A key for Mark 4?

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Stefan Kristensen
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A key for Mark 4?

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

I love and hate Mark 4:1-34, the discourse of Jesus with the Sower and the "secret of the kingdom of God" and the light and measure and mustard seed etc. There are so many interpretive options it drives you nuts, and just when you think you have found a way that it all makes sense, then there is a verse that doesn't fit in and seems to say the opposite. But it is also a great section dealing with the awesome theme of mystery and secrecy!

It comes right after we have heard about Jesus arranging his new community in Mark 3 with those inside of his house who are with him and those outside of the house. He ends up saying that his true family is "the one who does the will of God" (3:35). The motif of "those outside" and the insiders, "those with him along with the twelve”, comes up in the important sandwiched prargraph in 4:10-13.

This section in Mark 4 contains units that are very cryptic and some that seem like independant proverbial sayings, and so we shouldn't be surprised that it seems almost impossible to arrive at an interpretation where there is coherence throughout and not tensions. But are there specific interpretations of all the units in this sections that makes for an interpration where there is no tension between the units? I think there is.

The key is this: the four kinds of soil are four kinds of insiders. The "outsiders" are not part of this parable. And the insiders, i.e. the four kinds of soil, are to be understood as Christians that have been baptized and gotten the spirit.

Having "ears to hear" means having gotten the spirit which creates a new hearing faculty. So, this whole thing is an exhortation for those with the spirit to use the new hearing faculty, the new cognitive ability that comes with the spirit. "Think carefully about the things you hear in church, from your preachers, and you will be given sanctification, holiness, more of the spirit, to withstand Satan, and the tempation of apostasy come tribulations, and withstand the worries of this world and the lure of richness." Listen carefully, listen much, to what is preached, the Word, and you will be the good soil that bears fruit."

"Those outside" havn't gotten "ears to hear", i.e. the new creation that comes with the spirit. So they are not soil. In fact this is exactly what defines ‘insiders’: they have ears to hear. The outsiders are not inside in the house with Jesus, they have chosen to stay outside the house, i.e. outside the Christian community. They don't "hear" the Word, the Word is not sown in them at all, so they are not part of the Sower parable. Coming into the House with Jesus means that you get the new ears. (Now, consider Deut 29-30, especially 29,3, that the Israelites will recieve “ears to hear” when they get inside the promised land as part of God’s covenant, but this is a broader context.)

Note that all four kinds of soil "hear" the Word. This means being a Christian. The question then becomes, how carefully do you "hear". The verb "hear" can also mean "obey", and I think both meanings are carried.

As a Christian, if you only "hear" the Word a little, then the light of the Word doesn't shine within you, and a lamp has been brought in to shine. The Word is a "secret" (of God's kingdom), and make sure that you "hear attentively", so the secret that has been given to you can be revealed for you.

You have been given ears to hear, through the spirit: Now, hear! Be a good soil.

This is exactly like a Pauline letter in generalised form. You have been saved so as to be able to live according to God's will. Now, do it!

This whole section is about the Christian community internally. It is crucially not about how ‘people’ react differently to the Word, but instead how Christians that have the spirit react.

Some of those who have gotten the initial insight from Word being sown in them will listen carefully, measure with a big measure, and they are given more insight, and from those who don’t the little insight they have is taken away (the three bad soils).

“If one has ears to hear, he shall listen” = you have gotten the spirit, now take care that you use it.
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Giuseppe »

The key is this: the four kinds of soil are four kinds of insiders. The "outsiders" are not part of this parable. And the insiders, i.e. the four kinds of soil, are to be understood as Christians that have been baptized and gotten the spirit.
I can agree with this. Who receives the ''seed'', even if he is very flawed (for the various reasons exposed by the parable), continues to be, even so, an insider, in opposition to who does not even receive, or will receive, the seed (=the outsiders).

