Kata Markon

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

To Kata Markon Listers,

I have just submitted an essay on Synoptic-L which I would like to share
with you on Kata Markon.  The essay was generated by an exchange among
Leonard Maluf, me and others on Synoptic-L. The essay is in response to
recent posts that Leonard has submitted on the disciples in Mark vis-a-vis
the disciples in Matthew, as well as Markan Christology vis-a-vis Matthean
Christology.    Some of Leonard's posts deal with my argument for Markan
priority and Matthean and Lukan dependency on Mark.   Leonard strongly
disagrees with my position.   In this essay I argue that (1) Mark carried
out a programmatic vendetta against the Twelve and part of that vendetta was
Mark's  invention of the disciple Judas and his betrayal, as well as the
Petrine denial, (2) scholars have not taken seriously Mark's polemic against
the disciples and have tried to explain it away with other hermeneutical
theories, some of which become a hermeneutics of revisionism to save Mark
from being guilty of defamation of the Twelve, and (3) Mark's christology is
the lowest christology in the New Testament.

I have not included here a final section of the essay that dealt with
certain Matthean texts as they shed light upon whether Matthew is not
actually harsher on the disciples than is Mark, a section which I did not
think would be particularly relevant to the interests of Kata Markon.    The
essay, as included here is divided into six parts: I. The Markan Invention
of Judas; II. The Markan Invention of the Petrine Denial; III. The Johannine
Connection; IV. Markan Christology; V. Taking Mark's Polemic against the
Disciples Seriously; VI. The Hermeneutics of Revisionism.

I look forward to your critiques and feedback, as they will be invaluable to
me as I test out with you my Markan theses.   Unfortunately, I leave early
tomorrow morning (7/18) and will not be back until 7/26.   So I will not be
able to respond to replies to this essay until then.

And now my essay: "Taking Mark's Polemic Seriously"

Leonard Maluf wrote on 7/8/01, quoting from my post of 7/701 to Brian
Wilson:

My attempt was to suggest that the evidence I offered provides compelling
reason, absent any other extant evidence to the contrary with reference to
the specific patterning of the portrayal of the disciples in the  three,

that Mark was prior to Matthew and Luke and that the latter two used
Mark as a source. I am not arguing from the perspective of any other
linguistic or rhetorical perspective---only the issue of characterization as
it pertains to the disciples in the three Gospels.

[Leonard]

At the risk of repeating argumentation that has taken place several times on
this list in the past, I would like to react to this argument that has been
allowed to pass relatively unchallenged here in the last few weeks of
discussion. I should preface my comments by saying that I was away for three
weeks, without good access to Internet, in the latter part of June and early
July, and I have not yet gone back to read especially Weeden's lengthy
interventions (attached files, etc.) on this topic, which I still hope to do
when I have time.

On the basis of several of Ted's recent posts that I have read, I would say
that this particular argument in favor of Markan priority is one that I am
delighted to see given such prominence by Ted, because I think it is
especially weak. I would make two points:

1. I think Ted exaggerates the difference between the portrayal of the
Twelve in Mark and in the other Synoptics, especially Matthew; and 2. Even
allowing that the difference is as great as Ted says it is, as an argument
in favor of Markan priority it is still scarcely incontrovertible or strong.
I would concede, still allowing for the moment that Ted's subjective
evaluation of the difference in presentation between Mark and the other
Synoptics regarding the disciples is accurate, that one could make something
of an argument for Markan priority here, based on the overall tendency of
historical development, which was in the direction of greater veneration and
honor given to the Twelve Apostles in the great church. However, it should
be remembered that the Gospels are roughly contemporary documents, and so an
argument based on this tendency of a temporally evolving church history is
weak to the extent that other factors could well have motivated a relatively
"late" Mark to highlight the negative aspect of the portrayal of the
disciples found in his sources.

My response [Ted]:


Leonard, I have read with interest the dialogue you had carried on with
Emmanuel Fritsch and more recently Steve Black with respect your position on
Mark being the last of the Synoptics vis-a-vis my position cited in
arguments in two recent posts, "MEN...DE: Markan priority and Matthean
Dependence" (which was a post sent 6/24 in response to your post of 6/13)
and "Matthean and Lukan Dependence on Mark" (which was a post sent 7/01 in
response to Brian Wilson's post of 6/25).    I note in your post reply cited
above that you were away when I sent my posts and that you have not been
able to read them fully.   I do not know whether you have been able to do so
yet.   In any event, let me respond to your recent posts.

(1) You recognize that there was an "overall tendency of historical
development, which was in the direction of greater veneration and honor
given to the Twelve Apostles in the great church."    That is true.   But
what makes Mark such an anomaly is that no other document or tradition in
the early church, regardless whether it is dated early as in the case of
Paul's letters, or late into the Patristic period so "de-venerates," if I
may coin a word, the disciples as Mark does.   Mark conducts, in my view, a
programmatic vendetta against the disciple, as I have pointed out in my _
Mark-Traditions in Conflict_ and in my post to Brian Wilson.  It is a
thoroughgoing vendetta which cannot be explained, in my judgment, as
anything else but a Markan tour de force.   Let me present my argument for
claiming this.

I. The Markan Invention of Judas

First, the most ignominious acts perpetrated against Jesus by his disciples
were Judas' betrayal and Peter's denial.   I submit that neither act is
historical.   They never happened.   Both infamous deeds are fictive
inventions of Mark.   There is no convincing evidence in pre-Markan
tradition that early Christians knew of either act.   Paul evinces no
awareness that either Judas betrayed Jesus or that Peter denied him.  In
fact Paul makes no explicit reference or even the slightest allusive hint of
any disaffection upon the part of any one in the inner-circle of Jesus'
followers.   With specific respect to Judas, there is nothing in the Pauline
correspondence to suggest that Jesus was betrayed by one of his own.   In
Paul's statement in I Cor.11:23:, "I received from the Lord what I also
delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he PAREDIDETO took
bread," the translation of PAREDIDETO as "betrayed," found in many English
translations is a translation, which is unfortunately prejudiced by the
story of Judas' betrayal in the Synoptics, John and Acts.    The proper
translation of PAREDIDETO in I Cor. 11:23 is "handed over or delivered up,"
i.e., "arrested (cf. C. K. Barrett, _The First Epistle to the Corinthians_,
266).

