Overview

This volume adds to the scholarly interpretive discourses surrounding the Gospel of Mark and argues that the author of Mark attempts to re-construct social identity after the Second Temple’s demise. After the destruction of the Temple, Mark questioned his self-identity through sentiments of social alienation and expressed these emotions through lamenting lost socio-cultural institutions, utilizing creative intellectual attempts to reconcile his lost social-cultural identifiers. The volume analyzes theories regarding the concepts of nationality, identity, and exile, and proposes that Mark is an example of exilic literature, which can be understood through the larger umbrella of post-colonial literature. Readers gain a new understanding of the Gospel of Mark and a new way of dissecting it within a theoretical lens of exilic literature. Exile, Identity, and Reconstructing Belonging in the Gospel of Mark is of interest to students and scholars of Mark and the Gospels, as well as those working on exilic literature and post-colonial theories in the Bible more broadly.

Full Product Details

9781041220466

Table of Contents

Reviews

""Wright’s makes a compelling and much-needed intervention in Markan studies. Against the prevailing consensus, Wright proposes that we rethink the Gospel’s setting and social world: the Markan Jesus does not inhabit a realistic world of the 30s CE, nor does Mark even depict his own social world. Instead, Wright encourages us to think of Mark’s world as one caught up in the complex and symbolically-charged relations of the post-War period. Mark emerges as a creative and sophisticated text, challenging its first readers to ponder their new situation and confront their own feelings of alienation with its own novel interpretations of Jesus’ life."" - Christopher B. Zeichmann, Toronto Metropolitan University, Canada

Author Information

Allan E.C. Wright is an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Alberta, Canada. He is the author of “Better to Reign in Hell, Than Serve in Heaven:” Satan’s Metamorphosis From a Heavenly Council Member to the Ruler of Pandaemonium.

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