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The Gospel According to Mark: background and overview
The Gospel According to Mark is the second in canonical order of the Gospels and is both the earliest gospel that survived and the shortest. Probably contemporaneous with Q, it has no direct connection with it. The Passion narrative comprises 40 percent of Mark, and, from chapter 8, verse 27, onward, there is heavy reference forward to the Passion.
Though the author of Mark is probably unknown, authority is traditionally derived from a supposed connection with the Apostle Peter, who had transmitted the traditions before his martyr death under Nero’s persecution (c. 64–65). Papias, a 2nd-century bishop in Asia Minor, is quoted as saying that Mark had been Peter’s amanuensis (secretary) who wrote as he remembered (after Peter’s death), though not in the right order. Because Papias was from the East, perhaps the Johannine order would have priority, as is the case in the structure of the Syrian scholar Tatian’s Diatesseron (harmony of the Gospels).
Attempts have been made to identify Mark as the John Mark mentioned in Acts 12 or as the disciple who fled naked in the garden (Mark 14). A reference to “my son, Mark,” in I Peter is part of the same tradition by which Mark was related to Peter; thus the Evangelist’s apostolic guarantor was Peter.
The setting is a Gentile church. There is no special interest in problems with Jews and little precision in stating Jewish views, arguments, or terminology. Full validity is given the worship of the Gentiles. In further support of a Gentile setting and Roman provenance is the argument that Mark uses a high percentage of so-called Latinisms—i.e., Latin loanwords in Greek for military officers, money, and other such terms. Similar translations and transliterations, however, have been found in the Jerusalem Talmud, a compendium of Jewish law, lore, and commentary, which certainly was not of Roman provenance. The argument from Latinisms must be weighed against the fact that Latin could be used anywhere in the widespread Roman Empire. In addition, for the first three centuries the language of the church of Rome was Greek—so the Gentile addressees might just as well have been Syrian as Roman. The Latinisms—as well as the Aramaisms—are rather an indication of the vernacular style of Mark, which was “improved” by the other Evangelists.
Mark is written in rather crude and plain Greek, with great realism. Jesus’ healing of a blind man is done in two stages: first the blind man sees men, but they look like trees walking, and only after further healing activity on Jesus’ part is he restored to see everything clearly. This concrete element was lost in the rest of the tradition. It is also perhaps possible that this two-stage healing is a good analogy for understanding Mark theologically: first, through enigmatic miracles and parables in secret, and only later, after recognition of Jesus as the Christ, is there a gradual clarification leading to the empty tomb. In chapter 3, verse 21, those closest to Jesus call him insane (“he is beside himself”), a statement without parallel in the other Gospels.
In Mark, some Aramaic is retained, transliterated into Greek, and then translated—e.g., in the raising of Jairus’ daughter (5:41) and in the healing of the deaf man with an impediment in his speech (7:34). The well-known abba, Father, is retained in Mark’s account of Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane. In the two miracle stories, the Aramaic may have been retained to enhance the miracle by the technique of preserving Jesus’ actual words. And a cry of Jesus on the Cross is given in Aramaized Hebrew.
The stories in Mark are woven together with simple stereotyped connectives, such as the use of kai euthus (“and immediately,” “straightway”), which may be thought of as a Semitic style (as a typical simple connective in the Old Testament narrative style). More likely, however, this abruptness indicated that the compiler-redactor of Mark has used geography and people simply as props or scenes to be used as needed to connect the events in the service of the narrative.
Except for the Passion narrative, there is little chronological information. References in chapters 13 and 14 appear to presuppose that the Jerusalem Temple (destroyed in 70 ce) still stood (in Matthew and Luke this is no longer the case); but the context of chapter 13, the “Little Apocalypse,” is so interwoven with eschatological traditions of both the Jewish and Christian expectations in the 1st century that it cannot serve with certainty as a historical reference. To some extent, however, chapter 13 does help to date Mark—the priority of which has already been established from literary criticism—because it is in good agreement with the traditions that Mark was written after the martyrdom of Peter. Mark may thus be dated somewhere after 64 and before 70, when the Jewish war ended.
