Contrasting logia and anecdotes in Mark 3-8

Question

I'm a classicist approaching Mark's gospel for the first time

Taking Mark, very broadly, as a fusion of taught/recorded logia and remembered/collected biographical anecdotes - I wondered if in the first half there is a succession of points where the author has placed logia near anecdotes that are basically awkward to their lessons?

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• Mark 3:34 - whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother
• Mark 6:4 - A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home
• Mark 4:20 - Others[...]produce a crop - some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown
• Mark 4:34 - But when he was alone with his own disciples, he explained everything.
• Mark 7:20 - What comes out of a person is what defiles them
• Mark 7:37 - He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak
• Mark 6:44 - The number of men who had eaten was five-thousand
• Mark 8:9 - About four thousand were present
• Mark 8:17 - Why are you talking about having no bread?

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These seem like a structured contrast: with each having one "leg" in a saying and the other following a few verses later in a biographical anecdote/narrative event.

And if that might be part of Mark's logic-of-composition, what could be the objective? Is he keen to prevent the gospel being taken as didactic, like a philosophical dialogue? Or is this showing that the teachings can't be applied to life simplistically, or unprayerfully? Or is it the devil trying to throw up counterexamples?

And might that be using the anecdotes to cast light on the sayings? So that it's more than the sum of its parts.

Answer 1

I'll give an answer, since I was able to find relevant enough scholarly supporting material for it not to be original research. I'd much prefer to have others' recommendations but this is an answer I can be getting on with.

Brill's edition of Thomas has a table of 'Scriptural Parallels and Echoes' - and the ones across to Mark are uncomplicated. This offers a sampling frame that can be tested to see if it finds similar internal contrasts, without requiring a definite relationship between the two texts. If something's present in both it's reasonable to approach it as a saying.

There can be found these, which bring in most of the arguable logia in chapters 2-9:-

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Mark 2:21 - No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made.

Mark 3:14 - And he appointed twelve (whom he also named apostles) so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach

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Mark 3:12 - And he strictly ordered them not to make him known.

Mark 4:22 - For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light.

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Mark 3:34 - And looking about at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers!

Mark 6:4 - And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.”

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Mark 4:20 - But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”

Mark 4:34 - He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to his own disciples he explained everything.

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Mark 4:29 - But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

Mark 4:32 - yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”

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Mark 7:20 - And he said, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him.

Mark 7:37 - And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”

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Mark 8:33 - But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

Mark 9:5 - Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.”

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Mark 9:20 - And they brought the boy to him. And when the spirit saw him, immediately it convulsed the boy, and he fell on the ground and rolled about, foaming at the mouth.

Mark 9:42 - “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.

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[In the OP the one starting at Mark 6:44 doesn't have any Thomas-echo according to Brill.]

These aren't always one in a saying and the other in a life-event, it would be 6/8 of them.

Whether they are like-for-like is impossible to say, as is whether they influence use-of-language. In the last one σκανδαλίζω in place of ἁμαρτάνω might more recall the possessed boy earlier on. The words there being συνεσπάραξεν and πεσὼν - συσπαράσσω is rare. Also the legs taken from the presumed-logia are all landing in the aphorism/punchline, a defining structural feature they have in common.

It might do to continue this by looking at the passages like 'Jesus calls Levi and Eats with Sinners' (It is not the healthy who need a doctor) that don't have any (argued/presumptive) echo in Thomas but also have a lesson in direct-speech as their high point. And also whether it is supportable for the latter chapters, which might be more challenging as sayings give way to the crucifixion.