Marginal Christianity

The two dramatic stories of a miraculous feeding and a sea walk have given some major clues as to who Jesus is even though the disciples don’t get it. Though scarcely as compelling, the inter-Jewish debate Mark narrates here follows the previous stories nicely. Mark has made huge claims for Jesus – the hugest! He is the messiah! Jewish leadership, however, were not going to take that claim sitting down. It’s not surprising, then, that Pharisees and scribes come to him to contest his spurious (to them) claims. They attack him on purity issues – the nest of traditions of washings before meals that marked Jews off from other peoples as Jews, God’s people. Jesus’ disciples apparently no longer observed these regulations or human traditions. Surely messiah would not condone such flaunting of Israel’s identity markers. He speaks for Israel after all. Indeed he does. And that’s just why his disciples engage in such scurrilous behavior. The issue here is who really speaks for I...

http://larryhurtado.wordpress.com/2012/10/11/dogs-doggies-and-exegesis/ October 11, 2012  Since the assigned lection a few Sundays ago on Jesus and the Syro-Phoenician woman (Mark 7:24-30), I’ve intended to comment on what appears to me a surprisingly widespread mis-reading of the passage.  Essentially, the “dogs” (who Jesus says here must wait till after the “children” have eaten before they can be fed) are taken with an extremely pejorative connotation as feral mongrels, and the scene is read as if Jesus is pictured insulting the woman and treating her with contempt.  I am embarrassed to find this basic take on the passage even in the learned commentary on Mark by a scholar I deeply admire:  Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark:  Hermeneia (Fortress Press, 2007), 366-67.  But for several reasons, among them prominently the specifics of the Greek term used (unusually) in this passage, I think it pretty clear that this take is wrong. The term used h...

Mark 7:24-37 24 Jesus left that place and went into the region of Tyre. He didn’t want anyone to know that he had entered a house, but he couldn’t hide. 25 In fact, a woman whose young daughter was possessed by an unclean spirit heard about him right away. She came and fell at his feet. 26 The woman was Greek, Syrophoenician by birth. She begged Jesus to throw the demon out of her daughter. 27 He responded, “The children have to be fed first. It isn’t right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” 28 But she answered, “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” 29 “Good answer!” he said. “Go on home. The demon has already left your daughter.” 30 When she returned to her house, she found the child lying on the bed and the demon gone. 31 After leaving the region of Tyre, Jesus went through Sidon toward the Galilee Sea through the region of the Ten Cities. 32 Some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly speak, and they begged him t...