New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash: Mark Chapter 3

Continuing review - The Christ Myth Theory and its Problems by Robert M. Price

New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash: Mark chapter 3

If you have no idea what this article is about - please read THIS.

Robert Price has published his article, New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash on his website.  You can follow along HERE.  

OK, I continue with what Robert Price has to say about the Gospel of Mark chapter 3.  I will again include the full text from the New King James version, and highlight what I see as common features:

10. The Withered Hand -  Mark 3:1-6 ; 1Kings 3:1-6

Mark 3:1-6

And He entered the synagogue again, and a man was there who had a withered hand. 2 So they watched Him closely, whether He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. 3 And He said to the man who had the withered hand, “Step forward.” 4 Then He said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they kept silent. 5 And when He had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored as whole as the other.  6 Then the Pharisees went out and immediately plotted with the Herodians against Him, how they might destroy Him.

1Kings 13:1-6

And behold, a man of God went from Judah to Bethel by the word of the Lord, and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense. 2 Then he cried out against the altar by the word of the Lord, and said, “O altar, altar! Thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, a child, Josiah by name, shall be born to the house of David; and on you he shall sacrifice the priests of the high places who burn incense on you, and men’s bones shall be burned on you.’” 3 And he gave a sign the same day, saying, “This is the sign which the Lord has spoken: Surely the altar shall split apart, and the ashes on it shall be poured out.”

4 So it came to pass when King Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of God, who cried out against the altar in Bethel, that he stretched out his hand from the altar, saying, “Arrest him!” Then his hand, which he stretched out toward him, withered, so that he could not pull it back to himself. 5 The altar also was split apart, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of God had given by the word of the Lord. 6 Then the king answered and said to the man of God, “Please entreat the favor of the Lord your God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me.”

So the man of God entreated the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him, and became as before.

The common feature of both stories is the restoration of a  man’s dried and withered hand.  Dr. Price points out another common feature that is not readily apparent.  In the story from 1Kings 13, the authorities are present at the service of King Jeroboam, and on his command will arrest the unnamed Prophet of God.  In the more familiar story from the Gospel of Mark, the authorities are also present, waiting to condemn Jesus for healing the withered hand on the Sabbath.  Dr. Price explains the connecting link between the two stories: “Whereas the withering and healing were the aftermath of the villains’ attempt to arrest the prophet in 1 Kings,, in Mark it is the healing of the withered hand which makes the villains plot to arrest him: “The Pharisees went out and immediately took council with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him”. (Price p. 74)

I am trying to imagine how I would create a story based on Jesus from the story of King Jeroboam’s withered hand.  What elements would I keep, and what elements would I discard?  King Jeroboam was cursed by the Prophet of God, and caused the king’s hand to wither before he demonstrated God’s power by restoring it.  I cannot imagine Jesus a story of Jesus cursing a sinner with a withered hand would be very popular, so that part of the King Jeroboam story would not translate well.  King Jeroboam is cursed by the Prophet of God for essentially worshipping at foreign altars.  This probably would not translate to a story about Jesus either, so instead of that we get Jesus being accused of breaking Sabbath laws.  Both Jesus in the Gospel of Mark and the unnamed Prophet of God in 1Kings were innocent in the eyes of God, but they were both believed to be blasphemous by their sinful accusers.  There is a little more connecting tissue here than meets the eye, but there is too much juggling of story elements to be completely convincing.

GRADE: C

11. Choosing the Twelve; Embassy of Relatives -  Mark 3:13-35 ; Exodus 18:1-27

Mark 3:13-35

13 And He went up on the mountain and called to Him those He Himself wanted. And they came to Him. 14 Then He appointed twelve, that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach, 15 and to have power to heal sicknesses and to cast out demons: 16 Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter; 17 James the son of Zebedee and John the brother of James, to whom He gave the name Boanerges, that is, “Sons of Thunder”; 18 Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Cananite; 19 and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him. And they went into a house.

20 Then the multitude came together again, so that they could not so much as eat bread. 21 But when His own people heard about this, they went out to lay hold of Him, for they said, “He is out of His mind.”

