Jesus, Disciple of the Kingdom

Mark's Christology for a Community in Crisis

Osvaldo D. Vena

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN:
  9781610979405
  9781498262958
• eBook ISBN:
  9781630873738
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

That Jesus started his career as a disciple of John the Baptist is an idea that has gained almost universal recognition in the scholarly world. His coming from Galilee to be baptized by John in the river Jordan is the most compelling proof of Jesus' subordination to John. But quickly after John was executed Jesus started his own career, not as a disciple anymore, but as a teacher in his own right. In this book Osvaldo Vena makes the claim that throughout his ministry Jesus remained a disciple, not of John, but of a higher power, God, and God's kingdom. Thus, Jesus called men and women to join him as co-disciples as he went about proclaiming the nearness of the kingdom through word and action. In this work Vena contends that in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is presented as a prototype of true and faithful discipleship, a model to be followed and imitated by ancient as well as contemporary believers. This presentation amounts to an emerging Christology espoused by the early Markan community on the verge of destruction from outside forces, specifically the Jewish-Roman war, as well as internal divisions resulting from struggles for power in the community.

1

Christology and Discipleship

Paul and Mark

It has been my contention in the introduction to this work that Mark’s Christology is born out of his community’s situation. It is a communal construction that has as its starting point that community’s self-understanding. Crucial to that self-understanding is the stress and anxiety produced by the Jewish-Roman war of 66–70 CE, which produced a crisis of faithfulness as the members of the community were pulled between allegiance to the Zealot movement or to the teachings of Jesus. This was particularly heightened by the fact that God’s eschatological kingdom, as announced by the historical Jesus in Mark 1:15, had not manifested itself, thus creating a sense of disillusion, not to mention frustration and plain fear (cf. Mark 16:8). Therefore, the idea of faithful discipleship is conveyed through the example of Jesus, the ideal disciple of the kingdom, whom the believers are encouraged to imitate. Also, the eschatological Son of Man, a symbol/character extracted from the book of Daniel and the intertestamental Jewish literature, is deployed by the evangelist and placed to the service of his exhortation to faithful discipleship. In Mark’s mind, faithful discipleship leads to an appropriate stance at the time when God brings God’s kingdom. Therefore, these two ideas, discipleship and eschatology, are interconnected in Mark’s Christology. My purpose in this book is to unravel such connection and flesh out Mark’s theological perspective.

But in order to understand how Mark connects these two ideas, it is necessary to start with an historical-literary investigation of the two terms that seem to convey the ideas proposed above, namely, “disciple” and “Son of Man.” Now, this investigation has to start with a chronology of the usage of these expressions. That is, what are the occurrences of these two expressions in the NT and who is the first writer to use them? When the question of chronology is asked, the obvious answer is that the Pauline letters take precedence over any other document. They represent the earliest examples of canonical writing, followed very closely by Mark, probably the first narrative gospel ever to be written. If Paul’s literary production stopped with the letter to the Romans, which is believed to have been written by the middle of the first century (55–58 CE), and Mark was perhaps writing during or slightly after the Jewish War of 66–70 CE, then an investigation of the expressions “disciple” and “Son of Man” in these two authors is in order. Being as they were so close to each other in time, one is tempted to speculate as to the relationship between both of them. To what extent was Mark trying to correct, appropriate, or develop some of Paul’s theological affirmations?58 In other words, was Mark being remedial, trying to do damage control for his community? That will have to be assessed once we conclude our investigation.

The Occurrences of the Term “Disciple” in the NT

The word “disciple,” μαθητής, appears nowhere else in the NT but in the Synoptic Gospels, John, and Acts. Paul does not use it; neither do any of the other writers of the NT, including the author of Revelation. If Paul, who wrote between 49–58 CE, does not use the term “disciple,” and Mark, who probably wrote between 66–70 CE does, then that means that unless we can find another document prior to Mark59 where the word is being used, then Mark is the first NT writer to use the expression.60 Now, he does not expand theologically on what it means to be a disciple; but Matthew and Luke, using Q, do. See, for example, Matthew 10:24, 25 / Luke 6:40; 14:26, 27, 33, where Jesus addresses the issue of the cost of discipleship utilizing the technical term “disciple.” In Mark, it is only the narrator who uses the term, never Jesus. In the Gospel of John, “disciple” is used profusely. It is placed on the lips of Jesus (8:31, 13:35, 15:8), the Pharisees (9:27, 28) and the narrator (2:2, 11; 3:32; etc.). In the book of Acts, “disciple” refers to believers in general (6:1, 7; 9:10, 36; 13:52; 14:20ff; 16:1; 21:4, 16), while “apostles” refers to the twelve original disciples of Jesus (1:26).

What does this all mean in terms of chronology? Matthew and Luke, using Q, represent a later tradition. By this time, the concept of discipleship had been reappropriated to refer to a follower of Jesus. The same thing happens in John. The interesting thing, though, is that Paul never uses the concept of discipleship in his letters, nor does he develop the idea of the believers as disciples of Jesus Christ. To describe himself in relationship to Christ, Paul uses δούλος and ὰπόστολος. To refer to the believers in general, he uses mainly ἀγιοι and ἀδελφοί.

An analysis of the chronological data produces the following chart:

Paul (49–58 CE)	no Disciple Terminology (DT)
Synoptic Gospels (66/70–85 CE)	abundance of DT
John (90–95 CE)	abundance of DT
Acts (80–85 CE)	abundance of DT
Pseudo-Pauline Epistles (80–120 CE)	no DT
Catholic Epistles (90–120 CE)	no DT
Revelation (90–95 CE)	no DT

How can this data be explained?

1. There is no discipleship language in Paul.

Since Paul does not emphasize Jesus’ earthly ministry, he has no place for disciples as characters in the story of Jesus. No story, no disciples. The risen Lord, who appeared to him, does not need disciples but apostles (1 Cor 15:8–10) and believers. But an earthly Jesus needs disciples, followers, not believers, since he never made himself the object of people’s beliefs. God was always the object of his and people’s beliefs. Faith was placed on God’s power to execute liberation through miracles, healings, and exorcisms, both his and the disciples’.

Disciples and discipleship suggest a mission to be carried out and, even though Paul saw himself as a missionary and an apostle to the Gentiles, he did not envision a long mission because according to him the world ...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword - Ched Myers
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1. Christology and Discipleship: Paul and Mark
• 2. Discipleship as the Rhetorical and Theological Center of the Gospel of Mark
• 3. Jesus as Disciple of the Kingdom
• 4. The Son of Man: A Collective and Communal Symbol
• 5. The “Other” Community behind the Gospel of Mark
• 6. The Soteriological Aspect of Jesus’ Discipleship
• Conclusion: Mark's Christology—A Model for the Contemporary Church
• Bibliography