Luke: Chapters 7 to 12

Click here for the first part of Luke.

CHAPTER 7

Here’s a story we saw in Matthew: Christ heals the servant of a Roman centurion, and along the way Christ praises the centurion for having more faith than anyone he’s seen in Judah.  It’s not surprising that this story would make it into Luke, given that this is generally seen as being the most negative gospel towards Jews. 

There was one part I found especially striking here.  The Roman tells Christ, “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you under my roof.”  Did people openly call Christ “Lord” like that in the previous gospels?  Not that I recall.  (Checks back to Chapter 8 of Matthew).  Oh, the centurion said the exact same thing then.  So never mind me.  Still, with Luke beginning with multiple angelic visits, it has me primed to see more lordly involvement all around here.

Next up, Jesus raises a widow’s son from the dead.  Previous gospels gave us a story of Jesus raising someone thought to be dead, but he said was only sleeping.  There is no grayness here – he raises a dead son; just like Elijah and Elisha back in the day.  Luke reports that news of Christ’s doing spread across Judah.  Yeah – then why did Matthew and Mark forget this story?  My answer: the story wasn’t around then, but was around later when Luke wrote this.  It’s tall tales getting taller over the passage of time.  It’s likely the story of the dead/sleeping person being retold, only this time made to be fully dead.

John the Baptist – still not dead apparently – has his messengers ask Jesus if he’s the real deal.  We’ve seen this before in the previous gospels, but it has a different feel here.  In the previous gospels, Christ was just a follower of the Baptist, but in Luke he’s a cousin.  In this chapter, both of their births were foretold by angels.  In other words, it’s a little stranger that John would be in the dark on Christ’s divine nature here.  Shouldn’t he know?  He’s the man’s cousin, after all.

Luke ends with a new story; one not found in previous gospels.  Jesus had dinner at the home of a Pharisee.  This is unexpected.  He’s still their opponent, but at least on somewhat cordial relations with them here.  This isn’t the last time we’ll see Christ eat with a Pharisee. 

While there, a woman – name not given – sits at Christ’s feet, and bathes his feet with her tears, and then wipes it up with her hair.  The Pharisees are put off, because she’s a woman of ill repute.  But Christ chastises them for chastising her.  The people who sin the most are the most in need of forgiveness and the happiest when they receive it, Christ tells them.  So of course she’s the happiest to see Jesus and have him forgive her.  And since he’s done so, she’s shown great love for him by her actions.  He tells the woman to go in peace.

It’s a really nice story.  The details of wiping his feet with her air makes the girl sound kind of pathetic.  One concern: while Jesus comes off nice at the end of the story, what was he doing while it was going on?  Was he just letting her cry all over him without saying anything to her?  There is a definite awkwardness in that part of the story.  Also, though the Bible never gives a name, I think it’s associated with Mary Magdalene.  I’ll just point out that she’s known as a prostitute, but so far in the Bible she’s never been so identified. 

CHAPTER 8

Well what do you know – as soon as I mention Mary Magdalene, she shows up!  This is the earliest she’s ever appeared in a gospel.  Until now, she just appeared at the very end.  Here we’re told that she’d been cured by Christ of seven demons and gone out. So, still not a prostitute.  But maybe the proximity of her mentioning here and the story in late Chapter 7 gives her that reputation.  I guess – I’m not sure.  (The end of Mark also said she has seven demons driven out of her – but that was the part not in the original ending of Mark, and likely inspired by this tidbit here). 

Other woman also follow Christ – Joanna, wife of Herod’s steward, and Susanna.  Also, we’re told “many others who provided for them out of their resources.” (“them” being Christ and his apostles).  But we only remember the one, Mary Magdalene.

Next come a bunch of parables, but we’ve seen them already.  The story of Legion comes up again.  This time, we’re given this new detail about him: “For a long time he had not worn clothes, he did not live in a house, but lived among the tombs.”  Weird. 

There are a few more miracles we’ve seen already to end the chapter – the swine, a woman whose daughter keeps hemorrhaging.  Christ saves the day, as is his nature.

CHAPTER 9

It’s another collection of things we’ve already seen and read in previous gospels. 

Christ sends his dozen apostles out to spread the word and heal the sick.  They do so and come back. In the meantime, we learn that Herod wants Jesus dead (oh, and he apparently had the Baptist beheaded off-stage sometime last chapter).   But nothing comes of that for now.  When the gang comes back, they feed 5,000 on the Jesus Christ Discount Dining Plan. 

Peter figures out that Christ is the Messiah, but the scene isn’t the same as Matthew or Mark.  In Matthew, he’s profusely rewarded with the keys to heaven for what he learned.  That doesn’t happen here.  Instead, Christ rebukes his apostles and tells them not to tell anyone.  In both Mark and Matthew, in the very next scene Christ calls Peter Satan for trying to talk him out of his sacrifice, but that doesn’t happen here.  Sure, as soon as Christ acknowledges who his dad is, he tells them how the gospel will end – but this time no one tries to talk him out of it.  In all, it’s a much more sparsely told story or two here in Luke.

The introduction said that Luke was a shift in focus.  Whereas previous gospels focused on the imminent coming of the Lord, Luke doesn’t. That’s what the introduction said.  But in Luke 9:27, Christ says this: “Truly I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God.”  It sure sounds like it’s coming soon.

It’s more of the same.  Elijah and Moses show up on the mountain.  Christ heals people.  He again predicts how the story ends.  He tells everyone that loving God is the most important commandment. 

By the way – this is a long grab bag of a chapter; over 60 verses.  He starts getting ready to leave for Jerusalem near the end, which sure is early. 

CHAPTER 10

Christ has already sent out a mission of his 12 apostles.  Now he sends out a mission for 72 followers.  Or 70 followers – the texts vary.  (70 would make more sense, as it was 70 who followed Jacob into Egypt way back in Genesis.  It’s more symbolically fitting; just as 12 apostles stand for the 12 tribes of yore). 

Christ tells the, “I am sending you like lambs among wolves.”  Not exactly a cheery pep talk, now is it?  You get some hints here that Luke was written after the 66-70 zealot uprising, as Christ foretells doom and gloom – worse than Sodom’s demise he says at one point.  A few towns in particular are cursed for their hostility to the Jesus movement. 

Once everyone returns from their missions, Jesus gives some new prayers (that aren’t that new if you’re read the previous gospels).  At one point he says, “No one knows how the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” Yeah – nice catch there at the end. Until then I was thinking, “No one knows except the Father – and Peter, who you’ve already told.” 

We also get one of the most famous stories in the Bible: the Good Samaritan.  A man is beaten and robbed.  A priest walks by and sees the victim lying there, and goes along.  Then a scribe does likewise.  Then a Samaritan sees him and helps.

The point is as simple as the story.  Just because someone has stature and position and a role that says he’s a moral leader – none of those things really make him a moral leader.  Throughout the gospels Christ has been more concerned with those who follow edicts and rules instead of getting to the core of things – which is love for God and one’s fellow man.  As Pope Francis has publicly said, the core of Christianity is love.  Popes John Paul II and especially Benedict are like the officials who bypass the needy person.  They don’t really help, they just take care of their own rules. 

Samaritans were an outcast sect in Judah.  I don’t know much about them.  I’ve read about them, but forgotten it.  The key part is that they didn’t follow all the same customs and laws.  In fact, they are mentioned at the end of the last chapter.  Christ approached a Samaritan town, but they wouldn’t let him in when the found out he was on his way to Jerusalem.  They didn’t cotton to that.  Two of the apostles asked Christ if he wanted to Sodom/Gomorrah them for that – but he declined.  That story helps make this one that much stronger, because we’re already accustomed to thinking of the Samaritans as jerks (though not as bad as Gomorrah), but here Christ holds up one as an example of how to live and be moral.  Judge someone by their actions, not on their social role.  That’s a good lesson to have.

