Mark’s Emphasis On Jesus’s Teaching, Part 1: Exploring A Neglected Motif

By Dane C. Ortlund

[Dane C. Ortlund is Executive Vice President of Bible Publishing, Crossway Books, Wheaton, Illinois.

This is the first article in a two-part series on the eschatological significance of teaching in Mark’s Gospel.]

Abstract

While the Gospel of Mark is often thought to be more interested in action than in discourse, the Gospel in fact emphasizes the priority of teaching in Jesus’s earthly ministry. This distinctive emphasis becomes evident through surveying texts in Mark that highlight the teaching of Jesus as well as other recurring themes—the healing of deafness, Jesus’s title of “Teacher,” and the formula ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν. Part 2 considers the eschatological significance of this emphasis.

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Mark’s Gospel is commonly taken to be the Gospel of action, concerned above all with portraying the mighty deeds of Jesus, culminating in his death on the cross. Episodes that appear in multiple Gospels will often be recounted with greater length and detail in Mark’s Gospel than in the others. At the same time, Mark has by far the fewest extended blocks of Jesus’s teaching. Studies of Mark accordingly cast the book as more interested in fast-paced action than in teaching. As Edwards says, “We learn who Jesus is not so much from what he says as from what he does.”[1] Some treatments of Mark even build the “action” focus of Mark into their titles.[2]

All this is true. Mark is more fast-paced than the other three Gospels, and features such as the frequent use of εὐθύς, “immediately,” support this. Yet Jesus’s teaching is an important element to Mark’s portrait of the Messiah. This emphasis can be easily missed because Mark is the one Gospel that does not reproduce multiple large portions of Jesus’s teaching.[3] Thus Theo Heckel observes that Mark 1:22 and Matthew 7:28 both speak of people who were astonished at Jesus’s teaching, yet Matthew 7:28 concludes a body of actual teaching, while Mark 1:22 gives none of the content of the teaching.[4]

A few scholars have drawn attention to the vital role of the didactic in Mark. Robert Meye argued for the significance of Jesus’s teaching in Mark, though he focused on teaching on the way of the cross and the disciples’ response to it.[5] Edwin Broadhead similarly suggested at the conclusion of a study of Jesus’s miracles in Mark, “The central focus of this portrait is the teaching ministry of Jesus.” Yet Broadhead does not pursue this idea.[6] Ulrich Mell explores the significance of Jesus’s “Lehrautorität” and “Lehrgespräch” but restricts his study to Mark 11-12.[7] David Garland gives two pages in his 600-page treatment of Mark’s theology to Jesus’s teaching, and his rather bland conclusion is that, in Mark, Jesus’s words and deeds are both important.[8]

This article details the evidence that Jesus’s teaching and words are of special importance to Mark. It then briefly notes three recurring themes that underscore Mark’s didactic emphasis.

Jesus’s Teaching In Mark

An overview of texts in Mark that highlight the teaching of Jesus brings out the distinctive importance of teaching and the spoken word to Mark’s Gospel. Three comments are in order before proceeding.

First, this article does not intend to sideline Jesus’s healing ministry. The healings and other miracles are clearly integral to Mark’s portrait of Jesus and signify the inaugurated eschaton. Thus many times Mark pairs words and deeds (e.g., 1:39; 3:14-15; 6:12-13, 30). This article simply highlights the teaching aspect of this pairing.

Second, this survey looks at Jesus’s own teaching and also a few texts that speak of the significance of Jesus’s words more generally—how Jesus instructs others to speak, and the speech of other characters. The picture that emerges underscores the significance of the spoken word throughout Mark.

Third, this survey does not distinguish between Jesus’s preaching (κηρύσσω) and his teaching (διδάσκω). Trocmé may be right that teaching is more detailed, more precise, and less public than preaching in Mark.[9] But the two activities overlap to a degree that it would be artificial to treat them distinctly.

