January 20, 2011 by Tom Brunson
Like Matthew, Mark describes the crucifixion and records just one saying of Jesus on the cross: "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?" This is especially appropriate for Mark's audience of Jewish slaves in Rome, as they also would have felt forsaken by God. Mark then goes on to show that Jesus was honored in death by His burial details, and then that He was resurrected to great glory.
This helps focus Mark's readers that even though they may ...
Categories: Mark |
January 19, 2011 by Tom Brunson
Mark chapter 4 presents Jesus' teaching in parables that reveal the delay in bringing the Kingdom, the same as in Matthew chapter 13. Both begin with the parable of the Sower, although Mark leaves out some other parables that Matthew includes that are pointedly about the Pharisees and other leaders in Israel, as these meant little to Mark's audience of slaves in Rome.
Mark tells how Jesus got into a boat to teach the large crowds on shore, so they...
Categories: Mark |
January 18, 2011 by Tom Brunson
If indeed Mark was written for an audience of slaves, it explains much about it's style and content. For one thing Mark leaves out details of Jesus' ancestry, birth, and childhood that helped Matthew accredit Jesus to the Jews in Israel as their rightful King. Slaves in Rome wouldn't have cared about such things. They were looking for a Messiah, no doubt feeling abandoned by their people and God.
One of my professors at DTS pointed out that each of the four Gospels has...
Categories: Mark |
January 17, 2011 by Tom Brunson
Different commentaries give widely different views of the Gospels, including what they are, why they were written, and how they were written. Many views are based on modern theories that completely dismiss the statements of the early Church fathers and assume the Gospels are all recording Jesus' sayings and putting them into a nice story so they will be more memorable. They theorize which order they were written by assuming they went through the same process as other old stories and legends. These theories often say that Mark must have been written first, partly because of its briefness and poorer Greek, that the trend is for later writers to expand a text and clean it up...
Categories: Mark |
