The Gospel according to Mark

James R. Edwards

• Publisher: Eerdmans
• Year: 2001
• Print ISBN: 9780802837349
• eBook ISBN: 9781467426954
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

This new Pillar volume offers exceptional commentary on Mark that clearly shows the second Gospel — though it was a product of the earliest Christian community — to be both relevant and sorely needed in today's church.
Written by a biblical scholar who has devoted thirty years to the study of the second Gospel, this commentary aims primarily to interpret the Gosepl of Mark according to its theological intentions and purposes, especially as they relate to the life and ministry of Jesus and the call to faith and discipleship. Unique features of James Edwards's approach include clear descriptions of key terms used by Mark and revealing discussion of the Gospel's literary features, including Mark's use of the "sandwich" technique and of imagistic motifs and irony. Edwards also proposes a new paradigm for interpreting the difficult "Little Apocalypse" of chapter 13, and he argues for a new understanding of Mark's controversial ending.

CHAPTER ONE

The Gospel Appears in Person

MARK 1:1-13

THE KEY TO MARK (1:1)

Ancient writings normally begin either with a formal dedication describing the purpose of the book or with an opening line treating the first subject discussed.¹ The formal introductions of the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts follow the former pattern. The Gospel of Mark begins in the latter way, “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (1:1). If Mark intended his work to have a title, this is it. Like Genesis, Hosea, and the Gospel of John, the first word of Mark is simply “beginning.” Mark doubtlessly chooses it as a reminder of God’s activity in history: in the beginning God created the world; so, too, the age of the gospel is manifest when the Son of God becomes a human being in Jesus Christ. The Greek word translated “beginning,” archē, can incorporate two meanings: first in order of temporal sequence, or first in terms of origin or principle. It is the latter sense in which the term is here used, since Mark intends the whole Gospel, and not merely its opening part, to be incorporated by archē. “Beginning” thus identifies in the initial word of the Gospel the authority from whom the Gospel derives, God himself, the author and originator of all that is.² Lohmeyer is correct in saying that “beginning” signals the “fulfillment of God’s everlasting word.”³ For Mark the introduction of Jesus is no less momentous than the creation of the world, for in Jesus a new creation is at hand.

The gospel of which Mark speaks is not a book, as it is for Matthew (1:1, “A record [Gk. biblos] of the genealogy of Jesus Christ”). Rather, for Mark the gospel is the story of salvation in Jesus. The word for “gospel” (Gk. euangelion) literally means “good news.” In both the OT and in Greek literature euangelion was commonly used of reports of victory from the battlefield. When the Philistines defeated the troops of Saul on Mt. Gilboa, “they sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to proclaim the news (euangelizesthai)… among the people” (1 Sam 31:9; see also 2 Sam 1:20; 18:19-20; 1 Chr 10:9). The messenger who brought the report was the deliverer of “good news” (2 Sam 4:10; 18:26). Among the Greeks the term was used likewise of victory in battle, as well as of other forms of good news. In 9 B.C., within a decade of Jesus’ birth, the birthday of Caesar Augustus (63 B.C.–A.D. 14) was hailed as euangelion (pl.). Since he was hailed as a god, Augustus’s “birthday signaled the beginning of Good News for the world.”⁴ In the Greco-Roman world the word always appears in the plural, meaning one good tiding among others; but in the NT euangelion appears only in the singular: the good news of God in Jesus Christ, beside which there is no other.⁵ The concept of “good news” was not limited to military and political victories, however. In the prophet Isaiah “good news” is transferred to the inbreaking of God’s final saving act when peace, good news, and release from oppression will be showered on God’s people (Isa 52:7; 61:1-3). For Mark, the advent of Jesus is the beginning of the fulfillment of the “good news” heralded by Isaiah.