Afterall, according to the Naasseni's interpretation of the parable, the ''seeds'' allegorize the Primal Man's components, after the his Fall, to give life to the matter without life. So the mission of Jesus is to join again the people in possession of the ''seed' [=the insiders] by ignoring the people without the ''seed'' [=the 100% materialistic outsiders]. In metaphysical terms, to reconstruct the original body of the Primal Man (just as Isis collected the disiecta membra of Osiris).
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Stefan Kristensen
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

Giuseppe wrote: Mon May 28, 2018 6:41 am
The key is this: the four kinds of soil are four kinds of insiders. The "outsiders" are not part of this parable. And the insiders, i.e. the four kinds of soil, are to be understood as Christians that have been baptized and gotten the spirit.
I can agree with this. Who receives the ''seed'', even if he is very flawed (for the various reasons exposed by the parable), continues to be, even so, an insider, in opposition to who does not even receive, or will receive, the seed (=the outsiders).
I'd say that the three bad soils go back to being outsiders. In Mark 3 we have just seen (on the sublevel) how the new people of God under the new covenant, i.e. the Church (of Mark's time), has been created, and the next thing Mark does is focus on this new people. Or Jesus' family, as Mark has it at the end of the chapter: "The one who does the will of God is my mother and brothers".

But, as the next thing, we hear Jesus begin the Sower parable with "hear!" These two things are intimately connected: Because this is an exhortation to the insiders, the same group represented by the ones inside the house with Jesus in the preceding scene.

So something like this is what Mark has Jesus say in Mark 3-4, I think:
You are the insiders, you have come into my house to follow me and to hear more of my preaching. In here you have been given the spirit, so now you have ears to hear, which means that you have gained access to private explanations of my cryptic preaching, a privilege those who havn't chosen to come inside of the house don't have. But it is only the ones among you who hear the preaching to such an extent so as to do the will of God, 'bear fruit', who are my family, the members of the kingdom of God to come. Therefore, don't just 'hear', but really, really hear, i.e. understand, and understand (hear) as much as you can, as closely as you can! Because you have been given the gospel from God, but it just so happens that the gospel has the form of a secret, i.e. a message hidden so as to be revealed to some and not to others. It is in parables. Which means that even though a secret, it has to be understood, so just like a light it has to shine. Therefore don't just 'hear', but use your new spiritual insight, your new ears, and really, really, hear. Pay close attention and guard the words carefully within you, and take it in in big measure, and this way you will gradually come to realise the gospel in full with all its ugly implications of personal suffering and renouncements, and then you are my family, being able to do God's will, like seed in good soil bearing plenty of fruit. You are the ones that will constitute the kingdom of God, so you need to grow in knowledge, you need to know the secret of God's kingdom, the gospel, in its entirety, the secret which is for the ones that belong to the kingdom, and the secret that fascilitates the kingdom, until you have all grown mature, and the completion is reached, at which point comes the harvest, where the kingdom is set up with you as its subjects.

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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Kunigunde Kreuzerin »

Stefan Kristensen wrote: Mon May 28, 2018 2:12 am I love and hate Mark 4:1-34, the discourse of Jesus with the Sower and the "secret of the kingdom of God" and the light and measure and mustard seed etc. There are so many interpretive options it drives you nuts, and just when you think you have found a way that it all makes sense, then there is a verse that doesn't fit in and seems to say the opposite.
I find this a very good interpretation and I agree with you on many of your points. In particular, I also think that the giving of the mystery of the kingdom of God does not mean that it is revealed, but only the possibility of its understanding.

