Mark Wrote for Highly Educated People

[Ulan]

. The trick was how to create a text that reads as if it were as ancient and authoritative as the Septuagint, but was actually written last week?

Its almost non sequitur bud

Daniel is some very important text for the origins of Christianity bringing in new Jewish practices, and that book did not have age to it.

Well, Daniel is also a good example for a text that tries to make itself look older than it actually is.

[Secret Alias]

My point is simply that Mark's gospel is too sophisticated to have been written for oral reading alone. It fits into the general 'gnostic' tradition. If it was meant to be read silently first and foremost the identification of a version in Alexandria as 'mystical,' 'mystic' might have had the sense of 'private' because musterion is derived muo (= to shut the mouth) i.e. reading secretly, thinking secretly, understanding privately. The secrecy thing necessarily implies silence.

[Secret Alias]

The Father dwells in silence according to the Nag Hammadi 'Valentinian Exposition' - "He dwells alone in silence, and silence is tranquility since, after all, he was a Monad and no one was before him." In the Trimorphic Protennoia "I am the Invisible One within the All. It is I who counsel those who are hidden, since I know the All that exists in it. I am numberless beyond everyone. I am immeasurable, ineffable, yet whenever I wish, I shall reveal myself of my own accord. I am the head of the All. I exist before the All, and I am the All, since I exist in everyone.

I am a Voice speaking softly. I exist from the first. I dwell within the Silence that surrounds every one of them. And it is the hidden Voice that dwells within my, within the incomprehensible, immeasurable Thought, within the immeasurable Silence.

I descended to the midst of the underworld, and I shone down upon the darkness. It is I who poured forth the water. It is I who am hidden within radiant waters. I am the one who gradually put forth the All by my Thought. It is I who am laden with the Voice. It is through me that Gnosis comes forth. I dwell in the ineffable and unknowable ones."

[Secret Alias]

Hippolytus on the mysteries of Justin:

But swear, says Justin, if you wish to know "what eye hath not seen, and ear hath not heard, and the things which have not entered into the heart;" that is, if you wish to know Him who is good above all, Him who is more exalted, (swear) that you will preserve the secrets (of the Justinian) discipline, as intended to be kept silent. For also our Father, on beholding the Good One, and on being initiated with Him, preserved the mysteries respecting which silence is enjoined, and sware, as it has been written, "The Lord sware, and will not repent."

[Secret Alias]

I thought Tertullian's discussion of silence and the binary nature of God was instructive for us to understand the ancient mindset:

For although God had not yet sent out His Word, He still had Him within Himself, both in company with and included within His very Reason, as He silently planned and arranged within Himself everything which He was afterwards about to utter through His Word. Now, whilst He was thus planning and arranging with His own Reason, He was actually causing that to become Word which He was dealing with in the way of Word or Discourse. And that you may the more readily understand this, consider first of all, from your own self, who are made "in the image and likeness of God," for what purpose it is that you also possess reason in yourself, who are a rational creature, as being not only made by a rational Artificer, but actually animated out of His substance. Observe, then, that when you are silently conversing with yourself, this very process is carried on within you by your reason, which meets you with a word at every movement of your thought, at every impulse of your conception. Whatever you think, there is a word; whatever you conceive, there is reason. You must needs speak it in your mind; and while you are speaking, you admit speech as an interlocutor with you, involved in which there is this very reason, whereby, while in thought you are holding converse with your word, you are (by reciprocal action) producing thought by means of that converse with your word. Thus, in a certain sense, the word is a second person within you, through which in thinking you utter speech, and through which also, (by reciprocity of process,) in uttering speech you generate thought. The word is itself a different thing from yourself. Now how much more fully is all this transacted in God, whose image and likeness even you are regarded as being, inasmuch as He has reason within Himself even while He is silent, and involved in that Reason His Word! I may therefore without rashness first lay this down (as a fixed principle) that even then before the creation of the universe God was not alone, since He had within Himself both Reason, and, inherent in Reason, His Word, which He made second to Himself by agitating it within Himself.

There is this very ancient sense within Christianity that 'the Father' the god that distinguished Christianity from Judaism, the god to whom Christians prayed, was lodged in some of divine Silence. His Word manifest speech for him. But there seems to be a division between 'silence' and 'speech' associated with two different powers of God - and I presume two different gospels (or perhaps the gospel and the Law).

[outhouse]

. The trick was how to create a text that reads as if it were as ancient and authoritative as the Septuagint, but was actually written last week?

Its almost non sequitur bud

Daniel is some very important text for the origins of Christianity bringing in new Jewish practices, and that book did not have age to it.

Well, Daniel is also a good example for a text that tries to make itself look older than it actually is.

