Kata Markon

[Karel Hanhart <K.Hanhart AT net.HCC.nl>]

Kata Markon digest wrote:

> Kata Markon Digest for Saturday, March 11, 2000.
>
> 1. Re: Guidelines for Locating the Markan Community
> 2Your post begins:
> >>A good idea in principle ....... by using the following seven
> methodological
> >>guidelines. But the guidelines presented are hardly "methodological", a
> term >>which usually has the connotation of a neutral technique.
>
> Your response was:

>  I am not sure why you think that the guidelines are not
> neutral.  It is true that I ended up with the result that Caesarea Philippi
> is the most likely candidate.  But I tested all other Markan geographical
> references against the guidelines.  To have shown that in my original
> posting of the guidelines would have made a very long post.  So I just
> presented the argument for Caesarea Philippi.
>

Dear Ted,
I want to commend you on your defending and clarifying your position in this 
and in following Kata Markon March contributions. In your efforts you do 
justice to Dilthey's concerns re. the
hermeneutic circle, namely, that the various parts of a document should be 
interpreted in the light of the overall purpose; and that the overall purpose 
is found by the exegesis of these
passages separately. One must crawl into each passage, as it were, and at the 
same time keep the the overview, - the overall purpose - in mind.  I also 
appreciate your innovative approach to
the riddle of Mark's Gospel.  Luz wrote years ago about the impasse that 
Markan studies had reached and one is still waiting for a breakthrough 
leading to the valley of understanding.
    We agree on a number of points:
With you I believe that those " who follow the path of reaader-response 
criticism and other literary critical approaches" exclusively,   run "the 
risk of eschewing what the text originally was
really all about."
    I for one do appreciate their slogan, as you put it : "The text has its 
own life, separate from its origin; what matters is how the text reads the 
reader and the reader responds" and I
have learnt much from the new rhetoric, narrative and semiotic analysis. But 
one must still try diachronically  to answer the historical questions of the 
Sitz im Leben, however tenuous the
answers, in order to uncover Mark's message and purpose. You have worked out 
one complete answer, answering in detailed exegesis what you hold to be an 
overall purpose. That needs to be tested
and it does depend on the Sitz im Leben.
I, for one, begin with accepting an originally Roman (and later Alexandrian?) 
provenance of Mark along the lines of Stephen Carlson (Kata Markon Digest 
March 21). So in my reply I will try to
respond in the light of a different overall purpose of Mark than yours.
    But I believe in fact that no single method suffices. The Papal Bible 
Committee offered in 1993 a good survey of modern exegetical  methods of the 
last century [literary analysis; the
approach based on tradition (- in particular the appraoch based on Jewish 
traditions of interpreting scripture!- , the anthropoolical approaches 
(cultural, psychological) and the contextual
(liberation theology,  feministic approach). Now  every discovery resulting 
from these analyses should play a role if possible. But I believe that what I 
call the Judean approach (IOUDAIOS -
Gr. for a Jew of the first century) has been grosly underestimated. Who, for 
instance, has offered an adequate answer of Mark's markers EUTHUS and PALIN ?

    This leads me to your analysis of the typically Markan  'Galilee - Judea 
- Galilee structure'  of the Gospel. In your answer to Mahlon, you "find Mark 
throughout his narrative to be
demonstratively anti-Judean, in particular, anti-Judean establishment".  But 
isn't there a world of difference in "demonstratively anti-Judean"  and 
"anti-Judean establishment". We all hold, I
think, that Jesus would be called in Greek a IOUDAIOS and so would his 
disciples be designated. It seems to me a 'tour de force' to make Mark so 
sectarian as to condemn all inhabitants of
JOUDAIA. This is all the more true if the author is indeed the John Mark of 
Acts and the epistles. Mark himself was a Judean, even a Jerusalemite, who 
about 72 CE would have grieved the
loss.of his city. I agree Mark writes with a polemic irony about the ruling 
elite in Jerusalem. I hold, in fact, that his wrath is focused on various 
high priests (always in the plural) who
were responsible for Jesus' death and for the persecutioin of the ecclesia in 
Jerusalem. In particular on Caiaphas and on Joseph , "who having come from 
Rama dared to enter the [premises] of
Pilate and ask for the 'body' of Jesus" (Mk 15, 42).