22 And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, “He has Beelzebub,” and, “By the ruler of the demons He casts out demons.”

23 So He called them to Himself and said to them in parables: “How can Satan cast out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. 25 And if a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. 26 And if Satan has risen up against himself, and is divided, he cannot stand, but has an end. 27 No one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man. And then he will plunder his house.

28 “Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; 29 but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation”— 30 because they said, “He has an unclean spirit.”

31 Then His brothers and His mother came, and standing outside they sent to Him, calling Him. 32 And a multitude was sitting around Him; and they said to Him, “Look, Your mother and Your brothers are outside seeking You.”

33 But He answered them, saying, “Who is My mother, or My brothers?” 34 And He looked around in a circle at those who sat about Him, and said, “Here are My mother and My brothers! 35 For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother.”

Exodus 18:1-27

And Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law, heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel His people—that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt. 2 Then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took Zipporah, Moses’ wife, after he had sent her back, 3 with her two sons, of whom the name of one was Gershom (for he said, “I have been a stranger in a foreign land”) 4 and the name of the other was Eliezer (for he said, “The God of my father was my help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh”); 5 and Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife to Moses in the wilderness, where he was encamped at the mountain of God. 6 Now he had said to Moses, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you with your wife and her two sons with her.”

7 So Moses went out to meet his father-in-law, bowed down, and kissed him. And they asked each other about their well-being, and they went into the tent. 8 And Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardship that had come upon them on the way, and how the Lord had delivered them. 9 Then Jethro rejoiced for all the good which the Lord had done for Israel, whom He had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians. 10 And Jethro said, “Blessed be the Lord, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh, and who has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians. 11 Now I know that the Lord is greater than all the gods; for in the very thing in which they behaved proudly, He was above them.” 12 Then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took a burnt offering and other sacrifices to offer to God. And Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law before God.

13 And so it was, on the next day, that Moses sat to judge the people; and the people stood before Moses from morning until evening. 14 So when Moses’ father-in-law saw all that he did for the people, he said, “What is this thing that you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit, and all the people stand before you from morning until evening?”

15 And Moses said to his father-in-law, “Because the people come to me to inquire of God. 16 When they have a difficulty, they come to me, and I judge between one and another; and I make known the statutes of God and His laws.”

17 So Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “The thing that you do is not good. 18 Both you and these people who are with you will surely wear yourselves out. For this thing is too much for you; you are not able to perform it by yourself. 19 Listen now to my voice; I will give you counsel, and God will be with you: Stand before God for the people, so that you may bring the difficulties to God. 20 And you shall teach them the statutes and the laws, and show them the way in which they must walk and the work they must do. 21 Moreover you shall select from all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them to be rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens. 22 And let them judge the people at all times. Then it will be that every great matter they shall bring to you, but every small matter they themselves shall judge. So it will be easier for you, for they will bear the burden with you. 23 If you do this thing, and God so commands you, then you will be able to endure, and all this people will also go to their place in peace.”

24 So Moses heeded the voice of his father-in-law and did all that he had said. 25 And Moses chose able men out of all Israel, and made them heads over the people: rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens. 26 So they judged the people at all times; the hard cases they brought to Moses, but they judged every small case themselves.

27 Then Moses let his father-in-law depart, and he went his way to his own land.

I think that a proper analysis of this parallel depends a lot on the exact meaning of Mark 3:21.  Why did ‘His own people’ think He was beside Himself, or out of His mind?  The Gospel of Mark never explicitly gives the reason, but since this accusation from ‘His own people’ comes immediately after Jesus’ appointment of twelve named disciples, Dr. Price figures that might have something to do with it.  “We must imagine that previous to Mark someone had rewritten the story of Moses heeding Jethro’s advice to name subordinates resulting in a scene in which choosing the twelve disciples was the idea of the Holy Family of Jesus” (Price p. 77).  

