THE STRUCTURE OF MARK’S GOSPEL: CURRENT PROPOSALS

For many decades now Markan scholarship has struggled to uncover the structure of Mark’s gospel. With the advent of literary/narrative criticism the struggle has intensified to understand how the gospel unfolds in order to tell its story of Jesus. This article surveys recent and current proposals that have been advanced for Mark’s gospel. Some scholars have judged that there is no structure; others have found a highly complex web of inter-related sections. While many proposals use a mixture of principles to derive the alleged structure, an attempt has been made to classify the proposals based upon the primary principle used. These categories include: topography/ geography; theological themes; Sitz im Leben of the recipients; literary factors. Tannehill remarks that ‘outlining narratives is not a neat endeavor ’ (1995: 170). His observation can be corroborated by looking at the numerous proposals that Markan scholars offer for the structure of this gospel. Con