Review of The Original Ending of Mark by Nicholas P. Lunn

[JoeWallack]

JW:
The purpose of this Thread will be to review the following book:

The Original Ending of Mark: A New Case for the Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20 by Nicholas P. Lunn

Preface

Lunn gets off to an excellent start explicitly stating the significance of the problem:

The contents of the disputed passage makes the debate to touch upon beliefs at the very foundation of the earliest church, notably the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead.

Since the ending of Mark widely averred to be inauthentic contains descriptions of resurrection appearances of Jesus, the issue before us has significant repercussions in the dialogue of the church with atheists and skeptics, as well as with those of other faiths. A brief examination of pertinent internet discussions reveals that instances abound in which the supposed lack of an ending to what is commonly accepted as the earliest Gospel provides considerable intellectual ammunition for those who wish to assail the historic Christian faith. The following citations offer typical examples:

...

"If Mark did not write verses 16:9–20, but some anonymous person(s) later added those verses, pretending (or erroneously believing) that Mark wrote them (as in fact they must have), then this Gospel, and thus the Bible as a whole, cannot be regarded as inerrant, or even consistently reliable. Were those words intended by God, he would have inspired Mark to write them in the first place. That he didn’t entails those words were not inspired by God, and therefore the Bible we have is flawed, tainted by sinful human forgery or fallibility. . . . The interpolation of the Markan ending thus refutes Biblical inerrancy.9 9. Posted by Dr. Richard Carrier on a website concerned with disproving biblical inerrancy. See http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php?title=Legends2 "

It's standard for Apologists to claim that in addition to the Romans never doing anything for Christianity and that there is no cannibalism in The Eucharist or The Royal Navy, that there is no Textual Criticism issue which effects any significant Christian Doctrine.

I consider James Snapp Jr. to be the foremost defender of 16:9-20 that the world has ever known. On rare occasion he will let slip in conversation just how important 16:8 is to Christian assertions. It's refreshing to see Lunn publicly state what Snapp is thinking.

As is always the case with anything involving GMark, we have the irony that Lunn's honesty in giving his motivation at the start of the book to defend Christianity as his reason for the book, hurts his objectivity. I also appreciate Lunn's proper notice and citation of what I think is the foremost article the world has ever known against 16:9-20 at my site:

Mark 16:9-20 as Forgery or Fabrication
by Richard Carrier, Ph.D. (2009)



Joseph

ErrancyWiki

[JoeWallack]

JW:

Introduction

In his introduction Lunn identifies his conclusions and his claimed major reasons for the conclusions. He fails to professionally present his objectives and methodology in a clear and organized manner.

A recurring problem in his introduction is that his conclusions are often not supported by the evidence he is referring to or are even contradicted by that evidence. Specifically:

• 1) He claims that Sinaiticus and Vaticanus support for 16:8 is the key evidence for the 16:8 argument. It is not. Supporters of 16:8 generally conclude that the External evidence is either mixed or even favors 16:9-20 (LE) and that the cruncher is the Internal evidence. Even in the External category, Eusebius' and Jerome's related textual criticism comments are much better evidence.
  
  2) He selects various positions regarding 16:8 and postures that how opinions have changed is somehow evidence for LE. Every category of External evidence though, Manuscript, Patristic, Scribal and Authority shows that the direction of change is from 16:8 to LE.
  
  3) He claims that LE has relatively more professional authority support than 16:8. Support of the LE though is more closely related to level of religious belief than 16:8.
  
  4) He says that trying to understand GMark from the reader's perspective is a relatively new method which moves understanding away from the author's intent. He is correct about the relationship but concludes that this phenomena is used to support 16:8 when in fact it has always been used to support the LE. All readers, professionals, Christians and Skeptics, have a natural problem with 16:8 because they already know all of the resurrection appearances in subsequent Christian literature. Unlike "Mark's" (author) original audience.
  
  5) He claims that the variety of explanations for 16:8 as original is evidence against originality. Another correct relationship observation but he fails to consider the why. His previous point about the modern effort to try and understand from the reader's perspective as opposed to author's intent explains. Read by itself GMark is one long polemic against the disciples which is supported by the only extant significant author before, Paul, who shows more competition between Paul and apostles who came before him, than cooperation. This than supports one of the identified explanations for 16:8, disciple failure. The other explanations are influenced by readers' refusal to accept this explanation because of subsequent writings regarding resurrection appearance.
  
