Nathan Eubank, «Dying with Power. Mark 15,39 from Ancient to Modern Interpretation», Vol. 95 (2014) 247-268
This article examines the reception-history of Mark 15,39 to shed new light on this pivotal and disputed verse. Mark's earliest known readers emended the text to clarify the centurion's feelings about Jesus and to explain how the centurion came to faith. Copyists inserted references to Jesus' final yell around the same time that patristic commentators were claiming that this yell was a miracle that proved Jesus' divinity, an interpretation which was enshrined in the Byzantine text and the Vulgate. The article concludes that a 'sarcastic' reading is a more adequate description of 15,39 as found in B, NA28 etc.
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DYING WITH POWER 257
bis zum allerletzten Augenblick der Handelnde ist, daß er mithin
vom Tod nicht überwältigt wird, sondern sein Leben freiwillig in
den Tod dahingibt” 27. It was this display of power that led the cen-
turion to understand that Jesus was God’s son: “Denn aus der Par-
allelität der Worte avfei.j fwnh.n mega,lhn evxe,pneusen V. 37 und
ou[twj evxe,pneusen V. 39 ist zu folgern, daß der römische Centurio
in dem Gekreuzigten gerade deshalb den ‘Gottessohn’ erkennt, weil
er ihn unmittelbar zuvor so ― nämlich mit einem ‘lauten Schrei’
― sterben sah” 28. Kammler is surely correct to suppose that the
parallelism between v. 37 and v. 39 is relevant for understanding
what provoked the centurion’s remark, but it is less clear that the
Markan Jesus’ dying breath manifested his equanimity and power.
As Adela Collins recently put it, Mark describes Jesus’ death as
“anguished, human, and realistic” 29. It is interesting to note that,
unlike most pre-modern commentators, Kammler, Gundry and others
who defend this reading are not interpreting a text which ex-
plicitly mentions the cry as that which most impressed the centu-
rion. In other words, pre-modern readers argued that the centurion
was impressed with the cry in part because their text actually said,
“When the centurion who was standing with him saw that he ex-
pired while crying out, he said … ”. Modern readers have no such
justification.
On the whole, modern attempts to make sense of Mark 15,39
are among the most fanciful in history. Frederick W. Danker, for
example, argues that it is the sight of a demon leaving Jesus’ body
that compels his confession: “Mark’s literary technique therefore
clearly indicates that he does not mean to imply that the centurion
was aware of the rending of the veil. The soldier’s pronouncement
is not based on that sign, but on the cry. The expulsion of the
demon is what the centurion ‘observed’ (ivdw,n)” 30. Danker is not
27
C. KAMMLER “Das Verständnis der Passion Jesu im Markusevan-
gelium”, ZThK 103 (2006) 461-491, 485.
28
Ibid., 486.
29
A. COLLINS “Mark’s Interpretation of the Death of Jesus”, JBL 128
(2009) 545-554, here 553-554.
30
F. DANKER, “The Demonic Secret in Mark: A Reexamination of the Cry
of Dereliction”, ZNW 61 (1970) 48-69, here 69. K. Stock (“Das Bekenntnis
des Centurio. Mk 15,39 im Rahmen des Markusevangeliums”, ZKT 100
[1978] 289-301) suggests that Jesus’ cry recalls divine cries in the OT (e.g., Amos
1,2) and that this is what led the centurion to his confession.