"How reliable is the Story of the Nag Hammadi Discovery?" New article in JSNT

I have an article in the latest Journal for the Study of the New Testament:

How Reliable is the Story of the Nag Hammadi Discovery?
Mark Goodacre

James Robinson’s narrative of how the Nag Hammadi codices were discovered is popular and compelling, a piece of fine investigative journalism that includes intrigue and blood vengeance. But there are several different, conflicting versions of the story, including two-person (1977), seven-person (1979) and eight-person (1981) versions. Disagreements include the name of the person who first found the jar. Martin Krause and Rodolphe Kasser both questioned these stories in 1984, and their scepticism is corroborated by the Channel 4 (UK) series, The Gnostics (1987), which features Muhammad ‘Ali himself, in his only known appearance in front of camera, offering his account of the discovery. Several major points of divergence from the earlier reports raise questions about the reliability of ‘Ali’s testimony. It may be safest to conclude that the earlier account of the discovery offered by Jean Doresse in 1958 is more reliable than the later, more detailed, more vivid versions that are so frequently retold.

Full citation: Mark Goodacre, "How reliable is the story of the Nag Hammadi discovery?", JSNT 35/4 (2013): 303-22

The Jesus Discovery? A Sceptic's Perspective

The third in the series of papers on the claims made by James Tabor and Simcha Jacobovici on the Talpiot Tomb is now up on the Bible and Interpretation website.  All three papers are revised versions of presentations given at the SECSOR meeting in Greenville, SC, on March 16 this year:

The Jesus Discovery?  A Sceptic's Perspective

Mark Goodacre

My paper gathers together my thinking about Talpiot Tombs A and B as they have emerged here on the NT Blog over the last five years.  The primary focus is the more recent claims about Talpiot Tomb B (Is it is fish? Is it a vase? Is it a stick man with seaweed wrapped around his head? Are those scales of a fish or patterns on a vessel?  Are those fins or handles?) but there is some discussion also of Talpiot Tomb A, and I am afraid that I could not resist the temptation to bring out John, Paul, George, Alan, Martin and Ziggy for a reunion concert.

Renewed thanks to Ralph Hawkins for the invitation to speak last month at SECSOR, to Mark Elliott for inviting us to publish our papers on Bible and Interpretation, and to James Tabor and Christopher Rollston for stimulating exchanges.

Review of Crook's Parallel Gospels

At this year's SBL in Chicago, I took part in a session on Monday afternoon, in the Synoptic Gospels section, that was devoted to  reviewing Zeba Crook's Parallel Gospels.  The other reviewers were Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, Paul Foster and Robert Derrenbacker.  My article review is available here:

Zeba Crook's Parallel Gospels: Review Article
Mark Goodacre

Update (22 April 2014): My conference paper is now revised and published in SBL's Review of Biblical Literature here:

Review of Zeba A. Crook, Parallel Gospels [PDF]
Mark Goodacre

Please cite as: Mark Goodacre, review of Zeba A. Crook, Parallel Gospels: A Synopsis of Early Christian Writing, Review of Biblical Literature [http://www.bookreviews.org] (2014)

Jesus, Criteria and the Demise of Authenticity

Jesus, Criteria and the Demise of Authenticity is edited by Chris Keith and Anthony Le Donne and it will be out this summer, published by T & T Clark.   I have contributed an article the volume entitled "Criticizing the Criterion of Multiple Attestation: The Historical Jesus and the Question of Sources".  The book also features essays by Morna Hooker, Dale Allison, Scot McKnight, Loren Stuckenbruck, Jens Schroeter, Dagmar Winter, Rafael Rodriguez and the editors.

Here's how T & T Clark are blurbing the book:
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Criteria of authenticity, whose roots go back to before the pioneering work of Albert Schweitzer, have become a unifying feature of the so-called Third Quest for the Historical Jesus, finding a prominent and common place in the research of otherwise differing scholars. More recently, however, scholars from different methodological frameworks have expressed discontent with this approach to the historical Jesus. In the past five years, these expressions of discontent have reached a fever pitch.

The internationally renowned authors of this book examine the nature of this new debate and present the findings in a cohesive way aimed directly at making the coalface of Historical Jesus research accessible to undergraduates and seminary students. The book’s larger ramifications as a thorough end to the Third Quest will provide a pressure valve for thousands of scholars who view historical Jesus studies as outmoded and misguided. This book has the potential to guide Jesus studies beyond the Third Quest and demand to be consulted by any scholar who discards, adopts, or adapts historical criteria.
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Sounds interesting, doesn't it? There is a conference associated with the book and I'll be blogging about that tomorrow.

