Category: General

356

Mark is a poet, his Gospel a poetry, a prose epic in the style of the time.

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; Woodstock veteran with wife, German theologian
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; Woodstock veteran with wife, German theologian

The Gospel of Mark is only accessible to a literary analysis, but then reveals the great spiritual richness of early Christianity beside and after Paul.

Mark does not yet have Christian models to fall back on, he ties his writing to Greek and Roman literature. He uses narrative motifs from Christian tradition and pagan poetry.

The religious ideas in Mark come from all areas of ancient religions, especially from the areas of astrology, alchemy and religious ruler worship.

General references to the history of religion are found so frequently in Mark’s Gospel that it seems useful to bring them back into the scholarly discourse.

355

When the church ship ran into heavy seas after the sinking of Jerusalem,

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; Professor Helmut Koester (1926-2016)
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; Professor Helmut Koester (1926-2016)

Mark gave the slogan: Wake up the sleeping Jesus! (4:38), to remember Jesus.

It was no longer the disciples and apostles of the first generation who, like Paul, could boast of their immediacy to God, Galatians 1:11-12, who led the church.

It was Christians of the second generation who united the church with human energy, 9:39 and placed it on the basis (arche 1:1) of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

354

Mark also draws a comparison of the Jewish war with the Roman civil war of 69 AD.

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; The conference management
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; The conference management

In Rome, the new emperor Vespasian, the Roman commander at the beginning of the war in Judea, had quickly established order by following the great emperor Augustus.

Vespasian, however, no longer saw himself as a god like his predecessors from the noble family of Augustus, but as a human being who ordered the commonwealth with human energy and with reverence for the real gods.

353

Mark based his Gospel on the Iliad by the Greek poet Homer:

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; View into the meeting room
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; View into the meeting room

The death of Jesus, in Mark’s judgment the greatest Jew of his time, in the Gospel refers to the later fall of Jerusalem. The death of Hector, the greatest Trojan hero, also refers in Homer to the later fall of Troy.

The Gospel concludes with the activities that belong to the burial of Jesus, as the Iliad concludes with the ceremonies of Hector’s burial.

The resurrection of Jesus cannot be told in the Gospel, because the literary model, Homer’s Iliad, also ends with the burial and the further events were already indicated before.

352

Mark initially reacts with sadness,

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; The conference hotel Flamingo
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; The conference hotel Flamingo

he, too, sees a connection between the work of the Christians and the disastrous uprising against Rome.

But Mark finds comfort in Greek poetry, in Homer, whose Iliad was well known to him as school reading at that time.

Thus he can compare the downfall of Jerusalem with the downfall of Troy in Homer and understand it as a fate assigned by God. Just as the defeat of the Trojans in the Iliad was decided by Zeus despite all human struggle, so the defeat of the Jews followed the counsel of God, which is to be accepted by humans as fate.

351

The author of the Gospel of Mark writes after the catastrophe of the Jewish war,

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; On the streets of Santa Rosa
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; On the streets of Santa Rosa

the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 70 A.D. He asks: How could this tragedy have happened?

Why could God allow the Gentiles to destroy the holy city and the temple that had been completed a few years earlier?

Was Josephus, the conservative Jewish historian, right in blaming the insurgents, who included Christians?

Were the Christians in Palestine to blame for the burning of Jerusalem under Titus, the son and successor of Vespasian, as the Roman Christians allegedly were for the burning of Rome under Emperor Nero?

350

A new theme:

The Gospel of Marc

Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; On the way to Santa Rosa, October 11, 2009
Jesus Seminar October 2009 in Santa Rosa, California; On the way to Santa Rosa, October 11, 2009

The German text is printed in: Neumann, Johannes: War Jesus Statthalter von Galiläa? Radebeul 2009, p. 43-92. The book can be obtained from bookstores. More books can be found on my homepage www.johannesneumann.com

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

159

(Continued) 3. We owe to Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann the insight that reality is always

Glacier Morteratsch, Pontresina, Upper Engadine 2011
Glacier Morteratsch, Pontresina, Upper Engadine 2011

“socially constructed”, in other words, embedded in society. This also applies to the Bible’s authors, of course. The religious reality they describe follows contemporary social conventions that we are no longer familiar with, so we need to research them.

 

The difference between oral and written tradition must also be taken into account. As long as traditions are passed on orally, the wording can change. As soon as they are written down, a change of meaning can only take place through an interpretation of the tradition.

 

Because the written versions of the Gospels and Acts were preceded by a long period of oral tradition, we must assume that they were adapted to the changing early Christian consciousness before being written down.

