Toto

Why is this strange? Slavery was an established institution. Christians often called themselves "slaves of Christ." The recently deceased Archbishop of Greece took the name Christodoulos, which means "slave of Christ." The current governor of Florida is Charlie "Crist", but his 2nd generation Greek Cypriot father shortened the name from "Christodoulos".

And a Christian angel slaying Jewish priests is an unfortunate reflection of what a lot of Christians wanted to do, and at times, actually did.

This apocryphal story is a story, the product of human imagination.

Yes I do object. It makes no sense. Asceticism is not described by a "simple and recursive definition." I am not sure that your definition of either term is the same as anyone else's.

JoeWallack

Break On Through To The Other Side


JW:

A Jesus' Sandwich

Jews First, Insiders

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Mark_6

"6:32 And they went away in the boat to a desert place apart.

6:33 And [the people] saw them going, and many knew [them] [Israel], and they ran together there on foot from all the cities, and outwent them.

6:34 And he came forth and saw a great multitude, and he had compassion on them, because they were as sheep not having a shepherd [Israel]: and he began to teach them many things.

6:35 And when the day was now far spent, his disciples came unto him, and said, The place is desert, and the day is now far spent;

6:36 send them away, that they may go into the country and villages round about, and buy themselves somewhat to eat.

6:37 But he answered and said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they say unto him, Shall we go and buy two hundred shillings` worth of bread, and give them to eat?

6:38 And he saith unto them, How many loaves have ye? go [and] see. And when they knew, they say, Five, and two fishes. [What do they have? - Five loaves from Moses and two fish from the Prophets (Prophets, Writings) = 7 = Completeness]

6:39 And he commanded them that all should sit down by companies [Tribes] upon the green grass.

6:40 And they sat down in ranks, by hundreds, and by fifties.

6:41 And he took the five loaves and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, he blessed, and brake the loaves; and he gave to the disciples to set before them; and the two fishes divided he among them all.

6:42 And they all ate, and were filled.

6:43 And they took up broken pieces, twelve basketfuls, [12 Tribes] and also of the fishes.

6:44 And they that ate the loaves were five thousand men."

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Mark_7

The Inside (Explanation) to the Frame:

"7:25 But straightway a woman, whose little daughter had an unclean spirit, having heard of him, came and fell down at his feet.

7:26 Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician [reference to Paul] by race. And she besought him that he would cast forth the demon out of her daughter.

7:27 And he said unto her, Let the children [Israel] first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children`s bread and cast it to the dogs [Gentiles].

7:28 But she answered and saith unto him, Yea, Lord; even the dogs under the table eat of the children`s crumbs. [Salvation comes from the Jews]

7:29 And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way; the demon is gone out of thy daughter. [Paul's Revelation projected to "Mark's" Jesus. Bread/The Gospel to the Gentiles]

Gentiles Last, Outsiders

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Mark_8

"8:1 In those days, when there was again a great multitude, and they had nothing to eat, he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them,

8:2 I have compassion on the multitude, because they continue with me now three days [Passion], and have nothing to eat:

8:3 and if I send them away fasting to their home, they will faint on the way; and some of them are come from far [Gentiles].

8:4 And his disciples answered him, Whence shall one be able to fill these men with bread here in a desert place?

8:5 And he asked them, How many loaves have ye? And they said, Seven [Completeness].

8:6 And he commandeth the multitude to sit down on the ground: and he took the seven loaves, and having given thanks, he brake, and gave to his disciples, to set before them; and they set them before the multitude.

8:7 And they had a few small fishes: and having blessed them, he commanded to set these also before them.

8:8 And they ate, and were filled: and they took up, of broken pieces that remained over, seven baskets [Completeness].

8:9 And they were about four thousand: and he sent them away."

Disciples' hearts are hardened following Pharisees and Herod:

"8:15 And he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven [This leaven doesn't "rise" just like Moses' leaven in the desert] of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.

8:16 And they reasoned one with another, saying, We have no bread.

8:17 And Jesus perceiving it saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? do ye not yet perceive, neither understand? have ye your heart hardened?

8:18 Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?

8:19 When I brake the five loaves among the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve.

8:20 And when the seven among the four thousand, how many basketfuls of broken pieces took ye up? And they say unto him, Seven.

8:21 And he said unto them, Do ye not yet understand?"

JW X-Uh-Jesus:

The first Teaching/Feeding story is Jesus to the Jews. The second Teaching/Feeding story is Jesus to the Gentiles. This Frames the Syrophoenician story where it is Revealed that Salvation to the Gentiles comes from the Jews and explains the relationship of the two feeding stories. The water represents the divide between Jews and Gentiles and Jesus crosses the divide to unite the two. The Disciples are guilty of following the Teachings of the Rulers of the age, Pharisees and Herodians, and that is why their hearts are hardened. This sets up their following opposition to the Passion.

Jesus is the first to cross the "water". He commands his Disciples to do so but they are "afraid". This is Commentary on the Historical mission of the Disciples to the Jews, with a base in Jerusalem, and exclusion of the Gentiles. Paul, as opposed to the Disciples, goes north of Jerusalem and crosses water (understand Dear Reader?) to go to the Gentiles.