I find it unusually striking that, if in fact a trusted disciple in the
inner circle did betray Jesus,  Paul does not use that information to attack
the "false/super apostles" in II Cor. 10-13, particularly in II Cor.
11:13-15.   Had Paul known about Judas, how could he have passed up the
opportunity to cite Judas as an excellent example of (to paraphrase only
slightly Paul's words in that Corinthian passage) "a false disciple, a
deceitful worker, disguising himself as a disciple of Christ, and no wonder,
for even Satan in disguises himself as an angel of light.   So it is not
strange if Judas also disguised himself as a servant of the Lord.  His end
corresponded to his deed"?   Moreover, I find it strange that, in citing the
resurrection appearances to various early Christian leaders and their
respective cohorts in I Cor. 15:5ff., Paul cites "Peter and then to the
Twelve"--- not "Peter and then to the eleven."   Paul's citation, which must
go back to before the 50's, suggests that the Twelve are a coherent and
faithful body of original disciples whose original integrity is in tact.  I
see the election held for Judas' replacement in Acts to be pure Lukan
fiction, required once the original integrity of the Twelve was compromised
when Mark invented the story that an insider, a disciple named "Judas,"
betrayed Jesus into the hands of his enemies.

Thus, there is no tangible evidence that Paul knew about Judas' betrayal.
Nor is there any evidence of such a betrayal in either the Q tradition (I
hold to the existence of Q) or the tradition behind the Gospel Thomas.   Q
does not show any awareness of the disaffection of any one of the inner
circle of Jesus' disciples.  There is at least one Q saying that implies
that the integrity of the Twelve is in tact.   Q 22:30 (Lk. 22:30/Mt.19:28)
presents Jesus as prophesying to the disciples that they "will sit on
thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel."   Now the _QEP_ edition of Q
does not have Jesus refer specifically to the fact that each of the twelve
disciples sit on a throne, though the implication is there.   Matthew makes
what is implied in Q explicit in his appropriation of Q.    Namely, in
response to Peter (19:27) the Matthean Jesus states (19:28): "when the Son
of the human shall sit on his throne, you who have followed me will also sit
on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."  This declaration
by the Matthean Jesus must be another case of what Mark Goodacre calls
Matthean "fatigue. "  For the twelve disciples who are with Jesus at that
point includes, by logic of the narrative, Judas.

The same "fatigue" is found also in Luke, only more glaringly so, at the
point at which Luke inserts Q 22:30.   The setting of Q 22:30 in Luke is the
last supper.   Luke has just informed us of Judas' decision to betray Jesus,
namely, "Satan entered into Judas Iscariot, who was of the number of the
twelve... [who] conferred with the chief priests and officers how he might
betray him" (22:3f.).   Then, according to Luke, following the preparation
for the last supper,  Jesus sits down "at table, and the apostles [sic] with
him" (22:14).   After supper, the Lukan Jesus announces: "...the hand of him
who betrays me is with me on the table (22:21).  Shortly thereafter, Jesus
states to the gathered disciples, which still includes Judas, "You are those
who have continued with me in my trials; and I assign to you ...a kingdom,
that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on the thrones
judging the twelve tribes of Israel" (22:28-30).

It is, of course, not logically consistent in either Gospel narrative that
Jesus should include Judas the betrayer as one who will sit as a judge with
the others of the twelve tribes.   But narrative logic tells us that he
does.  This inconsistency in narrative logic in both Matthew and Luke (cf.
John Shelby Spong, _Liberating the Gospels_,271, who also recognizes the
"confused context" of Lk. 22:21ff. for yet another reason related to the
invention of Judas) is due to the fact that they each have included a Q
saying, which speaks of the twelve as a faithful body of disciples of whom
none is known to have betrayed Jesus, and places the saying within a
narrative that has already "fingered" one of the twelve as a "turn coat"
bent upon betraying Jesus.   That inconsistency arises, as I judge it, as a
result of Matthew and Luke adopting Mark's story line of a disciple-betrayer
and then each including within it a Q saying that speaks of the twelve as
though no such disciple-betrayer existed.     This fact underscores my
thesis that prior to the Gospels themselves, there is no tangible evidence
that there was a disciple named Judas who betrayed Jesus.

I submit that Mark and Mark alone created the narrative figure of a betrayer
and named him Judas.   In creating Judas, Mark modeled him after Ahithophel,
the confidant of David, who betrayed  David by joining the rebellion against
him.   I have developed extensive essays on how Mark created the whole
Gethsemane scene of the betrayal using material from the Davidic saga in II
Sam. 15-17 and 20:4-10, essays which appeared on Kata Markon ("Judas and
Jesus" [2/22], "Re: Judas and Jesus' [3/14], "Judas' Kiss and Methodology"
[3/27], "Judas' Kiss: Methodology and Misplaced Concreteness" [4/9]).   See
also the impressive case Spong makes for Judas being a Christian invention
(_Liberating _,257-276).   Spong presented his case to the Jesus Seminar and
the Seminar concurred with him that Judas is a fictive invention (_Acts of
Jesus_, 136f., 138).   Spong, in his paper presented to the Seminar, argued
that Mark created the betrayer-figure Judas.  But he does not identify Mark
as the "culprit" in his book.