Mark 1:14-15

This passage introduces and summarizes Jesus’s public ministry: “Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming [κηρύσσων] the gospel of God” (v. 14). Mark then unpacks the content of Jesus’s proclamation: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (v. 15). A key verb here is κηρύσσω, which recurs six times in Mark 1 (1:4, 7, 14, 38, 39, 45). Jesus’s ministry was one of heralding, preaching, and proclaiming—that is, of speaking. Mark will narrate many healings and miracles, but the introduction to Jesus’s ministry mentions only his speech.

Mark 1:17

Jesus calls Simon and Andrew, promising to make them “fishers [ἁλιεῖς] of men.” This likely draws on Jeremiah 16:16, where God says he is “sending for many fishers [ἁλεεῖς in the Septuagint]” to restore his people in view of the “lies” that Israel’s fathers have inherited (v. 19).[10] Thus to become a “fisher of men” is not in the first instance a summons to evangelistic activity but a referent to the restoration of God’s own people through healthy teaching.

Mark 1:21-22, 27

After calling four of the disciples (1:16-20) Jesus formally begins his ministry, not with a healing or another miracle, but by teaching. “And they went into Capernaum, and immediately [εὐθύς] on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and was teaching [ἐδίδασκεν]” (v. 21). This pericope is often remembered as being about Jesus healing a man with an unclean spirit, and so he does. But the immediate (note εὐθύς) ministry of Jesus is one of synagogue teaching.[11] Thus when Mark later tells us that Jesus entered the synagogue, it is likely that we are to understand him to be teaching there (e.g., 3:1). The significance of this didactic aspect of Jesus’s ministry is underscored by the response to his teaching: “And they were astonished at his teaching [τῇ διδαχῇ], for he taught [διδάσκων] them as one who had authority, and not as the scribes” (v. 22). Although Jesus has just performed a healing miracle, it is not the miracle but his teaching that produces astonishment.[12] That the διδάσκ- root (vv. 21-22) appears three times in two verses makes plain Mark’s emphasis in this pericope.

Jesus’s teaching is of another kind. This is the teaching of the dawning eschaton. It is not simply more insightful, more penetrating; it has unparalleled authority. Verse 27 then adds even more weight to Jesus’s spoken teaching: “And they were all amazed, so that they questioned among themselves, saying, ‘What is this? A new teaching [διδαχὴ καινὴ] with authority!’ ” “New teaching” does not mean “new” generically but categorically and indeed eschatologically. After all, this is the very identification that the demon has just made of Jesus, that he is the one who was to come (v. 24).

Mark 1:34

This text depicts the photo negative of Jesus’s speaking ministry. When Jesus cast out demons, “he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him” (v. 34). As the Gospel unfolds it becomes increasingly clear that Jesus does not allow the demons to speak of him because that is his own distinct role as the bringer of the New Age. He is the explainer, the interpreter (cf. 1:21-28). Again in 3:12 Jesus silences the demons about his identity; it is his to make known.

Mark 1:38

In this pericope, Jesus clearly states his purpose: “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach [κηρύξω] there also, for that is why I came out” (v. 38). In the next verse Mark adds, “And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching [κηρύσσων] in their synagogues and casting out demons” (1:39). Thus while we see ministry of both word and action in verse 39, Jesus in verse 38 draws attention only to his words. The spoken kerygma is the raison d’etre of Jesus’s ministry; it is supplemented by his actions, but most centrally manifested in his preaching.

Mark 1:44

Again, Jesus reserves the teaching role for himself, telling a cleansed leper, “See that you say nothing to anyone” (v. 44). That Mark seems to connect the leper’s commanded silence with Jesus’s non-silence seems evident from the word choice of verse 45: “But he went out [ἐξελθών] and began to talk freely [κηρύσσειν] about it, and to spread the news.” Mark uses the very verb (κηρύσσω) that he has been using to speak of Jesus’s eschatological proclamation. Jesus is the kerux, the herald. Here the healed leper usurps that role. Moreover, Mark tells us that the healed leper “went out” and proclaimed this, using the same verb (ἐξέρχομαι) that has just been used in 1:38 of Jesus’s self-proclaimed ministry: “for that is why I came out [ἐξῆλθον].”

