AbstractThis study explored Jesus’ social interactions in Mark’s Gospel for good leadership practice in Ghana. It employed Ghanaian traditional models of leadership, which hold that leadership is interaction. Jesus is situated in his macro socio-cultural context in the study, and his leadership model is re-described using social interactionism as an entry point. The study thus analysed how leadership is conveyed through interaction by observing Jesus’ interaction as performed in Mark’s Gospel. Social interactionism analytical tools from Goffman and Mead made it plausible to re-imagine and observe Jesus. Tools like Ritual making, Frame making, Characterisation, Encounter processing, Stage making and Role-taking informed by Ghanaian traditional notion of leadership were used to analyse the four selected passages (Mark 6:30-44; 7:1-23; 7:24-30; 10:35-45). The analysis addressed and affirmed both the main hypothesis that ‘if leadership is interaction, how did Jesus interact?’ And the subsidiary hypothesis that ‘if Jesus’ social interactions convey leadership principles, how do the underlying nuances in his social interaction contribute to leadership understanding?’ The study consists of six chapters. Chapter one is the introduction, which sets out the study and reviews literature on Jesus’ leadership. It notes two gaps. First, a gap in the knowledge about the social interaction of Jesus, which could be drawn towards understanding his leadership principles. Second, a gap in filtering Jesus’ leadership through the Akan cultural lens for relevant leadership practises for the African context. With these in mind, the Ghanaian (African) traditional notion of leadership and African leadership challenges were discussed. Chapter two delineates the social interactionalism as the theoretical perspective for the study. Six analytical tools, stated earlier, were delineated from Goffman’s Interactional Order and Presentation of Self, and Mead’s Mind, Self and Society to re-imagine Jesus in the Gospel of Mark. Chapter three deals with the historical, literary and the socio-cultural settings of Mark. It establishes Jesus in his macro socio-cultural context. Chapter four analyses the four selected passages through the analytical tools of social interactionalism informed by Ghanaian (African) traditional notion of leadership. Chapter five outlines the leadership principles gleaned from interactions in the four passages as analysed in the previous chapter. Chapter six, focuses on the implication of the Jesus-performed leadership principles on leadership in Ghana (Africa). The study establishes that the reception of Jesus as the Son of God and Son of man are not mere Christological titles but more significantly, leadership categories. From the Ghanaian traditional notions of leadership, the study finds Jesus as reflecting the distinguished leadership categories of ’nyimpa’ and ‘opanyin’. In addition, over 104 Jesus-performed Interactional leadership principles gleaned from his interactions form the foundation for his Social Interactional Leadership model. These principles challenge the leadership being practiced in Ghana today. The study concludes that Jesus consciously fashioned his interactions to achieve his vision and mission and modelled his leadership to his associates (disciples), followers (crowd) and even his opponents. The study postulates that these principles when applied to Ghanaian (African) leadership will result in social transformation, and leaders will become reformers and builders.

AbstractProfessor Adela Yarbro Collins brings to bear on the text of the first Gospel the latest historical-critical perspectives, providing a full treatment of such controversial issues as the relationship of canonical Mark to the "Secret Gospel of Mark" and the text of the Gospel, including its longer endings. She situates the Gospel, with its enigmatic portrait of the misunderstood Messiah, in the context of Jewish and Greco-Roman literature of the first century. Her comments draw on her profound knowledge of apocalyptic literature as well as on the traditions of popular biography in the Greco-Roman world to illuminate the overall literary form of the Gospel. The commentary also introduces an impressive store of data on the language and style of Mark, illustrated from papyrological and epigraphical sources. Collins is in constructive dialogue with the wide range of scholarship on Mark that has been produced in the twentieth century. Her work will be foundational for Markan scholarship in the first half of the twenty-first century.

AbstractThis book takes the established fields of orality, performance, and first-century Christian healthcare studies further by combining analogues of praise performances to Apollo, Asclepius, and those from the Dondo people of South Eastern Zimbabwe to propose that Jesus's healing stories in Mark's Gospel are praise-giving narratives to Jesus as the best folk healer within the region of Capernaum. The book argues that the memory of Jesus as the folk healer from Capernaum survived and possibly functioned in similar contexts of praise-giving within early Christian households. The book goes through each healing story in Mark's Gospel and imaginatively listens to it through the ears of analogue from praise-giving given to Greek healers/heroes and similar practices among the Dondo people. The power, completeness, and effectiveness in which Jesus healed each of the mentioned conditions provoke praise-giving from the listeners to the best folk healer in the village. In each instance, while Mark is calling for attention to the new healer, more so, he is raving praise-giving.

AbstractViolence shutters a community's ability to survive. By using violence in Zimbabwe as analogy, this book explores, using various theories such as cultural trauma, historical critical methods, narrative approaches and orality, to establish how the memory of the exorcism stories functioned within Mark's community. The rhetoric of violence expressed from the stories is read in view of the possible context of Mark's community around AD70 to suggest the oral function of the stories. The book suggests that within a context of violence, the exorcism stories functioned as cultural trauma meaning making narratives that provided the mythical language from which the community articulated its suffering as a shared story

AbstractThis book considers Jesus’ first appearance and activity in Galilee and affirms that Mk. 1:21–28 has a programmatic character for the Gospel of Mark.

AbstractThe first part of this investigation of the Gospels of Mark and John explains how the textual forms of these Gospels should be interpreted from a literary perspective, as well as the theory and rhetoric of narrative texts: the NT as literature, Mark and John as narratives, and narration and reading of Mark and John. The second part is a historical exposition of the two Gospels from a sociological angle: the meaning of historical events, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus reveals himself as the suffering Son of Man (Mark), and Jesus reveals himself as the Son of God (John). The authors teach at the University of South Africa. Abstract Number: NTA33-1989-2

AbstractThesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2016.