Mark's choice of IOUDAS as the name of Jesus' betrayer was carefully
designed, in my view, to symbolize the southern kingdom of Judah (IOUDAS)
and its successor the province of Judea in Mark's day.    Spong pursues the
case for historical antecedents for the Judas persona by suggesting that
there are parallels between the Gospels' Judas and Judah the brother of
Joseph.  Among the interesting parallels between the two biblical stories
Spong notes are the following (267): (1) Joseph was handed over "by a  group
of twelve who later became known as the leaders of the twelve tribes of
Israel," (2) in "both stories [the story of Joseph and the story of Jesus]
the handing over or betrayal was into the hands of gentiles,' (3) in "both
stories money was given to the traitors- twenty pieces of silver for Joseph,
thirty pieces of silver for Jesus," and (4) "one of the twelve brothers of
Joseph who urged the others to seek money for their act of betrayal was
named Judah or Judas (Gen. 3726-27)."    Spong points out also (267f.) that
in the case of Jesus the amount of conspiracy money was made thirty pieces
of silver, a touch added by Matthew, as a result of the influence of the
Zechariah prophecy "about the betrayal of the shepherd king of the Jews for
'thirty pieces of silver' (Zech. 11:13)."

Along with these historical antecedents behind the name Judas, which Spong
points out, there lies also the traditional hostility between the northern
tribes of Israel and the southern tribe of Judah, Richard Horsley (_Galilee_
and _Archaeology, History and Society in Galilee_) has reconstructed an
impressive history of the bitterness that existed among the northern tribes
for the ill-treatment they received from Solomon, David's son, not to
mention the inherent differences between the northern tribes and Judah with
respect to their diverse origins and cultic traditions.   This historic
conflict between the northern tribal heritage and the southern cult and
ethos has very importance for understanding some of the factors and issues
driving the Markan narrative.   How do I see that?

It is my thesis that Mark is a descendent of the ancient heritage of the
northern tribes which were situated in the Galilean region.   In a post,
"Guidelines for the Location of the Markan Community," which I submitted on
XTalk and Kata Markon (2/29/00), I have made a case for Mark's provenance
being the village area around Caesarea Philippi.   I am convinced that Mark
viewed himself as a Galilean with a strong dislike of Judeans and
particularly the Judean Temple establishment.    There is a very detectable
pro-Galilean/anti-Judean bias in the Gospel.    As a descendent of the
ancient Israel heritage, it is not surprising that Mark makes Galilee Mecca
for the dawning of the kingdom of God.   Nor is it surprising that the
betrayer-figure he has created is given the name IOUDAS (Judah),
symbolically representing the IOUDAIOI (Judeans) of second Temple Judaism,
who, again representative of his Judean namesakes, joins the conspiracy of
the Judean Temple establishment that seeks to do away with Jesus (Mk. 3:6;
11:18; 12:12; 14:1-2, 10f.).    Matthew and Luke, as I have posited,
appropriated Mark's Judas and added to his legendary character.  The same is
true of John who was dependent upon Mark for among other things the passion
narrative.  I will address this Johannine dependency shortly.
I turn now from the Markan invention of Judas his betrayal to the Markan
invention of the Petrine denial.

II. The Markan Invention of the Petrine Denial

As in the case of Judas' betrayal, Paul makes no mention of Peter' denial,
not even a hint that it ever happened.     Again I find it strange, if the
denial did occur, that Paul would not have drawn attention to such a Petrine
lapse in Antioch when Paul castigates Peter for his duplicity in first
eating with the uncircumcised at Antioch and then refusing to do so when the
James party arrives in town (Gal. 2:11-14).  What better way could Paul have
had to drive home his point about Peter's hypocritical reversal of behavior
than to remind Peter, and those before whom he castigated Peter, that Peter
has a bad habit of being duplicitous, a habit which began with his denial of
Jesus in the moment when Jesus most needed someone to stand by him?
Moreover,  Paul says that he at one time- there may have been others (e.g.
Peter's stay at Antioch)--- spent fifteen days with Peter in Jerusalem (Gal.
1:18).   In those fifteen days, if Peter had denied Jesus, did Peter keep
silent about it and never mention it to Paul?   And if Paul had heard about
Peter's denial, previous to his visit with Peter, is it not logical that
Paul would have brought it up to learn from Peter why he did so, or perhaps
even confront Peter with it if Peter made no mention of it?   If Paul really
knew that Peter denied Jesus, either from the mouth of Peter or from the
reports of others, then his total silence with respect to it is deafening.

Likewise, there is no reference or allusion to a Petrine denial in any other
pre-Synoptic tradition. Not a trace of it can be found in Q.   And nothing
in the Gospel of Thomas would lead one to believe that any of the
tradition(s) behind that Gospel knew of Peter denying Jesus.   Had the
author of Thomas known of the denial, he could have used it as sufficient
cause alone for the elevation of Thomas over Peter in GTh. 13.   For in that
saying it is clear that what is at stake is that the author is trying to
prove that Thomas, rather than Peter or Matthew, is Jesus' most trusted
confidant and most favored disciple.

Stephen Patterson observes with respect to this point (_The Fifth Gospel_,
42): " In Thom. 13, Thomas is exalted but Peter and Matthew must play the
fool, unable to understand the real significance and identity of Jesus.
This suggests a time in early Christianity when local communities had begun
to appeal to the authority of particular well-known leaders from the past to
guarantee the reliability of their claims, even while rejecting the rival
claims of others and their apostolic heroes."   (Parenthetically, that is
precisely what I see Mark doing, namely, appealing to the authority of Jesus
as support for Mark's christology, "while rejecting the rival
[christological] claims of others [Mark's opponents] and their apostolic
heroes [Peter and the Twelve].").   The fact that the Gospel of Thomas fails
to produce a reference or allusion to the Petrine denial as ammunition to
support the primacy of Thomas over Peter, in the rivalry between their
respective followers, suggests to me that Thomas did not know of the Petrine
denial.  Given the high stakes involved in such rivalry, I cannot imagine
that the author of Thomas knew of the denial and chose not use it.

