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Let the Reader Understand: Essays in Honor of Elizabeth Struthers Malbon

2020; Eisenbrauns; Volume: 30; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5325/bullbiblrese.30.3.0466

2576-0998

Charles Nathan Riddlehoover,

Biblical Studies and Interpretation

This volume is a Festschrift edited by Edwin K. Broadhead to celebrate the life and scholarship of Elizabeth Struthers Malbon. Malbon occupied a number of academic positions throughout her career but most recently retired as the Director and Emerita Professor of Religion and Culture in the Religious Studies Program, Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, in Blacksburg, VA. She made her mark in the NT guild through her prolific writing on the Gospel of Mark and numerous academic memberships and scholarly organizations. Malbon’s legacy resonates throughout the following essays and the consensus agrees that her extraordinary grace as a teacher, mentor, colleague, and friend are beyond compare. Her reach within the field extends even beyond exegetical matters to topics of poetry/art and social issues.The celebration of Malbon’s legacy begins with an enumeration of her educational achievements, employment, honors/awards, publications, and offices occupied. Next, David M. Rhoads, John R. Donahue, and Robert Fowler add personal and touching tributes to the beginning pages of the volume. These tributes outline Malbon’s extensive work in the implementation of narrative criticism to Gospel scholarship. The chapters of the book are split into five parts. Part 1 continues with the introductory tributes with a chapter devoted to the creative achievements of Malbon. The chapter is entitled “Meaning as Narrative” (Werner H. Kelber). Part 2 contains three chapters that discuss methodological issues. Chapter 2 (R. Alan Culpepper) examines Malbon’s contribution to Markan Christology, ch. 3 (Elizabeth E. Shively) considers Mark’s development of disciples from a narrative perspective, and ch. 4 (Kelly R. Iverson) describes the study of characterization and what might be gained by recent developments in orality.Part 3 focuses on studies in characterization. This section differentiates itself from the previous section in that it gives working examples of characterization in Mark’s Gospel. The previous section focused on the methodology of characterization. The first chapter in this section seeks to explore the topic of Mark’s Jesus with a particular emphasis on his actions (Joanna Dewey). Chapter 6 (Christopher W. Skinner) examines the character of Jesus from the longer ending of Mark (16:9–20). Chapter 7 (Joel F. Williams) studies the characterization of demons in Mark’s Gospel. Chapter 8 (Edwin K. Broadhead) considers the role of the prophet. While the role is typically defined by its preaching, wilderness sojourns, unusual clothing, and strange diets, Broadhead argues that the waiting guest room in Mark’s Gospel adds an unexplored dimension. Chapter 9 (Mikeal C. Parsons) studies the character of the good Samaritan through the lens of Malbon’s “reflected Christology.” Chapter 10 (David L. Barr) concludes part 3 with the characterization of Jesus within John’s Apocalypse. Barr argues that this characterization is developed not through the means of unveiling but rather through disguising and hiding Jesus behind other characters.Part 4 focuses on narrative readings in Mark’s Gospel and the writings of Paul. Chapter 11 (Ira Brent Driggers) revisits Mark’s depiction of the poor widow (Mark 12:41–44). Chapter 12 (David J.A. Clines) provides a gender analysis of the Magnificat, asking how the three main characters in the narrative are formed—God, Mary, and the others. Chapter 13 (Calvin J. Roetzel) argues that there is a literary dependence in Mark’s Gospel on the writings of Paul. Chapter 14 (Jerry L. Sumney) looks at the motif of suffering in Paul. Sumney examines how suffering is situated in contexts of eschatology, ways in which suffering is vicarious, and the ways suffering involves imitation in Paul’s writings. Chapter 15 (Brian Pritt) changes focuses away from Mark and Paul with an examination of Gen 32 and the story of Jacob’s nocturnal wrestling. The essay is ingenuously titled “The First Sports Injury.”Part 5 concludes the volume with an emphasis on esthetic and political readings of Scripture and their application to contemporary problems. In the first contribution (ch. 16), Robert C. Tannehill examines the topics of love and forgiveness in the synoptic Gospels and how they apply to the modern criminal justice system in the United States. Chapter 17 (J. Cheryl Exum) gives a reading of Luke’s Annunciation in light of Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s Ecce Ancilla Domini. The essay draws conclusions from the beauty of the artwork—its simplicity, realism, and color scheme. Chapter 18 (Heidi J. Hornik) forms the second essay concerning art. This essay focuses on the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus. Hornik examines the scholarship since Malbon’s monograph on the subject in 1990 and focuses on the significance of a youthful and beardless Christ. Chapter 19 (Geert Van Oyen) juxtaposes the paradoxical presentation of God in Mark’s Gospel with The Table of Silence of Constantin Brancusi. Chapter 20 (Philip Ruge-Jones) analyzes the spatial and social dimensions of eschatos in Mark 5:21–43 and how it relates to texts in Spanish, the author’s particular critical approach, and ramifications for Latin American biblical scholarship. Chapter 21 (Richard Walsh) compares Mark’s Gospel and Jesus of Montreal as parables. The terms of engagement are paraphrase, parody, and parataxis. Chapter 22 (Cynthia Briggs Kittredge) has a poetic emphasis. Kittredge traces the theme of speech and agency in Mark’s characters through the medium of poetry. Chapter 23 (Edwin K. Broadhead) concludes the volume with a summation of the impact of narrative criticism, creative achievements of Malbon, collegial connections between Malbon and the volume’s contributors, future connections between literary methodology and other fields of study, and the power of showing the story of Jesus.This volume is equally valuable as a piece of Markan scholarship and touching tribute to a Markan scholar. Nearly every essay displays outstanding exegetical insights alongside an anecdotal story about how each author knew Malbon or were deeply influenced by her work. In ch. 22, Cynthia Briggs Kittredge even provides some of her own poetry inspired by the scholarship of Malbon. As David Rhoads notes, Malbon was one of the early pioneers of narrative criticism and its relationship to biblical scholarship. The essays of this volume show the trajectory of the beginnings of narrative criticism in biblical studies to its potential for ongoing studies. For this reason, this volume will help to inspire the next generation of Markan scholars who will sit on the foundations that Malbon began to establish more than 40 years ago. In so doing, others will participate in the ongoing progress of getting to know the primary character within Mark’s Gospel—the character of Jesus.