THE MESSIANIC SECRET
Another feature is that Jesus reveals that he is the Messiah in Parables which his disciples cannot understand. For example, the Parable of the Sower seems to mean that Jesus is the Messiah and his teachings are a "seed" that will grow in some people's souls but not in others. Why doesn't Jesus say this more plainly? Jesus explains:
The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables - Mark 4: 11 Wrede thinks that this means Jesus is DELIBERATELY being mysterious and speaking in Parables because he doesn't WANT ordinary people to know he is the Messiah
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a tension in the belief of the Early Church of Jesus as Messiah and the unmessianic character of Jesus' ministry - MORNA HOOKER
if he believed himself to be in any sense the Messiah, the last thing he would do was to claim the title for himself - Morna Hooker
it would have been misunderstood as a claim to political kingship - Morna Hooker
the truth about Jesus is at once hidden from view and yet spelt out on every page of the gospel’ - Morna Hooker
Finally, there's the Triumphal Entry where Jesus arrives in Jerusalem and is greeted as a king. This scene is described in Mark and in the other Synoptic Gospels and in John.
Jesus makes no attempt to silence the crowd, who wave palms (symbolising liberation from oppression) and declare that he is from the line of David. Jesus has obviously planned his entrance, arriving on a donkey to symbolise that he is coming in peace not as a warrior - and fulfilling a prophecy from Zechariah in the Old Testament about the appearance of the Messiah. There's no secrecy here but a very public claim by Jesus to be the Messiah.
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YES
The Messianic Secret is a theory which explains why Jesus is so secretive in Mark's Gospel but this secretiveness disappears in the later Gospels. It makes sense of Jesus speaking in Parables that hide his real meaning.
The theory is supported by the view that 1st century Jews did not expect a Suffering Messiah or interpret Isaiah's Suffering Servant as a Messiah. Jesus' disciples would not have understood him identifying as the Messiah so these passages must be later fictions.
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NO
The theory exaggerates the secretiveness in Mark's Gospel. The healed leper doesn't keep the miracle a secret and Jesus is mobbed by crowds. The Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem is a public statement of Messianic identity.
Not everyone agrees that 1st century Jews didn't expect a Suffering Messiah. There are other plausible explanations for Jesus' secrecy, such as wanting to avoid political entanglements or celebrity that distracted from his mission and message.
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