This is what you also try to do. But as I read your argument you draw a 
picture of an introvert Christian community in Caesarea Philippi who believes 
Galilee in the North was favored by Jesus
overagainst Judea in the South. Moreover, - based primarily on your exegesis 
of the sandwich in Mark 3, 20-35 and the sandwich 14,53-72   - you also 
believe this introvert group also is
anti-the three pillars in the christians in Jerusalem: Peter, James and John. 
Galilee was the Mecca of Mark. You agreed with Trocme that we must try to 
uncover from the text who Mark was
AGAINST, in order to also uncover the overall purpose.  And so do I.  Enemy 
no. 1 is Roman tyranny and the brutality of the Roman occupying  army. 
Indeed, Mark tries to exemplify Jesus'
teaching of 'loving your enemy'  - but trhe Romans remain an enemy. Enemy no. 
2 are those spiritual leaders in the temple who turned against Jesus and his 
followers and at times turned them
over to the authorities.  But I disgree with Trocme (and with you) that Mark 
disparaged the "three pillars" of the ecclesia.  In a next contribution to 
Kata Markon I will try to offer an
alternative exegesis of Mk 3.
    Buit re. Peter's denial - I believe it is historically quite possible 
that some such exchange between a woman servant in Caiaphas' courtyard and 
Simon could well have taken place.
Tradition would then be right that Mark knew Peter who told him the facts 
including his own grief about his denial. On the other hand, I donot hold 
that Mark wrote a vita, that must be
historically as accurateas possible. On the contrary, he wrote a 
passover.story on a most critical episode in Jewish history based on his 
faith in the divine mission of Jesus Messiah. It is a
(victorious) tragedy about the Messiah and his people of the past half 
century, written in the aftermath of a sudden, unexpected turn in Judean 
history  - it is NOT a biography of a socalled
'theios aner'.
    So the denial story is now part of the entire haggadah and Peter'[s role 
in it (e.g. (cmp 8,27-30;  14,27ff). The denial is sandwiched between the 
confession of Jesus himself to draw a
stark contrast. However, Peter's leading role is redeemed in the gospel - in 
1,16 (fishing for peaople in the THALASSA) and  in 16,7 - he especially, the 
last named in the Gospel,  is
separately named as the one to be told of the victorious continuation of 
Jesus' mission. (why the women didnot tell Peter can only be explained if 
Montefiore's  reference to LXX Isa 22,16 in
Mk 15,46 is taken seriously). As far as James, the brother of Jesus, one of 
the pillars is concerned. Their mother Mary is specially designated as " 
Mirjam [the mother] of James" in 16,1 when
in the vision she is told of Jesus' resurrection by the angel. Therefore, in 
a somewhat subdued manner, James is also honored as leader  next to Peter.
    But my foremost objection to your 'introvert' picture of a small, 
seemingly sectarian Markan community in Caesarea Philippi is the fact that 
Matthew with certain corrections adopted Mark's
very story of the passion with its epilog of the women's vision. I find it 
HARDto believe that Matthew had  read this supposed opposition to Peter in 
Mark, even less that he THEN would have
inserted Mt 16,18  in order to counter this opposition. Why follow Mark's 
story so closely if Mark were a narrative by an opponent? And why would Mark 
afterwards have been included into the
canon, if he had been so contrary, as you suggest? Should we believe that the 
ecclesia of the 2nd century on your supposition had misunderstood Mark's 
antagonnism to Peter completely?
    However, I understand that you deduced the Galilean "Sitz im Leben" of 
Mark's community from Mark's arresting structure Galilesa-Judea-Galilee 
accentuated by the angels's message "he goes
before you into Galilee". To you Mark is awaiting the parousia in Galilee - 
never in Judea. Galilee is Mark's Mecca.
    I on the other hand believe that Mark's post-70 radical revision  of an 
earlier passion story was to comfort and encourage his readers (Judeans and 
Gentiles in Rome, Alexandria and other
places in the diaspora) in the trasumatic
aftermath of the Roman Judean War. The overall purpose is to retell the story 
of Jesus' divine mission but adding to it
the reason for the unexpected DELAY of the parousia [which as the prophets 
foretold would be on Zion - not in Galiulee] . But "first the Gospel must be 
preached to all nations", 13,10. Mark's
new insight was inspired by Romans 9-11, a letter he read and discussed in 