To pursue support for my position further: if such a Petrine denial is
historical, then I find it quite strange that nowhere in the NT is there any
reference to Peter ever offering a *mea culpa* and receiving forgiveness for
his denial.  It is particularly striking that in none of the
resurrection-appearance stories is there any suggestion that Peter offers or
has offered a *mea culpa* and is forgiven by the risen Jesus.   The
appearance story that comes closest to supplying a possible allusion to a
Petrine *mea culpa* is the story found in John 21:15-21, part of the later
redaction of the original text of the Gospel of John.   But even here one
has to strain to extrapolate from that passage such a *mea culpa.*    In
that story the risen Jesus asks Peter three times whether Peter loves him.
It is obvious to me, as it is to others (e.g. Funk and the Jesus Seminar,
_The Acts of Jesus_, 491), that the narrator has Jesus ask the question
three times to parallel Peter's denial of Jesus three times in Mark.   Yet,
even here I do not find any suggestion that Peter regrets his denial and
asks Jesus for forgiveness.   Rather, the point of the story is more about
Jesus needing assurance of Peter's love than of Peter's need for
forgiveness.   And the reason that Jesus requires assurance that Peter loves
him is that he needs to know that Peter loves him, despite the fact that
Peter will be crucified for following Jesus (21:18f.).   Robert Funk and the
fellows of the Jesus Seminar saw this story as a rehabilitation of Peter
after his denial (_Acts_, 491), but even that is not self-evident, as I read
the flow of the narrative.

It is clear to me that the story of Peter's denial entered the early
Christian tradition as a result of its fabrication by Mark.   Among the
Synoptic authors, who else but Mark is the most likely candidate to have
created the infamous Petrine denial as an act that coheres naturally and
consistently with the image of Peter he narratively wished to project to his
hearers/readers?    Certainly not Matthew!   Given his high veneration of
Peter, represented by Matthew having Jesus make Peter the foundation of the
Church and the possessor of the keys to the kingdom (16:18f.), it hardly
makes sense that Matthew would turn around and destroy the pedestal he has
placed Peter upon by creating the ignominious denial of Jesus by the
foundation of the church.   Surely, Luke would not be a likely candidate for
inventing the denial of Peter in view of his generally high esteem of the
disciples in both his Gospel and Acts.    Mark and Mark alone invented the
denial of Peter to consummate his narrative defrocking of Peter in order, in
my view, to discredit claims made for Petrine  authority by Mark's opponents
within his church (see my _Mark_, 70-100, my article, "The Markan Mystery
and Mark's Messiah for Faith," 22-24, 29-31, and my essay, "Markan
Fabrications: the Denial of Peter," which can be found in the XTalk files at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crosstalk2/files/Articles%20for%20Review/.)

III.  The Johannine Connection

Before I conclude this discussion of the Petrine denial, I need to state
that I find convincing evidence that (1) there was *not*  a pre-Markan
passion narrative, contra Raymond Brown et al, that included the Gethsemane
episode, the denial of Peter and the hearings before the Judean authorities
and Pilate, and (2) John was dependent upon Mark for his passion narrative
and some other aspects of his Gospel.   On (1),  I have presented essays,
which I have just noted, that strongly suggest that Mark created the
Gethsemane betrayal scene, and I have posted an essay, "Sleeping Disciples:
Apostasy in Gethsemane" (6/21) that makes a case for Mark creating the Jesus
prayer scene in Gethsemane.  I am continuing to produce other essays on the
Markan Petrine denial and the Jewish and Roman hearings to demonstrate that
they are also Markan creations.

With respect to (2), Maurits Sabbe has led the way in mounting significant
arguments for the Johaninne dependency on Mark.   I also am developing an
essay on Johannine dependence on Mark for the passion narrative.   But until
that is finished let me point out what I consider to be one significant
instance of Johaninne dependency on Mark.   I have in mind Jn 1:19-22.  I am
struck by the parallels I find when I compare Jn 1:19-22 with Mk 8:27-29.
John, I posit, has taken the Markan Caesarea Philippi story and used it as
material to construct his first episode in his Gospel drama after the
prologue, namely, the episode of the Pharisees questioning John the Baptist
about his identity.   In the Johannine story the Markan Petrine
christological confession has been reworked and transformed into the Baptist
's non-Messianic confession.   John has the Baptizer deny that he is the
Messiah (Christ), Elijah or one of the prophets.

The interesting parallels between the Markan Caesarea Philippi story and the
Johannine Baptist story are these: (1)both passages focus on identity
questions with the identity questions in John framed in a somewhat similar
way to Mark with alterations guided by the difference between questioner and
respondent and narrative context, (2) John introduces the Markan
identity-names of "John the Baptist," "Elijah," "prophet"(s) in the same
Markan order, only John leads off with the title "Messiah" (CHRISTOS) in a
confessional statement rather than concluding with the title "Messiah" in a
"confessional" statement, and (3) Mk. 8:27-29 (and parallels.) and Jn.1:
19-21 are the only two passages in the entire New Testament where the terms
or names "John" (the Baptist), "Elijah," "prophet"(s) and "Christ" (CRISTOS)
are mentioned in the same narrative context.   Those two passages are the
Caesarea Philippi exchange between Jesus and his disciples over his identity
and  John's opening story of his Gospel in which he narrates an exchange
between John the Baptist and the Pharisees over his identity.    These
parallels between the two passages cannot be accidental.   Other such uses
of Markan material could be offered but space does not permit them here.

IV. Markan Christology

I turn now, Leonard, to your point regarding the christology of Mark as
stated in your 7/8 post:

[Leonard]:

It is usually the "understanding" of the disciples that is criticized by
Jesus in Mk, and some modern scholars have rightly pointed out that this
emphasis has the effect of highlighting the divinity (mysterious,
incomprehensible) of Jesus so this motif would be at the service of a high
Christology in Mark.

