Mark's Galilean Primacy

[Yozavan]

Introduction: Was Galilee the intended epicenter of the Church?

Our oldest gospel anticipates a Galilean resurrection, Mark 16:1-8. I say anticipate, because an actual resurrection doesn't occur in our text. Verses 9-20 are considered a pious addendum.

Considerations for debate: Did Mark consider Galilee the epicenter of the Church via the resurrection?

Premise: Matthew and Mark have a Galilean resurrection, and by implication a Galilean epicenter for the Church . Luke has a Jerusalem resurrection, and by implication a Jerusalem epicenter for the Church.
A Jerusalem-till-Rome narrative is in Acts, where the baton is passed for the spiritual capital ( Historically so ).


Church of Antioch: Matthew has no reservations following Mark's Galilean resurrection, 28:7,16, and even casts shade on Jerusalem as the place where truth is despised, at the closure of his book, 28:11-15. Matthew seems to nod to the Church of Antioch at the beginning of Jesus's ministry, 4:24! Very telling, since Acts portays Antioch as being founded independently from Jerusalem's apostolic efforts, and the birthplace of the scornful word "Christian," 11:19-26. Its noteworthy that Antioch was where Judaism needed to be settled years later, Acts 15:1-34.

A Curious Jesus: Its plain to me that Matthew and Luke use Mark's gospel. (To each their own on the Synoptic Problem) Its equally plain that Romans to Revelation have no interest in the historical Jesus, only the heavenly Jesus. There's absolutely no interest in quoting Jesus to settle religious disputes, just theological proclamations and mystical interpretations of the Septuagint Old Testament. ( The exceptions are James, which no doubt uses the Sermon on the Mount for the layout of his book. 2 Peter 1:16, which reads like pious nostalgia of the transfiguration, and Jesus's " good confession before Pilate, " 1 Timothy 6:13. )

Conclusion: Was Mark actually preserving a Galilean epicenter and their particular Jesus? The Ebionites, ( Evyonim in Hebrew, the poor, destitute ) used Galilee as their epicenter, and the Hebrew Old Testament along with Matthew and James. They rejected the Septuagint, and the rest of the NT. Sources: Irenaeus, Origen, Eusebius. The Evyonim may well be " the poor " Peter asked Paul to remember, Galatians 2:10. Notice Paul's supposedly large financial offering he collected from gentile churches, Romans 15:22-33, 2 Corinthians 8:1-24, never actually got delivered, Acts 21:15-36. Also notice Paul was set up by James to be arrested! Factions are cut-throat. ( Go to the Temple brudda. Angry mob waiting )

Personal Note: The Evyonim were too poor to travel around spreading their message. They lived a life of poverty and austere asceticism, and seemed content to hunker down in Galilee waiting for the apocalypse. They seem to be as close to the historical Jesus as we can get, or at least the first sect that was a direct by-product of his.

Historical Jesus: I realize calling Jesus a historical person, is becoming increasingly contested among academics. Jesus may have been a mystic invention. Jewish rabbinical folklore often used mystic inventions, whereby fictitious people are used for teaching tools. The Talmud exhibits this out the ying yang! This would certainly explain gnosticism's obsession with him later on. I'm entirely open to this possibility.

[The Tanager]

"... and they said nothing to anyone."

How much does an author have to qualify something before you're not allowed to change it?

You are changing it just as much as you think I’m changing it (although I’m not changing it at all since I’m appealing to outside material for my case and leaving the text as it is) in saying that Mark meant they never told anyone. It doesn’t say they never said anything to anyone (or that they did eventually tell others). Mark doesn’t explicitly claim the women were or weren’t the initial vehicle for the spread of the message, he provides one moment where they are scared and don’t tell anyone and then ends his story there.

Mark wasn't addressing the spread of the message directly at all. If he was, then he would have added something like: "but then Jesus appeared to others and they told others" or "but then Jesus appeared to every individual in light and sound" or whatever. He doesn't. He doesn't address the question you are reading into the text. And I'm addressing that question by looking outside of his text, not reading it into Mark's text.

If we want to ask that question and want to do more than just speculate (since the text is silent on that question) we should consider the wider context. I’ve offered the historical sources we have on the spread of the message in support of my view and you want to focus only on one abnormal experience within that literature. It seems more reasonable to me to take the whole witness into account, then just one small part.

