Author Archives: Alex Dong

Team 6, Question 2

Posted on by under matthew

Both Matthew 8:1-4 and Mark 1:40-45 present the story of Jesus healing a leper. However, Mark and Matthew describe this event differently: it is obvious that the story in the Gospel of Matthew is much shorter than it is in the Gospel of Mark, therefore, it’s easy to recognize how Matthew’s redaction of the Gospel of Mark shows the tendency of abbreviation. I also discovered that this specific story in Matthew offers an “improved” image of Jesus: notice the verse Mark 1:41: “Moved with pity…” and its footnote “e”: “other ancient authorities read anger” –it is not hard to see that Mark’s description of Jesus’ reaction here might cause unnecessary confusion: why would Jesus feel angry when the leper asks for a healing miracle? On the other hand, Matthew 8:3 simply did not include Jesus’ reaction whatsoever. This is one of many changes in the Gospel of Matthew which provides the readers a transformed characteristic of Jesus. Similarly, the description of Jesus’ calming the storm in both Matthew 8:23-27 and Mark 4:35-41 shows the same tendencies: Matthew’s version of the story is much more concentrated and abbreviated, it also shows an improvement of writing style as well as the transformation of Jesus’ characteristic. For example, in Mark 4:38, the disciples are described to approach Jesus with the question: “Teacher, do you not care if we perish?”(4:38) This attitude is completely transformed in the Gospel of Matthew: “Save, Lord; we are perishing.”(8:25) This is to say that the disciples in the Gospel of Matthew have a clearer understanding of Jesus’ identity than they are described in the Gospel of Mark. This transformation also elevates Jesus’ identity from “teacher” to the “Lord”.

The story of Jairus’ daughter and the woman’s faith presented in Matthew 9:18-26 is also a serious transformation of the story presented in Mark 5:21-43. It is not difficult to see how Mark’s version of the story contains many details and how Matthew’s version of the story is much more abbreviated and less detailed. There are several important concepts that are worth paying attention to: 1) the healing of the woman, 2) the moment Jesus realizes the woman has touched His garment, 3) the moment Jesus faces the woman, 4) the appearance of the person from the ruler’s house. In the Gospel of Mark, the healing of the woman occurs instantly when she touches Jesus’ garment: “And immediately the hemorrhage ceased; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.”(5:29) Jesus realizes someone has touched His garment by “perceiving in himself that power had gone forth from him,”(5:30) then after Jesus questions about the person who touched His garment, the woman “came in fear and trembling and fell down before him, told him the whole truth.”(5:33)  This scene is completely different in the Gospel of Matthew: after knowing someone has touched His garment, Jesus simply turns and heals the woman by saying “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.”(9:22) Notice that the woman is healed not by touching Jesus’ garment but by Jesus’ words. These changes in the Gospel of Matthew place emphasis on Jesus’ divine healing power in order to provide a new and “improved” image of Jesus as the Son of God.

The appearance of the person from Jairus’ house (Mark 5:35) is not recorded in the Gospel of Matthew–this also shows us how Matthew emphasize people’s faith and their proper understanding of Jesus’ identity.

Even though Jesus performs healing miracles to variety of people, most of the objects of Jesus’ healings are often people of lower social class, presumably the ones that are generally considered “weak”(disabled, women, children, etc.) These miracles mirrors the teachings Jesus delivered in the Sermon of the Mount and also provide concrete examples for understanding the concept of social and metaphysical values which Jesus proclaims in the Sermon of the Mount.

Matthew put emphasis on the resemblance between Jesus and Moses by listing ten miracles in Matthew 8-9 in comparison to the ten miracles Moses performed, which are described in Exodus 5-12. This comparison not only serve the purpose of giving Jesus credibility as well as validating Jesus’ authority, it also serves the purpose of proclaiming the good news of salvation: the ten miracles Moses performed was for the purpose of freeing Israelites from the slavery in Egypt: this is a form of salvation. On the other hand, in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus’ ten miracles imply a much more elevated Salvation: the eternal Salvation. The parallelism being: Moses brought his people out of Egypt and freed Israelites from slavery and Jesus is able to bring salvation to the people and free us from being slaves of sin.

Team 6, Question 3

Posted on by under miracles

According to White, the ancient miracle stories often include the following parts: 1) Description of the situation, 2) Action by the miracle worker, 3) Response of onlookers. Such pattern is often used to describe a miracle-performing event which signifies the miracle worker’s ability/power. In Mark 7:31-37, Jesus healed a deaf man who had a speech impediment and all three features of the pattern appeared within the verses, however, the miracle event presented in Mark 8:22-26 only included parts of “the description of the situation” and “the action by the miracle worker”. Each of these miracle-performing stories engage with the concepts of both “humanity” and “divinity”–through these miracle stories, Mark presented Jesus as the one who is with God, that is, a man with healing power that can only come from the divine being. This is to emphasize Jesus’ identity as the Son of God.

The two healing stories mentioned above are not included in neither the Gospel of Luke nor Gospel of Matthew–according to White, the reason why it is not included is because of the difference between the settings: In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus heals two blind men at once as well as a deaf-mute person(9:27-31) because it is more fitting for such set of narratives and thematic interests. To White, all miracle stories play important roles in the Gospels, and they are told in a way which is shaped by the specific ideology that the Gospel tries to get across. Another reason that White pointed out is that whether Matthew and Luke considers Mark’s miracle stories are strong enough to present Jesus’ divinity, according to White: “Either way, it would appear that the Gospels of Matthew and Luke found this miracle to be less than satisfactory as a depiction of Jesus’s miraculous powers, as it was removed in both.”(179)
 Another important detail that worth paying attention to is the reaction Jesus has after seeing people’s amazement responding His miracles: in Mark 7:36, “And Jesus charged them to tell no one” after He has healed the deaf man. What’s interesting here is that unlike the descriptions in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, instead of telling people to proclaim His name, Jesus remains quiet and repeatedly asks people to “tell no one”.