AbstractChapter 3: Drums of Redemption in the Synoptic Gospels (1) Chapter 4: Drums of Redemption in the Synoptic Gospels (2) Chapter 5: Drums of Redemption in the Synoptic Gospels (3) If the New Testament records the good news that the Messiah came in the person of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, what good news does it proclaim to the church in Africa today? Across the African continent, nations are grappling with issues of genocide, terrorism, political instability, ethnic division, abject poverty, environmental degradation, and the rapid erosion of community life and values. There is a dire need for New Testament theology that seriously addresses these social-political realities from an African perspective. Dr. Bitrus Sarma seeks to meet this need, providing a contextual understanding of the gospel for African Christians. Addressing every book of the New Testament, Drums of Redemption is contextually relevant, biblically rooted, and radically hope-filled as it casts a vision for how Christ’s redemptive mission can be experienced in every area of life. An excellent resource for church leaders in training or those already in ministry, it also serves as a powerful example of the incarnational nature of God’s word.

AbstractThe practice of exegesis is currently characterized by the many and even diverse questions to which texts are subjected. There is a very lively debate regarding the suitability and success of the various exegetical methods as well as the possibility and desirability of harmonization. One should however take into account that an exegetical method is the product of a particular theory with regard to the question of how knowledge is arrived at, the character of the text as object of study, and the objectives of the particular textual investigation. For that reason it is possible that certain methods exclude one another and can be regarded as irreconcilable. This can be attributed to divergent theoretical points of departure There are exegetes who consider that the existence of such exclusive exegetical methods creates a dilemma for biblical scholarship. According to this point of view the lack of synthesis hampers the search for the 'truth' (in this case, the 'meaning' of the text). Ernest vr,n Eck has examined three different popular questions in the area of Marean research from the past and the present, namely the historical-critical, the literary-critical and the ideological-critical approaches. It is however not the primary intention of Van Eck to bring about a synthesis between these exegetical approaches. The fact of plurality of interpretation does not therefore, according to Van Eck, provide a dilemma. The application of a variety of exegetical approaches by biblical scholars can be treated positively. The author is rather, therefore, searching for methodological gaps in existing research which can be fllled by a new or modified inquiry. In this way progress can be brought about. The result of the new inquiry does not imply that the exegete has come 'closer' to the 'real meaning' of the text. It implies at the most relevant research. The results of a relevant inquiry can provide an explanation for present day problems and even suggest possible solutions, while earlier inquiries and methods are regarded as inadequate. The gaps in research that Van Eck has identified with regard to the above three exegetical approaches are related to the emphasis placed on the pragmatical dimension in scientifical investigation today. In this connection pragmatics can be represented as a social program. Theology without a 'social program' easily develops into static imaginary propositions. Ernest van Eck shows that the historical-cn:tical study of the opposition between Galilee and Jerusalem in the Gospel of Mark is indeed inclined to do so. As regards this opposition, historical critics identify a tension between 'cultic' particularity and 'eschatological' universality in regard to the Marean Sitz im Leben. 'Cult' and 'eschatology', however, develop into abstract theological concepts when they are not interpreted as being incorporated in Mark's 'social program'. In the light of the possible hermeneutical relevance that the opposition between Jerusalem and Galilee in the Gospel of Mark can have for present-day social problems, the historical critic therefore represents a gap in existing research. The pragmatic dimension of theological reflection is largely ignored by historical critics. The literarycritical approach has certainly emphasized the interests that Galilee ~d Jerusalem represent in Mark as narrative. These interests appear to be in conflict with each other. Nevertheless, there are deficiencies in the literary-critical approach, for reasons such as that this conflict of interests is not anchored within a social program peculiar to the first-century Mediterranean world. The ideological-critical approach in the exegesis of Mark indeed places emphasis on such a political and social program. The hiatus with regard to this approach is that references to pre-industrial, agrarian social problems in New Testament texts are erroneously attributed to modern economic and political ideologies, as though the same or similar dominant ideological forces that Karl Marx identified - with regard to the modern industrialized century - had been present in the first century. Van Eck considers that an association of narratology and social-scientific criticism in exegesis could flll these gaps in existing research. By means of narratology, Galilee and Jerusalem are responsibly studied as spheres of interest in the plot of the Gospel of Mark. Social-scientific criticism enables one to see the advanced agrarian society of the first-century Mediterranean world as the macrosociological framework of the Gospel of Mark. Van Eck regards the narrated world of the Gospel of Mark as a reflexive microsociological version of the agrarian society, seen from a macrosociological perspective. Using an association of narratological and social-scientific criticism, he intends interpreting the ideological communication strategy of the narrator (narrator's point of view) in Mark as a social program without making himself guilty of anachronism or ethnocentricism. Van Eck's presupposition is, therefore, that the narrator's concern in Mark's story about Jesus is communicated from an ideological perspective. This ideological concern is conveyed with aids such as symbols. Galilee and Jerusalem (as topographical references in the Gospel of Mark) function as symbols that represent particular interests. Galilee represents the interests of the 'open household' ('politics of commensality') and Jesus' message of God's unmediated presence. Jerusalem represents the interests of the temple system ('politics of holiness') and the idea of God's constraining presence. Galilee (household) and Jerusalem (temple) thus function as narrative and sociological oppositions.