THE PROBLEM OF THE MESSIANIC SECRET

BY

DAVID E. AUNE Chicago

WILLIAM WREDE is still with us. His radical solution to the problem of the messianic secret in the Gospel of Mark is a vigorously debated today as it was when his book, Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien, was first published sixty-eight years ago 1). This continu- ed interest is primarily due to the problems which WREDE raised concerning the interpretation of the text of Mark in its present form 2). Those problems necessitated the annulment of the ille- gitimate marriage between the "Markan hypothesis" and liberal theology. ALBERT SCHWEITZER, whose book Das Messianitats- und Leidensgeheimnis also appeared in igoi, was in complete agreement over the relevance of the problems which were raised by WREDE. Although his answers were diametrically opposed to those of WREDE, SCHWEITZER clearly recognized that it was the assumptions held in common with WREDE and himself which would prove fatal to liberal theology's version of the Markan hypothesis, and not one or the other of their solutions. The basic difference in viewpoint between WREDE and SCHWEITZER is still maintained in a modified and developed form in current trends of research. While WREDE worked from the standpoint of literary criticism and arrived at a position of "thoroughgoing skepticism" 3), SCHWEITZER arrived at his position of "thoroughgoing " by means of historical criticism. Methodologically, WREDE was one of the more significant prede- cessors of the later foymgeschiclatliche and redaktionsgeschichtliche schools of New Testament criticism. SCHWEITZER'S provided the impetus for a new emphasis on the

1) WILHELMWREDE, Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1901). The book was reprinted in 1963. 2) ALBERT SCHWEITZERraised almost identical questions in The Quest of the , trans. W. Montgomery (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1909), pp. 334-36. 3) Ibid., p. 33°. 2 eschatology of Jesus and the early Church on the part of New Testament scholars. The realized eschatology of C. H. DODD and RUDOLF OTTO arose in reaction to SCHWEITZER, while a more mediating position developed in the direction of the sich yealisierende eschatology of JoACHm2 JEREMIAS. T. W. MANSON, a distinguished adherent of realized eschatology, was convinced that "... the farther we travel along the Wredestrasse, the clearer it becomes that it is the road to nowhere" 1). In his recent review of the second edition of the collection of essays in honor of C. H. DODD in which the quotation from MANSON was found, NORMAN PERRIN rather sanguinely asserted that "The Wredestrasse Becomes the Haupt- strasse" 2). The former has clearly rejected the stone, while the latter has made it head of the corner.

Summary and Cyiticism of Wyede's Hypothesis The primary features of the Markan account which interested WREDE were those which were linked together by what he sup- posed to be a common secrecy motif: (I) Jesus commanded the demons to keep silence, for they recognized him (Mk. i 23 ff., 34, iii m ff., v 6 f., ix 20), (2) Those who were healed by Jesus were enjoined to remain silent (Mk. i 44, v 43, vii 36, viii 26), (3) His disciples were ordered not to reveal that he was the after Peter's confession (Mk. viii 30), (4) Jesus asked his disciples not to speak of the Transfiguration until after the (Mk. ix 9), and (5) Jesus frequently withdrew from the crowd to go on secret trips with his disciples and gave private instruction to them (Mk. iv 10-13, 34, vii 17-23, ix 28 ff., viii I, ix 31, x 32-34, xiii 3 ff.). WREDE concluded that the messianic secret in Mark was a theo- logical and apologetic device of the early Christian community which the second evangelist heightened and brought to literary expression 3). According to WREDE, Jesus had made no explicit or implicit messianic claims during his lifetime. Mark ix 9 provided strong evidence for him that the belief that Jesus was the Messiah did not arise until after the Resurrection. St. Mark and his pre- decessors firmly believed that Jesus was the Messiah, a fact that 1) T. W. MANSON,"The Life of Jesus: Some Tendencies in Present-day Research", The Background of the New Testament and its Eschatology, ed. W. D. Davies and D. Daube (Cambridge: The University Press, 1956), p. 216. 2) NORMANPERRIN, "The Wredestrasse Becomes the Hauptstrasse: A Review Article," Journal of Religion, XLVI (1966), 296-300. 3) WREDEhimself thought the messianic secret to be older than Mark, p. 145.