creature

How do "we" or many of you understand the rich ruler story in Mark 10?

was Jesus trying to indicate that the way to eternal life is to keep the 10 commandments plus, or to indicate that it was impossible and no one can do it? Or, something else?

Toto

The Rich and the Kingdom of God

17 As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
18 “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. 19 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’[d]”

20 “Teacher,” he declared, “all these I have kept since I was a boy.”

21 Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

22 At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

23 Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”

24 The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, “Children, how hard it is[e] to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

26 The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, “Who then can be saved?”

27 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”

28 Then Peter spoke up, “We have left everything to follow you!”

29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. 31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”

I think the author's point is that "with god, all things are possible." But there are a lot of possibilities.

stephan huller

No actually Clement of Alexandria has a very interesting and surprising analysis of this passage (Str. 3. 1 - 13, Quis Dives Salvetur) which has close parallels with the (disputed) letter to Theodore discovered at Mar Saba.

Clement and the Carpocratians seem to have had a long running debate about Mark chapter 10. The Carpocratians read Mark 10:17 - 31 in the way we would - viz. you have to give up all your money to go to heaven. However Clement has an interesting spin on this.

In Quis Dives Salvetur Clement argues that - in effect - those who merely base their knowledge on the canonical gospels miss the conclusion of the narrative which is the story of Zacchaeus which only appears in Luke in our canonical set but appears shortly after Mark 10:17 - 31 in the Diatessaron.

Clement argues that the Zacchaeus narrative reveals that Jesus's 'real teaching' is not to give up everything but rather to perform acts of 'charity':

"Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount."

Clement's point is that to take Mark 10:17 - 31 on its own is to take Jesus's word out of context. The material in this section of the gospel forms a 'set' and has to be seen in a greater context.

I don't want to bore everyone here but I have long argued that Clement's comments here are one of about a hundred statements in his writings which suggest that he was already familiar with the a 'Diatessaron' like gospel which is always associated with Ammonius the Alexandrian (possibly the famous Ammonius Sacca). I identify this text with Secret Mark and it is worth noting that Rev. C W Phillips (1941) noticed that Origen and many other witnesses seem to know of a variant order to the gospel closely related to the Diatessaron where the following narratives were heavily integrated:

The Rich Fool (Luke 12:13 - 21)
The Rich Youth (Mark 10:17 - 31)
Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19 -31)

I happen to think that if you stick the baptism story from Secret Mark here and continue following the order of the Diatessaron you can explain Clement's argument in Quis Dives Salvetur:

Foretelling of the Passion (Mark 10:32 - 34)
Addition to Secret Mark (the inititiation of the resurrected rich youth)
Salome's request for enthronement for her children (Mark 10:35 - 41)
Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1 - 10)

Under this scenario the redemption baptism 'on behalf of the dead' essentially allowed rich patrons like Ambrose the deacon of Alexandria to keep most of their wealth (and effectively have the great Origen of Alexandria in his pocket for his whole life) in contradiction to the literal interpretation of Mark 10:17 - 31.

That Christians can be Christians and get into heaven without giving up all their money can only be explained in Alexandrian environment necessitates the existence of a gospel like Secret Mark.

Doug Shaver

Since I believe there was no Jesus to tell the story, I don't think he was trying to indicate anything. The author of Mark's gospel, on the other hand, was making a point of his own by attributing the story to Jesus.

I think his point was mainly just to bash rich people, not to say anything specific about what they were obliged to do.

rhutchin

Given that the man asked how he might gain eternal life, there is the indication of uncertainty on his part suggesting that he was unsure that his obedience to the law was sufficient to gain entry into heaven. While he might have viewed his wealth as an indicator of God's blessing, he does not appear to be so sure about this and seeks reassurance.

The issue seems to be whether the man was telling the truth in v20 when he said, "...all these [commandments] I have kept since I was a boy." It was not true as we read elsewhere that all have sinned and even David says in the psalms that he was born in sin. We might then view the question as, "Can a man who is good and seeks to obey God enter heaven by his own efforts?"

Jesus discerns the issue. He challenges the young man to give up his wealth and follow Him. The young man could not suggesting that he was trusting in his wealth and not in God so that his wealth had become his idol.

Had his wealth not been an issue, then Jesus would have touched on the the true issue. The whole point is that no one can enter heaven on their own merits because all the good that a person does cannot erase the evil that they have done.

stephan huller

I am not so sure that is the exact point. The point is, as Clement notes in Stromata Book Three, that in the shared non-canonical gospel of the 'Carpocratians' and Alexandrian Church there was an addition left out of canonical Mark " ἀκούσῃ παρὰ τοῦ κυρίου· « Ἐγὼ δὲ λέγω, οὐκ ἐπιθυμήσεις·»"

The Marcionite gospel preserved other details which slightly changed the narrative too. Clement's point seems to justify the ritual castration of both traditions. As long as one 'lusts' or 'covets' things one will not get into heaven.

