"The Gospel According to Mark: Jesus and the Common Person"
How Things Work – Consideration #127 (Book II Science & Religion)
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Tuesday March 19, 2024
“One of the main issues in Mark's way of presenting Jesus is what it means for Jesus to be the Messiah... Mark's gospel is playing with that issue, is forcing that issue to the front for his audience and saying this is the key point. It's what the disciples failed to understand that you must understand, and the whole point of Jesus' Messianic identity in Mark's gospel is that he had to die...”
– L. Michael White (The Gospel According to Mark - PBS)
PREFACE
Welcome Everybody!
Following the longest gospel comes the shortest gospel, the Gospel According to Mark. Mark is a second-generation Christian, possibly the follower of Peter. Likely written in Rome between 65-70 C.E., Mark reflects Jesus as a heroic teacher, healer, and miracle worker who is misunderstood by those closest to him. Mark was likely a Gentile Christian who was experiencing suffering and persecution in Rome for his faith. He emphasizes the “poor in spirit” and the more human qualities of Jesus, compared to qualities such as strength and kingship that were generally associated with the Messiah.
“…the Gospel of Mark was meant to support the Gentile Christians in Rome and other outlying areas…”
For Mark, Jesus is more of a suffering servant of God than a dynamic Messiah of man. Sometimes referred to as “the Greek” Gospel, the Gospel of Mark was meant to support the Gentile Christians in Rome, and other outlying areas, through times of severe oppression. Most scholars believe Mark to be the oldest Gospel and the main source material for both Matthew and Luke. Because these three Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) are so similar in their narrative, or synopsis, they are collectively known as the synoptic gospels.
CONSIDERATION #127 – Jesus and the Common Person
Although Mark is similar, identical in some cases, to Matthew and Luke, there are still some clear differences. For example, there is no birth narrative of any kind in Mark. There is also no attempt to genetically link Jesus directly to Abraham, or King David, in order to prove his Messiahship.
Mark begins with the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. This event marks the beginning of Jesus and his ministry. Fulfilling previous Jewish prophecy through a lineage to Abraham, or a virgin birth by Mary, are not critical factors pertaining to Mark’s Jesus.
“The original ending of Mark is believed to have been lost…”
Almost half of Mark’s Gospel is devoted to the miracles and revelations of Jesus, proportionally more than any other Gospel in the New Testament. The original ending of Mark is believed to have been lost, and at some point the section from the middle of the crucifixion to the end was replaced by an unknown editor to complete the Gospel.
Some examples of how Mark sees Jesus as more of a “common man” are provided by the stories he tells which include the common man, or woman. In this story, Jesus is criticized for associating with sinners as opposed to the “righteous.”
As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
– Mark 2:14-17
In Mark, the foreshadowing of Jesus’ death begins early, often in the context of displeasing the teachers of the law by performing good works in controversial ways.
Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Stand up in front of everyone.”
Then Jesus asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they remained silent.
He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.
– Mark 3:1-6
POSTSCRIPT
There is perhaps no greater common denominator for human beings than family. One strange account by Mark has Jesus’ “family” claiming that Jesus is “out of his mind.” However, Jesus then uses the incident to further prove that he is in fact not out of his mind at all. A similar story is told in Matthew, however without mention of his family calling him insane.
Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”
And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.”
So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come… Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.”
He said this because they were saying, “He has an impure spirit.”
Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.”
“Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.
Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”
– Mark 3:20-35
Abraham Lincoln alludes to this narrative in his famous “A House Divided” speech; foreshadowing the inevitability of Civil War.
In another family related incident, Jesus laments about people from his past not recognizing who he has become. Once again, Mark shows us a very human Jesus with real issues he must deal with, just like everybody else. This makes a lot of sense from Mark’s perspective.
