Religion Of The Month Club: Mark 1

In this episode, we discuss the first chapter of the Gospel according to Mark, the oldest and rawest of the four canonical gospels. In this chapter, Jesus is baptised, ventures into the wilderness, heals some folks and starts his ministry.

Transcript

Welcome to the Religion of the Month Club,

A podcast where we discuss texts from the world's scriptural traditions.

Today is Ascension Day,

The 40th day of Easter in the Christian calendar in the year 2021 ano Domini.

In this episode,

We will be discussing the first chapter of the Gospel according to Mark.

John the Baptizer appeared in the wilderness,

Proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him and were baptized by him and the River Jordan,

Confessing their sins.

Now John was clothed with camel's hair,

With a leather belt around his waist,

And he ate locusts and wild honey.

He proclaimed,

The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me.

I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his handles.

I have baptized you with water,

But he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

In those days,

Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.

And just as he was coming up out of the water,

He saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him.

And a voice came from heaven,

You are my Son,

The Beloved.

With you I am well pleased.

And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.

He was in the wilderness for forty days,

Tempted by Satan.

And he was with the wild beasts,

And the angels waited on him.

Now after John was arrested,

Jesus came to Galilee,

Proclaiming the good news of God,

And saying,

The time is fulfilled,

And the kingdom of God has come near.

Repent and believe in the good news.

As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee,

He saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea,

For they were fishermen.

And Jesus said to them,

Follow me,

And I will make you fish for people.

And immediately they left their nets and followed him.

As he went a little further,

He saw James,

Son of Zebedee,

And his brother John,

Who were in their boat mending the nets.

Immediately he called to them,

And they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.

They went to Capernaum,

And when the Sabbath came,

He entered the synagogue and taught.

They were astounded at his teaching,

For he taught them as one having authority,

And not as the scribes.

Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit,

And he cried out,

What have you to do with us,

Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are,

The Holy One of God.

But Jesus rebuked him,

Saying,

Be silent and come out of him.

And the unclean spirit,

Convulsing him and crying with a loud voice,

Came out of him.

They were all amazed,

And they kept on asking one another,

What is this,

A new teaching with authority?

He commands even the unclean spirits,

And they obey him.

At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.

As soon as they left the synagogue,

They entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John.

Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed with a fever,

And they told him about her at once.

He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up.

Then the fever left her,

And she began to serve him.

That evening,

At sundown,

They brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons.

And the whole city was gathered around the door,

And he cured many who were sick with various diseases,

And cast out many demons.

And he would not permit the demons to speak because they knew him.

In the morning,

While it was still very dark,

He got up and went out to a deserted place,

And there he prayed.

And Simon and his companions hunted for him.

When they found him,

They said to him,

Everyone is searching for you.

He answered,

Let us go on to the neighboring towns,

That I may proclaim the message there also.

For that is what I came out to do.

And he went throughout Galilee,

Proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

A leper came to him,

Begging and kneeling.

He said to him,

If you choose,

You can make me clean.

Moved with pity,

Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him,

And said to him,

I do choose,

Be made clean.

Eventually the leprosy left him,

And he was made clean.

After sternly warning him,

He sent him on his way at once,

Saying to him,

See that you say nothing to anyone,

But go,

Show yourself to the priest,

And offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded,

As a testimony to them.

But he went out and began to proclaim it freely,

And to spread the word so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly,

But stayed out in the country,

And people came to him from every corner.

This is the first chapter of the Gospel according to Mark.

It is not the first gospel in the Gospels.

That honor goes to Matthew.

However,

I chose to use Mark instead of Matthew this time,

For two reasons.

One,

The first chapter tells more of the story.

The first chapter of Matthew is mostly backstory.

It does go into the story of Jesus a little bit,

But it's a bit more like the first chapter in the Bhagavad Gita,

Doing mostly setup.

The action doesn't really start,

Whereas Mark kind of cuts right to the chase.

The other reason for picking Mark to go first is because Mark is the earliest gospel that we still have.

It is believed by most that Matthew and Luke were both based on Mark and another source that has been lost.

And possibly the Gospel of Thomas,

Or that the Gospel of Thomas influenced other gospels as well.

Of course,

The Gospel of Thomas is not one of the four canonical gospels,

But it was rediscovered in the Nag Hammadi Library in 1945,

I think.

The Gospel of John is kind of another animal altogether.

I was tempted to use the Gospel of John partially as a parallel to Genesis,

Because in the first chapter of John,

He provides a retelling of the first chapter of Genesis.

But this seems like a more important way to enter into the story of Jesus.

Mark is not cited as often.

His language is very terse and rough.

It's not nearly as flowery or as pretty as the other gospels.

And that's actually some part of what I like about it.

It feels much more raw,

Much closer to the kind of stories that would have been passed around in the time when Jesus was maybe still in living memory.

