Kata Markon

[Steve Black <sblack AT axionet.com>]

Title: Mk & "History"

> At 12:00
> AM -0500 3/2/01, Joe Alward 
> wrote:
> I think
> there is strong evidence that almost all of the betrayal and
> arrest
> <BR>story was taken from the Old Testament. &nbsp;Consider
> this one example: &nbsp;Jesus
> <BR>went off alone to pray at Gethsemane, leaving the others
> behind to keep
> <BR>watch. &nbsp;How did Mark know what Jesus said to the
> Lord? Mark doesn't tell us
> <BR>that God told him, nor does he tell us that Jesus told him
> later what his
> <BR>private prayers to God were. &nbsp;Is it not fair to
> assume that Mark "knew" what
> <BR>Jesus said because he took David's prayer and put in the
> mouth of Jesus

<BR>himself? &nbsp;

It seems obvious to me that there is creative activity in all the biblical  materials - and of course that includes Mark! That doesn't settle the questions of historicity or non-historicity, rather it simply defines the issues. Ancient humans told story to understand. "Fiction" and "history (as we know it) as genres both were still a good millennia and a half (or more) away. Because a story shows signs of embellishments doesn't prove that it is entirely fictive! (The six and a half foot long fish may have only been eleven inches in  reality - but it was nonetheless a real fish!)

I think we fool ourselves if we believe that our own telling of history actually happened as we tell it. There will always be a gap between what we can evoke imaginatively in story (or in dry facts - if we insist) and what actually happened. What actually happened is forever gone with a sounding finality - but the story has itself entered history - and remains.

> At 12:00
> AM -0500 3/2/01, Joe Alward 
> wrote:
> I believe
> you're begging the question.  Not only is the crucifixion in
> doubt, so is the very existence of the historical Jesus. 
> Josephus's silence
> speaks volumes.  He reported the most minor details of the life
> of Herod, but
> said virtually nothing about Jesus, the man who allegedly worked so
> many
> miracles.  How could it have been that a man who attracted
> thousands to the
> shores of the sea of Galilee and miraculously fed them--twice--was
> not
> mentioned by any disinterested reporter of the first century? 
> How could it
> have been that a man who so upset the high priests, elders, and
> teachers of
> the law in Jerusalem that they sent a mob of armed men to arrest him,
> not

have been reported by anyone except the evangelists?

Are you merely being provocative or are you seriously calling into question the existence of a historical Jesus?!?

Now if we're discussing the miracles - that's another issue all together. The trial, the extent of the followers, the event in the temple, the garden, the last supper, the final words from the cross, even the alleged  arguments with the Jewish religious leadership , and so forth - they may (or may not)  be products of tradition (or Markan redaction) - to one degree or another. But I do think you'll have a hard time persuading any serious historian that there was no Jesus.

Granted, nothing can be known with absolute and unquestioned certainty.

It is quite remarkable, I think, that Scholarship in the last hundred years has been sounded with one voice on the issue of the mere existence of a historical Jesus- including many who would love to see Christianity, and Theism come to a abrupt and final halt!

There has, I'm sure, been lone voices saying otherwise - but their arguments has not been persuasive. (And frankly I can't think of one serious theologian or scholar of any repute who has gone down that road in the last hundred years - not to say there aren't any- I just can't think of any).

The cross also has been virtually unanimously accepted as historical as it would an unthinkable "creation" at that time.

This is not probably the right place to go through the well known reasons to accept the reality of a historical Jesus.

I guess I am just a little surprised...

--
Steve Black
Diocese of New Westminster
Anglican Church of Canada

3049 West 14th Ave
Vancouver, BC
Canada
V6K 2X7