CHAPTER 11

It’s mostly more stuff we’ve seen already.  Christ gives us the Lord’s Prayer.  He teaches on what prayer is for and that prayers will be answers – “ask and you will receive; seek and you will find.”  That’s still a nice line, just as it was in previous gospels.  (I don’t think it’s fully true, but no matter).

His enemies claim Jesus is in league with Satan, and he makes the same reply he did in other gospels.  People demand a sign, and he says that ain’t how things go.  It’s a lot of the same elements as before, but there seems to be less of a flow.  Maybe it’s because I’ve already read this stuff before, but Matthew felt like it had more of an advancing plot.  Luke just seems like a haphazard miscellany of stuff.  (For example, he throws in the advancement to Jerusalem way, way too early). 

The chapter ends with an extended denouncing of the Pharisees and scholars by Jesus.

CHAPTER 12

Jesus continues denouncing the Pharisees, and then denounces greed while he’s at it.

That anti-greed them leads to a new story – one I haven’t read in Matthew and Mark.  It’s the parable of the rich fool.  A guy has lots of money and wealth, and decides to build a new barn with it.  Christ thinks the man is a fool, because he’s spending money on himself instead of others.  You never know when your day will come or your name will be called.  So – apparently, Christ doesn’t like McMansions.  Good for Jesus Christ.

That said, as Jesus goes on about his life philosophy, it sounds a bit too passive.  People shouldn’t worry about their clothing or their body or the physical.  Don’t worry about that – and worrying doesn’t add to your lifespan anyway.  Even the smallest things are beyond your control, so just let go and accept the Lord’s way.  Why, Jesus Christ is practically flirting with Daoism right here. 

Instead, he suggests people sell their belongings and give alms.  When you really get into Christ’s philosophy and theology, it can get uncomfortable.  Earlier I took a cheap shot swipe at people living in McMansions, but this stuff just as easily applies to me – and everyone else out there.  By the standards he sets here, everyone spends too much money on themselves.  We don’t really let go.  It’s worth remembering that Jesus Christ was ministering to down-and-out-ers in a captured province in the Roman Empire.  Their experience is as far away from modern affluent suburban American experience as you can get.  And even there, Christ was pushing the envelope with what he wanted his supporters to do. 

Jesus then has an entire section on how a servant should act.  Short version: be good to your master.  It’s stuff like this that southern slave owners could point to in order to justify their Peculiar Institution.  We all might be equal under God with his kingdom comes, but in the meantime you act morally by acting properly in your role. 

Well, maybe.  While he might be a religious reformer first and foremost, that doesn’t mean he’s looking to avoid rocking the boat.  The next passage makes that abundantly clear.  Christ tells his followers: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing.” Holy smokes!  (No pun intended).  This is “burn, baby burn!” stuff.  We’ve seen things like this in previous gospels, but never before has Christ ever so openly called for violent social discord.  No wonder the Romans will have him crucified.  Words like that can be taken to mean different things – and if you’re Rome, why take any chances?  

In fact, he goes on, proclaiming: “Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth?  No, I tell you, but rather division.  From now on a household of five will be divided, three against two and two against thee; a father will be divided against his son and a son against his father” – and son on from there.  Man, he’s out to fuck some shit up.  This is not the Jesus quote people typically think of first.

Click here for the next part of Luke.

Luke: Chapters 1 to 6

Click here for the end of Mark.

CHAPTER 1

OK, time for the third gospel.  The introductory notes helpfully point out that Luke wasn’t too familiar with the landscape of Judah.  This marks a shift from the previous two gospels – where there was an expectation of imminent salvation for all through the coming of the kingdom of God – to a concern of the Christian community in this world. 

Oh, and going back to ancient times, the general belief has been that whoever wrote this also wrote Acts of the Apostles.  I guess there are some clear stylistic similarities in the ancient Greek – or maybe there will be an indication in Acts that he also wrote this.

This one does have a different start.  The gospel writer himself includes a brief preference, where he notes that others have been writing testimonies of the life of Jesus, and though he never met Christ personally, he’s looked at all the evidence as much as he could and has sought to add his own version of it.  So it’s admittedly second-hand.  That isn’t bad, but based on what Luke himself says, this isn’t the first written of the gospels.  Just based on this opening segment, this gospel must be written after the destruction of Jerusalem – possibly decades after; maybe not until around the year 100 or so. (Because those earlier gospels were likely written after the city’s ruin, and they’ve had time to spread and become known.  That takes time in the pre-Gutenberg world). 

The entire first chapter is pre-birth stuff, and it’s very unlike anything in Matthew or Mark. (Well, it must be unlike Mark – where the story begins with an adult Christ).  Well, this is a little like Matthew because there is an angel’s visitation there, but Luke really one-ups him.  This opening chapter has two angelic visitations – to two different people.

First an angel gives the good news that an important child is to be born.  No, not Jesus.  That comes later.  First the angel Gabriel spreads the good news that John the Baptist will be born.  His dad is a big priest and gets the good news in the sanctuary of the Lord itself.  Not a bad place for it.  He is struck mute, but then – despite both he and his wife (Elizabeth) being of advanced age – his wife becomes pregnant.  It’s Abraham-Sarah all over again.

Now the angel visits Mary and gives her the good news – she’ll be the mother of the main event.  Oh, and the angel also says your relative Elizabeth is also with a special child.  Yes, Mary and Elizabeth are related, which means that John the Baptist and Jesus Christ are relatives.  That wasn’t the case in Matthew or Mark, but it explicitly said to be the case here.  I found it doubtful.  Luke begins his gospel acknowledging his second hand nature, the others were written earlier – if there really were blood ties, the others would’ve noted this.  Instead, it just sounds like tall tales increasing in height as the years go on.  “Not only was Jesus close to John the Baptist – they were cousins!”  Sure.

Mary visits her relative (the exact nature of their relation is never said) and gives a canticle of thanks.  Man, Mary is finally getting a decent role.  Matthew and Mark downplayed her some – especially Matthew – but Luke gives her a place of prominence. 

John is born, and it’s a little confusing with how pronouns are used, but I think John starts speaking the word of God upon birth.  Yeah, I don’t buy that.  We’re told that all over the hill country of Judah people marveled about John.  Like I said – tall tales getting taller over time.  Luke may have investigated these events, but it sounds like anything impressive that he heard he assumed was true and put it in.  Thus the most impressive folk tales made it in.

The chapter ends with a canticle from John’s dad, Zechariah. 

CHAPTER 2

Finally, Christ is born.  Like Matthew, Luke wants Jesus born in Bethlehem.  Luke doesn’t mention any prophecies needing to be fulfilled, but it’s clear that’s the case.  That said, Luke’s cover story for explaining how Christ – known to be from Nazareth – was born in Bethlehem.  Luke claims it is due to an imperial census from Augustus.  He orders a census, and wants everyone to go back to their original hometown to be registered properly.

Wait – what?  Huh?  That doesn’t make any sense.  First, we have decent records from the era from Roman officials –and there is zero evidence for this census outside of this gospel, so it’s unlikely.  Second – and much more strangely – who the hell orders everyone to return to their hometown for a census?  Why oh why would that be necessary?  Why would the government care?  What a massive logistical clusterfuck this would be!  Hell, if the Roman Empire really cared where people’s hometown was from – they would just ask people that as part of the survey.  You don’t actually have to move everyone around.  And the reason why Bethlehem is the hometown is weak – Joseph is a descendent of David, who was from there.  Yeah – but that was 1,000 years ago!  C’mon!

