The Journal of Theological Studies, 2024, 75, 46–62 https://doi.org/10.1093/jts/flae005 Advance access publication 25 February 2024 Article Daniel B. Glover School of Theology and Ministry, Lee University, Cleveland, TN, USA dglover@leeuniversity.edu ABSTR ACT Markan scholars have often taken for granted that the daimonic acclamations of Jesus’s messianic identity in Mark’s Gospel present the author’s own Christological perspective. Giving attention to daimonic speech in Mark’s literary context, however, opens up the interpretive possibility that this daimonic speech may serve to mislead rather than teach. By using insights from the rhetorical practice of prosopopoeia (speech-in-character), this article compares the Christology of Mark’s daimones with a) Jesus’s reliable statements about his own messianic identity and b) Mark’s discursive presentation of the messianic role in order to assess whether the daimonic Christology in Mark’s Gospel is trustworthy or misleading. 1. IN TRODUCTION Studies of Mark’s Christology routinely invoke the proclamations of Jesus’s identity by the daimones and unclean spirits as reliable representations of Mark’s own understanding of Jesus,1 an understanding consistently missed by other actors in the Markan narrative, with perhaps occasional exceptions (e.g. 5:19–20; 15:39).2 Exegetes, in other words, often assume these daimones accurately convey Mark’s own Christology,3 which is kept from other characters in the story, 1 In reference to works of Greek literature throughout this study, the term δαίμων and its diminutive form will be transliterated as daimon(es) rather than demon. I made this decision to foreground the conceptual range and ambiguity of meaning of the term and avoid the conceptual limitations imposed by later conceptions of ‘demons’. 2 This is true across the ‘critical’ spectrum: William Wrede, The Messianic Secret, trans. J. C. G. Greig (Cambridge: J. Clarke, 1971 [orig. 1901]), pp. 24–34; H. Seesemann, ‘οἶδα’, TDNT, vol. 5, pp. 116–19, esp. 117–18; Howard Clark Kee, Community of the New Age: Studies in Mark’s Gospel (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1977), pp. 119–24; Jack Dean Kingsbury, The Christology of Mark’s Gospel (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983), pp. 11–21; William Telford, The Theology of the Gospel of Mark (NTT; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 30–54; Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, Mark’s Jesus: Characterization as Narrative Christology (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2009), pp. 45, 131–2; David Garland, A Theology of Mark’s Gospel: Good News about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015), pp. 106, 116, 227–8. Studies on Mark’s diabolical characters typically do not pursue the Christology presented by their speech. See Elizabeth Shively, ‘Characterizing the NonHuman: Satan in the Gospel of Mark’, in Christopher W. Skinner and Matthew Ryan Hauge (eds.), Character Studies and the Gospel of Mark (LNTS, 483; London: T&T Clark, 2014), pp. 127–51; Joel Williams, ‘The Characterization of the Demons in Mark’s Gospel’, in Edwin K. Broadhead (ed.), Let the Reader Understand: Essays in Honor of Elizabeth Struthers Malbon (LNTS, 583; London: T&T Clark, 2018), pp. 103–18. © The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site—for further information please contact journals.permissions@ oup.com. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 Mark’s Demonic Christology: Reevaluating the Daimonic Confessions of Jesus’s Messiahship Mark’s Demonic Christology • 47 3 Terminological distinction between ‘daimones’ and ‘unclean spirits’ is difficult with respect to Mark’s Gospel. It is not obvious that daimones and unclean spirits were always equated. Clinton Wahlen, Jesus and the Impurity of Spirits in the Synoptic Gospels (WUNT, 2/185; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004) points out the importance of acknowledging ritual purity for understanding τὰ πνεύματα τὰ ἀκάθαρτα, and Ryan E. Stokes, The Satan: How God’s Executioner Became the Enemy (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2019), pp. 48–74 discusses the occasional conceptual distinction. Nonetheless, Mark tends to equate the two (3:22, 30; 5:2, 8, 12; and 3:15 with 6:7 and 6:13). I, therefore, employ ‘daimon’ as a catch-all term. 4 Important figures in this debate include, of course, Wrede. In addition, the collection of studies in Christopher Tuckett (ed.), The Messianic Secret (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983) is helpful in orienting the variety of options proposed in the mid twentieth century. See esp. Ulrich Luz, ‘Das Geheimnismotiv und die markinische Christologie’, ZNW 56 (1965), pp. 9–30; Jürgen Roloff, ‘Das Markusevangelium als Geschichtsdarstellung’, EvTh 29 (1969), pp. 73–93. Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary (Hermeneia: Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), pp. 170–3 has a good summary of scholarship on this issue until the 1990s. 5 For one recent contribution to Mark’s intellectual milieu with extensive relevance for the study of the Second Gospel and any reconstruction of his ‘earliest audiences’, see especially Robyn Faith Walsh, The Origins of Early Christian Literature: Contextualizing the New Testament Within Greco-Roman Literary Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021); eadem, ‘The Satyrica and the Gospels in the Second Century’, ClQ 70 (2020), pp. 356–67, who relocates Mark from a non-literate community of religious believers to an elite community of fellow writers and a literary culture with definable and measurable characteristics. This culture was well-versed in ancient rhetoric. 6 The precise translation of προσοποποιΐα is not of great consequence for the present study, though Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, p. 142 have offered a spirited defense of ‘speech-in-character’ over against ‘personification’, translation advocated by Kennedy (which usually connotes animation of the inanimate), and ‘impersonation’, the translation advocated by Russell and Caplan (which may connote mimicry and sarcasm—though, in my opinion, need not). See George A. Kennedy, Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric (Atlanta: SBL, 2003), e.g. pp. 47–9, 115–16 as well as Donald Russell’s translation of Quintillian’s Instititio oratoria and Harry Caplan’s translation of (Ps.-)Cicero’s Rhetorica ad Herennium, both for the Loeb Classical Library. Butts also translates the term ‘speech-in-character’, which ‘communicates the core element of speaking in another character’s voice’. James R. Butts, ‘The Progymnasmata of Theon: A New Text with Translation and Commentary’ (Ph.D. diss., Claremont Graduate School, USA, 1987), pp. 459–60 (also cited in Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, p. 168). More recently, Craig Gibson, Libanius’s Progymnasmata: Model Exercises in Greek Prose Composition and Rhetoric (Atlanta: SBL, 2014) translates the term this way. For further discussion, see Heinrich Lausberg, Handbook of Literary Rhetoric: A Foundation for Literary Study, trans. Matthew T. Blass, Annemiek Jansen, and David E. Orton (Boston: Brill, 1998), §826–9. The advantage of using ‘speech-in-character’ as a translation is that it forefronts the importance of a figure’s characterization for understanding the role of the speech (and vice versa). Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 and so is often thought to constitute an element of the ‘messianic secret’ motif.4 But it is questionable whether this daimonic speech—and, by extension, the daimonic Christology implied thereby—reliably conveys the author's Christology. This article serves, therefore, to probe the validity of this pervasive assumption by incorporating insights into speech-writing and characterization from the ancient Greco-Roman rhetorical and compositional exercises.5 The Progymnasmata (Greek rhetorical-compositional handbooks) describe an exercise called prosopopoeia, sometimes translated ‘speech-in-character’.6 This exercise showcases the care ancient authors would have taken in assigning speech to certain characters. In turn, the characterization of Mark’s daimones and their speech is crucial for understanding their claims about Jesus and the relation of such claims to the Christology Mark himself held and wanted his readers to share. This article, therefore, evaluates the daimones’ Christological claims in the Second Gospel by taking into account insights from progymnastic discussions of prosopopoeia. In doing so, I propose that the daimones’ Christological confessions do not convey the author’s own conception of Jesus’s Messianic identity or role. This article proceeds in five steps. First, I place Mark into his ancient literary and rhetorical context by describing prosopopoeia. Second, I survey how daimones were viewed in the ancient Mediterranean world to establish a possible prosopopoetic stereotype in Mark’s literary milieu. Third, I assess the most explicit and reliable Christological confessions in Mark to establish a baseline against which to judge the reliability of the daimonic Christological speech. Fourth, I critically evaluate the daimonic Christological proclamation against Mark’s own Christological perspective, so far as it may be established from the narrative, to identify specific points of correlation, connection, and/or conflict. Finally, I reflect briefly on the nature of daimonic speech in Mark’s Gospel in light of the daimones' Christological proclamations and actions throughout the narrative. 