There maybe were people when this gospel was written that might have actually still remembered Jesus.

That is,

Of course,

Assuming Jesus was a historical person.

I think he probably was,

But it's not for sure.

One of the things that's kind of funny is that he is not mentioned by Josephus,

Who was the Jewish-Roman scholar who wrote about this time in Jerusalem.

Which is a little bit surprising because Josephus was so comprehensive in his account.

So it would seem that perhaps at the time that Josephus was writing,

Jesus was simply not considered notable,

Newsworthy at the time.

Which certainly does not accord with what's in the gospels.

Jesus is obviously having a profound effect on those around him.

It's also worth mentioning that this was a time that was of great political upheaval.

Jerusalem was currently under Roman occupation.

If you've seen the movie The Life of Brian,

You actually get a surprisingly good account of what life was like,

With various Monty Python comedic elements thrown in,

Of course.

But one of the things that The Life of Brian shows,

Which is authentic,

Is that there were a lot of what would be messiahs.

Messiah was a.

.

.

The idea for a messiah was a liberator.

And it's also worth noting that it's most likely that Jesus,

Assuming he did exist,

Was not trying to create a new religion.

He would have been trying to reform the existing religion.

So the early Christians were Jews,

And they saw this as a continuation of the tradition.

So for example,

In the beginning of the Gospel of Mark,

He writes,

As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,

See,

I am sending my messenger ahead of you,

Etc.

So the way that this was interpreted,

Or meant to be interpreted,

Was a fulfillment of previous prophecies.

And this tradition of seeing it as a fulfillment of previous prophecies is definitely maintained in the Christian tradition,

But in a way that is maybe different from how Jesus' early followers would have thought of it.

For one thing,

Linear time,

The perception of linear time is a little bit different.

One of the things that you see if you read through the Hebrew Bible is these motifs that happen again and again.

Separation of waters.

The whole story of the child being stashed away.

This occurs both in the Gospel of Matthew and in Exodus.

So both Moses and Jesus are hidden away so that the king or pharaoh doesn't kill them.

This kind of echoing of motifs occurs throughout the Bible.

And Jesus is just the latest in a long thread of these.

Another thing I find interesting about the Gospel of Mark is that there are some people who think that the last chapter of Mark was actually added later.

And if so,

That's really interesting because that would mean that the Gospel of Mark actually ends before the resurrection of Jesus.

And if that's true,

That kind of changes what the Gospel of Mark would have meant to the original author.

He wouldn't have been telling a story of resurrection,

Which of course becomes so central to the Christian theology.

One of the things that you might have noticed if we compare the Jewish and Christian scriptures to the Dharmic,

That is the Hindu and Buddhist scriptures that we've also talked about,

Is that the Christian and Jewish scriptures are focused more on storytelling than on giving advice.

They are generally less practical.

Now the Eastern,

The East Asian traditions,

Religions,

Certainly have their fair share of mythologizing and that sort of thing.

However,

The myths in East Asian scriptures tend not to come to the forefront in what we see in the modern religious traditions as important as the teachings.

Whereas the Wisdom teachings in the Bible are also,

There are definitely Wisdom teachings in the Bible.

There's actually a whole section referred to as the Wisdom teachings in the Old Testament and Jesus does have his fair share of sermons and admonitions later.

But a big part of what's going on here is this story.

The important part here is really the story and how it connects to the earlier stories of the people for whom this story was intended.

You might have also noticed this occurrence of the word sin and forgiveness of sins.

In verse 4 it says,

John the Baptizer appeared in the wilderness proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

And then later he says,

The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me.

I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his handles.

I have baptized you with water,

But he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

Going back to John Prothero,

Stephen Prothero,

Sorry,

Prothero's theory about religion being a solution to a problem or answer to a question.

When we were talking about Buddhism,

The problem was suffering and the solution was a cessation of suffering,

Or a cessation of desire.

In Christianity,

The problem is sin and the solution is,

Well it's both forgiveness and it's salvation,

Which in the Christian context kind of end up being merged together.

In fact,

Salvation becomes such a key element in Christianity that Christians tend to look at all other religions in terms of their salvific component.

So this is one of the ways in which our understanding of religion has been colored by the Christian theologians who were trying to understand the religions around them.

Of course,

You tend to understand things in terms of what you already know.

So earlier understandings of non-Christian religions were often in terms of what is or is not salvific.

So they'd look at a religion like Buddhism and say,

Oh,

Okay,

Buddha is like Christ and you know,

The people who are following the Buddha are trying to be saved in this way.

While there is a certain element of symmetry there,

It's also very different because in the Buddhist context,

The Buddha doesn't save you really.

Now there is something called the three refuges,

I take refuge in the Buddha,

I take refuge in the Sangha,

I take refuge in the Dharma.