Uh-oh.  We are asked to imagine that this story found in the Gospel of Mark is actually a corrupted text, and that the Gospel originally described the concern of Jesus’ own people that He was overworking Himself and maybe going a little crazy, and that maybe He ought to consider appointing some Disciples to help out with all the healing and preaching.  When Dr. Price attempts to make a stronger case for midrash by asking us to imagine a hypothetical text that does not exist, then I think we are on pretty dangerous ground.  But if we do imagine this hypothetical original story from the Gospel of Mark, Dr. Price lays out some pretty interesting comparisons that can be made:

Both stories include relatives that journey to meet the hero after hearing reports of the hero’s successes (Exodus 18:1-5, Mark 3:21)

Both heros are surrounded by riff-raff (Exodus 18:13-18, Mark 3:20)

The arrival of relatives is announced to the heros. (Exodus 18:6, Mark 3:31-32)

These are interesting enough, but then Dr. Price creates more parallels with texts that do not exist, and makes his argument weaker.  Originally, Dr. Price contends, we would have read of Jesus welcoming His family, and we would have read of Mary or one of His brothers advising Jesus to appoint disciples to ease His burden - both of which happen in the story of Moses.  Dr. Price is weakening his own argument by fabricating evidence out of texts that do not exist!  

Even if these additions to the story did originally exist, they would eventually been edited out of the story.  Why would this be?  Dr. Price argues that it is to intentionally bring dishonor on the family of Jesus, who in this allegorical story represent rival political and religious factions to Jesus.  I am just not seeing any of this!  Even if this story (based partially on texts that do not exist) really is an allegory against a religious dispute, it assumes that there were people, claiming to be relatives of Jesus, who were involved in some kind of succession dispute.  But note that the Gospel of Mark is too vague about who these people are!  Nobody is named.  There is no Mary, no James, just ‘His Family’.  Who is this religious rival?  Even if this the intent of the story, nobody knows who they are.  There are just too many loose links and fabricated texts to make this convincing.

GRADE: D

I hate to say it, but so far I am just not very impressed with New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash.  I have only looked at three chapters from the Gospel of Mark.  Lots more to go. 

Can't get enough?  Loads more of this kind of stuff coming soon.

New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash: Mark Chapter 2

Continuing review - The Christ Myth Theory and its Problems by Robert M. Price

New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash: Mark chapter 2

If you have no idea what this article is about - please read THIS.

Robert Price has published his article, New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash on his website.  You can follow along HERE.  

OK, I continue with what Robert Price has to say about the Gospel of Mark chapter 2:

9. Healing the Paralytic -  Mark 2:2-12 ; 2Kings 1:2-17a

Mark chapter 2 is the famous story of Jesus teaching in a house in the town of Capernaum.  At this time in his career, He really drew in the crowds with His teaching.  But a paralytic man who was desperate for His healing touch was not able to get into the house.  Rather than wait for Jesus to finish His teaching and leave the house, the paralytic's friends decided to carry him onto the roof, rip a hole through the thatch large enough to fit the paralytic through, then lower the paralytic down on a pallet.  It remains unclear whether the owner of the house was paid for damages.

Is there anything in the Old Testament where this story may have come from?  Dr. Price reminds us of a story in 2 Kings, where Ahaziah the wicked king, fell through the lattice of his second story palace in Samaria.  Ahaziah was incapacitated from the fall, so he ordered his priests to inquire of the god of Ekron, Baalzebub, whether he would recover.  But the god of Israel, Jehovah, let his jealousy get the better of him, and he wondered why Ahaziah went to the rival god Baalzebub instead of inquiring of his own god.  Jehovah condemns the faithless king.  Blast you Ahaziah!  You shall surely die!  The story ends with the prophet Elijah speaking for his god Jehovah.  No! Jehovah shall not heal King Ahaziah from the injuries he incurred from the fall off the roof because he decided to inquire first of Baalzebub, the god of Ekron.  

Oh yeah, this bookends a long section where King Ahaziah ordered his priests to deliver his arch-nemesis Elijah from his home, which was apparently on a hill.  But their plans were continually foiled when Elijah commanded fire to fall from heaven to devour them.

