Excavating Mark as Another Example of Christian Apocalyptic

With this working definition of apocalypticism in mind, how does the Gospel of Mark function apocalyptically? Our first consideration is the moment in history when the Gospel of Mark was written. The majority of New Testament scholars date the Gospel between 66 and 70 CE, that is, squarely during the Jewish War with Rome, or shortly after the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. Thus Mark was written during a time of real political and cultural crisis (cf. Adela Yarbro Collins’s language of perceived crisis; A. Y. Collins, 84–110) that may have indeed been an impetus for an apocalyptic response. Second, the Christology of the Gospel of Mark foregrounds the messiahship of Jesus. This is made explicit in the very first verse of the Gospel: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ” (i.e., Messiah). This christological emphasis is maintained throughout the Gospel (e.g., in the messianic secret motif: see the commentary on Mark). The relationship of a messianic figure to different apocalyptic scenarios is still under scholarly debate. I defer to Aune’s assessment, noted above, which highlighted the expectation of God’s oppressed people that an agent of God would act on their behalf at the critical and ultimate moment.

Other features of the Gospel of Mark that add to its apocalyptic tenor include its explicit cosmological dualism, as represented in the temptation of Jesus, after his baptism, by Satan (1:12–13) and the multiple exorcisms in the Gospel (e.g., 1:21–28; 5:1–20; 9:14–29). In comparison, the Gospel of John, arguably the least apocalyptic of the four canonical Gospels—has not one exorcism.

The Gospel of Mark also maintains a unique relationship to time. It is by far the most compressed of the four Gospels, narrating the ministry of Jesus from baptism to empty tomb. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke each begin with narratives of Jesus’ birth, and end with accounts of his ascension into heaven. The Gospel of John goes even further, beginning “in the beginning” and ending with an ascension account. The Gospel of Mark employs the phrase “and immediately” some forty-one times in its narrative, twelve times in the first chapter alone. (The Greek phrase kai euthys occurs only nineteen times in the rest of the New Testament.) The phrase gives the reader/hearer the impression of a story moving very rapidly, and may remind the reader, ancient and modern alike, of the initial words uttered by Jesus in the Gospel: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near” (1:15). Further, aspects of Mark’s story reveal aspects of sectarian groups, as identified by modern theory: the requirement of severance of ties with one’s biological family (e.g., 1:16–20; 2:13–14; 10:28), the creation of a new eschatological family (3:31–35), and the mandatory renunciation of personal wealth for the benefit of the group (6:7–13; 10:17–27).

These observations crystallize the argument that Mark has apocalyptic features. This “excavation” goes beyond the usual characterization of Mark 13 as the “Little Apocalypse” to reveal that an apocalyptic character pervades the Gospel, and thus to foreground another apocalyptic moment in early Christian history; the Revelation to John does not stand in isolation. But consider next how both Matthew and Luke, unsatisfied with Mark’s apocalyptic moorings some ten to fifteen years after the fact, chose to domesticate Mark when they incorporated his Gospel into their own. By means of this domestication, the legacy of Christian apocalypticism has been canonically offset, if not altogether suppressed, by the consequent conflated readings of the Gospel narratives.