The Gospel of Mark:
Note: This gospel is the oldest and supposedly the most original one in the New Testament!
"
Although the book is anonymous, apart from the ancient heading "According to Mark" in manuscripts,
it has traditionally been assigned to John Mark, in whose mother's house (at Jerusalem) Christians assembled. (The New American Bible, ISBN: 978-0-529-06484-4, Page 1064)"
"
Although there is no direct internal evidence of authorship, it was the unanimous testimony of the early church that this Gospel was written by John Mark. (From the NIV Bible Commentary [1], page 1488)"
- We certainly do not know whether Mark was the author or not! The quote clearly states "no direct internal evidence of authorship". Also, the so-called unanimous testimony of the early church:
- Does not prove that the author was Mark.
- Nor does it prove that other people did not alter and modify the book, especially when the book was written at least 40-50 years after Christ. We don't even know if Mark even wrote the book.
"
Traditionally, the gospel is said to have been written shortly before A.D. 70 in Rome, at a time of impending persecution and when destruction loomed over Jerusalem. (The New American Bible, ISBN: 978-0-529-06484-4, Page 1064)"
"Serious doubts exists as to whether these verses belong to the Gospel of Mark. They are absent from important early manuscripts and display certain peculiarities of vocabulary, style and theological content that are unlike the rest of Mark. His Gospel probably ended at 16:8,
or its original ending has been lost. (From the NIV Bible Foot Notes [1], page 1528)"
"This verse, which reads, "But if you do not forgive, neither will your heavenly Father forgive your transgressions,"
is omitted in the best manuscripts. (The New American Bible, ISBN: 978-0-529-06484-4, Page 1081)"
"This passage, termed the Longer Ending to the Marcan gospel by comparison with a much briefer conclusion
found in some less important manuscripts, has traditionally been accepted as a canonical part of the gospel and was defined as such by the Council of Trent. Early citations of it by the Fathers indicate that it was composed by the second century, although vocabulary and style indicate
that it was written by someone other than Mark. (The New American Bible, ISBN: 978-0-529-06484-4, Page 1088)"
So, in reality, we don't really know whether Mark was the sole author of this Gospel or not,
nor do we know when and where the "gospel" was even written. And since The New Testament wasn't even documented on paper until 150-300 years (depending on what Christian you talk to) after Jesus, then how are we to know for sure that the current "Gospel of Mark" wasn't written by some pro of Mark?
A new captured image of this book's corruption:
(Bible Gateway passage: Mark 16:9-20 - New International Version)
The above text reads:
"The most reliable early manuscript and other ancient witnesses do not have Mark 16:9-20."
Now my concern to this corruption and 'answer-the-problem-away' statement is that what are those so-called "reliable early manuscript(s)" and who are the "ancient witnesses"?
According to the
early Christians' manuscripts, Jesus never got crucified, and
trinity is a lie. The so-called "gospel of Mark", along with all of the "gospels" of the NT, were written by third-party narration, as clearly demonstrated and shown in the sections below. People wrote on the tongue of Jesus' Disciples those books. They are neither original nor are the Pure Word of GOD Almighty.
If the "gospel of Mark" was indeed Divine and from GOD Almighty, then we wouldn't have this corruption, that they're admitting above, in it.
I hope you see the real danger in making these assumptions when you are willing to DIE for the fact that such Gospel is the actual True Word of GOD Almighty!
Further regarding this Gospel, we read the following commentary about Mark 16:9-20:
"Serious doubts exists as to whether these verses belong to the Gospel of Mark. They are absent from important early manuscripts and display certain peculiarities of vocabulary, style and theological content that are unlike the rest of Mark. His Gospel probably ended at 16:8,
or its original ending has been lost. (From the NIV Bible Foot Notes [1], page 1528)"
This quote raises a very serious issue here. First of all, as we've seen above in the first quote, we have no evidence that proves that John Mark was the sole author of this so called "Gospel". Second of all, we see that this Gospel has some serious problems/suspicions in it. The issue of Mark 16:9-20 is a scary one, because many Christian cults today use poisonous snakes in their worship and end up dying.
Removing Mark 16:9-20 is quite appreciated by me personally (to be quite honest with you), because it prevents people from dying from snake bites. But however, the serious issue of man's corruption of the Bible remains.
We can be absolutely certain now that the above quotes prove without a doubt that the Bible is doubtful. The quote "or its original ending has been lost" proves that what we call today "Gospels" were not written by their original authors such as Mark, John, Matthew, etc... It proves that the Gospel had been tampered with by man. Let alone considering it as the True Living Words of GOD Almighty.
If John Mark wasn't the one who wrote Mark 16:9-20, then who did? And how can you prove the ownership of the other person? Let alone proving that it was GOD Almighty's Revelation. And as we saw in the first quote above, we don't even know that John Mark was indeed the one who wrote the so called "Gospel of Mark".
To say the least in our case here, we now have enough evidence to discard the entire Gospel of Mark from the Bible, because you can't take bits and pieces of it and say some of it belongs to him and some of it doesn't! Let alone considering the entire corrupted Gospel as the True Living Word of GOD Almighty, which is a complete blasphemy.