48 • D. B. Glover 2. SPEECH-IN- CHAR ACTER AND M ARK different ways of speaking belong to different ages of life, not the same to an older man and a younger one; the speech of a younger man will be mingled with simplicity and modesty, that of an older man with knowledge and experience. Different ways of speaking would also be fitting by nature for a woman and for a man, and by status for a slave and a free man, and by activities for a soldier and a farmer, and by state of mind for a lover and a temperate man, and by their origin the words of a Laconian, sparse and clear, differs from those of a man of Attica, which are valuable. (Prog. 115–16) Acknowledging that different characters manifest different speech in accord with their identities gives way to Theon’s advice to ‘have in mind what the personality of the speaker is like and to whom the speech is addressed’ (Prog. 115), because ‘surely each subject has its own appropriate form of expression’ (Prog. 116). The personality of the speaker is fundamental to the speech-in-character. ‘We become masters of this’, Theon says, ‘if we … give what is appropriate to each subject, aiming at what fits the speaker and his manner of speech and the time and his lot in life and each of the things mentioned above [i.e., the nature, status, activities, state of mind, and origin of a character]’ (Prog. 116). The progymnastic prescriptions for speech-in-character assume that there is a stereotyped component to these compositions. Theon’s offers some leading questions, ‘What would a man say to his wife when leaving on a journey?’ or ‘Or a general to his soldiers in time of danger?’ These presume that the students of the handbooks will know the proper answers. On the one hand, the knowledge itself comes from experience. Even children distinguish clearly the quality of their own speech from that of their parents (Prog. 116). Yet, such knowledge also derives from literary exempla. Consider Theon’s comments on examples for the student to emulate: ‘What would be a better example of prosopopoeia than (speeches in) the poetry of Homer and the dialogues of Plato and other Socratics and the dramas of Menander?’ (Prog. 68). The writer knows how certain characters should speak in a given situation because she has seen such examples in earlier literary works. Therefore, understanding how such characters were already perceived becomes foundational for discerning an author’s use of speech-in-character. A final note about prosopopoeia is necessary. Prosopopoeia typically occurs in the form of long speeches, as in the case of Thucydides the historian (Hist. 1.139–45; 2.34–46, 59–65), Chariton 7 See Lausberg, Handbook, §826–9; Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, pp. 141–2 for the various terms of debate (ethopoeia and eidolopoeia in addition to prosopopoeia, as well as the various Latin translations of these terms). 8 Theon, Prog. 115. Trans. and ed. George A. Kennedy, Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric (Atlanta: SBL, 2003). Cf. also Quintilian, Inst. 9.2.30–31. All passages quoted from Theon have been checked against Michel Patillon (ed.), Aelius Théon: Progymnasmata (Paris: Les belles lettres, 1997). 9 Kennedy trans. (slightly altered). See also Quintilian, Inst. 9.2.30–31. 10 Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, p. 142; Theon, Prog. 115. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 Speech-in-character, in the broadest analysis, is the application of speech to certain characters that suits their identities.7 As the first-century rhetorician Theon defines it, ‘Prosopopoeia is the introduction of a person to whom words are attributed that are suitable to the speaker and have an indisputable application to the subject discussed’ (Prog. 115).8 For Theon as for Quintilian, speech-in-character applies to characters who are either ‘real or imagined, alive or dead …, specific or conventional, animate or inanimate’.9 In short, speech-in-character is a broad term referring to speech applied to certain characters that fits the popular concept of such characters. In the first place, Theon is concerned to differentiate characters and their settings according to such factors as age, occasion, place, social status, and subject under discussion.10 He remarks, Mark’s Demonic Christology • 49 3. THE PROSOPOPOETIC ROLE OF DAIMONES IN MEDITERR ANE AN AN TIQUIT Y AND M ARK’S GOSPEL Daimones in Greco-Roman Antiquity Because there is a stereotyped component in constructing ancient speech, it is necessary to place the speech of Mark’s demons within its ancient literary context, especially since the speech in Mark is so terse. Discerning the stereotype is complicated by the facts that the term δαίμων 11 Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, p. 146. Cf. Quintilian, Inst. 9.2.26. The identification of Mark as a bios itself suggests at least a limited familiarity with the rhetorical practices of the day. On this, see Richard Burridge, What Are the Gospels? A Comparison with Graeco-Roman Biography (3rd edn., Waco: Baylor University Press, 2018) and esp. Helen K. Bond, The First Biography of Jesus: Genre and Meaning in Mark’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2020). On the role of rhetorical and grammatical education in the ancient Mediterranean, and the strong likelihood for the Gospel authors’ exposure to it, see Raffaella Cribiore, Writing, Teachers, and Students in Graeco-Roman Egypt (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996), esp. pp. 173–87; idem, Gymnastics of the Mind: Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), esp. pp. 15–44, 160–84; Theresa Morgan, Literate Education in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 150–9, 265–74; the various essays in Matthew Ryan Hauge and Andrew W. Pitts (eds.), Ancient Education and Early Christianity (LNTS; London: T&T Clark, 2016), esp. Ronald F. Hock, ‘Observing a Teacher of Progymnasmata’, pp. 39–70 and Sean Adams, ‘Luke and the Progymnasmata: Rhetorical Handbooks, Rhetorical Sophistication, and Genre Selection’, pp. 137–54. Parsons and Martin, Ancient Rhetoric, p. 2 rightly describe education as far more ‘fluid’ than previously thought, so that one would encounter (and perhaps, to a greater or lesser degree, engaged) higher stages of education even before having begun those stages oneself. Most recently, Walsh, Origins of Early Christian Literature, esp. 105–95 convincingly situates the Gospels within elite literary culture, demonstrating rather clearly that such literary and cultural producers as the Gospel authors would have received much the same rhetorical and compositional education as those in their literary circles. The Gospel authors, in spite of their less-refined Greek, were aware of, wrote about, and engaged in precisely the same literary practices of such more educated authors as Plutarch, Lucian, and the authors of the Greek and Roman romance novels, such as Chariton, Achilles Tatius, the author of the Satyricon, and Apuleius. 13 As S. Vernon McCasland asks: ‘Why should a legend-building early church adopt this one incongruous device [daimonic possession] and use it to the exclusion of every other type of testimony in giving public acclaim to the messiahship of Jesus?’ See his ‘Demonic “Confessions” of Jesus’, JR 24 (1944), pp. 33–6, here 34. 12 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 the novelist (Chaer. 4.7), or the model exercises of Libanius. Mark’s reported dialogues are brief by comparison. Can prosopopoeia be so terse? It seems so. Some ancient rhetoricians claimed that character could be revealed with only a few words. For instance, Theophrastus (Char. 24.13) offers examples of speech that suit particular characters, remarking that an arrogant person’s character is revealed, among other ways, by his manner of sending a commission: ‘[the arrogant] doesn’t write “would you be so kind as to …” but rather “I want this done (βούλομαι γενέσθαι)” and “I’ve sent you to pick up … (ἀπέσταλκα πρὸς σὲ ληψόμενος)” and “no deviations (ὅπως ἄλλως μὴ ἔσται)” and “immediately (τὴν ταχίστην)”’ (Rusten, LCL).11 Giving examples of many forms of speech that illustrate various character traits, Theophrastus remarks that sometimes only a few words are sufficiently illustrative of character. For him, key words, phrases, and ideas were often sufficient to evoke the desired response. One example from Mark’s Gospel of such brief but evocative speech-in-character is Pilate’s dialogue in 15:14–15. Pilate’s punitive judgements against Jesus contradict his repeated proclamations of Jesus’s innocence. This example suits Theophrastus’s characterization for the obsequious man (Char. 5). Such a one, when called to judge, attempts to mollify both parties, and is otherwise non-committal (5.3). Herod at once claims he finds nothing wrong with Jesus and yet delivers him over to death. Mark’s comment that Herod hoped ‘to satisfy the crowd’ confirms this speech functions to the betterment of character. If Mark received a rhetorical education, and our knowledge of Greek paideia and literary cultures suggests he did,12 we should expect to find in the daimones’ reported speech a sensitivity to their character.13 By identifying and adopting the ancient perspectives about such characters and their speech, readers today should be able to perceive more accurately how their Christological confessions are portrayed in Mark’s Gospel. 50 • D. B. Glover 14 Foerster disambiguates six distinct ranges of meaning of δαίμων: to denote (a) gods; (b) lesser deities; (c) an ‘unknown superhuman factor’ at work; (d) ‘anything which overtakes man’ (e.g. destiny, death, good or evil fortune); (e) a protective deity that watched over a person’s life; (f) the ‘divinely related element in man’. See his article on ‘δαίμων κτλ.’ in TDNT, vol. 1, pp. 1–20 (here 2–3). Frederick E. Brenk is, therefore, right to call this ‘an extremely ambiguous word, particularly in the singular’ (‘In the Light of the Moon: Demonology in the Early Imperial Period’, ANRW 16, pp. 2068–2145, at 2068). In the period of the New Testament, the diminutive δαιμονίον becomes a common synonym for δαίμων, with a little discernible distinction. Andrei Timotin, La démonologie platonicienne. Histoire de la notion de daimōn de Platon aux derniers néoplatoniciens (Philosophia Antiqua, 128; Leiden: Brill, 2011), traces the concepts behind and development of these terms. 15 There are likewise no examples of gods, but, as Quintilian remarks, ‘we are even allowed in this form of speech to bring down the gods (deos) from heaven or raise the dead’ (Inst. 9.2.3). 