The Kinship of Jesus

Christology and Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark

Kathleen Elizabeth Mills

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781498230315
  9781498230339
• eBook ISBN:
  9781498230322
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

Christology and discipleship have largely remained separate categories in Markan scholarship. This study provides a commentary on the Gospel of Mark that underlines kinship as the nexus between Christology (Jesus and his kinship with God) and discipleship (Jesus and his kinship with disciples). Jesus, designated as the Son of God (1:1), establishes a kinship group of disciples and followers by providing them hospitality, welcoming them into his household, and addressing them in kinship terms as his family. The kinship between Jesus and God and that between Jesus and the disciples are imitative and contestive means for Mark to negotiate the Roman imperial context. In the church today, Christians still refer to their church family and to each other as brothers and sisters because of their relationship to Jesus. In a world that finds people increasingly separated from one another, this study demonstrates Jesus's formation of his own family and its continued impact on Christian identity and community.

1

Scholarly Approaches to Christology and Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark

In this book I will argue that structures of honor and kinship serve as a nexus between Christology and discipleship in Mark’s gospel. While previous work has examined the Gospel’s “Son” language (of God, of Man, of David) in its history-of-religions, titular, and narrative contexts, it has largely neglected attention to the language and social structures of kinship to which “Son” language belongs. Moreover, while previous scholarship has noted kinship language in Markan discipleship, it has not sufficiently attended to the function of kinship language and structures in drawing Christology and discipleship together, and to its contribution to, and role in, the imitative and contestive interface between the community of disciples and the Roman imperial world.

I will bring together two of the most important aspects of Markan scholarship in an analysis of the language of sonship and kinship pertaining to both Jesus and disciples. The intersection of Christology and discipleship will come plainly into view by way of a multidisciplinary approach that will center on a narrative methodology through a lens of imperial negotiation with a focus on honor and kinship. My argument is that Mark’s use of sonship language for Jesus functions to ascribe honor to him as chosen by God to be the authorized agent of God’s will and to establish a kinship community (brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, mothers, and children) that will further God’s will. This community acquires honor through service and suffering with other followers of Jesus. This realignment of conventional kinship roles in terms of service and suffering will be viewed as a means by which Mark’s gospel negotiates its Roman imperial context–a context which prized kinship and the gaining of honor as central cultural practices.1

In this chapter, I analyze various methodological approaches to Markan Christology and discipleship. The discussion of approaches to Christology in Mark follows its historical development, including history-of-religions, titular studies, and narrative approaches. The discussion of scholarly approaches to discipleship in Mark includes the identification of the twelve as a literary construct serving as a corrective to Mark’s historical community, historical-critical approaches, narrative approaches, and sociohistorical approaches. I also address a few works that have attempted, though inadequately, intersections of Christology and discipleship. In addition, I review three contributions to Mark and its Roman imperial context because they provide a foundation for the imperial critical lens through which Christology and discipleship intersect.

Many studies in discipleship and Mark reflect solely on the role of the twelve disciples of Jesus. However there are those that recognize that the concept of discipleship belongs to all those who follow Jesus, including the crowds, the women, and the recipients of the Gospel of Mark.2 For this study, it is better not to limit the concept of discipleship to the twelve, though in order to understand the major discussions and methodological approaches to discipleship, the majority of studies addressed do focus primarily on the twelve disciples in Mark.

Christology

Christology–History of Religions

Christology and discipleship are two central themes in the Gospel of Mark. The history of scholarship pertaining to these themes has largely moved along two diverging tracks with little explicit connection between the two. The spectrum of discussions of Christology in Mark has ranged from history-of-religions to titular studies to the narrative context. In order to gain a firm foothold on Christology and discipleship in Mark, it will be necessary to survey the major contributions that scholars have made to these themes.

The history-of-religions method finds the definition and origin of Christology in Mark and other early Christian documents in their Near Eastern and Greco-Roman literary predecessors. In the quest to determine the form and source of the gospels, scholars considered that they were partly made up of a collection of miracle stories akin to collections about Hellenistic gods, divinized men, and magicians called aretologies.3 In his analysis of Mark 3:7–12, for example, Leander Keck concludes that Jesus is a theios aner,4 a type of divine-human religious hero or holy man in Hellenistic literature that demonstrates his divinity through miracles and healings.5 His analysis of Mark 3:7–12 becomes significant for the whole gospel because the stream of miracles Keck derives from the theios aner tradition defines Jesus over and against the natural world. The miracles Jesus performs “are direct manifestations of the Son of God, and in a particular way–the θεῖος ἀνήρ.”6

Based on several pericopes in Mark that he deems pre-Synoptic, Hans Dieter Betz also suggests that Jesus could be seen as a theios aner. The pericopes (Mark 1:32–34; 3:7–12; 6:53–56) follow the profile of the theios aner: nature miracles, healings, exorcisms, and raisings from the dead.7 The implication then is that the gospel writers utilized such theios aner stories in their works to aid in their depiction of Jesus as a miracle-working holy man. While concentrating on depictions of Jesus’ power, these studies, however, did not adequately take into account other dimensions of the presentation of Jesus, such as suffering, and so cannot give an adequate account of the gospel’s Christology.

In his critique of the theois aner influence on Markan miracle stories, Barry Blackburn provides false correspondences between Judaism and Hellenism when he argues that the theios aner concept cannot be limited to Hellenistic sources, but must draw on Old Testament and Jewish sources as well.8 Based on the writings of Artapanus, Philo, and Josephus, Blackburn contends that the tradition surrounding Moses defines him as a theios aner.9 This work is a significant contribution to the study of theios aner illuminating the significance of christological sources for Mark. Unfortunately, he overstates his argument to the point that he suggests some sort of artificial bifurcation between Hellenism and Judaism, when in reality it is necessary to consider both.10 Blackburn also ignores the significant role of suffering in Mark’s christological presentation.

Scholars have also suggested a connection between the gospel’s designation of Jesus as “Son of God” and the emperor’s title. Adela Yarbro Collins provides a brief outline of the Greco-Roman texts that may influence the gospel’s depiction of Jesus as “Son of God.”11 The study focuses on a textual analysis and comparison between the gospel’s Son of God language and how the specific title υἱός θεοῦ functions in the Greco-Roman literary world and within the imperial cult. Although she does acknowledge that cultural context and traditions would have influenced how early believers understood “Son of God,” she does not investigate the impact of such a link of understanding the gospel as a whole, nor in relation to other aspects of Christology, nor on the requirements of discipleship.12

The...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1: Scholarly Approaches to Christology and Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark
• Chapter 2: Methodology
• Chapter 3: Mark 1:1—8:30
• Chapter 4: Mark 8:31—16:8
• Chapter 5: Conclusion
• Bibliography