Beyond this Mark adds, seemingly needlessly, “and to spread the news [τόν λόγον].” This is likely Mark’s way of driving home the healed leper’s assumed role of speaking the word that belongs to Jesus alone. Mark does not use what perhaps would have been the more natural Greek word here, ἀκοή (“hearing, report”), even though he has just used in it 1:28 to speak of the report of Jesus that was spreading throughout the region. The word λόγος will come back into play in chapters ahead, especially in the parables of chapter 4.

Mark 2:2

While this is another healing episode, Mark sets up the narrative in terms of teaching. “And many were gathered together, so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was preaching [ἐλάλει] the word [τὸν λόγον] to them” (2:2). The house is packed not because the crowd is marveling at a healing, but because they want to hear Jesus speak. The Greek verb here is λαλέω, not κηρύσσω, yet λαλέω is not insignificant to Mark’s developing narrative. When the scribes are scandalized by Jesus forgiving the paralytic’s sins, they ask, “Why does this man speak [λαλεῖ] like that? He is blaspheming!” (2:7). Moreover, Jesus was speaking the λόγος to the crowd, the same word just used in 1:44 of the leper spreading the λόγος about Jesus.

Jesus then heals the paralytic, and does so with unambiguous emphasis on his own words.

“Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the paralytic—“I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home” (2:9-11).

Jesus heals the paralytic by speaking to him, and he forgives his sins by speaking to him. Jesus often speaks and teaches without healing; he never heals without speaking.

Mark 2:13-14

The narrative transitions from the house to the sea: “and all the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching [ἐδίδασκεν] them” (2:13). Once again nothing is said about his miracles or healings. The focus is on Jesus’s teaching.

Jesus then calls Levi, an episode that Mark appears to deliberately juxtapose with the paralytic a few sentences earlier. For both the paralytic and Levi “rise” when Jesus speaks. Both miracles and non-miraculous summons are executed at Jesus’s word.

Mark 3:23

The scribes accuse Jesus of being in league with Satan, a charge prompted by Jesus’s healings and miracles. Here, then, the focus is on Jesus’s actions, not words. Yet Jesus responds with words, not actions: “And he called them to him and said to them in parables” (v. 23). He uses speaking and teaching, not further miracles, to correct his opponents. And whatever the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is, it is a matter of one’s words (vv. 28-30).

Mark 4:1-2

Now at the Sea of Galilee Jesus is teaching such a packed crowd that he must get into a boat to teach the people on land. As in 1:21-22, three instances of the root διδάσκ- occur in the space of two verses. This presents the parables of chapter 4 as a matter of teaching.

Mark 4:3-20

The first parable recounts the sower who sows seed that lands on different kinds of soil and thus produces varying degrees of fruitfulness. The umbrella theme of the parable is hearing the word, the λόγος. As Jesus explains, “the sower sows the word [λόγος]” (v. 14). The significance of the λόγος is clear from its eight uses in the explanation of this parable (vv. 13-20). What matters is a person’s response to this λόγος.

Particularly striking is verse 13, which introduces Jesus’s explanation of the parable. “And he said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?’ ” Evidently this first parable holds the key that unlocks all the others, if one has ears to hear the λόγος of Jesus (v. 9).

Mark 4:9, 23

Two statements are almost identical: “He who has ears to hear, let him hear” (v. 9); and, “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear” (v. 23). The point once more is to hear (ἀκούω) and comprehend the λόγος of Jesus, to heed his teaching. And as is true of the notion of “hearing” throughout the Old Testament, not least in the Shema (Deut. 6:4) and subsequently in the prophets (e.g., Isa. 42:23; 46:3, 12; 51:1, 7; 52:2; Jer. 6:10; 7:13, 26; 16:12; 44:5; Ezek. 20:8), hearing is not merely a physiological phenomenon but more deeply a moral and spiritual one.

Mark 4:24-25

Before Jesus says, “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you,” he opens with, “Pay attention to what you hear” (v. 24). Hearing and heeding Jesus’s words is what determines the measure one receives.[13]

Mark 4:39

When Jesus calms the storm, he does not raise his hands to the sea or leap into it or walk on it. He uses words: “And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ ” His words are brought to bear not only on humans and demons, but on the natural elements.

