Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

robert j wrote:Thanks Ben, great food for thought. I'm going to take my leave of participation in this topic for now, and appreciate your work here.
Thank you, and likewise,
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Tenorikuma
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Tenorikuma »

I have only read the first seven pages of this discussion so far. But since I'm currently finishing The Two Jesuses (a tremendously insightful book) by Theodore Weeden, let me offer his interpretation.

Nearly all key elements of Jesus' trial and punishment are mirrored by premonitive statements in Mark about what will befall Jesus' followers. (There's a table of them on pp. 176-177.) Weeden also holds that the charge of blasphemy against Jesus is a reflection of similar charges made against Christians by Jews in the author's own day. He cites Haenchen, who in Weg Jesu surmises that some Jews found it blasphemous to exalt a crucified person as Messiah due to Deut. 21:23 — a view that Paul rebuts in Gal. 3:13 and alludes to in 1 Cor. 1:23. (In other words, some early Gentile Christians, particularly in the Pauline sphere, were dealing with Jews who said you could not ascribe God's supreme blessing upon someone whom the Torah described as accursed.)

Ben Smith's original premise is certainly clever — and enticing for the way it absolves Mark of an apparent misunderstanding of Jewish law. However, if the trial is a fictive story illustrating Christian-Jewish theological controversies of the late first century, we don't need to look for another explanation within the narrative of how claiming to be messiah could be blasphemous. Jesus was wrongfully crucified, in a sense, for proclaiming the same christological truth that Christians in Mark's day are being "crucified" for.

Storywise, it's paradoxical (reminds me a bit of the last Game of Thrones episode), but Mark uses his narrative as a tool in service of the discourse-level claims he is making.

The reason Ben's proposition doesn't convince me is this: If Mark's readers are supposed to understand that Jesus uttered the name Yahweh — euphemized only for the narrative as "Power" — then he did commit blasphemy, then the passage's relevance to the readers' situation no longer makes sense to me, unless I'm missing something.

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Ben C. Smith
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Tenorikuma wrote:The reason Ben's proposition doesn't convince me is this: If Mark's readers are supposed to understand that Jesus uttered the name Yahweh — euphemized only for the narrative as "Power" — then he did commit blasphemy, then the passage's relevance to the readers' situation no longer makes sense to me, unless I'm missing something.
The OP asks the question, and it is not a rhetorical one: does Mark himself understand what the blasphemy was?

The position that I am leaning toward is that Mark's readers are not supposed to understand that Jesus uttered the divine name, because Mark himself did not understand that, either; the position that I am leaning toward is that this is what blasphemy in the pericope originally meant, but later authors (including Mark himself) did not understand that, and used it in the more generic sense that you suggest.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by iskander »

Ben C. Smith wrote:
Tenorikuma wrote:The reason Ben's proposition doesn't convince me is this: If Mark's readers are supposed to understand that Jesus uttered the name Yahweh — euphemized only for the narrative as "Power" — then he did commit blasphemy, then the passage's relevance to the readers' situation no longer makes sense to me, unless I'm missing something.
The OP asks the question, and it is not a rhetorical one: does Mark himself understand what the blasphemy was?

The position that I am leaning toward is that Mark's readers are not supposed to understand that Jesus uttered the divine name, because Mark himself did not understand that, either; the position that I am leaning toward is that this is what blasphemy in the pericope originally meant, but later authors (including Mark himself) did not understand that, and used it in the more generic sense that you suggest.

Why is this unworkable question helpful to the understanding of the gospel of Mark? :
Ben C. Smith wrote: does Mark himself understand what the blasphemy was?
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Tenorikuma »