  Further support for multiple explanations for 16:8 as original is something called The Difficult Reading Principle which just happens to be the most important criterion for modern Textual Criticism. But one wouldn't know that from Lunn's introduction or even that The Difficult Reading Principle exists.
  
  The noticeable variety here is the alternative wordings for additions to 16:8 which in Textual Criticism is important evidence for addition.

The above are just 5 of about 20 examples (the first 5) of Lunn making conclusions which are not supported by the evidence. 15 more to follow. Lunn does have many pages of claimed detail evidence so maybe he does a better job there of trying to support his conclusions.



Joseph

ErrancyWiki

[Steven Avery]

1) He claims that Sinaiticus and Vaticanus support for 16:8 is the key evidence for the 16:8 argument. It is not. Supporters of 16:8 generally conclude that the External evidence is either mixed or even favors 16:9-20 (LE) and that the cruncher is the Internal evidence. Even in the External category, Eusebius' and Jerome's related textual criticism comments are much better evidence.

Posted also on the EvangelicalTextual Criticism comments section:

==============================

Joe, here is a simple historical consideration. If Vaticanus and Sinaiticus had not been missing (in their quirky way) the Mark ending, there never would have been an issue in 1881, or today. The abbreviated text would barely be an apparatus entry, and would be in zero Greek New Testament editions.

If the subjective realm of “internal evidences” were very different, Westcott and Hort almost surely would have omitted the ending. No matter what the “internal evidences” evaluation. The Critical Text started out as a Vaticanus-primacy text (putting aside western non-interpolations) and for the most part remains so today.

All Reformation Bible, Vulgate, Peshitta, and Byzantine and Western editions will have the ultra-majority text. Even an Alexandrian edition would have to puzzle out the split, since most Alexandrian mss have the traditional ending. Only a Vaticanus-primacy (or the quirky one edition of Tischendorf with was Sinaiticus-oriented) text will omit the ending. Remember, 99.9% of the Greek, Latin and Syriac mss support the ending, which would make for a very high bar of internal evidence needed, which is not even remotely approached. The key has always been Vaticanus.

In point of fact, internal evidences in the modern realm are often special pleading to match the preexisting Vaticanus-primacy variant.

Historically, your criticism of Lunn on this issue is simply false.

==================================

[ Every category of External evidence though, Manuscript, Patristic, Scribal and Authority shows that the direction of change is from 16:8 to LE.

In one sense this is true. Early in the transmission history there was a major bifurcation of the textline. Then the omission ending was completely rejected (with some Armenian-related exceptions). Thus the direction was to the full ending.

This tells us very little about the movement from 45 AD to 400 AD, or more significantly 45 AD to 200 AD. The evidence there, by the use of the ending by writers like Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, more supports initial movement from LE to abrupt ending.

==================================

Support of the LE though is more closely related to level of religious belief than 16:8.

Another historical misrepresentation. The abrupt ending was clearly perceived to be stronger on an apologetic level by some writers in the early centuries. Thus thus with a faith-consistent approach to the text could easily prefer the abrupt ending. Even today, this position, that true Bible consistency requires the short ending, has been argued by David Robert Palmer.

Now, I do not agree with any of those approaches, but the issue here is what has occurred historically.

==================================

(4) and (5) look to be circular arguments to your position, including errant presuppositions about NT dating and some mind-reading. They are hardly worth trying to unravel.

Steven Avery

[JoeWallack]

Steven Avery: Blah, blah, blah

JW: Sonofnewman!

[Steven Avery]

Nice of you to concede the issues. Not unexpected.

Scorecard
Lunn 3 - JW 0 - worthless issues 2

[JoeWallack]

1) He claims that Sinaiticus and Vaticanus support for 16:8 is the key evidence for the 16:8 argument. It is not. Supporters of 16:8 generally conclude that the External evidence is either mixed or even favors 16:9-20 (LE) and that the cruncher is the Internal evidence. Even in the External category, Eusebius' and Jerome's related textual criticism comments are much better evidence.

Posted also on the EvangelicalTextual Criticism comments section:

==============================

Joe, here is a simple historical consideration. If Vaticanus and Sinaiticus had not been missing (in their quirky way) the Mark ending, there never would have been an issue in 1881, or today. The abbreviated text would barely be an apparatus entry, and would be in zero Greek New Testament editions.

If the subjective realm of “internal evidences” were very different, Westcott and Hort almost surely would have omitted the ending. No matter what the “internal evidences” evaluation. The Critical Text started out as a Vaticanus-primacy text (putting aside western non-interpolations) and for the most part remains so today.