Mark 6:1-6

As in 1:21, Jesus enters a synagogue and begins “to teach [διδάσκειν]” there (6:2). Once more the onlookers are “astonished.” While the people marveled at his authority in Mark 1, here they marvel at his wisdom—both reflect his teaching. “Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him?” (6:2). While the people also ask, “How are such mighty works done by his hands?” (6:2), this is secondary to the questions about his teaching. Moreover, while Jesus finds himself unable to do any “mighty work there” (v. 5), his teaching has remained constant.[14] The bridge into the next pericope is apt: “And he went about among the villages teaching [διδάσκων]” (v. 6).

Mark 6:34

This pericope records a mighty deed—the feeding of the 5,000—but it also provides significant evidence of the importance of Jesus’s teaching to Mark’s Gospel. Though Jesus and his disciples drew away by boat to rest, the crowds anticipated where they would land and were waiting for them. Mark recounts, “When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach [διδάσκειν] them many things” (6:34). He taught “many things” (v. 34) until “it grew late” (v. 35); thus some length of time is packed into verse 34, perhaps many hours. Jesus’s first impulse, as compassion for the lost “sheep” floods his heart, is to teach them.[15] Only later does he feed them.

Mark 7:1-13

This key confrontation between Jesus and the Jewish leadership centers on teaching—specifically, Jesus’s teaching correcting the “tradition” (παράδοσις) the religious elite have been teaching. The Pharisees and scribes call this “the tradition of the elders” (v. 5) but Jesus exposes it for what it is: “the tradition of men” (v. 8). The conflict between Jesus and the religious teachers is not like that between Moses and Pharaoh’s court, in which mighty deeds are pitted against each other (Exod. 7:10-11, 22; 8:7). Rather it is a conflict between alternate bodies of teaching.

Jesus’s key denouncement of the Pharisees and scribes in Mark’s Gospel is against not their actions but their teaching. This differs from, say, Matthew, where the Pharisees’ and scribes’ actions receive the central rebuke (Matt. 23:1-36). Indeed, Jesus explicitly tells his hearers in Matthew 23 that they should do what the Pharisees and scribes say, but not what they do (v. 3).

Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:32

At this juncture in Mark Jesus begins to tell his disciples of his impending death and resurrection.[16] Mark casts this, too, as teaching: “And he began to teach [διδάσκειν] them that the Son of Man must suffer many things” (8:31; similarly 9:31; 10:32 uses λέγω rather than διδάσκω). The openness (παρρησία, 8:32) with which Jesus now speaks to his disciples of the dark side of his messianic role complements the first half of Mark. There, as the crowds thronged, as the afflicted were healed, as Jesus’s notoriety spread, he repeatedly enjoined silence on those with whom he interacted. Meanwhile, he himself spoke in parables and general hiddenness. But now he teaches openly, for he must speak of the difficult side of his mission.

Mark 8:38

Jesus teaches his disciples that they must lose their lives for his sake to truly gain them, or else seek to gain their lives and thus lose them. The one who is on the wrong side of this equation, Jesus says, is one who “is ashamed of me and of my words [τοὺς ἐμοὺς λόγους] in this adulterous and sinful generation” (v. 38). Jesus does not speak of those who are “ashamed of me and of my deeds.” Rather, we are confronted once more with the significance of the λόγος of Jesus. It is our association with his words and teaching that reflects our allegiance to him.[17]

Mark 9:7

At Jesus’s transfiguration the voice from heaven affirms Jesus as God’s own royal Son and adds an injunction that his teaching be heeded: “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”[18] The disciples are clearly meant to hear, since the voice does not speak in the second person as in 1:11 (“You are my beloved Son”) but in the third person.[19] More to the point, the Father could have said, “This is my beloved Son; watch him.” This would fit naturally in John, where there is such an emphasis on the witness of Jesus’s works (e.g., John 5:36; 7:3; 8:39; 10:25, 37-38; 14:10-11; 15:24). But in Mark the emphasis is on listening to his words.

