Kata Markon

["L. J. Swain" <l9swain AT wmich.edu>]

Dennis Ronald MacDonald wrote:

> Homer was the basis of ancient education. Mark did not have to do advanced
> studies to have been exposed to mimesis of the epics. In fact, paraphrase
> of the epics would have taken place early in one's studies.

Possible, but is it probable?  That is to say, the fact that Mark could write,
and even compose and read, does not automatically lead us to the conclusion 
that
he had an education which included the classics.  In fact, (and I tremble as I
say this for 2 of the 5 men I hold in the highest esteem on the planet seem to
disagree with me) Mark's Greek, even if more reflective of his sources than 
his
own skill, nonetheless points to an unfamiliarity with the epics and other
literature.  We must also remember that the ability to read and write were 
viewed
as skills to be mastered, not necessarily as the first step in everyone's
education.  Thus, Mark's ability to read and write is not a clue to his 
knowledge
of Homer or Virgil, his usage however would be, and I don't detect anything in
his usage that would indicate such intimacy with the classics.

> Some have said that Mark's "flags" to the epic are weak. I say that, too,
> but they are even weaker for us insofar as we know the epics so poorly. We
> should expect that ancient readers would have caught allusions that escape
> nearly all of us.
>

This assumes that they exist.  But further, while the point is well taken, not
all of us know the epics so poorly, some of us teach them and have read them a
few times.  If they did catch the allusions, I would have expected some sort 
of
comment from other writers, but this is exactly what we don't find.

> What is most important for my argument is the bulk of parallels. I agree
> that some of the parallels are faint; they might be products of my
> imagination, but surely not all of them are. Furthermore, one cannot find
> the bulk of such parallels elsewhere, not even in the LXX. Dennis
> MacDonald
>

But again this assumes that the parallels are valid, if you'll pardon me 
saying
so.  Let's take the case of Mark 6 and John the Baptist: To my mind the
differences between the two tales  seem to me to show that if Mark is indeed
using Homeric structure, that he used it so badly as to be unrecognizable.  
And
I'm not convinced by the parllels:  let's take the dinnerware parallel with
heads.  In the Clytemnestra case, the scene is active, violent, she wields the
axe cutting Agamemnon's head off and it falls amok among the scattered dishes 
of
the feast.  But the scene in Mark is utterly different.  The feast carries on,
there is no on scene violence, and a woman certainly does not wield the axe.
John is beheaded by a soldier off stage and his head brought on a platter BY
REQUEST.  So sure, we have two apparent parallels, a woman protaganist and
beheadings, but next to those two parallels we have a fistful of differences 
that
seem to me to negate any possible parallel.  Perhaps I've missed something.

So, I appreciate your call for literary antecedents, and I appreciate your
comments, but at least in this pericope, I'm unconvinced.

With Respects,

Larry Swain