Anyhow, Joseph and very pregnant Mary go there.  The inns have no room, so Christ is born in a manger.  OK, that’s where we get that image from – from Luke.

As soon as Jesus is born, he has some visitors who give him gifts.  No, not the Magi.  That’s in Matthew.  Here, it is some shepherds. An angel told them a newborn king was born and they should honor him.  I don’t really know why these nameless shepherds would get the good news, but they do. 

After being born, Jesus is taken to the temple.  Naturally, several people immediately recognize the glory that he’ll become.  (Funny – people notice this at his birth, when there is no real indication of his personality – but no one else figures it out for 30 years.  Man, Luke is really laying it on a bit too thick here).  The parents (Luke inaccurately calls Joseph the father, overlooking the virgin birth of the first chapter), are amazed at this reaction.  That makes some sense – but they should have some idea of this.  I mean, an angel already visited Mary and all. 

Oh, and the chapter ends with another famous story – one not in Matthew or Mark.  At age 12, the clan Christ goes to the temple in Jerusalem (just like they dutifully do every year, we’re told) and Jesus stays behind.  The family looks for him for three days, only to find him in the Temple, asking questions and really impressing anyone with his wisdom.

It’s a nice story, but it would be more believable if Luke hadn’t laid it on so thick here in the early chapters.  The power of this story is lessened when you’ve gone too far with people stumbling over themselves to declare the baby Christ the Messiah upon sight. 

Two chapters – long ones (132 verses in all) and five verses – all on stuff that predates the first line in Mark.

CHAPTER 3

Now we get into the main action.  John the Baptist is a full adult, and of course he’s preaching.  Unlike Matthew and Mark, there is nothing about eating honey and locusts here.  There is one weird difference.  Whereas previous gospels had him call the Pharisees a “brood of vipers” here the Baptist says that to the crowd that comes out to be baptized by him.  Huh?  Why would he say that to his followers?  That makes no sense.  Well, I guess Baptist is trying to using guilt to make people come to him – but that doesn’t sound to effective yet.  The whole Christian guilt ethos hasn’t really developed yet. 

The Baptist gives out some moral calls.  If you have two tunics, give one to someone else.  Tax collectors – take less from the people.  Soldiers – don’t commit fraud.  Everyone – act well to your fellow man.  Then he tells everyone that someone mightier than him is coming, and “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”  Hey – that’s just what Matthew said (but Mark left out the fire part).  Christ shows up and then John baptizes him.  Actually, in a weird ordering issue, Luke first tells us that John is arrested by the authorities, and then gives the story of him baptizing Christ.  Luke needed a better editor here.

Rather weirdly, Luke decides to plunk down Christ’s genealogy right here, going all the way back to Adam.  I’ve been told that from Abraham-onward (the part covered in Matthew), that there are differences here and Matthew, but it’s too boring for me to go back and check myself.

Oh, and Luke tells us that Christ was 30 years old when he began to minister.  So that’s where we get that. 

CHAPTER 4

Now that Jesus has been baptized, it’s time for Satan to tempt him.  Like Matthew, we get details in Luke.  It’s the same three temptations – but strangely enough, the order is different.  The second and third ones get flipped.  Here, Satan offers Christ power, and after that tells him to prove he’s God’s son by jumping off a tower.  That last temptation still sounds like a terrible one from Satan. 

Unlike the other gospels, Christ begins his teaching in his hometown. Again, he’s rejected.  It’s a great story, but Luke (being Luke) has to sell it too hard to lose some of its power.  Christ gives some teaching, and the people are amazed.  Then they wonder, “can this really be the carpenter’s kid?” and Christ gives his famous line about a prophet not having honor in his hometown. 

It would be fine if Luke just ended it there; it’s where the other gospels end the story. But no, Christ needs to keep going in Luke.  He blasts them, noting how Elisha and Elijah had better luck preaching to people outside the Children of Israel.  The crowd becomes irate and forces him out of town physically.  The other gospels just have them reject him.  Luke has them throw him out. 

This is part of a theme in Luke.  This is the most anti-Semitic of the gospels, written by someone from outside.  So he lays on hard the Jewish rejection of Christ right here, and not for the last time in this gospel.

In fact, immediately after that, Luke’s Christ cures the servant of a Roman centurion.  It’s the same story as in Matthew, but it’s interesting placement, especially given how Christ praises the Roman’s faith.  And doubly so given what Christ said about Elisha and Elijah in his rant against his hometown crowd. 

One other thing – in the background of Luke, there are constantly people talking.  The great unwashed masses keep talking and murmuring to each other in Luke.  For example, when Christ cures the centurion’s servant, Luke writes: “They were all amazed and said to one another, `What is there about his word?’”  This happens more in Luke than previous gospels, it seems to me.

Next Christ cure’s Simon’s mother-in-law, which is odd because Christ hasn’t met Simon/Peter yet.  Again – editor needed.  He cures other people, and one demon comes out of a person screaming, “You are the Son of God.”  Man, this Son of God talk is a lot more open here.  You get two angel visits before his birth.  You get a few people that recognize him as the Messiah on sight.  Now a demon even recognizes him.  Plus Satan and his temptations.  Luke is really laying it on thick; too thick.

CHAPTER 5

OK, so now Christ forms his posse, getting the fishermen first.  Never mind that he cured Simon’s mother-in-law last time  - here is where they meet.  In fact, Christ does a miracle just to get him on board.  In Matthew and Luke he just told them to come with him to become fishers of men.  Here, Jesus performs a miracle to get them on board.  Simon and the others are having a rough go of it, then Christ tells them to cast down their nets where they are.  They do and they get so many fish, that their weight threatens to sink their boat.  I got to admit, that makes their willingness to follow Christ sound more believable.  A guy walks up to them and tells them to come, and they abandon their lives and families – the story in Matthew and Mark – sounds extremely underwritten.  I guess they don’t like fishing.

The rest is stories we’ve already seen without much new.  He heals a leper, a paralytic, gets support from a tax collector named Levi, and has his first run-ins with the Pharisees. 

CHAPTER 6

Christ and the Pharisees continue to go at it here.  We’ve seen almost all of this before, but there is one interesting difference.  Someone with a withered hand comes up to Christ on the Sabbath to be healed.  We’ve seen this before – Christ heals them, and then the Pharisees denounce him for healing on the Sabbath, and Christ defends himself.  That was Matthew and Mark. 

This time Christ preempts them Pharisees.  The debate comes first – and with Jesus initiating it.  He gets the drop on them in the debate – it’s really more an explanation than a debate, with Christ explaining why it’s right to heel on a Sabbath – and then he heels.  The Pharisees, totally preempted, can just grumble to themselves. 

The rest of the chapter is Christ’s greatest hits.  It’s a greatly abbreviated version of the Sermon on the Mount, except that Luke says it’s on a plain instead of a mountain.  And Luke adds in great moral statements that are scattered throughout Matthew. 

It’s still a great speech, but Matthew’s version is still the great version.  That was three full chapters full of great statements.   This is most of one chapter.  

Click here for the next part of Luke.

Luke main page

Chapters 1 to 6
Chapters 7 to 12
Chapters 13 to 18
Chapters 19 to 24

Mark: Chapters 13 to 16

Click for the previous part of Mark

CHAPTER 13

It’s the last chapter before we get to the end game. 

Jesus foretells the destruction of Jerusalem, the Temple and all of that.  It’s a really, really bleak vision – and we read it already in Matthew (never mind that Mark wrote it first and Matthew just took it from him).  This section is the main reason scholars typically estimate that Mark was written in the aftermath of the failed Jewish Revolt against Rome; in which the Temple and the city were totally destroyed – and all the horrors Christ describes pretty much came true. 

