In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’
Mark 1:9-11
Καὶ ἐγένετο ἐν ἐκείναις ταῖς ἡμέραις ἦλθεν Ἰησοῦς ἀπὸ Ναζαρὲτ τῆς Γαλιλαίας καὶ ἐβαπτίσθη ὑπὸ Ἰωάννου εἰς τὸν Ἰορδάνην
καὶ εὐθὲως ἀναβαίνων ἀπὸ τοῦ ὕδατος εἶδεν σχιζομένους τοὺς οὐρανοὺς καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα ὡσεὶ περιστερὰν καταβαῖνον ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν·
καὶ φωνὴ ἐγένετο ἐκ τῶν οὐρανῶν Σὺ εἶ ὁ υἱός μου ὁ ἀγαπητός ἐν ὦ εὐδόκησα
We are in the wilderness (ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ) – ἔρημος occurs 9 times in Mark. It is translated (NRSV) as “wilderness”, “deserted place”, “in the country” (1:45). So the connection between these occurrences is lost in translation. In LXX (the Septuagint – the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible) has 104 occurrences of ἔρημος in Exodus through Deuteronomy. During the Exile, the prophets pointed to a new Exodus hope – ἔρημος occurrs 38 times in Isaiah, 26 in Jeremiah, 34 in Ezekiel.
Mark echoes these in his use of ἔρημος – Jesus spends time in the ἔρημος, feeds in the ἔρημος, is leading us to a new Exodus.
Jewish leaders stay home, marry, and have a family – in this Mediterranean culture, they remain with the kinship network. Here, Jesus leaves family and village.
ἀπὸ Ναζαρὲτ – from Nazareth, a place with about 500 people, not mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. This is Mark, basically saying: “Jesus from Nowhere”. Galilee underscores edge with Jerusalem as centre.
1:10 εὐθὲως – immediately (“as he was coming up out of the water”). εὐθὲως and its variant occurs 47 times in the action-packed, “immediately” Mark.
σχιζομένους – “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down” Isaiah 64:1
“like a dove” is an obscure allusion.
“Son of God”, here, is presumably not the ontological, Trinitarian understanding which took centuries to come to define. (see Ps 2:7; Is 42:1-2)
As this year the Sunday Gospel reading focus is on St Mark’s Gospel, I thought I’d now start some of my personal study and Lectio Divina with that Gospel.
This is the fourth post in a series – you can begin here:
Mark in Slow Motion 1
Mark in Slow Motion 2
Mark in Slow Motion 3
Just a note to say that I *love* your “slow motion” readings, Bosco. More please!
For folk like me who lack Greek, your expositions of the key words and of their concordances in the Septuagint are especially helpful.
I hope before long to be able to remedy that defect, which is an acutely embarrassing one in a seminary professor! During a sabbatical last year, I did a refresher of my Latin grammar by working through J. M. Whiton’s 1886 book “Six Weeks’ Preparation for Reading Caesar,” which I found utterly wonderful. And I have lately discovered that Whiton wrote an introduction to Greek on the same plan, called “Three Months’ Preparation for Reading Xenophon,” and I think that this will be an ideal way into the language for me: https://archive.org/details/threemonthsprep00whitgoog
Thanks for the encouragement, Jesse. I have, in the past used Handbook of New Testament Greek, Volumes 1 & 2 – they follow an inductive approach to learning Greek; this sounds similar to your Whiton approach. I must look at your link. Blessings.