Method and Meaning -- Harold Attridge Festschrift

I was delighted to receive today my copy of Andrew B. McGowan & Kent H. Richards, Method and Meaning: Essays on New Testament Interpretation in Honor of Harold W. Attridge (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011).  It's a massive volume, just under 600 pages, and aims to honour one of the great scholars of early Christianity of our time.

You can read a little more about the volume over on the SBL site -- front matter including introduction and table of contents -- and there is a nice flyer there too.  One of the two editors, Andrew McGowan,  has been blogging about it too, with more over on academia.edu too.

My essay in the volume is about the Synoptic Problem.  It's called "The Synoptic Problem: John the Baptist and Jesus" and it comes just after James Robinson's contribution (and there's an honour I never expected to have).   I know -- surprise, surprise! -- Goodacre is writing about the Synoptic Problem again!  But in my defence, I was asked to write on the topic, and the idea of the volume is that it will not simply be one of those Festschriften that allows scholars to throw in any old piece they happen to have been working on.  Rather, it looks to provide a volume that will be of use to students of the NT and early Christianity, looking at the major methods in the field and applying them to specific texts.  Seriously, I am absolutely delighted to have been invited to participate in what looks to be a fantastic volume.  I have already begun delving into it.  

There was a reception in honour of Harold Attridge at the SBL this year, at which this volume was presented, on the Friday evening, and it was very clear just how well-loved and greatly respected Harold Attridge is in the guild.  My hope is that this volume will contribute in some way to honouring the wonderful contribution that he has made to enriching the study of early Christianity.

Putting some of my articles online

I have been meaning to put some online reproductions of more recent articles on my homepage and I have now got round to it.  The newly uploaded pieces are:

“Mark, Elijah, the Baptist and Matthew: The Success of the First Intertextual Reading of Mark” in Tom Hatina (ed.), Biblical Interpretation in Early Christian Gospels, Volume 2: Matthew (Library of New Testament Studies 310; London & New York: T & T Clark, 2008), 73-84 [PDF]

"Scripturalization in Mark's Crucifixion Narrative" in Geert van Oyen and Tom Shepherd (eds.), The Trial and Death of Jesus: Essays on the Passion Narrative in Mark(Leuven: Peeters, 2006): 33-47 [PDF]

"The Rock on Rocky Ground: Matthew, Mark and Peter as Skandalon" in Philip McCosker (ed.), What Is It That the Scripture Says?: Essays in Biblical Interpretation, Translation, And Reception in Honour of Henry Wansbrough Osb (Library of New Testament Studies; London & New York: Continuum, 2006): 61-73 [PDF]

I have indexed these and other pieces on my articles page. I suppose I should add them to the NT Gateway too but it always feels a bit self-serving to be putting my own materials on the gateway.

Simon Peter in Matthew's Gospel: Article and NT Pod 7

I made available the latest NT Pod earlier this week, NT Pod 7: Simon Peter in Matthew's Gospel. It's the first time I have done a kind of "sequel" episode, this one following on from NT Pod 5: Simon Peter in Mark's Gospel. In this latest piece, I explore the way that Matthew works with Mark's portrayal of Peter and suggest that we can see the same "Peter Pattern" here as we see in Mark. As in Mark, the "rocky ground" Peter is the one who enthusiastically receives the word with joy but stumbles when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word (Mark 4:16-17 // Matt. 13:20-21).

Matthew takes forward the characterisation of Peter as the disciple who is scandalized by the idea of "Christ crucified" (1 Cor. 1:23), and he underlines and enhances the same language of skandalon and skandalizomai ("stumbling block", "to fall away"). Far from whitewashing the disciples, Matthew in fact proves to be a strong reader of Mark, understanding and elaborating on his presentation. One of the reasons that we fail to see this is our over-reliance on redaction-criticism, and our tendency only to pay attention to the parts where Matthew differs from Mark; we do not take seriously the elements that Matthew takes forward and underscores in Mark.

For those who would like to follow up the discussion on this point, I have an article available on the issues. It was published in 2006, but I am happy now to make it available online in toto (PDF):

"The Rock on Rocky Ground: Matthew, Mark and Peter as Skandalon," in Philip McCosker (ed.), What Is It That the Scripture Says?: Essays in Biblical Interpretation, Translation, And Reception in Honour of Henry Wansbrough Osb (Library of New Testament Studies; London & New York: Continuum, 2006): 61-73

The essay has been available in the above Festschrift for Henry Wansbrough for the last three years, but I am happy now to make it available free for all on the internet.

