret.

But, if we can explain the tension in Matthew 8.1-4 by reference to his manipulation of Mark, is it not possible that we can explain the same tensions elsewhere in Mark by reference to his manipulation of previous texts or traditions? This is, in fact, exactly the tack that Wrede takes:

William Wrede, The Messianic Secret, pages 124-125: The public nature of the miracles does not accord with the command to keep silence about certain miracles. .... How are we to explain the fact that in the Gospel [of Mark] the activity and so the nature of Jesus comes so much into the limelight and is so widely known, if he is constantly concerned to conceal it? The most obvious idea is that [Mark] the evangelist has taken over traditional materials in which the idea of the secret messiahship was not present....

William Wrede, The Messianic Secret, page 145: Is the idea of a messianic secret an invention of Mark's? The notion seems quite impossible. This can be seen from Mark itself. In it, the entire life of Jesus is shot through with the various motifs of this idea. The individual conceptions occur in a multiplicity of variants. In them there is much that is unresolved. Material of this kind is not the work of an individual.

Wrede thus presumes that the tensions in Mark over the so-called messianic secret derive from multiple sources of tradition before Mark, which Mark has conglomerated together without caring about the tensions. My observation about Matthew 8.1-4 using a previous text or tradition (Mark's gospel itself) in a way resulting in exactly the same kind of tension between public and private that we find in Mark serves to make Wrede's argument all the more concrete.

I am digging up this past material only to apply it to the matter at hand: the differences/tensions between Mark 14.57-58 and Mark 13.1-2. Wrede's treatment of the messianic secret (as a result of Mark mixing up different kinds of traditional materials originating with multiple other tradents without bothering to iron out the tensions) is one possibility I have in mind for the matter here: to wit, perhaps Mark has mixed together materials drawn from multiple other tradents without bothering to iron out the differences. Perhaps the temple word in Mark 14.57-58 came from one source and the temple word in Mark 13.1-2 came from another; hence the difference in wording and application.

I have no argument for this possibility being greater than other possibilities as yet. Still sorting all of that out. Just because I disagree with specific aspects of Joe's reconstruction does not mean that some such holistic reconstruction of Mark on this point is not possible. But Wrede's solution involving multiple traditions flowing into Mark is also a possibility, I think.
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JoeWallack
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Your Literary Mind Has Been Expanded

Post by JoeWallack »

What's This Explanation Let's See I'm Feeling Lexiconi

Ben C. Smith wrote: Sat Mar 10, 2018 6:21 pm
I have an issue with the following:
The "False Witness" testimony is true. Jesus did say that he would be responsible for the destruction of the physical Temple and after three days he would raise a spiritual temple. The false part is that these witnesses never heard Jesus say it.
This observation, I think, succumbs to what Kunigunde was saying about it being "close, but no cigar." Mark 13.1-2 attributes no actual responsibility to Jesus; it merely makes a prediction. This difference is one of the things that I am exploring.
JW:
If you do not understand The Parable how will you understand any of GMark?:

11
12 And on the morrow, when they were come out from Bethany, he hungered.
13 And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find anything thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for it was not the season of figs.
14 And he answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit from thee henceforward for ever. And his disciples heard it.
15 And they come to Jerusalem: and he entered into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and them that bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money-changers, and the seats of them that sold the doves;
16 and he would not suffer that any man should carry a vessel through the temple.
17 And he taught, and said unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? but ye have made it a den of robbers.
18 And the chief priests and the scribes heard it, and sought how they might destroy him: for they feared him, for all the multitude was astonished at his teaching.
19 And every evening he went forth out of the city.
20 And as they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away from the roots.
21 And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Rabbi, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away.
22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God.
23 Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou taken up and cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that what he saith cometh to pass; he shall have it.
24 Therefore I say unto you, All things whatsoever ye pray and ask for, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.
25 And whensoever ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have aught against any one; that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.
26 [But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your trespasses.]
27 And they come again to Jerusalem: and as he was walking in the temple, there come to him the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders;
JW:
There is an Intercalation with The Fig Tree and The Temple yes? The Fig Tree represents traditional Judaism of the time which includes The Temple to a significant extent yes? Jesus was responsible for the destruction of the fig tree by cursing it (and only his disciples heard this. Seems like an unnecessary thing for "Mark" to add unless my overall point is correct). You also have the obligatory irony that The Jewish Religious Leaders are trying to destroy Jesus at the same time but so it goes without Sayings.


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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Your Literary Mind Has Been Expanded

Post by Ben C. Smith »

JoeWallack wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 12:06 pmThere is an Intercalation with The Fig Tree and The Temple yes?
Yes.
The Fig Tree represents traditional Judaism of the time which includes The Temple to a significant extent yes?
Yes. (Well, I think that the fig tree represents Israel, as it so often does in the Hebrew scriptures, with the Temple as Israel's visible embodiment, as it were. But yes: the Temple is going to be overthrown here, and it is Jesus doing the cursing.)
Jesus was responsible for the destruction of the fig tree by cursing it....
That is true.
...(and only his disciples heard this. Seems like an unnecessary thing for "Mark" to add unless my overall point is correct).
Very good point. The fig tree has to be figured into my overall interpretation. Thanks.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by arnoldo »

Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 10:28 am
arnoldo wrote: Sat Mar 10, 2018 7:21 pmActually, Wrede writes that is was written as a coherent narrative.
Wrede wrote: We must not suppose that the evangelists were merely fishers and handicraftsmen. They were in a way literary men who as such belonged to the more cultured members of the Church. At least that is true of the author of Mark, more of that of Matthew, and especially of that of the Gospel of Luke. The latter prefaces his work with an introduction such as we find usual with educated men in the literature of the period, in which he speaks of predecessors, mentions the order of events, is interested in chronology, in short, he makes it clear that he is following a certain historical plan. Of course, this is not to be denied of the other two : their intention is not merely to preach about Christ, but to tell of Him in narrative form.
Just a bit after that comment, however, Wrede comments that "nothing could be more perverse than to regard these authors as modern writers of history." He emphasizes that the evangelists are writing a narrative meant to be edifying, not a history.

More to the point, however, Wrede explicitly deals with internal contradictions and tensions in the gospel of Mark (especially) in another book of his, The Messianic Secret, in which he is at pains to account for the fact that, in Mark, we find Jesus enjoining his miracle recipients to silence despite there being no chance for that silence to be maintained (because the word is already out, for example, or because there are so many people serving as witnesses that few people even remain to be told). . .
Yes, that comment from Wrede was from "Origin of the New Testament."
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As far as the alleged internal contradictions in the gospel narratives are there any records of early christian apologists addressing this issue?
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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arnoldo wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 1:06 pmAs far as the alleged internal contradictions in the gospel narratives are there any records of early christian apologists addressing this issue?
Which issue? The messianic secret? Or the one about the word against the temple?
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 10:28 am Perhaps the temple word in Mark 14.57-58 came from one source and the temple word in Mark 13.1-2 came from another; hence the difference in wording and application.. . . . But Wrede's solution involving multiple traditions flowing into Mark is also a possibility, I think.
We may question, I think, whether Mark was patching together such a massive set of sources that included, say, one source saying that the temple charge was brought up at Jesus' trial as a false accusation, and another source saying that the temple claim was something related to what Jesus said in private, etc. Wrede was talking about working with existing traditions, with extant contradictory claims about Jesus: that he was not recognized as the messiah until his resurrection (and "Easter appearances") on the one hand; that his appearance on earth was accompanied with a display of messianic signs on the other, for instance.

I think we are getting into unnecessarily overly numerous additional hypotheticals (both prior to Mark and within the creation of Mark itself) to suggest that Mark was also piecing together lots of micro-data in "the traditions". (Think through the implications.) We can see Mark weaving traditions into a new narrative, something quite new, with his creation of the Passion scene and second-exodus motifs leading up to that climax by means of 'haddadic' use of OT passages.
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Re: Your Literary Mind Has Been Expanded

Post by neilgodfrey »

JoeWallack wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 12:06 pm
...(and only his disciples heard this. Seems like an unnecessary thing for "Mark" to add unless my overall point is correct).

Once again, putting on my Wrede costume, we are breaking the fundamental rule of "reading" Mark. Pull ourselves out from the narrative and thinking about the characters as if we are doing a school exercise (Why did Hamlet procrastinate?) and focus on the creative act of the author himself. The author gives us all the room in the world to make up whatever we like at the narrative level. But in working at that level we have long since left our author behind; we live in the world of his characters and talk about them from our perspectives. We lose sight of the author.

Mark was not dropping little subtle hints like clues in a murder mystery novel; he was keeping the level of Jesus' "mysterious discourse" beyond the ability of the disciples to understand prior to the resurrection.

Think of all the hypotheticals we have to add to the story (that Mark "hid" from his readers) to move from what he actually said re the fig tree miracle and the accusation in the trial. We can do it but only by rewriting in our minds Mark's story so that it becomes totally unlike anything Mark has actually left us.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by neilgodfrey »

arnoldo wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 1:06 pm As far as the alleged internal contradictions in the gospel narratives are there any records of early christian apologists addressing this issue?
Interesting question. I think we see the first effort to address Mark's contradictions appearing in "Matthew's" and "Luke's" regular rewrites, omissions, additions, etc. They had a lot to work with and didn't smooth out everything but they were well on the way with the project and ever since, thanks to their efforts, we tend to read "Mark" through their narratives and tend to not notice or be too worried by Mark's contradictions. They become "apparent" contradictions.

(As an aside, I would even think the Gospel of John gives us a clue -- if we accept John's knowledge of Mark (which I think is very likely). John was writing a gospel that was every bit as symbolic (ahistorical) as Mark's. The primary difference was that John turns Mark's account inside out; or sets up some sort of syzygistic reversal of Mark's narrative.)

P.S. None of the above of itself denies the historicity of Jesus. Wrede protested the very idea.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by arnoldo »

Ben C. Smith wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 1:15 pm
arnoldo wrote: Sun Mar 11, 2018 1:06 pmAs far as the alleged internal contradictions in the gospel narratives are there any records of early christian apologists addressing this issue?
Which issue? The messianic secret? Or the one about the word against the temple?
I dunno. . . I guess the messianic secret. My hunch is that the early readers wouldn't necessarily find that there were any internal contradictions perhaps due to either cultural sensitivities or some parallel to the OT. For example there are some similarities between Joseph's true identity being "hidden" from his brothers, David's rejection by Saul, etc and the gospel accounts.
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