Gospel of Mark

The Quest of the Historical Gospel explores the nature and origin of the gospel genre. After a review of the promises and difficulties of the designation of the gospels as biography, Wills compares popular, novelistic biographies, such as the Life of Aesop , with the gospels of Mark and John. He posits that they all belong to the same genre and comprise similar literary motifs; the cult biography of the dead, revered figure; the notion of the scapegoat and the character of the hero. Professor Wills also examines the relationships between the gospels of Mark and John arguing that they exist independently of each other and are derived from earlier, oral accounts. The Quest of the Historical Gospel offers a provocative and timely analysis of the figure of Jesus and the gospels depicting his life. It provides fresh perspectives on the origins of gospel genre and the analogies between Jewish and Greco-Roman literature and gospel narrative, and challenges the preoccupation of prior criticism with the placing of Jesus in a definitive historical context.This erudite and critically up-to-date book will be of interest to those concerned with the early traditions of Jesus and the origins of the narratives about his life.

In this book, Marie Sabin argues that Mark's gospel represents an early and evolving Christianity, which shaped its theological discourse out of the forms familiar to early Judaism. In that early Jewish context, she says, theology took the form of connecting scripture with current events: the biblical word was continually reopened - i.e. reinterpreted - so as to reveal its relevance to the present faith-community. At the time, the chief genre for this hermeneutical process was the synagogue homily. Sabin contends that Mark's composition represented an interweaving of homilies preached by Jesus and his followers in the local synagogues. Sabin sees Mark not as a mere collector or scribe, however, but as an original theologian shaping his material in the context of two theological traditions: the Jewish wisdom traditions and Jewish Creation theology. Reading Mark in the contexts of these traditions reveals fresh meanings that break open Christian formulas long frozen in time and illuminate the Gospel's striking relevance to our own time.

These essays, interdisciplinary in their approach, demonstrate the variegation of the religious imagination from the broadest historical and denominational scope. By examining the works of philosophers and theologians, of poets, painters, and novelists - from Saint Mark to Jacques Derrida and from Erasmus, Loyola, and Milton to Rouault and to Andrew Greeley - the essayists seek to answer the question Jesus posed to His disciples: "Who do you say that I am?" and to anticipate the equally contentious query: "How do you say who I am?" The essays together explore the religious imagination through the question of transcendence, using both the age-old Christian imagination and the contemporary world wherein the divisions between religious cultures are less fixed, an age of imaginative permeability where the absence of God is as present as the presence of God.

This sparkling collection of new essays addresses a wide range of issues surrounding women's lives in the early Christian period. The first set of articles supply the historical and social contexts. The contributors go on to address issues surrounding the representation of women in the Gospels, women in the Pauline tradition, and finally, attitudes toward women in the early church and the roles played by early Christian women. The most comprehensive look available on the Christian origins from women's point of view and Christian feminist theology, this book will be essential reading for students and others interested in these topics.