stephan huller

I have been posting a number of arguments in favor of authenticity while most everyone else argues over the validity of hoax hypotheses. I think this is the best one yet. The closing words of the first Secret Mark fragment in to Theodore:

God's promise to Jesus the son of Nave in the LXX of the Book of Joshua:

I think all the evidence suggests that the selection of the disciple occurred on the 10th of Nisan and is related to Lazarus Saturday in the liturgy of the eastern churches. While the Exodus 12:1 - 3 identifies the tenth of the first month as the date for selecting the sacrificial lamb, the Book of Joshua identifies the crossing of the Jordan - i.e. the 'redemption' of Israel - occured on 10 Nisan. But Jews (as with the Christian veneration of Lazarus's raising celebrate the events of 10 Nisan on the Saturday before Passover).

The language of the fragment in Secret Mark is obviously borrowed from the LXX of Joshua and the Samaritan tradition associated with Joshua understands Joshua to have underwent an 'initiation' into mysteries exactly like the disciple in Secret Mark.

I think most of the people who argue for authenticity are ignoramuses when it comes to the Jewish scriptural background to the gospel. I think Mark borrowed from the LXX version of stories relating to Joshua in the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua. This argument will never be made and as such the debate over authenticity will rage on ad infinitum. Yet I think the borrow from Joshua here closes the door on any question of Morton Smith being the former (this is one of many things he never figured out about the text - the parallels with John 10 being another, so too his assumption that Bethany was on the 'Jewish' side of the Jordan, that 'naked with naked' is a phrase from the near contemporary writings of Maximus of Tyre etc.)

The people who typically argue for forgery are better informed about the Jewish scriptural background to the gospel. I am hoping they at least can see the implications and acknowledge the significance of this discovery. I have always thought the people arguing for authenticity are mostly comprised of cultural philistines at least with respect to the Jewish background to earliest Christianity.

andrewcriddle

FWIW πέραν τοῦ ιορδάνου occurs in canonical Mark 10:1

Andrew Criddle

stephan huller

Yes that's very useful information information Andrew. πέραν τοῦ ιορδάνου occurs exactly 40 times in the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua. τὸ πέραν τοῦ ιορδάνου occurs once in the whole LXX - Joshua 1.14, 15. In Hebrew it has a numerical value of 543. I should clarify my understanding. The concept of crossing the Jordan occurs necessary on the same day (or was made to occur on the same day). This is not an accidental or throw away concept. Mark is making a mystical statement here. The initiated disciple receiving the mysteries of the kingdom of God (itself another concept from the Book of Joshua and the early literature associated with it cf. the Samaritan Prayer of Joshua which is usually dated to before the Common Era) is the new Oshea, he is the Christ figure of Irenaeus's report of Jesus crucified and an impassable Christ (AH 3.11.7)

In any event I appreciate the input.

stephan huller

One more thing, which I think is important. πέραν is technically an adverb, but it can - as you note - be used as a preposition with the genitive. Yet only in Secret Mark and Joshua 1.15 LXX we see it used as an accusative article - i.e. the man is the direct object of the action (the crossing of the Jordan). In Jos. 1.15 LXX it is the ancient Israelites led by Jesus (Joshua) and in Secret Mark it is either Jesus or the initiated disciple. I suspect the latter. But this is a very significant parallel. The timing of the event is clearly days before Passover and certainly in the month of Nisan. It would have been hard to avoid connecting the event (i.e. the crossing of the Jordan) with Jesus (Joshua) and the inheritance of the land merely by the coincidence of timing. Now with the parallel terminology it is undeniable and highly significant - even 'mystically' so hence the name of the gospel.

Compare Mark 5:1 "They went across the sea (εἰς τὸ πέραν τῆς θαλάσσης) to the region of the Gerasenes." Needless to say I think that the crossing of the sea here corresponds to the Israelites crossing of the sea and Secret Mark's crossing of the Jordan to the final redemption of Jesus (Joshua). Mark 5:1 is direct citation of Deuteronomy 30:11 - 18 LXX:

The material all fits together perfectly and subtracting SGM 1 from the Markan narrative destroys the original integrity and renders the original literary purpose incomprehensible.

We have to understand the context here of what Moses is saying and when he is saying it. Moses like Jesus is about to die. He takes his 'disciple' (cf. Philo Virt. 55, 66) Oshea whose name has been changed by receiving the divine name (or the divine letter iota or yod) and initiates him into the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven (cf. the Samaritan Chronicle on Jos. 1). His words here in Deuteronomy 30 are clearly connected to the crossing of the Jordan as Marqe the Samaritan noted back in the first century CE:

The point of Deuteronomy 30 then is to make clear to the ancient Israelites that merely by participating in the miracle of the crossing the sea they have not attained perfection. Their actions will be judged and they can lose the promise that will be given to them (i.e. a clear foreshadowing of the history of the nation after Judges).

