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In an effort to restore @MattThiessenNT& #39;s sleep, a thread on the angry Jesus text (Mark 1:41) 
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="đ" title="Zwinkerndes Gesicht" aria-label="Emoji: Zwinkerndes Gesicht"> 1/ https://twitter.com/MattThiessenNT/status/1314173443915603973">https://twitter.com/MattThies...
overall, I love Mattâs reading of the exchange between Jesus and the lepros. But there& #39;s the issue of whether Jesus is "angry" or has "compassion" when purifying the lepros. Matt goes with "anger," I have made an argument for "compassion." Here& #39;s why. 2/
Matt appeals to âangerâ being the more difficult reading: why would scribes change Jesus& #39; âcompassionâ to âangerâ? Since itâs hard to imagine that change, âangerâ is more difficult and therefore more likely original, right? 3/
Matt then points out that âMt and Lk...mention neither Jesusâ compassion nor his anger. This silence suggests that the version of Mark that they had used had âangered,â not âcompassion.& #39;"
Again, why would they omit compassion? More likely they& #39;d omit an angry Jesus, right? 4/
Again, why would they omit compassion? More likely they& #39;d omit an angry Jesus, right? 4/
this looks like an argument from âsilence,â but Matt wisely supports it by looking at Mark 3:5, where Mt and Luke again *both* leave out an instance of Jesusâ anger: âand looking around at them with anger.â
So why think "compassion" is earlier and "anger" was added later? 5/
So why think "compassion" is earlier and "anger" was added later? 5/
The issue is that Mt and Lk leave out anger *and* the next phrase: Jesus was âsympathizing over their hardness of their heart.â They omit both anger AND sympathy here. If they are censuring the angry Jesus, theyâre also censuring theâŠsympathetic Jesus? The passage is equivocal.
Actually, Luke leaves out every instance of âcompassionâ from Mark. We wouldn& #39;t say that is because Luke is uncomfortable with âcompassionâ in Mark.
Why do we do this with Jesus& #39; "anger"? 7/
Why do we do this with Jesus& #39; "anger"? 7/
The reason is that an angry Jesus seems *obviously* offensive to us â why would Jesus be angry with a suffering man who asks for his help? Itâs clearly the more difficult reading, right? 8/
Well, thatâs not so obvious in the ancient world. And I also think @MattThiessenNT& #39;s argument has space for this too.
For this, we need to think about the role of the angry Jesus in antiquity. 9/
For this, we need to think about the role of the angry Jesus in antiquity. 9/
First, I don& #39;t see any evidence of ancient scribes being bothered by Jesusâ anger outside of the putative case of this variant - which is circular: scribes changed it because it was a difficult reading. How do we know that? Because scribes changed it. 10/
Second, oddly, thereâs evidence that an angry Jesus could be useful *in some* contexts. For starters, scribes never changed other instances of Jesusâ anger (Mark 3:5, 8:12, 10:14, John 2:13-22) 11/
Next, Origen argues against Marcionâagain, oddly to usâthat Jesus& #39; righteous anger makes Jesus more like the wrathful God of the OT (!). An angry Jesus was theologically generative in the christological debates of late antiquity. 12/
In fact, strangely, scribes actually *inserted* or *increased* Jesusâ anger in a number of manuscripts! (@ Mark 10.14, Luke 6.10; d @ Mk 3.15) 13/
I wonder if this could actually fit with an aspect of Matt& #39;s argument. He notes scholars who think that âJesus loathes ritual impurity, much like Israelâs God, who requires that no one approach his terrestrial residenceâŠwhile in such a conditionâ 14/
Also â[Mark] believes that Israelâs God is now, in Jesus, purifying those with Lepra.â Agreed! But if so, then it& #39;d make sense for him to be âangryâ when approached with ritual impurity. If thatâs the case, âangerâ isnât the more difficult reading--canât have it both ways, right?
last point if youâve made it this far--the manuscripts
16/20 (so close to the end)
16/20 (so close to the end)
"Angerâ is only found in 5 witnesses â 4 Latin manuscripts, and only one (!) Greek manuscript. But the Greek manuscript is a famous Greek-Latin dual-language codex (D/d). So the only Greek witness is connected to the Latin witnesses 17/
How did we get "anger"?
The words âangerâ (iratus) and âcompassionâ (miseratus) resemble each other in Latin. A scribal slip explains the entrance into Latin manuscripts, where it remained isolated in only 4 manuscripts (Diatessaron? see my article) 18/20
The words âangerâ (iratus) and âcompassionâ (miseratus) resemble each other in Latin. A scribal slip explains the entrance into Latin manuscripts, where it remained isolated in only 4 manuscripts (Diatessaron? see my article) 18/20
So the âangerâ manuscript evidence is isolated in Latin, the evidence of Matthew and Luke is equivocal at best, and âangerâ isnât obviously the more difficult reading in antiquity. The angry Jesus is a fascinating reading, but one that& #39;s not in the initial text of Mark 19/20
Ultimately, @MattThiessenNT& #39;s argument doesn& #39;t depend on "anger" - his care in reading Lepra in antiquity is entirely convincing without it.
(Now hereâs hoping Matt, like Markâs Jesus, has compassion rather than anger in responsehttps://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="đ" title="LĂ€chelndes Gesicht mit lĂ€chelnden Augen" aria-label="Emoji: LĂ€chelndes Gesicht mit lĂ€chelnden Augen">) 20/END
(Now hereâs hoping Matt, like Markâs Jesus, has compassion rather than anger in response