Agreed, less The visions of chapters 7–12 reflect the crisis which took place in Judea in 167–164 BC and the court tales may have originally circulated independently

I would love to see some kind of evidence of how it was received

Context was as such, "The legendary Daniel, known from long ago but still remembered as an exemplary character ... serves as the principal human "hero"

[outhouse]

My point is simply that Mark's gospel is too sophisticated to have been written for oral reading alone.

Deeper meaning for those educated in the know? For me much of the mystery was their best attempt to combat different Christology without pinning it down knowing this was rapidly changing.

It also added enough intrigue to keep people turning pages to see if they could solve it. It added value.

I think like now, there was no one way to read/view it.

[Secret Alias]

Deeper meaning for those educated in the know? For me much of the mystery was their best attempt to combat different Christology without pinning it down knowing this was rapidly changing.

But you get the Catch 22 I hope. Christianity isn't really about the Jesus story. If it was just 'history' it wouldn't have caught on, it wouldn't have become a movement. People believed in the Jesus story because they thought they were going to 'get stuff' from it - salvation, redemption, whatever. As a result whether or not there was a historical Jesus, Christianity begins and ends with the mystery. The mystery promised things to people and people believed in Jesus because they thought there were benefits associated with 'belief.'

We can argue over whether or not any of this ever happened. But the ancients didn't battle over this. They fought over what mattered - whether or not you really 'get stuff' from believing in Jesus.

[outhouse]

. Christianity isn't really about the Jesus story. If it was just 'history' it wouldn't have caught on, it wouldn't have become a movement.

I believe Christianity is about the Hellenistic divorce of the religious practices of Judaism, from the rebellious people of Israel. Basically Herods temple promoted monotheism in the Diaspora. Jesus martyrdom just lit a match to that woodpile finishing the divorce of cultures quicker, combined with the fall of the temple.

Without jesus, I think we would still have a major movement within Hellenistic Judaism light in the Diaspora.

People believed in the Jesus story because they thought they were going to 'get stuff' from it - salvation, redemption, whatever.

100% true, hurry hurry folks!!! save your soul before the end comes! like a 3 ring circus caller. He died to save your soul! hurry hurry while you can!

As a result whether or not there was a historical Jesus, Christianity begins and ends with the mystery. The mystery promised things to people and people believed in Jesus because they thought there were benefits associated with 'belief.'

I think your placing to much certainty on the mystery here. Yes it was there, but no where near primary to the stupid poor peasants and pagans that were proselytized to.

Central to the movement was the crucifixion and man who gave it all to save you, the common man. he was martyred for his perceived selfless actions whether he existed or not. He was so perceived as divine he competed against the first son of god, the Emperors divinity as such.

[Secret Alias]

I believe Christianity is about the Hellenistic divorce of the religious practices of Judaism ...

I know this is what you believe. But the point of the forum is - at least for me - to hear and try out new ideas based on the consideration of things you likely haven't considered before. That's the beauty of the forum. If I wanted to hear the standard explanation for things ... I'd read a book.

While arguing on behalf of the status quo is of course part of the 'consideration' process - at least in theory - I don't think that you've actually spent the time to consider the evidence brought forward in this thread. The first thing I brought up is - why would Mark have developed such intricacies like chiasmic literary patterns - far more sophisticated and intricate than let's say the Pentateuch if the text was simply meant to be read out loud?

Another point that was brought up is the emphasis on 'silence' and 'secrecy' in the gospel(s). Celsus for one emphasizes the 'secretiveness' of Christian associations. Yes at least part of that secrecy can be attributed to Christianity being a persecuted religion. But Celsus and others seem to indicate at times that the sect(s) was/were punished because of their secrecy not the other way around.

Another point that I might bring up (inspired by the recent resignation letter of one of the Presidential committees) is the frequency of acrostics in certain early Christian prayers. Why make an acrostic if the acrostic can only be 'seen' by the person reading the prayer?

My point is that there is a circular argument which says that Christians literature was absolutely ordinary and so Christian literature was read aloud. But I don't think the preponderance of evidence shows that Christianity was in any way 'ordinary' and instead there is lots of evidence to suggest that its secretiveness made it 'exceptional.'

When one hears the gospel read in a church you simply can't 'get' any secret meanings at all from the text. The narrative is entirely two dimensional - i.e. Jesus came into a place, did something, the people said X, Jesus said Y, the gospel of the Lord.

If there was an original secret meaning intended the text had to be read silently. Yes neo-Platonists approached Homer 'as if' there was a secret meaning but did Homer encode a secret meaning in the Illiad. I see no evidence to suggest this. But we have it claimed in TWO PLACES that Mark encoded a secret meaning in his gospel. This meant the gospel had to been 'intended' to be read silently 'in one's head' by the author of the gospel.