Chapter # 1 Paragraph # 1 Study # 1
August 28, 2018
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
(006)
1901 ASV
1. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
- I. Textual Comment: the phrase "the Son of God" has a "C" rating in the second edition of the UBS Greek New Testament. This makes the phrase probable as an emendation not written by Mark.
- A. The literary design of Mark presents Jesus as "the Son of God" so there is no conflict with Mark at the "thesis" level.
- B. The problem with emendations is that they insert words that are problematical for the actual intent of the author in that they press us intellectually to go where he did not go.
- II. Some Initiatory Considerations.
- A. The time frame for Mark's record of history was the 69th week of Daniel, plus a week. This will make it necessary for us to consider many of the words of Jesus within the "Jewish" setting. It requires us to be cautious about how to "apply" Jesus' words to the interrupting period between the end of the 69th week and the beginning of the 70th week.
- B. The author was the Mark who was known also as John Mark and was the man who abandoned Paul and Barnabas on the first missionary journey, but became a useful minister of the Gospel under Barnabas' mentoring.
- C. The historical/theological background for Mark's words is the Old Testament presentation of that aspect of Messiah that focused upon the "Messiah ben Joseph" concept of flawed Jewish theology.
- 1. Joseph was the initial presentation of the "Suffering Servant" whose early imagery was that of "the shepherd, the stone of Israel" (Genesis 49:24).
- 2. Then, in Moses' characterization of him in Deuteronomy 33:17 the imagery is that of the bullock with two powerful horns.
- 3. In the banners of Israel seen by Balaam, there are two references to the horns of the wild ox (Numbers 23:22 and 24:8). These prophecies are conditioned by Numbers 24:2 where we are told that Balaam saw "Israel camping tribe by tribe" with the assumption that he also saw the tribal banners where were pictured the water bearer (Aquarius; Numbers 24:7/Reuben; Genesis 49:3), the wild ox (Taurus; Numbers 24:8/Joseph; Deuteronomy 33:17)), and the lion (Leo; Numbers 24:9/Judah; Genesis 49:9), all of which form three of the four "corners" of the Zodiac. [Note: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia Vol. 1, p. 310, paragraph 7].
- 4. In the imagery of Ezekiel's vision of the glory of God in chapters one and ten, and in the imagery of the four living creatures in Revelation 4, there are the same three of four at 90 degrees of separation from each other in the Zodiac and, with the addition of the Eagle, are typically seen as the root images of the four Gospels of the New Testament.
- D. Mark's place in the setting of four distinct presentations of Jesus the Christ is also highly significant.
- III. Mark's Use of "Beginning".
- A. The Authorized Version translates the word "beginning" with eight English words.
- 1. The reason for this appears to be rooted in Strong's claim that the word is used in the abstract to indicate "a commencement" and concretely to indicate some form of the idea of "chief" ("in...order, time, place, or rank").
- 2. The prominent underlying issue seems to be "the initiation of a thing".
- a. The "corner" of a sheet (Acts 10:11) as the beginning place for the creation of it.
- b. A point in time in which something "began" to exist (Matthew 19:4); a starting point.
- c. A "magistrate" as the point of origin for the exercise of authority (Luke 12:11).
- d. A "principality" as an angelic authority who can make consequential decisions and carry them out (Ephesians 3:10).
- e. The foremost person/issue of importance in a given setting (Colossians 1:18).
- B. Mark's Uses.
- 1. 1:1 -- this current text under our consideration.
- 2. 10:6 -- "the beginning of the creation" wherein God's creation of male and female occurred.
- 3. 13:8 -- "the beginnings of sorrows" as the initial difficulties that point to the onset of the time of great trouble to come upon the earth.
- 4. 13:19 -- "the beginning of the creation" as the point in time from which the issues involved are measured.
- C. If Mark is being consistent, his "title" to this written record indicates that he considers the record to be a kind of starting place for our understanding of the Gospel.
- 1. Our initial point of reference makes a great deal of difference to our perception of Mark's message.
- 2. It is my contention that the "Jesus" of all four writers of the Gospels is presented with particular attention, and deliberate focus, upon God's gift as the Author of Life for men.
- a. This automatically means that Jesus is the answer to the problem of man's "Sin" as that is the human problem in the details of human participation in the Life of God.
- b. Given this thesis, it is my contention that Mark is presenting Jesus as the Author of Life with a particular focus upon man's "fear" of a loss of status in the eyes of men and the corollary "fear" of humiliation in the eyes of men. This makes Jesus the Solution to John's category of "things in the world" existing in the words, "the pride of life" (1 John 2:16 in the Authorized Version).
- IV. Mark's Use of "Gospel".
- A. Mark used the word "gospel" long years after the beginning of the Church and within the context of the "Gospel" of the New Testament era.
- B. But his use of it begins before Jesus came into the world.
- C. The straightforward implication is that there is only one "Gospel" with multiple theses that sometime surface under titles such as "the Gospel of the Kingdom", "the Gospel of the Grace of God", "the Everlasting Gospel", etc. There are not different "Gospels", but are different branches of the theology of the large umbrella known as "The Gospel".
