The Secret of the Kingdom of God: The Literary and Theological Achievement of the Evangelist Mark by Hugh Humphrey

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Secret of the Kingdom of God: The Literary and Theological Achievement of the Evangelist Mark by Hugh Humphrey Susan M. (Elli) Elliott hugh humphrey, The Secret of the Kingdom of God: The Literary and Theological Achievement of the Evangelist Mark (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2019). Pp. xiv + 179. $100. Hugh Humphrey offers a literary analysis of the Gospel of Mark, presenting the Gospel writer as a well-educated creative author trained in the literary conventions of his day. H. intends to elucidate what the “secret” or “mystery” of the kingdom of God is in Mark’s Gospel and to show that this expression does not refer to “‘heaven’ or ‘something after death’” (p. vii). [End Page 146] In his introduction, H. provides a concise view of what he considers a “new paradigm” of interpretation of Mark. He locates the beginning of this paradigm in the sociorhetorical methods that Vernon K. Robbins advanced starting in the 1980s and in the work of the Markan Literary Sources Seminar of the Society of Biblical Literature begun in 2010 (pp. x–xi). H. identifies this paradigm as “new” in distinction, first, from previous scholarly focus on Mark as a source of evidence for the historical Jesus based on the consensus source theory of Marcan priority and, second, from assumptions of form and redaction criticism that reduce Mark to what H. describes as “a cut-and-paste compiler of oral traditions” (p. x) rather than a skilled and creative author. H.’s discernment of this “new paradigm” omits mention of decades of other major work on Mark’s Gospel, including performance critics’ work on its narrative unity and authorial creativity and other scholars’ work on Roman imperial contexts that provide background for its core terminology and concepts. Following the introduction, H. presents several elements of his literary analysis in a series of readable short chapters. In chap. 1, he explains his theory of layers of development in Mark. The second chapter discusses the chreia as a rhetorical convention and lists chreiai in Mark with a comment on and full translation of each passage. The next three chapters discuss specific literary sources for Mark, starting with H.’s own exposition of Mark’s use of the Wisdom of Solomon to portray Jesus as the “righteous man” in the image found there. Evaluative reviews follow, first of Adam Winn’s work on Mark’s use of the Elijah/Elisha narratives and then of Dennis MacDonald’s work on the Gospel’s reliance on Homer (Adam Winn, Mark and the Elijah-Elisha Narrative: Considering the Practice of Greco-Roman Imitation in the Search for Markan Source Material [Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2010]; Dennis R. MacDonald, The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark [New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000]). Another chapter details Mark’s use of other sources, including Jewish Scriptures, a passion narrative, some sayings from Q, and Plato’s Timaeus. Overall H.’s presentation effectively demonstrates that Mark drew on more than one source and on Greek as well as Jewish sources. He avoids the pitfalls of claiming any single source as “the” explanatory source for the Gospel. H. shows that Mark used literary conventions of his time, pointing especially to chreia and mimesis. In chap. 7, H. provides a detailed summary of the entire Gospel detailing its literary sources and construction passage by passage. Before a brief epilogue and an appendix that includes a full translation of the Gospel with indications of the literary sources, H.’s final full chapter offers what could be a stand-alone exposition on the theme introduced in his title, The Secret of the Kingdom of God. He focuses on the teachings assembled in Mark 4, especially the parable of the sower (vv. 3–9) and its explanation (vv. 13–20) along with the key message from Jesus to the disciples in v. 11 that the secret of the kingdom of God has been given to them. H. sees this “secret” as the image of authentic discipleship as bearing good fruit offered in the explanation of the parable. H.’s analysis points most constructively to a shift of focus in the interpretation of Mark. H. redirects...