16 Timotin, La démonologie platonicienne, esp. 37–84, 163–322. Plutarch takes his lead from Plato, who speaks of daimones as lower divinities (Apol. 27c–e), departed souls (Crat. 397e–398c), and an intermediary spirit (Symp. 202d–203a). On daimones in Plutarch, Hans-Josef Klauck remarks: ‘We find a relatively fully developed demonology in Plutarch, but unfortunately this is also a problematic sphere where clarification is at its most difficult. Scarcely at any point is Plutarch’s own opinion more a matter of scholarly dispute than here, and one reason for this is the plurality of phenomena covered by the conceptual field of δαίμων’ (The Religious Context of Early Christianity: A Guide to Graeco-Roman Religions [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003], pp. 422–3). Christopher P. Jones, Between Pagan and Christian (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014), pp. 34–46, 173–5 argues that the daimonic concepts available to ‘pagans’ were commonly adopted or shared by Christians, both in the New Testament era and beyond. 17 We must still bear in mind Smith’s criticisms: ‘the exemplary texts cited by each authority are a motley collection from diverse periods and that no single classical author’s total use of the term daimōn accords with this portrait’. Smith ultimately concludes that the modern interpretation of the development and meaning of daimonic power is utterly misdirected and ‘theoretically wrong since it shifts from a logical to a chronological outline’. Jonathan Z. Smith, ‘Towards Interpreting Demonic Powers in Hellenistic and Roman Antiquity’, ANRW 16, pp. 425–39. I avoid Smith’s criticisms by focusing not on the development of daimonic powers per se but the popular conception of daimones as beings who can or cannot be trusted during the period surrounding the early Christian era. 18 Daniel B. Glover, Patterns of Deification in the Acts of the Apostles (WUNT, 2/576; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022), p. 18. The term ‘non-obvious being’ is a concept Stanley Stowers has taken from the cognitive study of religion that helpfully conceptualizes the vagaries of the term daimōn. See Stanley Stowers, ‘The Secrets of the Gods and the End of Interpretation’, in Claudio Gianotto and Francesca Sbardella (eds.), Tra pratiche e credenze: traiettorie antropologiche e storiche. Un omaggio ad Adriana Destro (Bresica: Morcelliana, 2017), pp. 335–46. 19 Foerster, ‘δαίμων’, p. 3. There are two traditions. One sees daimones as souls of the departed, the other as independent spirits who never were human. For commentary, see Plutarch, Def. orac. and Apuleius, De deo Socr. 15–16. For Daimones as spirits of the departed: Euripides, Alc. 1002; Hipp. 141–150; PGM IV.1475–85. As independent spirits: Apuleius, De deo Socr. 16.2. Hesiod, Op. 120–5 describes daimones as spirits of the first generation of humans, from the mythical golden age. Perhaps this is the reason Mark places the Gerasene demoniac by the tombs (5:3). 20 Foerster, ‘δαίμων’, p. 3. 21 Euripides, Bacch. 72, 902, 904, 911; Iph. aul. 162; Medea 598, 1228, 1230; Orest. 1606, 1659; Suppl. 166; Sophocles, Aj. 597; Phil. 720, where the term has come to mean ‘happy’ or ‘blessed’. Apuleius: ‘a good desire of the soul is also a good god, which is why some people think, as I have already said, that the term eudaimones is applied to those blessed ones who have a good daemon, that is, a mind of perfect virtue’ (De deo Socr. 15.2). Without the terminological distinction, Philo speaks of protective daimones in Prob. 39: εὐμένειαν ὡς παρὰ τύχης καὶ ἀγαθοῦ δαίμονος αἰτεῖσθαι γλίχονται. See also Josephus, Ant. 16.210; Hesiod, Op. 120–5; PGM VIII.53; XXI.1–29. 22 Aristophanes, Ach. 1094; Thesm. 229, 232, 604, 650, here used as misfortune, and Josephus, Ant. 6.166, 168, 211, who does not use the specific terminological distinction but appropriates the concept. 23 E.g. Philo, Prob. 130; Flacc. 168, 179; Josephus, Ant. 16.60; and both good and bad daimones in connection with Fate in PGM XXI.1–29. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 and its cognates (e.g. δαιμονίον) in ancient Greek were semantically broad and depended upon the period and context in which the terms appeared,14 and that there are no examples of daimonic speech in the handbooks, as there are for generals, slaves, or husbands.15 Even in a single author like Plutarch, the term conveys radically different concepts depending upon context.16 While making no attempt to be comprehensive, we can make some general observations about the nature of daimonic speech among authors near to Mark’s social and literary context.17 Daimones are a class of non-obvious beings in the ancient Greco-Roman world, which were often regarded as intermediary divine figures, located between humans and eternal gods.18 They are frequently thought to be spirits of the dead and, as such, invisible, aethereal beings.19 In our period, daimones were typically categorized into two groups:20 protecting (εὐδαίμων)21 or malevolent daimones (κακοδαίμων),22 reflecting a broader association with fate (τύχη; cf. LXX Isa. 65:11).23 Since not all writers or texts employed the technical terms to distinguish various kinds of daimones, the characterization of a particular daimōn depended upon its interactions Mark’s Demonic Christology • 51 Positive portrayals of daimones According to Plato, daimones are the interpreters and messengers of the gods for humanity.24 Behind seers and prophets lies their power: ‘being midway between [gods and humanity], [the daimonic] makes each to supplement the other, so that the whole is combined in one. Through [the daimōn] are conveyed all divination and priestcraft concerning sacrifice and ritual and incantations, and all soothsaying and sorcery’ (Symp. 23 [202d–e]).25 Thus, daimones are trustworthy insofar as they convey the divine will to humanity. Of course, these oracles need not be straightforward, as the prophecies from Delphi attest. Therefore, Plato himself affirms that ‘skill [σόφος] in these affairs [interpreting divinatory signs]’ is a necessary characteristic of the ‘spiritual man’ (δαιμόνιος ἀνήρ). This concept of the εὐδαίμων is adopted by Plutarch, Apuleius, and others, who discuss Socrates’s daimonic guide.26 Each writer sees Socrates’s daimōn as essentially the means by which Socrates represents the ideal philosopher.27 These philosophers describe daimones as essentially trustworthy guides.28 For instance, Apuleius claims that ‘if Socrates too anywhere stood in need of advice that his wisdom was unable to supply, he needed to be warned by his demon’s power’ (De deo Socr. 18.5 [ Jones, LCL]). Apuleius also speaks clearly of the daimōn’s speech: ‘In [certain] cases he would say he heard some kind of voice of supernatural origin … Socrates, though, did not say that it was “a voice” that had come to him but “a certain voice”, from which qualification one can readily see that he did not mean an ordinary or human voice’ (18.4–20.2).29 Apuleius considers Socrates ‘a perfect man’ (19.2), and Socrates’s adherence to the daimōn’s advice ‘made him equal to any divinity … far above all other men’ (20.6, 7). Such daimones were essentially good, and their speech truthful. Writing much later than the Second Gospel but still relevant to it, Philostratus characterizes Apollonius of Tyana as δαιμόνιόν τι (‘a supernatural being’, Vit. Apoll. 3.43; cf. 8.7.1).30 Philostratus conveys not that Apollonius is possessed by a daimōn but that he is one’s incarnation, a manifestation of divine power in human form. Apollonius is not a physical manifestation of a ghost or non-obvious being; he simply possesses divine power.31 By virtue as daimonion, Apollonius speaks truthfully as the perfectly reliable Pythagorean. 24 For a positive view of daimones and demon-possession, see Hippocrates, Morb. sacr. Lamb, LCL. Greek: ἐν μέσῳ δὲ ὂν ἀμφοτέρων συμπληροῖ, ὥστε τὸ πᾶν αὐτὸ αὑτῷ συνδεδέσθαι. διὰ τούτου καὶ ἡ μαντικὴ πᾶσα χωρεῖ καὶ ἡ τῶν ἱερέων τέχνη τῶν τε περὶ τὰς θυσίας καὶ τὰς τελετὰς καὶ τὰς ἐπῳδὰς καὶ τὴν μαντείαν πᾶσαν καὶ γοητείαν. 26 Socrates’s δαιμονίον is discussed in Euth. 3a; Apol. 31c–d, 40a. 27 Cf. Plutarch, Gen. Socr. 580d (10): ‘for exactly as Homer has represented Athena as “standing at” Odysseus’ “side in all his labours,” so Heaven seems to have attached to Socrates from his earliest years as his guide in life a vision of this kind, which alone showed him the way, illumining his path in matters dark and inscrutable to human wisdom, through the frequent concordance of the sign with his own decisions, to which it lent a divine sanction’ (De Lacy and Einarson, LCL). 28 Plutarch reports Socrates’s demon prevented him from being trampled by swine (Gen. Socr. 580d–e [10]). 29 Plutarch prefers a sneeze to Apuleius’s voice or vision (Plutarch, Gen. Socr. 581b; Apuleius, De deo Socr. 20.4). Plutarch, Gen. Socr. 589d (20): ‘so the messages of daemons pass through all other men, but find an echo in those only whose character is untroubled and soul unruffled, the very men in fact we call holy and daemonic. In popular belief, on the other hand, it is only in sleep that men receive inspiration from on high; and the notion that they are so influenced when awake and in full possession of their faculties is accounted strange and incredible’. 30 All translation of Philostratus derive from Jones, LCL. 31 Cf., however, Philostratus’s discussion of Pythagoras’s reincarnations in Vit. Apoll. 1.1 with the possible implication that Apollonius is himself Pythagoras’s reincarnate self. Nevertheless, Philostratus characterizes Apollonius as ‘more divine’ than Pythagoras (1.2). Cf. also Plutarch, Def. orac. 13 for a similar conception. 25 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 with a human to identify whether it was good, protective, malevolent, misleading, or perhaps somewhere in between (e.g. Apuleius, De deo Socr. 12.6–13.2). Since this section is concerned especially with the prosopopoetic role of daimonic speech in antiquity, we must note its dearth. While daimones are omnipresent in antiquity, they are seldom quoted. For this reason, the best glimpses of a daimōn’s characterization and, by extension, its speech come primarily from observing its roles in shaping human destinies. 52 • D. B. Glover Negative portrayals of daimones 32 Brenk, ‘In the Shadow of the Moon’, p. 2074. According to Brenk, the word bears sinister overtones in the Odyssey. Cf. Xenophon of Ephesus, Eph. 2.5.7; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 32.76; the Ethiopian’s answer in Plutarch, Sept. Sap. Conv. 8 (153a–b); Ps.