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The Ending of St. Mark's Gospel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 August 2011

Wilfred Lawrence Knox
Wilfred Lawrence Knox
Affiliation:
Pembroke College, Cambridge, England
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Extract

In The Gospel according to St. Luke the late Professor Creed accepted the view of Welhausen and Meyer that the original version of Mark was intended to close with the words ἐϕοβοῦντο γάρ. The view avoids the difficulty of explaining the fact that neither Matthew nor Luke knows any other ending; it is certainly hard to see how a document could have gained so wide a circulation that the authors of these two Gospels knew it, and yet had at some previous date been so little known that the only surviving copy had lost its original ending.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , January 1942 , pp. 13 - 23
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1942

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References

1 314 ff., and cf. his article in J. T. S., XXI, 122, pp. 175 ff. (Jan. 1930).

2 Ursprung und Anfänge des Christentums, I, 17 ff.

3 Streeter, The Four Gospels, 338. [On the possibility of ordinary loss in an early codex form, cf. Sanders, H. A., University of Michigan Quarterly Review, Winter 1938, pp. 119 ffGoogle Scholar. Cf. also C. C. McCown, HTR, XXXIV, p. 239 f.]

4 J. T. S., loc. cit.

5 The Gospel according to St. Luke, loc. cit.

6 Professor C. H. Dodd pointed out to me the resemblance of these openings to that of Herodotus. Apart from the initial clause, the introduction of Mark's story with an appeal to prophecy followed by the story itself is no more abrupt than Lucian's abrupt opening of his Life of Demonax with an ethical reflection beginning ἔμɛλλɛν ἄρα.

7 Locality and Doctrine in the Gospels, 11 ff.

8 For the “acclamations” cf. Dibelius, From Tradition to Gospel, 58. The wonder and admiration excited by a miracle is a regular theme of Hellenistic wonder stories; but it is thoroughly Semitic; it is peculiarly prominent in the story of the widow's son at Nain (Lk. 7, 14 ff.). the nadir of Greek in the synoptic Gospels.

9 Naturally these conclusions are not mutually exclusive; the same “life” may contain at the close an account of the hero's death and burial and a formal conclusion. In what follows I treat the last item, whatever it may be, as the “conclusion.” In some cases it is not easy to decide whether we have a closing panegyric or a formal ending, as in John 21, 25.

10 Accepting the view of Wells in Charles Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament that the doxologies are an addition. For the doxology as an ending see below.

11 Antt. XI. 158 and 183. My thanks are due to Professor F. S. Marsh for drawing my attention to this point. It is worth noting that Philostratus' Life of Apollonius of Tyana concludes with the various stories of his death of which Damis his source gave no account. ἐμοὶ δὲ οὐδὲ τοῦτο χρὴ παραλελεῖϕθαι, δεῖ γάρ που τὸν λόγον ἔχειν τὸ ἑαυτοῦ πέρας. Philostratus has no doubt that a life must end with the death and cultus of his hero.

12 Or is it inspired by the pagan lives which add to the hero's death and burial an account of the cultus paid to him after his death?

13 Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha II, 57.

14 Cf. Cook in Charles Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, 1, 57.

15 Cf. Antt. 2, 347 ff., where he apologizes for the story of Exodus and the use of a similar formula as the close of Book 3, (322) to conclude the marvelous career of Moses; in 10, 281 we have a similar conclusion to the story of Daniel. For such sceptical conclusions cf. Pausanias 6. 26. 2, and for milder specimens 1. 2. 2, 2. 19. 8, 8. 2. 7.

16 For the purpose of completeness it may be noted that among the Hellenistic historians Polybius in his surviving books ends as a rule with a formal conclusion or transition, occasionally with a natural break in the story (a general going into winter-quarters). Diodorus Siculus invariably has a formal transition to the next book. Dionysius of Halicarnassus varies between stopping at a good break in the story or winding up with a formal conclusion or transition.

17 Cf. Ed. Schwartz, Fünf Vorträge über den Griechischen Roman for the demand of the Hellenistic public for a happy ending for its novels. (I owe this reference to the joint kindness of Professor E. Fränkel and Dr. Daube of Caius College, Cambridge.) The Scriptores Erotici invariably provide a happy ending which is entirely explicit.