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Use of Standard Greek Subject Followed by Verb Much More Common Post Transfiguration & Greek Setting

Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2018 6:42 am
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

Restricted distribution characteristics

1. Prominent characteristics (twenty or more occurences in Mark)

c. Subject-verb (S-V) word order
In chapters 9-15 especially...standard Greek S-V word order is much in evidence. It is especially frequent in stories/pericopes placed in a Hellenistic setting [P. 7]
JW:
So use of the standard Greek order of subject followed by verb is much more common post Transfiguration and Greek settings in GMark. Mr. Spock?

Spock: Fascinating.



Joseph

Skeptical Textual Criticism

δὲ Used Extensively In Chapters 9-15

Posted: Sun Oct 07, 2018 7:40 am
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

Restricted distribution characteristics

1. Prominent characteristics (twenty or more occurrences in Mark)

d. δὲ in conversational interchange and several other contexts
...
Not nearly as frequent early in Mark's Gospel, δὲ is used extensively later, especially in chapters 9-15
...
introduces the immediate reaction of a character
[P. 8]
JW:

δέ
1. universally, by way of opposition and distinction; it is added to statements opposed to a preceding statement:
Note that in The Teaching & Healing Ministry it is not used much compared to its use in The Passion Ministry:

14
14:44 Now he that betrayed him had given them a token, saying, Whomsoever I shall kiss, that is he; take him, and lead him away safely. [Judas]

14:55 Now the chief priests and the whole council sought witness against Jesus to put him to death; and found it not. [Jewish leaders]

14:68 But he denied, saying, I neither know, nor understand what thou sayest: and he went out into the porch; and the cock crew. [Peter]
Interestingly "Mark" (author) does not use the offending word in the Pilate/Jesus exchange but uses it in the Pilate/The Jews exchange when the subject (so to speak) is Jesus:
15:9 And Pilate answered them, saying, Will ye that I release unto you the King of the Jews?
"Mark" often uses the word with a meaning of a strong/negative reaction/emotion. Note that in GMark in Toto, in The Teaching & Healing Ministry Jesus is the man of action and strong emotion. This light flips off in The Room of The Passion Ministry where Jesus' emotions go dark ("crucify his passions") and the opposition reaction is that Jesus' actions and emotions are transferred to the Opposition. See my related classic Thread:

Mark.How Much Ironic Contrast,Transfer&Reversal Did He kraM?



Joseph

Skeptical Textual Criticism

That's What δὲ Said

Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:04 am
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

Restricted distribution characteristics

2. Distinctive characteristics (ten to twenty occurrences in Mark)

a. Redundant ἀποκριθεὶς
After the middle of chapter 8, ἀποκριθεὶς occurs somewhat frequently...
in a way which is redundant with another verb of speaking.
[P. 8]
11 22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God.
JW:
Note that the literary effect of redundant words is to slow down that narrative and give it relatively more attention. In the big picture then "Mark" (author) has seasoned (so to speak) the Teaching & Healing Ministry with quickening such as "immediately" and slowed down the Passion Ministry. The irony of course is that the basic comparison of the two Ministries in total is that The Teaching & Healing Ministry was much bigger in terms of absolute time. The literary effect seems to be that The Teaching & Healing Ministry was bigger in quantity but The Passion Ministry was greater in quality.



Joseph

Skeptical Textual Criticism

When In Rome...

Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2018 2:30 pm
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:
Hellenic Features

...
  • Restricted Distribution Characteristics

    Subject-verb (S-V) word order, especially in chapters 9-15...

    δὲ in conventional interchange...especially in chapters 9-15...

    Split syntax/hyperbaton...in chapters 8-16...

    Participle strings. especially from the middle of chapter 5 onward...

    Genitive absolute used "improperly," ...after chapter 8...
Note that the above indicates that the author has intentionally supplied
a Hellenistic flavor in general to the second half or Passion Ministry of
GMark. Fortunately there does not appear to be enough evidence here
to support Bernard's cockamemeie theory that GMark originally ended
at 15.


Joseph

Why Did CNN Terminate Its Contract With Marc Lamont Hill?

Phaedo as a Source for GMark

Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2018 1:18 pm
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

It's been demonstrated Ad Nazorean in this unholy Forum that GMark is a sophisticated classic written
by a Master. Very few authors of the time would have had the necessary literary skills to write it and
therefore Rome is a good guess as to origin.

