Hot answers tagged mark
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Jon gives a good answer as to why Jesus would have been able to speak Greek, Aramaic, and Hebrew. He also asked for more information regarding the existence of Hebrew in the Land at the time of Jesus. Mishnaic Hebrew was very well known in the first century and was distinguished from Aramaic in such works as the Letter of Aristeas and Josephus. See below for ...
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My understanding is that a strong majority of scholars (including conservative scholars) take the position that the long ending of Mark was not in the original and was not written by the same author as the rest of the text, but nonetheless was added very early on (probably in the early 2nd century). However, the evidence is not as overwhelming as for the ...
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According to Bruce M. Metzger, in his able Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (Stuttgart: Deutschebibelgesellschaft, 2012), the academy places their highest certitude "{A}" that the verse of Mark 11:26 was not part of the original autograph. On Page 93 of his commentary, Metzger says that
...although it might be thought that the sentence was ...
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The definition of λῃστῶν is:
λῃστής, οῦ, ὁ (ληϊς, epic form of λεία ‘booty, spoils’; Soph., Hdt.+; ins, pap, LXX; ApcSed 15:3; Joseph.; loanw. in rabb.; Ar. 3, 2;
Just., Tat., Ath., R. 19 p. 72, 25; Theoph. Ant. 3, 14 [p. 232, 13]).
① robber, highwayman, bandit (in Palestine: Jos., Bell. 2, 125;
228 al.) Lk 10:30, 36; 2 Cor 11:26 (Chariton 6, 4, ...
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The Hebrew word שמיים (shamayim), which is translated into English, is what is known in Judaism as a כנוי (kinnui), or a "substitute," "nickname."
The reason why Matthew uses "kingdom of Heaven" more often than "kingdom of God" is because he wrote to a Jewish audience, and the Jews did not pronounce the Tetragrammaton יהוה, and sometimes not even the word ...
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Some say the "Kingdom of Heaven" refers to the a physical/political kingdom on earth while the "Kingdom of God" is the spiritual, coming reign of Christ.
Arguments against the two being the same often come down to hair splitting and misinterpretation of verses. For example, the site listed above relies on a single verse in an attempt to say they are ...
5
Every commentary I could find has seemingly a different interpretation on this passage! I have however, managed to distil these down into two main interpretations:
1. Jesus was going to pass them by, but was diverted
The phrase "meant to" in the ESV and RSV is also translated "would have" in the KJV. The Greek word used here is thelō which means to wish or ...
4
Jews of the time understood God to have different roles (and different names), and one of these views of God was as father. For example, in Pirkei Avot, an early mishnaic writing from somewhere between 200 BCE and 200 CE, one rabbi writes:
20 Judah the son of Teima would say: Be bold as a leopard, light as an eagle, fleeting as a deer and mighty as a ...
3
Jesus' statement about the unforgivable sin comes in the context of an attack from the Pharisees:
22 The experts in the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and, “By the ruler of demons he casts out demons.”
They recognize that Jesus is doing the work of casting out demons, a good work, but instead of accepting this ...
3
Markan priority is an answer to the question what is the precise literary relationship between Matthew, Mark and Luke, also known as the Synoptic problem. A close comparison of the first three gospels suggests that one or more of these writers had one or more of the other gospels before them as they wrote. This is more than a common oral tradition. ...
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Ben Witherington in The Gospel of Mark: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (pp. 18-9) documents a number of stylistic traits of Mark's Gospel:
Historical present tense verbs
Repetition of phrases
Impersonal plural verb followed by a singular verb
First-person plural narrative
Parenthetical clarifications
γάρ-clauses
Anacoluthon
Paratactic καί
Aramaic phrases
...
3
My Take On The Question(s) Behind The Question
Based on the cursory information available in Wikipedia, Ched Myers is a Liberation Theologian. There's nothing wrong with this as it provides some valuable insight into a potential, auxiliary reading of a given text. As such, it is natural that he views this in light of social stratifications, and how those ...
