Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

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Ben C. Smith
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Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Many moons ago, Peter Kirby posted the following as one of his talking points in favor of historicity:
Peter Kirby wrote:(6) In the Gospel of Mark 15:21, the man named Simon of Cyrene is said to be "the father of Alexander and Rufus," an otherwise unexplained detail not picked up by the writers of Matthew and Luke. One very simple explanation for this is that Alexander and Rufus were known to the audience and that they were actual men who were the sons of Simon. This would then imply the existence of Simon as someone who was present during the crucifixion, and, thus, a historical crucifixion of Jesus.
I would like to explore this point in hope of assessing its use as a potential indicator of historicity. Let me ask a few probing questions:
  1. I think Peter calls this detail otherwise unexplained at least partly because Simon is already identified as being of Cyrene, which is usually enough of an identifier for an ancient author, so the detail about Alexander and Rufus seems gratuitous. (If this has nothing to do with why you called it that, Peter, I apologize; nevertheless, I would like to see it addressed if possible.) So... are there any other likely reasons this detail might have been included? If its purpose is not to connect with readers who may actually know one or the other of these two men, what is its purpose?
  2. Is the Rufus mentioned in Mark 15.21 the same as the Rufus mentioned in Romans 16.13? Mark is often argued (perhaps sometimes argued, often assumed) to have a Roman origin, after all. Does Romans 16.13 inform our assessment of this datum at all? Or is it too tenuous a point to count for anything?
  3. What about the somewhat similar situation when it comes to Mary the mother of James and Joseph in Mark 15.40, 47; 16.1? I say somewhat similar because of course both Matthew and Luke copy over this datum (in 27.56 and 24.10, respectively), whereas they do not copy over Alexander and Rufus; also, Mary lacks any other identifier in the text. (Perhaps the presence of two Maries, whereas there is only one Simon and thus no grounds for confusion in his case, might have something to do with Matthew and Luke using James and Joseph; perhaps Matthew and Luke had no independent idea who this Mary was, and were forced to use the same identifier for her as their source.) Nevertheless, identifying Mary by her sons instead of by her husband or father or place of origin or what not seems conceptually the same as identifying Simon by his sons, right? Does this similarity inform our assessment of Simon and his sons as a historical datum? Does the Marcan readership know of James and Joseph, too?
I admit I am especially interested in hearing answers to that first question; the answers I have encountered so far, which are not many, have proven far from satisfying to me.

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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Peter Kirby »

It is a very interesting question.

Thank you for bringing the other references into the mix. It is not clear how much they affect the question.

I am guessing it can be admitted that the idea that the men Alexander and Rufus were known to the expected audience of the Gospel of Mark (because they were part of that community, or at least one of them were) is a pill that is not so hard to swallow. It may be the single best explanation of this datum, taken by itself.

There was a speculative suggestion a few threads ago, on this forum:

http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... f=3&t=1356

The strength of this suggestion, I think, is that it retains the best virtue of the typical explanation ("known to the expected audience of the Gospel of Mark") and simply negates the somewhat speculative additional rider ("they were part of that community, or at least one of them were") by positing that they were known entities outside of that audience or community.

There have been several threads in this forum so far:

http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... f=3&t=1274
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... f=3&t=1261
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... ?f=3&t=843
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... ?f=3&t=370
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... nder+rufus (implied by the table of contents)
http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... p?f=3&t=45

And a few more on the old forum: http://bcharchive.org:8000/search?c=mai ... nder+rufus

I'm certainly not discouraging new exploration of these questions. Just wanted to provide some of the context of the discussion so far. I find the points that you've enumerated helpful, and I agree that there have been no extremely "satisfying" answers, although we might have to settle for "doesn't give us terrible indigestion" in order to start growing a list of plausible candidates and generating ideas.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Secret Alias »

I think that the questions of whether the gospel was intended to be 'historical' or not and whether Jesus was a 'real' human being come to a head in this example you cite. Certainly someone along the chain of the production of the Gospel of Mark as we have it now was saying 'Simon was a real person and we know people that knew him.' I don't think that this 'Simon' ever had his identity questioned seriously to be begin with. Interestingly there are two traditions which associate Simon as essentially a proof that Jesus did not exist. Simon according to the Basilideans and one of the Nag Hammadi texts was crucified in place of Jesus on the Cross.