Interestingly the Apostle pays special attention to Deuteronomy 30 also but applies its words to the gospel narrative that was known and written by him (I accept the primacy of the Marcionite tradition). He writes:

This is a most interesting passage because the Apostle acknowledges that Moses is saying something which is reinterpreted in terms of the gospel. Anyway, I will explain this in a subsequent post. Go to go

stephan huller

Any meaningful discussion of what the exegesis of Deuteronomy 30 in Romans 10 means must begin with an acknowledgement that the Marcionite text read slightly different than our existing material. I have always argued that Clement's canon represented a kind of 'neo-Marcionite' collection (because the Alexandrian tradition was Marcionite and Clement represents that portion of the tradition which did not endure persecution and superficially at least embraced the new material being produced in Rome). Be that as it may it is worth noting how different Clement's Romans text is from ours. Whereas our text reads:

The early Alexandrian text inverts vv 10, 11 and 8, 9:

Clement's adds in his own voice that here "is clearly described the perfect righteousness, fulfilled both in practice and contemplation." [Strom 4.16]

The point then is that there is a Marcionite critique of the OT at work here. If we insert the new material we might get a better idea of what is being said:

The only thing that remains unclear here is why is Deuteronomy 30 used to make the point about faith? My working hypothesis would be that SGM 1 is being connected to the story of the crossing of the Jordan and salvation is ultimately attained by merely believing that as a result of his initiation 'the Lord' (i.e. Christ) took on the name and person of Jesus.

stephan huller

And because it is a 'mystic' gospel that we are investigating is it really that incredible to hold that one of the 'more precious mysteries' - that of the gospel as (re)conquest of the Holy Land - should be at its core:

The point is that the basic paradigm of the 'Gospel of Jesus' = a mystical reinterpretation of the story of Joshua in the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua isn't that crazy. It has a lot of ancient support

PhilosopherJay

Hi Stephan Huller,

Good points.

I think we do have to consider Joshua tales/material, both ones we know about and ones we don't, as important sources for the gospel Jesus.

One analogous situation is the development of the popular "Superman" comic book character from the 1930's. We can trace one of the sources back to Friedrich Nietzsche's writing about an "Übermensch" or "Superman." It gets changed through George Bernard Shaw's play "Man and Superman" and gets applied later to Lenin and the Bolsheviks at the time of the Russian Revolution. It gets picked up in narratives about Benito Mussolini in the early 1920's and Adolf Hitler in the early 1930's. By the early 1930's, the concept "Superman" is so generally known that in the movie musical "Footlight Parade," (1933) actor Frank McHugh as a dance director suffering from overwork and exhausion can complain that "I'm not a Superman," without having to explain the meaning of the term. (I think Ginger Rodgers also makes fun of Fred Astaire in one of their movies (probably "Roberta") by calling him a 'Superman." It is at this time that Jerry Siegel invents the character "Superman," first as a bald super-villain character intent on taking over the world and then as an heroic alien from the planet Krypton.

One can even trace Nietzsche's concept further back to the Russian Nihilists who believed in the propaganda of the deed. Ivan Turgenev's novel "Father and Sons" sympathetically describes such a person who dedicates his life to liberating the poor and oppressed people. They themselves were influenced by German Romantic idealism and Hegel and Thomas Carlyle's "Great Man" theories of history. (circa 1840)

Tracing the concept back further we can see it being applied by the Aristocrats of the 18th century, who saw themselves as great men and women of refined taste and sense sponsoring great geniuses, scientists and artists to make their nations great.

Jerry Siegel's "Superman" character was also directly influenced by Harold Lloyd and Errol Flynn movies, as well as Flash Gordon and Torchy Blaine serials and "The Shadow" radio series.

In the same way, the Gospel Jesus character doesn't exclusively come out of the Joshua character, but there are definite relational elements.

You are nicely laying out some of these definite relational elements here.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

stephan huller

Thank you so much Jay for the kind words. Anyone who can bring Fred Nietzsche into one of my posts has me at hello

I don't know if I need to do this but just in case anyone else out there isn't clear the person of Moses is of course the basic typology of the messiah. The messiah will be like Moses (Deut 18.18) and Joshua is Moses's successor so the idea that Joshua should be another typology for the messiah is always on people's radar.

What I am suggesting though derives from a detailed study of the earliest Church Fathers. Christians didn't simply put forward that Jesus was the messiah because he shared the same name as Joshua. Instead all the earliest Fathers focused on the fact that Oshea becomes Jesus (LXX Joshua = Jesus) by a mystical change of letters (much like Abram and Sarai).

When you read what is written in writers like Justin, Clement, Origen and Eusebius you come away with a clear intimation that Jesus was not of the Joshua typology but rather of the typology of Moses. Jesus like Moses dies before entering the Holy Land, he is a high priest rather than king etc.

The point of course is that given all the emphasis of Jesus being like Moses it is very apparent (even though there is rarely an explicit allusion to the mystery) that someone else was meant to be of the typology of Joshua. The fact that Joshua was originally called by a different name can be argued to have led the aforementioned list of writers to assume that someone else - a chosen disciple - was clearly meant to be of this typology.

The Secret Gospel of Mark makes it absolutely explicit that Jesus initiated this disciple whom he loved into the mysteries of Joshua (= the kingdom or kingship of God). The adoption of the divine name is at the heart of Christian baptism rituals. I think that the transformation of Oshea into 'Jesus' was developed by the author of Secret Mark into a paradigm for baptism.

If you look carefully at Origen's statement above, he says that 'the baptism of Spirit and water' derives from the crossing of the Red Sea. Yet Origen is famous for arguing that the crossing of the Jordan is another baptism - the baptism of fire which I believe connects Origen and the Alexandrian tradition he represented with the various reports of 'another baptism' among the heresies and rooted in Mark chapter 10.

I think this is ultimately an allusion or a remembrance of the existence of Secret Mark's role in Alexandrian baptism rituals. The purpose again was to take the phantasm 'Jesus' and implanted in the souls of men made after the example of the Creator. That is why the baptism ritual is fixed to a crossing of the Jordan presumably on the 10 of Nisan