The opening of Mark

[davidmartin]

what is odd is Peter's presence at all. You would think he'd not have gotten away with it and been hauled in himself as a ringleader
The girl being present i assume is a reference to Magdalene who might as a female have managed to get away with it, in the readers mind
Look at the convoluted account in John some "other disciple" (always a code for Magdalene) is there and 'let's Peter in' but it's the 'girl on the door' who lets him in. I bet originally it only had 1 female disciple being there and no Peter. But how does that help even if true?

[perseusomega9]

It appears to be more complicated than first appears.

Would a woman be present (maid)?

Great question and I dunno. Support Staff, servants, slaves, women. What are their roles in the Male-Centric Judaic Culture? We know that Malchus had his ear cut off and he was the High Priest's slave.

When Hawai'i was "discovered", there were people there on the islands. What does that mean? Women simply HAD to be on the boats that originally landed there. What were their roles?

If a subservient role - performing a menial task - was necessary, a female would make sense as much as anything else. No History is given for these people. How much notice do you give to a door opener? Perhaps that's the point.

Caesar gives Thermusa to a Parthian king and all Hell breaks when "her" kids get "of age" and she manipulates the results.

Josephus, Ant..., 13, 15, 5 :

""Do thou, therefore," said he [Jannaeus], "when thou art come to Jerusalem, send for the leading men among them, and show them my body, and with great appearance of sincerity, give them leave to use it as they themselves please, whether they will dishonor the dead body by refusing it burial, as having severely suffered by my means, or whether in their anger they will offer any other injury to that body. Promise them also that thou wilt do nothing without them in the affairs of the kingdom. If thou dost but say this to them, I shall have the honor of a more glorious Funeral from them than thou couldst have made for me; and when it is in their power to abuse my dead body, they will do it no injury at all, and thou wilt rule in safety..."

No doubt, women were minimalized but it is not out of the realm of possibility that "Operator of the Door" might have a function performed by a "maid" in the Temple.
Any input here would be appreciated.

Thanx,

CW

I'm just not sure there would be women working the Temple service.

[Charles Wilson]

I'm just not sure there would be women working the Temple service.

Your Objection implies, then, that my linking of the Data of the Synoptics - Peter sitting and warming himself - and John - Peter standing and warming himself - is incorrect. Peter is NOT at the Chamber of the Flame or the Chamber of the Hearth.

Or is there another explanation? Perhaps the Maid is a Symbol?
I'm open to alternatives here.

THNX,

CW

[schillingklaus]

Wilson is only dreaming historizing hallucinations.

Not only is the whole story of Peter's denial and the Sanhedrine trial interpolated, the fire is a late addition as it is not fouynd in Mt. Mk opportunistically conflates the Lk version (where a fire is kindled) and the Mt version (no fire at all) to create some insane mixture.

[Charles Wilson]

John 18: 18 (RSV):

[18] Now the servants and officers had made a charcoal fire, because it was cold, and they were standing and warming themselves; Peter also was with them, standing and warming himself.

John 21: 9 (RSV):

[9] When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish lying on it, and bread.

I don't know what I have done to arouse such venom and hate but it isn't warranted. There is hardly a phrase in the entire Denial of Peter episode that doesn't deserve exploration. John, above, tells of two CHARCOAL fires. This is interesting since John 21 is, to many scholars, a chapter appended to the end of John. Why would this find its way into such a disjointed text?

Examples multiply.

What is astonishing to me is the fact that many prefer Metaphysics over Real Possibilities. The Chamber of the Hearth and the Chamber of the Flame were apparently actual places, used by the Priests. Someone might fault me for positing a Real, Physical "Realm of Heaven" but here again, Textual Analysis supports the idea that the Pharisees - real people - kept certain Priests - real people as well - from entering the Realm of Heaven and the Scribes were prevented from chronicling the event where 3000+ died around the Temple.
***
I used to tell my Math Students who walked into my class and immediately proclaimed that they couldn't do Math that, "Now you have 2 problems: You'll never work the Math Problems when you deny that you can work them and you still have to work the Math Problems anyway. Why not eliminate the emotional negativity and at least try..." Save the venom for someone else, please.

CW

[davidmartin]

I sympathise CW, I just think when we imagine things to be real they can be useful constructs, also dangerous ones. I'm not surprised that 'belief' style apology is criticised what surprises me is that anything historical at all is, even to the point of denying actual historical evidence. I think that is why I like the scholars like Mead and those from his era. Maybe it's not just because they were so learned perhaps it's because their era permitted freedom to interpret and criticise the sources how they liked, but within a framework that the events more or less happened - and they could say some wild stuff. Like that book 'Jesus the healer'. It's like a throwback to that style and really interesting, wild and you can criticise it a lot but who cares, he operates from some kind of historical framework to make it seem real so he can make his point

But that fire thing seems not so likely to be literal to me, way too similar to that Jesus saying about being near the fire... someone is using it to score a point against Peter while making it look like part of the story I think. It's not just Thomas that gets that treatment, it looks exactly like church politics got played out in the stories told before they were considered scripture, then they got frozen. In the days when a church could actually say 'I follow X apostle' from some tradition or other. This only works in a historical framework, that there actually were real churches about 100AD or so when this stuff got written down.

[neilgodfrey]

What I do know is that much of Mark 1 seems to me like it was written by someone who had knowledge of narrative elements that are found in Luke and knew that their readers would be aware of those details. (Also note that some of those elements are not found in Marcion.)

Yes, I think that's a significant observation. We have seen arguments that the Gospel of Mark was written as a parable and I wonder if that helps explain why this gospel is such an outlier. I can't help but think that Jesus is written up as a personification of Israel, an Israel that had been recently destroyed by Rome. (By recent, I don't see any reason to discount 135 CE and several reasons to prefer it over 70 CE.)

Before the gospel of Mark there were Justin's Memoirs of the Apostles with apparent items about Jesus listed along with their Scriptural justifications. There was also apparently a Gospel known to Aristides. And who knows what Papias may have written about the Baptist? The idea was extant -- before Mark's gospel -- that Jesus had a forerunner Elijah figure who had to be removed to make way for Jesus. Did the author of Mark's gospel turn this Elijah figure John into a symbol of the Israel from which the ideal Israel, Jesus, emerged?

[Giuseppe]

The idea was extant -- before Mark's gospel -- that Jesus had a forerunner Elijah figure who had to be removed to make way for Jesus.

Rivka Nir argues for a such idea (=the Messiah preceded by Elijah redivivus) being a Christian idea, not a Jewish one.

[schillingklaus]

Many statements of the Old Testament concerning the people of Israel were abused as messianic prophecies, such as Isaiah's suffering servant.

Eliaj making the way for the messiah is a Judaization of the gnostic topic of the faculty of knowing, acquainted in the baptism, making the way for the salvific knowledge, shared in the eucharist.