Against Wrede I tend to believe that the mystery of the kingdom of God and the question of how Jesus is part of that mystery is as a theme much more important to GMark than a messianic secret.
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by jude77 »

Hello Stefan:

Mark 4 is indeed complex, and you are right to observe that as soon as you solve one problem in the text another appears. Here are my thoughts on chapter 4 (for what they are worth):

Mark is a deeply self-referential Gospel; and the stories in it are interwoven in order to interpret one another. As an example the blind man in 8:23-26, that Jesus has to touch twice to heal, is a reference to the disciples blindness and their inability to fully see who Jesus is, which is demonstrated in 8:27-33. In 8:29 Peter can "see" that Jesus is Messiah, but he can't see clearly enough to perceive that Jesus will be a suffering Messiah. Like the blind man in 8:23-26 Peter's vision of Jesus is blurry and he will need a second touch to see clearly.

With the idea that Mark is internally referential, and that the four soils in chapter refer to four characters within the Gospel I would offer you this exegesis:

4:4 describes the seed that is devoured by the birds. In 4:15 Jesus interprets that the his message being snatched out of people's hearts before it could take root. That, obviously, is a reference to the Pharisees who hear Jesus preach, but never take his message into their hearts.
4:5 describes the seed that falls on rocky soil then sprouts immediately and withers in the sun. Jesus interprets that in 4:16-17 by saying it describes people who immediately respond to him, but then fall away when persecution arises. That seed would represent the disciples. In 1:8 they "immediately" responded to Jesus. The Greek word for "immediately" in that verse is "euthus", which is the same word used in 4:5 to describe how quickly the seed springs up. The disciples are also like the withering seed in that they quickly fall away when persecution arises (14:50).
4:7 describes the seed that falls among the thorns and then is choked out. Jesus interprets the thorns in 4:19 as the cares of the world and the deceitfullness of riches. That is a reference to the rich man in 10:17-23 who would not sacrifice his wealth to follow Jesus.
4:8 describes the seed which falls on on good soil and bears fruit. Jesus interprets that soil as those who hear his message and respond (4:20). Hopefully that represent YOU!!

I hope this helps.
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by FransJVermeiren »

Maybe we should also consider a political reading of Mark 4:1-34.
To start we have to determine the setting of this fragment. I believe Jesus shows himself here as a propagator of God’s rule, in other words as a messianist, and not as the messiah (see also gLuke 4:16-21). In the view of the Zealots God’s rule was to replace Roman rule, so messianism was a concept of resistance and war, with a free Israel under God and his messiah as the ultimate goal.
The whole fragment centers around the ‘word’, with verse 14 as the central verse: The sower sows the word. How can this ‘word’ be understood? In a ‘kingdom of God’ context this word seems to be the messianic word, the message of the impending coming of the messiah to overthrow Roman rule*. So I start from the following meaning of verse 14: The propagator spreads the messianic message.

Within this context the subject of this parable is a discussion of the reception of the messianic idea in Jewish society. The are some clues that the four groups of receivers of the seed may be groups in society.
The first group, from which the word is immediately taken away by Satan, may be the Herodians. Literary ‘Satan’ means ‘the adversary’, referring to the possibility of the civil and judicial authorities to prosecute people. That Satan comes immediately to take away the messianic word could point in the direction of the swift exercise of power.
The second group then may be the Sadducees. In verse 17 they are described as ‘the temporary ones’, those ‘who have no scion in themselves’, referring to their rejection of the immortality of the soul, afterlife and resurrection. This group was in power and therefore they were most interested in maintaining the status quo. They collaborated with the Romans; of course they did not risk tribulation or persecution for a revolutionary anti-Roman movement.
Verse 19 depicts a group that loves money, and this connects with gLuke 16:14: The Pharisees, who were loves of money, heard all this, … Maybe their ‘desire for other things’ refers to their predilection with supplementary rules, as Josephus states in Antiquities XIII:297: For the present I wish merely to explain that the Pharisees had passed on to the people certain regulations handed down by former generations and not recorded in the Laws of Moses.
That Mark saw these three groups as opponents is also clear from chapter 12. The Pharisees, Herodians and Sadducees are staged in Mark 12:13-27.