But this chapter is what Matthew already noted in Chapters 24-25.

CHAPTER 14

The last three chapters cover the same ground as the last three chapters of Matthew: 1) the arrest of Christ, 2) his execution, and 3) his resurrection. 

The main outline is the exact same.  But that just makes the differences a bit more interesting.  Once again, perfumed oils are put on Christ, and the apostles are unhappy, saying the money used for it could’ve been given to the poor.  This time, however, they go into a bit more detail, giving us a greater sense just how valuable the perfumed oil was.  We’re told it could’ve been sold for more than 300 days wages.  Yowza!  Imagine that in modern life. 

Doing about 20 seconds searching on the internet (so the answer I got must be true!), in the year 2013, an average day’s wage in the US is $70.  Thus 300 days wages comes out to ….$21,000!  My oh my that is some nice perfumed oil!  OK – I’m sure the average per capita income on ancient Judah was far lower – but that makes it even worse to some extent.  Those people were poorer, and they could use something of value that much more.  This little extra detail makes Christ look a bit worse – hence maybe why Matthew excluded it.

The rest goes just as it had in Matthew – until the Last Supper.  Oh, the big items are still the same.  Wine is still blood, and the wafer is still the body.  The doctrine of transubstantiation is still holding up.   The difference is that Matthew adds an extra phrase.  Mark quotes Jesus saying, “This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many.”  But in Matthew it read:  “This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of the many for the forgiveness of their sins.” Depending on how you look at it, Matthew either decided to clarify what was already there in Mark – or he helps create (or at least further develop) the theology of the early Christian church.  It was more important to stress that the communion is to help one’s sins be forgiven by the time Matthew put pen to papyrus. 

Christ then tells Peter he’ll thrice deny him – but there is an odd difference.  Here, the denials will happen before the cock crows twice.  In Matthew, it’s just the cock crowing.  Sure enough, when the time comes, Peter will do it just before the second cock crow.  Rather oddly, the first cock crow is added in seemingly by an editor, as its in brackets.  It’s a weird quirk and I can see why Matthew cleaned it up. It flows better the way he does it.

Christ again prays in the Garden.  A reader pointed out something important to me after I covered it in Matthew.  That scene in the garden is one of the more powerful scenes in the entire Bible.  I’ve said all along in this project that the Bible is at its best when it is at its most human, and Christ is rarely so human as he is in the garden.  He is praying to God for help because he doesn’t want to go through with it.  That is a deeply human reaction.  Also, it’s relatable.  Everyone has their doubts.  No Christian is a pure saint.  But here, they can look up to Christ and see that even he had his doubts.  So they can take some solace and sympathy in that.  Powerful stuff, man, powerful stuff.  Also – it’s scenes like this that help the case for the historical Jesus.  If he wasn’t real, it’s not likely they’d make up a story of Christ doubting, well, his own divinity.  It’s counterintuitive.

The arrest scene has a few differences.  Actually, wait – I forgot one thing from earlier.  Mark in general has less info on Judas than Matthew did.  Matthew had Judas sell out Christ for 30 pieces of silver.  We get no denomination in Mark. (Later on, Matthew ties this to a fictional prophecy, and then has Judas’s death become the basis for a place called the Field of Blood.  There is nothing like that in Mark.  Matthew plays up the story of Judas more).

Anyhow, both Matthew and Mark have the same basic story of the arrest – the kiss of betrayal, the scuffle, (note: I thought Matthew said the priest lost his ear, but no – I misread that.  It was the priest’s servant who lost an ear, just as it is in Mark), Christ arrested.  But there are some differences.

First, the great line from Matthew isn’t here.  Matthew had Christ tell Judas: “Friend, do what you have come for.”  It helps play up the story of Judas, but it’s left out of Mark.  Instead, Mark has his own addition – and it’s a weird one.  During the arrest, all the apostles fled (just as in Matthew).  But Mark tells us, as Christ was led away, “Now a young man followed him wearing nothing but a linen cloth about his body.  They seized him, but he left the cloth behind and ran off naked.”

Oh, and after the arrest we never see Judas again.  Matthew had him throw the money away and kill himself, but once again that’s Matthew focusing more on the Judas end of the story.

The. Hell?  That’s a doozy to just throw in there.  No name or anything, either. Just a naked guy running off as Christ is arrest.  It makes so little sense, that I assume it really happened.  Some guy was sleeping without much clothing on, and lost his cloak to the soldiers and ran off naked.  Sure – these things, they happen.  But it’s such a senseless part of the story that it’s no wonder Matthew edited it out.

Oh, and Christ has a similar angry reaction as in Matthew, but Jesus has been angry so many times that it just looks like him getting irked off again.  Actually, it goes on longer in Matthew.  There, Christ says that if he wanted to resist, he could call on his father to send a flock of angels down to save him.  That isn’t in Mark, though. Assuming that Matthew was getting his story from Mark, he decided to add that extra element, to further show Christ’s divinity. 

Christ stands before his accusers and they sentence him to death.  Meanwhile, Peter does thrice deny Jesus.

CHAPTER 15

Jesus Christ dies.  Again – it’s the same basic story as in Matthew.  There is Pilate and the choice before the crowd of freeing Barabas and Jesus.  He’s crucified (and again, it’s some other guy carrying the cross.  Huh).  Jesus dies, and the Temple’s sanctuary curtain again tears just then.  Jesus is buried.

OK, so how does Mark contrast with Matthew in the particulars?  First, Pilate seemed to have a reduced role here.  (Or, more accurately, Matthew expanded on Pilate’s role compared to what the earlier written Mark had done).  The whole Pilate sequence takes 26 verses in Matthew, but just 15 in Mark.  Well, much of that is Matthew wrapping up the Judas story, but even still – there is some differences.

Most notably, Mark doesn’t have Pilate washes his hands of the affair, and claim him innocent of this man’s blood.  The main story is the same, but Matthew wanted to add that.  As a general rule of thumb, the more you play up Pilate, the more you’re trying to absolve Rome of blame and/or the more you’re trying to put the blame squarely on the Jews for Christ’s death. 

Along those lines, Mark also has a slightly toned down scene with Barabas.  Oh, it’s all basically the same, with the Jews calling to free Barabas instead of Christ.  However, this time he’s listed as a rebel “who had committed murder in a rebellion” whereas Matthew just called him, “a notorious prisoner.”  He sounds worse in Matthew – and thus the Jews sound worse for wanting to kill him. 

Both gospels have the crowd become more militant when Pilate asks them if they’re sure they want Barabas to go – but in Matthew they are so agitated that Pilate fears a riot.  Not so in Mark.  There is a clear trend here of putting all the blame on the Jews in Matthew.  You get a similar theme in Mark, but it’s not so starkly done. 

The crucifixion scene in Mark is mentioned in Bart D. Ehrman’s book “Misquoting Jesus” in which he discusses how the Bible was changed by the copyists.  In this scene, though, he looks not at a change that is still in the Bible, but one that was used in ancient times in some Bibles.  Instead of asking “My God, My god, why have you forsaken me?” some copyists turned “forsaken” into “mocked.”

The reason?  It dealt with theology.  Some early believers – before church doctrine was really solidified in the fourth century – thought that Jesus and Christ were separate, and that on the cross the spirit of Christ left the carpenter Jesus.  This statement of forsaking was taken as the moment when Christ left Jesus.  For various reasons, the people that believed this theology really liked the book of Mark – it was their favorite gospel.  So some copyist tried to undermine them in their favorite gospel.  He figured “mocked” would hurt their theory. 