-Lucian, Asin. 24. 33 All cited in Brenk, ‘In the Shadow of the Moon’, pp. 2074, 2077. It is important to note that Brenk distinguishes between the ‘demonology’ of the characters in Homer’s epics and that of Homer (i.e. the narrator). 34 Josephus, Ant. 8.48 contains a similar narrative of exorcism to Vit. Apoll. 4.20.2–3. 35 Trans. Daniel Ogden, Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds (2nd edn., Oxford: Oxford University Press), p. 230. Notice also the hesitance of the old man at the monastery to wish to believe the demon’s words: ‘The saint would not let the symbols or the young man be hunted down before he had exorcised the virgin, lest … he should himself be thought to have put faith in what the demon said. He affirmed that demons were deceitful and clever at pretense’ (emphasis added). Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 The concept of the evil daimōn appears in the literature as early as Homer. Brenk claims that ‘almost everywhere Homeric characters see a daimon [rather than ‘a god’] devising ill for them’.32 Daimones do so through deception: Nestor claims to Telemachus that some δαίμων was secretly devising evil (Od. 3.166; cf. 2.134; 16.64; 18.256; and 19.512), and Odysseus reports that a δαίμων had deceived him into wearing only his tunic before travelling to Troy (14.488; cf. 16.194).33 Thus, very early on, the concept of the daimōn was complex and occasionally negative, and as early as Homer their purpose was often to mislead humans to their demise. Elsewhere, Philostratus’s Life of Apollonius reports that Apollonius exorcised a malicious demon. The boy was ‘possessed by a spirit [δαιμονᾶν] for two years, and the spirit had a sly, deceitful [ψεύστην] character’ (Vit. Apoll. 3.38.1 [ Jones, LCL]). The boy’s mother claims the demon speaks through the boy and professed to be a fallen soldier’s ghost. Remarkably, this demon is labelled a ‘liar’. Several more times throughout Philostratus’s narrative, daimones feature as deceptive or liars (4.10.1; 4.20.2–3; 4.25.4; cf. 4.44).34 Contemporary with Philostratus, some early Christians also depict daimones as misleading. Jerome writes about an exorcised daimōn who confesses it used ‘to deceive men with dreams in Memphis’, leading the exorcist to express that ‘demons were deceitful and clever at pretense’ (Vit. Hil. 23, 38–39).35 Tertullian asserts daimones are not but merely pretend to be dead people and gods (An. 57). According to Ignatius, when Jesus appeared to his disciples, he invited them to touch him so they would not think they had been deceived by a daimōn (δαιμόνιον, Smyr. 3.1–2; cf. 2.1). Similarly, Origen remarks, ‘Celsus fails to notice that the name of demons is not morally neutral like that of men, among whom some are good and some are bad; nor is it good like the name of gods, which is not to be applied to evil daimones … The name of daimones is always applied to evil powers … they lead men astray and distract them, and drag them down’ (Cels. 5.5). Many more examples could be adduced, but the point is this: from Homer to Origen and Philostratus, many thought daimones could be malicious actors whose speech might be untrustworthy or misleading. A binary between trustworthy and misleading daimones is, however, artificial. They could be either or both, depending on context. For instance, Apuleius claims that daimones share with the gods their immortality and power, but with humanity their ability to be moved to anger or pity (De deo Socr. 12.6–13.2). Thus, daimones might act differently toward different people. For some, such as Socrates, they might aid in the path to wisdom. For others, however, they might deceive and lead to destruction. Such figures would not be simply trustworthy or deceitful but sometimes one or the other. The term does not simply indicate good beings or evil beings. Their role must be determined in each individual case. Positively, however, it does indicate that early readers of Mark’s Gospel would not have taken the truthfulness of the daimones’ Christological confessions for granted. Other signifiers of their truthfulness or deceitfulness would need to be sought out. Mark’s Demonic Christology • 53 Demons in Jewish Antiquity 36 Among others, some common terms for such beings could include: ‫רוחת‬, ‫חיות‬, ‫כרובים‬, ‫ׂשרפים‬, ‫בני–)ה(אלהים‬, ‫מלאך‬. See Glover, Patterns of Deification, pp. 30–3. 37 On the origins of ‘demons’ in the apocalyptic literature, see John J. Collins, ‘The Origin of Evil in Apocalyptic Literature and the Dead Sea Scrolls’, in J. A. Emerton (ed.), Congress Volume, Paris 1992 (VTSup, 61; Leiden: Brill, 1995), pp. 23–38; Dale Martin, ‘When Did Angels Become Demons?’ JBL 129 (2010), pp. 657–77; Loren Stuckenbruck, ‘The Book of Jubilees and the Origin of Evil’, in Gabriele Boccaccini and Giovanni Ibba (eds.), Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), pp. 294–308. 38 E.g. PGM XIII.1075; the use of Hebraic names of divinities is pervasive. 39 See PGM XIII.1–343 as well as the exorcistic formulae in PGM IV.1227–64 (though this one is more explicitly Christian); IV.3007–86; V.96–172; XCIV.17–26. Cf. also PGM XIII.210–35. 40 The complexity of Second Temple Jewish angelology requires qualification. The ‘Watchers’, a class of intermediary beings both identified as angels and as the progenitors of evil spirits, continue to be called ‘angels’ both before (1 En. 6.2) and after their ‘fall’ (1 En. 19.1–2; 21.10). In addition, the 70 ‘shepherds’ (angels) that God appoints over ‘the sheep’ (Israel) in the so-called Animal Apocalypse (1 En. 85.59–64) abuse their power and oppress humans, killing more than has been appointed to be destroyed. These angels are so overzealous in their destructive operations that they too disobey God’s command. We should also not disregard the concept of the ‘evil angel’ and thereby misconstrue the angelic role, either. E.g. LXX Ps. 77:49; Isa. 30:4; Barn. 9.4; Herm. Mand. 6.2.4–9 (36.4–9); cf. Herm. Sim. 6.2.1–2 (62.1–2); 7.1–5 (66.1–5). Yet we can agree with Mika Ahuvia, On My Right Michael, On My Left Gabriel: Angels in Ancient Jewish Culture (Oakland: University of California Press, 2021), pp. 154–8: ‘evil angels were not in the same category as demons’ (p. 155). Indeed, rebellious angels did not typically become identified with demons. Loren T. Stuckenbruck, The Myth of Rebellious Angels: Studies in Second Temple Judaism and New Testament Texts (WUNT, 335; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014). The upshot is this paper is concerned with the prosopopoetic role of Markan daimones, not that of angels. Precisely how we gauge angelic truthfulness, in short, is another topic entirely. The variance of daimonic characterization is apparently perceptible in the Jewish angel as well. The dividing lines are not neat; since we are dealing with ancient religion over the span of many centuries, we probably should not expect them to be. 41 Foerster, ‘δαίμων’, p. 15. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 The Judaism contemporary with Mark shared the concept of the non-obvious being, developing it in ways similar to the Greek daimōn. More diverse terminology, however, allowed for greater specificity, helping to classify these beings more precisely according to their roles.36 Apocalyptic Judaism disaggregated these different classes of non-obvious beings, especially what we call angels, with varying levels of complexity. During this period, evil spirits also received unprecedented degrees of attention.37 In general, apocalyptic Judaism came to regard evil spirits as those who served to lead people towards rebellion against God, leading to their own destruction. Certainly, this perspective is not universal in Judaism—the Greek magical papyri attest strains of Judaism (or perhaps Judaizing strains) that performed spells, many based upon the Jewish Scriptures, to command such non-obvious beings.38 Yet even these spells rarely request help from ‘daimones’ rather than ‘gods’ or ‘angels’.39 Although complex, it appears that in Mark’s era, Judaism often ascribed the qualities of the good δαίμων to the ‘angel’ while those of the evil δαίμων typically applied to ‘demons’ (δαιμόνια) proper.40 This terminological distinction allows for greater nuance in Jewish daimonology— though in works written in Hebrew or preserved in Semitic translation, terminology shows greater variation. Within first-century Judaism, however, there seems to be broad acceptance of a special class of non-obvious beings that are evil, deceptive, and operate with the intention of misleading humankind. In Greek-language texts, these beings are often called daimones, most commonly in the diminutive form δαιμόνια. Already the Septuagint attributes idol worship and sacrifice of other gods to daimones (e.g. LXX Deut. 32:17; Pss. 95:5; 105:37; Baruch 4:7). And Foerster rightly points out that pseudepigraphal works extend this interpretation: ‘In general … the work of demons in the pseudepigrapha is to seduce man. They tempt to witchcraft, to idolatry, to war, strife and bloodshed, to prying into hidden mysteries … Only rarely are other functions ascribed to them’.41 An excellent example of the divergent roles of these non-obvious beings is found in the Community Rule (1QS) in the treatise of the two spirits (1QS 3:13–4:26). According to this document, God placed in humanity two spirits, one of truth and one of deceit (3:19). The deceiver is called an evil angel: ‘In the hand of the Angel of Darkness is total dominion over the 54 • D. B. Glover 42 These angels, at the behest of Shemihaza, do make an oath together to make children for themselves (6.1–7). This occurs, however, before or at the commencement of their fall, and their status as angels is not determinative for identifying the prosopopoetic role of Mark’s daimones. 43 ‘Why did you father Terah not obey your voice and abandon the demonic worship of idols until he perished, and all his house with him?’ (Apoc. Ab. 26.3, OTP trans.). 44 For terminological issues, see Stokes, The Satan, p. 79–87. 