| Clement passage | Greek cited / alluded to | Synoptic / Johannine locus | Markan corridor location | Gospel profile | Effect on Secret Mark / Canon thesis |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strom. 37.4–5 | διὰ τοῦτο ἄνθρωπον ἐνέδυ… λύτρον ἑαυτὸν ἐπιδιδούς… “ἀγάπην ὑμῖν δίδωμι τὴν ἐμήν”… τὴν ψυχὴν κατέθηκε | Mark 10:45 (λύτρον ἀντὶ πολλῶν); John 13:34; 15:13 (new commandment; laying down life) | Passion-oriented discipleship axis | Markan soteriological core with Johannine articulation | Strongly supportive: Mark supplies the salvific logic; John supplies idiom and expansion |
In Stromateis 37.4–5 Clement fuses incarnation, passion, and love into a single explanatory arc. The governing soteriological premise is unmistakably Markan: the Son’s voluntary suffering is interpreted through the category of λύτρον, echoing Mark 10:45. Clement’s language—σπένδεσθαι, λύτρον ἑαυτὸν ἐπιδιδούς—keeps the focus on substitutionary self-giving and measured condescension to human weakness, which is precisely the Markan passion logic.
The explicit dominical saying “ἀγάπην ὑμῖν δίδωμι τὴν ἐμήν” is Johannine (John 13:34), and the gloss “ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἑκάστου κατέθηκε τὴν ψυχὴν” resonates with John 15:13. Yet here again Clement does not allow the Johannine farewell-discourse framework to govern the exposition. John supplies language and ethical intensification, not narrative or theological control. The causal chain—incarnation → voluntary suffering → ransom → covenantal bequest—remains Mark-shaped.
What is especially revealing is Clement’s ordering: the λύτρον logic precedes and explains the “new commandment.” Love is not the starting point; it is the interpretive consequence of the ransom. This reverses the typical Johannine emphasis and confirms that Clement is reading John through Mark rather than Mark through John.
For the Secret Mark / Canon thesis, this passage is highly diagnostic. It shows Clement operating with a Markan passion-soteriology as the axis, while freely incorporating Johannine sayings where they clarify or heighten meaning. This is exactly the same pattern observed with Matthew and Luke in the discipleship corridor: parallel recognition without narrative governance. The result anticipates Eusebius’s later canonical practice, where Mark silently determines the logic of alignment even when other Gospels provide the verbal surface.
In short, Strom. 37.4–5 reinforces the claim that Clement’s gospel matrix is Mark-centered, with Johannine material functioning as a secondary, confirmatory register rather than as the controlling frame.