All Reformation Bible, Vulgate, Peshitta, and Byzantine and Western editions will have the ultra-majority text. Even an Alexandrian edition would have to puzzle out the split, since most Alexandrian mss have the traditional ending. Only a Vaticanus-primacy (or the quirky one edition of Tischendorf with was Sinaiticus-oriented) text will omit the ending. Remember, 99.9% of the Greek, Latin and Syriac mss support the ending, which would make for a very high bar of internal evidence needed, which is not even remotely approached. The key has always been Vaticanus.

In point of fact, internal evidences in the modern realm are often special pleading to match the preexisting Vaticanus-primacy variant.

Historically, your criticism of Lunn on this issue is simply false.

JW:
That Sinaiticus and Vaticanus (S & V) support for 16:8 is the key evidence for 16:8 is a fantasy strawman narrative created by fundamentalists who argue for LE. Now where might a fundamentalist like you have drank this kool-aid:

The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20 by James Snapp Jr.

some commentators have rejected these twelve verses, mainly because the text of Mark 16 ends at verse 8 in two important Greek manuscripts, (Vaticanus and Sinaiticus).

Now what would be a better source of the position of supporters of 16:8 on S & V, what fundamentalists say is the position of supporters of 16:8 on S & V or what supporters of 16:8 say is their position on S & V? [will not be surprised if Steven says "Fundamentalists"].

We go first to the best article of all time for 16:8:

Assessment of Internal Evidence

Already from the internal evidence it is clear neither the LE nor SE were written by Mark. As continuations of Mark's Gospel they are illogical, written in a completely different style, and betray knowledge of the Canonical NT and thus long-post-date the composition of Mark.

Thus Dr. Carrier concludes against LE based on the Internal evidence. No help from any External is needed. External evidence such as S and V supports the conclusion.

Next, I think if a poll was taken, Professor Ehrman would receive the most votes as the top textual criticism expert of our time. In his more detailed writings Ehrman indicates that the most important Textual Criticism criterion is The Difficult Reading Principle and this forms the basis of modern Textual Criticism. A minimum of quality External/Internal evidence combined with The Difficult Reading Principle is decisive. Here he explains for 16:8:

Bart Ehrman - Mark 16:9-20 is fake

[Must resist Lunn ad hominem impulse]More amazing than Jesus' supposed resurrection is that Lunn never mentions "The Difficult Reading Principle" in his introduction.[/Not resisting well]

Metzger would be considered the traditional top textual critic and here is his related contribution:

http://www.bible-researcher.com/endmark.html

The longer ending (3), though current in a variety of witnesses, some of them ancient, must also be judged by internal evidence to be secondary. (a) The vocabulary and style of verses 9-20 are non-Markan. (e.g. απιστεω, βλαπτω, βεβαιοω, επακολουθεω, θεαομαι, μετα ταυτα, πορευομαι, συνεργεω, υστερον are found nowhere else in Mark; and θανασιμον and τοις μετ αυτου γενομενοις, as designations of the disciples, occur only here in the New Testament). (b) The connection between ver. 8 and verses 9-20 is so awkward that it is difficult to believe that the evangelist intended the section to be a continuation of the Gospel. Thus, the subject of ver. 8 is the women, whereas Jesus is the presumed subject in ver. 9; in ver. 9 Mary Magdalene is identified even though she has been mentioned only a few lines before (15.47 and 16.1); the other women of verses 1-8 are now forgotten; the use of αναστας δε and the position of πρωτον are appropriate at the beginning of a comprehensive narrative, but they are ill-suited in a continuation of verses 1-8. In short, all these features indicate that the section was added by someone who knew a form of Mark that ended abruptly with ver. 8 and who wished to supply a more appropriate conclusion. In view of the inconcinnities between verses 1-8 and 9-20, it is unlikely that the long ending was composed ad hoc to fill up an obvious gap; it is more likely that the section was excerpted from another document, dating perhaps from the first half of the second century.

The internal evidence for the shorter ending (2) is decidedly against its being genuine. Besides containing a high percentage of non-Markan words, its rhetorical tone differs totally from the simple style of Mark's Gospel.

JW:
Boom! Steven, you should just confess that you are wrong on this. You would have more street cred in this Forum.



Joseph

ErrancyWiki

[MrMacSon]

[ Every category of External evidence though, Manuscript, Patristic, Scribal and Authority shows that the direction of change is from 16:8 to LE.

In one sense this is true. Early in the transmission history there was a major bifurcation of the textline. Then the omission ending was completely rejected (with some Armenian-related exceptions). Thus the direction was to the full ending.