Rome. This Pauline influence is entirely possible since the external evidence 
points to a Roman provenance. But Mark
was foremost inspired by Isaiah writing about the destruction of the first 
temple followed by the Babylonian exile.
    The Galilean - Judean structure - contrary to your assessment - serves 
this overall purpose. As I stated in a former contribution, post 70 Mark is a 
two layered story. In story time it
offers the story of Jesus' divine mission in GALILEE and Gentile surroundings 
and his passion and death in JERUSALEM as Israel's Messiah. But this story is 
addressed to an audience almost half
a century later in ROME (or Alexandria, an ecclesia  in mourning for the loss 
of Zion and tempted to let go of faith in the coming of the kingdom at his 
parousia.
    Now the structural turning from the Judean section back to Galilee (15,55 
and 16,7 "he will go before you into Galilee) has a two fold purpose.  It 
refers the audience BACK to the
beginning  of Jesus' mission in Galilee and his 'healing and purifyuing' 
ministry there and it points FORWARD to the ecclesia that now lives  in exile 
with the living Jesus going on before.
Galilee functions as the gateway toward the nations, as it always has in 
Tenach. Matthew confirms this second aspewct of the Judea - Galilee structure 
with his citing  Isaiah  9,1-2 GALIL
HA-GOYIM.  The implied message is: as Jesus in his lifetime served in 
Galilee, so the risen Christ would serve the nations through his body, the 
ekklesia. For there is a baptismal emphasis in
Mark's burial/opened tomb story. Pilate may have given Jesus' dead body 
(PTOMA, 15,45) to Joseph, but Jesus' SOOMA (15,43 the risen body in a Pauline 
sense) he could not give - it would live
on: Jesus would reign at "the right hand"  as the head and his members would 
serve him on earth. The young man in the tomb wears a white baptismal stola, 
tgo emphasize that one must be buried
":wsith Christ" in order to rise with him. So the Messiah who prepared the 
Way of JHWH in Galilee even to his death on Zion, would go on preparing the 
Way to the nations.  Thus to the ecclesia
in 72 this message was relevant indeed.
    This two layered meaning (as I pointed out before) is also found in the 
use of the term THALASSA. On the one hand in story time Jesus did mninister 
around LAKE Kinnereth in Galilee and
there he formed a nucleus of followers (the 'house of learning of Simon" 
(1,29). And afterwards he crossed the 'thalassa of Galkilee' in anticipation 
of  the apostles in their crossing of ther
Mediterranean Sea. The 'house' of Simon is the prototype for any post-70 
ecclessia, including the adressees, situated around the Meditteranean SEA.  
So Mark has foremost his mourning audience
in mind about to celebrate Pesach abnd the first day of Pentecost when the 
converts were baptized. Hence the double meaning of thalassa. Simon and the 
other three were called by the SEA to
begin 'fishing for people" . So Mark's audience is called after their baptism 
to "fish" among the nations. Jesus' ministry in Galilee serves as a mirror 
for their situation in exile.
    If these ideas are part of Mark's overall purpose then the term Caesarea 
Philippi has the same double meaning. In story time Jesus and his disciple 
are in the extreme North beyond Galilee
in Gentile territory. There Simon makes his confession and there he receives 
his vision of the transfiguration. In the 'real time' of the audience. this 
Simon had come to Rome and had been
martyred. The overtone of  the term CAESAREA Philippi is then clear - it 
points to the Caesaraen capital:  Imperial Rome! where Peter would make a 
second confession.
    Thus it is possible to interpret the various segments of the Gospel quite 
differently depending on the overall purpose one has found. The individual 
pericopes are the bricks of the house
of interpretation - the overall purpose is the cement that must uphold the 
entire structure.
    If, in fact Mk 16,46 "the tomb hewn from the rock" is a reference to LXX 
Isa 22,16, as I hold, Matthew would confirm Mark's emphasis on Peter's 
leadership. For in the following verse Mt
18,19 Matthew too cites LXX Isa 22,22 (the keys !). So Matthew rather 
confirms Mark's overall purpose if the epilog of the burial story is read as 
a midrasj on LXX Isa 22.

Thus we both agree Mark presents us with a mystery, a riddle (I prefer a 
mashal , 4,11). And it will take radically new approaches to open up a 
terrain of understanding.

cordially yours
Karel