My response [Ted]

Steve Black and Stephen Carlson have each contributed responses to your
thesis on Markan christology.   In my judgment Mark has the lowest
christology of the four canonical Gospels.   Mark clearly has an adoptionist
christology, as Steve has correctly pointed out.   Jesus becomes named as
God's son in his baptism experience in Mark (1:9-11, vis-a-vis Ps. 2:7).
Matthew and Luke have what I would call a "genetic" christology.   Jesus is
the son of God by virtue of the direct agency of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus is
conceived through a union between the Holy Spirit and Mary.   Therefore
Jesus has divine "genes," which is a contemporary way of stating what the
Greco-Roman world believed was the case with respect to their revered
heroes, their THEOIS  ANDRES.   They were considered to have been conceived
through the copulation of a god with human woman.   John has the highest
christology of all, what I would call an "ontological" christology.   From
the very beginning of time Jesus, according to John, was divine and only
took the human form for the benefit of the incarnation (see also the
Philippian hymn, 2:5-11).

The christology of Mark is, in my view, clearly lower than Matthew or Luke,
for Jesus never makes an appearance as the risen Lord, as he does in the
other canonical Gospels.   In fact, for Mark Jesus does not become exalted
(enthroned) until the end time event after the dissolution of the world.
The scene depicted in Mk. 13:26f. is Jesus' exaltation-enthronement as the
Son of the Human, a la Dan. 7:13.   Until that point Jesus is God's adopted
one who suffers as the Son of the Human.   But until the end-time moment of
his exaltation, according to Mark's  schema, Jesus does  achieve fully
divine status (cf. my _Mark-Traditions in Conflict_, 124-137) where I
provide the argument for 13:26 being an exaltation-enthronement event).
In Matthew and Luke Jesus' exaltation occurs concomitant with his
resurrection.   In the Gospel John Jesus' moment of exaltation is his
crucifixion.

The christology of Mark is the christology of the Philippians 2 hymn without
the pre-existence (2:6) and without the accomplished exaltation (2:9).
Mark's christology is, in a sense, the christology of the middle section of
the hymn (2:7b-8), i.e., Jesus lived the "form of a servant [Mk. 10:45], ...
born in human likeness, and found in human form, [he] humbled himself and
became obedient [DEI: Mk. 8:31]  to the point of death (even death on a
cross" [to include the Pauline addition to the hymn]).  Mark's is the lowest
christology in New Testament, even lower than the early creed in Rms.1:3, in
which Jesus is depicted as human through his death and then "declared to be
Son of God, according to the Spirit of holiness by resurrection from the
dead."

V. Taking Mark's Polemic against the Disciples Seriously

And now I turn to your position on the purpose of Mark's negative treatment
of the disciples, as well as your position on the Markan ending, 16:7-8.
To respond to your positions on these issues, I need to first provide a
series of snippets from your posts that address the issues.

[Leonard, 7/8: "Matthean and Lukan Dependence on Mark," reply to Ted Weeden]

I have also argued that Mark is a moralistic Gospel in the sense that the
author uses older material, originally written as legitimation of Jesus as
Israel's Messiah, for more parochial, pastoral, moral purposes. The
disciples become representatives of contemporary disciples of Jesus and
their failures become transparent of weaknesses in discipleship that Mark
perceives in the Roman Christians he is writing to, who are weak in the face
of growing persecution from the side of the State.

[Leonard, 7/9: "Matthean and Lukan Dependence on Mark," to Emmanuel Fritsch]

...the disciples in Mk serve to represent weaknesses and foibles in the
Christians
Mark is addressing.  Mark need not be making any statement at all about the
Twelve apostles as such. They may simply have a representative function in
the story -- either representing Jewish Christianity generally, or, more
probably, the "disciples" of Jesus to whom Mark is addressing this Gospel as
a logos parakleseos.

[Leonard, 7/11: "Disciples in Mark," unclear to whom the post is addressed]

I argued that (1) the difference between Mark's and Matthew's presentation
of the disciples is not all that great; (2) eventual negativity in Mark's
portrayal of the disciples is easily explicable in terms of a dramatic
portrayal with homiletic motives, directed at practicing "followers of
Christ" (symbolized by the disciples in Mark's narratives) who have not yet
given, and would undoubtedly like to avoid, the ultimate witness of
martyrdom (the echo of a passage of Heb here
is intentional)....

[Leonard, 7/13: "Disciples in Mark," reply to Steve Black "]

For specific pastoral reasons, preachers throughout the later centuries have
stressed the weakness or obtuseness of Jesus' disciples, even at times when
these men were simultaneously regarded as great apostles and saints.  It is
entirely conceivable to me that Mark could have read Acts 5:13 with
approval -- and nevertheless felt obligated to write about the apostles as
he did.

[Leonard, 7/14: "Disciples in Mark," reply to Steve Black]

The apostles in Mark are presented in a negative light only as "disciples"
of Jesus (and therefore as representative of Christian discipleship
generally), not under the formality of "human leadership".

[Leonard, 7/9: "Matthean and Lukan Dependence on Mark" reply to Emmanuel
Fritsch]

I also see a perfectly possible allusion, in the final verses of Mark, to
the by then well-known story of the rehabilitation of the disciples, and in
particular of Peter, after a period of weakness and denial (16:7).   One is
not, I think, supposed to treat the highly stylized and functional ending
(16:8) with full logical seriousness, as though the reader were expected to
believe in the end that the disciples of Jesus never heard the message of
the Resurrection, because the women were too afraid to speak.   Conventions
of dramatic composition are at work in this abrupt ending; they follow their
own laws and elicit their own proper emotions.

My response [Ted]:

Let me see if I can state what I understand to be the points you are making
in these various snippets from your posts.   You are saying, if I understand
you correctly, that (1) the apostles as such, namely, the post-Easter
leaders of the Church are not themselves being placed in a "negative light"
in the Gospel of Mark, (2) the only disciple figures being placed in a
negative light in Mark are the pre-Easter disciples who are negatively
featured by Mark to score some homilectical, exhortative or pastoral points
with Markan Christians in Rome, and (3) one should not take the Markan
ending (16:7-8) at face value with full logical seriousness, for the Markan
ending is constructed by "conventions of dramatic composition" that operate
under their own unique laws, laws that are intended to elicit responses from
the hearers/readers that are different from the normal laws of narrative
logic.