As the subversive idea of an impending messianic era could not be discussed openly throughout society, the members of the revolutionary party had to keep it secret and therefore speak in parables. The secret of the preparation of a revolution was given to the insiders, the Essene Zealots. Between each other they could discuss the subject openly, but towards the outside world this was way too dangerous.

In my opinion the whole of Mark 4:1-34 fragment can properly be explained in this political reading. Only verse 24-25 seem to be alien to this otherwise homogenous pericope. The harvest in verse 29 for example is the time of war against and victory over the Romans. The preceding verses depict the growth of the messianic Zealot movement. When the movement has become powerful enough (‘ripe’), it is time for the messianic harvest.

* There are two instances in the New Testament where ‘logos’ clearly refers to ‘messiah’: Revelation 19:13 and 1John 5:7 v.l. See also the commentary in BDAG (3rd edition, p. 601) which says that in the fourth gospel ‘this divine ‘Word’ took on human form in a historical person, that is, in Jesus’.
Last edited by FransJVermeiren on Mon Jun 04, 2018 9:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Stefan Kristensen
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

Kunigunde Kreuzerin wrote: Sat Jun 02, 2018 12:41 pm
Stefan Kristensen wrote: Mon May 28, 2018 2:12 am I love and hate Mark 4:1-34, the discourse of Jesus with the Sower and the "secret of the kingdom of God" and the light and measure and mustard seed etc. There are so many interpretive options it drives you nuts, and just when you think you have found a way that it all makes sense, then there is a verse that doesn't fit in and seems to say the opposite.
I find this a very good interpretation and I agree with you on many of your points. In particular, I also think that the giving of the mystery of the kingdom of God does not mean that it is revealed, but only the possibility of its understanding.

Against Wrede I tend to believe that the mystery of the kingdom of God and the question of how Jesus is part of that mystery is as a theme much more important to GMark than a messianic secret.
Thanks, Kunigunde, and I think I agree with you on both points. That the mystery (or secret) "has been given" means that some have the ability to have it divulged and others not. That is, "those around him with the twelve" and "those outside" respectively. In order for the whole thing to make sense, though, we need to assume that Jesus addresses his disciples in this section (i.e. "those around him with the twelve") as a group that symbolizes the true Christians, the ideal hearers, those of the fourth soil. Even though at this point in time, before the completion of Jesus' deed, there are no fourth-soil-people yet. But Jesus (or rather, Mark) uses this group to say something about the ideal Christians, the true believers, the people of God. Or, "the one who does the will of God", Mark 3:35.

The theme of the specific 'messianic secret' that Wrede spoke of has to be abandoned, and instead we need to look at the whole secrecy aspect of Mark's narrative as a permeating idea, imo.
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

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Stefan Kristensen wrote: Mon Jun 04, 2018 3:16 pmThe theme of the specific 'messianic secret' that Wrede spoke of has to be abandoned, and instead we need to look at the whole secrecy aspect of Mark's narrative as a permeating idea, imo.
Wrede's premise, at its most basic, was that Mark was reconciling two different traditions: one in which Jesus was declared to be the son of God, the Messiah, at his resurrection/exaltation (as in Romans 1.4) and another in which that declaration happened at his baptism (as in Mark 1.9-11). The natural result was that Jesus' sonship and messiahship must have been kept private (a secret to everyone except the demons) between his baptism and his resurrection, at which point it became public. Does that basic premise have to be abandoned, in your view?
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Stefan Kristensen
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

jude77 wrote: Sun Jun 03, 2018 6:40 pm Hello Stefan:

Mark 4 is indeed complex, and you are right to observe that as soon as you solve one problem in the text another appears. Here are my thoughts on chapter 4 (for what they are worth):

Mark is a deeply self-referential Gospel; and the stories in it are interwoven in order to interpret one another. As an example the blind man in 8:23-26, that Jesus has to touch twice to heal, is a reference to the disciples blindness and their inability to fully see who Jesus is, which is demonstrated in 8:27-33. In 8:29 Peter can "see" that Jesus is Messiah, but he can't see clearly enough to perceive that Jesus will be a suffering Messiah. Like the blind man in 8:23-26 Peter's vision of Jesus is blurry and he will need a second touch to see clearly.

