Looking at Mark 8:27-38

[Daniel_Marsh]

Who was the gospel of mark written to? Greeks? pagans in general?

We know that John was written to Chrisitians. That Luke and Acts was written to a Roman. Matthew was written to Jews.

For example, when writing to a Roman, Luke would not bring up all three members of the godhead right away ( Acts 2:38 ) because he would not want that roman to think of the godhead as three gods thus baptism “in Jesus name”. Yes, Acts 2 was written about Jews, but it was written to a Roman as his audience. And, a pagan Roman who was use to having a bunch of gods would see the Father, Son and Holy Spirit as three gods.

So, why would Matthew writing to Jews include the rock thing and Mark writting to ??? leave it out? Why would Paul, a Jewish person writing to Ephesians spell out exactly what the foundation was? Who were the Ephesians?

Eph 2: 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;

Ok, the core knowledge of a Jewish person in Jesus day would know that,

Psalm 18:2
The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower.

So, when a Jewish person would read Matthew 16, he would view Peter as only part of the foundation, not the full foundation because they would know better.

But, an Ephesian would not very likely know the Old Testament and therefore may have a completely different core knowledge of God and his word. Thus Paul would have to spell it out for them that the church has Jesus as the bedrock, corner stone, that the foundation is made up of all the prophets and all the apostles. Thus Eph 2:20 gives us the complete picture.

Now, catholics make the mistake of building the church at Matthew 15, when in fact Jesus told us eariler that,

Matthew 7:24-29 (King James Version)

24Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:

Jews would know that bedrock is God himself. right

25And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.

** 26And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:**

27And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

28And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine:

29For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

So, here Jesus is equating his words to bedrock, but Jews know that the bedrock is God, Jesus had authority greater than the scribes. So, a Jewish person would realise that Jesus temple would be built on the bedrock of God and would be glued or mortared together by the Words of God, Jesus.

So, when reading each book of the New Testament, we should ask ourselves about the likely core knowledge of those who are hearing the letter or book read to them. Are they Jewish? How much of the Scriptures do they know? Are they Romans, Greeks or Pagans? How much about the Hebrew Scriptures would they know? Were they formerly idol worshippers with no knowledge of the true God or no knowledge of his word? How much detail is neccessary for an author to supply to those whom he is addressing?

Looking through Matthew and Jewish writings, what else is known about foundations, bedrock, cornerstones?

Looking through John, how much would his audience know? Would they have the full story about Jesus? know all the gospels or what they have heard in church? Remember, the gospels and letters were read aloud to them.

Looking at any letter in the New Testament, what was the background of the people in that city? Who or what did they worship or no worship before Jesus? How much detail was needed?

Why for example was one church messed up with gnostics and another church very immature concerning spiritual gifts? what in their background contributed to their condition?

 

[Sixtus]

ow, catholics make the mistake of building the church at Matthew 15,

YES and NO

As a Catholic, it is my understanding the preferred texts are John and Luke but Mark has seniority

 

[Nita]

Daniel,
You pose too many questions for one thread.

Since your title refers to Mark 8:27-38, I’m wondering if your main query is why Mark didn’t mention Peter being the rock. If so, my answer would be that Mark’s gospel (according to Papias) is the record of Peter’s preaching. Perhaps Peter didn’t make it a point to preach about how Our Lord had appointed him the visible head of His (Jesus) Church. Some people like to toot their own horn; Peter may have been a lot more humble than that.

Nita

 

[mercygate]

Daniel,
You pose too many questions for one thread.

Since your title refers to Mark 8:27-38, I’m wondering if your main query is why Mark didn’t mention Peter being the rock. If so, my answer would be that Mark’s gospel (according to Papias) is the record of Peter’s preaching. Perhaps Peter didn’t make it a point to preach about how Our Lord had appointed him the visible head of His (Jesus) Church. Some people like to toot their own horn; Peter may have been a lot more humble than that.

Nita

Matthew was present when the Lord said those words about Peter being the rock upon which he would build His church. You will remember that at Caesarea Philippi, the Lord had withdrawn with the 12. Mark was not one of them. He wasn’t there to hear those words. Also, Mark’s gospel is almost telegraphic in its brevity, and as you mention, Peter’s preaching likely would not have emphasized that detail.