Christ dies, and once again Mary Magdalene makes her first appearance then – along with the Virgin Mary. Mark, like Matthew, also downplays the mom’s role, but not as seriously as Matthew had.  Whereas Matthew kept calling her “the other Mary,” Mark repeatedly refers to her as “Mary the mother of the younger James and Joses” – guys already listed in Mark as Christ’s brothers.  So both acknowledge Mary’s family connection without really making too big a deal of it.

Christ is buried, but there is a big difference here with Matthew.  In Matthew, the author goes to great pains to explain to us that Christ’s tomb was guarded by Roman soldiers to ensure no one disturbed it.  Matthew went over so many charges and counter-charges between Jews and Christians over how Jesus’s body came to disappear that I thought it had a ring of truth to it – real disputes over how the guarded tomb became empty.  But there is nothing like that in Mark.  There are no guards mentioned at all. There is just a stone rolled by a centurion with the two Marys looking. 

CHAPTER 16

This is one of the most amazing moments in the history of Biblical archeology.  Throughout the gospels so far, I’ve noted the writings of Bart D. Ehrman as he has tried to tell the masses about Biblical scholarship on the New Testament.  A main focus for him has always been how the word of the Bible has change, and the copies we’ve found from the New Testament are often different from each other – and sometimes different from out modern Bible.  Occasionally, these changes have big theological importance – and they’re never greater than in the last chapter of Mark.

Here is the story of Mark – according to the oldest and best surviving copies of the Gospel we have from ancient times. 

Mary Magdalene and “Mary, the mother of James and Salome” (another Christ sibling) go to the tomb.  To their surprise, the rock has been rolled away.  They go in, and see a young man (no identity beyond that given) in a white cloak.  He tells them that Jesus has been raised from the dead.  He tells the women to go to “the disciples and Peter” (I guess that means Peter is leader, not just disciple now.  I guess).  They should tell the apostles to go to Galilee to see Jesus there. The two Marys, stunned and scared, flee the tomb.  Instead of telling the apostles, “they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”

THE END.

Wait, wait – time out, WHAT?  How the hell do you end the story like that?  You have some guy saying Christ has been raised – but no Christ himself!  You have the mystery man telling the Marys to tell the gang – but they never do!  It’s the most unsatisfying and abrupt ending of all time. The hell?

Yeah, I guess it shouldn’t be too surprising that the version we have isn’t this version.  Boy, if copiers were ever going to make any additions, they’d make them here.  You can’t really blame them.  I bet some copier must’ve though,  “Man, whoever copied this before me must’ve had the last page missing.  That sucks – we have an incomplete version!  What might it say?  Well, let me give it a crack….”

And so we get our more modern – and more conventional – ending.  The Marys never talk, but that’s fine – Christ showed up.  Jesus first appears to two (unnamed) apostles.  They tell the rest, but aren’t believed. Then suddenly Jesus is with all of them.  He gives them the mission to spread the word to all the world and then ascends into heaven. 

Let’s take stock for a second.  Matthew had the apostles see Christ in Galilee, and the mystery man in tomb here in Mark also wants them to go to Galilee.  So there is that similarity.  But when Christ actually does see the apostles in Mark – it’s apparently in Jerusalem. 

Actually, both Mark and Matthew have their own degrees of ambiguity on Christ’s return from the grave.  It’s very stark in Mark, the oldest of the gospels.  As originally written, we’re just told Christ is risen – that’s it.  In Matthew, we’re told the apostles first aren’t really sure what they’re seeing.

Anyhow, what the hell was the point in Mark?  I really don’t know.  Throughout, though, we’ve seen the apostles come off poorly.  Maybe he didn’t want the apostles to get that glory.  Did Christ return? Sure – but the important thing is that WE know he returned. Screw them apostles.  Whoever wrote this really didn’t think much of them.  From reading Ehrman and some other Biblical scholars, there is reason to think – good reason – that St. Paul often clashed with the original apostles.  That doesn’t mean he wrote this (unlikely, as he was dead by the time he wrote this), but whoever wrote it wanted Paul’s version to triumph over the other strands of Christianity.  But it left a deeply unsatisfying ending, and as time went on, those other strands weren’t as important. (The others were based on Jerusalem, which of course had been totally destroyed).  So future gospels would let Christ see the savior, thinking that helped the story more than a swipe at the apostles.

Just a theory, but it’s the best I can do.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

I can believe that this was the first one written.  It does feel like Matthew cribbed from it when writing his gospel. 

But I can also see why Matthew gets top billing.  That was a more satisfying gospel – if for no reason than it had all the teachings of Christ, like the Sermon on the Mount, that Mark is in the dark about.

It’s an intriguing gospel here, with interesting hints on Jesus.  Was Jesus really as frequently peeved as Mark makes him out to be?  Maybe, but it’s hard to say. Given that Mark doesn’t know Christ’s teachings, it’s doubtful that he ever met him, after all. 

An interesting read, indeed, but I can see why Matthew is more popular.  

Click here to start Luke.

Mark: Chapters 6 to 12

Click here for the first part of Mark.

CHAPTER 6

This begins with one my favorite parts of the Bible – where Jesus goes back home and is rejected.  There are a few minor differences between this and the same story from Matthew: Chapter 13. 

First, when Christ teaches at the synagogue, the people say, “Is he not the carpenter, son of Mary?”  OK, this is the only place in the entire Bible where Christ is personally called a carpenter.  Elsewhere, he is the son of a carpenter.  Here, it’s just “son of Mary.”  That’s odd by itself, because normally a kid isn’t referred to by his mom back in those days.

According to “Misquoting Jesus” by Bart D. Ehrman, there is an explanation.  Our oldest copies of Mark have this line as “son of a carpenter” but somewhere along the way, a scribe’s pen slipped, and that became the modern version.

Both Matthew and Mark have the locals mention Jesus’s siblings, but it’s a little different here.  In Mark, Jesus is “the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon” and “Are not his sisters here among us?”  It’s almost the same in Matthew – but it’s Joseph, not Joses for the second brother’s name.  But the brother “Joses” will get mentioned again in Chapter 15 of Mark.  It’s not a big point, but it is a discrepancy.

Then John the Baptist is killed and it’s the same ugly story as in Matthew.  Actually, it’s a little uglier here, as we’re specifically told the dancer is the daughter of Herod.  Ewwww.  Actually, Mark does a better job explaining why he felt he had to keep his word to her.  He’d promised her in front of other people.  He’d look bad for backing down now. 

All this fear about killing the Baptist causing some uprising turns out to be entirely unfounded.  The Baptist dies and no one does anything.  Well, I guess it does help the Jesus movement. 

Anyhow, the disciples are told to go out and they do.  They come back.  5,000 are fed on hardly any loaves.  Christ walks on water.  It’s all stuff we saw in mid-Matthew.

But there is one difference of note in the walk on water story.  In Matthew, when Christ walked on water, that’s when the apostles began to figure out who he really was: “Those who were in the boat did him homage, saying,  `Truly you are the Son of God.’” (Matthew: 14:36).

It plays out differently here. Mark says, “They were completely astounded.  They had not understood the incident of the loaves.  On the contrary, their hearts were hardened.”  Wait – what?  Instead of realizing that Jesus is the Son of God, “their hearts were hardened.”  We’ve seen that language before – that’s the language of the pharaoh versus Moses.  It’s the language of someone denying God.  And that’s what Mark has the apostles do here.  That’s rather astonishing.

