Note 93 — Chapter IV · DEATH AND RESURRECTION OF JESUS.

If we turn to the third account, that of Mark, to ascertain whether he may not perhaps be the nearest to the fact: we find it so incoherent, and composed of materials so little capable of being fitted together, that such a relation is not to be thought of. After it has been already narrated that early in the morning of the day succeeding the Sabbath the women came to the grave of Jesus, and were informed by an angel of his resurrection, but out of fear said nothing to any one of the appearance which they had seen (xvi. 1–8): at v. 9, as if nothing had previously been said either of the resurrection or of the time at which it happened, the narrator proceeds: Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils, ἀναστὰς δὲ πρωὶ πρώτῃ σαββάτων ἐφάνη πρῶτον Μαρίᾳ τῇ Μαγδαληνῇ. This statement also does not suit the foregoing narrative, because this is not formed on the supposition of an appearance specially intended for Mary Magdalene: on the contrary, as she is said to be informed by an angel of the resurrection of Jesus, together with two other women, Jesus could not have appeared to her beforehand; while afterwards, on her way to the city, she was in company with the other women, when, according to Matthew, they were all actually met by Jesus. Whether on this account we are to regard the end of the gospel of Mark, from v. 9, as a later addition,93 is indeed doubtful, from the want of decisive critical grounds, and still more from the abruptness of the conclusion ἐφοβοῦντο γὰρ, for they were afraid, which the gospel would then present: but in any case we have here a narrative which the author, without any clear idea of the state of the fact and the succession of the events, hastily compiled out of the heterogeneous elements of the current legend, which he knew not how to manage.