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Seth's avatar

I have been trying to come up with scholarship that has some kind of speculation as to what sources the author of Mark may have used.

Religion & History | Tanner A.'s avatar

And speculations are all you can get since there is no consensus.

Burton Mack in A Myth of Innocence argues Mark was drawing on a sayings collection similar to Q, plus earlier written or oral accounts of the passion already circulating. Helmut Koester did substantial work on pre-Markan sources, arguing the passion account in particular looks like it was assembled from earlier independent units rather than composed fresh.

John Dominic Crossan went further and proposed a "Cross Gospel" embedded in the Gospel of Peter as a source Mark used, though most scholars don't buy it.

For the miracle stories specifically, Paul Achtemeier made an influential argument that Mark inherited two pre-existing collections of miracle stories, each following a similar pattern, and combined them into a single sequence.

Mel's avatar

What version of Mark do you recommend reading from your sources?

Religion & History | Tanner A.'s avatar

The NRSV is the standard scholarly choice; it's what most of the academics I cite use, and the New Oxford Annotated Bible (NRSV) gives you the notes that flag where the text is doing something interesting.