If I have understood you correctly on these three points, and the two issues
cited above to which they speak, we differ significantly in our
understanding of Mark and hermeneutical methodology for accessing the
purpose and meaning of the Markan Gospel.   Let me explain how I see our
differences and my problem with your approach and interpretation of Mark.

Your argument, again if I have understood you, is the same argument that I
find reader-response critics taking with respect to the negative role of the
disciples in Mark and how the Markan ending relates to that negative role.
That is, according to these literary critics, Mark's purpose was not to cast
aspersions on the actual, historical disciples/apostles, but rather Mark's
intent was only to cast them dramatically in a negative light to serve as
symbolic and dramatic representations of Christians of Mark's day.    Mark
did so, according to this hermeneutical theory, solely for the purpose of
existentially confronting Christians in his community with the issue of how
faithful they have been to Christ and what measures they need to take in
their own lives (1) to avoid lapsing and (2) to maintain their commitment to
being steadfast witnesses of the kergyma regardless of any cost  to their
own well-being.   Such a literary approach, which I sense you are taking,
ignores, even discounts, the historical reasons for why Mark wrote his
Gospel and tends to treat the Markan ending as a literary technique used by
Mark to accomplish what finally turns out to be whatever perspective the
respective literary critic is looking to support his/her theory for deriving
meaning from a narrative.

I have expressed my profound reservations and objections to such a
hermeunetical approach to Mark before in my article, "The Markan Mystery and
Mark's Messiah for Faith," _Chicago Studies_, 1995: 17-31.   What I stated
there is applicable here.   So I quote the following from that article
(29f.):

"Literary critics contend that the Markan abrupt and unresolved ending,
which leaves the fallen disciples unredeemed and the Easter message sealed
in silence by the terrified women, is a literary device to hook the
readers/hearers into raising existential questions concerning their own
faithfulness to Christ.   The unresolved ending compels them to ask of
themselves questions, such as: "What would I have done had I been a
disciple?   Would I have forsaken Jesus?   Am I, like the women, afraid of
sharing the Easter message?   What must I do now, facing persecution as I
am, to remain faithful to Christ?"

I am not persuaded by this existential explanation for the abrupt ending.
First, I doubt that nonliterate hearers, the majority of the Markan
community, would recognize this sophisticated literary device just in
hearing the story read.    Second, if the Markan negative portrayal of the
disciples, which reaches its coup de grace in their failure to receive the
Easter message, is a literary technique to evoke existential questions about
the hearers' or readers' own faithfulness, then Matthew and Luke [from the
view of their dependency on Mark] either missed the purpose of this literary
device or they were unconvinced that it would evoke the faith response Mark
presumably desired.    For, when they incorporated Mark into their own
Gospel stories they recast the disciples' portrayal in a far more favorable
light and rewrote the ending (the authors of the "Shorter Ending" and the
"Longer Ending," likewise) to have the women proclaim the Easter message and
to depict Christ's resurrection appearances to his disciples.   Third, if
the disparaging picture of the disciples, culminating in them being left
unredeemed in the story, is just a literary device to evoke existential
questions for the hearers or readers, then the revered image of the
disciples as the postresurrection apostles of the faith pays a terrible
price solely to create an existential encounter for others."

Let me add to what I said in the article.  I find the literary critical
argument, and I presume (hopefully not mistakenly and not unfairly) the
argument from your posts, to be very difficult to understand
psychologically.   Why would anyone denigrate their revered heroes, the
apostles of the faith, to score a moral, exhorting or pastoral point?    I
do not know of any religious movement that debases the character of its
authorities in order to rally the followers to do better than their
authorities did..

Furthermore, with respect to your hermeneutical position that the Markan
ending should not be taken with logical seriousness, I pose this question to
you and to others: Why should we not take Mark's ending with "full logical
seriousness," just as we take Matthew, Luke and John's ending with full
logical seriousness.   Why must we look for "conventions of dramatic
composition," which "follow their own laws and elicit their own proper
emotions" in the case of the ending of Mark?    Why can we not accept Mark
at face value, rather than trying to explain what to some hermeneuts may be
an uncomfortable, anomalous, unresolved or impalatable ending --- or
whatever?    I sometimes wonder if the reason that some Markan interpreters
go hunting for some literary and psychological convention to make Marks'
ending more palatable is because they cannot countenance the fact that any
one in the early church would write a Gospel which set out, as one of its
purposes,  intentionally to defrock the revered twelve apostles (Peter,
James and John, etc.) and to discredit totally their authority by carrying
on a programmatic vendetta against them in the form of a Gospel drama, as I
am convinced Mark, taken at face value, does.