The reasonable conclusion is that Mark was a competent author that told us the story he wanted to tell. Why that's different than the stories that Matthew, Luke, and John told us is an interesting question, but just saying that it's the same story isn't intellectually honest.

Why do you think I’m saying it’s the “same story”? Yes, one ought to treat Mark as a competent author who told the story he wanted to tell that is different in ways from what Matthew, Luke, and John told us. Why those differences are definitely interesting questions worth investigation and that is exactly what I’m doing by looking at the wider context since the text itself doesn't directly address "why those differences".

The "wider historical context" is three other theological stories, none of which is established as attempted historiography and all three of which are later than Mark. Two of those three are obvious modifications of Mark with other changes to historical details. Whether any of those details is true in a historical sense is, once again, an interesting question, but unless you're willig to claim that Matthew or Luke is more authoritative than Mark, there's no justification for subsuming Mark's narrative details to a hamhanded harmonization just because you want them to be historically true in a particularly narrow way.

No, it’s those three stories along with the letters we have that talk about the spread of Christianity (which is the detail this point is about, not other details). Your talk of my justification being because that is what I want to be true is empty rhetoric, stick with the actual reason I am offering.

[Difflugia]

You are changing it just as much as you think I’m changing it (although I’m not changing it at all since I’m appealing to outside material for my case and leaving the text as it is) in saying that Mark meant they never told anyone. It doesn’t say they never said anything to anyone (or that they did eventually tell others).

In my synthesis, "said nothing" stays "said nothing." In yours, "said nothing" changes to "said something."

Just out of curiosity, how do you feel about similar apologetic arguments to preserve inerrancy? Did Jesus conduct two sermons, one "on a mount" and one at "a flat place?" Did Jesus cleanse the temple at both the beginning and the end of his ministry? Did Peter actually deny Jesus six times in order to cover all the different details of each Gospel's three? Did Judas die twice in order to both hang himself and burst asunder?

Can we go farther than that? Was John the Baptist a time-travelling superhero because the Gospels don't say he never did that?

Mark wasn't addressing the spread of the message directly at all. If he was, then he would have added something like: "but then Jesus appeared to others and they told others" or "but then Jesus appeared to every individual in light and sound" or whatever. He doesn't. He doesn't address the question you are reading into the text.

Have you read Mark? Mark is all about implication, irony, and "the messianic secret." The reader is clued in because she's the one for whom "let the reader understand" (13:14) applies. Matthew is the one that expanded on Mark and explained things like Mark's callbacks to prophecy. You're still trying to turn Mark into the other evangelists.

And I'm addressing that question by looking outside of his text, not reading it into Mark's text.

And what, exactly, do you think the difference is between those two things? The question we're answering is about authorial intention. "Looking outside of his text" is exactly "reading it into Mark's text."

I'm not posting on an internet forum, I'm typing a response to you on my computer.

I’ve offered the historical sources we have on the spread of the message in support of my view and you want to focus only on one abnormal experience within that literature. It seems more reasonable to me to take the whole witness into account, then just one small part.

You're claiming, but haven't established, that it's reasonable to amend Mark by appealing to the other Gospels. You're at least making a genre error. Next, you'll be claiming that Mark's Jesus was both born of a virgin and a student of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardy because it doesn't say he wasn't.

No, it’s those three stories along with the letters we have that talk about the spread of Christianity (which is the detail this point is about, not other details). Your talk of my justification being because that is what I want to be true is empty rhetoric, stick with the actual reason I am offering.

The detail isn't about the spread of Christianity, but Mark's intention as author. This presupposes at least three things that you haven't established. First, the women at the tomb were real and were involved in the initial spread of Christianity. Second, the narrative changes to the later Gospels accurately represent what happened in a way that their stories can inform our understanding of Mark. Third, Mark is trying to represent the story of the women at the tomb in a historically accurate way. If your reason for relying on these premises isn't religiously motivated wishful thinking, then your literary analysis is barely above sloppy.

[The Tanager]

In my synthesis, "said nothing" stays "said nothing." In yours, "said nothing" changes to "said something."

No, in yours “said nothing” becomes “never said anything”. In mine, “said nothing” remains “said nothing” for the narrative point Mark wants to make and then I make a historical comment about how Mark would have been aware of the women eventually telling others, which I then take into account to help figure out what Mark’s narrative point in saying “said nothing” was.

