The last post, dealing with what is to be gleaned from the Gospel of Mark, ended with:
Jesus proclaimed the nearness and the imminence of the kingdom of God. Jesus told his disciples that they would enlist others. Jesus drove out unclean spirits and healed the sick. Jesus taught that his disciples participate communally in the soliciting and the bestowal of eternal forgiveness. Jesus taught that experience is understandable, though perhaps only incrementally so.
If, as I contend, the ministry of Jesus recorded in the gospels is meant to be understood in story form, rather than as a formal account, then it would be expected that the prefatory sections would give way to the body of the story. Ironically, since the applications of Jesus' teaching hinge on a few basic teachings--imparted naturally at the beginning--then the "body" of the story would have some of the tenor of a conclusion. After all, in the framing of a theological system, there are certain basis premises that must be developed from the start--at least, that is what we might naturally expect.
This "playing-out" of the beginning premises is what we see in the Gospel of Mark, where that portion of the story between the prefaces and the onrushing of "Passion Week"--that is, that portion which is conventionally taken as an account of "teachings of Jesus" (usually broken up under the translators' headings)--ought really to be seen as an outworking of the teachings of Jesus. What we see from the Mission of the Twelve onward to the Transfiguration--a progress viewed most neatly through the framework of references to The Baptist--is a display of how the teachings of Jesus must be assimilated by the disciple.
As I wrote in the preceding post about the sending of the Twelve: "They have been prepared by him to face the world. And the message they are to impart? 'And they went out, and preached that men should repent.' The Baptist could have told them that."
6:6b-29) And then now we have the familiar story of John's imprisonment and murder. It is sewn into the text with a brief set of ruminations from various quarters about Jesus' personage, a set of ruminations that is not resolved but is rather left hanging (though Herod's contention that Jesus is a resurrected John leads into the account of the murder.) We will revisit this phenomenon about multiple interpretations of a person's theological identity.
6:30-44) Then we have the story of the First Miracle of the Loaves. There has never been enough emphasis on what seems at first like a sarcastic response of Jesus to the disciples' concern about the unfed crowd: "Give ye them to eat." Jesus really did mean that the disciples should draw forth enough for the crowd, something that Jesus then does himself. Jesus does not wave a hand and create a pile of food. Jesus draws it into existence.
6:45-56) Jesus then creates a heightened version of the Calming of the Storm. He puts the disciples in a boat by themselves, and contrives to have them placed to cry out as he appears in the storm. The disciples are frightened both by the storm and by the apparition, but when they cry out in their distress he comforts them and calms the sea. This is taken too often as simply a miraculous sign, as a lesson to the disciples in the sovereignty and mercy of Jesus, or as a display of how the disciples--and we--need to petition for the mercy and comfort of God. All these are valid, but none of them addresses directly the lesson that the text brings:
"For they considered not the miracle of the loaves: for their heart was hardened." Over and over again Jesus is teaching that the phenomenon of people obtaining benefits from God is really a phenomenon of them yielding themselves to the unmerited miracle of serving as vessels of God's bounty.
7:1-13) The "Pharisees, and certain of the scribes" from Jerusalem then upbraid Jesus about his disciples' disregard for ritual washing. It should be noted not only that he defies their contention that such rituals have divine warrant, but that he chooses a particular example of their unseemly traditions that bears on our topic. Jesus speaks about how a son, though bound in fact by duty to his parents, can choose to withhold benefits to his parents by declaring such things of his to be dedicated to God--an exact opposite (and an impious one at that) of drawing forth from oneself the benefits of God.
7:14-37) Jesus then, in speaking about "clean and unclean," reverses the standard notion of impurity. Rather than pollutants being introduced to a person from without, says Jesus, "That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man . . . . All these evil things come from within, and defile the man." Whether for good or ill, the things that matter for a person's eternal fate arise from within--though of course the incomprehensible sovereignty of God transcends all bounds. For the purposes of the disciple, and for the purposes of Jesus teachings, the kingdom of God does indeed reside within the person--and in that manifestation is to be looked to as a seat and source of blessings.
8:1-21) Shortly thereafter, Jesus again feeds a crowd, and again he draws forth from what is at hand--from what the disciples already possess--enough for the multitude. Then the text has Jesus, after sailing to Dalmanutha, dismiss abruptly a company of Pharisees looking for a sign. And then comes an episode that must be left to speak for itself:
"Now the disciples had forgotten to take bread, neither had they in the ship with them more than one loaf. And he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and of the leaven of Herod. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have no bread. And when Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? perceive ye not yet, neither understand? have ye your heart yet hardened? Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember? When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve. And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they said, Seven. And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand?" (Mark 8:14-21)
We have proceeded partway through the journey to the Transfiguration. This gets us through Chapter 8, verse 21.
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