serve very well In the absence of other indications in this Gospel that Jesus was viewed as a superhuman being. In the presence of such indications, however, — especially so clear an instance as is afforded by the saying of Jesus in 13^- — and in the presence of other sug- gestions of the identification of Jesus with the Jehovah of the Old Testament, — such as is afforded by His adop- tion of the title of ' Bridegroom,' — the natural im- plication of joining this prediction to its fellow in which we hear of the " messenger " coming " before the face" of Jesus ("thy") and "preparing His way" ("thy"), must be permitted to determine the ques- tion in favor of the application of the term ' Lord ' to Jesus Himself. And in that case it is the person of Jesus which is identified with Jehovah.
It cannot be doubted, therefore, that Mark sees in
Jesus a supernatural person, — not merely a person
endowed with supernatural powers, but
„ , , a person m His own personality supe- Method . ^ , 1 , r V
nor to angels and therefore standing
outside the category of creatures. He does not, how- ever, dwell upon this. It emerges in his narrative, al- most, we may say, by accident. This is in accordance with the character of his undertaking, which is illus- trated by many kindred phenomena. His is not the Gospel of reflection: it is the Gospel of action. This evangelist is not accustomed to stop to muse upon the events he records or to develop all their significance. He does not attempt to give even a full record of the teaching of Jesus. He has set himself to exhibit " the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ"; and he exhibits this " beginning " in a vivid picture of the wonderful career of the divine Messiah, preserving
Mark's Conception of Our Lord 51
only casually certain of our Lord's sayings as sub- stantial elements in his presentation of His career and only incidentally suggesting what our Lord was in de- scribing what He did. His concern is to portray fully the supernatural life which Jesus lived, at the begin- ning of the Gospel, as the fountain from which has flowed the great movement in which he was himself an actor. In doing this his method is of a piece throughout. He does not record for us, for example, the great saying in which Jesus declares: "All au- thority has been given unto me in heaven and in earth " (Mt 28^*^). He simply exhibits the exercise of this authority by Jesus In detail ( i--^^ 2i«'28 f'' 4^ 5*2, etc.) ; leaving it to the reader to infer the gift. Similarly he does not stop In his rapidly moving narrative to say, " Lo, here Is a supernatural person " : much less does he pause to develop that conception Into its Implica- tions. He does not even charge himself to cite from Jesus' lips His own claims to divine origin and His own conception of His unique relations with the Father. What he gives us on these themes Is Incidental to the narrative and falls out in it almost by accident.
What he gives us Is ample, nevertheless, to make It clear that Mark was not ignorant of these things. How can It be said that Mark knows g,.^'^ ^ nothing of the preexistence of Christ when he records Jesus' constant appli- cation to Himself of the title ' Son of Man ' ? How can it be said that he knows nothing of the supernat- ural birth of Jesus when he records Jesus' assertion of a superangellc nature for Himself? How should one above angels enter into the sphere of human life ex- cept by a supernatural birth? Unless we consider it
52 The Designations of Our Lord
more credible that Mark claimed for Him an even more supernatural descent as an adult from heaven? Mark, in a word, leaves the exposition of these things to others. It is Matthew and Luke who complete the story by the record of the supernatural birth. It is John who develops all the implications of Jesus' pre- existence. But all that these bring to expression In their fuller accounts is implied in Mark's narrative, in which he Incidentally tells us of the dignity of that person's nature whose wonderful career he has under- taken to describe. And there is no reason why we should suppose him ignorant of the implications of his own facts, especially when his purpose In writing did not call for the explication of these implications. In a word, it seems clear enough that there lies behind the narrative of Mark not an undeveloped christology, but only an unexpressed one. To give expression to his christology did not lie within the limits of the task he had undertaken.''^