Gospel of Mark vs. Republic of Plato

[liamconnor]

Just curious, as I don't doubt the attributions of either book, but...

1) Who wrote the so called Republic that we now have, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

2) Who wrote the so called gospel of Mark as we now have it, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

(Wikipedia is not an ancient resource).

[Divine Insight]

Just curious, as I don't doubt the attributions of either book, but...

1) Who wrote the so called Republic that we now have, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

Why should I care who wrote it? Putting a name to the author wouldn't mean anything to me. I still wouldn't know the person who wrote it. Nor should it matter. All that matters is whether or not I find the content compelling.

2) Who wrote the so called gospel of Mark as we now have it, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

Same thing applies here. Whether or not I find the story compelling is all that matters.

The other thing that you haven't mentioned here is that the gospel of Mark was obviously written within the context of a much larger religious paradigm that included all of the rumors and tales of the Old Testament fables of Yahweh.

So in the case of the gospel of Mark I have the added advantage of already knowing that the tales it is based upon are already deeply flawed with self-contradictions and are totally unconvincing.

So there's an entire cultural superstition associated with the gospel of Mark that cannot be ignored.

Who the person named Mark might have been is totally irrelevant since I wouldn't have known him anyway.

The bottom line for me when it comes to the Christian religion is that I see no reason to believe that a supposedly omnipotent all-wise God would be as ignorant as the Christian dogma portrays their God to be. It's not a compelling theology.

So why even bother focusing on Mark? That's just one of a myriad of unconvincing tales associated with this particular religious mythology.

By the way, since you are focusing on the gospel of Mark what's up with these claims that are made in this gospel?

Mark 16:
[17] And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
[18] They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

We know that no human exhibits these signs.

Do you know of anyone who can drink any deadly thing and it won't hurt them?

Do you know of anyone who can cure the sick by simply laying their hands on them?

So what's the difference who Mark might have been? Clearly the things written about here are not true. So who might have written these things a moot point.

[Zzyzx]

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Concerning authorship of the two works mentioned:

The person who wrote The Republic (that we now have) demonstrated high intelligence and wide knowledge by what was said. The person who wrote the gospel does not appear to display evidence of such intelligence or knowledge by what was said.

From The Republic: The principles of definition, the law of contradiction, the fallacy of arguing in a circle, the distinction between the essence and accidents of a thing or notion, between means and ends, between causes and conditions; also the division of the mind into the rational, concupiscent, and irascible elements, or of pleasures and desires into necessary and unnecessary
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1497/1497-h/1497-h.htm

From the Gospel Mark: Dead bodies come back to life, casting out demons, rooster crowing

[Willum]

Easily understood by modifying the title.

Gospel of Mark vs. Republic of Plato vs. Grimm's Fairy Tales

Christians would arbitrarily group the first two together, and obviously exclude the third.
Non-theists, Jews, Hindu, Hellenists, and in fact every other religion but Christianity, would group the 1st and3rd together, obviously.

Let's expand the title again:

Gospel of Mark vs. Republic of Plato vs. Grimm's Fairy Tales vs The Vedas

We have similar obvious distinctions by belief.
Of course all agree that the Republic is a valid work.

It has to do with the claims of the work.
Fairytale-like claims verses applicable ones.

[Difflugia]

Just curious, as I don't doubt the attributions of either book, but...

1) Who wrote the so called Republic that we now have, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

I'm not a particular fan of Greek philosophy, so Wikipedia

In the spirit of what you're asking, though, the reason that Plato is important at all is because of his writing. If we say that Plato didn't exist or that all of our present works attributed to him are pseudonymous, then it only matters in an academic sense because "Plato" is just the guy that wrote the Platonic dialogues. In that sense, Plato is more similar to Paul than to Mark. Like Paul, we have works attributed to Plato that are considered to be almost certainly genuine, a number that are possibly genuine, and some that are almost certainly spurious. The main reason I have for thinking that both Paul and Plato existed is that they both seem to be important because of their writings. Without their amazing writing in the first place, who would attribute a forgery to them?

For that reason, though, it wouldn't surprise me much if either Paul or Plato were shown to be an idealized character created as a mythical founder of their respective schools of thought (Pauline churches, Platonic philosophers) that arose more organically as sort of collective, "grass roots" efforts. Maybe the name originally meant something else (Nazarite, Nazorean, Nazarene?) or maybe the original Paul or Plato was a much less accomplished writer that was overshadowed by the refined talent of later students. How would we know and what would it matter?

2) Who wrote the so called gospel of Mark as we now have it, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?

We probably don't know. The apparent origin of attribution to "Mark" is from Papias (technically, Eusebius quoting Papias from a document that we no longer have). Papias wrote this:

And John the Presbyter also said this, Mark being the interpeter of Peter, whatsoever he recorded he wrote with great accuracy, but not however, in the order in which it was spoken or done by our Lord, for he neither heard nor followed our Lord, but as before said, he was in company with Peter, who gave him such instruction as was necessary, but not to give a history of our Lord's discourses: wherefore Mark has not erred in any thing, by writing some things as he has recorded them; for he was carefully attentive to one thing, not to pass by any thing that he heard, or to state any thing falsely in these accounts.

