Greek/Aramaic Help w/ Mark 16:9

[crowned2serve]

I've been working on a harmony of the resurrection appearances of Jesus which depends on a Sabbath evening resurrection. That may sound absurd, but Matthew 28:1 can be viewed as saying just that. However, I've run into a problem with Mark 16:9, "Now when he had risen early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene ..." If the comma is moved to between "risen" and "early," the rendering would be, "Now when he had risen, early on the first day of the week, he appeared to Mary Magdalene ..."

I don't have the experience with Greek or Aramaic to be able to really tear this down and see if indeed Mark 16:9 can be translated in a way that is consistent with a Sabbath evening resurrection.

Victor Alexander translates Mark 16:9 from an Aramaic text, " At dusk then, on Sunday, he rose, and was seen first by Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast out seven demons." I have no idea why he put Sunday into the translation rather than Sabbath, or Saturday. Perhaps because in the English speaking western mind many people consider Sunday to be the Sabbath. But, other than the Sunday problem, his rendering of Mark 16:9 is consistent with a Sabbath evening resurrection.

For those who are curious, a Sabbath evening resurrection has Jesus out of the grave to have an encounter with Mary Magdalene in the pre-dawn hours when it was "yet dark (John 20)." Then she later joined up with the other women and arrived at the tomb at sunrise (Mark and Luke). This view requires a hidden time gap between Matthew 28:4 and 5 and leaves us wondering as to why Mary M didn't tell the other women about her pre-dawn experiences, but it does clear up most of what are viewed as a maze of contradictions by skeptics in the initial resurrection appearances of Jesus. I've been debating this issue with Farrell Till on his errancy listserve and could really use some help with Mark 16:9.

Thank you, Stephen

[John Reece]

Victor Alexander translates Mark 16:9 from an Aramaic text, " At dusk then, on Sunday, he rose, and was seen first by Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast out seven demons." I have no idea why he put Sunday into the translation rather than Sabbath, or Saturday. Perhaps because in the English speaking western mind many people consider Sunday to be the Sabbath. But, other than the Sunday problem, his rendering of Mark 16:9 is consistent with a Sabbath evening resurrection.

AnastaV de prwi prwth sabbatou efanh prwton Maria th Magdalhnh . . . (= the Greek text) is rendered in the ESV thus: "Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene . . ."

In that rendering "the first day" = prwth and "of the week" = sabbatou / sabbatou = genitive singular of sabbaton.

BDAG presents two different definitions of sabbaton:


sabbaton

. . . the seventh day of the week in Israel's calendar . . . sabbath . . .

. . . a period of seven days, week . . . prwth sabbatou on the first day of the week (Sunday). Mk 16:9

Context determines which if the two different definitions of sabbaton should be rendered in a text. The context of Mark 16:9 indicates that the sense to be rendered in that text is, as indicated in the BDAG quote above, week rather than Sabbath.

[Dr. Jack Bauer]

I've been working on a harmony of the resurrection appearances of Jesus which depends on a Sabbath evening resurrection. That may sound absurd, but Matthew 28:1 can be viewed as saying just that. However, I've run into a problem with Mark 16:9, "Now when he had risen early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene ..." If the comma is moved to between "risen" and "early," the rendering would be, "Now when he had risen, early on the first day of the week, he appeared to Mary Magdalene ..."

I don't have the experience with Greek or Aramaic to be able to really tear this down and see if indeed Mark 16:9 can be translated in a way that is consistent with a Sabbath evening resurrection.It is already consistent with a Sabbath evening resurrection. The First day of th week began on Saturday evening, when the sun went down. So a Sabbath evening is really the next day, the first day of the week,

[crowned2serve]

Can Mark 16:9 then be rendered, "Now when he had risen, early the first day of the week he appeared to Mary Magdalene ..." ??? Making "early the first day of the week" a description NOT of the timing of His resurrection, BUT of the timing of His appearance first to Mary Magdalene?

