The Mystery Gospel of Mark

Jesus didn’t leave a written trial for his life and preaching, his childhood or the family’s escape to Egypt and the time lived there. The first Christian groups received Jesus' teachings and narratives about his life through the twelve apostles and their disciples. Paul that wrote many years before the gospels, didn’t tell much about Jesus. Paul never saw Jesus in person, but he got a vision on his way from Jerusalem to Damascus.

There is a consensus among New Testament scholars that the Gospel of Mark is the oldest among the Gospels and that it was written around 70 AD, about forty years after the death of Jesus, followed by the Gospel of Matthew and Luke between 80-100 AD, and finally the Gospel of John, which was written between 100-110 AD. However, I found a book by Enoch Powell, “The evolution of the Gospel,” contradictory to these views with a different opinion. Enoch Powell claimed that Mathew, not Mark, is the oldest among the four canonical gospels.

The Gospel of Mark authenticity as the oldest among the four gospels has created a tendency with many researchers to adopt it as a reliable source, closer to the reality when the Gospels differ among them. The problem in the Gospel of Mark is recognized by different churches and Bible editions that the ending of the Gospel(Mark 8-16) added at a later period and that it is not found in the oldest manuscripts such as the Codex Sinaiticus and codex Vaticanus. Furthermore, a letter written by Clement of Alexandria, one of the church's early fathers, directed to Theodore of Palestine mentioned that a hidden version of Mark’s Gospel exists.

There are two main differences between the Gospel of Mark and the version mentioned by Clement in his letter: the first was a paragraph added in Chapter 10, paragraphs 34-35, and the second was added in Chapter 10, paragraph 46. But paragraph 34-35 adds the account of Jesus's resurrection of Lazarus, which was mentioned only by the Gospel of John. While the second paragraph 10:46 is an addition that when Jesus Christ came to Jericho, he refused to receive women who were presented to welcome him, they are the sister of the disciple whom Jesus loved, his mother, and Salome. But Salome's personality is not unknown to the Bible traditions, she is introduced in 15:40 and 16: 1. Likewise, the incident of not receiving his mother and brothers mentioned on more than one occasion in the Gospels, even in the Gospel of Mark that is in our hands, with a difference in some details, Mark (3: 31-35), Matthew (12: 46-50) and Luke (8: 19-21).

But why was the Gospel of Saint John different from other gospels by telling the story of Jesus' resurrection of Lazarus? Perhaps it is the same purpose to hide the story from the Gospel of St. Mark, which prompted John to mention it with an alteration to the details, even though the story was not mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew and Luke, who considered that the Gospel of Mark was the main source of the narratives. These differences can be summarized from us as follows: First, the secret Gospel of Mark does not mention the name of the boy Jesus Christ resurrected from death while John mentions his name, Lazarus. Second, the secret Bible speaks of one sister he did not name while John mentioned Martha and Mary. Third, in the secret Gospel of Mark, Jesus Christ is called "the son of David," while in the Gospel of John, the two sisters call him "Lord." Fourth, in the secret Gospel of Mark, Jesus Christ rolls the stone that was covering the entrance to the grave himself, while in the Gospel of John he asks the people in the place to do so. Fifth, Jesus approaching the grave in the secret Gospel of Mark is a miracle, as Lazarus shouts, and Christ extends his hand to him and brings him out, while in the Gospel of John, Jesus suffices with directing a loud voice, as Lazarus comes out of his grave. Despite the difference in some of the details that were the result of John's attempt to narrate the incident in a manner that makes it far from the misinterpretation of heresy Gnostic sects, there are common factors that the location of the accident is the village of Bethany and that there is a woman whose brother died and asked Jesus to resurrect and that there is a person he was dead, but he got out of the grave.

The secret Gospel of Mark omitted the story of Lazarus resurrection so that it will not be abused by heretical Christian sects, as Clement mentioned in his letter to the Reverend Theodore, in response to the latter questions about some of the teachings that spread in the region and are attributed to traditions mentioned in the Gospel of Mark. But the secret Gospel of Mark is not the only mystery in the Gospels that raises many questions, but rather there are many that I will talk about in the upcoming topics.