So you take refuge in the Buddha,

But that by itself is not going to provide liberation,

Except in some Mahayana contexts where they have this idea that if you just recite the name of Amida Buddha enough,

Through your faith alone you will be saved.

But even then,

That's considered to be like a side door into Nirvana.

Whereas in Christianity,

Faith in Jesus is the way to be saved.

It's only through grace that you get saved.

You can't do it by yourself.

Now returning to the Gospel of Mark and the Gospels in general,

One of the things that I think is kind of interesting about it is that though it's written by and for a Jewish community,

With the exception of the Gospel of John,

Which may have been written by a later convert,

It is not very critical of the Roman Empire,

Even though the Roman Empire was really the source of the problems for the Jewish people at the time.

This probably has more to do with the fact that history is written by the victors.

So the Gospels,

As they came to exist in the modern Bible,

Occurred through a form of transformation and redaction and selection that was very uncritical to the Romans.

This was important for the early Christians because they needed to be accepted within Roman society.

If they were openly critical of the Romans,

They would have been put to death even more than they already were.

You might have heard of stories of Christians being fed to lions.

This is of course before the Roman Empire became Christian.

That was definitely a problem.

The early Christians were not going to be openly critical of the Romans.

They were,

However,

Going to be openly critical of the established,

Of the Pharisees,

The Jewish scholastic establishment.

They saw them as rigid,

Old-fashioned,

Hypocritical.

It actually goes back to,

In some ways it's similar to what we saw in the Bhagavad Gita about the people who know the flowery words of the Vedas but who don't actually walk the walk.

This occurs in many traditions over the course of time.

It kind of makes sense.

We see that in all kinds of aspects.

We even see it politically where the ideals of an establishment,

Be it religious or political,

Once the revolution is won,

So to speak,

Whether it's a religious revolution or a political revolution,

The people who,

Sometimes very quickly,

Within a matter of years and sometimes longer over the course of generations,

But the establishment gains its own powerful foothold.

The words,

The language that was used to incite the revolution become perverted and become the tool of the establishment.

This is what Jesus is railing against when he's railing against the Pharisees.

This is also what Martin Luther was railing against when he kicked off the Protestant Reformation centuries hence.

Martin Luther also did not intend to create a new religion.

He wanted to reform the Catholic Church.

Similarly,

The would-be messiahs,

Including of which Jesus was one,

Were not intending to start new religions.

They saw themselves as Jews that were trying to rectify Judaism.

It's also worth pointing out that the Judaism that is presented in the Gospels is not the Judaism of today.

I think that this is really important to emphasize because I think that one of the things that is maybe confusing,

Particularly to Christians who are thinking about Judaism,

Is that the Judaism that they know is what's presented in the New Testament,

Or worse,

In the Old Testament.

But that's not the Judaism of today.

Judaism changed dramatically after the Second Temple was destroyed,

And that happened around 70 CE or 70 AD if you're a Christian.

So this was shortly after the time of Jesus.

Most scholars now think that if Jesus existed,

He was born probably 4 BCE,

Not 1 or 0 AD.

So the calendar is a little bit off.

And traditional holds that he lived 33 years.

Who knows,

Really,

But let's just say that he probably lived to his early 30s,

Which would mean that he was crucified around,

Say,

29 CE.

So within about 40,

41 years after his death,

The Second Temple is destroyed.

It's destroyed because the Romans get fed up with all these Jews trying to revolt.

And basically,

As I said,

This is a messianic time for the Jews.

They were ripe for a revolutionary figure to come up and deliver them.

But what's interesting is how the figure of the Messiah,

Who was originally conceived of in the Jewish imagination as a liberator,

Well,

He's still a liberator,

But he's no longer a liberator of the Jewish people against an oppressive political force.

He's now a liberator for all people against this demonic force.

And so that's the other villain in the Gospels,

And actually the New Testament in general,

Is the sort of demonic influence.

So we see that a lot in this first chapter of Mark,

Where he goes to the synagogue and casts out this unclean spirit.

There's a lot of casting out of unclean spirits,

Both in the Gospels and in Acts,

Which is sort of the sequel to the Gospels,

Which follows the acts of the apostles after the crucifixion of Jesus.

So as with all of these texts,

All of these scriptures,

Translation is interpretation.

And with regard to the Judeo-Christian Bible,

I've been using the New Revised Standard version.

This is the version that's preferred by most scholars today.

But of course it is one of dozens,

Maybe hundreds of translations into the English language.

Probably the most influential is,

Of course,

The King James Version.

Now the King James Version is highly problematic in a lot of ways.

The translation,

I think,

Is universally considered to be inaccurate,

To say the least.

However,

It was the translation for such a long period of time that it's affected a lot.

And a lot of things that reference the Bible or that are based on the Bible are either based directly on the King James Version or is evocative of it.