Mark 10:1

This verse does not simply speak of Jesus’s teaching but places his teaching in a certain priority. Mark writes that as Jesus crossed into Judea, “Again, as was his custom, he taught [ἐδίδασκεν] them” (10:1).[20] Nowhere in Mark do we read anything to the effect of “As was his custom, he healed them.” Jesus’s teaching appears to be the most basic mark of his public ministry. We are reminded of 1:38: “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.”

Mark 11:17-18

As soon as Jesus and his disciples arrived in Jerusalem,

he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And he was teaching them and saying . . . (11:15-17, italics added).

In this episode Jesus’s actions precede his teaching. But the focus on his teaching remains central not only because these events take place in the temple, the central place of Jewish teaching and worship (note Mark 11:18; 12:35; 14:49; cf. Luke 19:47),[21] but also for two other reasons.

First, all three Synoptics recount this episode, but only Mark casts Jesus’s use of Isaiah 56:7 (“my house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations”) as a matter of Jesus teaching (cf. Matt. 21:13; Luke 19:46).[22] Second, the passage concludes, “And the chief priests and the scribes heard [his teaching] and were seeking a way to destroy him, for they feared him, because all the crowd was astonished at his teaching” (Mark 11:18). The religious leaders were not after Jesus because he had been flipping over tables and wreaking havoc in the temple, upsetting business. No, they wanted to destroy him because they heard his teaching and because of the crowd’s astonished reaction to it.

Mark 12:13-40

Mark has strung together a series of questions posed to Jesus—a political question (about paying taxes to Caesar, 12:13-17), a theological question (about the resurrection, 12:18-27), and a moral question (about the greatest commandment, 12:28-34). In each case Jesus is put in the place of teacher, even if one of the questions is meant only to trap him (12:13). One verse particularly worth noting is 12:14, where emissaries from the Pharisees and Herodians, after addressing Jesus as διδάσκαλος, say to him, “You are not swayed by appearances, but truly teach [διδάσκεις] the way of God.” Even his enemies acknowledge his superlative teaching authority and wisdom.[23]

At the end of this interrogation, “no one dared to ask him any more questions” (12:34); Jesus’s teaching authority has been established. Jesus turns the tables on his questioners, asking a question that gets at his own identity (12:35-37). This series of four questions, three to Jesus and one from him, reinforces his role as teacher and concludes, “The great throng heard him gladly” (12:37).

Mark 13:31

Toward the end of this discourse on Jerusalem’s impending destruction, Jesus underscores the certainty of his teaching: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” (13:31). As in 8:38 (“whoever is ashamed of me and of my words”), Jesus drives home the importance of his words. “My words” here likely refers to the whole of his teaching.[24] The very cosmos may come undone, but Jesus’s teaching will abide.[25]

Mark 14:49

Asking his captors why they have come against him with such force, Jesus tells them, “Day after day I was with you in the temple teaching [διδάσκων], and you did not seize me” (14:49). Though the purpose of the comment is to remind his accusers that they have had every opportunity to arrest him, it also reinforces the central significance of teaching to Mark: not occasionally, but daily, Jesus was teaching.[26]

Mark 15:3-5

Finally, at the pinnacle of the Gospel, standing on trial, Jesus does not speak. Before his accusers he is, to Pilate’s astonishment, silent. His time of earthly teaching, of driving home the importance of his words, is over. Previously in Mark’s Gospel Jesus has been speaking and telling others—demons who know his identity, persons he has healed—to be silent. Now the roles are reversed.

This is the culmination of what Jesus has been preparing his disciples for since the middle of chapter 8. He cannot defend himself because he has come to serve rather than to be served, setting himself to die as a ransom for many (10:45). The exchange of the innocent for the guilty is underscored in the very next pericope, where Barabbas is freed and Jesus is not (15:6-15).