45 Stokes, The Satan, p. 88–9 highlights the importance of misleading for the evil spirits by observing that ‘Jubilees differs from the Book of Watchers, however, in the prominence that Jubilees accords the spirits’ deceptive activity … In Jubilees, conversely, it is the spirits’ ability to mislead nations into error that poses their greatest threat to humankind’. 46 God’s rule or power over Mastema/Satan/the devil as reflected in Jubilees is equally present in CD at Qumran as well as 3 (Greek) Baruch 16.3 (= 16.2 Slavonic). 47 This document could very well be a Christian invention, but the compositional origin should not concern us too much. The ideas presented in it surely do not attest to a singularly unique perspective but more likely reflect ideas about Satan and daimones that were available within the shared cultural reservoir from which Mark must also have drawn. Nevertheless, Susan Garrett, Temptations of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) thinks Mark might actually have depended on this document. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 sons of deceit; they walk on paths of darkness’ (3:20–21). This evil angel leads the sons of justice astray (3:22) and fits what the Septuagint and Greek pseudepigraphical works usually call a δαιμόνιον. Nevertheless, God has determined an ultimate and imminent end to this deception (4:18). Although the Damascus Document (CD), evincing an even more pronounced sense of providence, says that God causes those he hates to stray (CD[A] 2.13), the remainder of the document speaks of a coming apostasy instigated by Belial or Mastema (8.1–3; 12.1–6; 16.2–5; 19.13–14). Although the text never records their speech, it regards these apostasy-inspiring spirits as untrustworthy in their dealings with humans.42 As in other apocalyptic Jewish texts, these spirits mislead humanity into worship of idols, demons (apparently a distinct class of non-obvious being), and themselves. In the Book of Watchers (1 En. 1–36), the angel Uriel claims that the evil spirits ‘lead [humanity] into error so that they will offer sacrifices to the demons as unto gods’ (1 En 19.1; cf. 99.7–10). Jubilees and Apocalypse of Abraham similarly portray demons misleading humankind.43 Although there is no quoted demonic speech, these spirits and their actions are viewed with fear and suspicion. Jubilees presents a major figure called ‘Prince Mastema’ (= ‘Satan’, 10.11), who controls the ‘polluted demons’ (10.1).44 Before the Noachic Deluge, these demons/spirits ‘were leading astray and blinding and killing [Noah’s] grandchildren’ (10.2). Following the Deluge, these spirits continue misleading humanity by encouraging them to worship demons (1.11, 20; 11.4– 5; 22.17). Their deceptive function is prominent throughout Jubilees (1.20; 7.27; 10.3, 5, 8; 11.4–5; 12.5, 20; 19.28; 22.16–18).45 Here too we have no quoted speech from demons (except Mastema’s petition to God to retain a demonic horde).46 Yet, the persistent characterization of these spirits as those misleading humanity gives the strong impression these are not reliable characters. In the Testament of Job, we have the clearest example of overtly deceptive daimonic speech.47 In 3.1–3, the divine voice informs Job that idol worship ‘is the power of the devil, by whom human nature is deceived’. Job continues by asking the speaker for authority to purge the local idol’s temple, ‘if this is indeed the place of Satan by whom men are deceived’ (3.6). Aside from attacking Job and his family, Satan’s role here is primarily deceptive. He disguises himself as a beggar (6.5), the king of Persia (17.2), and a bread seller (23.1), and hides behind Job’s wife (26.6; 27.1–2), causing her to utter false claims ‘so that he might deceive me too’ (26.6). She is deceived by Satan’s claims that Job would not have received these evils if he had not deserved them (23.6)—a claim that surely does not reflect the perspective of the author of Testament of Job. The audience would undoubtedly recognize this speech as deceptive, as is all of Satan’s speech towards humans in this text. Mark’s Demonic Christology • 55 Conclusion By locating Mark’s Gospel within ancient Mediterranean daimonic discourse, we cannot simply choose either a Greco-Roman or Jewish setting.51 There is no such distinction. Ancient GrecoRoman sources have conceptions of daimones as helpful, intermediary divinities as well as harmful, deceptive, and ultimately wicked superhuman beings, much more in line with the common apocalyptic Jewish idea.52 The choice, then, is really between two distinct views of daimones: reliable guides or malicious, deceptive spirits. We are still left with a problem: when daimonic speech does occur, it may be either trustworthy or misleading speech, depending on the context. Occasionally it is one, occasionally the other; sometimes from the same demon we may receive the truth or deception, and that can change under the circumstances (e.g. whether that demon is ‘bound’ as in T.Sol.). So, in 48 Cf. also Josephus, Ant. 8.2.5 and Apoc. Adam 7.13 for Solomon’s exorcistic renown. Only one demon admits to telling the whole truth (T.Sol. 14.5). It is also worth noting that all the daimones who converse with Solomon were tricked into appearing by Beelzebul, indicating that even daimonic speech to one another was untrustworthy. 50 On the origins of these texts, see their associated introductions in OTP. That these works postdate the New Testament is irrelevant to their function as comparanda since I am not claiming they play a genealogical role but a comparative one. On genealogy and comparison, see Jonathan Z. Smith, Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), pp. 1–53. 51 Attempts to read Mark by foregrounding Greco-Roman literary types and motifs are, therefore, equally as helpful as those engaging Jewish apocalyptic. E.g. Dennis MacDonald, The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000); Edward P. Dixon, ‘Descending Spirit and Descending Gods: A “Greek” Interpretation of the Spirit’s “Descent as a Dove” in Mark 1:10’, JBL 128 (2009), pp. 759–80. 52 For instance, Plato, Apol. 15 (27b–e) agrees with the etiology of 1 Enoch that demons are the deceased offspring of divine beings (Cf. also Plato, Apol. 27d; Pindar, Ol. 13.105; Hesiod, Works and Days 110–27). Thus, George Nickelsburg’s claim (in 1 Enoch: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch [2 vols.; Hermeneia; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2002], p. 273) that these parallels are unsubstantial since, as he sees it, daimones in Greek literature are thought to be good beings, evinces an insufficiently broad understanding of daimones in Mediterranean antiquity. To be sure, good daimones preponderated, but there was no scarcity of wicked ones. 49 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 In Testament of Solomon, there are important examples of daimonic speech, wherein daimones describe their evil-doing and how to thwart them.48 Nearly every quotation of daimonic speech takes place after they are bound by Solomon, making it difficult to assess the character of their speech. In one exceptional case, a daimōn named Ornias promises a young boy all the world’s riches if he does not deliver him to Solomon, which is clearly a lie (1.12). In every other case, daimones confess under questioning. Their confessions are presented as trustworthy speech but only because Solomon has already bound them. While Ornias explains to Solomon that daimones may know the future by hearing God discuss plans for human beings, this tells us nothing about whether those daimones would accurately share that information. Indeed, it is only because Solomon has bound Ornias that the demon offers any knowledge of future events (20.11). Because their unbounded actions are frequently described as deceptive (as in 4.6; 5.5; 6:4; 7.5; 8.3, 5; 10.3), we may conclude that their unbounded speech would be too.49 The daimonic functions throughout the book give the impression that daimonic speech should not be trusted. Finally, characterization of demonic speech as deceptive also occurs in later Old Testament pseudepigrapha.50 After his expulsion from heaven in Life of Adam and Eve 12–16, Satan recounts how ‘with deceit’ he ‘assailed [Adam’s] wife and made [Adam] to be expelled through her from the joys of your bliss, as I have been expelled from my glory’ (16:3). Satan’s primary role here is the deception of humans (cf. 17:1–3). Again, in T.Sim. 3; T.Jud. 23.1; and T.Zeb. 9.7–8, daimones or evil spirits are continually associated with deception. In T.Dan 1.7, we have quoted daimonic speech: ‘one of the spirits of Beliar was at work within me, saying, “Take this sword, and with it kill Joseph; once he is dead, your father will love you.”’ This daimonic speech is unquestionably deceptive. 56 • D. B. Glover 4. DISCERNING M ARK’S CHRISTOLOGICAL PER SPECTIVE The best place to look for Mark’s own Christological perspective is in the speech of reliable characters. It is there we find that, for Mark, the messiah is the one who is betrayed, crucified, and rises again. That is, Mark’s Christology is fundamentally cruciform. The clearest statements to this effect come from Jesus’s own lips, and this Messianic conception is oriented around, and anchored to, the passion. Three separate times in the narrative, Jesus, Mark’s most reliable speaker, proclaims that his singular role as messiah is to suffer, die, and rise again: ‘And he began to teach them that it was necessary for the son of man to suffer many things, to be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, to be killed, and after three days to rise again’ (8:31; cf. 9:31; 10:32–34). This cruciform messianism is consistently missed by human characters, contributing to the long-recognized problem of the messianic secret. Yet while Jesus’s followers and contemporaries misunderstand this messianic role, Mark sees it prefigured in Scripture: ‘The son of man goes just as it is written (γέγραπται) concerning him’ (14:21a)—a way marked by ‘betrayal’ (14:21b) and leading to crucifixion. This Scriptural witness becomes the subtextual scaffold for Mark’s construction of the passion narrative, in which Jesus’s suffering and crucifixion fulfil Scriptural prophecies.53 Mark’s is a Christology of the cross, one in which God’s true power is manifested not in displays of earthly power but in its inversion, by suffering and dying, only to overcome death by rising again. The parallels between Mark’s Christology and Paul at this point are not incidental but instead reflect an effort at narrativizing Paul’s Christology of the cross, especially as it is presented in the Corinthian correspondence, in which God inverts human expectations to display truly divine wisdom and power (cf. 1 Cor. 1:20–25; 2 Cor. 12:9).54 Even in those parts of the narrative in which Jesus manifests great deeds of power, the discursive focus is realigned back to the cross. As Marcus observes, ‘Mark’s whole narrative, at least from 2.20 and 3.6 on, points toward the crucifixion scene that is its climax’.55 53 See esp. Joel Marcus, The Way of the Lord: Christological Exegesis in the Gospel of Mark (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1992), pp. 153–98. 