cup and being baptized with His baptism? And how can He, after speaking so decidedly of the necessity of His death, think it possible in Gethsemane that the cup might yet pass from Him? Who are the undefined "many," for whom, according to Mark x. 45 and xiv. 24, His death shall serve as a ransom? [1]
How came it that Jesus alone was arrested? Why were no witness called at His trial to testify that He had given Himself out to be the Messiah? How is it that on the morning after His arrest the temper of the multitude seems to be completely changed, so that no one stirs a finger to help Him?
In what form does Jesus conceive the resurrection, which He promises to His disciples, to be combined with the coming on the clouds of heaven to which He points His judge? In what relation do these predictions stand to the prospect held out at the time of the sending forth of the Twelve, but not realized, of the immediate appearance of the Son of Man?
What is the meaning of the further prediction on the way to Gethsemane (Mark xiv. 28) that after His resurrection He will go before the disciples into Galilee? How is the other version of this saying (Mark xvi. 7) to be explained, according to which it means, as spoken by the angel, that the disciples are to journey to Galilee to have their first meeting with the risen Jesus there, whereas, on the lips of Jesus, it betokened that, just as now as a sufferer He was going before them from Galilee to Jerusalem, so, after His resurrection, He would go before them from Jerusalem to Galilee? And what was to happen there?
These problems were covered up by the naturalistic psychology as by a light snow-drift. The snow has melted, and they now stand out from the narratives like black points of rock. It is no longer allowable to avoid these questions, or to solve them, each by itself, by softening them down and giving them an interpretation by which the reported facts acquire a quite different significance from that which they bear for the Evangelist. Either the Marcan text as it stands is historical, and therefore to be retained, or it is not, and then it should be given up. What is really unhistorical is any softening down of the wording, and the meaning which it naturally bears.
The sceptical and eschatological schools, however, go still farther in company. If the connexion in Mark is really no connexion, it is important to try to discover whether any principle can be discovered in this want of connexion. Can any order be brought into the chaos? To this the answer is in the affirmative.
The complete want of connexion, with all its self-contradictions, is ultimately due to the fact that two representations of the life of
- ↑ These and the following questions are raised more especially in the Sketch of the Life of Jesus.