Mark 15:39

The centurion acknowledges—with his words—that Jesus is the Son of God. In an ironic twist the Roman Gentile shows that he is not ashamed of Jesus or of his words (cf. 8:38). Markan scholarship also notes widely that the centurion’s confession is the latter of two bookends, the former of which is Mark’s opening ascription, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (1:1). Here at the Gospel’s end it is the ultimate outsider who affirms this identity.[27] Indeed, this is the only confession of Jesus as God’s Son on the lips of a human in Mark’s Gospel. Now that Jesus has been silent before Pilate, Pilate’s own officer confesses what Jesus had previously commanded to be kept silent.[28]

Mark 16:8

The final words spoken in the Gospel[29] are those of the man in white, who tells the women at the tomb that the disciples will see Jesus in Galilee “just as he told you.” With that, the women leave the tomb afraid and tell no one (v. 8). Thus the Gospel ends with an (ignored) affirmation that Jesus’s spoken word is reliable.

Three Whole-Gospel Didactic Themes

Three observations remain. These do not rest on individual texts but are themes that resound throughout Mark’s Gospel and underscore the centrality of the didactic element in Mark. These are the deafness motif, the repeated ascription of Jesus as “Teacher,” and the formula Ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν.

1. Deafness And The Words Of Jesus

Jesus’s healing ministry points to his teaching ministry, but it is harder to say that his teaching ministry points to his healing ministry. As Meye puts it, “Even the deeds of Jesus were recounted by Mark from the point of view of their parabolic function.”[30] The healing of deafness is a test case for this. Mark is the only Gospel with more than one healing of a deaf person (7:31-37; 9:14-29); Matthew and Luke have one each, John has none. Given Mark’s emphasis on listening to the words of Jesus, having one’s ears unstopped brings a new ability to hear Jesus’s teaching. (Blindness is often paired with deafness in Mark, and may be roughly synonymous.)

This emphasis comes through especially in Mark 7, where the crowd reacts to Jesus’s teaching: “And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak’ ” (7:37). This alludes to the restoration described by Isaiah: “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy” (Isa. 35:5-6).[31] There is likely broader Isaianic significance to this passage and others in Mark. In Isaiah 29, speaking of the judgment on Jerusalem, God speaks (as Mark does in Mark 7:37) of his people being “astonished” and yet at the same time “blind” (Isa. 29:9). The text then criticizes, “All this has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed” (Isa. 29:11); the people of Israel cannot read it. Then follows the text Jesus uses to denounce the scribes and Pharisees for what they teach (Isa. 29:13 in Mark 7:6-7). A few verses later we read of Israel’s restoration: “In that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see” (Isa. 29:18). The anticipated unstopping of ears in Isaiah occurs specifically so that the people can understand the book that they previously could not read due to their hardness of heart and false teachers. Deafness is connected with teaching in Isaiah, and Mark appears to draw on this connection.[32]

Mark 8 makes clear that healed hearing in Mark signifies something deeper than physical healing. Here the disciples mistake Jesus’s teaching on the leaven of the Pharisees and Herod to be a reference to literal bread. Jesus responds, “Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?” (8:17-18). This recalls Mark 4:11-12, where Jesus quotes Isaiah 6:9-11 to explain that he speaks in parables so that those “outside . . . may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand.”[33] In Mark 4 and 8, being unresponsive to Jesus is cast in terms of deafness and blindness. The miracles of healing deafness and blindness make the same point in reverse: now one can hear Jesus’s words. Thus Watts reads Mark as presenting Jesus (against an Isaianic backdrop) as the “servant-deliverer-teacher” who guides God’s people along the right way with opened ears and opened eyes.[34] Thus even miracles such as healing the deaf point toward and reinforce the centrality of Jesus’s words.

2. Jesus Called “Teacher”

Twelve times in Mark’s Gospel Jesus is referred to as “Teacher” (ten times with the vocative διδάσκαλε [4:38; 9:17, 38; 10:17, 20, 35; 12:14, 19, 32; 13:1] and twice in the third person but with the same ascriptive force [5:35; 14:14]). In addition, four times Jesus is referred to as “rabbi” (ῥαββί or ῥαββουνί, 9:5; 10:51; 11:21; 14:45). The Greek term is a transliteration of the Hebrew for “my lord” or “my teacher” and denotes in particular an exemplary teacher of the Jewish law.[35] Thus sixteen times Jesus is referred to as either “Teacher” or “Rabbi,” compared with fourteen total uses of both ascriptions in Matthew and seventeen in Luke. Proportionately, Mark refers to Jesus as Teacher/Rabbi more than any other Gospel. Jesus is also referred to as “Christ,” “Son of God,” and “Son of Man” in Mark, but none of these is used as frequently as “Teacher”/“Rabbi.”

