Why is Peter called Satan in Mark?

[Giuseppe]

..maybe the key is in the expression 'son of man'. That expression is one of the biggest mysteries, I think.

Sure. For me the expression 'son of man' makes a lot of sense (in the context) if it refers only to the human(-oid) body of Jesus, not to his divine nature (the spiritual Christ possessing him).

[Stefan Kristensen]

..maybe the key is in the expression 'son of man'. That expression is one of the biggest mysteries, I think.

Sure. For me the expression 'son of man' makes a lot of sense (in the context) if it refers only to the human(-oid) body of Jesus, not to his divine nature (the spiritual Christ possessing him).

I think this is something like the way the early church fathers understood it, the son of God in his human form, "the son" in fleshly form, "the human-son". But what about the 'son of man' sayings that seem to pertain to Dan 7, with the heavenly son of man in "glory" (Mark 8:38; 13:26; 14:62)?

The spiritual beings know Jesus as the son of God, but what do they understand by that? How would the demons understand Dan 7? It seems that Satan and his minions know who Jesus are, they just didn't know about his death and resurrection? Also consider the Gadarene demoniac in gMatt, where Matthew adds an interesting reaction from the demons:
"What have you to do with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God! I adjure you by God, don't torment me!" (Mark 5:7)
"What have you to do with us, son of God! Have you come here to torment us before time?" (Matt 8:29)

Has Jesus "come here before time"? In comparison to what schedule, what plan?? Did God forget to inform the evil spirits of an important calender update? "Oh yes, by the way, before his great, victorious, heavenly, end-time appearance when he will judge and punish you evil ones my son is going to make a short guest appearance in your earthly realm".

What does the demon actually mean with "here"? "Have you come here before time to torment us?" The earthly realm of Satan and his minions? Or Gentile country? If the latter, then the demons have some pretty deep insight into Jesus' mission, that he goes first to the Jews then to the Gentiles. That would be very surprising. So does the demons mean the realm of Satan? It seems, that Matthew thinks that the demons, and therefore Satan, are aware that the 'son of God' is going to come and torment them for their final judgement, which is probably the second coming of Jesus, but that they were surprised about this 'first' coming of him?

The author of Jude has evidently read some of 1 Enoch and not only cites from it directly (Jude 14-15) but also speaks about "the angels that didn't keep their rulership but left their dwelling, God has kept them in eternal chains under the earths gloom for the judgement of the Great Day" (Jude 6). Similarly 2 Pet 2:4 says that God didn't "spare the sinning angels, but threw them into Tartarus and committed them to the chains of the gloom, keeping them for the judgement." We also hear of this in Jubilees, but here we also learn that Satan pleads God to keep 10% of the evil spirits, so that he (Satan) can have his rulership among the humans until his judgement (Jub 10). For some reason God allows this! And that would mean that Satan and his minions are roaming the earthly sphere causing disease and immorality awaiting their appointed time of judgement.

But Matthew introduces here this element of surprise: "Have you come here before time to torment us?" What does this tell us about Matthews view of the knowledge of Satan and his minions, the "rulers of this world"? Is Satan trying to prevent the crucifixion of Jesus or is he trying to make it happen? Or doesn't he know what he's trying to do?


Perhaps it is significant that Luke omits the whole episode with Peter/Satan rebuking Jesus' passion prediction. According to Luke, "Satan entered into Judas" (Luke 22:3) in order to set up Jesus' crucifixion, which must mean that Satan is explicitly trying to get the 'son of God' crucified here. Is it possible, that in gMark and gMatt Satan is trying to prevent Jesus going to the cross, for example when using Peter to try and make Jesus fail his passion-mission, whereas in gLuke he is instead the one to make it happen?

[Giuseppe]

..maybe the key is in the expression 'son of man'. That expression is one of the biggest mysteries, I think.

Sure. For me the expression 'son of man' makes a lot of sense (in the context) if it refers only to the human(-oid) body of Jesus, not to his divine nature (the spiritual Christ possessing him).

I think this is something like the way the early church fathers understood it, the son of God in his human form, "the son" in fleshly form, "the human-son". But what about the 'son of man' sayings that seem to pertain to Dan 7, with the heavenly son of man in "glory" (Mark 8:38; 13:26; 14:62)?