Could the familiar story from the Gospel of Mark chapter 2 really have come from this story of King Ahaziah falling from his roof, getting Jehovah jealous, and the command of fireballs from the sky, by Elijah, to consume a few hundred of the king’s priests?  I will again highlight the points of similarity between the two stories:

Mark 2:2-12

And again He entered Capernaum after some days, and it was heard that He was in the house. 2 Immediately many gathered together, so that there was no longer room to receive them, not even near the door. And He preached the word to them. 3 Then they came to Him, bringing a paralytic who was carried by four men. 4 And when they could not come near Him because of the crowd, they uncovered the roof where He was. So when they had broken through, they let down the bed on which the paralytic was lying.

5 When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven you.”

6 And some of the scribes were sitting there and reasoning in their hearts, 7 “Why does this Man speak blasphemies like this? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

8 But immediately, when Jesus perceived in His spirit that they reasoned thus within themselves, He said to them, “Why do you reason about these things in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Arise, take up your bed and walk’? 10 But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins”—He said to the paralytic, 11 “I say to you, arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” 12 Immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went out in the presence of them all, so that all were amazed and glorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”

2Kings 1:2-17

Now Ahaziah fell through the lattice of his upper room in Samaria, and was injured; so he sent messengers and said to them, “Go, inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover from this injury.” 3 But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria, and say to them, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?’ 4 Now therefore, thus says the Lord: ‘You shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.’” So Elijah departed.

5 And when the messengers returned to him, he said to them, “Why have you come back?”

6 So they said to him, “A man came up to meet us, and said to us, ‘Go, return to the king who sent you, and say to him, “Thus says the Lord: ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are sending to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.’”’”

7 Then he said to them, “What kind of man was it who came up to meet you and told you these words?”

8 So they answered him, “A hairy man wearing a leather belt around his waist.”

And he said, “It is Elijah the Tishbite.”

9 Then the king sent to him a captain of fifty with his fifty men. So he went up to him; and there he was, sitting on the top of a hill. And he spoke to him: “Man of God, the king has said, ‘Come down!’”

10 So Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, “If I am a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men.” And fire came down from heaven and consumed him and his fifty. 11 Then he sent to him another captain of fifty with his fifty men.

And he answered and said to him: “Man of God, thus has the king said, ‘Come down quickly!’”

12 So Elijah answered and said to them, “If I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men.” And the fire of God came down from heaven and consumed him and his fifty.

13 Again, he sent a third captain of fifty with his fifty men. And the third captain of fifty went up, and came and fell on his knees before Elijah, and pleaded with him, and said to him: “Man of God, please let my life and the life of these fifty servants of yours be precious in your sight. 14 Look, fire has come down from heaven and burned up the first two captains of fifties with their fifties. But let my life now be precious in your sight.”

15 And the angel of the Lord said to Elijah, “Go down with him; do not be afraid of him.” So he arose and went down with him to the king. 16 Then he said to him, “Thus says the Lord: ‘Because you have sent messengers to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, is it because there is no God in Israel to inquire of His word? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.’”

17 So Ahaziah died according to the word of the Lord which Elijah had spoken.

I personally do not see much anything in common between the two stories, and I do not see how Mark the Evangelist created the history in his Gospel from the story of King Ahaziah in 2Kings.  The only remotely similar points of comparison is the paralytic being lowered from the roof in the Gospel of Mark, and King Ahaziah falling from a second story lattice and injuring himself.  Dr. Price explains in his analysis that this may be a case of midrashic history that is created by an antithesis of the original story.  King Ahaziah is not healed because of his reliance on the god Baalzebub, and his lack of faith in the god Jehovah.  In contrast, the faith of the paralytic’s friends was enough to have his sins forgiven, and his paralysis cured by Jesus.

I have two problems with this analysis.  I think it is plausible that in some cases, the Evangelists were constructing history based on the analogy they found in the Old Testament Scriptures.  Many Christians have noticed these analogies, and believe them to be divinely inspired ‘types of Christ’ buried like treasure in the Old Testament narratives.  But I have a harder time imaging that Mark the Evangelist found a story in the Old Testament and believed he could create history from its antithesis!  If Ahaziah was condemned for his lack of faith, then could this really mean that the paralytic could be saved because of his friends' strong faith?  I suppose everybody will have to judge that plausibility for themselves, but I personally do not find it convincing.