153

V  15   The canon of the New Testament

5.15.1.
The dominant master narrative about the origins of the New Testament canon states that in the first half of the 2nd century AD,

Istanbul, Hagia Sophia, Christ
Istanbul, Hagia Sophia, Christ

there were so many Gospels and Apostolic letters circulating among the communities that the churches had to separate the wheat from the chaff.

The only texts they adopted into the canon of significant texts for the Christian religion were those that they considered were written by one of the twelve Apostles or the Apostle Paul, or that were authorised by one of the Apostles; e.g. Luke’s Gospel, written by Paul’s companion Luke (Col. 4:14; 2 Tim 4:11; Philemon 24), was authorised by Paul.

5.15.2.
The new theses about the origin of the New Testament canon:

The New Testament canon was formed from writings from the three Palestinian Apostolic churches of James, John and Peter and the Gentile Christian church of Paul.

5.15.3.
The criterion for the acceptance into the canon was the balance between the origins in the individual churches and the extent to which the writings supported the church’s unity.

150

V  14   Mark’s Gospel

5.14.1.
The dominant master narrative about Mark’s Gospel states that the Christians passed down their memories of Jesus

Istanbul, Theodosian Walls
Istanbul, Theodosian Walls

orally in the church community. When those who had known Jesus personally grew older, Mark collected their memories, wrote them down and published them as the Gospel.

5.14.2.
The new theses about Mark’s Gospel:
Mark’s Gospel is an epic narrative. The author modelled it on Homer’s Iliad.

5.14.3.
Mark formed the Passion narrative within his Gospel according to the  Praetexta Octavia des Pseudo-Seneca.

148

5.13.6.
In the Greek version of the Persian myth, the following thought model emerged:

Greek Middle Ages: Mystras
Greek Middle Ages: Mystras

God sacrifices his son: Mark 12:6-8 par. In (neo)Platonic philosophy one would say emanation rather than son; a piece of God himself.

138

5.11.5.
The Marys in the New Testament are prosperous women, in particular merchants, who had the reputation

Ephesus, ancient toilet
Ephesus, ancient toilet

of possessing skills in alchemy and who supported the Christians materially and financially.

5.11.6.
The Messiah’s conception was understood as an (alchemical) act of creation, and only an entirely upright, i.e. pure alchemist could achieve the conception of the Messiah with God’s help (God’s Spirit).

This is why the Messiah’s mother was named after the famous alchemist Mary. She is called a virgin to indicate her purity; therefore in the legend, Jesus must be her first-born son.

5.11.7.
The resurrection was also viewed as an alchemical act of creation. It was prepared by the women called Mary.

When the women arrived at the grave to prepare Jesus’ body for the resurrection, the Creator God, Lord of alchemical powers and mysteries, had already carried out the act of new creation and had raised Jesus from the dead.

137

V  11   Mary and Joseph

5.11.1.
The dominant master narrative about Jesus’ parents states

Ephesus, Roman foot soldier
Ephesus, Roman foot soldier

that Mary, a housewife, and Joseph, a building worker, were Jesus’ biological parents.

5.11.2.
The new basic narrative about Jesus’ parents states:
Mary was not the name of Jesus’ mother. His mother’s name, like her virginity, are part of the Christian legend about the Messiah’s origin.

5.11.3.
Mary was not the name of the women called Mary in the New Testament; at most it was their nickname.

5.11.4.
Mary was a well-known Jewish alchemist in classical times.

Literature: Patai, Raphael: The Jewish Alchemists. A History and Source Book, Princeton, New Jersey 1994, p. 60-91; Schütt, Hans-Werner: Auf der Suche nach dem Stein der Weisen. Die Geschichte der Alchemie, Munich 2000, p. 117-126,

135

5.9.12.
Cephas, the later leader of Peter’s church, is not identical with Simon Peter. It was Cephas, not Peter,

Ephesus, goddess
Ephesus, goddess

who attended the Apostolic Council. Paul never met Peter personally; he only met Cephas. Paul differentiates in Gal. 1f precisely between the Jewish Apostle Peter and Cephas, one of the three pillars (Gal. 2:9) whom he personally met.

113

5.5.13.
The international language of astrology: a legend quoted by Luke in Acts states that when the Holy Spirit was

Masada, tourists
Masada, tourists

poured out at Pentecost, all Jews from the diaspora could understand the Apostles speaking in their various languages.

Nowadays the phrase “international language” makes us think of art or music. In classical times, we should first think of astrology, a “language” that was understood by all nations.

The Gnostic’s statements about the astrological Age of Aries that was ending and the new Age of Pisces that had just begun were statements that everyone understood in their mother tongue.

The linguistic miracle at Pentecost, a sign of the last days, was interpreted according to contemporary understanding as annulling the Babylonian confusion of languages from the ancient Biblical story in Gen. 11:7f.