The spiritual beings know Jesus as the son of God, but what do they understand by that? How would the demons understand Dan 7? It seems that Satan and his minions know who Jesus are, they just didn't know about his death and resurrection? Also consider the Gadarene demoniac in gMatt, where Matthew adds an interesting reaction from the demons:
"What have you to do with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God! I adjure you by God, don't torment me!" (Mark 5:7)
"What have you to do with us, son of God! Have you come here to torment us before time?" (Matt 8:29)

Has Jesus "come here before time"? In comparison to what schedule, what plan?? Did God forget to inform the evil spirits of an important calender update? "Oh yes, by the way, before his great, victorious, heavenly, end-time appearance when he will judge and punish you evil ones my son is going to make a short guest appearance in your earthly realm".

I have always thought that the expression "Son of the most high God" was an anti-marcionite expression (Marcion denied that the Demiurge was the supreme god). So I think that Matthew, by omitting "Son of the most high god" but by inserting "before the time", is saying the same thing of Mark: The demons realize (wrongly) with surprise that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah, came before the time fixed by the creator god. But the irony here would be that even the demons don't realize the true identity of Jesus (as Messiah of an alien god, distinct from the creator god).

[Stefan Kristensen]

I think this is something like the way the early church fathers understood it, the son of God in his human form, "the son" in fleshly form, "the human-son". But what about the 'son of man' sayings that seem to pertain to Dan 7, with the heavenly son of man in "glory" (Mark 8:38; 13:26; 14:62)?

The spiritual beings know Jesus as the son of God, but what do they understand by that? How would the demons understand Dan 7? It seems that Satan and his minions know who Jesus are, they just didn't know about his death and resurrection? Also consider the Gadarene demoniac in gMatt, where Matthew adds an interesting reaction from the demons:
"What have you to do with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God! I adjure you by God, don't torment me!" (Mark 5:7)
"What have you to do with us, son of God! Have you come here to torment us before time?" (Matt 8:29)

Has Jesus "come here before time"? In comparison to what schedule, what plan?? Did God forget to inform the evil spirits of an important calender update? "Oh yes, by the way, before his great, victorious, heavenly, end-time appearance when he will judge and punish you evil ones my son is going to make a short guest appearance in your earthly realm".

I have always thought that the expression "Son of the most high God" was an anti-marcionite expression (Marcion denied that the Demiurge was the supreme god). So I think that Matthew, by omitting "Son of the most high god" but by inserting "before the time", is saying the same thing of Mark: The demons realize (wrongly) with surprise that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah, came before the time fixed by the creator god. But the irony here would be that even the demons don't realize the true identity of Jesus (as Messiah of an alien god, distinct from the creator god).

How do you mean this expression is "anti-marcionite"? If Jesus was son of the supreme God, which Marcion believe(?), then wouldn't 'son of the Most High' exactly be Marcion's christology instead of anti-marcionite?

The appellation "Most High" can also be regarded as the universal appellation for God, and so typically used in Gentile contexts, i.e. a certain aspect of God, the ruler aspect, which is his authority as creator over all creation. I suspect that the healing of the Gerasene, Gentile, demoniac is a Markan 'parable' that would go something like this:
The possessed man represents the whole world, i.e. the Gentile nations, that are held in occupation by Satan's forces of death, which is the Roman empire. God's deliverance of the Gentiles from Satan's forces, is not a fleshly liberation from the Roman empire, but instead a spiritual liberation from the spiritual forces that are behind the Roman empire. And the Gentiles that are all held captured by the Roman empire are like Israel held captured in Egypt, so this liberation of the Gentiles that God will now effectuate (following the Christ event) is like an exodus, and the Roman armies, "Legion", is sent into the sea to drown.

[Giuseppe]

How do you mean this expression is "anti-marcionite"? If Jesus was son of the supreme God, which Marcion believe(?), then wouldn't 'son of the Most High' exactly be Marcion's christology instead of anti-marcionite?