3. The Formula ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν

Jesus opens his teaching twelve times with ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, “Truly, I say to you” (3:28; 8:12; 9:1, 41; 10:15, 29; 11:23; 12:43; 13:30; 14:9, 18, 25; 14:30).[36] These are clustered mainly in the second half of Mark’s Gospel, which may underscore Jesus’s need to convince his disciples that the messiahship will take the shape of suffering, rejection, and death. Jesus never precedes a miracle with the words Ἀμὴν ποιέω ὑμῖν (“Truly, I do to/for you”) or Ἀμὴν ποιέω ἔμπροσθεν ὑμῶν (“Truly, I do before you”). His chosen formula highlights his words and teaching.[37]

Conclusion And Application

Mark’s unique emphasis on Jesus’s teaching and words is easily missed, since Mark does not reproduce the actual words to nearly the same extent as Matthew, Luke, and John. To focus on the didactic is not to displace the most crucial feature of the Gospels, Jesus’s death and resurrection. At the same time, a fear of reducing Jesus merely to an ethical teacher should not blind us to the distinctive emphasis on his teaching in Mark. Indeed, much of his teaching concerned his coming death and resurrection, and so his teaching work and his atoning work should not be set at odds. Jesus’s earthly ministry was primarily a ministry of teaching.

Mark’s emphasis on Jesus’s teaching prompts us to revere and listen to the Lord Jesus as the supreme and authoritative voice in our lives. Talking to wise fellow Christians, reading sound books, and hearing from pastors and counselors are all vital means of grace. But the central voice in our ears is to be the Lord Jesus himself—anticipated in the Old Testament, given to us in the Gospels, and whose teaching has been preserved in the apostolic witness of the rest of the New Testament. “Listen to him” (Mark 9:7).