The second problem is the amount of material that the story in 2Kings contains that was ignored by the Evangelist Mark.  About 10 verses in 2Kings chapter 1 are ignored by the Evangelist.  In the story, Elijah sits atop a hill as wave after wave of messengers sent by King Ahaziah are consumed by fire called from the heavens.  I can imagine that the Evangelist was not enthusiastic about including fireballs from heaven and warnings from God to admonish the paralytic for his sins.  Still, it seems a lot of juicy stuff to skip over, just to build a story with the bare thread of a man falling through a lattice!

GRADE: F

This story of Jesus healing the paralytic is the only portion of Mark chapter 2 that Dr. Price finds a possible parallel in the Old Testament.  This leaves three more stories from Mark chapter 2 for which Dr. Price offers no plausible Old Testament parallel.  Let's take a look at what was 'left behind'!! 

1)  Mark 2:13-17.  Jesus sees Levi the tax collector sitting in his booth.  Please note that the text does not say this is Matthew the tax collector.  Anyway, Jesus gives His hypnotic call to the tax collector, and Levi immediately drops everything where he sits to follow his Master.  This calls to mind the similar story in Mark chapter 1, where Jesus did a similar Jedi trick on James and John as they mended their nets.  Dr. Price made a good case that this was reminiscent of the call of Elisha by the prophet Elijah the Tishbite in 1Kings 19:19-21.  I assume that the call of Levi is just following a similar theme that was already done in Mark chapter 1.  But after the call of Levi, Jesus dines with the scandalous friends of Levi the tax collector.  Jesus replies to His critics with the famous aphorism, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”  If this did not come from the Old Testament, where did this come from?  Do we have here something that Jesus may have actually said, and was remembered and passed down through tradition until the Evangelist finally put pen to paper?

2) Mark 2:18-22.  When asked why the disciples of Jesus do not fast when disciples of other religious leaders do fast, He says something about the friends of the bridegroom not being able to fast while they are with the bridegroom.  I am not sure what that means - maybe He means to say that the guests of the bridegroom are not able to fast while in attendance to the wedding.  Anyway, Jesus goes on to say warn His critics that the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken away, and then they will fast!  New patches will rip old clothes, and new wine will burst old wineskins.  

Dr. Price cannot find anything in the Old Testament that may have produced this story or these short aphorisms.  But at this point I have to wonder about the context of the answer of Jesus to the question that was asked of Him by His critics.  Jesus does give an answer, but it is not really an answer to the question asked of Him.  Jesus could have easily given an answer about the hypocrisy of fasting and self-denial, and could have easily done it based on a parallel from the Old Testament - say from Isaiah chapter 58.  But no, instead of creating history from midrash, as Dr. Price is suggesting, the Evangelist makes Jesus warn that the time to fast is when He is taken away, for new, unshrunken cloth cannot be sewn onto old garments without tearing them.  If the stories of Jesus are created from Old Testament midrash, why does the Evangelist not consistently use this method to create his history?  Maybe a better question would be, if the stories of Jesus are created from Old Testament midrash, what can we learn from the stories of Jesus that are not created from Old Testament midrash?

3) Mark 2:23-28.  Finally Mark chapter 2 ends with another story for which Dr. Price offers no Old Testament parallel.  This is one that puzzles me.  The story goes that Jesus and His disciples wander the fields on the Sabbath and nibble from the stalks of grain.  The critics of Jesus again charge Him, and He responds with a story taken directly from 1 Samuel chapter 21.  Not only that, it also directly references a law found in Deuteronomy 23:25 regarding plucking grains of your neighbors field with the hands.  Combining these two stories seems a very plausible candidate for the creation of Mark 2:23-28, especially since the Evangelist Mark seems so explicit about referencing these Old Testament stories!  Huh??  Ah well, this methodology is not easy for me to nail down!

OK, that takes care of the Gospel of Mark chapter 2.  Sorry, but it looks like this chapter was a bit of a bust for me.

Can't get enough?  Loads more of this kind of stuff coming soon.