If, as seems probable, Mark is the first evangelist, then he also inaugurates a new literary genre in applying the term “gospel” to the life and ministry of Jesus Christ.⁶ For Mark, the gospel refers to the fulfillment of God’s reign and salvation in the fullness of time (Isa 52:7; 61:1). In the appearance of Jesus in Galilee, a new age has dawned that requires repentance and faith. Mark’s written record of Jesus’ life is itself called a Gospel, and thus this same Jesus who overcame the grave in the resurrection from the dead is now the living Lord who is at work in the church and world, calling people to faith in the gospel. In Mark’s understanding, therefore, the gospel is more than a set of truths, or even a set of beliefs. It is a person, “the gospel of Jesus Christ.”⁷ The kingdom that God inaugurates is bodily present in Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus, whose name in Hebrew is a variant of “Yehoshua” (Eng. “Joshua”), meaning “God is salvation,” is defined in Mark’s prologue as the “Christ” and “Son of God.” (See the excursuses on Christ at 8:29 and on Son of God at 15:39.) Son of God is a more complete title for Jesus’ person and mission than is Messiah, and is Mark’s blue chip title for Jesus, the chief artery of the Gospel.⁸ “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ the Son of God” (1:1) is the prologue, indeed the topic sentence, of Mark’s Gospel. It may even be considered the title of the Gospel, as long as it is not divorced from what follows, as the connection with John the Baptist in v. 2 evinces. In v. 1 Mark declares the essential content of the euangelion, the “good news.” The Gospel of Mark is thus not a mystery story in which readers must piece together clues here and there to discover its meaning; nor is it a pedestrian chronicle of dates and places without purpose or significance; nor is it reducible to a mere system of thought. Rather, from the outset Mark announces that the content of the gospel is the person of Jesus, who is the Christ and Son of God. It is a brief confession of faith, the meaning of which will unfold only as the reader follows Mark’s presentation of Jesus in the Gospel.

JOHN THE BAPTIZER: FORERUNNER OF JESUS (1:2-8)

2-3 The Gospel of Mark was written for Roman Gentiles. Quite understandably, Mark makes sparing use of OT quotations, since proof texts from Hebrew prophecy would not carry the degree of authority with Gentile audiences that they would and did with Jewish audiences. It is all the more remarkable, therefore, that Mark begins his story with a reference to the OT. The quotation is introduced with an authoritative formula common in both the Greco-Roman and Jewish worlds, “It is written” (Gk. kathōs gegraptai). In the Hellenistic world the formula frequently appears in introductions to laws or declarations carrying legal force. In the OT it claims normative influence over hearers or readers by designating the authority of God, Torah, king, or prophet.⁹

The quotation of 1:2-3 is identified as coming from the prophet Isaiah, although it is actually a tapestry of three OT passages.¹⁰ The reference to the sending of the messenger in v. 2 follows the first half of both Exod 23:20 and Mal 3:1, although there is no exact counterpart in the OT to the latter half of v. 2 (“who will prepare your way”). The greater part of the tapestry comes in v. 3, which reproduces Isa 40:3 nearly exactly. Isaiah 40:3 is quoted by all four Gospels with reference to John the Baptizer as the forerunner of Jesus (Matt 3:3; Mark 1:3; Luke 1:76; John 1:23). The Isaiah quotation in v. 3 was deemed the defining element of the tapestry of quotations.¹¹ Thus, the whole is attributed to Isaiah, who was considered the greatest of the prophets, and whose authority in the early church superseded that of both Exodus and Malachi.¹²

In both the MT and the LXX “in the desert” designates the place where God will prepare the way for his people; thus, “A voice of one calling, ‘In the desert prepare the way for the LORD’” (Isa 40:3). Following this understanding, the DSS cite the verse in justification of founding a Torah community away from “the men of sin” (= Jerusalem) in the steppe or desert of Qumran (1QS 8:14). Mark, however, aligns “in the desert” with the herald (“a voice of one calling in the desert”) rather than with the place of God’s preparation, thus conforming to John the Baptizer’s appearance in the Judean wilderness. The quotation introduces John the Baptizer as the “messenger sent ahead of you,” the “voice of one calling in the desert” (1:2-3).

John’s task is to “prepare the way” for the One to follow. In Exod 23:20, 23 the “messenger” who will lead the people is not a human guide or even Moses, but a divine messenger of Yahweh. Applying this text to the Baptizer indicates more than Mark’s high estimation of John; it indicates his divinely ordained purpose. Likewise, the Malachi passage (also Mal 4:5-6) identifies the preparer of the way with Elijah, who, according to 2 Kgs 2:11, did not die but was taken to heaven in a chariot of fire. There was widespread expectation in Judaism that Elijah would return as a forerunner of God’s eschatological kingdom in the final day.¹³ It is often assumed that Elijah, whom Mark here identifies with John the Baptizer, would be the forerunner of the Messiah. But in pre-Christian Jewish texts preserved in the OT and intertestamental literature Elijah prefigures not the Messiah but the appearance of God himself.¹⁴ This fact considerably elevates the importance of the OT quotation in 1:2-3. In the quotation, several of the pronouns and “the way for the LORD” refer to God. Mark, however, applies these texts with reference to Jesus. This indicates that the Baptizer is not simply the herald of the Messiah but of God himself, appearing in Jesus of Nazareth