The problem with this is that it doesn't sound like our Gospel of Mark. Though that quote is often used as an apologetic explanation for why things happen in a slightly different order between Matthew and Mark, the document that Papias describes was made up of "instruction" from Peter rather than "a history of our Lord's discourses." Our Mark sounds much more like a history of our Lord's discourses than instruction from Peter. It's also mostly in chronological order, even considering the minor discrepancies with Matthew.

Irenaeus is the one that took the description of Papias and attached it to what we know as the Gospel of Mark by quoting from it. Every other early Christian writer that I'm aware of simply takes Irenaeus at his word. The reason I doubt Irenaeus about Mark is because he did the same thing with Matthew. Papias said that "Matthew composed his history in the Hebrew dialect," but once again, offered no quotations or other identification of what he meant by Matthew's history. Again, Irenaeus is the one that attached the Matthew of Papias to what we now know as the Gospel of Matthew. The problem there is that there's little evidence that Matthew was written in anything other than Greek (however, Google the phrase "Aramaic primacy" to read about the minority view that most or all of the New Testament was written in Aramaic, then translated into Greek).

If Mark were just some guy that was unknown except for his Gospel, it wouldn't matter. He'd just be a one-hit-wonder version of Plato or Paul. A stated reason that his Gospel was considered for canonization, though, is that the "Mark" of Papias accompanied Peter and was thus at least attached to an Apostle. That's also the source of much "eyewitness" rhetoric amongst those claiming reliability of the Gospels.

When I say or write "Mark," I personally mean "whoever wrote what we call the Gospel of Mark." I have no reason to think that it was actually a Mark that knew Peter, though. Instead, it's possible (though there are reasons to think Papias himself wasn't particularly reliable) that there was a Gospel written by Mark, friend of Peter, but we no longer have it.

[Zzyzx]

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Does it matter in modern life if Plato existed?

Does it matter in modern life if Jesus existed?

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 2 by Divine Insight]

liamconnor wrote:

Just curious, as I don't doubt the attributions of either book, but...

1) Who wrote the so called Republic that we now have, and how do you know? What are the ancient resources that you consult? When were these written?


Why should I care who wrote it? Putting a name to the author wouldn't mean anything to me. I still wouldn't know the person who wrote it. Nor should it matter. All that matters is whether or not I find the content compelling.

A further curiosity, why comment on this particular post?

[liamconnor]

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Concerning authorship of the two works mentioned:

The person who wrote The Republic (that we now have) demonstrated high intelligence and wide knowledge by what was said. The person who wrote the gospel does not appear to display evidence of such intelligence or knowledge by what was said.

From The Republic: The principles of definition, the law of contradiction, the fallacy of arguing in a circle, the distinction between the essence and accidents of a thing or notion, between means and ends, between causes and conditions; also the division of the mind into the rational, concupiscent, and irascible elements, or of pleasures and desires into necessary and unnecessary
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1497/1497-h/1497-h.htm

From the Gospel Mark: Dead bodies come back to life, casting out demons, rooster crowing

I do not see how this answer is pertinent to the historical question being asked here. If you do not know any more who wrote the Republic than who wrote Mark, then you do not know whether or not Mark was an associate of an eyewitness of Jesus' activities. And if you do not know whether Mark had interviewed an eyewitness of Jesus' activities, then you can hardly dismiss the contents of Mark as TALES.


(Oh, and Plato believed in the reincarnation of the soul; as well as transcendent Ideas).

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 6 by Zzyzx]

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Does it matter in modern life if Plato existed?

Does it matter in modern life if Jesus existed?

For people who don't care much to think about things other than their own day to day existence, probably not. But then one wonders why such people would participate in a site such as this; more, why they would feel qualified to debate such topics as history, philosophy etc.

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 5 by Difflugia]

In the spirit of what you're asking, though, the reason that Plato is important at all is because of his writing. If we say that Plato didn't exist or that all of our present works attributed to him are pseudonymous, then it only matters in an academic sense because "Plato" is just the guy that wrote the Platonic dialogues. In that sense, Plato is more similar to Paul than to Mark. Like Paul, we have works attributed to Plato that are considered to be almost certainly genuine, a number that are possibly genuine, and some that are almost certainly spurious. The main reason I have for thinking that both Paul and Plato existed is that they both seem to be important because of their writings. Without their amazing writing in the first place, who would attribute a forgery to them?

Thank you for a thorough and thoughtful and non-hostile response.

However, such was not the "spirit" in which I wrote. The Republic does not identify its author; nor does Mark. Skeptics do not seem to have a problem (or perhaps they have never thought of the issue) that it Plato, friend of Socrates, who wrote the book. Why? What outside source do they trust? Eusebius seems to attribute the 2nd gospel to a Mark, even a John Mark mentioned in the N.T. But this attribution is met with scorn. Why?

What difference between the two explains this difference in attitude?