CX

It wasn't. It was a jewish temple reform movement aimed at reformation of the temple cult system and promoting an unbrokered and unmediated relationship with god.

I disagree with this basic characterization. Rather I think, as do the majority of mainstream scholars, AMk was a 2nd or 3rd generation Xian outside Palestine working with existing traditions. He added narrative elements to pull the various stories and sayings of which he was aware together into a cohesive quasi-historical biography.


Many people in the period claimed to be a Jewish messiah. Many jews were executed by the romans. It's hard to say how much over lap there may have been. Although I am an HJ agnostic I do not find the case for a completely mythical Jesus compelling enough to disabuse me of said agnosticism. Be careful not to accept as fact that which is extremely controversial and tenuously supported simply because it jibes with any personal philosophical positions. (Which, incidentally, I am not accusing you personally of)

motorhead

My personal take on it having read some scholarship on this gospel and the other three canonical gospels is that each gospel represents the viewpoint of a particular Christian community, at a particular time, in a particular place, under particular circumstances.

Each gospel writer has a particular viewpoint of who Jesus was and what their God intended to do through Jesus. They each rewrote the story of Jesus using various sources, which included some creative storytelling using symbols and expressions understandable to the audience reading the gospel at the time. It appears there was some agreement between Christian communities but each writer put their own spin on the Jesus story.

I think the author of Mark had oral traditions, maybe some written teachings (out of context), and parables (out of context) and he put them into context. For example, he may have taken a one liner from Jesus and built context around it to make a point to the believers in his community. Same deal with the parables. It's also possible the writer had complete stories with context and in that case he may have believed it actually occurred. Where he built context around sayings and parables, he didn't believe they happened but it didn't matter. They were written to make a point to the believers in his community.

Best example I can think of is Jesus walking through a corn field with his disciples on the Sabbath, and there happens to be Pharisees around. I think the writer built this context just to work in the saying where the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. The saying is to tell something about Sabbath (don't ask me what) and to challenge the Pharisees.

Marduk

"Assuming Mark wrote the first gospel and the other writers copied from him"

how would the 'Q' theory fit in with all this if Mark is the first?


it seems like some sort of tradition of "Jesus says" stuff was already in circulation.

Doctor X

According to Conservative Q, Mk did not have it/use it. It was a source of sayings that Mt and Lk used . . . maybe G of Th as well which did not get accepted.

According to Reforemed Q, Mk did know of Q . . . but they be heretics and their souls anathema!

Anyways, I have not read Kloppenberg's work on Q, and he is a "big guy" now on it--choosing to concentrate on the area. A mentor of his, Burton Mack wrote a nice and accessible book on Q.

Mack's theory on Mk is that he created a founding document for his community which combined the Jewish reform with the Hellenistic group that wanted a god--to over simplify his A Myth of Innocence.

--J.D.

Silent Acorns

I recently read Carrier's review of the book and I find the idea fascinating. I'm curious though, how seriously is this idea taken among biblical scholars?

Toto

Evangelical, conservative scholars poo-poo it. More liberal scholars seem to like it, but then they are more concerned with literary analysis that history.

How does Q fit in? Matthew and Luke seem to have copied from Mark but also added material from a "sayings" source, which is Q. Q does not add much to the story line, and may or may not predate Mark.

Kingdomovehearts

Matthew wrote his gospel in 41 AD, Mark wrote his in 65 AD. Wrong info bud.

Toto

Where do you get this? What we know as the gospel according to Matthew could not have been written in 41 AD. I can't think of any scholars who even argue for that date.

Doctor X

BWA!HA!HA!HA!HA!HA! . . . oh . . . you are serious?

Nothing personal, but that is the equivalent of wandering over to Evolution and stating that evolution is a communist plot or Media and stating that country-western is music.

The fact that Mt uses Mk as a source rather demonstrates that Mk is earlier. Even the most apologetic scholars from about thirty years ago--Howard Clark Kee comes to mind--place Mk just before the fall of Jerusalem to save it as a "historical witness." However, Mk clearly does not know his geography, does not know his history, does not know his politics which along with his "prediction" of the fall of Jerusalem forces a date after 70 CE. Now apologetic scholars place him at 70 CE.

If anyone seriously believes he can demonstrate a date of 41 CE for Mt and 65 CE for Mk, I know a journal or two that would be interested.

--J.D.

Sensei Meela

Not to come off as too uninformed, but, supposing that Mk's "prediction" was a later addition to the original, and thereby an admission of post-contemporary material, would this not weaken the "fact" that Mk is a "source" of Mt?

I suppose that there is a rigorous (and far beyond my abilities to perform) method of determining "source" materials, but it would seem to me that, granting alterations of the text, such a distinction would become far more problematic.

[This assumes that textual and/or literary analysis (were) the only available method(s) for determining the chronology of the writings]