In fact,

One of the translations of the Qur'an that I think is interesting is intentionally trying to ape the style of the King James Version in order to make it sound biblical in the imagination of English speakers.

So one of the things that I think is,

Especially for people who are raised with the Bible,

Often the NRSV,

The New Revised Standard Version,

Might sound a little bit off because it's not necessarily the Bible that you remember.

And so I think it's good to go back and hear what it sounds like with the King James Version,

Understanding that it is flawed and that it is inaccurate.

But there is a poetry to it which is interesting and also just as a historical artifact I think it's worth checking out.

So I'm going to read the first chapter of the Book of Mark,

Of the Gospel According to Mark,

The King James Version.

The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ,

The Son of God.

As it is written in the Prophets,

Behold,

I send my messenger before thy face,

Which shall prepare thy way before thee.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness,

Prepare ye the way of the Lord,

Make his path straight.

John did baptize in the wilderness,

And preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.

And there went out unto him all the land of Judea,

And they of Jerusalem,

And were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan,

Confessing their sins.

And John was clothed with camel's hair,

And with a girdle of skin about his loins,

And he did eat locusts and wild honey,

And preached,

Saying,

There cometh one mightier than I after me,

The latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to stoop down and am loose.

I indeed have baptized you with water,

But he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost.

And it came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee,

And was baptized of John in Jordan.

And straightway coming up out of the water,

He saw the heavens opened,

And the Spirit like a dove descending upon him.

And there came a voice from heaven,

Saying,

Thou art my beloved Son,

In whom I am well pleased.

And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness.

And he was in the wilderness forty days,

Tempted of Satan,

And was with the wild beasts,

And the angels ministered unto him.

Now after that John was put in prison.

Jesus came into Galilee,

Preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God,

And saying,

The time is fulfilled,

And the kingdom of God is at hand.

Repent ye,

And believe the gospel.

Now as he walked by the sea of Galilee,

He saw Simon and Andrew,

His brother casting a net into the sea,

For they were fishers.

And Jesus said unto them,

Come ye after me,

And I will make you become fishers of men.

And straightway they forsook their nets,

And followed him.

And when he had gone a little further thence,

He saw James the son of Zebedee,

And John his brother,

Who also were in the ship mending their nets.

And straightway he called them.

And they left their father Zebedee in the ship with their hired servants,

And went after him.

And they went into Capernaum.

And straightway on the Sabbath day he entered into the synagogue and taught.

And they were astonished at his doctrine,

For he taught them as one that had authority,

And not as the scribes.

And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit,

And he cried out,

Saying,

Let us alone,

What have we to do with thee,

Thou Jesus of Nazareth?

Art thou come to destroy us?

I know thee who thou art,

The Holy One of God.

And Jesus rebuked him,

Saying,

Hold thy peace and come out of him.

And when the unclean spirit had torn him and cried with a loud voice,

He came out of him.

And they were all amazed,

Insomuch that they questioned among themselves,

Saying,

What thing is this?

What new doctrine is this?

For with authority commandeth he even the unclean spirits,

And they do obey him.

And immediately his fame spread abroad throughout the region around Galilee.

And forthwith,

When they were come out of the synagogue,

They entered into the house of Simon and Andrew,

With James and John.

With Simon's wife's mother lay sick of a fever,

And a non they tell him of her.

And he came and took her by the hand,

And lifted her up.

And immediately the fever left her,

And she ministered unto them.

And at even,

When the sun did set,

They brought unto him all that were diseased,

And them that were possessed with devils.

And all the city was gathered together at their door.

And he healed many that were sick of diverse diseases,

And cast out many devils,

And suffered not the devils to speak because they knew him.

And in the morning,

Rising up a great while before a day,

He went out,

And departed into a solitary place,

And there prayed.

And Simon and they that were with him followed after him.

And when they had found him,

They said unto him,

All men seek for thee.

And he said unto them,

Let us go into the next towns,

That I may preach there also.

For therefore came I forth.

And he preached in the synagogues throughout all Galilee,

And cast out devils.

And there came a leopard to him,

Beseeching him,

And kneeling down to him,

And saying unto him,

If thou wilt,

Thou canst make me clean.

And Jesus moved with compassion,

Put forth his hand,

And touched him,

And saith unto him,

I will,

Be thou clean.

And as soon as he had spoken,

Immediately the leprosy departed from him,

And he was cleansed.

And he straightly charged him,

And forthwith sent him away,

And saith unto him,

See thou say nothing to any man,

But go thy way,

Show thyself to the priest,

And offer for thy cleansing those things which Moses commanded,

For a testimony unto them.

But he went out,

And began to publish it much,

And to blaze abroad the matter,

Insomuch that Jesus could no more openly enter into the city,

But was without in desert places,

And they came to him from every corner.

Thank you for listening.

I hope you will join us next month when we discuss the first chapter of the Qur'an.