54 Joel Marcus, ‘Mark—Interpreter of Paul’, NTS 46 (2000), pp. 473–87, esp. 479–81. 55 Marcus, ‘Interpreter of Paul’, p. 479. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 distinction from studies of the speech of regular, stock characters (such as religious leaders, generals, slaves, or fools), any analysis of daimonic speech in Mark’s Gospel requires an extra step that other investigations of speech-in-character do not, namely determining the character of the daimonic speech about Jesus before making a judgement about how the daimones' speech suits Mark’s rhetorical purposes. There is no ‘stock’ daimōn character from which to draw; there are many different and divergent literary exempla, some depicting these characters as reliable and others depicting them otherwise. In short, while the application of speech-in-character does not decisively decide the issue, it calls into question any hasty conclusion about the truthfulness of Mark’s daimones. Within Mark’s literary context, the daimones may well have been speaking the truth, but they may as well have not been. Thus, before we can assess the truthfulness of the daimonic confessions, we must understand Mark’s own Christology—that is, the understanding of Jesus’s role as messiah that the author Mark wanted his audience to share once their study of the Second Gospel was complete. The question then becomes: does the Christology pronounced by the daimones dovetail with or run against the grain of Mark’s own Christology? To answer, we turn first to Mark’s discursive presentation of Jesus’s messianic role. Mark’s Demonic Christology • 57 5. THE CHRISTOLOGY OF M ARK’S DAIMONES Given the Markan Jesus’s description of the Messianic role, the question remains what we should make of the speech of Mark’s daimones: do they accurately reflect this Markan perspective and exhibit the prosopopoetic role of the reliable εὐδαίμων, or do they represent a departure from the definition of messiah offered by Jesus, misleading their hearers like the κακοδαίμων? A survey of daimonic action may offer an early hint. Satan is the first daimonic character to appear at Mark 1:13, and his first action is to test Jesus in the wilderness. The precise nature of this testing is unclear (though cf. Matt. 4:1–11; Luke 4:1–13), but a strong case has been made that the proximity of the temptation to Jesus’ baptism indicates it consists of attempts to mislead Jesus from his messianic vocation.58 If so, already in the temptation we find an attempt at warping Jesus’s messianic conception. It remains to be seen whether daimonic speech throughout the Gospel confirms this glimpse of a warped Christology provided in the temptation. Other daimonic action in Mark hints at malevolence. The Gerasene demoniac in 5:1–20 in particular suggests that the possessing daimōn seeks out the man’s destruction, causing him to physically harm as well as to ostracize himself from his community. A bit later, the speechless daimōn in 56 Donald Juel, Messianic Exegesis: Christological Exegesis of the Old Testament in Early Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988), pp. 142–4 argues the solution to the problem is not total rejection of Davidic messiahship but one that ties it inextricably to the death and resurrection of Jesus. Only at his ascension to God’s right hand, Juel argues, is Jesus called Lord. Aside from his over-reliance on Rom. 1:3–4, Juel’s view suffers from the apparent identification of Jesus as the ‘Lord’ in 5:19–20. Even with this qualification, Juel’s argument rather lends to a redefinition of Davidic messiahship, comprising suffering and death, rather than the traditional understanding of a conquering, political messiah. 57 See Ernst Lohmeyer, Das Evangelium des Markus (KEK; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1937), p. 262; Rudolf Bultmann, History of the Synoptic Tradition, trans. John Marsh (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), pp. 136–7; and Howard M. Teeple, ‘The Origin of the Son of Man Christology’, JBL 84 (1965), p. 215 n. 8. For Mark, Jesus attributes the teaching of Davidic messiahship to the ‘scribes’ in 12:35 and then immediately warns of their teaching and praxis in 12:38–40. The logic of the narrative suggests a rejection of their praxis and teaching (a conquering Davidic messiahship). 58 Garrett, Temptations of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel, pp. 55–60. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 Until Jesus hangs dead on the cross, no (human) character ever confirms this cruciform Christology. Only once the centurion announces, ‘Truly this man is the Son of God’ (15:39), do we have a confirmation of Jesus’s divine sonship associated with his role as the crucified messiah. To be sure, other characters acknowledge both divine (3:11) and Davidic (10:47) sonship, but they do so without tying this messiahship to the cross and consequently misrepresent the true nature of Jesus’s messiahship. It is worth observing, however, that, in 12:35–37, Mark rejects any martial associations with Davidic Christology56 if not Davidic Christology itself.57 The cross, above all else, stands in sharp relief to conquering Davidic messiahship and the human displays of power it represents. Peter’s Christological confession in 8:29 likewise reveals that a simple recognition of Jesus as the messiah may be insufficient, even diabolical, if understood wrongly. When messiahship is not constructed around Jesus’s suffering and death, it is not Markan messiahship. Indeed, Christologies of power universally receive condemnation or commands to silence from the Markan Jesus (cf. 1:25; 1:44; 3:11; 5:43; 7:36; 8:30; 9:9). By contrast, when Jesus proclaims his messiahship openly (παρρησία), he always proclaims the centrality of his suffering, death on the cross, and resurrection (8:31–32a; 9:9, 12, 31; 10:33–34). If we must identify a representative for Mark’s Christological perspective within the narrative, Jesus seems the obvious choice, and he identifies his Messianic role as one of ‘obedience to death, even death on a cross’ (cf. Phil. 2:8). 58 • D. B. Glover 59 See esp. Shively, ‘Characterizing’, p. 145. See the discussion of the following views in Broadhead, Titular Christology, pp. 97–100. In addition to these, another possible view is that ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ represents an angelomorphic Christology. A similar title is used of angels in Dan. 7:18 (ἅγιοι ὑψίστου). There is perhaps merit to this view, but, to my knowledge, no scholar has made the argument. 61 For Anton Fridrichsen, The Problem of Miracle in Primitive Christianity (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1972), p. 122, this acclamation is a Markan apologetic device to attribute Jesus’s wonder-working to a power holier than Beelzebul in 3:22. Graham Twelftree responds in Jesus the Exorcist: A Contribution to the Study of the Historical Jesus (WUNT 2/54; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1993), pp. 62–3, but the discussion serves to show how deeply ingrained is the assumption that the daimones’ Christological acclamations represent Mark’s perspective. 62 E.g. Marcus, Mark, pp. 188–99; Karl Kertelge, Die Wunder Jesu im Markusevangelium. Eine redaktionsgeschichteliche Untersuchung (SANT, 23; Munich: Kösel, 1970), p. 53. 63 E.g. Herbert Braun, Qumran und das Neue Testament (2 vols.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1966), vol. 1, p. 62; Hans Dieter Betz, ‘Jesus as Divine Man’, in F. T. Trotter (ed.), Jesus and the Historian: Written in Honor of Ernest Cadman Colwell (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968), pp. 114–33; Ferdinand Hahn, The Titles of Jesus in Christology: Their History in Early Christianity, trans. H. Knight and G. Ogg (London: Lutterworth, 1969), pp. 231–5; Theodore Weeden, Mark–Traditions in Conflict (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971); Paul J. Achtemeier, ‘Gospel Miracle Traditions and the Divine Man’, Int 26 (1972), pp. 174–97. 64 While ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ has no direct parallel in Jewish literature as a Messianic title, the phrase likely invokes the phrase ὅσιος σου/αὐτοῦ in the Psalter. Max Botner, ‘The Messiah Is the “Holy One”: ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ as Messianic Title in Mark 1:24’, JBL 136 (2017), pp. 417–33. 65 Let me clarify that I do not deny that miracle-working is relevant for Mark’s portrayal of Jesus. Probably Mark’s portrays Jesus as a theios anēr. Here, Luz’s argument (n. 2 above) is helpful for considering how Mark’s Christology—his concept of messiahship specifically—revolves centrally around Jesus’s crucifixion. ‘Christ crucified’ is Markan Christology. 66 Gregory Barnhill, ‘Jesus as Spirit-Filled Warrior and Mark’s Functional Pneumatology’, CBQ 82 (2020), pp. 605–27. 67 Broadhead, Titular Christology, p. 98: ‘The Gospel of Mark, at first glance, seems to employ “the Holy One of God” to refer to the charismatic power of Jesus expressed in his frequent exorcism of demons’. Cf. Wrede, The Messianic Secret, pp. 24–114, who assumes the messianic significance of this title. 68 John J. Collins, ‘Jesus and the Messiahs of Israel’, in Hubert Cancik, Hermann Lichtenberger, and Peter Schäfer (eds.) Geschichte–Tradition–Reflexion. Festschrift für Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburgstag, vol. 3, Hermann Lichtenberger (ed.), Frühes Christentum (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996), pp. 287–302, here 293–5. 