The Gospel According to Mark: unique structure
The organization and schematizing of Mark reveals its special thrust. It may be roughly divided into three parts: (1) 1:1–8:26—the Galilean ministry—an account of mighty deeds (an aretalogy); (2) 8:27–10:52—discussions with his disciples centered on suffering; and (3) 11:1–16:8—controversies, Passion, death, the empty tomb, and the expected Parousia in Galilee.
“The beginning of the Gospel” in the first words of Mark apparently refers to John the Baptist, who is clearly described as a forerunner of the Messiah who calls the people to repentance. Jesus never calls himself the Messiah (Christ). After Jesus’ Baptism by John, the heavens open, the Spirit descends, and a heavenly voice proclaims Jesus as God’s beloved son with whom He is well pleased. Already in this account there is a certain secrecy, because it is not clear whether the onlookers or only Jesus witnessed or heard. Jesus was then driven by the Spirit into the wilderness, the place of demons and struggle, to be tempted by Satan, surrounded by wild beasts (the symbols of the power of evil and persecution) and ministered to by angels. Here again he is in secret, alone. The opening of the struggle with Satan is depicted, and the attendance by angels is a sign of Jesus’ success in the test.
Many references to persecution in Mark point toward Roman oppression and a martyr church that was preoccupied with a confrontation with the Satanic power behind the world’s hostility to Jesus and his message. There was stress on the underlying fact that the church must witness before the authorities in a hostile world. Much of the martyrological aspect of Mark’s account is grounded in his interpretation of the basic function of Jesus’ Passion and death and its implication that the Christian life is a life of suffering witness.
What Jesus preached in Galilee at the beginning of his ministry was that the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is “at hand”; i.e., very very near—therefore repent! (1:15). In Matthew this same message is that of both John the Baptist (3:2) and Jesus (4:17). This sets the stage; and the miraculous ministry in Galilee about which the followers are enjoined to secrecy points not so much to Jesus as the wonder-worker as to the great scheme of pushing back the frontier of Satan. Toward the end of this first section, the Pharisees ask Jesus for a sign, and he answers in no uncertain terms that no sign will be given (8:12). In the Synoptic Gospels the miracles are never called “signs” (as in John); and no sign is to be given prior to the cosmological, eschatological signs from heaven that belong to the end: darkening of the Sun and Moon and extreme tribulations that in postbiblical Jewish eschatology—the mood of the first Christian century—is a sign of the coming of the heavenly Son of man to judge the world.
Parables are a revelatory mode of expression; they are not just illustrations of ideas or principles. Jesus, the revealer, tells his disciples that the secret of the Kingdom of God is given to them but that to the outsider everything is in parables (or riddles) in order that they may not hear and understand lest they repent and be forgiven (4:10–12). This mystery and hiddenness is particularly related to the parables about the coming of the kingdom. Yet, even Jesus’ disciples did not recognize him as the Messiah, although his miracles were such that only a messianic figure could perform them: forgiving sins on earth, casting out demons, raising the dead, making the deaf hear and the stammerer (the dumb) speak, and the blind to see—all fulfillments of Old Testament prophecy concerning the Messiah. Only the demons, supranatural beings, recognize Jesus. There is a constant campaign against Satan from the temptation after Jesus’ Baptism until his death on the Cross, and, in each act of healing or exorcism, there is anticipated the ultimate defeat of Satan and the manifestation of the power of the new age. In all this Mark stresses the need for secrecy and Peter’s confession of Jesus as the Christ (8:29) is told in Mark as the opportunity to motivate an acceptance of the admonition “not to tell” by reference to the necessity of suffering.
This strong emphasis on the necessity of suffering—in the life of Jesus and in the life of the disciples—before the hour of victory gives the best explanation to what scholars have called the secrecy motif in Mark—i.e., the constant stress on not telling the world about Jesus’ messianic power.
