Mark 1 (2): 1:3-8 Mark and The Lord of the Rings
Now that we have gotten a fix in the last post on what Mark thinks the “good news,” the gospel is: an account and announcement of how Jesus of Nazareth has brought God’s plans for Israel and humanity, his eternal purpose, to its culmination and successful climax. That’s the story he tells in all its peculiarity and grandeur. Let me posit an analogy that can help us keep both the peculiarity and the grandeur of that story in mind. Remember the three parts of The Lord of the Rings trilogy? The Fellowship of the Ring (FR), The Two Towers (TT), and The Return of the King (RK). -FR shows the formation of an implausible community tasked with an impossible deed. -TT dramatizes the perils and the possibilities of the struggle to finish their task. -RK pictures the “impossible possibility” of the task completed and the afterlife of the community. I suggest these three categories map pretty well on to the way Mark composed his story of Jesus. -chs.1-7: Jesus gathers an imp...