creature

It has been several years since I paid much attention to this question. . .

I see other threads on this subject. Are you folks telling me that additional information has come to light, which makes it much more likely than not, that Morton Smith found something in the monastery, rather than forging it?

what then implications do we wish to propose?

that there was in fact a longer version of Mark in use in Egypt before and during the time of Clement of Alexandria, and that this version of Mark implies some either erotic contact between Jesus and the young man, or at least, it suggests that they "slept" together?

Also, it seems that the one good argument in favor of some kind of forgery was that the words in Greek translated as spent the night together are normal for English, but would have been unlikely or awkward or never used in Greek. Do we know more about that?

What about the question as to which had come first: Longer Mark or Canonical mark. Did someone write Longer Mark and then someone else delete the problem verse about spending the night with the man nude and move the reference to the nude man to the garden of gethsemane? Or, did someone take the shorter mark and add to it the story of the baptism of the nude young man?

Or, did the same person write both gospels, and intentionally not have widely circulated the Longer Version of mark, because of the risk of offending the sensibilities of certain readers?

For what it matters, I think from the writings of Paul that we have implications that unmarried christians travelled together and may have "slept" together without intercourse.

5Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?

The word sister here probably refers to a female Christian who is not a wife . . .

Don't we who are apostles have the right to travel with female Christian companions, either sisters (meaning not married to us and "virgins") or wives(meaning married to us)?

and

36 But if any man think that he behaveth himself uncomely toward his virgin, if she pass the flower of her age, and need so require, let him do what he will, he sinneth not: let them marry.

But if any man think he is behaving indecently with his Christian "sister" with whom he is affectionate and who had intended to remain a virgin and if there are other factors leading that way, let them marry.

buster

No. It simply appears that Stephen Carlson's handwriting analysis was flawed. The handwriting is competent, and not obviously forged.

Either Smith had mastered the handwriting style, or someone else wrote it for him. If the letter is anachronistic, it doesn't matter how good the handwriting is.

Have you read Carlson's book? It goes into detail about this.

The Gospel Hoax (or via: amazon.co.uk), p. 67.
Ibid., pp. 67-68.
So, yes, it's another anachronism. Secret Mark would have ended with a thud for an ancient reader.

If To Theodore is to be believed, it sounds as if Mark wrote the secret part at a later date.

To Theodore.
Keep in mind that if it was copied in the 18th century, there is still no prior evidence of it.

stephan huller

It's not that uncommon to avoid unconfortable translations. When I was studying philosophy in university you can't imagine how embarassing it was to walk around with Kaufmann's translation of Nietzsche's Die fröhliche Wissenschaft rendered 'the Gay Science.' If I had a dollar for every wise crack I got about being a gay science major. Subsequent translations avoided the connotation. I doubt this had anything to do with their sexual orientation. If anything I would imagine translators who happened to be gay would be more open to the terminology ...

Toto

There is a blog that track the latest on Secret Mark: Salainen Evankelista

stephan huller

There's also a blog by a guy who often uses the Mar Saba document as a launching pad for utterly irrelevant discussions that have no bearing on the current debate over the text's authenticity www.stephanhuller.blogspot.com

creature

>To a twentieth-century scholar, the main Secret Mark passage culminates with a >euphemistic suggestion of a casual sexual encounter between the young man and >Jesus . . .

The implication is not restricted to 20th century scholars. For the first 500 years or so of Christianity, there were bishops, priests and ordinary Christians who had female virgins as housemates or bed-mates. And other bishops, priests and ordinary Christians were somewhat upset with them, and implied that they frequently were not in fact virgins any more; or, if physically virgins, not virgin in spirit; and various of the councils forbade the practice. So, the words to spend the night with do not require a 20th century context to be meaningful.

>On the other hand, these details would have been lost on an ancient reader of Secret >Mark . . .

which details, if I may ask, and not having the Carlson book with me at this time?

>Because of Secret Mark's presentation of Jesus and the young man as social peers, >none of the professions of love between Jesus and the young man nor Jesus' rejection >of three women within Secret Mark would have defined Jesus' sexual identity to an >ancient reader as easily as it would define it for the modern reader.

it seems as if Carlson is making the assumption that a purpose of Secret Mark was to "define Jesus' sexual identity," and that this purpose is undermined by the text itself. Butthe assumption that the purpose of SGM is to define Jesus as a homosexual seems to be only an assumption. If it was written by an ancient author, there may have been no such purpose

stephan huller

It's absurd to suppose that the primary motive of the document is to define Jesus's sexual identity. The author attacks the Carpocratian interest in homosexuality - an opinion first witnessed by the hypomnemata attributed to Hegesippus (c. 175 CE) where it is also attacked. Does that mean that Hegesippus was 'promoting' Jesus's homosexuality by referencing the claims of the Carpocratians? Carlson is such a smart guy and this argument is so stupid it is hard to reconcile the two. Yet I imagine that stupid people get it right at least once and a while. So too do smart people get it wrong on occassion.

buster

You don't need to buy each individual thing Carlson says.

There's still the anachronistic salt metaphor; the hyper-Clementine vocabulary; the anomaly of Epistolae genuinae, S. Ignatii Martyris being the only printed text from Amsterdam, the only one in Latin, and the only one on patristics; Smith's rundown of biographical info on a previous owner of the book - info gleaned purely from the handwriting, and working well as a self-description of Smith. The list runs longer, and it is cumulative.

The rejection of three woman by Jesus, and the expression of love between two males.

This is not the assumption at all. Carlson's point is that a forgery often exposes its nature by pandering to a contemporary audience. It will always fit a modern context better than an ancient one. Carlson makes the case that Secret Mark is tailor-made for the 20th century - and a poor fit for the ancient world. The sexual innuendo is only a small part of his larger case.

