In Mcn Mark 10:40 applies to Paul and Marcion

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Post Reply
Giuseppe
Posts: 13732
Joined: Mon Apr 27, 2015 5:37 am
Location: Italy

In Mcn Mark 10:40 applies to Paul and Marcion

Post by Giuseppe »

We read Mark 10:40 as a sarcastic prophecy insofar the reader knows already (or at least, he presumes to know in advance) that the two Pillars will be deceived by the Pauline Mark (while the truth is that really they will NOT sit at the right and left of Jesus).


Mark 10
35 And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” 36 And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?” 37 And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” 38 Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” 39 And they said to him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized, 40 but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” 41 And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John. 42 And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 43 But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
But the meaning in Mcn is different.

For this reason, they loved him quite justly, but they did not keep their love within bounds; for they kept wondering ''whether perhaps he was the Christ''. The apostle Paul warns against inordinate and irrational love when he says of himself, ''I fear that someone might have an opinion of me above what he sees or hears from em,a nd that the greatness of the revelations might exalt me'', and so on. Paul feared that even he might fall into this error. So he was unwilling to state everything about himself that he knew. He wanted no one to think more of him than he saw or, going beyond the limits of honor, to say what had been said about John, that ''he was the Christ''. Some people said this even about Dosithesus, the heresiarch of the Samaritans; others said it also about Judas the Galilean. Finally, some people burst forth into such great audacity of love that they invented new and unheard of exaggerations about Paul.
For, some say this, that the passage in Scripture that speaks of ''sitting at the Savior's right and left'' applies to Paul and Marcion: Paul sits at his right hand and Marcion at his left.

(Origen, Hom. in Luc., 25)

Therefore it is not more certain whether Mark meant really that John and James weren't the two who will receive the first places.

The version in Mcn reconstructed by Couchoud (as absent in Luke) is the following:
35 And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” 36 And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?” 37 And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.” 38 Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking.

To sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.
It is interesting to note that Mark ceases to be ''pauline'' insofar he puts as pre-requisite to have the first places the execution of good works (i.e. the baptism of the martyrdom). In this Mark is very much similar to those who proclaimed that the Christ was the Zealot as Judas the Galilee or Dositheus (see the passage of Origen above), i..e people who underwent a violent death (Dositheus was the Samaritan Prophet killed by Pilate). Also Acts makes James and John killed by Herod.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Post Reply