60 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 9:23–27 attempts to kill the lad by throwing him in fire and in water. The need for liberation from ‘the strong man’ in 3:27 also hints that this being treats his ‘stuff ’ (τὰ σκεύη) with malice.59 We have not only the actions but also, of course, the speech of Mark’s daimones. Daimonic speech first occurs at 1:24. Here, a demoniac acclaims Jesus as ‘the Holy One of God’ (ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ).60 Commentators regularly affirm this quotation as a reliable disclosure of Jesus’s true identity.61 Because the title is rare, scholars dispute its interpretation. For some, it signifies a priestly title invoking ‘the holy one of the Lord’ associated with Aaronic priesthood in Ps. 106:6, though this reading has not proved convincing to many, and the parallels drawn are slim.62 Others associate the title with a charismatic figure or theios-anēr Christology, a miracle worker who achieves victory over the Satanic kingdom through displays of power.63 Relatedly, the most convincing proposal for understanding this phrase argues ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ reflects a Davidic Christology of the conquering, political liberator-king.64 The cruciform shape of Markan messiahship stands in stark tension with martial Davidic messiahship. So whether we read ὁ ἅγιος τοῦ θεοῦ as indicative of a miracle-working or Davidic Christology—which are not mutually exclusive, especially given the Second Temple traditions about Solomon—there is reason to regard this demon’s speech as an inadequate expression of Markan understanding of Jesus’s messiahship, and indeed perhaps misleading.65 While one should not deny that Mark’s messianic conception contains an apocalyptic element, certainly involving defeat of unclean daimones,66 the power manifested in those encounters do not constitute Jesus’s divine sonship or determine his role—if indeed this is a Messianic title at all.67 For Mark, Jesus’s identity as messiah is inextricably bound up with Jesus’s passion. To locate Jesus’s Messianic identity elsewhere would place him among other political Messianic pretenders. In 5:7, the Gerasene demoniac identifies Jesus as ‘Son of the Most High God’ (υἱὲ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ὑψίστου). Exegetes frequently mention the Septuagintal translation of the Hebrew ‫ עליון‬by (ὁ) ὕψιστος, especially in the Psalms. To explain the title, some scholars68 also point to Luke 2:32 (‘he shall be called great and son of the Most High [υἱὸς ὑψίστου]’) or to the fragmentary ‘Son of God’ document from Qumran (4Q246), which reads, ‘He shall be hailed (as) son of Mark’s Demonic Christology • 59 69 This translation follows the one provided in Joseph A. Fitzmyer, ‘4Q246: The “Son of God” Document from Qumran’, Bib 74 (1993), pp. 153–74, here 155. The Hebrew transcription reads as follows: ‫ברה די על יתאמר ובר עליון כזיקיא‬. 70 Collins, Mark, p. 268 n. 60. 71 Cilliers Breytenbach, ‘Hypsistos’, DDD, pp. 439–43. 72 There is a text-critical problem in 5:1. Γερασηνῶν is the best-attested variant and is adopted by the three most recent critical editions (NA28, Tyndale House GNT, and the ECM), each working with slightly different text-critical methods. While the reading is by no means certain (Metzger and the UBS committee assign it a ‘C’ rating and its pre-genealogical coherence is not noteworthy), it is nevertheless the most likely candidate for the earliest reading. Bruce Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (2nd edn., Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1994), p. 72. 73 Carl H. Kraeling (ed.), Gerasa: City of the Decapolis (New Haven: ASOR, 1938), pp. 373–4, also cited in Collins, Mark, p. 268. 74 Collins, Mark, p. 268; eadem, ‘Mark and His Readers: The Son of God among Greeks and Romans’, HTR 93 (2000), pp. 85–100. 75 C. Kavin Rowe, World Upside Down: Reading Acts in the Graeco-Roman Age (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 24–5; Paul R. Trebilco, Jewish Communities in Asia Minor (SNTSMS, 69; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 127–44; Stephen Mitchell, ‘The Cult of Theos Hypsistos’, in Polymnia Athanassiadi and Michael Frede (eds.), Pagan Monotheism in Late Antiquity (Oxford: Clarendon, 1999), pp. 81–148. 76 The daimōn's acclamation of Jesus the exorcist as a ‘son of Zeus’ may be explained by Zeus’s position as king of heaven, commander of all the gods, including the daimonic realm (cf. Apuleius, De deo Socr. 5–6 [esp. 6.5]). Some human figures would be described as sons of specific gods, and, consequently, inherit from them their associated divine power. So Plato is regarded as ‘son of Asclepius’ because he is a healer of the immortal soul (Diogenes Laertius, Lives, 3.45), and Apollonius is regarded as a child of the Egyptian deity Proteus but with even greater power or prescience (Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. 1.4, 5). In this sense, the title might seem fitting, if mistaken. 77 On the activity of the Gerasene demoniac as a parodic counter-exorcism, see Marcus, Mark, p. 344. 78 Matthew Novenson, ‘The Universal Polytheism and the Case of the Jews’, in idem (ed.), Monotheism and Christology in Greco-Roman Antiquity (NovTSup, 180; Leiden: Brill, 2020), pp. 32–60 argues that the Jewish God was not immune from interpretatio Romana et Graeca. Yahweh was frequently identified, even by Jews, with Zeus/Jupiter (Let. Aris. 15–16; Josephus, Ant. 12.22; Valerius Maximus, Mem. 1.3.3; Augustine, Cons.1.22.30) and, occasionally, Dionysus (Plutarch, Quaest. conv. 4.6; Tacitus, Hist. 5.5), not to mention El, Elyon, and was often portrayed similarly to Baal and Ashera. Novenson’s main point that Jews and non-Jews alike could identify Yahweh with the high God Zeus/Jupiter is certainly true, but his interpretation of Luke’s identification of Zeus with Yahweh on the basis of his quotation of Aratus, Phaen. 5 in Acts 17:38 is questionable. Paul expresses exasperation in 16:17–18 at being named a servant of Zeus and stridently criticises the Zeus cult in 14:8–18 as an unnecessary, inferior, and perhaps also competitive attempt to draw benefactions from a god who is not benevolent (as Zeus/Jupiter is portrayed by Ovid, Metam. 8.618–728). These passages mark a distinction between Zeus and the God proclaimed by Luke, the God of Israel, the gracious God who dispenses benefactions on all. Here, as in Mark, we have a case of mistaken identity, not interpretatio. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 God, and they shall call him son of the Most High’ (2.1).69 An important difference, however, between these and Mark 5:7 is the absence of the word θεός in the latter (cf. 2 Macc. 3:31).70 When θεός appears with ὕψιστος in Greek literature outside the LXX, it appears as a terminus technicus for the cult of Theos Hypsistos or Zeus Hypsistos.71 That particular use of the phrase in Mark’s Gospel may well have been heard by Mark’s gentile audiences, especially given the narrative setting in Gerasa.72 A first-century inscription from Gerasa reports a temple of Zeus was dedicated there by the early twenties.73 For those familiar with the setting or the title Theos Hypsistos, ‘the demon’s address of Jesus is equivalent to “son of Zeus’”’.74 The same meaning for this title is present in Acts 16:17 where another demoniac proclaims, ‘These men are slaves of the Most High God/Theos Hypsistos (τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ὑψίστου)’.75 Paul and Barnabas silence this annoying Lukan demoniac for misrepresenting the two missionaries. Jesus is no son of Zeus any more than Paul and Barnabas are his slaves.76 If interpreted thus, the Gerasene demoniac may misidentify Jesus, explaining why what has appeared to many scholars as a parodic counter-exorcism fails when Jesus’s does not:77 both Jesus and the unclean spirit invoke the identity of their attacker, but only Jesus identifies his correctly.78 If not a misidentification, the daimōn’s speech is at least potentially misleading to Mark’s gentile readers. If Jewish readers also made this connection, they likely would have identified the daimonic speech in the line of the spirits in Jubilees and other Old Testament pseudepigrapha, namely as leading humanity to idolatry and the service of other gods. Finally, in 8:32b, Peter functions as Satan’s mouthpiece by rejecting the suffering messiahship that Jesus describes openly in vv. 31–32a, perhaps in favor of a miracle-working or martial one. Perhaps nowhere else in Mark’s Gospel do we have such an unequivocal statement affirming a 60 • D. B. Glover 79 Collins, Mark, p. 403. Cf. Collins, Mark, pp. 213–14, quoted at p. 404. Whether Satan is a daimon is a valid question. Whatever Satan’s origins, Mark seems to include him among the daimones (3:23), even if he is superior to them in some way. Without drawing the lines in the sand too starkly, this hierarchy seems to fit better within a Second Temple Jewish cosmology rather than a classically Greek cosmology (see Iamblichus, Vit. Pyth. 37, 40, 100; Plutarch, Rom. 28.8). 82 See Howard Clark Kee, ‘The Terminology of Mark’s Exorcism Stories’, NTS 14 (1968), pp. 232–46 and the response by Marcus, Mark, p. 193. 83 The parallels between Mark’s narrative in 8:31–33, in which Satan is identified as the source of Peter’s speech, and the narrative of T.Job. 25:9–25:6, in which Sitis ( Job’s wife) becomes a mouthpiece for Satan who ‘stands behind’ her ‘unsettling [her] reason so that he might deceive me too’ (26.6), are too strong to dismiss Jesus’s address of Peter as Satan as mere rhetoric. As Garrett (Temptations of Jesus, p. 78–9 and passim) argues rightly, the laconic temptation narrative (Mark 1:8–9) forces us to imagine that a) Satan as the agent behind all temptation in Mark’s Gospel (as is often recognized but seldom appreciated sufficiently) and b) this instance of daimonic and/or tempting speech manifests that Satanic temptation clearly. Garrett remarks, ‘in both texts, the righteous person discerns Satan’s agency in a human denial of the need to suffer’ (78). This is an instance of genuine Satanic testing, not merely Peter playing a similar role. Joachim Gnilka, Das Evangelium nach Markus (2 vols.; 3rd edn., EKK; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukircher Verlag, 1989), vol. 2, p. 17. 