Fantastic Voyage

6"Don't be alarmed," he said. "You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. 7But go, tell his disciples and Peter, 'He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.' "

8Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

Mark of course has another 13 verses before it ends...but the above ending usually gets a notation in most bibles hinting that the earliest manscripts end there.

Now I am believer in Markan Priority and the 2SH Theory (Matthew and Luke borrowing liberally from Mark), which begs the question, what is the story on the sudden stop of Mark 16 and the emergence of the 13 verses.

Several options arise:

The author of Mark delibrately ended the gospel at verse 8, and someone later added the remaining verses either an individual or the church as an organziation.

Several editions of the Gospel floating around in the early church?

The counter argument for all this runs from the Gospel of John, which has Mary returning a second time to the tomb, a gap in the timeline not noted in Mark.

S.C.Carlson

The consensus among textual critics that the long ending of Mark 16:9-20 is an early-to-mid second century addition to the text. Exactly when and where and by whom it occurred is still largely speculative--if I had to had to hazard a guess it would have occurred in Asia Minor when a codex of the four gospels was first put together.

Textual critics, however, are in less agreement whether the Mark deliberately ended at 16:8 or was accidentally truncated there, though the modern (some would even say "post-modern") trend is to view the 16:8 as the intended ending.

B. H. Streeter, The Four Gospels (1924), ch. 12, which is on-line, once suggested that the subject matter of a lost, original ending to Mark had been preserved in John 21. Stylistically, John 21 is more Johannine than Markan, so if Streeter was right, the lost original ending must have been thoroughly reworked.

Stephen

Julian

There is excellent manuscript reason from early and good exemplars to believe that Mark ends at 16:8. It also makes sense within the context of Mark's message. See below.
Mark conveys the idea that no one really knows that Jesus is the (adopted and separate from Christ) son of god. The reader is let in on the secret, of course, but those around Jesus are mostly bungling idiots who do not understand what is going on. Now, if the women had gone out and told everybody and Jesus has showed up post-resurrection there wouldn't have been much of a secret so Mark logically ends his story by saying, in essence, that no one was the wiser, except for Mark and the reader.

This theme did not work for Matthew and Luke, their wanted their apostolic tradition and had Jesus appear and authorize the disciples.

Later on scribes and priests started looking at the end of Mark, thinking, "Gee, that ends quite differently, doesn't it? Hmmm, maybe we should bring it more in line with the other, far better, gospels..." And so, the later manuscripts started having longer endings more harmonized with the 'better' gospels.

Just a theory but probably reasonably correct.
Exactly. As above.
Lots of versions. In fact, I don't believe that we have two ancient manuscripts that are alike. Most of the differences are scribal errors but, in some cases, the changes are deliberate and significant. Manuscripts were largely a local affairs that spread slowly and underwent changes as they wandered across the map. For large changes, compare D (05) to any Alexandrian witness. But even in D (05) we see some of the original text peek through in the Western Non-Interpolations.
GJohn is far later than Mark and radically different in both message and theology. No reason to believe that the author of John either knew or cared about GMark.

Julian

JoeWallack

JW:
Qualification. Eusebius and Jerome were in effect some of the earliest textual critics and they both confirm that 16:8 was the original ending. The "accidentally truncated there" is the modern apology that the Early Church Fathers never mentioned.



Joseph

John Kesler

Stephen, what is your opinion, and why?

S.C.Carlson

I am indeed discussing contempory textual critics, not Eusebius or Burgon for that matter. (Jerome is dependent on Eusebius.)

This argument from silence would be more effective (a) if the patristics were more interested in textual criticism than they were and (b) if a lot more of the ante-Nicene Christian writings actually survived.

Stephen

S.C.Carlson

I'm still very unsure about it. As in similar cases when I haven't made up mind, I tend to lean toward the last book I read on the topic.

In this case, it is Clayton Croy's The Mutilation of Mark's Gospel, which favors the accidental truncation theory because he thinks there are too many loose ends promised in Mark 1:1-16:8 to be left hanging.

However, I'm reserving judgment until I get around to reading Lee Magness's Sense and Absence, which I am told does a bang-up job for the other position (i.e., that 16:8 is the intended ending).

Stephen

Julian

Thanks for the link to Streeter's book, Stephen. Seeing how it is quite old, is it worth reading? I have heard it warmly recommended in the past.

Julian

S.C.Carlson

Streeter's book is well-written and extremely influential -- even today. I'm not a fan of Q, so obviously there are things in it that I don't agree with, but it easily ranks among the most important books of the 20th century in the field of Biblical studies. I would recommend reading it.

Stephen

Julian

Halfway through chapter one now.

BTW, speaking of not being a fan of Q, have you looked at this: http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=135815

I would love to hear your thoughts on this. I have looked at your synoptic problem page (not in as much detail as I should, and will) and I am curious as to which theory you support and why. Maybe this proposed debate would be an excellent opportunity to explore those views.

Julian