Mark 16 and the silence of the women: The disciples redeemed?

[gmx]

I attempted to find a thread about what the women were a afraid of, but didn't locate it. I'm sure it's been asked before. If they never understood that Jesus foretold his resurrection, and find the stone rolled away and a young man saying he is risen, go tell Pete and the homies to hightail it up to Galilee, why were they so afraid, and secondly, why would being so afraid be a reason not to tell the inner circle?

The word used seems versatile, possibly referring to any of several specific emotional states, often accompanied by physical signs of intensity. That is clearly the case at 16:8.

http://biblehub.com/greek/5399.htm

There doesn't seem to be any need of a "something" to be afraid "of." The Sunday morning events as narrated are emotionally enervating. The context is that the women spent all day Friday watching somebody being slowly suffocated after having been partially flayed alive.

Matthew, following Mark closely on the 2-source hypothesis, was himself concerned at why the women's emotional state was fear...

So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples.

He adds "yet filled with joy", which suggests the same conundrum I raised.

[gmx]

And bluntly, Mt 28:8-15 is reasonably ridiculous narrative. If you support the notion that Mt is dependent upon Mk, these verses are a hatchet job on Mk, whether his gospel originally extended beyond 16:8 or not.

[Kunigunde Kreuzerin]

"Someone you can ask" was meant in a general way by me. If you really want to look behind the story, you have a name as a lead in this case. What this exactly means depends on whether the story was real or it wasn't. Giving names to unique figures is usually done for a purpose though. The purpose is easy to see if we look at a real story, and it gets more complicated when we come to invented stories with invented characters. Mark doesn't put the effort into naming most characters he has act. He does it with some though, and if we look at an invented story, the reason why certain characters have names needs an explanation, which is not exactly easy in some cases.

Granted.

And Ken's question is at first view rather straightforward. The answer to that question he poses is quite clear: In gMark, that's Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses for all 3 points, plus Salome for two of them (plus maybe Joseph of Arimathaea for point 2). This is a rather short list. Of course, we already dealt with the point that they didn't exactly see the raised Jesus in gMark, but only indirect evidence, so no need to get back to this point.

I found our discussion very inspiring, but it could be that our previous discussion on the concept of witness is rather beside the point because ultimately it depends on what is going on in 1 Cor 15:1ff and Mark 15:40-16:8.

In agreement with other scholars Ken's thought was that the named persons are witnesses to Jesus' appearences after his resurrection and that as named witnesses they establish the appearences as the 4th part of the credo. His question was:

So the creed tells that the Jesus appeared after his resurrection to Cephas and the twelve, but who were the witnesses to the earlier parts? What witnesses establish that (1) he died, (2) he was buried, and (3), that he was raised on the third day?

I tend to think that this starting point is only correct

- if 1 Cor 15:3-5 is in fact a pre-Pauline creed and
- if the inner logic of the assumed creed disagreed not only with Paul's reasoning, but also with what we can observe with slight differences in Matthew, Luke and John

imho in Paul's thoughts the namend persons do not establish the appearences. It is the other way around. Not Paul establishs the appearence, but the appearence establishs Paul's authority. Probably Paul had a face to face situation in mind in which the appearence is a heavenly grace and casts authority over the addressee of the appearence.

1 Cor 15:8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain.

This view seems to me typical of Paul and probably of early Christianity too. The apostles are not just humans who decided to preach something. In their self-perception the apostles are empowered and instructed by the resurrected Jesus.

Gal 1:1 Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead

According to Paul, the apostles preach the resurrection with this authority and with their preaching they are witnesses to the whole process of the resurrection (and not only to the appearences).

1 Cor 15:14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. 15 We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised.

Furthermore, in Paul's thought this preaching seems to be not an abstract idea like a creed which needs a prove to convince someone, but it is Paul's personal message to you (his gospel) and it needs faith. In its idealized form this message may be given from the apostle to the believer like the broken bread and should be accepted in faith.

1 Cor 15:1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.

It seems that Luke followed Paul with the slight difference that according to Luke the mission of the apostles needs a second step (descent of the holy spirit upon the apostles). But likewise it is the appearence and the command of the risen Jesus what empowered the apostles and they become witnesses through their preaching to the whole resurrection from the suffering to the rising on the third day.

Luke 24:45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

Matthew's great commission followed a similar pattern. The resurrected Jesus appeared to his disciples and instructed them to spread his teachings to all the nations.

Matthew 28:16 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

In GJohn Mary seems to be narrated just as a witness to the first appearence of Jesus. It looks like John took care that he did not portray Mary as an apostle. But likewise the appearence is a face to face situation and Jesus establishs (so to speak) the non-seeing Mary in this story with his call in verse 16 and she testifies with her message to the disciples. But then John follows exactly the same pattern when Jesus appeared to the disciples.

John 20:11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. 12 And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. 13 They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” 14 Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). 17 Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” 18 Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”—and that he had said these things to her.

19 On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 20 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” 22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”

Ken's view is that

the named persons -> establish the appearences as part of the creed

But it seems to me that in 1 Cor 15 (in broad agreement with Luke, Matthew and John)

the appearences -> establish the authority of the named apostles -> and with their authorized preaching they are witnesses to the whole resurrection

[Ulan]

@Kunigunde: This is of course a view I share. In one of the other threads I just talked about this understanding of Paul, of how he got his authority and why it is worthier than physical contact. After the current majority view of the sequence in which the texts were written, any view about this that is taken from the gospels is secondary. However, in general, I tend to acknowledge that different texts present different views, and there may be a gradual shift in place. Particularly Mt and Lk seem to have a shift to historical instead of spiritual reasoning in many places. You can even see in the texts themselves that also in the times when the gospels appeared, people had no problems with just disbelieving any spiritual "revelations". In this sense, the gospels try at least to insert a (quasi?-)historical safety net: If the listeners disbelieve the spiritual message, here you have some "real" witnesses. In Matthew, this strategy is obvious (the clearest example is the introduction of guards at the tomb to get rid of the "the disciples stole the body" rumors), while it's up to debate in Mark. With gMark, we see some hints that he also tries to work on different levels at the same time (see the exorcism in the first chapter). Therefore, I would not outright dismiss an idea that we look at a situation, where both ideas are true to some extent.