The Real Messiah

So let me make one thing absolutely clear. The Real Messiah does not go into what motivation Marcus Agrippa to write the gospel. It doesn't 'connect the dots' between contemporary research into the idea that St. Mark's composed the gospel at Paneas (Ted Weeden for instance) and Marcus Agrippa's prolonged exile there in 66 CE as the Jewish War was just beginning. It doesn't argue that Agrippa developed the veneration of the Cross as the new testimony of Israel as part of a military strategy. It doesn't make the case that Agrippa and his sister Berenice convinced their intimate associate Titus the future Emperor and leader of the Imperial effort against the rebels to recreate the prophesied events in Daniel chapter 9 - the prophesy at the heart of the little apocalypse of Mark's and which Jews and Christians agree pointed to Agrippa as the awaited messiah of Israel.

I happen to think that all of these ideas has some merit. I have discussed them here on my blog but they did not form a part of my published book.

There just wasn't enough room in the book for this kind of speculation. All that I could do was build the case that a nine year old Marcus Julius Agrippa went to Alexandria in a Jubilee year (38 CE) and was enthroned as the messiah by the Jewish and Samaritan populace there.

I did allow myself to take some time arguing that the Samaritan remembrance of a shadowy figure named 'Mark the son of Titus' was a recollection of Agrippa. I also added that the Coptic traditions remembrance of the Alexandrian 'St. Mark' seemed to reflect many aspects of Agrippa's person as did the cult of St. Berenice (Veronica) in Paneas.

I also showed how deeply ingrained the Jewish belief that Agrippa was the messiah of Israel was. The rabbinic literature is filled with references to this idea. The understanding continued to trickle down to the late Medieval period. Indeed notice what Christiani's attack against Nachmanides against was. The rabbinic literature testifies to the fact that the messiah already appeared in the period leading up to the destruction of the Temple. Yes, Christians like to manipulate this original argument to mean that the Jewish writings testified to Jesus but the evidence simply does not support this argument.

A case can be made that both Christiani and Nachmanides are dancing around the traditional Jewish identification of Agrippa as the messiah of Israel.

Again I can't claim that I proved that Marcus Agrippa was St. Mark or that Marcus Agrippa wrote the gospel just yet. There is a long way to go in that regard and I need companions to help me along the way.

What I can say is that I have established something which should have been recognized long ago - namely that Marcus Julius Agrippa was recognized as the awaited messiah by the ancient Sanhedrin in a Jubilee year (some would argue sabbatical year but the point is the same). Agrippa had a messianic tradition associated with him which seemed to connect early Jews and Christians. This tradition might well be identified as the 'Marcionite' tradition mentioned in the Church Fathers especially as the very name means 'those of Marcus' in Hebrew.

Beyond that there is a wide horizon for us to explore together ...

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Stephan Huller's Observations by stephanhuller.blogspot.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at stephanhuller.blogspot.com.