End

 

This diagram showing how much the first three gospels have in common may help:






There are several different possible interpretations from these diagrams.

 

We can refer that to Marcan priority, which The Gospel of Mark was used as source for the Gospel of Matthew and Book of Luke, and as per style of writing The Book of John was written last.

 

My personal hunch is that each of them borrowed from the writings of the others, and then added more things they remembered, or had found out about from other witnesses.

It's also possible they might have picked and chose what they wanted to copy from the other source. (Writing manuscripts back then was difficult, so they did not want it to be too long)

So this does not really give us any certainty which one came first.

Christian tradition has it that each of these apostles wrote a gospel, so if that is the case it really does not matter what the exact time frame was. It's only in later times that secular scholars have claimed that some of them might actually have been written later, copying from the others.
There's a lot of controversy and uncertainty about when exactly they were written, and there's a lot of scholars presenting what are actually theories as facts.

 

Yes, Mark seems to be the source for Luke and Matthew. Saying that, it's fairly common knowledge and I say this as a Christian myself, that the scripture which was canonised is not the full scripture.

 

The Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus are hoaxes.

 

Yes, it was likely the first written of the four gospels. I think most Christian scholars have come around on this one.

 

This theory has already been exposed as a terrible misreading of a single blog post and a complete misrepresentation of the history of the Greek language.

 

The sequence is not really certain scholars only mentioned that the four canonized gospels was written between 66-110 AD, We did not even know when is the actual birth date of Jesus Christ, everything about Christianity's foundation is only through faith and beliefs.

 

Seriously!!!????

 

Kool

 

I had read that Matthew and Mark were both early with some dispute on which was earliest. I dont think there is a consensus yet on which is earliest.

 

Don't you know that the original Bible was written in Latin? The Greek versions are just translations.

 

Do some research = http://the-jesus-realm.com/wordpress/2013/07/31/hoax-alert-codex-sinaiticus/

 

That last illustration shows that some in that field think there may have been an earlier book or source called "Q". With 3 gospels using it.

The gospels like the rest of the NT were chosen by a group of men in prominent positions from many books with some of those long gone texts unknown and lost unless there are new discoveries in the sand.

The apostles surely wrote down some history but you can bet your arse those that were literate recorded the words of Christ He was the son of God after all! What God said through christ was the most important words these men had ever heard. So what happened to their recordings? They were recorded early on and not decades later.

Always thought things looked fishy when it came to the NT. No recordings of the apostles ? What happened to them? Then we have the self proclaimed apostle Went by the name of Paul. Wrote most of the NT. And created much of its theology.

It seems those hand picked by christ needed help from someone who never met Christ nor his teachings.

Imo the NT is just a bit sketchy . Too many questions lacking answers.

 

When the scrolls were written down has nothing to do with when they were narrated; oral traditions predominated in Jewish practices even with the Torah and OT. The Gospels were around long before they were written down, and only when the 'Way' got sufficiently large and scattered around enough was it even necessary to begin writing them down. The OP has several false assumptions based on this error of dating them, common enough among those who haven't studied enough and assume 'consensus' = 'factual'. These fantasies are mostly just attempts to rewrite the books and invent a 'New Improved Hippie Jesus' that magically complies with the current fashions in political correctness, i.e. fake narratives that are misleading and stupidly ridiculous, something dopers and credulous fashion victims can be sold on.

 

I personally don't buy into that theory. Not saying it is incorrect, but there is no particular logical reason that indicates that specific theory over other possibilities.

To me, it's obvious that some of the gospels copied from other gospels, but also added additional things. That still does not indicate the author of that gospel did not witness those things first hand. It was probably just easier for him to copy the account from the other text rather than thinking about how to put everything he saw into his own words.

For all we know, maybe the apostles all sat down together at the same time, wrote their texts, compared notes, shared and traded sections, and then put together their own individual gospels of what they thought was most important.

