Units 6 and 7: Early Christian Writings

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Units 6 and 7 Early Christian Writings

• Unit 7 Narrative Accounts
• 5 March 2008
• Mark The Counter-Cultural Jesus

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Purpose of the Lecture

• To supplement
• To symbolize
• To stir up

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On Book Cover Design

• Mine, he said gently, as the designer, was to
  suggest to the reader what he might find beneath
  the wrappers to offer him some simple,
  uncomplicated symbol which he could recognize
  enough to tempt him to read the book. Not
  something which would convince him that he had
  read it already, or worse, that he knew what it
  was all about and

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On Book Cover Design

• didnt want to read it anyway.
• Dirk Bogarde, A Postilion Struck by Lightning,
  Chatto Windus 1977 Triad/Granada 1978, 224.

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Thesis

• The application of an array of critical skills
  supports the hypotheses that Mark
• Is prior
• has a classical construction
• represents a particular type of early
  Christianity
• presents Jesus as liminal
• Is surrealistic

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Critical Skills

• Source Criticism
• Genre Criticism
• Redaction (editorial) Criticism
• Historical Criticism
• Literary and Rhetorical Criticism
• Ideological Criticism
• Myth and Ritual Criticism

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Outline

• http//www.utoronto.ca/religion/synopsis
• Genre Criticism Drama Recognition Scene
• Source Criticism Priority Literary Seams
• Ideological Criticism Pauline
• Literary Criticism Conclusion and Inclusio
• Myths of Power
• Trial of Jesus, Mishnah, Historiography
• Anthropological Criticism Food

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4. Ideological Criticism Pauline

• Torah-observance
• Leadership
• Euangelion
• Apocalypticism

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5. Literary Criticism 5.2 Conclusion and
Inclusio

• 96
• He did not know what to say because they were
  terrified (RSV exceedingly afraid KJV sore
  afraid) ekphoboi gar eyenonto.

• 168
• So they went out and fled from the tomb, for
  terror and amazement had seized them and they
  said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid
  ephobounto gar.

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5.3 Special Mark 5.3.1 Mark 321

• MR Solution by Translation
• NRSV for people were saying, He has gone out
  of his mind.
• MR note to 321

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5.3.1. Mark 321

• Solution by changing the Greek text (5th century
  manuscripts)
• The original reading (his friends or his
  relatives) apparently proved to be so
  embarrassing that D W al altered it to read,
  When the scribes and the others had heard about
  him, they went out to seize him, for they said,
  He is beside himself. (Bruce Metzer, A Textual
  Commentary on the Greek New Testament, 2nd ed.
  United Bible Societies, 1971, Deutsche
  Bibelgesellschaft,1994.

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6. Myths of Power

• 6.4 Elisha
• 6.5 The spitting Jesus
• 6.6 Outbursts
• 6.7 Wali friend and baraka power
• 6.7 Herodotus

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6. Myths of Power

• Wali friend and baraka power Such potent
  walîs may indeed be recognized for their sanctity
  during their lifetimes, but most often it is
  after their deaths that a cult grows around their
  memory and their mortal remains, represented in
  burial shrines. (Frederick M. Denny, Islam and
  the Muslim Community in Religious Traditions of
  the World, ed. H. Byron Earhart,
  HarperSanFrancisco, 1993, 673.

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6. Myths of Power

• after a long series of reverses in the war they
  Spartans sent to Delphi and asked of which god
  they should beg favour in order to ensure their
  conquest of Tegea, and the Priestess promised
  them victory if they brought home the bones of
  Orestes. Herodotus, The Histories, Trans.
  Aubrey de Sélincourt, Rev. A.R.Burn, Penguin,
  1954, 1972, 1.66-69, 66.

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7. Trial of Jesus, Mishnah, Ancient
Historiography (Luke-Acts)

• 41 J. (7) In property cases they try the case by
  day and complete it by night. In capital cases,
  they try the case by day and complete it by
  day.
• K. (8) In property cases they come to a
  final decision on the same day as the trial
  itself, whether it is for acquittal or
  conviction. In capital cases they come to a final
  decision for acquittal on the same day, but on
  the following day for conviction.

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7. Trial of Jesus, Mishnah, Ancient Historiography

• L. (Therefore they do not judge capital cases
  either on the eve of the Sabbath or on the eve of
  a festival.)
• 55 A. If they found him innocent, they sent him
  away. If not, they postpone judging him till the
  next day.
• The Mishnah a New Translation. Trans. Jacob
  Neusner. Yale University Press, 1988.