For Mark, Jesus is just a regular human being until he is baptized by John and receives the Holy Spirit. That is the event that separates Jesus “the man” from Jesus “the Christ,” which is a Greek translation of Messiah. The Jesus preaching to the people in his hometown is a “new” Jesus who they refuse to recognize or accept.
Jesus left there and went to his hometown, accompanied by his disciples. When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed.
“Where did this man get these things?” they asked. “What’s this wisdom that has been given him? What are these remarkable miracles he is performing? Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.
Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.” He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. He was amazed at their lack of faith.
– Mark 6:1-6
When the people in Jesus’ hometown first encounter him, they are amazed with his teaching, wisdom, and remarkable miracles; until they realized who he “really” was. Once they recognized him as the carpenter who was part of the local community along with his family, who still lived there, they could no longer see him as a prophet, or Messiah.
“the people of his hometown had no faith thus he could not perform any miracles…”
This is also a clear example of Jesus not being the absolute source of his miracles. Miracles require the faith of the people involved in the miracle: the people of his hometown had no faith thus he could not perform any miracles of great significance. They could not get past the Jesus they thought they already knew.
“healing a few sick people almost doesn’t count as a miracle for Jesus.”
What is uniquely interesting about this narrative is how “healing a few sick people” almost doesn’t count as a miracle for Jesus. It reflects a certain nonchalant sincerity that reveals a subtle authenticity about Jesus’ actual power to perform serious miracles.
Next week the Gospel of Mark reveals more about Jesus the man…
Expand the Conversation by Upgrading to “Reality by a Thread!”
Excerpt From This Week’s “Untangling the Knots of Reality” Podcast:
• UNTANGLING THE KNOTS OF REALITY: Podcast #87 – “Untangling the Mystery of Brownian Motion: Part-One”
“What is Brownian Motion?” “How is it related to the discovery of the microscope?” “How did finding the solution to Brownian Motion alter the course of modern science?” “Who was Ludwig Boltzmann, and how did his ideas about atoms help lead to Einstein’s understanding of Brownian Motion?” “How did a botanist looking at flower pollen under a simple single-lens microscope eventually lead to the atomic age and the development of String Theory?” These are some of the knots we will attempt to untangle in this week’s podcast. That’s a lot of Brownian Motion for one podcast! And this is only part-one! So, let’s get started…
• REALITY BY A THREAD: “Digital Instinct” (Excerpt) – “At the instinct level of biological awareness, animals are “programed” by a long string of opposites to recognize empirical patterns designed to produce specific behaviors, or actions, that lead to specific results. At the Artificial Intelligence level of digital instinct computers are programed by large strings of digital code to behave, or act, in specific ways that produce specific results. Neither animal intelligence nor digital intelligence is “self-aware” of this programing, or to their reactions based on it. It is a mystery as to how instinct was programed into animal DNA; we are the programmers of digital instinct.”
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Is The Universe Manifesting a Cosmic Symphony of Everlasting Creation?
“For Pythagoras, music represented much more than just pleasant sounds to our ears; it directly reflected the mathematical perfection of the universe. The entire universe was in tune, generating itself through unheard vibrations creating a Cosmic Symphony…” (Book IV – The Cosmic Symphony)
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“Pythagoras called this Cosmic Symphony of Abstract Perfection ‘The Music of the Spheres.’ This marked the beginning of a very long journey into the nature of a Reality that reflected an experience based purely on mathematical vibrations.” Book IV – The Cosmic Symphony (210 pages)
The final link in the causal chain leading to Artificial Intelligence is the emergence of Quantum Consciousness…
“Quantum level thinking embraces a world of probability over physicality. It refocuses Awareness and Consciousness beyond the empirical world of Physical Reality to a totally abstract world of Quantum Possibility…” – BOOK V Quantum Consciousness
Book V considers the questions related to what Consciousness is, how it evolves through levels of Perception and Awareness, why each step in the process is important, where we are currently on the “Arch of Consciousness,” and how all of this connects to Artificial Intelligence. (166 pages)