iprocal agreement
The Gospel According to Mark provides a persuasive testimony of the life, works, and atoning sacrifice of Jesus of Nazareth. It can be distinguished from the other two "Synoptic" Gospels in both form and content, as well as its intended audience and use at the time it was originally composed and circulated among the synagogues and churches of the eastern Mediterranean world in the latter half of the first century of the Common Era (C.E.). However, in the intervening 1900 years which precede this study, the (occasionally faulty) wisdom of mankind has chosen to interject itself into the context and history of the original words, the subtle nuances of the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek languages from which the Gospel takes its shape, and perhaps even into the will and wisdom of God, as theologians, philosophers, historians, church "fathers," scholars, and still others submit the text to debate, argument, hypothesis/theory, illumination, and pontification as they conjecture about the authorship, date, sources, and intentions of the Gospel According to Mark.
In so doing, have most of these men and women "of God" (for the overwhelming most part) not, in some sense, actually hypothecated some or all of the mystical essence of the Gospel--indeed, of religion itself--in exchange for what they perceive, and would have us accept as "gospel," to be the true meaning of the text and/or the author's (or authors') purpose (theological, historical, or otherwise). Far too many writers of antiquity, modernity, or the times in between ignore (or, possibly, are ignorant of) the mystical roots of Judaism--and, hence, Christianity--a fair amount of which was likely to have been lost as the Mediterranean Jewish world came increasingly under the influence of Hellenism. So thoroughly Hellenized was the "world" in Jesus' time (and to this day) that modern scholars doubt the possibility that any of the Gospel records might have originall...