Notes

1. James R. Edwards, The Gospel according to Mark, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 13. See similar comments by Robert H. Gundry, A Survey of the New Testament, 4th ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003), 126; Adam Winn, The Purpose of Mark’s Gospel: An Early Christian Response to Roman Imperial Propaganda, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/245 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 123; Leland Ryken, Literary Introductions to the Books of the Bible (Wheaton: Crossway, 2015), 370.
2. E.g., John Paul Heil, The Gospel of Mark as a Model for Action: A Reader-Response Commentary (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2001); Don Belles, Mark the Educator: The Layman’s Guide to the Gospel of Action (Mustang, OK: Tate, 2008).
3. See Ralph Martin, Mark: Evangelist and Theologian (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1973), 112-13. The only two extended portions of teaching in Mark are in chapters 4 and 13.
4. Theo K. Heckel, Vom Evangelium des Markus zum viergestaltigen Evangelium, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 120 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999), 72-73.
5. Robert P. Meye, “Messianic Secret and Messianic Didache in Mark’s Gospel,” in Oikonomia: Heilsgeschichte als Thema der Theologie: Oscar Cullmann zum 65. Geburtstag gewidmet, ed. F. Christ (Hamburg-Bergstedt: Reich, 1967), 57-68; Meye, Jesus and the Twelve: Discipleship and Revelation in Mark’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1968).
6. Edwin K. Broadhead, Teaching with Authority: Miracles and Christology in the Gospel of Mark, Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement 74 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992), 209.
7. Ulrich Mell, Die “anderen” Winzer: Eine exegetische Studie zur Vollmacht Jesu Christi nach Markus 11, 27-12, 34, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 77 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1994).
8. David E. Garland, A Theology of Mark’s Gospel: Good News about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, Biblical Theology of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015), 258-60.
9. Étienne Trocmé, L’évangile selon Saint Marc, Commentaire du Nouveau Testament 2 (Geneva: Labor et Fides, 2000), 50.
10. Joachim Gnilka, Das Evangelium nach Markus (Mk 1-8, 26), Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament 2/1, 5th ed. (Zürich: Benziger, 1998), 73-74; Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016), 24-25.
11. Timothy Dwyer, The Motif of Wonder in the Gospel of Mark, Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement 128 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996), 98 (though Dwyer takes vv. 21-22 and 27 as redactional comments).
12. Dwyer, Motif of Wonder, 95.
13. Hays comments on Mark 4:24-25, “For Mark everything depends on listening carefully to the word of the kingdom proclaimed by Jesus” (Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 39).
14. Later Jesus refuses to do any “signs” for the Pharisees, despite continuing to teach (8:11-13).
15. C. E. B. Cranfield, The Gospel according to Saint Mark: An Introduction and Commentary (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963), 217; M. Eugene Boring, Mark: A Commentary, New Testament Library (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006), 183.
16. See especially the illuminating discussion of Peter G. Bolt, The Cross from a Distance: Atonement in Mark’s Gospel, New Studies in Biblical Theology 18 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2004), 48-84.
17. This point is brought out effectively by Légasse, who also notes that the parallel between “of me and my words” in v. 38 and “for my sake and the gospel’s” in v. 35 equates Jesus’s “word” and the “gospel” (Simon Légasse, L’évangile de Marc, Lectio Divina 5 [Paris: Cerf, 1997], 515-16); cf. Jens Schröter, Erinnerung an Jesu Worte: Studien zur Rezeption der Logienüberlieferung in Markus, Q und Thomas, Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament 76 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1997), 390.
18. Luke, too, has “listen to him” (Luke 9:35), while Matthew does not (Matt. 3:17). John does not include an account of the voice from heaven.
19. Légasse, L’évangile de Marc, 531.
20. The crowds listen to him here, though Jesus focuses increasingly on the disciples in this second half of the Gospel; see Joachim Gnilka, Das Evangelium nach Markus (Mk 8, 27-16, 20), Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament 2/2, 5th ed. (Zürich: Benziger, 1999), 71.
21. Timothy C. Gray, The Temple in the Gospel of Mark: A Study in its Narrative Role, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/242 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 90.
22. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 95.
23. Noted by Mell (Die “anderen” Winzer, 195), though attributed to post-Markan redaction.
24. Cranfield, Saint Mark, 410; Robert H. Stein, Jesus, the Temple, and the Coming Son of Man: A Commentary on Mark 13 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2014), 126-27. Cf. Matt. 28:20.
25. Légasse, L’évangile de Marc, 823.
26. Schenk believes Mark deliberately ties 14:49 back to 12:35 (Wolfgang Schenk, Der Passionsbericht nach Markus: Untersuchungen zur Überlieferungsgeschichte der Passionstraditionen [Berlin: Mohn, 1974], 213-14).
27. Kelly R. Iverson, Gentiles in the Gospel of Mark: “Even the Dogs under the Table Eat the Children’s Crumbs,” Library of New Testament Studies 339 (London: T. & T. Clark, 2007), 153-59, esp. 154.
28. See Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008), 261-62.
29. I take 16:8 to be the original ending of Mark, a conclusion supported by both the internal and external evidence, and well summarized in a number of commentaries, such as William L. Lane, The Gospel according to Mark, New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974), 601-6; Edwards, Gospel according to Mark, 497-504 (who thinks the original Markan ending has been lost); Garland, Theology of Mark’s Gospel, 535-59.
30. Meye, Jesus and the Twelve, 214.
31. See Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 32-33.
32. Trocmé, L’évangile selon Saint Marc, 210-11. As early as the third century, deafness in Mark 7 was understood as reflecting obtuseness to teaching, as seen in the interpretation of Mark 7:37 by Lactantius (Thomas C. Oden and Christopher A. Hall, eds., Mark, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2014], 104).
33. See Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 36-40.
34. Watts, Isaiah’s New Exodus in Mark, 247-57.
35. Walter Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed., ed. William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich, and Frederick W. Danker (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 902.
36. In 14:30 Jesus speaks to Peter alone and thus uses the singular (ἀμὴν λέγω σοι).
37. Légasse, L’évangile de Marc, 245. On the Old Testament background of this formula, see the overview in Cranfield, Saint Mark, 139-40.