Missing Endings
Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2023 10:02 am
I recently reread Streeter on the hypothesis of a lost ending (not the 16:9-20 "longer ending") of Mark.
https://archive.org/details/fourgospels ... 4/mode/2up
Streeter suggests this long ending resembled the John 21 story of Jesus appearing to the disciples fishing in Galilee as one unknown. Certainly aspects of the story make more sense in the context of Mark, where the women say nothing to anyone, than they do in other gospels.
This modern story shows how a text can be so compelling that people will copy it even if the ending is lost:
https://lostmanuscripts.com/2014/08/31/ ... -34-years/
On analogy, there's not that much difficulty in supposing that the ending of Mark was lost early on. Mark was still too good to ignore.
https://archive.org/details/fourgospels ... 4/mode/2up
Streeter suggests this long ending resembled the John 21 story of Jesus appearing to the disciples fishing in Galilee as one unknown. Certainly aspects of the story make more sense in the context of Mark, where the women say nothing to anyone, than they do in other gospels.
This modern story shows how a text can be so compelling that people will copy it even if the ending is lost:
https://lostmanuscripts.com/2014/08/31/ ... -34-years/
On analogy, there's not that much difficulty in supposing that the ending of Mark was lost early on. Mark was still too good to ignore.