Interestingly Clement (the crypto-Marcionite) understands that Paul knew that this saying as part of his gospel in Rom 7:7

Romans 7:7 Τί οὖν ἐροῦμεν; ὁ νόμος ἁμαρτία; μὴ γένοιτο· ἀλλὰ τὴν ἁμαρτίαν οὐκ ἔγνων εἰ μὴ διὰ νόμου τήν τε γὰρ ἐπιθυμίαν οὐκ ᾔδειν εἰ μὴ ὁ νόμος ἔλεγεν οὐκ ἐπιθυμήσεις.

Yes the saying appears in the Torah but Clement says explicitly 'gospel and Law'

Chili

Oh I think that the Jesus of Mark was stupid to say such a thing as I have tried to throw my money to God so often and he keeps throwing it right back to me.

The point is that God does not want our money but he wants our 'all' and by this he means our 'sin nature' and sin nature only and that has nothing to do with being rich or poor because that fact is the same for the rich and the poor wherein in itself both the rich and poor are rich and poor for a good reason and so really to give to the poor is a dumb thing to do or they would not be poor for good reason.

Now there is such a thing as giving out of guilt (and Billy Graham knew all about that) and that is precisely what makes giving itself a sin and therefore a liability instead . . . which really is the flip-side and no different than to receive a prophet in the name of a prophet so as to gain fame and that so will be the full extent of our reward there.

So this means that it is a good thing to fuck somebody out of some money but not if you do that to a poor man because that defiles your own integrity and so makes the gutter our 'home' as the place (or Nietzsche's anvil) from which deviance must be made known . . . wherefore then Joseph was said to be an upright Jew and not just a Jew (no insult intended here, sorry).

I think the best thing to do it to instill piety in children to deeply entrench virtue in children (first suit and angelic dresses at first communion etc.) so they will know later in life what Eden was like when their faculty of reason takes over and the artificial concept of sin will clash like a blow on an anvil and zing into their soul from where we later in life must stand convicted as sinner and there carve a clearing deep into the world we have created for ourself (Advent) so that we can see the 'sun' again in the darkness we have created for ourself and from there look back on our life and look for that paradise we once knew and left behind to make a name for ourself. I think Seneca advocated this concept and if anything we can learn from him is that he should know!

Toto

Could you explain a bit more?

The only online translation I see for Stromata Book Three is here. (Was it too obscene to translate?)

stephan huller

Too obscene for me? The guy who developed a post about the masturbating Polycarp of Smyrna. No it was early in the morning and I had to get to work. I use remacle.org's version but it is also available here http://earlychristianwritings.com/te...3-english.html in English.

Clement (without directly referencing the source of the quotation) says that Jesus answered someone apparently citing the command 'thou shall not lust'

The Lord has said: "But I say unto you, you shall not lust."

This is not a variant of Matthew 5:29 because Clement cites it side by side with that saying. This resembles Aphrahat's version of Mark 10:17 - 31 (albeit cited from a Diatessaron) and the Marcionite version of the same material (where the youth says 'I know the commandments ...' instead of the received text "You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not defraud, honor your father and mother.’”

The youth wants to have eternal life. Jesus says that not lusting is key to entering the kingdom where ἐπιθυμήσεις means both 'to lust' and 'to covet'

to set one's heart upon a thing, lust after, long for, covet, desire, c. gen., Hdt., Aesch., etc.; also c. gen. pers., Xen.:—c. inf. to desire to do, Hdt., Soph.:—absol. to desire, covet, Thuc., etc.; τὸ ἐπιθυμοῦν τοῦ πλοῦ ῀ ἐπιθυμία, eagerness for it, id=Thuc.

Let's just stop there and see how closely this resembles Ephrem and the Syrian Church's understanding. The context is the Law. Mark (or whoever wrote the original gospel) is saying IN THE CONTEXT OF THE DISCUSSION OF THE COMMANDMENTS that 'not lusting' is the key to paradise - 'not lusting' taken in the sense of sexual desire and material ambition for 'things.'

The argument in Stromata 3 is identical with what appears in Quis Dives Salvetur - and to a lesser degree the Letter to Theodore - in that there are Alexandrians promoting an interpretation of the passage at odds with the official Church.

Those whom Clement identifies as 'Carpocratians' simply read what appears in canonical Mark and put forward a simple monastic formulation - give up your money, join the commune, enter the kingdom. They clearly must have questioned someone like Ambrose the former Marcionite who managed to rise to the position of deacon during the tenure of Clement's successor Origen and nevertheless had a family and retained all or most of his money.

