Secret Mark at the 2008 SBL Annual Meeting

I was a rather bad boy at this year’s SBL, attending only one day of the conference, the day that comprised my own paper on the Syriac tradition of Infancy Thomas and the afternoon session on Secret Mark (“Secret Mark after Fifty Years”). I decided to compose a post on the session because of the text’s importance for those who study the Christian Apocrypha and because of the session’s relation to my recent article and postings on conservative scholars’ approaches to the CA (Heresy Hunting in the New Millennium). My apologies in advance for any infelicities in recording and summarizing the event.

The session was chaired by Mark Goodacre and featured two pairs of scholars: Stephen Carlson (known for his book The Gospel Hoax: Morton Smith’s Invention of Secret Mark) and Birger Pearson, who deny the text’s authenticity, and Scott Brown (known for his own monograph on Secret Mark, Mark’s Other Gospel: Rethinking Morton Smith’s Controversial Discovery, and for his responses to Carlson’s book) and Allan Pantuck, who believe it to be an authentic ancient text. There were also two respondents: Charles Hedrick who supported Brown’s and Pantuck’s position, and Bart Ehrman who sided with Carlson and Pearson.

Pearson’s presentation, “The Secret Gospel of Mark: A Twentieth-Century Fake,” offered a selective overview of research on the text—selective, that is, in that it focused on the scholarship that convinced Pearson to go from a supporter of its authenticity to a critic. He cited particularly Per Beskow’s Strange Tales About Jesus: A Survey of Unfamiliar Gospels, along with Carlson’s book and the more recent book by Peter Jeffery (The Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled). Pearson offered nothing new on the debate on origins of the text but the presentation served as a useful introduction to the issues for those new to the topic.

Carlson followed with “Can the Academy Protect Itself from One of Its Own? The Case of Secret Mark.” Despite its title, the presentation’s real focus was on responses to some of Brown’s criticisms of Carlson and Jeffery. Brown had stated previously that Morton Smith could not have forged the letter of Clement that contains the Secret Mark passages because extensive work on Clement was not available to Smith and Smith himself had little acquaintance with the study of Clement. Carlson cited some evidence to the contrary and also noted that Smith had an interest and skill in paleography and in church history. Summing up, Carlson said that an argument therefore cannot be made for the authenticity of Secret Mark based on Smith’s incompetence. Carlson also made the point that evidence of forgery is easier to see as time passes because the twentieth-century anachronisms in Secret Mark become more apparent as the twentieth-century looks more and more alien to us.

Allan Pantuck followed Carlson with “Can Morton Smith’s Archival Writings and Correspondence Shine Any Light on the Authenticity of Secret Mark?’ Pantuck focused on refuting Carlson’s claim that Smith’s motive for the forgery (or “hoax” as Carlson prefers) was sour grapes over being fired from his position at Brown. Pantuck used Smith’s own private correspondence to show that Smith was not fired (his contract was merely not renewed), nor was he bitter about it (indeed, a year later he was happy to be free to do research), nor was his reputation among his peers in any way diminished as a result. Smith’s archival writings also indicate that he did not begin research on Clement of Alexandria until his discovery of Secret Mark in 1958.

The presentations came to a conclusion with Scott Brown’s “Fifty Years of Befuddlement: Ten Enduring Misconceptions about the ‘Secret’ Gospel of Mark.” Due to time constraints, Brown decided to limit his presentation to five misconceptions, and ended up only covering four of them. They are:

1. Clement’s letter represents Secret Mark as the liturgical reading for baptism. Brown counters this “misconception” by stating that Clement connects the text to “the great mysteries,” which is more likely a reference to initiation into a more profound study of God, not baptism.

2. Secret Mark excerpt one depicts Jesus baptizing the young man. Brown counters that there is no reference to water in the text, nor is there to sex, to Jesus being naked, etc. The text only says that Jesus taught him the mystery of God.

3. Secret Mark is a “Secret Gospel.” Brown counters that Clement’s term for the text is more accurately translated as “Mystical Mark.” The title “Secret Mark” comes from Smith’s translation preference.