According to William Wrede, a German scholar, the messianic secret motif was a literary and apologetic device by which the Christological faith of the early church could be reconciled with the fact that Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah. According to Wrede, Mark’s solution was: Jesus always knew it but kept it a secret for the inner group. After Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi, Jesus began to speak of a suffering Son of man. The Son of man in Jewish apocalyptic was a glorious, transcendent, heavenly figure who would come victorious on clouds of glory to judge the world at the end of time. Suffering was not part of this picture. E. Sjöberg (1955) has interpreted the messianic secret not as a literary invention but as an understanding both that the Messiah would appear without recognition except by those who are chosen and to whom he reveals himself and that he must suffer. For outsiders, then, he remains a mystery until the age to come. Even his disciples did not understand the necessity of suffering. Only in the light of Resurrection faith—the hope of the Parousia and final victory over Satan—could they understand that he had to suffer and die to fulfill his mission and how they, too, must suffer.
Martyrological aspects in Mark can be noted from the beginning. Already according to 2:20 Jesus’ disciples are not to fast until “when the bridegroom is taken away from them and then they will fast….” In Mark 8 to 10, there is great concentration on discussions with the disciples. The theme is suffering, and repeatedly they are reminded that there is no way of coming to glory except through suffering. Three Passion predictions meet either with rejection, fear, or confusion. In the Transfiguration (9:2–13; in which three disciples—Peter, James, and John—see Jesus become brighter and Elijah and Moses, two Old Testament prophets, appear) there is the same emphasis. The tension between future glory and prior suffering is the more striking when the Transfiguration is recognized as a Resurrection appearance, placed here in an anticipatory manner. The disciples are reminded of an association of Elijah with John the Baptist and his fate. This is also a hidden epiphany (manifestation)—the triumphal enthroned king closely juxtaposed with suffering and death.
After the third Passion prediction, in chapter 10, two of the disciples ask for places of honor when Jesus is glorified. He reminds them that suffering must precede glory for “The Son of man also came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” It is worth noting that this is the only reference to the death of Christ as a ransom or sacrifice but that Mark does not dwell on the Christological implications, but uses the saying for ethical purposes. Even so, the Marcan text gives one of the important building blocks for Christological growth and reflection on the suffering Son of man.
Just as Jesus’ public ministry in Mark started with the calling of disciples, so the central part of the Gospel calls them to participate through suffering in his own confrontation with the power of Satan.
In the last section of the Gospel, the scene is shifted to Jerusalem, where Jesus is going to die. His entry is described as triumphal and openly messianic and is accompanied by acted-out parables in a judgment of a barren fig tree, casting money changers out of the Temple, and in a parable of a vineyard in which the beloved son of the owner is killed. There is an increasing conflict and alienation of the authorities. Chapter 13, the “Little Apocalypse,” made up of a complex arrangement of apocalyptic traditions, serves as instruction to the disciples and thence to the church that they must endure through tribulation and persecution until the end time. Thus, although the setting is Jerusalem, the orientation is toward Galilee, the place where the Parousia is expected. The Holy Spirit will come to those who must witness in the situation of trial before governors and authorities (13:11); in the final eschatological trials only by God’s intervention can anyone endure unless the time be shortened for the elect. Because this chapter is shaped as a discourse that precedes the Passion narrative, it serves as a farewell address, a type of testament including apocalyptic sayings and warnings to the messianic community at the end of the “narrative” before the Passion—as do most testament forms (admonitions given before death to those beloved who will remain behind).
The Cross is both the high point of the Gospel and its lowest level of abject humiliation and suffering. A cry of dereliction and agony and the cosmic sign of the rending of the Temple veil bring from a Gentile centurion acknowledgment of Jesus as Son of God. The disciples reacted to the scandal of the Cross with discouragement, although already the scene is set for a meeting in Galilee. There are no visions of the risen Lord, however, in the best manuscripts (verses 9–20 are commonly held to be later additions), and Mark thus remains an open-ended Gospel. The Resurrection is neither described nor interpreted. Not exultation but rather involvement in the battle with Satan is the inheritance until the victorious coming in glory of the Lord—a continual process with the empty tomb pointing to hope of the final victory and glory, the Parousia in Galilee. The Gospel ends on the note of expectation. The mood from the last words of Jesus to the disciples remains: What I say to you, I say to all: Watch!
