Kata Markon

["Ted Weeden" <weedent AT atw.earthreach.com>]

Dear Mark,

Thank you for your critique on my thesis that Mark invented the denial of
Peter. I should like to respond to your counter points.

You state at the outset:
> I must admit to having several difficulties with the line of
> reasoning here. First, we do not know whether or not "the Q
> community" referred or alluded to Peter's denial.  Let us assume
> for the sake of argument that Q existed and note:
>
> (1) We would only have access to what "the Q community"
> believed by means of Q itself, but Q itself might not tell us what
> "the Q community" thought about Peter's Denial.
>
> (2) This point is accentuated when we bring in the question of
> genre.  If Q theorists are right to see its genre as logoi sophon, we
> will not expect the document to refer to events in Jesus' passion.
>
> (3) We need to bear in mind that we only have access to Q via
> reconstructing on the basis of what is retained in Matthew and
> Luke.
>
> (4) The latter point reminds us to have a careful look at Matthew's
> and Luke's witness here in the story of Peter's Denial where we find
> the following five word verbatim agreement: KAI ECELQWN ECW
> EKLAUSEN PIKRWS (Matt. 26.75 // Luke 22.62).  This is not
> found in Mark.  Perhaps, then, Q knows about the Peter's Denial
> after all and perhaps we should be talking about Q 22.62?

My response to your points on Q:
I do accept the existence of Q, first as an oral "text," presented in oral
performance by the Q prophets on regular assemblies of the community.  It
was then written but still performed orally.   See Richard Horsley and
Jonathan Draper, WHOEVER HEARS YOU HEARS ME (1999), for some important new
insights on Q and a persuasive profile of the community.
Horsley/Draper, using the reconstructed text of Q by the International Q
Project, have made some exciting new breakthroughs on our understanding of
Q, many of which challenge the work of Robinson, Kloppenborg et al and the
views that Q has a logoi sophon orientation, is apocalyptic in ethos, and
that it is stratigraphic in its evolution.

Regard to (1): "Q might not tell us about the denial of Peter."  That is
true but to speculate that it knew but chose not to tell is using an
argument from silence, which is very problematic.   We could say the same
thing about Paul.  He knew about Peter's denial, but decided not to
embarrass Peter further by bringing it up.  If we follow that argumentative
route, anything can be posited and no one can disprove any claims, as long
as you allow arguments based upon silence.. We can only deal with the texts
we have. Of course texts could be found to disprove any theory based on
evidence in current extant texts.  But until then... .

With regard to (2): the genre of Q, a collection of orally performed
speeches, consisting for the most part of aphorisms, does not rule out an
allusion to the denial of Peter.  In fact Q 12:8-9 is a saying that deals
with denial: "Everyone who confesses me before people, also the son of man
will confess him/her before the angels of God.  But whoever denies me before
people, will be denied before {the angels of God} (IQP translation, see
Horsley/Draper, 271).  This saying addresses generally the issue of
confession/denial.  It does not provide evidence that Q knew of the Petrine
denial, nor does it provide evidence that it does not.

With respect to (3): I agree we can only reconstruct Q from Matthew and
Luke.

With respect to (4): Despite the agreement you find in wording in Mt. 26:75
and Luke 22:69, those verses are not considered to have been a part of Q by
any Q scholar I am aware of, certainly not by the scholars of the IQP
project.

Your counter points on Q do not give me any reason to believe that Q knew
about a Petrine denial.

With respect to GT you state:
> I would be similarly concerned about the argument from silence as
> it touches on both the "Signs Source" and Thomas.  When it
> comes to Thomas, again we do not know what "the tradition behind
> Thomas" contained.  We can, of course, say that Peter's Denial
> does not come in Thomas, but again this is surely a question of
> genre.  There is, of course, no allusion to any of the Passion
> events in Thomas.

My response: The genre of GT is more like Q than the narrative gospels.
Thus you are right, it would be unlikely that there would be an allusion to
the Passion events.  But there are sayings in GT in which Peter figures
prominently, namely GT 13 and 114.  Conceivably GT could have woven in some
allusion about the duplicity of Peter or his undependability.   GT 113,
which seems to be a leadership "competition" for who is "top dog," would
offer itself as a natural place to show why Peter is not the equal of
Thomas.   Since GT offers us no such allusion, I conclude that GT is unaware
of a Petrine denial.

Then you quote me with respect to whether Paul could have known about the
denial:
> > I cannot imagine, if Paul knew of Peter's denial, that Paul would have
passed
> > up the opportunity of citing that in his attack upon Peter's duplicity
in
> > eating and than refusing to eat with the uncircumcised at Antioch when
the
> > James "party" arrived in town (Gal. 2:11-14).   Citing Peter's denial of
> > Jesus would have been a tour de force in Paul's argument that Peter is
> > duplicitous.  Paul could have make a strong argument for the fact that
Peter
> > had a habit of being duplicitous, a habit, Paul could have declared,
that
> > goes back to Peter's confession of Christ (Mk. 8:29), which, under the
heat
> > of accusations that he was a follower of Jesus, Peter later reneged upon
and
> > denied that he ever knew Jesus (Mk. 14:66-72).   Furthermore, if Peter
> > actually denied Jesus, I find it astounding that there is no Petrine mea
> > culpa in any of the resurrection narratives.  Peter never sought
forgiveness
> > for his betrayal-denial of Jesus?
 And then you respond to me:
> The first point is an interesting one, but the second sounds odd to
> me in the light specifically of John 21 but also generally of the
> tradition of appearance to Peter (Luke 24, 1 Cor. 15 etc.).

My response: I am not sure what you mean about the second sounds odd in the
light of John 21 the tradition of appearance to Peter (Luke 24; I Cor 15,
etc.). My point in saying that I find it astonishing that there is no
Petrine mea
culpa and Peter never seeks forgiveness for his denial.   For such a
"betrayal" of avowed loyalty to Jesus (a la Mark), if Peter did in fact make
such an avowal and break it, I would think would call forth from Peter, at
least in the eyes of the faithful in the early community, some mea culpa
before the risen Jesus and a request for forgiveness for having turned
against Jesus by his denial. But the earliest resurrection tradition and
appearances are reported as though nothing has happened to even have
strained the relationship between Jesus and Peter.   John 21: 15-19  does
have Jesus ask Peter three times whether Peter loves him which questioning
does seem to echo the three occasions of Peter's denial.  John 21 of course
is a late addition to John and may be trying to address the strange fact
that Peter never says that he has any regret for what he did.  But even in
John 21 it is Jesus asking from Peter love, not Peter apologizing for
turning against Jesus.

By the way with respect to John, I think it may be evident, but it needs to
be said.   I am convinced that John is dependent upon Mark for his own
denial scene (18:13-18, 25-27). That is also the conclusion that the Jesus
Seminar (See THE ACTS OF JESUS,  429-431, [published by the Jesus Seminar,
1998]) came to via the case made for it by John Dominic Crossan (see BIRTH
OF CHRISTIANITY, 112-114).  By the way Crossan also considers the Petrine
denial a Markan invention.

Ted Weeden