Kata Markon

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

Peter Head wrote on August 8, 2001 to Phil Frommlich:

With respect, I don't think your argument re Mark 14.20 is very compelling.
Could Mark have expected any real reader to notice such a thing?

Your wrote: "The above manuscripts, in my view, are supported by some other
significant factors. First of all one of Mark's earliest copiers, The
compiler of Matthew, does not include the second occurrence of "eis twn
dwdeka"."

Well, it is a bit much to take Matthew as a witness to the shorter form of
Mark's text without any further argument, when the dominant theory would
suggest that many manuscripts of Mark have been assimilated at various
points to parallel texts in Matthew (and on any view Matthew is patently
not a transcriber of Mark).

You also wrote: "Secondly, certain key words and phrases in Mark are placed
strategically througout the narrative and counted. One such word is dwdeka.
Now without going into great detail about how these words function in
Markíís narrative I will simply say that whenever the count is close to 12
or 7 or 4 I generally am inclined to investigate variant readings on these
words or phrases."

I admit it would be quite a neat trick for Mark to use "seven" seven times
and "twelve" twelve times. But using such a dubious method to inform your
textual criticism seems to put the cart before the horse. It doesn't even
work for "seven" (which occurs twice in 8.20 and thus eight times overall).
You need to get rid of three "twelve"s to make it work.

My response (TJW):

Phil, with Peter, I, too, do not find your argument compelling.  To Peter's
critique I add my own reasons why I am not persuaded by your suggestion.

(1) When Jesus and the Twelve, are gathered with Jesus at the last supper
(4:17), Jesus immediately  announces: hEIS EX hUMWN PARADWSEI ME hO ESQIWN
MET' EMOU ("One of you will betray me, one who is eating with me," 14:18).
With that declaration, the disciples each become introspective and ask
Jesus, "Is it I?" (14:19).    Whereupon Jesus answers,  hEIS  TWN DWDEKA hO
EMBAPTOMENOS MET' EMOU ( "One of the Twelve, one who is dipping with me,"
14:20).   I find that answer to be quite strange.   How strange that Jesus
would identify his betrayer as "one of the Twelve!"   Who else but the
Twelve are eating with him anyway?    It is not as if there were a large
crowd eating with Jesus and the Twelve only made up a small portion of it.
Furthermore, for Jesus to state at the outset that one of the Twelve eating
with him will betray him and then to identify his betrayer,  in response to
the individual disciples' question, "Is it I?" as "One of the Twelve who is
dipping with me" is tautologous.   Moreover, Jesus' naming of his betrayer
via the betrayer's "membership status" ("One of the Twelve") rather than by
personal name appears stilted and unusually formal.   Far less stilted and
less formal, and somewhat less tautological, is the reading you cite, Phil,
from the manuscripts M and k, in which EIS TWN DWDEKA does not appear and
14:20 reads, as I understand you, hO DE EIPEN, hO EMBAPTOMENOS MET' EMOU
("He said to them, 'One who is dipping with me'").    Clearly, then the
Nestle accepted  reading of 14:20 is the "harder" reading from a
text-critical perspective and, therefore, appears to be more original than
the text as found in the M and k manuscripts.    For it is, my judgment, far
easier to explain why a copyist would have removed the stilted and formal
reference to the betrayer as  EIS TWN DWDEKA from the Nestle accepted text,
and at same time reduced the tautology in the Nestle text, than it is to
explain why a copyist would have added EIS TWN DWDEKA to an original text.

(2) I find it striking that the expression  hEIS  TWN  DWDEKA occurs only
six times in all of the New Testament.    Three of the six NT occurrences
are found in Mark (Mk. 14:10, 20, 43).   The other three occurrences happen
to be ones in which Matthew (26:14, 47) and Luke (22:47) have each
independently followed Mark: Mk. 14:10//Mt. 26:14; Mk. 14:43//Mt. 26:47/Lk.
22:47.   The one Markan use of hEIS  TWN  DWDEKA in which neither Matthew or
Luke follows Mark is the text in question, 14:20.   I submit on the basis of
this evidence (1) that the expression hEIS  TWN DWDEKA originates with Mark,
and (2) that Matthew and Luke each independently recognized the Markan
stiltedness and tautology in using hEIS  TWN DWDEKA in 14:20 and chose not
to follow Mark at that point.

(3) I think that there is strong evidence of Mark's redactional hand
exercising its creativity in 14:18-21, the passage which contains the text
in question (14:20).   In fact those verses, in my judgment, are Markan
insertions into the Last Supper tradition which Mark had received.    I draw
that conclusion on the basis of what I detect as Markan intercalation, a
sure sign of Markan redaction.   Where is the evidence of intercalation?

Notice that there is a repetition of the same clause, KAI  ESQIONTWN ("and
while eating"), in 14:18 and at the beginning of 14:22.    I posit that Mark
's tradition of the Last Supper began KAI ANALEIMENWN AUTWN KAI ESQIONTWN
hO IHSOUS LABWN ARTON EULOGHSAS EKLASEN KAI EDWKEN AUTOIS KAI EIPEN ("And
while they were at table and eating, Jesus taking bread, having blest, broke
and gave to them and said").   It is my thesis that Mark, following his
source's clause KAI ESQIONTWN, attached the clause KAI EIPEN found in that
source (Mk. 14:22b) and then added his own material beginning with  AMHN
LEGW  hUMIN hOTI  hEIS  EX  hUMWN  PARADWSEI  ME  hO  ESQIWN  MET' EMOU and
ending with KALON AUTW EI OUK EGENNHQH hO ANQRWPOS  EKEIONOS.    Then Mark
returned to his source by repeating the clause KAI ESQIONTWN of his
tradition to which he had attached his own creation.   I plan in a future
post to provide a full argument with supportive evidence of how and why Mark
chose to take essentially the same tradition that Paul received on the Last
Supper and transformed what in that tradition spoke of Jesus being delivered
up by God (I Cor. 11:23), a la LXX Isa. 53:6, into a deliverance by a
disciple "turn coat," an inside betrayer, in the Markan narrative.

Over a year ago I argued on Kata Markan that Mark created Judas and Judas'
betrayal as a part of a programmatic vendetta against the Twelve.   More
recently I have argued the same in posts on XTalk and am now working on an
essay that will provide more detail evidence for this.   Briefly here, early
on in his Gospel, Mark identifies Judas as the betrayer (3:19).   One of the
strong points in Mark's vendetta against the Twelve is to emphasize that
Jesus was betrayed from within the cohort of the Twelve.  That is why it was
important for Mark to indicate that, wherever Judas, Jesus' betrayer, is
referred to in the context of the passion narrative, he be identified as
"one of the Twelve."  On the three different occasions where Judas is
mentioned or alluded to in the passion narrative he thus is clearly and
specifically identified as "one of the Twelve."    It is the case when Mark
has Judas go to the religious authorities to join the conspiracy against
Jesus (14:10).  It is the case when Jesus speaks of his betrayer at the Last
Supper (14:20).   It is the case when Mark dramatizes Judas' arrival with
the arresting party in Gethsemane (14:43), where Judas' betrayal is
consummated.   Thus, the reference to  hEIS  TWN DWDEKA in Mk. 14:20, in my
judgment, is part of Mark's vendetta against the Twelve.   The Nestle
reading of 14:20 is the authentic and original Markan text.

Ted Weeden