Voelz writes: (12)
Sophistication
It must be observed that a number of Mark's linguistic features are congruent with those of Classical
(or at least standard literary) Greek authors. The following characteristics of Mark's Greek may be noted in the Greek of Plato's Phaedo. The Phaedo is of no small interest because of the general parallel of subject matter (the death of a group leader accompanied by misunderstanding by his followers).
Phaedo
Phædo or Phaedo (/ˈfiːdoʊ/; Greek: Φαίδων, Phaidōn, Greek pronunciation: [pʰaídɔːn]), also known to ancient readers as On The Soul,[1] is one of the best-known dialogues of Plato's middle period, along with the Republic and the Symposium. The philosophical subject of the dialogue is the immortality of the soul. It is set in the last hours prior to the death of Socrates, and is Plato's fourth and last dialogue to detail the philosopher's final days, following Euthyphro, Apology, and Crito.

One of the main themes in the Phaedo is the idea that the soul is immortal. In the dialogue, Socrates discusses the nature of the afterlife on his last day before being executed by drinking hemlock. Socrates has been imprisoned and sentenced to death by an Athenian jury for not believing in the gods of the state (though some scholars think it was more for his support of "philosopher kings" as opposed to democracy)[2] and for corrupting the youth of the city.
CBS (Christian Bible Scholarship) has traditionally avoided the obvious parallels between Phaedo and GMark like Trump avoids vegetables. The default position is that a Master such as the author of GMark would have been thoroughly familiar with Phaedo (especially since there would have been relatively few classics and distractions at that time compared to ours). All of this suggests that GMark was originally intended for a very high class of readership and not a lower one. It was the subsequent Gospels that brought it down to earth.


Joseph

Why Did CNN Terminate Its Contract With Marc Lamont Hill?

Re: Phaedo as a Source for GMark

Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2018 1:31 pm
by robert j
JoeWallack wrote: Fri Dec 21, 2018 1:18 pm ... All of this suggests that GMark was originally intended for a very high class of readership and not a lower one. It was the subsequent Gospels that brought it down to earth.
Might the colloquial writing style in GMark have been a turn-off for sophisticated readers?

Re: Phaedo as a Source for GMark

Posted: Tue Dec 25, 2018 9:04 am
by JoeWallack
robert j wrote: Fri Dec 21, 2018 1:31 pm
JoeWallack wrote: Fri Dec 21, 2018 1:18 pm ... All of this suggests that GMark was originally intended for a very high class of readership and not a lower one. It was the subsequent Gospels that brought it down to earth.
Might the colloquial writing style in GMark have been a turn-off for sophisticated readers?
Phaedo
Phaedo missed the boat that day he left the shack
But that was all he missed
And he ain't comin' back
JW:
What is reMarkable about GMark is not the unsophisticated grammar but the change from unsophisticated Semitic grammar in the Teaching & Healing Ministry to sophisticated Greek grammar in the Passion Ministry. I have faith that this type of book will be the next Horae Synopticae. Horae Synopticae brought CBS out of the Dark Ages by demonstrating that GMark was the original Gospel and books like Voelz will provide the voelztage to demonstrate that GMark was not only first but the most sophisticated. Voelz, as believer, has a related apology that it is because GMark was last. He is as clueless about the significance of his book as Hawkins was about his.

Regarding initial Christian reaction to GMark I think Papias is illustrative. If he was Christian his entire life than he knows that GMark did not exist until he was mature. The historical Jesus did not do anything impossible and Jesus' audience did not witness anything impossible. So supposed information about Jesus in Papias' time is mainly about Jesus' supposed teachings and stories (Q). Since GMark is a condemnation of Jesus' disciples Christianity has no initial belief in it as history and it is recognized as largely fiction. It is only after GMatthew edits GMark to convert the disciples that Christianity becomes interested in the two as having some historical value. Papias, as an intellectual though (by Christian standards), still knows that GMark and GMatthew are fiction. That is why he says that he is only interested in oral tradition and prefers that over written Gospels. The Mark and Matthew that Papias identifies are the authors of Q material. Subsequent Christianity misidentifies them as authors of the first two Gospels (because it had no other evidence that it was written by disciples or had disciple sources). Note especially that there is no early Christian tradition about recognizing GMark as the first Gospel/only Gospel. All traditions show an early Christian recognition of both.

The distinct change in style of grammar supports the above as the Teaching & Healing Ministry sounds closer to possible history, Q and The Jewish Bible (Semitic setting) while the Passion Ministry sounds closer to likely fiction, Greek Tragedy and subsequent Christian belief/anachronism (Hellenistic setting).

