Mark 9:1 "seeing the kingdom having come in power"

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Stefan Kristensen
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Re: Mark 9:1 "seeing the kingdom having come in power"

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

DCHindley wrote: Fri Oct 19, 2018 9:14 pm
Stefan Kristensen wrote: Thu Oct 18, 2018 5:57 am With regards to the question of "this generation", I was reading in Acts and saw this interesting bit in connection with the incident with the first conversions to faith ever, where Luke says something about conversion meaning "saved from this crooked generation".

It's Pentecost and the apostles receive the spirit and preaches about God's mighty deeds (2:11) in all kinds of languages. Beause of that a large crowd gathers of diaspora Jews who have travelled to Jerusalem to lodge for the Pentecost (apparantly). They are confounded and wonder about how these Galileans are able to do this all of a sudden, speaking in all the various native languages of these diaspora Jews.

Peter then addresses them in preaching, the very first preaching of the gospel in history, as it were, explaining from Scripture what is going on, i.e. the gift of the holy spirit given by Jesus as he has been resurreced and has taken his seat with God as Lord and messiah.

Throughout the speech Peter addresses these Jews first as "Judeans and all you who lodge in Jerusalem" (2:14), then "Israelites" (2:22), and then "brothers" (2:29), and then indirectly "the whole house of Israel" (2:36). At the end, these Jews are then "cut to the heart" and ask Peter and the rest of the apostles: "What shall we do, Brothers!" Peter answers them:
Acts 2,38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Acts 2,39 For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.”
Acts 2,40 And he testified with many other arguments and exhorted them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.”
Acts 2,41 So those who welcomed his message were baptized, and that day about three thousand persons were added.
Acts 2,42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

This must mean that when you convert, you are no longer part of the "crooked generation". If so, then generation (γενεα) here means ethnic lineage, i.e. the Jewish 'race'. When you convert you are not of the Jewish race, or people. So what is your 'new' race then? Good question, but as Peter in the end addresses them as "brothers" and they address Peter and the apostles as "brothers", that may indicate that they now all go on to belong to the same, new race of humans. Not Israeliets descended from Abraham, not Gentiles descended from other forefathers. A new race with a new descent. From God and Christ, I guess. If one can be "saved from" one's "generation", that means that 'one' no longer takes part in one's fleshly descent?
You have a pretty good grasp if the circumstances.

Are you familiar with Denise Kimber Buell's 'Rethinking the Relevance of Race for Early Christian Self-Definition' (HTR 944, 2001, 449–476)? She reaches very similar conclusions.

DCH
Thanks, DC. Havn't read it, but will take a look at it. Just read the first pages, looks like she's saying something like what I also think: The NT texts are generally talking about the Christians as a new race of humans. When Paul says that the Christians are "son of God" or "children of God" (e.g. Rom 8), then I think he means it literally and materially. I base my view on the understanding that spirits in the NT should not be understood in a modern 'platonic' understanding, i.e. as something non-material, but (as Engberg-Pedersen argues) in the way the stoics understood it, i.e. as material, a fine, airy substance.

Therefore one can have descent according to the flesh as one is a fleshly being, but one can also have descent according to the spirit, if one is made into a spiritual being by God's spirit, getting spiritual descent from him, being part of his nature. And so that's what the Christians will be at the resurrection, but they are already taking part in this transformation inside their fleshly bodies, when they get the spirit at baptism. As Paul says it is one place: The spirit received at baptism is the "down payment" (αρραβων) for this fuller transformation at the resurrection (2 Cor 5:5).

Is this what Peter is saying here, "save yourselves from this crooked generation"? The conversion with the gift of the spirit is an exit from one's fleshly being, and therefore one's family and descent?
Stefan Kristensen
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Re: Mark 9:1 "seeing the kingdom having come in power"

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

What I hypothesise more generally is that the Christians of the NT thought their new race was more of a new species of humans. Or rather, that original immortal species described in Gen 1:26-26 ruling creation, before the Fall where the humans acquired their fleshly mortality and as such became a fleshly species. So at the resurrection human kind will be that original species, the image of God. And that transformation is already partly happening in conversion. At least, that’s one hypothesis that can explain much.
Stefan Kristensen
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Re: Mark 9:1 "seeing the kingdom having come in power"

Post by Stefan Kristensen »

More concerning "generation".

In Phil 2:14-15 Paul contrasts the Christians as "children of God" with the "crooked and perverse generation":
Do all things without murmuring and arguing, so that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine like stars in the world.

I was reading the article by Denise Kimber Buell, and she focuses on a really interesting aspect in connection with the ideas concerning race, people, nation, etc. at the time. She highlights that ethnicity or race etc. was quite often expressed in terms of religion. So that a people or race were often defined by their religious worship. E.g. the 'Romans' are those who worship the Roman dieties in their specific Roman cults, and cities defined their 'nationality' in terms of their local deity, etc.

As such, the Jews were also defined as a people, race, nation, from their particular religion and worship. In this way, she argues, it doesn't make sense to speak about the early Christians as dissolving the notion of race alltogether, which is often the case in modern research. We can see in the early Christian literature (outside of the NT) that they saw themselves as a race, people, nation, etc. Sometimes called by them "the third race", i.e. compared to the Jews and the Gentiles ("the Greek").

This led me to connect some dots that I think make sense. Because the Christians in the texts are talking about the manner of worship, that's what defines their 'religion', as we call it. Now we've entered a central aspect: covenant. Because as I see it, the Christians understood the covenant of God in a very specific way which is never really spelled out, but which I think can be deduced from the NT texts: covenant can be described as the contract of servitude. A job descrition, an employment contract, where the duties involved in the job is spelled out.