In discounting the possibility, let alone the likelihood, that Mark was
trying to smash apostolic icons, have we not forgotten that it was not
uncommon in the early church for various apostles to  severely attack,
denounce, and even disdain one another as impostors.   Paul is a classic
example of both attacking other apostles and being attacked and discredited
himself as an apostle.   Consider first how Paul attacks Peter and calls
Peter --- the supposed (according to Matthew's Gospel) the premiere apostle
upon whom the Church is built and to whom has been given the keys of the
kingdom --- a hypocrite and publicly denounces him for his hypocrisy (Gal.
2:11-14).  Note also how the pillars of the church in Jersusalem (2:9),
James (now supplanting Peter the supposed rock upon which the Church is
founded: see Hans Dieter Betz's _Galatians_, 99), Peter and John, challenged
Paul's mission; and, while they agreed at the Jerusalem conference that Paul
would go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised, these pillars did
*not* recognize Paul's apostleship and Paul refused to recognize them as
having any jurisdiction over him and his apostolic mission (Gal. 2:6-9; see
particularly on this matter Betz, 's _Galatians_, 92-101).   Furthermore, in
Corinth the church was divided into parties, each with its apostolic leader
(Peter, Apollos, Paul) and each faction competed and disclaimed the
apostolic authority of the others (I Cor. 1:10-12).    And of course the
classic example of internecine warfare between apostles, each denouncing the
other(s) and seeking to undermine the other(s) apostolic authority by
discrediting the apostleship of the other(s) in the Christian community, is
the battle between Paul and the so-called superapostles in Corinth (II Cor.
2:14- ; 10-13).   Paul's apostolic opponents in Corinth considered him
inferior, and sought to discredit Paul in the eyes of the community, because
not only, according to them, had Paul failed to demonstrate the signs of
apostleship (II Cor. 12:12: see Dieter Georgi's _The Opponents of Paul in
Second Corinthians_ for a reconstruction of the issues of apostleship lying
behind II Corinthians), but, according to them, in the final analysis he was
not really worth much, as they made quite clear to the Corinthian church
when they disdainfully put Paul down by proclaiming: "His letters are
weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech
contemptible" (II Cor. 10:10).   And, of course, Paul bitterly retaliates
and seeks to defrock his apostolic opponents by calling them, as I have
noted earlier, "*false apostles*, deceitful workers, *disguising themselves
as apostles* of Christ [emphasis: mine].  And no wonder! Even Satan
disguises himself as an angel of light.  So it is not strange if his
ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness. Their end
will match their deeds" (II Cor. 11:13f.).

This same intense, almost ruthless, warfare between apostolic figures, with
one being elevated over another in a "put down" intended to undermine, if
not discredit, the authority of another, is clearly evident in the tradition
that lies behind the Gospel of Thomas.   Stephen Patterson puts this
internecine "warfare" in the Thomas tradition this way (42):

"In Thom. 12, James is appealed to as an authority.   In Thom. 13, another
authority is lifted up: Thomas.   Other apostles do not fare so well,
however.   In Thom. 13, Thomas is exalted but Peter and Matthew must play
the fool, unable to understand the real significance and identity of Jesus."
Patterson then goes on to explain why such one-upmanship and
"put-downmanship" is being played out in Thomas.   He attributes it (42f.)
to "a time in early Christianity when local communities had begun to appeal
to the authority of particular well-known leaders from the past to guarantee
the reliability of their claims, even while rejecting the rival claims of
others and their apostolic heroes.    The rather pointed criticism of
Matthew and Peter in Thom. 13 suggests that perhaps the author of this
saying has in view the Gospel of Matthew and the particular form of
Christianity associated with it.   On the other hand, it has recently been
argued [Gregory Riley, _Resurrection Reconsidered: Thomas and John in
Controversy_] that the rough treatment Thomas receives in John 20:24-29 is a
direct attack on the Gospel of Thomas and the particular form of
Christianity associated with it.   This sort of rivalry seems at home more
in the first century than later.    As apostolic history gradually faded
into the distant past, such apostolic-inspired rivalries seem to have
quieted ---or shifted to other flash-points ----as all the apostles became
revered figures of that remote time of sacred origins.    Perhaps Luke made
the first , step in this direction.   In Acts, written around the turn of
the first century or perhaps slightly later, the twelve apostles have become
heroes of the early church, only a little less in stature than Jesus
himself.   And old rivalries, even as fierce as that which existed between
Peter and Paul, are smoothed out.    In Acts, Paul accepts the Jerusalem
church's position on circumcision (Acts 16:3), and Peter accepts the Pauline
position on eating with Gentiles (Acts 10).   Thomas, with its raw display
of apostolic rivalries, probably originated before this period of
accommodation."

Why is it--- given the inescapable evidence in the Pauline correspondence
and the Gospel of Thomas of apostle attacking apostle in the early church---
why is it, I ask rhetorically, that when it is clear there were cases where
an apostle sought to undermine the authority of another apostle, and even
defame him, that interpreters of Mark have such a difficult time believing
that anyone could write a Gospel with the intention of carrying out a
vendetta against Peter and the rest of the disciples known, as "the Twelve"-
a vendetta whose sole unvarnished purpose was to discredit, defame and
characterize Peter and the others as apostates?   Why is that so difficult
to imagine, when the same thing was going on in Corinth and in the Thomistic
tradition years  before Mark even thought about writing a Gospel?    Why is
it that so many Markan interpreters refuse to recognize or accept the
possibility that --- by his demeaning portrait of the disciples and refusal
to grant them a resurrection appearance (as does Matthew, Luke and John), in
which Jesus specifically commissioned them to be apostles--- Mark is
engaging in an attack upon the apostolic authority of the Twelve, much the
same as Paul and his opponents endeavor to undermine the apostolic authority
of each other in Corinth?

In this regard it needs to be stated that I, along with many other Markan
scholars, do not view Mk. 14:28 and 16:7 as references to said resurrection
appearance to the disciples.   Rather those verses refer to the moment when
Jesus is vindicated before the disciples, as he will be vindicated before
the high priest and Judean authorities (14:62) in Jesus'
exaltation-enthronement in the end-time (13:26; see my argument for this
interpretation of 14:28 and 16:7 vis-a-vis 14:62 in my _Mark_, 124-137).
Why is it that Markan interpreters, literary critics in particular, seem at
times to engage in what appears to me to be the hermeneutics of revisionism,
and, thereby, deny the fact that Mark means what he says and says what he
mean in order to save the apostles and make Mark more palatable?.

VI. The Hermeneutics of Revisionism

I can only surmise that the answer these questions is that we have grown out
of touch with the seriousness and depth of the internecine strife of the
apostolic age.    As a result, over the centuries we have imputed to the
apostles an aura of veneration and erected an impenetrable shield to protect
the Twelve from defamation.   Thus, we find it impossible to read the Gospel
of Mark and its portrait of the disciples, even in its most negative
features, as any thing more than Mark's attempt to score some homilectical
and pastoral points within his congregation.    The polemical purpose of the
Gospel is dismissed out of hand and lost on us by virtue of a hermeneutics
of revisionism.