3
The Rev. William E. Flippin Jr. - Naked Young Man and the Easter Angel in the Gospel of Mark - Mark 14:51-52
"And a young man followed [Jesus], with nothing but a linen cloth about his body. And they seized him, but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked."
Jesus had no help at the cross from his followers. Only he could bring about our ...
3
I am having trouble finding citations for this, so maybe some of the more erudite members of this list can help me out, but: I have read from a few sources that Mark's spelling, grammar, and overall Greek style are just about at the bottom of the barrel of the New Testament, a spot probably shared by Revelation. This being the case (and I'm assuming it is, ...
2
Mark includes these two feedings in order to give both structure and meaning to to those who hear his narrative. While visual signals such as chapter numbers and verses, section titles, paragraph indentations, highlighted words etc. help modern readers orient themselves to a stories structure and point, ancient books had no graphic signals, not even spaces ...
2
There is a helpful passage provided for us in Luke 12:10 that addresses this same issue.
"And anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be
forgiven him; but to him who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it
will not be forgiven."
The parallel seems to define "blaspheme" as "speaking against."
This is supported linguistically:
...
2
This statement by Ehrman that Jesus and the disciples did not speak Greek confuses me. Judea was at the crossroads of three continents. They had been under varying amounts of foreign rule for centuries-foreign rulers who spoke Greek. Greek was the lingua franca of Jesus' day (the trading language spoken by people of different countries). Even the Romans ...
2
To expand on Affable's answer, the entire book of Mark is one chiasmus made up of many fractally layered chiastic structures. The center of the Mark "sandwich" is:
And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.”—Mark 8:29 (ESV)
The layer just outside of that center illustrates the two misconceptions ...
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Jesus rewards the woman not because she came up with a clever saying, but because her saying, either intentionally or accidentally reminds Jesus of the prophecies that though the Jews come first, the gentiles will come after.
Presuming that Jesus and the woman were more comfortable speaking in Hebrew though it was recorded in Greek:
table comes from a root ...
1
What an interesting find! It has some implications for the Synoptic Problem. And of course, the solution you pick influences the significance of switching the names.
Markan priority
If we assume that Mark wrote his gospel first, Matthew and Luke must have decided to swap the order of names for some reason. One possible reason could be that ...
1
The order switch indicates that Matthew and Luke were more adept at handling the symbolism of the historical event than Peter and Mark were. There are two reasons for this: Peter was the least educated of the three (Matthew, Luke, Peter) and he also wrote earlier than the other two, so they had more time to develop a more detailed understanding of the events ...
1
A chiasm is an ancient form of poetry, in which there is an ABA structure. Indeed, looking at, say Proverbs 31, you can find ancient examples of even more drawn out chiasms that have a parallel structure many, many layers deep. The point of the chiasm is that it accentuates the thing in the center, by both leading up to it and away.
In this Mark is really ...
1
It seems as though Jesus intentionally puts his disciples in this difficult situation in order to reveal his glory to them. By "passing by them," he would be revealing his divine glory, analogous to the Lord revealing himself to Moses by passing by him in Exodus 33:12-23 (see also Elijah in 1 Kings 19:11).
Notice also that Jesus says "I AM here" ... which is ...
1
I am shocked at the idea that these "stylistic traits" would "point to an author who struggles to express himself in the language he is writing. " Too many native speakers of the same Koine Greek Mark wrote have found NO such thing in his writing. Mark did not invent any of these traits, many of them are found often enough in Koine written by excellent ...
1
Another line of thought for interpretation is in regards to Matthew 7:15 where Jesus likens people to trees which bear good or bad fruit. It seems that the blind man who began to partially see was given some insight into the condition of people. People are like trees. Good trees bear good fruit and bad trees bear bad fruit. Obviously, the blind man could ...
1
I don't think it was compassion, I think it was an object lesson, or illustrated sermon being played out on the screen of their everyday life. (Thus when the familiar was ripped out from under them they were unnerved and terrified.)
What was the lesson? Maybe it was all about AUTHORITY?
Witnesses saw and heard that the demons could not choose their fate ...
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