New URLs for my homepage and other academic materials

About three weeks ago, I announced that I had moved my home page and my own academic web materials to new locations at Duke. I did not imagine for a moment that I would need to move them again so quickly, but on Monday this week, the Duke servers suffered a major meltdown of some sort and at the end of the week, many Duke pages are still down. In well over a decade of having homepage and academic materials online, they have never experienced a crash like that. Back when they were on the University of Birmingham servers, they would occasionally be down for an hour or two, but rarely anything more. And while they were on the NTGateway.com servers, they were never down, year in, year out. So I have decided to move them again, to a new and, I hope, permanent destination (in so far as anything is permanent on the net, of course). I have followed the lead of others and have bought my own domain name connected with my actual name, markgoodacre.org. (Even if I had wanted markgoodacre.com, I could not have got it, on account of my namesakes's fine kitchen business). So the new URLs for my materials are as follows:

My homepage

The Case Against Q Website

The Synoptic Problem: A Way Through the Maze

The Aseneth Home Page

This one is now long in the tooth, but I keep it available for posterity / nostalgia, and because I devoted hours and hours of my time to it back in the day:

All-in-One Biblical Resources Search

See also:

Synoptic-L

Xtalk: Historical Jesus and Christian Origins

My homepage and related materials

I have moved my home page and my own academic web materials to the following new locations at Duke:

My homepage

The Case Against Q Website

The Synoptic Problem: A Way Through the Maze

The Aseneth Home Page

This one is now particularly long in the tooth, but I keep it available for posterity / nostalgia:

All-in-One Biblical Resources Search

See also:

Synoptic-L

Xtalk: Historical Jesus and Christian Origins

The pages for the edited collection on The Passion of the Christ and for the Library of New Testament Studies remain on the NT Gateway.

The Trial and Death of Jesus

This book is new from Peeters. My copy arrived today:

The Trial and Death of Jesus
Essays on the Passion Narrative in Mark

Series: Contributions to Biblical Exegesis & Theology, 45

Editors: Van Oyen G., Shepherd T.

Year: 2006
ISBN: 90-429-1834-9
Pages: XI-268 p.
Price: 40 EURO


What is the significance of the trial and death of Jesus in the Gospel of Mark? In its annual meetings the Mark Group of the Society of Biblical Literature studied the trial of Jesus in 2003 and the death of Jesus in 2004. Both speakers and audience expressed the desire to bring some of the papers together in book form. The current volume fulfills this wish. The contributions presented here represent an up to date expression of one of the most important themes in Markan exegesis. The editors use the metaphor of a prism to illustrate the two sections of the book. Like a concave prism spreading light, the first section presents a range of understandings of the meaning of the death of Jesus. Like a convex prism focusing light, the second section uses multiple methodologies to focus attention on the trial of Jesus, particularly the charge of blasphemy. The papers together raise questions, challenge common views, and interrelate themes that push Markan scholarship forward.
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I have an essay in the volume called "Scripturalization in Mark's Crucifixion Narrative". Here's the full list of contents:

Section One
The Meaning of Jesus’ Death

Sharyn DOWD and Elizabeth Struthers MALBON
The Significance of Jesus’ Death in Mark: Narrative Context and
Authorial Audience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Mark GOODACRE
Scripturalization in Mark’s Crucifixion Narrative . . . . . . . . . 33

Geert VAN OYEN
The Meaning of the Death of Jesus in the Gospel of Mark: A Real
Reader Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Jocelyn MCWHIRTER
Messianic Exegesis in Mark’s Passion Narrative . . . . . . . . . 69

William SANGER CAMPBELL
“Why did you abandon me?” Abandonment Christology in Mark’s
Gospel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Stephen P. AHEARNE-KROLL
Challenging the Divine: LXX Psalm 21 in the Passion Narrative
of the Gospel of Mark . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Section Two
The Trial of Jesus

Adela YARBRO COLLINS
The Charge of Blasphemy in Mark 14:64 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Jeffrey B. GIBSON
The Function of the Charge of Blasphemy in Mark 14:64 . . . . 171

Michael E. VINES
The “Trial Scene” Chronotype in Mark and the Jewish Novel . . 189

Kelli S. O’BRIEN
Innocence and Guilt: Apologetic, Martyr Stories, and Allusion in
the Markan Trial Narratives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205

Tom SHEPHERD
The Irony of Power in the Trial of Jesus and the Denial by Peter –
Mark 14:53-72 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

List of contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Index of Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
Index of Ancient texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253