The First Biography of Jesus: Genre and Meaning in Mark's Gospel

by Helen K. Bond

Overview

What difference does it make to identify Mark's gospel as an ancient biography?

Reading the gospels as ancient biographies makes a profound difference to the way that we interpret them. Biography immortalizes the memory of the subject, creating a literary monument to the person’s life and teaching. Yet it is also a bid to legitimize a specific view of that figure and to position an author and his audience as appropriate “gatekeepers” of that memory. Biography was well suited to the articulation of shared values and commitments, the formation of group identity, and the binding together of a past story, present concerns, and future hopes. 

Helen Bond argues that Mark’s author used the genre of biography to extend the gospel from an earlier narrow focus on the death and resurrection of Jesus so that it included the way of life of its founding figure. Situating Jesus at the heart of a biography was a bold step in outlining a radical form of Christian discipleship patterned on the life – and death – of Jesus.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802884473
Publisher:	Eerdmans, William B. Publishing Company
Publication date:	07/25/2024
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Helen K. Bond is professor of Christian origins and head of the School of Divinity at the University of Edinburgh. She is the author of Pontius Pilate in History and Interpretation, Caiaphas: High Priest and Friend of Rome?, The Historical Jesus: A Guide for the Perplexed, and Jesus: A Very Brief History. She has also acted as historical consultant and contributor for a number of TV programs.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Introduction

The Present Volume
Time, Place and Author
Overview

Chapter 1 - Mark as a bios

From the Ancients to Votaw
The Eclipse of Biography
A Jewish Background?
The Return of Graeco-Roman Biography
The Last 25 Years

Chapter 2 - Ancient bioi

The Emergence of Biography
Biography and Morality
Character
Depictions of Death
Biographical Fact and Fiction
The Preserve of the Elite?
Sub-Groups and Sub-Types?

Chapter 3 - Mark the Biographer

Profile of a Biographer
Mark’s Christian Readers
Mark’s Structure
Pre-Markan Tradition
Authorial Voice

Chapter 4 - A Life of Jesus

Mark’s Opening Section (1:1-15)
Temptation and Resolve
Jesus in Galilee (1:16-8:21)
Miracles
Conflict
Identity
Teaching on Discipleship (8:22-10:52)
Jerusalem (11:1-13:44)
Imitation of Jesus
Jesus’ Appearance

Chapter 5 - Other Characters

Peripheral Characters
Markan Intercalations – a form of synkrisis?
“King Herod”
The High Priest/Pilate
The Twelve
“Minor Characters”

Chapter 6 - The Death of Jesus

A Slave’s Death
Setting up an Ending
Significance
Imitation
King of the Jews
Events Around Jesus’ Death
The Disappearance of the Body

Conclusion
Final Reflections

Automimesis

Editorial Reviews

This is a beautifully crafted study that soundly explores the Gospel of Mark and probes its meanings, written by one of the world’s most eminent scholars in the field. In taking its genre seriously, Bond demonstrates that the Gospel’s curious characteristics fall into place. Mark is an innovative work, recrafting the Jesus tradition into a form that would serve as a model for discipleship. With this insight in place, Bond takes the reader through the world of ancient ‘lives’ to this one, allowing us to see the Gospel with fresh eyes, to admire both its literary craft and its message.”
— Joan Taylor
King’s College London

“Despite the now widely held view that Mark’s Gospel is an ancient biography, few Markan scholars have explored the narrative-critical implications of this genre. In this groundbreaking work full of fresh insights, Helen Bond skillfully redresses that deficiency and shows how reading Mark’s Gospel as ancient biography can fruitfully inform how we understand its message.”
— Craig S. Keener
Asbury Theological Seminary, author of Christobiography

“With characteristic insight and clarity, Helen Bond places Mark's Gospel in the company of other ancient lives of philosophers. The result is a fascinating reading of Mark's Gospel as a bios that both reflects and subverts the literary conventions of that genre, all in light of its intent focus on its protagonist, Jesus of Nazareth. Bond's considerable achievement is to hold in tension both the narrative world of the Gospel and the social and historical circumstances of its first-century readers, demonstrating not simply how to read Mark as a bios, but what difference it made, and makes.”
— Chris Keith
St Mary's University, Twickenham

“In her well written study Helen Bond makes a strong case for reading Mark’s Gospel as an ancient biography. Her careful analysis of ancient bioi shows why the genre of the gospels matters. Moreover, Mark’s Gospel is approached from a literary as well as a historical perspective to demonstrate that the work was written by a creative and learned author who provides a vivid portrait of Jesus. This study opens up a fresh reading of Mark which overcomes less-helpful alternatives of previous scholarship.”
— Jens Schröter
Humboldt University Berlin

From the Publisher