All refuted in chapter 10 of OHJ. Scores of peer reviewed articles and monographs cited. Scores of examples given. Try reading the book instead of spewing ignorant shit that doesn’t even acknowledge much less address the actual evidence carefully accumulated and documented by a qualified expert and published under peer review by a respected biblical studies academic press.

First of all, your claim that the Gospels are all “complete fiction” is ridiculous, and this can be debunked easily. There are varying degrees of historical events found in all of them. I have already posted lengthy arguments and evidence about the historicity of Jesus in general or someone whom Jesus was based upon. You have not included it here though, as you censor discussion topics. None of the points I make are addressed in your book OHJ, which is why I am mentioning them in the first place. This is likely why you won’t allow me to post this discourse on your blog.

Secondly, there is no way Mark would “invent a Messianic secret trope”. All the Messiah-claimants in all of Second Temple Judaism, and all of the others from 1st-century Galilea, Perea, Golan, Decapolis etc. were actual historical figures. Some of their followers thought they may have been the Messiah while they were alive, and the followers of some of the figures certainly did after they had died. The Gospels also do not state that “no one knew who Jesus really was before he was resurrected”. In Mark 8:27-30, there is Peter’s declaration, for example, showing that some of the apostles did at least think he was the Messiah before Jesus was crucified and died. Paul also never mentions anywhere that none of the apostles didn’t think Jesus was the Messiah before he had died, so I do not know where you’re deriving this claim from. What is implied is that the apostles did not truly understand or believe all that Jesus was – the Son of God and the Saviour – until after the resurrection, but not that none of them didn’t think he was the Messiah. The concepts of the Messiah, the Son of God and the Saviour of mankind can be related, but they are also distinct.

That is the most commonly accepted answer: to mimic a trope in Jewish and pagan scripture that amplifies the hero’s triumph. It’s exactly why the Jews portrayed themselves as fickle and clueless under Moses.

It’s also possible Mark, having invented the trope, did so to discredit non-Pauline factions, and then later authors played on that trope to transform it–many scholars have suggested this; it’s possible but I think Mark is doing something more in line with Jewish practice.

If Mark is doing anything specific with this (as opposed to just recreating Jewish and pagan scriptural tropes), it’s both a general and a specific theme.

Generally, Mark is inventing the messianic secret trope to explain the fact, as stated by Paul, that no one knew who Jesus was until he was resurrected, and he gave no signs before then either. The scripture said he was totally abandoned, etc. Thus the story must align. The ignorance of the disciples thus simply reiterates that trope.

But Mark also uses specific incidents as lessons: the James and John bickering is contrasted with the two thieves who die with Jesus instead, and Simon Peter is told to carry the cross but Simon the Foreigner does instead, etc. (reversal of expectation being a trope definitive of the gospel generally, “the least shall be first” etc.). We are to learn not to be like this, and to accept only Christ as authority and not put apostles on a pedestal as anything other than messengers (what the word apostle means).

Both play on a continual theme in Mark: that if you take a story superficially, you won’t get it, and you’ll be shut out of heaven (Mark 4); only those who get the real underlying meaning will find salvation. Thus the underlying meaning is always the point. Not the glorification of mere subordinate messengers.

In all these respects it’s just like modern preachers who claim they were sinful ignorant fools once until they saw the light. They use this myth to convey something they want you to understand about the gospel.

It didn’t come up. He didn’t use it as evidence. And I didn’t ask, but he has been reluctant to discuss it elsewhere, telling everyone else who asks to just wait for the publication. Which is always soon to come out. It keeps being soon even after years. I can only speculate what the delay is.

This is another example of where the book already answers everything he says. So just read the book and compare it to what he says and ask how the book already addresses it.

That’s almost possible. 🙂

May 1, 2016 at 2:22 pm

The Gospels are writing fiction. They are mimicking the way the Jewish followers of Moses behaved (and also the crew of Odysseus) in order to market a point (similar to when preachers claim to have once been foolish sinners and atheists and now see the light and therefore this proves how honest and right they must be now). Details are discussed in Chapter 10 of OHJ.

I know they are fiction, but I don’t understand why would someone potray the disciples in the way that they wouldn’t expect their Master to die, if in reality they actually did expect that. What is the pedagogical purpose for that? Or do you mean that the disciples are potrayed like that because the writer wanted to show somekind of convertion story, where disciples are the ones that don’t first see the real truth behind the Scriptures, but after the resurrection they do?

I want to see the ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS .

In your back stage chat with Craig Evans, did you get any update on that first century copy of Mark he definitely was going to publish on by now?

Sorry again to post it here, but I’m genuinely interested and the story seems to have gone cold on the interwebs and I also didn’t want to bother your inbox with the question.