The concept of death in ancient world is centered around “fear”–White expressed that the fear of death and the fear of being accidentally buried is widespread among the people of the ancient time. The idea of death is to be understood as a “one-way street” simply because it “marks a boundary from which there is no return.”(172) In Luke 7:11-17, Jesus is being portrayed as a divine being who sympathize with humans: “And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.””(7:13) Also Jesus’ ability to restore one’s life is works as a further prove of His divinity and crowd’s reaction actively engaged the identity of Jesus as the Messiah, Son of Man.

Team 6, Question 2

Posted on by under son of god, son of man

White opened up the discussion of the name “Son of God” by explaining it in a sense of character building. In order to understand Jesus’ identity as the Son of God, it is necessary to draw similarities between different titles such as “Messiah”, “Son of Man” and “Son of God”. The Gospels are narrative construction built on the understanding of these “common images” of Jesus. These titles are all expressing one main idea, that is, the understanding of Jesus’ identity as the chosen Messiah.

One of the most known titles that often address Jesus’ humanity as well as His divinity is the name “Messiah”, but just like White stated in the book, it is important to understand the name “Messiah” in its original cultural and historical context. In ancient Jewish literature, “Messiah” means “anointed”, the name “Messiah” was formed from the common Hebrew word “mashach” which means “to pour”. After translated into Greek, the word “Messiah” has a very specific meaning, it is commonly understood to be “the anointed one”, which refers to the ritual of anointing the king, therefore, the name “Messiah” is often used to refer to the king. It is not difficult to see why it is controversial to call Jesus the “Messiah” during that time: this understanding of the word “messiah” concerns not only religious power but also political power—the name “Messiah” is the utmost authoritative name, therefore, to call Jesus a Messiah is a direct challenge to the authority of both religious leaders and the political leaders.

In Daniel 7, the author described his apocalyptic vision, one of the features that stands out from the rest is the vision of the four beasts: the first one looks like a lion, the second looks like a bear, the third one looks like a leopard, and the fourth one is different from the rest: “…A fourth beast, terrifying and dreadful and exceedingly strong. It has great iron teeth; it devoured and broke in pieces and stamped what was left with its feet. It was different from all the beasts before it, and it had ten horns.”(Daniel 7:7) The identity of the beasts is revealed in verse 17-18: “As for these four great beasts, four kings shall arise out of the earth. But the holy ones of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever—forever and ever.” So it is clear that these four beasts are four kings, and the fourth beast is a little different: the identity and the ending for this beast is described throughout verse 23-27: this beast itself represents the “fourth kingdom” and it is the one that “devour the whole earth” as well as to “speak words against the Most High”. It also tries to “change the times and the law”. The ten horns of the beast represents the ten kings of the kingdom.

In his vision, Daniel also described the “Ancient One” and the “one like a human being”, that is, God and the Son of God Jesus Christ. Daniel 7:13-14 introduced the “One like human being” as well as explained the relationship between the “Ancient One” and the “One like human being”: “As I watched in the night visions, I saw one like a human being coming with the clouds of heaven. And he came to the Ancient One and was presented before him. To him was given dominion and glory and kingship, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and his kingship is one that shall never be destroyed.”  These two verses emphasized the authority of God as well as the dominance of the Son of God, the Messiah.

In 1 Enoch, the idea of the Messiah as the “Holy One” as well as the idea that God is the “Lord of the Spirits” are both being emphasized as well–it is clear to see these two identities are completely separable yet still closely related to one another: the two figures both exist before and after the “time” and the relationship between the two can be described as “Choosing One” and the “Chosen One”: this is, again, a matter of authority and righteousness, Lord of the Spirits has authority and righteousness and the same authority as well as righteousness has been given to the Chosen One by the Lord. Verse 46:4-7 revealed the role of judge that the “Chosen One” plays in world history: “…He will overturn the kinds from their thrones and their kingdoms, because they do not exalt him or praise him, or humbly acknowledge whence the kingdom was given to them. The face of the strong he will turn aside. And he will fill them with shame.”(5-6) Here the Chosen One is not only the Savior but also the Judge of the days–the Chosen One is the one that ends “this age” and begins the new age.

However, in the Gospel of Mark, the name “Son of Man” is no longer a representation of authority–instead, the name “Son of Man” represents a suffering Messiah: the One that is chosen to endure. In the Gospel of Mark, the name “Son of Man” is particularity emphasizing the holiness and the righteousness of Jesus as the Messiah instead of His authority: one of the most important scene is the request from both John and James: in verse 10:35 and following, both James and John had the impression that the name “Son of Man” only represents the God-given authority: “And they said to him, ‘Grant us to sit, one at your right and one at your left, in your glory.’”(10:37) What they are asking here is for Jesus to bless them with His glory and His authority. But what Jesus replied to them revealed the true understanding of the name “Son of Man” in the Gospel of Mark, that is, the “suffering Messiah”: “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”(10:39-40) Instead of proclaiming His authority, the Son of Man here is emphasizing the equality that He shares among the others.

It is important to acknowledge that the name “Son of Man”  has more than one emphasis: it is helpful for understanding Jesus as a divine human to first understand Jesus identity as the Messiah. Just like the conversation that Jesus had with Peter: “He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.”(8:29)

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