Mark (New International Commentary on the New Testament)

894 Pages·1987·8.32 MB·English

by  William L. Lane

THE NEW INTERNATIONAL COMMENTARY ON THE NEW
TESTAMENT
General Editors
NED B. STONEHOUSE (1946-1962)
NED B. STONEHOUSE (1946-1962)
F. F. BRUCE (1962-1990)
GORDON D. FEE (1990)
MARK
THE ENGLISH TEXT
WITH INTRODUCTION, EXPOSITION, AND NOTES
WILLIAM L. LANE

EDITOR'S FOREWORD
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
PRINCIPAL ABBREVIATIONS
INTRODUCTION
1. A NEW DIRECTION FOR MARCAN STUDIES
2. THE TRADITION CONCERNING THE GOSPEL
3. THE LIFE SITUATION THAT OCCASIONED THE GOSPEL
4. THE DATE OF THE GOSPEL
5. THE AUTHOR OF THE GOSPEL
6. THE PLACE OF COMPOSITION
7. SOME CONSIDERATIONS ON STYLE AND LITERARY METHOD
8. ANALYSIS OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK
9. SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
TEXT, EXPOSITION AND NOTES
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
SON OF MAN IN MARK
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
Additional Note on Repentance in the Rabbinic Literature
Additional Note on the Supplementary Endings to the Gospel
Additional Note on the Theology of the Freer Logion
INDEXES
This is the third volume on the Gospels in the New International Commentary on
the New Testament. The volume on the Gospel of L ike, by the late Norval
Geldenhuys, was published as long ago as 1950 - it was in fact the first volume
to appear in the series as a whole - and then we had to wait for over twenty years
for the next Gospel commentary, Dr. Leon Morris's comprehensive exposition of
the Gospel of John. Hard on its heels comes the present volume, and Professor
Herman Ridderbos is currently at work on the exposition of Matthew's Gospel,
which will complete the quartet.
The late General Editor of the series, Dr. N. B. Stonehouse, invited Dr. Lane
to undertake the commentary on the Gospel of Mark shortly before his death in
1961. How sound Dr. Stonehouse's judgment was in extending this invitation the
reader of the commentary may judge for himself.
Dr. Lane is known in scholarly circles as a member of the international
Society for New Testament Studies and as a contributor to its journal, New
Testament Studies. At a less specialist level he is known as jointauthor (along
with two of his colleagues at GordonConwell Theological Seminary) of the
volume The New Testament Speaks (New York: Harper & Row, 1969). But the
writing of this commentary has provided him with an opportunity to deploy his
scholarly and exegetical power to its full extent. In his Author's Preface he tells
us, in greater detail than most of the contributors to this series, something of the
scope and character of the commentary as he at first envisaged it and then
carried it towards its conclusion. It is unnecessary for me to repeat what he has
said, but much of the success of his enterprise is due to his early realizing that a
commentator's primary task is "to listen to the text". Only if he has learned this
lesson will a commentator effectively expound the text to others.
Mark did something which no one had done before: he wrote a Gospel. He
was, in Laurence Housman's words,
The saint who first found grace to pen The life
which was the Life of men.
Dr. Lane (rightly, as I think) inclines to the view that the situation which called
forth the writing of his Gospel was the crisis which broke upon the Christians of
Rome in the reign of Nero, and repeatedly he shows how aptly the Gospel
reflects its life-setting and speaks to the condition of its first readers. Jesus'
warning that those who would follow him could do so only by denying
themselves and taking up the cross must have come home with power to those
first readers. The fiery ordeal which had come upon them was no "strange
thing"; it was consistent with their Master's words, and as they underwent it they
were drinking his cup and sharing his baptism. "Truly", said the centurion at the
cross, "this man was the Son of God"; but it was the death of the cross that made
this truth plain to men. As we see from the Caesarea Philippi incident and its
sequel, the verbal recognition of our Lord's identity is meaningless unless it is
given content by the declaration that "the Son of Man must suffer".
We are sometimes asked why, at this time of day, we persist in using the
American Standard Version of 1901 as the basic text for the New International
Commentary. The principal reason for our persistence is that its excessively
literal style of translation, however unsuitable it may be for other purposes, is
admirably suited to serve as the basis of a commentary which endeavors to pay
careful attention to the details of the text.
The invitation to prepare a full-length commentary on the Gospel of Mark came
from Dr. Ned B. Stonehouse in the fall of 1961. At that time I had not yet
completed my doctoral studies and I felt very inadequate to the task. I was
encouraged to accept this responsibility only by the prospect of working closely
with Dr. Stonehouse, who had been my mentor. He felt certain that in preparing
his volume on Matthew he would encounter many of the problems which surface
in a detailed study of Mark, and that we could meet periodically for an exchange
of thoughts concerning the commentary. But before our first scheduled meeting
it pleased the Lord to call his servant to himself. Since then, more than ten years
have elapsed, during which I and the commentary have gradually matured
together.
My conviction from the beginning has been that the kind of commentary
which is needed is one which will reflect the wealth of contemporary scholarship
and insight found in journal articles and monographs. Frequently aspects of the
Marcan text that have been explored in depth have been lost for practical
purposes with the binding and shelving of the volumes in which they were
published. I have tried to review this vast reservoir of critical opinion and to
make the best material accessible to the man who is not a specialist. My
indebtedness to those who have labored in Gospel research, Roman law,
Rabbinics and Marcan studies is evident on every page. Without the assistance
offered by a multitude of men and women who became my teachers through
their articles the present commentary could not have been prepared.
My research and writing of the commentary has been controlled by several
goals. (1) In the interpretation of the Gospel I have sought for a new and primary
faithfulness to the biblical text. My desire was to allow Mark to speak as a
distinctive witness to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. It was
imperative that his voice not be drowned out by a concern for the harmonization
of Mark's record with the other Synoptic Gospels. In the commentary there is a
narrow concentration upon Mark's distinctive point of view, and only rarely is
attention drawn to the Matthean or Lucan witness. This critical decision reflects
the conviction that Mark is the oldest written Gospel. Since there was a
formative period in which it was the only Gospel in circulation, it is imperative