A particular strong argument for Marcion's priority on Mark

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Giuseppe
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A particular strong argument for Marcion's priority on Mark

Post by Giuseppe »

"Like a dove" seems to be apparently an innocuous formula:

Mark 1:10:

Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove

Matthew 3:16:

As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him

But then, very bluntly:

Luke 3:21-22:

21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”


Why did "Luke" need to point out the Spirit's descent "in bodily form", when the same author had already specified "like a dove"? Isn't a "dove" already per se "in bodily form"? Or was there also a docetic dove?

The enigma is resolved definitely when the Marcion's incipit is remembered:


In the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea,

Christ descended out of heaven into Capernaum, in Galilee,

and he (the Christ) descended in bodily form.

I think that there is no need of explanation, here, about what "Luke" did on the text of Mcn.

Now, "Luke" is catholic, not separationist. He can't conceive that a man (John the Baptist) could baptize a god. Hence he explains clumsly why Jesus allowed the his baptism by John:

When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too

That clumsy explanation was not necessary, if "Luke" was separationist as Mark. But in Luke that explanation was necessary, since "Luke" couldn't ignore the baptism episode having found it in Mark and in Matthew.

That "Luke" corrupted Mcn is a fact recognized now by the consensus of scholars.

The my point here is another:

In Mcn there is not a baptism of Jesus. Why did Marcion ignore it at all, when "Luke" was moved to justify someway it, at the price of remembering it?

The fact that "Luke" did copy and paste of "in bodily form" from the Marcion's incipit to the his description of the descending dove is evidence of the fact that the baptism episode, in any Gospel, is a development of something as the Marcion's incipit.

Therefore also the separationism in Mark is later than a Docetic christology found in a previous gospel (proto-Mark?).
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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