 

[Nan_S]

Matthew was written to the Jews, to explain how Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies and promises of the savior. As such, it is laced with nuances of Jewish law that only Jews fretted about. The authorship is traditionally ascribed to the apostle Matthew, aka Levi, but the gospel itself does not make plain the identity of the author.

The is some evidence that an early draft of Matthew, written in Aramaic, may have been circulating in the 40s, and would have been available as a source document for Mark and Luke. The final version of Matthew post-dates Mark.

Mark was written to the Romans, to bolster their faith under extreme persecution. The author of Mark was a disciple of Peter residing with him in Rome. Most scholars believe Mark was the first complete gospel, and that it was used as a primary source for Matthew and Luke.

Luke was written to the Gentiles, in part to explain the Jewish stuff and how/why it was important that Jesus fulfilled it. Luke was a disciple of Paul. Luke was a scientist, a physician, and was extremely concerned with the accuracy of his details. He was discredited in part until modern archaeology started proving him right. Luke also wrote Acts.

John was written about 30 years after the other three, to commit to writing additional details about Jesus that were either omitted or unstressed by the other authors. John wrote to all Christians in general. The author of John does not name himself, but the book has been traditionally ascribed to the apostle John due to the its frequent references to the “disciple Jesus loved” who is obviously the apostle John.

Does this help?

Regarding the rock: Jesus is the cornerstone of the Church, but a house/building needs a rock to be built upon or else it will collapse. Jesus declares that Peter is that rock.

Mt 7:26-27 And every one who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house upon the sand; and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell; and great was the fall of it."

Nan

 

[richardeekw]

Who was the gospel of mark written to? Greeks? pagans in general?

Hi Daniel

Mark’s Audience

Tradition states that after the martyrdom of Peter and Paul, Mark was the first to establish churches in Alexandria, in northern Egypt.

**The book aimed to equip such Christians to stand faithful in the face of persecution **
Mk 13:9-13 "But take heed to yourselves; for they will deliver you up to councils; and you will be beaten in synagogues; and you will stand before governors and kings for my sake, to bear testimony before them. And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. And when they bring you to trial and deliver you up, do not be anxious beforehand what you are to say; but say whatever is given you in that hour, for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit. And brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved.

**Its audience seems to have been Gentile, unfamiliar with Jewish customs **
(hence Mark 7:3-4, 11).
Mk 7:3-4, 11 For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders; and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they purify themselves; and there are many other traditions which they observe, the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze.)

but you say, `If a man tells his father or his mother, What you would have gained from me is Corban’ (that is, given to God) –

 

[richardeekw]

Mk 8:27-30

Mark notes tht Jesus did not want his truth to be spread about (vs 30). It is not proper that people should hold that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, before Jesus has suffered, died and risen. To call Jesus the Christ, was to see him the one whom God had promised through the prophets of old: the one whom the People hoped God would send to free them from all their troubles, the great successor to David, who had fred the People from all their enemies (2 Sam 7:1-17, Isa 9:5ff, 11:9; Pss 2, 72b 110). In the minds of many of the People this Christ of God (Annointed One of God) would usher in the final and complete Kingdom of God, the end of pain and suffering.

Jesus immediately begins to build on their act of faith, he begins to teach them that in God’s plan the Messiah, the Son of Man, must suffer, die and rise again. They are shocked to hear this.

Mk 8: 31-33

Peter rebukes Jesus for speaking of such terrible things. Then Jesus is said to look round at his disciples (vs 33) and then rebuke Peter. It is clear that Peter is speaking for all the disciples and that in rebuking Peter, Jesus is rebuking the disciples. Jesus uses the harshest words possible. “Get behind me, Satan”. Peter and the disciples in their refusal to accept that the Christ must suffer and die are thinking in the common way of humans – terrified of pain, wanting to avoid it at all cost, as though suffering and death were always evil and could never be willed by God. Jesus has said that the Son of Man “must suffer” (vs 31) which means that it is inevitable, unavoidable that he must suffer if he is to accomplish what God wants in him. The ways of God are not the ways of man (Isa 55:8ff).

In rejecting the suffering of the Messiah, however, there is another refusal, a more personal one. If the Messiah must suffer, then it would appear that his followers might also have to suffer. This unspoken objection is a revealed and spoken in the following section. Notice that Mark has these words addressed to “the people and his disciples”, that is, to all and any who want to remain disciples.