I don't think that one can go beyond the fact that Simon was a known historical figure. I think there was a tendency of the Catholic editors of the New Testament toward multiple attestations of this sort. Trobisch talks about this in his book. You have one name over here in the gospel and then the letters of Paul mention the name again and connect him with this other legendary Christian figure. The end purpose is to show that - rather than a single 'visionary' being behind the Church (as 'the apostle' was the heretical tradition) the Catholic tradition has multiple witnesses and attestations - all of which were complete fictions and lies.

I think there is evidence to suggest the Marcionite text of Romans did not have the address section in chapter 16. To this end I think we can extrapolate and assume that all these 'witness attestations' were later fabrications. There is scant evidence for the 'historical' narrative in chapter 2 of Galatians among the heretics.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by toejam »

I think the best hypothesis is that Alexander and Rufus were simply known members of the community of the passage's author, and thus contributing some weight to the crucifixion being a historical event. But I can't rule out deceptive verisimilitude (by the author or later interpolating scribes trying to justify their lineage). That would be my best guess if an alternative is required. It might even be something silly as the way an artist often draws himself or someone he knows into the background of a painting just for kicks. Carrier's attempts to render it mythological symbolism seem very weak.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by MrMacSon »

Carrier's attempts here? - http://www.academia.edu/2211991/Thallus ... st_s_Death (I only just found his bibliography and had that open)
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by toejam »

^Nope. That has nothing to do with the passage in question. I don't recall the details (I'm at work and don't have access to my books), but Carrier makes an argument that Alexander and Rufus are symbolically referring to two specific mythical characters. From memory, even he admits it's not a strong argument. But he puts it forward as a potential alternate explanation.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Tenorikuma »

Sid Martin (Secret of the Saviour: The Myth of the Messiah in Mark) suggests that Simon of Cyrene is an oblique reference to the revolt of the Jews in Cyrene, North Africa. Perhaps Alexander and Rufus are allusions to some work or event we no longer have a record of.

Josephus does mention two men named Rufus: a Roman solder, who captures and crucifies a Jewish partisan, and a captain (Terentius Rufus) who is associated with Simon bar Giora; and in a section about the revolt in Cyrene he mentions a Jew named Alexander who was falsely accused. (War book 6)

That said, it seems more likely that Mark's Rufus and Paul's are the same person.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Tenorikuma »

One other intersection of those two name I found would be the first-century Roman historian Quintus Curtius Rufus, who wrote a history about Alexander the Great. That history does mention Alexander's conquest of Cyrene. However, I can see no connection beyond mere coincidence.
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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Thanks for the links. I am going through them now. I had read some of them before, but only about half. My apologies to maryhelena for starting this thread without realizing that she had done much the same thing, responding to your talking points just as I am; hers was one of the threads I had not read yet.

I may have some thoughts after perusing the threads.

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Re: Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus.

Post by JoeWallack »

Ben C. Smith wrote:Many moons ago, Peter Kirby posted the following as one of his talking points in favor of historicity:
Peter Kirby wrote:(6) In the Gospel of Mark 15:21, the man named Simon of Cyrene is said to be "the father of Alexander and Rufus," an otherwise unexplained detail not picked up by the writers of Matthew and Luke. One very simple explanation for this is that Alexander and Rufus were known to the audience and that they were actual men who were the sons of Simon. This would then imply the existence of Simon as someone who was present during the crucifixion, and, thus, a historical crucifixion of Jesus.
I would like to explore this point in hope of assessing its use as a potential indicator of historicity. Let me ask a few probing questions:
JW:
"Mark" says "Simon, take up Jesus' cross".

"Mark" says "Simon, carry Jesus' cross".

"Simon, witness the crucifixion".

Uh, "Mark" didn't saay.


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