This tells us very little about the movement from 45 AD to 400 AD, or more significantly 45 AD to 200 AD. The evidence there, by the use of the ending by writers like Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, more supports initial movement from LE to abrupt ending.

Please elaborate on the "bifurcation of the textline".

What "movement from 45 AD to 400 AD", or "45 AD to 200 AD" ??

[JoeWallack]

JW:

Introduction

Continuing with Lunn's poor and backwards reasoning in his Introduction:

• 6) He claims that a resurrection appearance is expected because of preexisting Christian writings but there is no quality evidence of any resurrection appearance narrative before GMark. Most of his related argument is that previous Christian writing makes clear and emphasizes that Jesus was resurrected but GMark already does that. He appeals to Paul's controversial 1 Corinthians 15 (which ironically goes against the rest of Paul) but fails to cite the controversy or important differences between it and the LE (Cephas, the twelve, all the apostles) or Paul's related finish that Jesus than appeared to him which he otherwise makes clear was a brief revelation for the sole purpose of communication and not physical movement from heaven to earth which implies he is saying the same about the "appearances" to the disciples.
  
  7) He claims that the relationship with the canonical Gospels supports LE. His argument is that they have basic information/stories in common. He fails to explain that that is largely because GMatthew/GLuke use GMark as a base. He also fails to note that GMatthew/GLuke is quality evidence for 16:8 as they follow GMark almost word for word until and than are completely different after.
  
  8) He claims that resurrection predictions in 1-16:8 supports LE but GMark makes the resurrection explicit without LE. The observation that he should be making is that there is no resurrection appearance prediction in 1-16:8.
  
  9) He correctly claims that "for" is an extremely unusual way to end an ancient Greek book. He fails to note though that "Mark" has an extremely unusual style and that no early Patristic mentioned that as an issue.
  
  10) He correctly notes that 16:8 contrasts with GMark's positive beginning but fails to note that GMark in general has a style of contrast and specifically reversed expectations.

Joseph

ErrancyWiki

[Steven Avery]

Boom! Steven, you should just confess that you are wrong on this. You would have more street cred in this Forum.

That is a joke, Joe. For you to quote Metzger (and some parrots) when you actually know from the James Snapp material that it is loaded with distortions, errors, false claims and, the Metzger ultra-specialty, agitprop word-parsings, puts you in a non-integrity position in talking about cred.

You are simply sacrificing scholastic honesty when you repeat tripe that you know has been sent to the fish-house.

==================

It is a simple textual fact that if Vaticanus and Sinaiticus did not omit the ending (without or without blank spaces and cancel-sheets) there would NEVER have been a textual issue in terms of the Critical Text and the mass of corrupt versions produced today. Arcane supportive attempts based on internals and such were only attempted as Vaticanus support, since 999 out of every 1,000 mss support the traditional ending, and massive ECW evidences, including from way before any actual omission.

I have to conclude that you simply do not know the history of the Westcott and Hort GNT and the Revision and the period following

==================

Plus, I do not seek "cred" on a largely skeptic forum. I simply seek truth. And appreciate fairness, it is arrives.

Steven

[Secret Alias]

Steve

I don't know that anyone or everyone at this forum 'trusts' or believes either you or Joe. Let's call a spade for a spade. You and Joe are apologists and Joe is properly defined as a hater. You have all demonstrated yourselves to have agendas which make it possible to take anything you say at face value.

The fact that this is a 'skeptics' forum doesn't mean that we automatically side with a hater at the expense of an apologist. It just means that we don't fall victim (or try not to fall victim) to the blind spots of the arguments each side.

Take for instance your statement to the effect that '999 out of every 1,000 mss support the traditional ending.' WTF kind of an argument is that? You as an apologist pretend to the outsider that this shows that Christianity was in agreement about the gospels when you know - deep, deep down - that this is complete bullshit. The reason most of the manuscripts agree in general is because there was a political effort in the third and fourth and fifth centuries to make all points of doctrine agree including the texts themselves.

You know that's true. You know that's why the churches today have very little substantive differences in dogma WHEN COMPARED WITH THE SECOND CENTURY. You can't hold up textual agreement when you know full well that there were overt efforts to make all witnesses - living and literary - agree with one another.

You may call this 'God's will' when you gather together but you should know better. It was the will of man and in particular the Roman state. These kinds of examples of willful ignorance make you and your kind lose credibility among those who don't have to pimp the existing religious tradition.