The question of Ambrose is most interesting. Origen is broke (at least before Ambrose dies because the former Marcionite puts him in his will). We don't know about Clement but Ambrose is very wealthy.

The situation seems to be that there were Alexandrians who took Mark 10:17 - 31 at face value and must have had issues with Ambrose's wealth (and peoiple like Ambrose in Alexandria, he couldn't have been the first). Clement as I noted earlier says that just looking at Mark 10:17 - 31 on its own is taking things out of context. Mark 10:17 - 31 is only the start of the narrative. The narrative 'really ends' at what is for us Luke 19:1 - 10, the story of Zacchaeus.

Why is Zacchaeus significant? Because we can see Ambrose following the 'Zacchaeus paradigm' in his relationship with Origen. Ambrose retains his money but does good works - or if you will 'charity.'

Some might say that Clement is just using our canonical Luke to explain Mark but there is good reason not to believe this is true. There are a number of reasons to think that Clement is actually using a diatessaronic gospel and then when we come across the Letter to Theodore we discover a 'secret version' of Mark which inserts something in the exact place where the Diatessaron inserts the story of Zacchaeus into Mark 10:46. First Mark 10:46 as it stands now:

And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging.
Then the Letter to Theodore:

And after the words, "And he comes into Jericho," the secret Gospel adds only, "And the sister of the youth whom Jesus loved and his mother and Salome were there, and Jesus did not receive them."

Then the Arabic Diatessaron:

And when Jesus entered and passed through Jericho, there was a man named Zachaeus, rich, and chief of the publicans. And he desired to see Jesus who he was; and he was not able for the pressure of the crowd, because Zacchaeus was little of stature. Arabic, And he hastened, and went before Jesus, and went up into an unripe fig tree to see Jesus: for he was to pass thus. And when Jesus came to that place, he saw him, and said unto him, Make haste, and come down, Zacchaeus: to-day I must be in thy house. And he hastened, and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they all saw, they murmured, and said, He hath gone in and lodged with a man that is a sinner. So Zacchaeus stood, and said unto Jesus, My Lord, now half of my possessions I give to the poor, and what I have unjustly taken from every man I give him fourfold. Jesus said unto him, To-day is salva- tion come to this house, because this man also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and save the thing that was lost. And when Jesus went out of Jericho, he and his disciples, there came after him a great multitude

The point is that it hasn't been noticed before that Secret Mark structurally resembles the Diatessaron. C W Phillips has noted that a number of writers including Clement (Stromata 3) and Origen (Commentary on Matthew 15) used a non-canonical gospel which resembled the pattern of synthesizing material from the three synoptics into Mark chapter 10.

Yet Clement goes one step further. He puts forward a Marcionite understanding of the apostle Paul having a copy of this non-canonical gospel ('my gospel') and using its version of Mark 10:17 - 31 in Romans 7:7:

While on this point I think I must not commit mention of the fact that the apostle declares that the same God is the God of the law, the prophets, and the gospel. In the Epistle to the Romans he quotes the gospel saying "Thou shalt not lust" as if it were from the law, knowing that it is the one Father who is preached by the law and the prophets. For he says: "What shall we say? Is the law sin? God forbid. I had not known sin except through the law; and I had not known lust unless the law had said, Thou shalt not lust." Even if the heretics who are opposed to the Creator suppose that in the next sentence Paul was speaking against him when he says, "I know that in me, that is in my flesh, there dwells no good thing," yet let them read what precedes and follows this. For before it he says, "But sin which dwells in me," which explains why it was appropriate for him to say, "in my flesh dwells no good thing." [Strom 3.77]

The idea then is that Clement formulates a Marcionite understanding of 'Paul' using a non-canonical gospel which the Alexandrian Church retained along with the Carpocratians.

If anyone is interested Matthew 5:27 - 28 reads:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’[e] 28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Chili

Sorry about my rant on the rich and the poor but when the woman who presides over the TOL in Gen 3:6 saw that the TOK was good to be employed for gaining 'good things' in life she did not mean that power wealth and beauty are wrong as 'instruments' to make know the rich and the poor but in the use of our talents through which great mansions are built.

To be sure, great mansions come from great minds and they are only great in their beauty of truth which comes from the TOL where truth is retained and so is where every one of our hair has been counted to account for by us in 'the measure' that we have been given as wily carpenter sinner as well.

It has nothing to do with lusting per se but in just being accountable for who we are created to be and our failure to do so this is what brings lusting about. This then is how we 'encourages the courageous' so that destiny will be ours in the end.

My favorite expression here is that the true beauty of gold lies in our ability to walk away from it in that the worth of our achievement is far greater than the sum total of its material worth throught the exploitation of our own soul wherein we must [finally] find who were created to be (= having a dream to live instead of a lusting dreamer without a dream) when we come full circle there and know it as if for the first time now as a home of our own.