Just out of curiosity, how do you feel about similar apologetic arguments to preserve inerrancy? Did Jesus conduct two sermons, one "on a mount" and one at "a flat place?" Did Jesus cleanse the temple at both the beginning and the end of his ministry? Did Peter actually deny Jesus six times in order to cover all the different details of each Gospel's three? Did Judas die twice in order to both hang himself and burst asunder?

First, I don’t think my argument is similar to these arguments. But to answer the questions, I lean towards them being two different sermons (or combinations of smaller teachings into longer sermons), one temple cleansing with John moving it towards the beginning of Jesus’ ministry for his agenda, Peter denying Jesus three times, and Judas hanging himself and then his body falling, hitting the ground, and bursting open.

Can we go farther than that? Was John the Baptist a time-travelling superhero because the Gospels don't say he never did that?

I’m not saying anything like that.

Mark wasn't addressing the spread of the message directly at all. If he was, then he would have added something like: "but then Jesus appeared to others and they told others" or "but then Jesus appeared to every individual in light and sound" or whatever. He doesn't. He doesn't address the question you are reading into the text.

Have you read Mark? Mark is all about implication, irony, and "the messianic secret." The reader is clued in because she's the one for whom "let the reader understand" (13:14) applies. Matthew is the one that expanded on Mark and explained things like Mark's callbacks to prophecy. You're still trying to turn Mark into the other evangelists.

Yes, I’ve read Mark. Narratively, the secret is at least let out of the bag in chapter 14 when Jesus publicly declares himself to be the Messiah (v. 62) and put in the centurion’s mouth (15:39). I think the secrecy motif has more to do with what has been called “corrective Christology” raising his suffering as the main element of his messiahship (see Mark 9:9). This isn’t trying to turn Mark into the other evangelists.

And what, exactly, do you think the difference is between those two things? The question we're answering is about authorial intention. "Looking outside of his text" is exactly "reading it into Mark's text."

This seems like a semantic difference to me. Yes, since Mark doesn’t directly raise and address this question, our thoughts on Mark’s intent by writing what he did must look outside of his text (or read that into Mark). But that can be done without changing what an actual phrase literally means (what I meant by reading into the text).

You are directly changing the text by asserting that “said nothing” literally means “never said anything”. I am leaving the text as it is, not claiming that it literally means “eventually said something” but that it means they were afraid and didn’t say anything with no reference to whether they eventually said something or not (because that isn’t Mark’s aim).

Why? Well, that is a situation many of Mark’s readers would have found themselves in and they have a choice to say something or not. Ending the story with that line is an excellent way to confront those in that struggle. But I’m not saying that is the only possible reason; it is currently the best one I’ve come across.

You're claiming, but haven't established, that it's reasonable to amend Mark by appealing to the other Gospels.

I’m not amending Mark, you are. You are placing a question directly in Mark’s words that simply isn’t there. I’m addressing a question that isn’t in the text by drawing on the wider context.

You're at least making a genre error. Next, you'll be claiming that Mark's Jesus was both born of a virgin and a student of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardy because it doesn't say he wasn't.

I’m not saying anything like that.

The detail isn't about the spread of Christianity, but Mark's intention as author.

The issue is Mark’s intention as an author; the detail is about the spread of Christianity. You are arguing that Mark’s phrase directly addresses what Mark thought about the spread of Christianity, namely, that it didn’t come through the women. I’m arguing that the phrase isn’t about that, but something else. I’m using our wider knowledge about the spread of Christianity to help inform us what that something else could be or, at least, is not.

This presupposes at least three things that you haven't established. First, the women at the tomb were real and were involved in the initial spread of Christianity. Second, the narrative changes to the later Gospels accurately represent what happened in a way that their stories can inform our understanding of Mark.

I do think the women at the tomb being real and being involved in the initial spread of Christianity is most probably historical. You didn't seem to be contesting that earlier, so I didn't go into a case for it. We can talk about that more, if you want. That is what the majority of sources from the time tell us and it would be an embarrassing detail to make up in one’s efforts to convince others.

Third, Mark is trying to represent the story of the women at the tomb in a historically accurate way.

My point about why Mark concludes with the women is the same whether Mark thought it was historically accurate or not; the historicity is irrelevant. It is used narratively, possibly to confront Christians who are afraid and deciding whether they want to spread the message or not.