(j) Doubtful cases. — We must finally consider some passages in which it is doubtful whether we must attribute to Mk. priority or posteriority. In !Mk 6^ Ave find oi'x ovros ianv 6 t{ktwv ; where Mt IS''^ has 6 Tov TeKTovos vios and Lk 4'-- I'ios 'lioar)<p. Here the correction might be on the part of theFirst and Third Evangelists, who disliked the name ' the carpenter' being given to Jesus, and the fact that they use different phrases points to the probability that they are not here borrowing from their common source or sources ; while the correction might be on the part of Mark, who thought that the jihrase 'son of Joseph' might be misunderstood by his readers, inasmuch as they had not the birth- narrative before them to explain it. Origen asserts tiiat 'in none of the Gospels current in the Churches is Jesus Himself ever described as being "the carpenter'" (adv. Cels. vi. 36), and perhaps this reading was not in his copy of Mark — a few authorities now extant have a difierent phrase (but see Westcott-Hort, Notes on Select Headings, p. 24). If the correction is on tlie part of the Second Gospel, it is probable that our Markan reading is the work of an editor later than Mt. Lk. (but see § vii. below).— In 14*"- *«• "- the cock is said to crow twice, according to the usually re- ceived readings ; in Mt. Lk. Jn. only one cock- crowing is recorded. Some MSS omit Sis in Mk 14^', many (i<Bc syr sin etc.) omit Kai d\€KTwp i<pibvr)C€v in 14*^, some omit e/c Sevrepov in 14"-, others omit bis in 14'-. If a second cock-crowing was in the Petrine tradition, it is difficult to understand whj- the other Evangelists should have so completely omitted all trace of it ; but it is equally difficult to understand why, if it belongs to the original Mk., and if that Gospel was later than Mt. and Lk., the Second E\arigelist should have introduced it ; or again why, if it is an editorial addition to ^Ik., the editor .should have introduced it. Perhaps Dr. Salmon's solution is the right one {Textual Criticism, ch. v.) — that originally Mk. had only one cock-crowing, that of 14"- {i.e. not in tlie same place as in Mt. and Lk.): that the omission of NB, etc., in 14'^ is right ; and that some early scribe having by error put in these words, without intending to introduce two cock-crowings, other scribes added dis and e^ SeiTepov in the other places to produce consistency. On the other hand, it must be remembered that the omissions in some MSS of ^Ik. are easily explicable on the supposition that a harmonizing scribe, not finding two cock-crowings in the other Gospels, omitted these words in Mk. ; if this be so, the enigma is inexplicable. — In Mk 14** the words xeipoTToiriTov, dxeLpoiroitfTov may be a comment of the Evangelist's, the simpler words of Mt 26"^ being what the false witnesses really said (Lk. has no parallel). If so, the Markan form would probably be later than the Mattluean (see Schmiedel in
128 MARK, GOSPEL ACCORDING TO
MARK, GOSPEL ACCORDING TO
Encyc. Bihl. ii. 1851). But the introduction of comments such as these, however much in the style of Mt., is not in that of Mk. , and tliere is no reason Avhy Jesus should not actually have used the words, and, if so, wliy the false witnesses should not have quoted them ; their false testimony lay in giving a wrong sense to our Lord's words, rather than in quoting Him wrongly.
A case of possible correction of Mk. may be briefly noticed here, though it does not concern Mt. or Luke. In \S^^ we read that the Crucitixion took i)lace at the third hour ; Jn 19''* says that the trial was hardly over by the sixth hour (ibpa ijv ws eKTT]), and this looks like a correction of Mk. as to time. But probably this is no correction, whether we take Westcott's solution that John's ' sixth hour' is our 6 a.m., or that of Ramsay (Expositor, 4th ser. vii. 216, 5th ser. iii. 457) and others that the word ' hour ' is used in a loose and ill-defined way, or the more probable and ancient view (Euseb. ad Marin. ) that there is an error of the digamma, F (=6) for r (=3) or vice versa, in the text of the Gospels. If so, our copies of Jn. are probably wrong, since Mk. has three separate notes of time which hang all together, 151-25.33 ^ggg Wright, Synopsis', in loc, and Neio Test. Prob. p. 147).
(k) Conclusion from the evidence. — The detailed comparison of Mk. with Mt. and Lk. leads us to the conclusion that either Mk. as we have it now, or at least a Gospel which diflers from our Mk. in unessential particulars only, lay before the First and Third Evangelists when they wrote. If the doubtful cases mentioned above, and the instances given below in § vii., be held to argue the priority of Mt. or Lk. over Mk., that would apply only to editorial additions, and the main conclusion would not be att'ected. Some of the deductions made above may be questioned, yet the cumulative force of the whole is very great. And a careful study of them will at once dissipate the idea that Mark is an abbreviator of Matthew, and will lead us to the conclusion that here we come much closer to the bed-rock of the Gospel story than in either Mt. or Luke. This is the great value of Mk., and it has been left for modern scholars to discover it.