I don’t know fully what to make of that.  I’ll say this much.  First, it’s the best sign yet of the apostles never really getting it in the Gospel According to Mark.  Whoever wrote this didn’t think much of the original 12.  Second, it is even more evidence that the attributed writer isn’t actual Mark, longtime assistant to Peter.  If he really thought that little of Peter, he wouldn’t spend so long with him. 

CHAPTER 7

It’s more Christ versus the Pharisees stuff that we saw in mid-Matthew.  The Pharisees accuse Christ of not following tradition, and lays right back into them.  He says they disregard God’s commandments to follow human customs.  I don’t quite know what’s the basis for Christ’s claims here.  Say what you will about the Pharisees, but they base all their ideas from the Torah, and that’s believed to be the word of God.  I guess Christ thinks that some rulers are but in there just because humans are weak and it’s actually watered down the word of God.  Jesus says this in Matthew (but I don’t know if he says that here in Mark). 

Well, to be fair, Christ does quote Moses back to them.  His basic approach is that strictest equals best.  Jesus is holding people to the higher standard, and he’s appalled that the Pharisees don’t.  There’s an irony here.  The Pharisees are the needless sticklers for rules – but Christ is also calling for some strict standards.  Only for Christ, it’s not about having many laws, but just strict following of the high standards of his fewer laws.

When that’s done, the apostles question Jesus about what his parables mean.  Once again, Jesus is annoyed at them.  “Are even you likewise without understanding?”  Just one chapter after the apostles came off as impossibly dense, now they’re just routinely dense.  Christ says the same thing in Matthew, but the context overall is different.  In Matthew, it was occasional chastisements sprinkled with moments when the apostles figure things out (like Jesus being the son of God).  In Mark, you don’t get as much positive to wash out the negatives.

Oh, Christ finally helps a gentile in Mark.  There were more of them in Matthew, but here you have a Greek woman with faith in Mark.

The chapter ends with a disgusting cure.  A man is deaf and blind and Christ helps him but putting his finger in the man’s ears, and then splitting, and touching his tongue.  At first I misread that and thought he was giving the guy a wet Willie, but no – finger in ear first, spitting second.  Still – what an unfortunate sequence to go through to help the man.

CHAPTER 8

It’s more stuff we read bout in Matthew: a second mass feeding, Christ blows off the Pharisees demand for a sign, and some healings. 

One odd thing both here and Matthew.  Oftentimes, Christ speaks to people from a boat.  When big crowds show up, he’s often in a boat.  Why is he in boats so often?  The Bible makes is sound like that’s the best way to get his voice out to many, but I don’t get it.  This whole boating prophet thing just seems weird.

Also, once again Christ lays into his apostles for being slow.  At one point, Jesus lays into them about as harshly as he ever does, saying, “Why do you conclude that it is because you have no bread?  Do you not yet understand or comprehend?  Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear? And do you not remember when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many wicker baskets full of fragments you picked up?”  One or two rhetorical questions should be enough – but when you just keep going on like this, you’re badgering them. 

Also, it’s weird that both here and Matthew that there are two separate feeding stories. It’s the same basic feeding story, but told twice. This sort of thing happened a lot in the Old Testament, and the best understanding for it would be that you had two sources combined into one.  Thus you get Abraham twice tell people Sarah was his sister. Twice the world was created.  And so on.  Is Mark drawing from two sources?  That’s tricky, because he’s writing not that much after Christ’s death?  Maybe he made some inquiries and heard two variations on the same tale – and put both in.  Then Matthew decided to follow Mark’s lead.  It’s just weird you get two feeding stories like this.

However, at the end of the chapter, we finally – finally! – get an apostle figuring something out.  Christ asks who do people say I am, and Peter figures out he’s the Messiah.  DING!  Good one, Peter.  That makes the score Peter 1, other apostles 0. 

The build up is similar to Matthew’s Chapter 16. Christ asks who do people say I am, and they start off with some wrong guesses – then Peter wins the prize.  Aye, but what happens afterward is different.  Here, the story ends with Peter guessing correctly.  In Matthew, Jesus praises Peter extensively, calling him the rock upon which Jesus will found his church and giving Peter the keys to the kingdom of heaven.  There is nothing like that in Mark.  Even when an apostle gets one right in Mark, they don’t come off as well as they did in Matthew.

Mark may not give Christ’s praise of Peter, but he does have Jesus insult Peter in the next section.  As in Matthew, right at this point in the story, Jesus tells everyone how the story will end.  Again, Peter protests.  And again Christ yells at him, “Get behind me, Satan!”  So we lack Peter being the rock the church will be founded upon in Mark, but he’s still insulted a few verses later.  The apostles just can’t win in this gospel.

CHAPTER 9

Again, the stories here were given in Matthew.  Christ goes up to a mountain with his lead apostles and Moses and Elijah come. Christ cures some people.  Jesus predicts how the gospel will end.  He cures more people.

Some notes about it.  First, here is one a reader brought to my attention.  In Matthew, the lead apostles see Jesus with Elijah and Moses on the mountain and are amazed.  The question: how would they know it’s Elijah and Moses?  There are no photos, after all.  Well, maybe they had nametags. 

Also, when Jesus cures a boy of a demon, he sounds downright peeved.  He’s not upset with the boy, but – of course – with his apostles.  Either Jesus picked some really crummy apostles or he’s just too tough a boss. 

It’s a weird story.  A man bring a mute and apparently epileptic son for Jesus to cure.  He tells Jesus that the apostles tried to drive the boy away.  Really?  Man, the apostles are dicks in Mark.  Jesus sure thinks so, exclaiming to them, “O faithless generation, how long will I be with you?  How long will I endure you?” 

Later on, Jesus blasts the boy’s father. The father asks Christ to cure the boy “If you can.”  Well, that just sets off our Messiah: “If you can!  Everything is possible to one who has faith.”  Jesus comes off as rather peevish in this story.  Frankly, he comes off as peevish throughout Mark.  It all makes it more likely that the story really did have him be upset at the leper he cured at the end of Chapter 1.  It would be in character in this gospel.

CHAPTER 10

In a bit of a rarity in Mark, we get some teachings from Christ here.  It focuses on key matters, too – marriage and divorce.  It’s similar to what Jesus said in Chapter 19 of Matthew.  Jesus is against divorce and thinks the Torah’s acceptance of it was due to human weaknesses instead of being a real part of God’s plan.  But, perhaps more importantly, this is significantly different from Matthew beyond that.  In Matthew, Christ went on to tacitly endorse celibacy; saying that abstaining is the best course, but for those who can’t do that, marriage is the next best option.  In Mark, Jesus moves on to other subjects after talking of divorce.  

In particular, Jesus moves on to insulting his apostles.  Yes, again.  Now they’re trying to keep children from Jesus.  No reason is given.  I guess the apostles don’t like kids.  Jesus rebukes them, saying, “Let the children come to me; don not prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.”  Matthew tells part of this story.  Sort of. In Matthew, no one prevents the kids from coming to Christ.  They just come and he says those nice words.  Matthew edited out the part where the apostles were dinks and Jesus tells them to get bent.

Next comes the rich man who will have a harder time entering heaven than a camel would in passing through the eye of a needle.  That’s in Matthew, too (this entire chapter is Matthew 19, essentially).  If nothing else, it lets us know where Christ’s socioeconomic base came from: the down and outs.

In a rarity, Jesus is nice to his prophets for a stretch.  He says people must give up everything to enter heaven, and when Peter says they’ve done that, Christ congratulates them.  So that’s nice of him (for once). 