1:2-3 thus introduce John as the divinely ordained precursor of Jesus, and Jesus as the manifestation of God. The quotation has the further effect of linking the life and ministry of Jesus to the OT. Jesus is not an afterthought of God, as though an earlier plan of salvation had gone awry. Rather, Jesus stands in continuity with the work of God in Israel, the fulfiller of the law and the prophets (Matt 5:17). The introductory tapestry of OT quotations not only links the person and ministry of Jesus inseparably with the preceding revelation of God in the OT, but it makes the person and ministry of Jesus nonunderstandable apart from it. From a Christian theological perspective, this unites the NT uniquely and inseparably to the OT. The gospel is understandable only as the completion of something that God began in the history of Israel. This excludes the possibility of Christians either dismissing or diminishing the importance of the OT, or of attempting to “purge” the gospel of its Jewish origins and context.

A second effect of the tapestry of quotations offers a clue to understanding Jesus’ person. Of paramount significance is that the quotations, which in their original Hebrew contexts refer either directly or indirectly to Yahweh, are here applied to Jesus. The opening quotation of Mark transfers the fulfillment of God’s eschatological reign subtly but directly to Jesus. Already in 1:2-3 the groundwork is in place that will define and characterize Jesus’ bearing throughout the Gospel, in which Jesus unpretentiously but authoritatively unites his way with God’s way, his work with God’s work, his person with God’s person.¹⁵

Finally, the tapestry of quotations provides a clue to the nature of Jesus’ ministry. Three times in 1:2-3 the word “way” or “path” occurs. The initial reference to “the gospel about Jesus Christ” (1:1) is thus a way (cf. Acts 9:2). From its outset the story of Jesus directs hearers not to metaphysics and mysticism, nor to ethical rules and systems, but to something practical and transforming, a way of salvation made possible by God. Mark will resume and refine this theme in the second half of the Gospel, where “on the way” directs Jesus—and his disciples—to the fulfillment of his mission in Jerusalem. In Mark, the way of God is ultimately the way of Jesus to the cross.

4 Without so much as a conjunction following the quotation, John the Baptizer appears in 1:4.¹⁶ The immediacy of John’s introduction identifies him as the messenger of preparation for Jesus. The description of John in vv. 4-8 is more focused and defined than is the picture of John in the other Gospels. Omitted in Mark are the wondrous circumstances of John’s birth (Luke 1), his thunderous challenge to the dominant Pharisaic and Sadducean schools of Judaism (Matt 3:7-10; Luke 3:7-9), and his call for social reform (Luke 3:10-14). Mark restricts his portrait of John to a single motif, depicting John as the fulfiller of Elijah’s climactic role as the forerunner of “one more powerful” (1:7), whose sandals he is unworthy to untie.

Like Elijah (1 Kgs 17:2-3), John is identified with the wilderness—the vast and barren badlands of Judah, seared by wind and heat. The wilderness repeatedly represents in Israel’s history a place of repentance, and hence a place of God’s grace.¹⁷ From the inception of Israel the wilderness is the place where God brings deliverance to his people, first in the wilderness of Sinai following the Exodus (Exod 15:22ff.) and thereafter in a symbolic wilderness of hope proclaimed by the prophets (Jer 2:2-3; Hos 2:14ff.). John’s appearance in the wilderness fulfills both the Mosaic and the prophetic prototypes: it is a reenactment of the mighty inaugural event of Israel’s history in the Exodus, and it also fulfills the promises of the prophets, since “all the country around the Jordan” (Luke 3:3) frequented by John is precisely the region associated with Elijah (2 Kgs 2:6-14). John summons people away from the routines and comforts of their urban domiciles, and especially from the statutory temple hegemony of Jerusalem, “to a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” in the wilderness.

As a symbol of moral and spiritual regeneration John calls people to baptism. The Greek word for “baptism,” from the root baptein, means “to dip fully, to plunge or immerse.” The precise origins of baptism are obscure, although rites of sacred baths and ritual washings are known throughout the ancient Near East.¹⁸ Pre-Christian Judaism was agreed in the necessity of repentance before the eschaton when God would cleanse his people by the Holy Spirit (Jub. 1:22-25). Although mikwaʾot (ritual washings before worship) were a constitutive element of Judaism (see m. Miqwa.), and although there is some evidence for proselyte baptism in Judaism, the chief example of ritual washings in Judaism derived from the covenant community at Qumran near the Dead Sea, where daily lustrations symbolized the eschatological cleansing of God. “[God] will sprinkle over him the spirit of truth like lustral water (in order to cleanse him) from all the abhorrences of deceit and from the defilement of the ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Series Preface
• Author’s Preface
• Abbreviations
• Frequently Cited Works
• Introduction
• Commentary on Mark