Joseph

STORY, n.
A narrative, commonly untrue. The truth of the stories here following has, however, not been successfully impeached.

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

Amaleq13

Very nice.

Thanks.

JoeWallack

JW:
Ookay. Who are you and what have you done with Doug?



Joseph

Amaleq13

Hey! I've agreed with you more than I've disagreed with you, Joe.

neilgodfrey

Maybe maybe, but at the moment I'm liking the idea of Mary Ann Tolbert (Sowing the Gospel) that the disciple plot in Mark is explained in the parable of the sower. That is, the disciples start out well but then whither under the sun. I have also liked the idea of Mark being a polemic against the disciples, and it is only since recently resigning from a more-than-full time job I've had time to let it register that the two thoughts are not fully compatible.

If the pro-disciple sections are interpolations, it would seem odd that they are only in the first half of the gospel; that they make such plot-structural sense in relation to the parable; and that they appear to be set up in a balancing counterpoise to the failure sections in the last half of the gospel -- e.g. following/deserting; watching/sleeping; exorcising/failing to exorcise; good things in Simon's house/bad things in Simon's house; etc.

If Matthew and Luke are re-writing Mark partly in an attempt to redeem the disciples we can see that they used a very different approach with their "would-be interpolations".

But if we look at Mark in the context of Jewish scriptures, in particular Primary History (Genesis to 2 Kings) -- and other studies have given reasons we should (studying gospel allusions to Exodus and Elijah-Elisha etc etc) -- then it seems a simple logical step to ask if Mark's twelve disciples are patterned after the story of Israel. That the twelve are intended to be related to Israel seems fairly certain to me: they and their leader are plotted against by the king, flee to the sea with a "mixed multitude", escape across it, are called up to a mountain, and finally appointed to be the special favourites.

And if the twelve are reps of Israel, then the parable-plot seems to me to find an immediate explanation against the often repeated plot throughout the Primary History: great start ends in failure.

The lesson is for the readers -- the "new Israel". It's an old literary tradition.

But I'm also taking for granted, and maybe I should have made this clear, that the Jewish scriptures were written for the same reason -- to instruct a new generation of Jews in the lessons of old Israel. i.e. Copenhagen school, Davies, Thompson, etc. -- who argue that the Jewish scriptures were products of Persian or Hellenistic times and the stories of "old Israel" were created for this end.

But even without that construct, is not this how the Jewish scriptures would have often been understood and read to each generation?

Casper

That does make sense. It was just a perception on my part, and poorly thought out at that.

Taking it further if i may, why do i see such a condescending jesus in Marcion? It could of course be my lack of serious scholarship, the limited exposure I've had, just a personal bias, whatever. But it is my perception, still.

If taken as a redaction of Luke then it seems he made short work of any apostolic redemption of the original. I'm not saying i support the standard party line that Marcion rewrote Luke, just observing an "If, then".

If taken as a rewriting of Mark, or any number of proto-deutero-Markus theories, where is the positive spin on the apostles? Redacted?

Could this "attitude" be used to propose marcion priority over modern Luke and Mark?

Thanks for the insight above.

neilgodfrey

I just posted this on another thread:
That's making reasonable sense to me at this point -- but still waiting to see if it's shot down on the other thread.

I find it hard to accept that Marcion used our Luke. If our canonical Luke was one of the later gospels (witness the prologue for a start) then I get all muddled trying to think why Marcion would have singled that one out. Its attribution to a companion of Paul was late second century and appears to have been an anti-Marcionite dig.

Not sure what you mean by 'where is the positive spin on the apostles'. Marcion appears to have claimed he was following Paul in thinking of the Jerusalem apostles as false apostles. Mark's ambiguity allowed the 'orthodox' to transform his disciples into reformed pillars of their "Jewish Christianity" -- by that I mean the sort of Christianity Marcion opposed, that which rooted itself in the Jewish scriptures, allegorically of course -- the pillars of the "new/true/spiritual Israel", the people of the Creator God. Marcion's god and Jesus saw the whole Israel and Creator God idea as a backward step. Or am I talking off at a tangent?

Casper

That interests me because I have always wondered about things like the 4-source (Streeter), as well as things like Abbot's Deutero-Mark idea (I realize that is dated some). But it actually could represent a variation of single-source theories too. Kind goes around in circles.

It seems to me the argument for using Luke has to involve a later Marcion and earlier Luke. I agree with your opinion above, although I suppose it could involve two competing networks, one with access to Paul and Luke both, separated geographically to an extent.

No tangent that I see, but what I meant was exactly that; you have Marcion, wholly associated with epistles of Paul both physically and theologically, and my admittedly biased reading (again, online browsing, very dated) shows Marcion's Gospel to be critical or harsh whenever Jesus speaks at all, similar to what we see in the latter parts of Mark as outlined in the OP.

Or did you mean the roles of the apostles and their "scripts"? If so I see where I sidetracked the discussion, sorry. I was referring to the tone and setting, especially the words of Jesus.

neilgodfrey

I'd be interested in specific examples if you could. Thanks.