After predicting how the gospel will end (third time now he’s done that), there comes a story that has been modestly changed from Matthew (Chapter 20 of Matthew, this time).  It involves apostle brothers James and John.  They ask Christ if they can sit next to him when it’s time to judge all.  That’s almost what happened in Matthew.  In Matthew, it was their mother that made the big request.  I thought that sounded odd in Matthew.  Heck, he didn’t even know her name, just calling her, “the mother of the sons of Zebedee” – an awkward formulation if ever there was one. 

But this is part of a theme throughout. Mark makes the apostles look bad.  Matthew displaced the request onto the mother so they don’t look so bad.  Matthew consistently improves how the apostles come off in his gospels. 

CHAPTER 11

Time to enter Jerusalem.  This is a little less confusing than the similar story in Matthew: Chapter 21. There, they had a cold and a donkey with cloaks put over both to help fulfill a prophecy that Matthew didn’t understand.  (Matthew didn’t realize that colt and donkey could refer to the same animal in some Old Testament writings).  Mark isn’t as concerned with having Christ fulfill prophecies as Matthew was, and so just has Christ enter on a colt.  (In both stories, Jesus’s friends borrow a colt for him). 

As in Matthew, Christ creates a ruckus in the temple, and then kills a tree.  It’s the same stuff as in Matthew 21. 

The elders question Jesus authority but he dismisses them the same way as in Matthew.  He gives them a retaliation question – tell me what authority that John baptized people by.  Again, they don’t want to take a stand, and so Jesus uses that as an excuse to not answer their question.

CHAPTER 12

As is normally the case, most of this was in Matthew.  We get some parables, the “repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar” story, a question about Resurrection that Matthew covered in his 22^nd chapter, and the greatest commandment.

In that last part, things veer away from Matthew.  Both Matthew and Mark have the same root base.  In both cases, Christ’s enemies ask him what’s the most important commandment and he tells them to worship only God.  In both cases, Christ follows that up with a bonus – the next most important part is to love your neighbor as yourself. 

However, whereas Matthew stops the story at this moment in time, Mark keeps going.  A scribe talks to Jesus and notes how important it is to love others.  Jesus agrees, saying “You are not far from the kingdom of God” because he understood the lesson so well.  That’s an interesting bit of Matthew to edit out.   Why would he do that?  My theory is that it relates to the overall difference in how they treat the apostles.  Mark makes them look bad while Matthew makes them look good.  So when Matthew came across this story, “Boy, not only does Mark trash the apostles, but he then makes some unnamed scribe look good?  Boy, I better leave that out.”  It’s part of the process of making the apostles look better.  Making some unnamed scribe seem like he gets Christ when his own apostles don’t can be an indirect swipe at the apostles.

Or maybe there is something different going on.  Maybe Matthew just doesn’t like scribes.  Shortly after the above story, Mark denounces the scribes “who go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplace.”  In Mark, it’s a brief denouncing – just three verses.  But in Matthew it goes on forever – it’s much of Chapter 23.  Clearly, Matthew has a bigger gripe with the official powers that be in the Hebrew land.  Interesting.

The chapter ends with a story not in Matthew.  Jesus sees people give contributions to the temple.  Some rich guys give like big shots, but a poor woman gives a little bit.  Jesus sees the poor woman gave more than the others.  The others gave from their surplus, but she gave from their poverty.  It’s a nice sentiment.  They’re giving, but she’s giving when it hurts to give.  

Click here for the conclusion to Mark.

Mark: Chapters 1 to 5

Click here for the end of Matthew.

CHAPTER 1

The Gospel According to Mark – scholars pretty much all believe that this was the first written of the gospels, and that Matthew and Luke drew on it as a source.  In fact, so much of Mark was already in Matthew, that you get déjà vu when reading this one – so much “been there, read that.”  It’s pretty clear that Mark was using Matthew as a source, because it wouldn’t make much sense to cut out all the stuff left in the editing room.  Mark is more about what Jesus did.  There isn’t too much on what he said.  Sure, there are some parables, but there isn’t nearly as much teaching as in Matthew.  The Sermon on the Mount, for instance, isn’t here.

The work is written anonymously, but has been attributed to Mark – or John Mark as he is sometimes called.  (The gospel is shortened to just Mark because there is already a Gospel According to John thank you very much).  Anyhow, Mark most notably is known as an accompanier and interpreter for St. Peter. 

According to Bart D. Ehrman’s “Jesus, Interrupted,” the tradition that Mark wrote a gospel goes back to at least the second century AD.  Our earliest source is a man named Papias, who wrote that Mark never saw/heard Christ himself, but accompanied Peter for a long time, and thus wrote down, a list of the Lord’s sayings, including everything he knew Jesus said. 

Two problems with that, as Ehrman notes.  First, if it’s everything he knew Christ said (after a long time hanging with St. Peter) shouldn’t this be a longer book.  You can read it out loud from cover to cover in a few hours, no sweat.  Second: Papias says it’s a list of Christ’s sayings, but there really aren’t many teachings of Jesus in this one at all.  That’s more in the others.  Actually, based on what Papias said, Mark might be the author of the theorized Q source, the list of sayings that some scholars believed Matthew and Luke used when writing their gospels. 

Actually, there is another problem beyond all that.  OK, so Mark wrote this, and Mark was a longtime companion of the chief apostle.  Yeah, well – the apostles in general don’t come off too well here.  That’s mighty curious if it was written by an apostle’s assistant.  Not impossible, but certainly unexpected.

Oh, and one other thing.  Everything else Papias ever wrote was debunked.  It wasn’t just debunked by modern scholars, but debunked by early church leaders.  In fact, we have nothing left from Papias’ own writings – except when other early church founders quote him to rebut him.  But they accepted what he said on the writing of the gospels.  And clearly, his statements indicate that there was some tradition of this Mark fellow writing on Christ, and we had this anonymous gospel here – so it became attributed to him. 

OK, now for the gospel itself.  There is no virgin birth.  There is no Star of Bethlehem.  There is anything like that.  The story begins with John the Baptist preaching.  Mark doesn’t waste time with any set up.  Throughout, he’ll be quick and too the point – overly so; abrupt even. 

Well, for the most part what we learn here is what we already learned in Matthew.  John baptizes people while eating honey and locusts and foretelling of the more important one who will come after him – the Messiah.  One interesting difference between this John and Matthew’s John.  Here, he says, “I have baptized you with water, he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”  Yeah, Matthew recorded it as “baptize you with the holy Spirit and fire.”  I don’t quite get why Matthew made that addition, but there you go. 

Christ gets baptized and goes off into the desert for 40 days.  Satan tempts him – but we get no details.  Matthew went into detail on the three temptations, but Mark just says Jesus, “remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan.”  That’s it. 

Jesus again comes out, learns that the Baptist is now in jail, and so Jesus begins his preaching.  In Matthew, Christ withdraws to Galilee to fulfill a prophecy of yore.  Here, he just goes to Galilee.  There is far less emphasis in Mark on making Jesus fulfill Old Testament prophecies.  Christ’s first words are, “This is the time of fulfillment.  The kingdom of God is at hand.  Repent, and believe in the gospel.”  It was kingdom of heaven in Matthew.  That’s a minor difference, but more impersonal with Matthew. 

Jesus gets the same first for disciples as in Matthew – the two sets of brothers: Simon and Andrew, and James and John.  Interesting – Mark doesn’t indicate that Simon will later be known as Peter here, unlike Matthew.  (Doubly interesting, given that this was supposedly written by Peter’s aid).

Christ does his first healings, and there is one new thing I noted.  It isn’t actually new here, but it’s something I didn’t catch in Matthew.  Jesus goes to cure the mother-in-law of Peter (still called just Simon here).  Jesus does it – but hold on, Simon’s mother-in-law?  Yeah, I guess Simon was married.  Interesting, as he clearly won’t take his family with him when he goes off with Jesus.  Also: in Matthew this story appears in Chapter 8.  It takes places midway through the first chapter in Mark!  My goodness, things are moving quick!