Weeden's position (which I find convincing) is that Mark himself composed the trial scene, so there is no "original" meaning to the pericope other than Mark's. Are you of the position that there was a pre-Markan Gospel that had Jesus standing trial before the Sanhedrin and committing blasphemy?
…does Mark himself understand what the blasphemy was?
He "understands" that blasphemy was a false accusation; it was really the high priest who was committing blasphemy by denying the words and actions of the divine spirit (God) through Jesus, just as Jesus' detractors did when they accused him of collusion with Beelzebul. If Mark is successful (and I think he is), this is the ironic message that readers will infer.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Tenorikuma wrote:Weeden's position (which I find convincing) is that Mark himself composed the trial scene, so there is no "original" meaning to the pericope other than Mark's. Are you of the position that there was a pre-Markan Gospel that had Jesus standing trial before the Sanhedrin and committing blasphemy?
The term "gospel" is too strong, since I have not characterized the source at all, but yes, I am leaning toward the notion of an original source in which it was understood that the circumlocution meant Jesus had pronounced the divine name at trial. I have not read this book by Weeden, however, and I am persuadable. In the end, however, I would like the similarity between Mark and the Mishnah with respect to the unusual circumlocution in each to be accounted for.
He "understands" that blasphemy was a false accusation; it was really the high priest who was committing blasphemy by denying the words and actions of the divine spirit (God) through Jesus, just as Jesus' detractors did when they accused him of collusion with Beelzebul. If Mark is successful (and I think he is), this is the ironic message that readers will infer.
As I have mentioned, I am all in favor of the interpretation by which Mark makes the high priest the "real" blasphemer by speaking against the spirit who is speaking through Jesus. But that scenario neither precludes an earlier source in which the blasphemy was actually the speaking of the divine name in a context that the high priest naturally took as slanderous toward God nor explains the unusual circumlocutions for the divine name both in Mark and in the Mishnah, precisely in a context in which the divine name is the important thing.

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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

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Let me try to retrace Weeden's arguments. He relies heavily on a case made by John Donahue for a pre-Markan trial narrative.

• Donahue (whose book I don't have) argued that the pre-Markan trial tradition was "an apologetic historicization arising out of complex reflections on a variety of Old Testament texts," such as Wisdom of Solomon 2:12-20, 5:1-7.
• This trial included "the tradition of an appearance of Jesus before a Jewish official" that was merged with another Christian apologetic of Jesus as the Isaianic suffering servant.
• For Weeden, this "tradition of an appearance before a Jewish official" must have been the story of Jesus ben Ananias, which Weeden thinks Mark got from Palestinian oral tradition. (I think he got it from Josephus.)
• This explains, among other things, the discordant shift from anti-temple rhetoric that prompts Jesus' arrest to the actual charge on which Jesus is condemned, blasphemy (due to a christological claim) — which is suddenly sprung on the narrative.

In other words, there was a pre-Markan trial tradition, but it was concerned with the temple destruction motif, not blasphemy, which is Mark's innovation.

I'm explaining this terribly, but it's quite late where I am.
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Tenorikuma wrote:This explains, among other things, the discordant shift from anti-temple rhetoric that prompts Jesus' arrest to the actual charge on which Jesus is condemned, blasphemy (due to a christological claim) — which is suddenly sprung on the narrative.
Now, see, I have a different take on that. I suspect that Jesus uttering the divine name at his trial was him getting convicted on purpose, in keeping with all of his predictions and generally being in total control of what is going to happen to him (with the single exception of one understandable moment in Gethsemane). In other words, in earlier narrative, the temple stuff was the all-controlling factor from the Jewish authorities' point of view, but their case was failing (Mark explicitly says that their witnesses were not agreeing with each other). So Jesus took matters into his own hands and gift-wrapped a statement for them that they could not fail to accept as blasphemous (divine name + slander against God = blasphemy, according to the Mishnah).
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Tenorikuma »

My issues, then, are twofold:

1. Why introduce the anti-temple motif at all? It couldn't have been a part of Christian apologetic until after the Jewish War.
2. Does Mark (or ur-Mark) really seem like the kind of writer who is well-versed enough in Rabbinic law to hang the trial narrative on such a subtle point? (And yet, the trial is completely implausible for other reasons.)
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Re: Blasphemy & the passion narrative before Mark.

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Tenorikuma wrote:My issues, then, are twofold:

1. Why introduce the anti-temple motif at all? It couldn't have been a part of Christian apologetic until after the Jewish War.
Let me nuance this a bit. I rushed to agree with something that I am actually not sure about. First, let us suppose that the anti-temple motif was the original issue. What is to say that the first passion narrative, at least the first one with this element, does not postdate the fall of Jerusalem? I like to keep my internal analyses free of other factors, including the external, so as to get a clearer picture later of what actually "locks" into place and what does not. Second, it may have been, in my view, more general terms of sedition, and the anti-temple stuff was added later. I would not prejudge that issue yet, since I am still very much looking into it.
2. Does Mark (or ur-Mark) really seem like the kind of writer who is well-versed enough in Rabbinic law to hang the trial narrative on such a subtle point? (And yet, the trial is completely implausible for other reasons.)
My point, the position I am leaning toward, is that Mark did not hang the trial narrative on such a subtle point. He misunderstood the underlying narrative and assumed that Jesus' grandiose claims were the blasphemy.

ETA: Read the last two paragraphs here: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2397&start=110#p53992.
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