To boil it down, Carlson believes To Theodore is crafted to force scholars into a quagmire - where the text is both appealing and repulsive, and can be neither rejected nor accepted by the usual criteria. It banks on the methodology and prejudice of 20th century scholarship - and in doing so, reveals itself as a product of that milieu. He doesn't rely on any assumption about Secret Mark's purpose. He simply compares the effect of the text on different audiences.

I ask you this: If the language of Secret Mark wasn't sexually charged for an ancient reader, why was it kept under lock and key? What purpose does the secrecy serve, but to explain why there is no hint - in ancient sources - of Secret Mark's existence?

And why does Clement quote a top-secret document in full? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of it being "carefully guarded"?

DCHindley

Amen to that.

The gospel passages that the salt reference alludes to (Mat 5:13; Mar 9:50; Luk 14:34) are unexplainable either, as salt does not naturally get unsalty, but no one suggests this is due to forgery. The gospel authors may have been thinking of Lev 2:13 "And every gift of your sacrifice shall be seasoned with salt; omit not the salt of the covenant of the Lord from your sacrifices: on every gift of yours ye shall offer salt to the Lord your God," meaning the old covenant has lost its validity, dating this saying to after the destruction of the temple. For the author of Theodore to miss this allusion and think it meant mixing with other substances to debase it (something one can imagine happening in a marketplace) is a more natural explanation than conjuring up this Morton Salt plot device. Go back to your initial statement above.

So, you now think it is a "genuine" ancient book? Even if it was, "Clement" says it was kept under wraps because it represented teachings reserved for the true gnostic, and Smith was correct to note that this "true gnostic" theme does run through Clement of Alexandria's work. Does the stuff about "deny it under oath" from Clement's mouth seem gratuitous, sure, but secret societies, new and old, were and are like that.

He did not quote it in full, but exerpted from it the relevant passage. How do you know that Clement did not feel this Theodore was among those worthy of knowing such secret knowledge?

DCH

stephan huller

What I don't understand is that the same people who say that the 'questions' associated with Secret Mark should cause us to question its authenticity are usually the same people who tell us that there is good reason to believe that there was a historical Jesus. That doesn't make sense to me.

There is better evidence that there was a longer version of the gospel of Mark than there was a historical Jesus. This because:

1. the ascription of 'according to Mark' is mere splashed across the top of the MSS of the gospel said to be by Mark was not written by Mark himself. We call this version 'the gospel according to Mark' but the Mark 1:1 was likely meant by the original author as the true title - viz. it was intended to mean something akin to 'according to Christ.' Any gospel tradition that began with Mark 1:1 could theoretically be argued to have been 'Gospel of Marks.' It is only convention - Catholic convention - which assumes that the canonical text is 'the right length' or the only gospel by Mark. As noted in another thread the Marcionites certainly had a longer gospel which was identified by some as 'according to Mark.' The Diatessaron too (which typically begins with Mark 1:1) could have been argued to have been 'according to Mark' with the characteristic expansion mentioned in to Theodore (see next point).
2. at least two acrostic references at the beginning of the Diatessaron infer that this text was associated with Mark (i.e. the name 'Marcus' is developed from the first letter of the name of the first evangelist, the second letter of the second evangelist, the third letter of the third evangelist and the fourth letter of the fourth evangelist).
3. a variant Alexandrian Diatessaron is attested from an early period and continues throughout the ages (with obvious misinformation creeping into the discussion).
4. Irenaeus cites from a longer version of Mark (AH 4.11)
5. when Irenaeus attacks the heretics who deny an association between the gospel of Mark and the Law and the prophets (Marcionites) he implies they also had a different ending of the Gospel of Mark.
6. the only way that Clement of Alexandria's argument in Quis Dives Salvetur makes any sense is if the story of the rich youth (Mark chapter 10) 'concluded' with the Zacchaeus narrative.
7. Petersen points to Origen possessing a variant gospel which 'harmonized' material from Luke and Mark in this very same section. I can demonstrate that Clement knew this material too.
8. the Coptic tradition still references a strange idea present (apparently) in the Muratorian canon that Mark was actually present at the things he reported in his gospel. The bizarre thing about the Coptic tradition of course is that many of the stories mentioned as having Mark's eyewitness only appear in John (the marriage at Cana, the post resurrection appearance in the room with the doors shut etc). This is coupled with an equally bizarre situation noted by Trobisch that the Gospel of John doesn't reference stoires that John is universally said in the synoptic tradition to have been a witness (the Transfiguration most notably). The Acts of John make this absolutely explicit (i.e. that the evangelist John was the John of the Transfiguration).

How can (8) be resolved? My guess is that the 'final editor' of the canon was attempting to reconcile the tradition of Polycarp with the tradition of Mark. The original Johannine gospel (the one Gaius wrote against which was different than our canonical text) must have been the text which to Theodore references in association with the Carpocratians. In other words, 'John Mark' was both Polycarp's John and Alexandria's Mark.

Remember there is no evidence that Mark died at Alexandrria until the fourth century. Even to Theodore is open to the possibility that some could have claimed that John who is called Mark ultimately died at Ephesus.

My guess is that Irenaeus created a too short Gospel of Mark and a John-without-synoptic references to reconcile the two traditions in one church. The idea overarching idea of the canon is referenced in the second ending of John which Trobisch takes to pertain to all four texts which precede it not just John (i.e. that there were many more stories beyond what appears in Matt, Mark Luke and John which the editor COULD HAVE included but didn't).