Part 1 of 2

 

[richardeekw]

continued Part 2 of 2

B]Mk 8:34- 9:1

“***If anyone wants to follow me”. ***
In these words Jesus underlines the freedom with which a person chooses to be a disciple. These conditions for discipleship are listed by Jesus

1. “Let him deny himself” refers to denouncing one’s own self as the centre of one’s life. The expression could suggest, “Let him lose sight of himself”.
2. “**take up this cross” **clearly suggests the cross of Jesus to all Christian readers. Crucifixion, however, was a well known Roman form of execution. These words are saying that the disciple must be willing to go the whole way with Jesus even if the final cost is death, death even as a condemned criminal at the hands of the Romans.
3. The third condition, **“follow me”, **speaks of a relationship to Jesus himself. The disciple is one who learns from Jesus as a student follows his master, listening, questioning, learning, obeying.

“***Whoever wants to save his life”. ***
“To save” means to preserve from harm, to rescue from danger, pain, suffering. The word life literally refers to the soul, but has the sense of “self”, or even “person”. The meaning of the phrase is that anyone whose goal in life is to keep himself from pain, out of danger, safe from harm, such a person will in fact lose his life.

“Will lose it”.
Ther person who sets himself at the centre of his life, seeking security, pleasure and a pain-free life, will destroy his life. In the eyes of Jesus human life is precious, make to endure into eternity, there to be glorified. A truly human life is one of selflessness, but selflessness for a cause worthy of the dignity of human life.

“***Anyone who loses his life for my sake and the sake of the good news, will preserve his life…” ***
Selflesness can be misdirected to causes which are not worthy of human dignity. The only cause worthy of human dignity is the cause which is in keeping with Jesus and the Gospel. The whold world in all its greatness, all the beauty is not a sufficient price for a human person. Only the Kingdom of God itself is a worthy goal, a satisfactory place for a person.

The true goal of human life is to be taken into the glory of the Father when the Son returns at the end of timje (vs 38). All who had the Gospel announced to them, who understood it rightly, but were ashamed of the lowly life of carrying the cross will not be accepted when the end comes.

The last verse in this group of sayings (9:1) may have been understood at one time to mean that the Kingdom of God would come in this lifetime of the first disciples. There were Christians, who held firmly that the end of the world would come very soon, or had already come (see 2 Thess 2:1ff). It would be very possible to understand 9:1 in this sense. Mark, however, has placed this verse just before the Transfiguration of Jesus, and we believe that in doing so, he is suggesting that the same disciples who witnessed the Transfiguration were witnesses es to the final triumph of Jesus, his coming in golory.

While Mark’s account of the Transfiguration does point to the future glory of Jesus, it also takes Jesus to the past and then brings us to the present.

Extracted from
Bishop Gervais, M. - Journey. Vol. 3.

 

[jamannor]

Your thoughts are very scattered, I’m having trouble trying to find out exactly what you’re trying to prove/motive behind this. I’ve studied Mark very extensively, it is a great gospel which is attributed to bringing more people to Christ then any other gospel. Mark is believed to be Peter’s apprentice. The good news isn’t about Peter it’s about Christ. In the first half of the gospel Christ goes in great lengths to prove his authority. Foolish Peter doesn’t understand his plan at this point in the gospel, and actually most of it. Jesus tells him ‘hey if you’re not with me, and you have your own agenda, then stand back, because you’re with satin.’ He is in fact rebuked three times by Jesus. By the end of the gospel he does believe and is completely changed by humility. At the resurrection Christ reinstates him. I find this gospel very nice, to see that the one to start the church is like all of us. Confused, sometimes needs proof, runs into situations with our fist flying by forgetting to think first. He even denies Christ, not once but three times. In the end, it doesn’t matter, Christ dies for him, for you , and for all. The question with this gospel is will you go out and spread the word? It’s tough to take just one passage and prove Peter isn’t the rock, 8:27 is puzzle piece and anyone who just takes what they want and uses it to prove a point without the whole picture is giving Mark an injustice.

I wish you peace.

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

Yes, the question was whom mark wrote to, and what their core knowledge of scripture and literature would be.

 

[NotWorthy]

Mark wrote to Christians in Rome suffering persecution under Nero.

He hid (or maybe “hinted at” would be a better term) Christ’s Godhood until Christ suffered on the Cross. This was to help bolster the suffering Romans who were wanting to make sure that their pain was not in vain. It was only in His sufferings and on the Cross that Christ revealed his kingship as Pilot and the Romans revealed.