 

Well it seems some academics think it is possible . I have not studied their reasons but it seems possible.

No mainsteam academic attributes any Gospel to an apostle. I have a hard time believing some of them did not write about christ. Perhaps later people didnt like their "take" on Him And history was revised to suit powerful heretics?

 

I would agree that is generally true, but that does not mean these academics are right. It seems so often these academics who want to study the bible are looking for any excuses to secularize things, and doubt. Like they really have the mindset of an anti-religion atheist. Then they teach these studies to Christians, who just accept it as fact.

 

This goes back many years so its not a recent assessment. And it was not secular academics but religious academics...theologians.

The teachings of Christ were revolutionary and it got him killed. I think his words were recorded by some of his apostles the literate ones .

 

Not so much. The Jews of that time were not so different from the muslims of today. He claimed to be the "Son of God" and performed miracles, gathering a huge crowd of followers, yet he refused to perform a great miracle for them to prove his supernatural power.

The Jews were afraid he was leading other Jews away from the group to another religion. They were also afraid of one man gathering too much popularity and power, since many in the crowd of his followers wanted to make him king, believing he would liberate their nation from the Romans. And that when if that happened and the Romans crushed the rebellion, the Jewish leaders would lose their privileged place and special status, and their country would be worse off. The religious leaders were also resentful that the people were turning to Jesus instead of them.

It wasn't so much the revolutionary nature of his teachings that got him killed.

 

The only chronology that might matter at all is the one in the scriptures, and with the synoptic Gospels they are in many instances writing about concurrent events, and there are Bibles out there written according to those events, which is why the NT should begin with verses from John 1, and end with John's writings as well. Many Bibles follow the canonical order of the Latin Vulgate, which is not arranged in chronological order, making study a lot more confusing than it needs to be, and a practice that needs to be abandoned.

Those in the Peanut Gallery unfamiliar with this stuff and want to learn correctly should start with Joachim Jeremia's excellent history, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus, which will render many of the social aspects of Jewish culture and laws clearly and in great details which in turn make many of the references in the NT far less 'mysterious' and puzzling, and a good study Bible and reference, like Thomas Nelson's So That's Why! Bible, a NKJV arranged in chronological order along with historical timelines and commentaries throughout.

 

I don't; they were very busy as teachers and evangelizing to what was then a small group; it only became necessary to write it all down later on. Several were murdered soon after Jesus, and Paul wasn't arrested and executed until around 67 A.D. It's certain that the Testaments were complete by 70 A.D. before the destruction of the Temple.

No one even saw a need for a 'Canon' until Marcione dreamed up his around 150 A.D., but by then some 22 of the 'books' were named in various correspondences and already accepted among the church leaders of the day, many still having to operate underground, which made it even harder to falsify doctrines and writings. No way to round them all up and replace them with the Gnostic rubbish or any fantasy stuff.

History is always being 'revised', as new info comes along; re the New Testament the orthodox view was widely spread and accepted from the beginnings, too late for any radical 'revisions' to take root and get passed off as legit, which is why junk like the Gnostics rubbish is never to be taken seriously, and neither should the rubbish re Constantine forging anything some hundreds of years later be taken seriously as anything but crank nonsense; too many copies around to pull anything like that off, regardless of the many juvenile attempts by pseudo-intellectuals with political agendas to invent doubts on the texts.

On the above, see Darrell Bock's The Missing Gospels, and excellent and short examination of the issues.

 

The revolutionary thing was that God could live in a human body of flesh. Have you read the gospels? Christ had to cite jewish scripture to cover his arse but the religious authority didnt buy it.

It was also revolutionary this idea of the rebirth of consciousness in order to be saved . That was not a jewish belief.

The jews were expecting the savior to lead them against their enemies His teaching was against that which makes it also revolutionary.

You must have had others to tell you what he taught instead of reading his words?

He didnt demand dietary laws. For it is not what a man eats and craps out that defiles man . Revolutionary . . And I can give you more.