84 Garrett, Temptation of Jesus, p. 82. 85 Collins, Mark, pp. 403, 407. 80 81 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 properly Markan Christology than in 8:31–32a, 34–38 (cf. 9:12; 10:33–34). Here is a strong rejection of a martial Messianism: ‘for what does it benefit a person to gain the whole world and to forfeit his life?’ (8:36). As Collins notes, understood within the context of eschatological judgement (NB the δεῖ), ‘the teaching of v. 31 is a shocking inversion of the standard expectation of the messiah and his deeds’.79 The divine necessity of a suffering messiah is prefigured in the scriptures and ‘is now being revealed by the Markan Jesus to his disciples’.80 Peter’s vision of messiahship is political or charismatic, contrasting with the mysteries of the divine will, which is revealed only to those who are inside (cf. 4:11). So Peter ‘began to rebuke (ἐπιτιμᾶν)’ Jesus for defining his messiahship by his crucifixion and resurrection.81 Peter’s speech evokes the language of exorcism, so this scene can be read as a parodic exorcism, with Jesus on one side and Satan on the other (cf. 8:33b).82 Jesus, in turn, rebukes Peter/Satan, setting up a sharp contrast between a human and a divine messianism (cf. 8:33c).83 Although rightly recognizing Jesus’s messianic identity, he cannot abide a crucified messiah, and Jesus’s words suggest Satan bears responsibility for this incomprehension.84 If Peter/Satan does have a well-defined Christology, it is one detached from suffering, death, and resurrection. Peter likely advocates, instead, a martial messiah.85 Such a daimonic Christology is at odds with Mark’s own. This cruciform messianic conception, contrasted with that of Peter/Satan, also has a cruciform perspective on discipleship: those who follow should pick up their cross in like manner (8:34). Mark’s placement of this saying immediately after the encounter between Peter/Satan and Jesus serves to narrate Jesus’s rejection of that vision of messiahship by clarifying how those who follow in the way of Jesus should themselves respond. As in the case with daimones in the Homeric corpus, Mark’s daimones often set the conditions for the destruction of the person. This destruction does not merely include death. Jesus invites his own disciples to go the way of death, but only death of a certain kind. It is not death in battle or in victory but self-giving death ‘for the sake of the gospel’ (8:35). Here we do not have displays of power, military or charismatic, but displays of voluntary weakness by picking up one’s own cross in the manner of Jesus (8:34). The Christology of Mark’s daimones calls for a Davidic conquering messiah. To follow that messiah is to follow the futile attack of Peter in the garden (14:46–48), and to follow others to destruction (13:22–23; cf. Acts 5:36–39). But Jesus is a suffering rather than a militant messiah, calling followers not to arms but to carry their own cross. Mark’s Demonic Christology • 61 6. ANALY ZING THE SPEECH OF M ARK’S DAIMONES 86 This proposal may go some way to explaining Jesus’s anger (rather than ‘compassion’ in many manuscripts) towards the man with lepra (1:41), his exasperation at being asked for a sign (8:12), as well as his frustration for the exorcism request (9:19). These audiences miss the basis of his messiahship, a point made in 8:12. 87 Shively, ‘Characterizing’, pp. 143, 151. 88 Cf. Jesus’s self-identification as ‘the son’ in 13:32 and ‘son of the Blessed’ in 14:61. 89 See Telford, Theology of Mark’s Gospel, pp. 39–41; Adela Yarbro Collins, ‘Mark and His Readers: The Son of God among Jews’, HTR 92 (1999), pp. 393–408; eadem, ‘Son of God among Greeks and Romans’, pp. 85–100. 90 Brian K. Gamel, Mark 15:39 as a Markan Theology of Revelation: The Centurion’s Confession as Apocalyptic Unveiling (LNTS, 574; London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017). Even God’s audible declarations in 1:11 and 9:7–8 prove insufficient for the hearers to grasp the nature of Jesus’s divine sonship. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 As we have seen, the Christology of Mark’s daimones and that propounded by Mark’s Jesus and discursively by Mark himself stand in some tension with one another. Mark’s Jesus seems at every turn to reject the charismatic and especially the martial bases for his messiahship.86 Yet Mark’s daimones consistently confirm these features as fundamental to identifying Jesus. A full prosopopoetic analysis of the daimones’ speech is impossible because Mark omits several classic progymnastic topoi (age, social status, etc.) necessary for such an analysis, probably because such things are irrelevant to daimones. What we have, however, are the daimones’ actions, and their speech seems to share the character of their actions. While Mark’s daimones frequently work to drive humanity to destruction, either through idol worship (5:7), social ostracization (5:3–5), or perilous physical infirmity (5:6; 9:17–18, 20–22), their speech likewise misleads by offering a false (i.e. non-Markan) perception of Jesus’s messiahship. In presenting a charismatic and martial messiah, they offer the narrative audience a worldly hope of political dominance and power. This thirst for dominance and power misleads even the most prominent disciples in Mark’s Gospel (cf. 8:32; 10:35–45). And because revolt or insurrection was so dangerous in Roman antiquity, the daimones’ misleading speech also becomes dangerous. As Shively has proposed of their deeds, the daimones’ words too guide humanity towards destruction.87 But is their speech always misleading? Mark 3:11 says that ‘unclean spirits, when they would see him, fell before him and cried out saying, “You are the Son of God.”’ This speech would appear prima facie to display that the daimōn’s Christology is not far off from Mark’s own, since Mark centres his story of Jesus around four statements of his divine sonship (1:1; 1:10; 9:7; 15:39).88 Mark’s practice of prosopopoeia elsewhere, however, prompts us to take a closer look, since the speech may be misleading as is the case with some other ancient depictions of daimones. Indeed, as we have already established, Mark’s vision of divine sonship is far different than their own—and than popular expectation—since it is tied to Jesus’s passion. Because no singular meaning obtains in the phrase ‘Son of God’,89 it is necessary to determine the valence of a word or phrase wholly by its context. Mark’s daimones consistently associate Jesus’s identity as the Son of God with his displays of power. The acclamations themselves, therefore, give the wrong impression of Jesus’s messianic identity, even when the correct vocabulary is used. Perhaps this is why Peter, James, and John, all witnesses to these exorcisms, continue to so misunderstand Jesus’s identity later in the narrative (8:32; 10:35–45). Acclamations of Jesus as God’s son scarcely reflect Markan Christology if those acclamations are removed from his work on the cross, the singularly revelatory moment of Jesus’s true identity.90 The evidence from the Second Gospel, thus, strongly favours reading the daimones’ speech as misleading and untrustworthy. From the point of view of the constructed story-world, Mark’s daimonic speech understands Jesus’s divine sonship with reference to his charismatic displays of power or expectations of a martial messiahship. Neither miraculous nor military displays, however, are constitutive of Jesus’s divine sonship. Only his crucifixion plays that role. The daimones’ 62 • D. B. Glover ‘Son of God’ proclamations, then, represent a misleading Christology of glory rather than a Markan Christology of the cross.91 7. CONCLUSION 91 Weeden, Mark, pp. 65–8. Luz, ‘Das Geheimnismotiv’, pp. 9–30. The healing of Bartimaeus in 10:46–52 poses no problem to my claim since Jesus has already entered Jerusalem in fulfilment of his passion predictions and because his blindness may also symbolize spiritual ‘blindness’ (either his own or that of Jesus’s disciples). Cf. 4:12. 92 93 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/jts/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jts/flae005/7614000 by guest on 25 May 2024 Analysis of the prosopopoetic role of daimones in Mediterranean antiquity opens to us the possibility that Mark’s daimones are not always reliable mouthpieces for conveying Mark’s own Christology as contemporary interpreters typically assume. By placing Mark’s Gospel into this rhetorical and literary context, I propose that there are reasons to suspect their speech is misleading. My analysis leads to the following conclusion: Mark’s daimones offer a Christology of glory, characterized by charismatic and martial power, which contrasts with Mark’s own Christology of the cross, a Christology which finds expression in Jesus’s own confession of his messiahship. In some cases, the titles Mark’s daimones employ are not far from what Mark or his audience would have themselves affirmed (e.g. 3:11). The content communicated by those titles, however, is quite different. Mark’s daimones present a Christology of power and may be understood to attribute Jesus’s power to the wrong source (5:7). Mark’s literary purpose for these misleading Christological proclamations seems similar to his messianic secrecy motif—namely, to put Mark’s crucio-centric Christology in sharper relief.92 Mark’s Christology is defined by Jesus’s passion: to identify Jesus as the Son of God or messiah without reference to the cross is to misidentify him entirely. The centrality of the cross for Mark’s conception of the messiah also helps explain the messianic secret motif: Jesus silences all Christologies detached from the cross.93 Thus, Mark’s unclean spirits turn out to be poor teachers of his audience. These daimones do not represent reliable guides to Jesus’s messianic identity, according to Mark. Instead, readers should attend to Jesus’s own proclamations of his messiahship to understand it, which produces a messiahship bound inexorably to the cross.