An Atheist Explores the Bible Part 195: Jesus and the Sons of Thunder (Mark 1-5)

Mark 1-5
Jesus and the Sons of Thunder

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

Mark 1

“As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee”

Mark omits any details of Jesus’ birth, jumping straight in with His baptism by John the Baptist. I hadn’t thought of it before it was phrased differently in this chapter, but I don’t recall if we’ve come across the notion of baptism in water as a means of washing away sins. Possibly, I must admit my memory of earlier books is getting fuzzy.

Anyway, in short order, Jesus is baptized, has a vision, spends forty days in the wilderness, gathers Simon, Andrew, James and John as disciples, heals the sick, casts out demons, heals Simon’s mother and a leper. At the end, Jesus tells the leper to tell no-one but simply to go and make a thanks offering, but the leper tells everyone instead. Meanwhile, John is imprisoned.

There’s a lot less detail here than Matthew – for example the sojourn in the wilderness is summed up in one verse, whereas in Matthew there’s almost an entire chapter given to the specific temptations that the devil lays before Jesus. Also, there’s a lot less reported speech so far from Jesus, again in part due to the more summary nature of this chapter.

Mark 2

“And when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners?”

More incidents in the early ministry of Jesus, when the religious establishment begin to attack him. The scribes hear Jesus forgiving sins and claim this as blasphemy (as only God can forgive sins). Jesus retorts that it is easier to do than to make a man sick of palsy able to walk again, which He then does anyway to prove His point. There’s also the incident of Jesus mixing with the lowlife types, to which He replies that they are more in need of him; “They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick”. Finally there are the couple of incidents involving theological wrangling about fasting and eating on the Sabbath; Jesus’ arguments here are basically that whilst He’s around, His followers can do what they like. There’s a bit more reported speech from Jesus here, mostly in the form of replies to arguments, but still quite simple compared to Matthew.

Mark 3

“For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother.”

More incidents, and still nothing too different from Matthew except in terms of brevity. Jesus heals a man with a withered hand on a Sabbath day; His argument here seems to be that it does more good to help someone on the Sabbath than to be too pernickety about the laws governing what you can and cannot do. Later he travels around the Galilee region, healing people, and the twelve disciples are named (here James and John get the surname “Sons of Thunder” which sounds like an 80s hair metal band but it made me wonder if that’s the meaning of “Zebedee”; it’s certainly quite onomatopaeic  when you think about it).

In the last incident reported here, Jesus’ brothers and mother are trying to get to him through the throng, and Jesus replies that all gathered here are his brethren. Now, in Matthew the way this was written made it seem like Jesus was turning His back on family, and urging His followers to do the same. Here it comes across more as an inclusive move – everyone is brothers and sisters together – and somewhat less cult-like.

Mark 4

“And he began again to teach by the sea side: and there was gathered unto him a great multitude, so that he entered into a ship, and sat in the sea; and the whole multitude was by the sea on the land.”

Jesus begins teaching in parables, including the parable of the sower given here (as well as some other agriculture-based metaphors about great things growing from tiny seeds). The use of parables is quite a clever one, in that it has a two-fold purpose. As Jesus says, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear”. It requires the listener (but not the disciples, nor us who have the answer written down) to think about what they’ve heard, and you need to understand to … understand. It’s a bit like a Zen koan, I guess, although the purpose of those isn’t always about finding a specific answer. Secondly, it’s memorable. A bit like a joke without a punchline, putting teaching into a little story like that is a good way of getting people to remember it. It can’t be a coincidence that, so far in Mark, this is the largest piece of reported speech by Jesus.

Mark 5

“And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.”

All the scenes in this chapter featured in Matthew, but I there are few extra details here that make them more potent. Firstly there is the image if the man possessed with devils (who get driven into a herd of swine). This man, living amongst the tombs, “had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces”, wandering the tombs, crying and cutting himself, presents a powerful picture of an unfortunate wretch, and the classic line “My name is Legion, for we are many” sends shivers down the spine.

Next, Jesus is called to heal the daughter of a man named Jairus, “one of the rulers of the synagogue”. This is different in Matthew, I’ve got a feeling the parent is an important Roman – but either way it is a rich and powerful person who ought to be opposed to Jesus, yet Jesus still helps. He is interrupted in his journey by the woman with “an issue of blood twelve years”, whom He heals despite her possibly being unclean by Mosaic law. By the time Jesus reaches the house of Jairus, the daughter is dead, but Jesus revives her (sceptical version – everyone thinks she’s dead but Jesus is a better physician than them). I don’t know if there’s meant to be any kind of thematic link between the girl, who is twelve, and the woman whose “fountain of her blood was dried up”, representing the two ends of a woman’s fertility. Possibly not intentional, as I’ve not seen any kind of theme like that in the bible up until now, but it struck me whilst reading it.