All this being said, the lack of quality evidence for any conclusion here also makes Ben's oral tradition theory possible, which I have to confess is the simpler explanation. The Semitic grammar in the Teaching & Healing ministry is because generally the underlying stories had a Semitic storytelling background and the Hellenistic grammar in the Passion Ministry likewise generally had a Hellenistic storytelling setting. For the most part the author simply presented the grammar as found in the underlying story.

And, as always, the truth may lie somewhere in between as there is also something for those suspecting that there was a distinctly shorter original GMark. As there are two styles in GMark, Semitic and Hellenistic, maybe original GMark was Semitic, this was part of Q, and Hellenistic GMark was added. Or verse-vices. Or maybe there was both, Semitic GMark and Hellenistic GMark, and they were merged. The two styles are woven together so well though that it makes me think all of GMark was an original composition. As Farouk said in Legion "Have you ever tried to unmake soup?".


Joseph

The New Porphyry

He Who Shall Not Be Attributed

Posted: Fri Dec 28, 2018 9:40 am
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

[15]
Present Tense Verb Forms to Convey Past Historical Events ("Historical Present")

...Mark frequently depicts events in the past through the use of verbs in the present tense (indicative mood)
...it foregrounds the action described and makes it vivid to the reader's eyes.

[Foregrounding
Foregrounding is the practice of making something stand out from the surrounding words or images.[1] It is "the 'throwing into relief' of the linguistic sign against the background of the norms of ordinary language."[2] The term was first associated with Paul [Garvin]
]

...occurs in key pericopes, especially those that highlight the person of our Lord
...
2:1...forgive sins
3:31... true family
4:35..power over nature
5:22...power over death
11:27...Jesus' authority
14:32...Jesus' temptation
15:16-24 Jesus' passion and crucifixion
...
it is important to observe that in the direct discourse of characters in the narrative (i.e., when the characters speak, not the narrator), all verb tenses are normal,
...
This strongly suggests that Mark's use of the present tense in past narrative contexts is deliberate and meaningful.
I think it should be clear by now that to the extent GMark has a source of preaching, that preaching is the author and not the author's supposed/imaginary source. It sure looks like rather than the author of GMark having bad grammar, awe contraire Petaire, he had sophisticated grammar. And a Semitic, Greek, Latin background, of 1st century Israel, especially the War and familiarity of Greek Tragedy/Irony. Who is it?



Joseph

Why Did CNN Terminate Its Contract With Marc Lamont Hill?

Asyndeton

Posted: Sun Dec 30, 2018 10:55 am
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

[17]
Asyndeton
[Asyndeton (from the Greek: ἀσύνδετον, "unconnected", sometimes called asyndetism) is a literary scheme in which one or several conjunctions are deliberately omitted from a series of related clauses.[1][2] Examples include veni, vidi, vici and its English translation "I came, I saw, I conquered". Its use can have the effect of speeding up the rhythm of a passage and making a single idea more memorable.
]

Like the historical present, the presence of asyndeton (see "Basic Characteristics of Mark's Greek, A 1 f) is not only a linguistic phenomenon, but the lack of binding words/conjunctions has a literary effect upon the reciepient of Mark's narrative. Asyndeton heightens tension and focuses the reader's/hearer's attention. Such a grammatical irregularity is often present in interchanges involving Jesus, sometimes with his own disciples, and sometimes with his enemies. A prime example is 8:14-21:
8
14 And they forgot to take bread; and they had not in the boat with them more than one loaf.

15 And he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.

16 And they reasoned one with another, saying, We have no bread.

17 And Jesus perceiving it saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? do ye not yet perceive, neither understand? have ye your heart hardened?

18 Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?

19 When I brake the five loaves among the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve.


20 And when the seven among the four thousand, how many basketfuls of broken pieces took ye up? And they say unto him, Seven.

21 And he said unto them, Do ye not yet understand?

Joseph

Why Did CNN Terminate Its Contract With Marc Lamont Hill?

The Alexandrian Text Supports Voelz Observations

Posted: Tue Jan 01, 2019 6:01 pm
by JoeWallack
JW:
Book Review of Mark 1:1-8:26 by James Voelz:

[25]
Vaticanus (B) provides a strong witness to the characteristics of Marcan Greek (as generally established), as do a number of manuscripts normally allied with it
It's not needed but this is another category of evidence (grammatical tendency) which favors Alexandrian textual superiority. Interestingly this favors Vaticanus over Sinaiticus.
in the first half of the Gospel, B diverges noticeably from the Majority text. In the last half, however, the two show evidence of converging,
Consistent with Voelz general observations as subsequent Christianity was more likely to edit the Semitic settings than the Greek.


Joseph

Why Did CNN Terminate Its Contract With Marc Lamont Hill?