Prof Markus Vinzent is surely persuasive about the anti-marcionite character of the expression ''son of the most high''. Please read from here:

Why does Luke change Marcion’s title God into that of the ‘Most High’ (Luke 6:35)? Richard Bauckham provides an impressive list of works of early Jewish Literature (250BCE – 150 CE) that refer to God as the ‘Most High’.[1] He identifies as key passage about the ‘Most High’ Deuteronomy 32:8-9, a text ‘that has played a prominent part in discussion of Jewish monotheism’. In the Masoretic Hebrew, the text reads as follows:[2]

32:8 When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,
when he divided up humankind,
he set the boundaries of the peoples,
according to the number of the heavenly assembly.
32:9 For the Lord’s allotment is his people,
Jacob is his special possession.

In the early Jewish interpretations of this verse, the ‘Most High’ and the Lord were seen as ‘one and the same’, but Marcion accused this ‘most high’ Lord of Israel of being a biased sovereign ruler, one who ruled over all the nations and all souls, but who had allocated spirits and angels to rule over the many nations and people, while only Israel was solely ruled by himself. Hence, he accused the God of Israel of making a difference between the wise or virtuous souls and the wicked ones who are lead astray from following the Most High, an interpretation that Luke corrected by giving the all-merciful God the title ‘Most High’, of course a sort of tour de force in the eyes of Marcion, if read against the Jewish writings of his time:[3]

He appointed a ruler for every nation,
But Israel is the Lord’s own portion (Sir. 17:17).[4]
4:24 … It is the decision of the Most High that this has happened to my lord the king. 4:25 You will be driven from human society, and you will live with the wild animals. You will be fed grass like oxen, and you will become damp with the dew of the sky. Seven periods of time will pass by for you, before you understand that the Most High is ruler over human kingdoms and gives them to whomever he wishes. … 4:34 … I extolled the Most High, and I praised and glorified the one who lives forever. For his authority is an everlasting authority, and his kingdom extends from one generation to the next. 4:35 All the inhabitants of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as he wishes with the army of heaven and with those who inhabit the earth. No one slaps his hand and says to him, ‘What have you done?’ (Dan. 4:24-35)
And he sanctified them [Israel] and gathered them from all the sons of man because (there are) many nations and many people, and they all belong to him, but over all of them he caused spirits to rule so that they might lead them astray from following him. But over Israel he did not cause any angel or spirit to rule because he alone is their ruler and he will protect them and he will seek for them at the hand of all his authorities so that he might guard them and bless them and they might be his and he might be theirs henceforth and forever (Jub. 15:31-2).[5]
But from the sons of Isaac one would become a holy seed and he would not be counted among the nations because he would become the portion of the Most High and all his seed would fall (by lot) to the Lord, a (special) possession from all people, and so that he might become a kingdom of priests and a holy people (Jub. 16:17-8).[6]
When God divided and partitioned off the nations of the soul, separating those of one common speech from those of another tongue, and causing them to dwell apart; when he dispersed and put away from himself the children of earth, then did he fix the boundaries of the offspring of virtue corresponding to the number of the angels … But what are the portions of his angels, and what is the allotted share of the All-sovereign Ruler? The particular virtues belong to the servants, to the Ruler the chosen race of Israel.[7]
Marvel not at all, then, if the title of special portion of God the universal Ruler, to whom sovereignty over all pertains, is bestowed upon the company of wise souls, whose vision is supremely keen … Is not this the explanation of that utterance in the Greater Song [Deut. 32:7-9]?[8]

            Bauckham has shown that early Judaism had developed a monotheistic ‘uniqueness of the one God in terms of an absolute difference in kind from all other reality’, and he adds:
We could call it transcendent uniqueness. It means that there is no class of beings to which God belongs and of which he can be the supreme instance. I takes a ‘binary’ view of reality. In my view, early Jewish literature (with few, if any, exceptions) is strongly committed to such a view by the way it constantly understands the uniqueness of the God of Israel as that of the one Creator of all things and the one sovereign Ruler of all things. Because these definitions of God’s uniqueness drive an absolute difference of kind between God and ‘all things’, they override any oder gradient features of the Israelite-Jewish worldview (such as survive in some of the vocabulary used) and create an essentially binary view of reality. This does not and need not deny the existence of many heavenly beings, but simply insists that they are created by God and subject to the sovereign will of God. In early Judaism, the binary distinction between God and all other reality was observed and inculcated – in daily religious observance – by monolatry. In a gradient worldview (such as the pagan, inclusive monotheism of antiquity), many beings are accorded honour, each to a degree appropriate to its rank in the cosmic scale. Early Judaism turned monolatry (which had originally been a concomitant of henotheism) into a powerful symbol of exclusive monotheism.[9]
            Bauckham’s emphasis on monolatrial monotheism, the unique view of God that results in a ‘binary’ view of reality between things and God, highlights another feature that bridges Marcion and his contemporary Judaism.

