Kata Markon

["Jeffrey B. Gibson" <jgibson000 AT mailhost.chi.ameritech.net>]

George Young wrote:

> While I have not fully read Garrett's book, my interest (like others') was
> perked by the review article in JBL.  However, after perusing Garrett's book
> (which, by the way, is endowed with many fancy excerpts from various
> scholars on the back cover), I couldn't help asking myself just what "new
> direction" Garrett's book takes its reader!  The testing motif (as Garrett
> documents) is ubiquitous throughout the Old Testament and inter-testamental
> literature.  But Garrett seems to argue as if this is where the testing
> motif begins AND ends.  What seems to be lacking is a full discussion of the
> testing motif in Greco-Roman literature (particularly the Greek 'novel').
> This becomes all the more important when one considers that, with respect to
> provenance and all the implications that go along with this, Mark is in all
> probability a 'ROMAN' gospel.  Garrett ASSUMES a Palestinian provenance, and
> this I suspect is the underlying foundation to her book, but she provides
> little (or nothing?) in the way to support this assumption.  Could this
> undermine her book's thesis?
>

A very interesting response, I think. But even assuming a Roman provenance for
GMark, aren't you here confusing the traditions about, and interpretative 
models
of, PEIRASMOS that AMark would have been steeped in with those with which his
readers were familiar?

Also, I'm curious about your assertion that there is a tradition regarding
"testing" and/or a use of the "testing motif" in the Greek Novel. Can you tell
me when and where this appears? And can you tell me whether or not, when it
appears, what the technical language of "testing" is? That is to say, is it  
the
noun PEIRASMOS and its verbal cognates PEIRAZW, EKPEIRAZW, etc.,  or some 
other
terminology?

Yours,

Jeffrey
--
Jeffrey B. Gibson
7423 N. Sheridan Road #2A
Chicago, Illinois 60626
e-mail jgibson000 AT ameritech.net