Stephen

[Waterrock]

Greetings Stephen,

Eusebius of Caesarea happens to have addressed the same question you are examining here, in a work called "Ad Marinum." Eusebius offered two ways to settle the question: an apologist could just claim that verses 9-20 don't belong in the text, and claim that many manuscripts, or the good manuscripts, do not have those verses. But Eusebius advocated a different approach: inserting a pause in Mark's words in 16:9, so that the text has the meaning, "Having arisen, early on the first day of the week He appeared...."

This leaves the exact timing of the resurrection an open question. I think it would be questionable to insist on a "Sabbath evening" as the time of the resurrection, though, since in the Judaic way of measuring days, each day ends (and begins) at sundown, so anyone with a non-Judaic background could easily misconstrue "Sabbath evening" to refer to a time after sundown, which would actually be toward the beginning of the first day of the week according to the Judaic reckoning.

I wouldn't waste words using the gloss-rich translation-of-translation provided by Victor Alexander.

You said, "This view requires a hidden time gap between Matthew 28:4 and 5 and leaves us wondering as to why Mary M didn't tell the other women about her pre-dawn experiences, but it does clear up most of what are viewed as a maze of contradictions by skeptics in the initial resurrection appearances of Jesus."

I would advise interpreting Matthew 28:2-4 as a sort of flashback of events which took place before Mary Magdalene actually arrived at the tomb. Matthew, as he often does, compresses the narrative here.

Yours in Christ,

Waterrock

[crowned2serve]

Let me restate my plea to those with expertise in Greek and Aramaic this way, please look at Mark 16:9 as it sits in the text and tell me if the phrase, "early on the first day of the week," is a modifier of "now when he had risen," or "he appeared first to Mary Magdalene." Can the intended meaning be known with certainty, by the way the sentence is structure and the tense and gender of each word?

If you have skill with other versions and languages, it would be interesting to know what is stated therein re: Mark 16:9 also.

Thank you for your contributions.

Stephen

[Dr. Jack Bauer]

Let me restate my plea to those with expertise in Greek and Aramaic this way, please look at Mark 16:9 as it sits in the text and tell me if the phrase, "early on the first day of the week," is a modifier of "now when he had risen," or "he appeared first to Mary Magdalene." Can the intended meaning be known with certainty, by the way the sentence is structure and the tense and gender of each word?

If you have skill with other versions and languages, it would be interesting to know what is stated therein re: Mark 16:9 also.

Thank you for your contributions.

StephenStephen, I don't kow any Aramaic, but you might find this interesting. Here is the translation of the verse provided by George Lamsa in his translation of the NT from Aramaic sources:Now he rose early on the first day of the week, and appeared first to Mary of Magdala, from whom he had cast seven demons.As I said above, this would pont to the dark period between Saturday and Sunday, since the day began at sundown. So I still say this is compatible with the Sabbath evening.

In His grip,

Glenn

[judge]

You might wish to ask about the Aramaic here.

http://www.peshitta.org/forum/

Thewre have been some discussions there in the past, but I can't seem to access the archives for some reason.

http://www.peshitta.org/pdf/Marqsch16.pdf

Here is Paul Younans interlinear of Mark 16.

[lee_merrill]

... tell me if the phrase, "early on the first day of the week," is a modifier of "now when he had risen," or "he appeared first to Mary Magdalene.""Robertson's NT Word Pictures" says it could go either way:

"It is probable that this note of time goes with 'risen' (anastas), though it makes good sense with 'appeared' (efanh)."

And I don't think "early" can mean "early in the day," i.e. Saturday night, because the word in my dictionary specifies "morning": "early morning, in the morning, morning" (Strong's). But I think the apparent inconsistencies can be resolved, with an early Sunday morning resurrection, see, for example, "The Man Born to be King," by Dorothy Sayers, where she writes, in a play, a composite of the resurrection appearances.

Blessings,
Lee