Re: Metzger on Mk 16:8 (non-list)

From: Edward Hobbs (EHOBBS@WELLESLEY.EDU)
Date: Wed Dec 11 1996 - 11:19:19 EST


>I wasn't really quite sure, however, what he was
>driving at in that note on 16:8--I did catch that he thought there was an
>additional page, but I thought he was basing that primarily upon a page
>missing from the codex he was talking about; I guess I just have missed the
>discussion of GAR; I have just now looked again at the note in the second
>edition of the _Textual Commenary_ and I have found the discussion of the
>extra page, but I don't see anything about the GAR.

Dear Carl,
                My discussion of Metzger's views was based on his own book,
which I cited (I have all three editions, but he really didn't seem to
learn anything more between 1964 and 1992. In the _Textual Commentary_, he
couldn't state his own opinions altogether; he was bound to represent the
views of the Committee, and all he needed to argue was that the best texts
we have end at 16:8. But in _The Text of the New Testament_, he gives his
own view, that 16:8 is not the intentional ending of Mark. Either the last
page was lost, or else Mark died before finishing (and his stupid literary
executor thought it was finished, and published the "torso," as Metzger
likes to call it!).

>At any rate, it gave me an opportunity to say something about the authority
>of major scholars that needs to be said every now and then: pay attention
>to the evidence and let it convince you, not the stature of the one arguing
>what the evidence means. Speaking of which, did you see that message from
>Zeus that I forwarded over to B-Greek from Classics yesterday morning? My
>comments aboutZeus, Apollo, and Dionysus might well have offended some
>people, but I really thought the significance of the piece was the warning
>against that silly signature, "unscholarly but opinionated."

I enjoyed that post, and agree with you thoroughly. I suppose the only
difference for me is that if Bruce Metzger posts something on this List
about almost anything, I'll probably read it, but if Tim Dickens posts one
on anything, I won't. But Dickens just MIGHT say something worth thinking
about, and Bruce just might say something eminently silly.

>It is good to hear from you, even if off-list, more so, in fact, than
>on-list, because we're free from inhibitions. Any lengthy absence of you
>from the list is deeply disturbing. Dare I say, without fear of
>misinterpretation: FOBOUMAI GAR.

Carl, I'll take that in the Markan sense! (He uses FOBEOMAI to indicate
the response to mysterious revelation, to the presence of God which isn't
understood. It is a signal from Mark--just as the word GAR is, which
regularly means "STOP! I just wrote something important! Notice the odd
detail!" (This from an article by CHBird some decades ago, "Some GAR-
clauses in Mark's Gospel," I believe it is called.)

I had no idea you sensed divine revelation in my posts, but I'll keep it in
mind. After all, if you get messages from Zeus, you must be in SOME
communication with another realm.

St. Edward the Professor



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