This engagement in the hermeneutics of revisionism to preserve the venerated
status of the apostles in the face of their apostasy, as Mark reports it,
and at the same time save Mark as a Gospel that conforms with the other
canonical Gospel in its positive and upbeat message, despite the contrary
according to the Markan narrative logic, appears to be very much like the
hermeneutics of revisionism which the rabbis practiced to save the exalted
status of David in the face of the reality of his own scandalous person life
(a la Clinton).

According to Meir Sternberg (_The Poetics of Biblical Narratives_), the
rabbis exercised tortured hermeneutical attempts to exonerate David from any
suggestion that David in his affair with Bathsheba was guilty of the sin of
adultery.  To whitewash David's character and restore him to his revered
image, Sternberg criticizes (188), the rabbis followed the lead of a
hermeneutical principle: "Where there is a will, the midrash will always
find a way?"   Sternberg describes how the rabbis followed the lead of that
principle, with respect to David's adultery, thus (188f.):

"The David and Bathsheba story... confronted the rabbis with what was to
them a formidable problem: How is it possible that a king of Israel, and the
author of the Psalms at that, should be guilty of adultery?   The most
prevalent of the solutions devised ... is that David did *not* [emphasis:
Sternberg] commit adultery, because Uriah had divorced Bathsheba before
leaving for the front line.    As Rabbi Shmuel Bar Nakhmani contends,
'Whoever says that David sinned is totally mistaken.... How could he fall
into sin while the Divine Presence rested upon him?...    Under the house of
David, whoever went forth into battle would give his wife a letter of
divorce' (_Shabbat_ 56a). But this whitewashing still leaves unexplained the
sharp rebuke delivered by the prophet Nathan, the parable of the Poor Man's
Ewe-Lamb and all, and David's own confession of guilt.   So some
interpretive rule like "If you can't ignore it, then minimize it' is brought
to bear on the narrative: David gets off with the most venial sin possible
under the circumstances.  'Still, the thing was ugly,' one traditional
commentator says, 'because the custom was that the husband would remarry her
on his return from the war' (Metsudat David on 2 Samuel 11:8).   David's sin
accordingly shrinks from adultery to wife-stealing."

"As often, the questions troubling the rabbis here are certainly legitimate
....   But their answers, as hypotheses, stand or fall on their congruity
with the text's own norms.  Thus judged, the presentation of David as an
offender against decorum rather than morality shows up as tendentious and
idealizing.   Such a reading, designed to reconcile David's conduct in the
Bathsheba affair with the favorable (and ideologically vital) impressions he
produces in other parts of Samuel, betrays the typical marks of an arbitrary
hypothesis.   It imposes on the world represented in the tale a
socioreligious law (pre-battle divorce) consonant with the culture and world
view of the reader; it has no anchorage in the textual details, and even
clashes with some givens."

Sternberg's description of the way rabbis went through hermeneutical
gymnastics to save the divinely anointed David from the appearance of the
sin of adultery-of which according to the logic of the Old Testament
narrative he was clearly guilty -matches equally well with what I perceive
to be the hermeneutical gyrations some Markan intepreters go through to save
Mark from the appearance of the "sin" of defaming the divinely appointed
disciples-of which according to the narrative logic of his Gospel he is
clearly guilty.   With appropriate modification to fit the different textual
context, Sternberg's words are easily adapted and applied to describe what,
in my judgment, appears to be, an exercise in a hermeneutic of revisionism
by some scholars to make canonical Mark conform in its treatment of the
disciples to the acceptable canons of apostolic veneration.

Thus in Sternberg's words, modified to fit Markan interpretation:  Some
interpreters will say regarding the Markan portrayal of the Twelve, 'Whoever
says that Mark is guilty of the sin of apostolic defamation is totally
mistaken. ...How could Mark possibly suggest that Peter, for example, fell
into the sin of apostasy when Jesus made him the foundation of the Church
and intrusted him with the keys of the kingdom? ...  Under traditional
canons of interpretation the Markan portrayal of Peter and disciples may
expose the fact that they had a few weaknesses here or there, but Mark could
never have intended to suggest that the apostles were ever guilty of
apostasy.   So some interpretive rule like "If you can't ignore it, then
minimize it' is brought to bear on the Markan narrative: Mark gets off with
only having done minimal damage to the exalted image of the apostles.   Thus
judged, the hermeneutical presentation of the Markan Peter as lapsing for a
moment into denying Jesus, rather than actually denouncing Jesus, shows up
as tendentious and idealizing.   Such a reading, designed to reconcile Mark'
s presentation of Peter , as well as the other disciples, with the favorable
(and ideologically vital) impressions Matthew and Luke produced in their
Gospels, betrays the typical marks of an arbitrary apologetic hypothesis.
It imposes on the world represented in the Markan drama a socioreligious law
(Mark could not have intentionally defamed Peter and the disciples)
consonant with the culture and world view of the interpreter; it has no
anchorage in Markan textual details, and even clashes with some Markan
givens.

Thus, I conclude this discussion with this question: Is it not possible that
some New Testament scholars have, like the rabbis in the case of David,
sought to save Mark from being accused of intentionally defaming the
disciples in his narrative and, in doing so, have followed the lead of the
same rabbinic hermeneutical principle in their interpretation of Mark,
namely:  "Where there is a will, the midrash will always find a way?"

Of course, the same question could be posed to me with respect to the way I
understand and interpret Mark, namely, have, Ted Weeden, not followed the
lead of the same rabbinic hermeneutical principle,  "Where there is a will,
the midrash will always find a way?"   That is a fair question.   And I do
not deny that I may well lapse into the use of that hermeneutic because I
happen on occasion to be wed to a particular theory or thesis and have not
exercised sufficient self-criticism of my own exegetical and hermeneutical
endeavors.   I try to be self-critical, but I must depend upon on those who
see things differently from me to help me see my blind spots and point out
to me the tortured logic of my arguments when such occurs.


Ted Weeden