With the idea that Mark is internally referential, and that the four soils in chapter refer to four characters within the Gospel I would offer you this exegesis:

4:4 describes the seed that is devoured by the birds. In 4:15 Jesus interprets that the his message being snatched out of people's hearts before it could take root. That, obviously, is a reference to the Pharisees who hear Jesus preach, but never take his message into their hearts.
4:5 describes the seed that falls on rocky soil then sprouts immediately and withers in the sun. Jesus interprets that in 4:16-17 by saying it describes people who immediately respond to him, but then fall away when persecution arises. That seed would represent the disciples. In 1:8 they "immediately" responded to Jesus. The Greek word for "immediately" in that verse is "euthus", which is the same word used in 4:5 to describe how quickly the seed springs up. The disciples are also like the withering seed in that they quickly fall away when persecution arises (14:50).
4:7 describes the seed that falls among the thorns and then is choked out. Jesus interprets the thorns in 4:19 as the cares of the world and the deceitfullness of riches. That is a reference to the rich man in 10:17-23 who would not sacrifice his wealth to follow Jesus.
4:8 describes the seed which falls on on good soil and bears fruit. Jesus interprets that soil as those who hear his message and respond (4:20). Hopefully that represent YOU!!

I hope this helps.
Hi Jude

Thanks for this. I think you are spot on when you stress that gMark is "deeply self-referential", a characteristic of the narrative which is ever so understated. Therefore it makes sense if Mark has specific characters in mind that appear throughout the narrative to represent the four soils. However, what I want is the grand, golden reading of Mark 4 where all the units fit perfectly, assuming that such a reading is possible, and the above suggestion has a problem as I see it, when we try to fit it together with the rest of the section.

Mark creates a clear cut division between those who are given the secret and the outsiders for whom everything comes in parables, who hear but don't understand. But those who are given the secret are exactly the disciples, or "those around Jesus with the twelve" (Mark 4:10), and if they are the third soil, a shoe which indeed seems to fit, then that's a problem. Because then both of the groups of his division, those inside given the secret and those outside who don't understand, are those who fail, i.e. the three first soils.

I myself have come to the conclusion that even though different characters throughout the narrative seem to fit more or less with the four (or three) soils, this is not intended, and the attempt to correlate the four soils with them only causes problems. The reason that we can find characters that fit the soils is that we're dealing with one of the most central teachings in gMark, and a teaching which was also ever present in Judaism as well as the rest of NT, I'd say. Faithfulness to God is always opposed by the forces of the fleshly, corruptible, earthly sphere, i.e. fear of pain, shame, suffering and death, as well as the temptation of human honor, riches, fleshly desire, etc. Only by turning one's focus and thinking away from the earthly, corruptible things, can one achieve faithfulness to God's will.

It is all over Paul's letters and Christian epistle literature generally, and Mark expresses this fundamental idea most pointedly when Jesus talks about "thinking the things of man" and "thinking the things of God", 8:33, introducing a most central passage in the whole narrative dealing with this idea as the most important aspect of the gospel message itself (8:34-9:1). Therefore I think it makes sense, that Mark can create these four soils, and they 'accidentally' correlate well with some of the characters in the story.
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Re: A key for Mark 4?

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Stefan Kristensen wrote: Mon Jun 04, 2018 4:14 pmI myself have come to the conclusion that even though different characters throughout the narrative seem to fit more or less with the four (or three) soils, this is not intended, and the attempt to correlate the four soils with them only causes problems.
So "Rocky" (Πέτρος = Peter) being the disciple intended with the seed falling on the "rocky" (πετρώδης) soil does not impress you?
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