"Covenant" is the contract between God and his servants that explains how they must serve him, i.e. the manner of worship. According to the old covenant this manner was the temple cult. According to the new covenant the manner is an inner-worship, where the offerings are neighborly love and prayers. This was also required by the old covenant, but because of the fleshly, 'outer' nature of the servants, it was not possible to serve God truly in the right manner. When you enter the new covenant, i.e. the new manner of serving God, you are being transformed by the spirit to become a spritual being inside of you, making it possible to serve in the true manner, under the new covenant.

God's will hasn't changed, it's the same job that needs to be done in both employment contracts, i.e. covenants. He still wants the same thing, that the servants love him and love eachother. But now, with the spiritual transformation of the humans inner persons, his servants are fully able to do it, and all the outer conditions, which were required under the old covenant, i.e. the temple cult with the temple and all its paraphernelia, are now not required anymore. Now it is a spiritual worship, not bound to outer, non-spiritual things, such as a concrete building in a concrete location (the temple cult in Jerusalem).

When Jesus says to that scribe inside the temple complex, that he is "not far from the kingdom of God", we can understand it as not far from the new covenant, where the conditions of serving God has changed from the outer things to the inner things. The management of the "vineyard" is changing in accordance with the changed manner of work in the vineyard.

Then the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that ‘he is one, and besides him there is no other’; and ‘to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength,’ and ‘to love one’s neighbor as oneself,’—this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”
(Mark 12:32-34)

The "new wine" of the vineyard will soon be served to Jesus, i.e. the offerings under the new covenant, as perhaps what Jesus is saying as he institutes the new manner of worship, the new cult:
Truly I tell you, I will never again drink of the product of the vineyard until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.
(Mark 14:25)

And the new management of the "vineyard" needs to be prepared to carry that new "product of the vineyard", the disciples need training in the new cult institution, they need to be transformed inwardly to become new spiritual beings that can serve God in the new, true manner:
“No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.”
(Mark 2:21-22)

So if the manner of worship defines the nation or race of a people, then it makes sense that the Christians are the children of God among a crooked and perverse generation, they are a new race, or species perhaps, under the new covenant, like Israel was the 'people' of God under the old covenant.
nightshadetwine
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Re: Mark 9:1 "seeing the kingdom having come in power"

Post by nightshadetwine »

Stefan Kristensen wrote: Sat Oct 20, 2018 4:07 am What I hypothesise more generally is that the Christians of the NT thought their new race was more of a new species of humans. Or rather, that original immortal species described in Gen 1:26-26 ruling creation, before the Fall where the humans acquired their fleshly mortality and as such became a fleshly species. So at the resurrection human kind will be that original species, the image of God. And that transformation is already partly happening in conversion. At least, that’s one hypothesis that can explain much.
I think this may be what they believed. The resurrection will bring about a "return to eden". You find a similar concept in ancient Greek religion. They had different world ages and races of humanity. There originally was a golden age or golden race and in the future the gods/god will return and restore the golden age.

http://www.maicar.com/GML/AgesOfWorld.html
God (also called Creator—or Demiurgus—Father, Composer, Supreme Spirit, and Pilot) causes the world to revolve in a forward direction during a certain period of time. God is the extrinsic cause of this motion. This is the time of the Autochthons (earthborn or “sons of the soil”) and of “the reign of Cronos”. God supervises man, and a number of deities rule the beasts and different regions of the world.

Later, God withdraws (along with the administrative deities), a cataclysm occurs, the world starts revolving “backwards” of its own accord, and thus “the age of Zeus” commences. When the cataclysm subsides, there is order again; for the world remembers and practices the teachings of the Creator. But in the course of time the world grows oblivious, and the ensuing carelessness threatens destruction. At this point, God restores order again through the “forward” motion to prevent complete dissolution.

“The reign of Cronos” or Golden Age occurs when God steers the motion of the universe. Plato does not mention the other ages in this context, but when the pattern of the ages is combined with the phases derived from the motion of the universe described by the Stranger, the following sequence is obtained:

Golden Age: “The reign of Cronos” [271d]
Cataclysm [273a]—as motion is reversed
Silver Age: “got on most excellently” [273c]
Bronze Age: “disorder prevailed” [273c]
Iron Age: “dire trouble” [273d].

Divine intervention restores Golden Age: “he took again his place”, “reversed whatever had become unsound” [273e]. The motion is once more reversed. When the third period comes after the cataclysm, all deities have already left. As a way of compensating the solitude and defenselessness of man, the gifts of the gods are given to him by deities such as Hephaestus, Athena, Prometheus, Demeter, and Dionysus [274c]. In periods 3, 4, and 5, man takes care of himself without any further divine help. But man’s self-government ends in disaster (5) and God intervenes again (6), reversing the motion of the universe and putting it under His direction.”

The Golden Age is the reign of Cronos/Saturn, implying “the manner of life” under his rule (o epí Krónou Bíos, or Saturnia regna). This is the age of Right, Trust, Simplicity, Innocence, Peace, and Everlasting Spring. The gods have intercourse with men, and the Earth yields, without being forced, a diet necessarily vegetarian. The beasts are neither hunted nor forced; blood is not shed, not even among animals. There is no navigation, no mining, no laws, no judges, no war. For more details, see the commented Ancient Texts below; some obvious deductions are summarized here:

The Golden Age appears as a lost paradise often associated with the irretrievable reverie of Childhood: it is a state of innocence, purity, freedom, and simplicity, ruled by Justice and obviously permeated by the significance and beauty of the natural world. The spiritual power of this age is revealed by the circumstance that the world is enchanted or “bewitched,” as must be a world in which men have intercourse with gods. In this age, the mind prevails over the physical, as may be deduced by the growing “materiality” of the succeeding ages.”
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