gstafleu

That's a bit of an evasion, but OK. Is there a list of Jesus predictions in Mark available somewhere? I'll start with one: the resurrection prediction was not fulfilled. So now the score is right:1--wrong:1. Of course compared to the importance of the resurrection prediction, the petrine predictions are rather minor... Do we have any predictions about things that will come to pass within this generation in Mark, or is that only elsewhere? Of course the failure of that prediction would lie outside the text.

Gerard Stafleu

Ben C Smith

What?

Your position on this thread so far is that Mark ends at 16.8, before we can tell whether the resurrection prediction will be fulfilled. You even wrote:

If the resurrection fulfillment is in doubt, how can it count as a mark in the nay column?

And you are arguing in a circle if, in trying to determine whether Mark intended the reader to regard the resurrection prediction as fulfilled, you regard the resurrection prediction as unfulfilled from the start.

Ben.

Malachi151

Umm... this is quite easy. He said that he would be rise after three days and three nights, yet he is only in the grave for like 1 day and 2 nights.

Ben C Smith

I believe Gerard was asking for predictions from the gospel of Mark, and I know I was. The prediction about three days and three nights comes from Matthew 12.40, not from Mark.

Ben.

gstafleu

Touche, but I have an out. It is at least not in the Yea column, and in a (supposed) world where Jesus Is Always Right that is getting pretty close to a Nay. But I am (for now ) willing to reduce the Nay score to 0.5, quite generous in an absolutist environment I'd say.

What else can we put in either column?

Gerard Stafleu

Malachi151

This is also in Mark:

There is a proposed solution to this that says that the Sabbath was not Saturday, but was a different day due to the Passover.

Ben C Smith

It cannot be even a 0.5, since the whole point of the gospel may be (and some believe it is) that one has to take on faith that the resurrection happened based on the other fulfilled predictions.

Basically, if the narrative ends before the resurrection can be confirmed, then we cannot even slightly treat the resurrection as an unfulfilled prediction. Especially with an empty tomb staring us in the face!

The passion predictions, cited by Malachi in his last post, in 8.31; 9.31; 10.33-34 are fulfilled to the letter in Mark, right down to the groups that come to arrest Jesus, the spitting, and the flogging.

The prediction of the betrayal in 14.18-21 is fulfilled exactly in 14.42-45.

We already mentioned the denial prediction.

There are some predictions in Mark whose fulfilments fall beyond the scope of the gospel narration; the fall of Jerusalem, for example, or the remembrance of the woman who anointed Jesus. But these are a null set, since the narrative itself ends before they could possibly be fulfilled.

I do not know of any prediction by Jesus in the gospel of Mark that outright failed to be fulfilled; that is, the appropriate time came and went, and the prophecy did not come to pass.

It is the triple passion prediction that is most relevant here, since it predicts the delivering up, the scourging, the spitting, the death, and so forth, which details are fulfilled in full. But this same prediction also predicts the resurrection. Conclusion? It was fulfilled in full also.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

Yes. What is your point?

Ben.

Malachi151

I thought you just said it was only in Matthew.

At any rate, I think that he was resurrected according to GMark, but that the failure was on the part of his followers.

In GMark all of his followers are failures, this is just one more example of their failure.

Ben C Smith

It is. There is nothing about the three days and three nights in Mark.

Mark has only the bit about the three days. Using inclusive reckoning, part of day 1, all of day 2, and part of day 3 can count as three days. (See Genesis 42.17, in which Joseph imprisons his brothers for three days, yet in verse 18 releases them on the third day, not on the fourth; see also Matthew 27.63, where the chief priests recall Jesus predicting that he would rise again after three days, yet in the next verse they ask for a guard only until the third day, not until the fourth.)

The precise expression three days and three nights in Matthew 12.40 may be more problematic; this is why it is important to recognize that Mark does not use that phrase.

Ben.