[/font]
(my bold)


Therefore what I have put in bold:

Marcion accused this ‘most high’ Lord of Israel of being a biased sovereign ruler, one who ruled over all the nations and all souls, but who had allocated spirits and angels to rule over the many nations and people, while only Israel was solely ruled by himself

...may answer to your question about the Gerasene demoniac. In the your words:

The possessed man represents the whole world, i.e. the Gentile nations, that are held in occupation by Satan's forces of death, which is the Roman empire. God's deliverance of the Gentiles from Satan's forces, is not a fleshly liberation from the Roman empire, but instead a spiritual liberation from the spiritual forces that are behind the Roman empire. And the Gentiles that are all held captured by the Roman empire are like Israel held captured in Egypt, so this liberation of the Gentiles that God will now effectuate (following the Christ event) is like an exodus, and the Roman armies, "Legion", is sent into the sea to drown.

The gerasene demoniac was possessed by the demons established as elite on the pagans by the same Demiurge. In this sense the latter was named ''Ialdabaoth'': the ''Lord of the Legions''.

[Ben C. Smith]

The gerasene demoniac was possessed by the demons established as elite on the pagans by the same Demiurge. In this sense the latter was named ''Ialdabaoth'': the ''Lord of the Legions''.

I can see getting "hosts" ("legions") from the second half of the name (the "s" being truncated from sabaoth for some reason), but how does the first half give us "lord" or something like it? It would seem easier to get from the first half to yeled. But might this not be just one of those magical names composed of Jewish- or otherwise foreign- or ancient-sounding phonemes, rather like the magical language of witches and wizards in the Harry Potter universe is made to sound like Latin?

[Giuseppe]

The gerasene demoniac was possessed by the demons established as elite on the pagans by the same Demiurge. In this sense the latter was named ''Ialdabaoth'': the ''Lord of the Legions''.

I can see getting "hosts" ("legions") from the second half of the name (the "s" being truncated from sabaoth for some reason), but how does the first half give us "lord" or something like it? It would seem easier to get from the first half to yeled. But might this not be just one of those magical names composed of Jewish- or otherwise foreign- or ancient-sounding phonemes, rather like the magical language of witches and wizards in the Harry Potter universe is made to sound like Latin?

It is not necessary to see so far...

Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?

(Matthew 26:35)

[Ben C. Smith]

The gerasene demoniac was possessed by the demons established as elite on the pagans by the same Demiurge. In this sense the latter was named ''Ialdabaoth'': the ''Lord of the Legions''.

I can see getting "hosts" ("legions") from the second half of the name (the "s" being truncated from sabaoth for some reason), but how does the first half give us "lord" or something like it? It would seem easier to get from the first half to yeled. But might this not be just one of those magical names composed of Jewish- or otherwise foreign- or ancient-sounding phonemes, rather like the magical language of witches and wizards in the Harry Potter universe is made to sound like Latin?

It is not necessary to see so far...

Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?

(Matthew 26:35)

I am not talking about interpretation. Just the etymology of Ialdabaoth.

[andrewcriddle]

I am not talking about interpretation. Just the etymology of Ialdabaoth.

Etymology Disputed see Rasimus and Plese

Andrew Criddle

[Ben C. Smith]

I am not talking about interpretation. Just the etymology of Ialdabaoth.

Etymology Disputed see Rasimus and Plese

Andrew Criddle

Exactly so. The first link suggests it is an amalgam of 4 (!) separate sacred names.