4. There is something gay about a young man wearing only a linen sheet. Brown counters that no-one makes a similar claim about the young man who loses his linen sheet in canonical Mark. Brown connects the linen sheet to burial practices, suggesting that the teaching of Jesus in Secret Mark is about death.

Brown concluded with an indictment against the critics of Secret Mark for not using exegesis to understand the contents of the text. He said that this is something done regularly for the canonical texts but not for Secret Mark. He hoped it would not take another fifty years for scholars to figure this out.

Charles Hedrick’s response was a direct challenge to Carlson’s legal rhetoric. He said that all three elements needed for a crime—motive, opportunity, and means—were lacking in this case. For motive, Hedrick said all of Carlson’s remarks regarding Smith’s motive were false. For opportunity, Hedrick said that Smith would not be able to create the text under field conditions at the monastery and there is no evidence that the book containing the letter was not at the library before Smith’s visit. And for means, Hedrick said Smith’s skills were not sufficient to create the text. Hedrick finished his response with a call for a letter from the SBL to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem to locate the missing manuscript so that it can be studied and perhaps settle the issue of its authenticity once and for all.

Bart Ehrman’s response focused on motive. He declared that Brown’s and Pantuck’s presentations were not sufficient as they, in Ehrman’s view, took one argument for motive and cast doubt upon it. Motives can be complex and multi-faceted. Ehrman went on to discuss motives for forgery from antiquity and concluded Smith may have forged the text to sew discord in the academy or for the purpose of mystification (i.e., to see if he could get away with it). Ehrman agreed with Carlson and Jeffery that Smith left clues of his crime behind—namely, the anachronistic reference to adulterated salt and the use of the Voss book (the first edition of Ignatius’ uninterpolated letters) as the vehicle for the letter.

The audience response to the papers was not particularly engaging. Helmut Koester took the opportunity to state his own position on the text (Secret Mark is actually original Mark, and canonical Mark is an abbreviation of it which Matthew and Luke subsequently used to create their texts). Another audience member called for an end to the legal rhetoric in the discussion on the text. The final, and most interesting, response came from one man who seemed frustrated by Brown’s and Pantuck’s position and asked them for a proper response to Carlson. Both responded in their own way that such responses had already been published and they didn’t want to repeat themselves in the session. Brown then asked Carlson to respond to these articles, frustrated that there had yet to be a proper debate between the two sides. Carlson said such a response will come at the appropriate time. Brown asked, “When?” Carlson shrugged his shoulders. Brown asked, “After your Ph.D. thesis?” Another shrug. Brown: “I won’t hold my breath.”

Many who came out of the session may have been surprised at Brown’s demeanour. But I think it justified. The two main writers against the authenticity of the text, Carlson and Jeffery, are not biblical scholars. Their arguments are not based on the methodology used by biblical scholars. Yet many of their readers have been convinced by them, likely because their arguments merely confirmed in their minds what they hoped would be the case and not because the readers had sufficient knowledge of the contents of the text, nor of previous scholarship on it to make an informed decision. Furthermore, Brown and Pantuck have crafted some very detailed responses to Carlson and Jeffery that seem to be getting overlooked—Ehrman, for one, did not seem to be cognizant of the one article refuting the salt claim, and there were two allusions made to the size of Brown’s and Pantuck’s responses, as if thorough, detailed scholarly work was a bad thing. Brown is justifiably frustrated at the state of so-called scholarship (much of it he called “poppycock”) on Secret Mark.

I have no personal or professional stake in this discussion. I have been pleased to remain agnostic in the debate, though I have followed it closely. My own frustration is with those who leap to embrace a position on a controversial text merely because it allows them to dispense of the text and not because the position is based on sound argumentation. Several writers I cover in the Heresy Hunting article believe that Carlson had “proven” Secret Mark a fake. But they cite no scholarship to the contrary (including Brown’s initial responses) and spend much of their time misinforming their readers about its contents. Indeed, no-one can “prove” the text a forgery, they can only present an argument for it, which may or may not be compelling. Carlson’s presentation asked “Can the Academy Protect Itself from One of Its Own?” but I’m more worried that the academy cannot protect itself from those within it who let their presuppositions interfere with proper study.