At the end of a chapter comes an incident analyzed at length in another Ehrman book, “Misquoting Jesus.”  Some background is required. In that book, Ehrman takes on our copies of the Bible. We have no original copies of anything from the Bible.  We don’t have any copies of the originals.  We mostly have copies of copies of copies of copies.

The ancient world isn’t like modern times.  All copies of the same book now can be easily understood to say the exact same things.  Not so in ancient times.  Then it was always copied out word-for-word, letter-for-letter.  That opened the way for errors to be introduced.  It was especially problematic in early Christian centuries when the people doing it were amateurs who didn’t have as much training – and maybe their literacy was shaky.

People wouldn’t intentionally goof things up.  Most goofs were just accidental and minor – grammar crud.  But sometimes a scribe would make a change, intentionally. It wasn’t done with malice.  Maybe what he read sounded so off that he assumed a previous scribe had screwed it up. Maybe, as Christian theology changed and evolved, the old words seemed suspect in the new environment.  Anyhow, by the third and fourth centuries AD, the Bibles in use varied considerably from each other.  There was an effort made at standardization, culminating in the Vulgate, the common Latin Bible for 1,000 years.  But that was based on the 3^rd and 4^th century Bibles.  Modern archeology and studies have found some Bible going back further. 

And one sore sport is the end of Chapter 1 in Mark. There, Christ cures a leper.  In our modern Bible, when the leper approaches Jesus and asks to be healed, we’re told that Christ took pity on him and healed him.  OK, but our oldest and most reliable ancient copies don’t say Jesus took pity on him.  They say he became angry. 

What’s more, the angry Jesus story actually fits a little better with what happens later.  We’re told that after curing him, Jesus sternly warned him, and then dismissed him.  Ehrman points out that sternly warning and dismissing are mild translations.  A better translation would be that Christ rebuked him severely, and then cast him out.  OK, Jesus cured him, but he sure was annoyed by it. 

One general theme in trying to figure out what is in the original and what is not – which one would the scribe falsely translate into?  It’s hard to see why a translator would miss Christ’s compassion and pity for anger.  That seems totally out of character.  But it does make sense for a translator to want to clean this up into pity.  So he did.  But it looks like Christ was annoyed.

And Christ has a habit of getting annoyed at people in Mark. 

CHAPTER 2

This is stuff we saw in Matthew.  Christ heals some people.  The Pharisees ask the same question of fasting here as they did in Chapter 9 of Matthew – and get the same basic response.  The disciples pick grain on the Sabbath and are criticized for it.  Hey – that was way out in Chapter 12 of Matthew!  We’re just in Chapter 2 still here!

Aside from that, Christ calls some guy named Levi who is among the tax collectors.  I have no idea why this guy is called out, but it does allow Christ to explain to his critics why he hangs with sinners and tax collectors – they’re the ones who need him.  In Matthew, the tax collector was Matthew.  But here it isn’t.  Interesting.

I don’t think Matthew ever is identified as a tax collector here.  So that’s a difference.  I wonder if, once people began to associate the Gospel of Matthew with the apostle Matthew there was a need to include the story of his calling.  After all, that gospel has just five guys called – the first four and Matthew.  This one has just the first four. (In both cases, the full 12 are then later mentioned).  Then, rather than make up a story of a calling, you just changed Levi to Matthew.  That’s just a theory, but I like it.

CHAPTER 3

It’s more stuff from Matthew, but again – it’s stuff from deep inside Matthew near the front of Mark.  Christ heels a hand on the Sabbath, causing the Pharisees to ask, “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath?”  Seriously – that’s how they phrase.  Oh my – get bent, Pharisees.  Listen to yourselves! In Matthew, it just says, “Is it lawful to cure on the Sabbath?” which is also bad, but not as bad as questioning if its right to do good.

Jesus assembles his full 12 apostles and contends more with his critics.  Boy, the critics start early here.  The lack of the Sermon on the Mount really hurts Mark.  At least in Matthew you had a sense of momentum that would cause the powers to be annoyed by Jesus.

Christ is again accused of being in league with Satan, and I didn’t quite catch this the first time, but his response is a famous line: “And if a house divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.”  I assume the King James Bible more pithily says, “A house divided against itself can not stand,” which will later provided Abraham Lincoln with the key line to one of his best speeches. 

Finally, Christ says that his true family isn’t his mother and brothers, but his followers and believers. This was Chapter 12 in Matthew.

CHAPTER 4

This chapter is mostly parables – and they’re parables we saw in Matthew – the mustard seed, the parable of the sower, etc.  As was the case in Matthew, people don’t quite get his meanings and he has to explain them.  In Matthew, he started off calming explaining them, and then only later getting ticked off that people couldn’t figure them out sooner instead of later.

In Mark?  Christ starts off ticked off.  The first time he has to explain them, he cries out to his apostles, “Do you not understand this parable?  Then how will you understand any of the parables?”  Again, we see a bit of a shorter temper in Mark’s Jesus than in Matthew’s Jesus.  Also, this helps begin another theme in Mark: the apostles rarely seem to really get their Messiah. They’re a much more thickskulled dozen here.

Oh, and the chapter ends with Christ calming the sea.  Good job on that, Jesus.  This awes his thickskulled apostles, who begin wondering to themselves – who is this guy exactly?

CHAPTER 5

This one starts off with a weird story.  It’s one of the few stories in Mark that I don’t recall appearing in any form in Matthew.  Jesus comes across one guy afflicted by a demon.  This isn’t just any afflicted guy.  He is so strong, that no one could restrain him, not even with a chain.  In fact, he’d pulled apart many chains and smashes many shackles.  So he’s superhumanly strong.  Anyhow, Christ cures him.  He tells Christ his name is Legion.  Huh  - that was a Paul Bettany movie from a few years ago about some angels fighting over if they should wipe out humanity or not.  Or something like that – it involved angles and the final doom.  I wonder if this Bible verse helped inspire it.

Next comes the story of the swineherd that came in Matthew Chapter 8.  It’s a little different here.  In both cases, Jesus deals with possessed swine by running them off a cliff.  In Matthew, people were ticked off and wanted him to leave.  Here, the people were just amazed. 

The Matthew version makes more sense.  I didn’t quite get it then, but a reader pointed it out to me.  Look, some people would rather be prosperous than moral.  Possessed pigs can still be sold, but not a ton of dead pigs.  Also – if they were so devout, what are these Jews doing with un-kosher pigs, anyway?  Here, that subtext is lost.

The rest is more stuff we’ve already seen.  Christ heels people, most notably a woman given up for dead, that Christ insists isn’t.  A few things contrasting Matthew and Mark. First, in Mark, these healings were typically sprinkled with stories of healed gentiles – and they were often the ones praised as having the most faith.  Those aren’t here.  It looks like Matthew copied mark on the healings and then threw in some gentiles to help broaden his appeal to them.

Also, we again see Christ come off as easily ticked off.  A woman with chronic hemorrhaging issues goes up to Christ, believing that just touching his cloak will be enough to save her.  She does, and Christ immediately whirls around asking, “Who has touched me cloak?”  Well, maybe this is more just my reaction than the text.  Maybe I’m just preconditioned to see Christ as being annoying in Mark based on what I’ve read in Bart Ehrman’s books.  But that does sound like a nature reaction to having some stranger grab your clothing out of nowhere.

It’s all good, though.  Jesus is impressed by her faith and fixes her up.  

Click here for the next part of Mark.