A strong argument for Marcionite priority: baptism in Mark

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Giuseppe
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A strong argument for Marcionite priority: baptism in Mark

Post by Giuseppe »

So Prof Price, talking about the Virgin Birth:
The only
way we happen to know that some Ebionites rejected the Virgin
Birth is that a heresiologist mentions the to-him strange fact in the
course of discussing the doctrine, so for us the non-Virgin Birth
version is attested only subsequently to the Virgin Birth version.
Yet if we compare the inherent logic of the two positions, anyone
can see that the later-attested version (the natural birth version)
must be the earlier version. Legends grow; they do not shrink.
(The Christ Myth Theory and Its Problems, p. 379)

Now, a similar logic would may serve to prove the priority of Marcion's Gospel over the same Mark.

In Mark, there is no apology for the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. This fact is even more strange (=unexpected = surprising = not probable), since the later Gospels take cure of showing baptism + relative apology.

The Best Explanation for the Absence of Apology for Baptism in Mark is the adoptionistic theology of Mark:
the man Jesus has to be purified from all his sins, as he has to be a perfect, apt recipient for the divine Christ who “enters” in him just when he is purified.
This is the Simplest Explanation, since it explains why:

1) it is necessary to have John the Baptist who “prepares the way of the Lord” (meaning that the 'way' is Jesus, while the 'Lord' is Christ).

2) Mark goes against Josephus' description of John insofar the Mark's John does a baptism for the remission of the sins, while in Josephus the baptism is only a mere corollary of a conversion that is already happened.

3) the natural absence of any kind of embarrassment (and relative apology) for the baptism.

Note that a similar case is the Virgin Birth:
the mother of Jesus, Mary, has to be purified from all her sins, as she has to be a perfect, apt recipient for the divine Jesus Christ born of her.
But then, paraphrasing Price, I would have any right to conclude that:
The only way we happen to know that Marcion rejected the Baptism by John is that some heresiologists (the various Ireneus, Tertullian, etc) mention the to-them strange fact in the course of polemizing with the doctrine of Marcion, so for us the non-baptism version (in Marcion's Gospel) is attested only subsequently to the baptism version (in Mark). Yet if we compare the inherent logic of the two positions, anyone can see that the later-attested version (the non-baptism version of Marcion) must be the earlier version. Legends grow; they do not shrink.

Therefore it is more probable that a Gospel without Baptism preceded Mark.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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